thuscomeone

I don't know if this is right or not, but I'd say that what thusness wanted you to realize about view is how we make it into another permanent background like we have with so many things before. I may be wrong, though. When dogen had realization, he said "body and mind have dropped off!" Later he said "Dropping off has dropped off!"

Oh! I certainly wasn't referring to you Some elitists are ok...

Ah I remember Osho! Much more wise than a lot of elitist spiritual types make him out to be.

Of course, the presence is never denied. Simply seen to be dependent arising.

Yes. But it's all based on dependent arising. When we're done analysing, all that is left is dependent manifestation -- which is the middle way beyond extremes of existence and non-existence. Not nothing because it appears. Not something because it has no essence. At that point, that manifestation simply IS. Problems arise, as they have in this discussion, when we conflate and don't correctly distinguish between relative, conventional, and absolute.

Right, inseperable while appearing different. I would say that those formless realms are not completely apart from form either -- at least if one looks at present as containing both past and future.

Well causes and conditions themselves are the absence of inherency. It's never necessary to negate dependent arising. Just to see what it implies. If there were no dependent arisings, there would be no emptiness. It's like this: Because A is dependent, A is neither existent nor non existent. So you don't get rid of dependence, as it is the basis for the whole thing.

I actually have a book on that that he recommended I should read. Haven't gotten around to it yet. Karma and all that makes my head spin. But even Namdrol said on a recent post I read that wherever there is mind there must be matter.

Yes. It is much subtler than we think. It's amazing to see how interconnected all insights are in the end.

I don't know if I'd go that far. That sounds too much like solipsism , "the world is my creation", when it actually seems to be much more complex than that. Mind and matter are clearly interdependent. They appear different, but actually can't be seperated.

Exactly! We agree on something Except I'd prefer to call it potential rather than awareness...

After "no-mind", one realizes that awareness and pheomena are interdependent. Nothing inherent. After that, there is just dependent arising, which, as you say, neither is or is not. Looking at it from emptiness of subject, there is the illusion of seperate self created through thought. And yet there is no actual seperate self. So there you could also say that is and is not both don't apply. Do you think that I believe in an inherent awareness? Views of is and is not are ultimately just dependent manifestation. Just right where they are.

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Well, here's my take on view and what I've seen over the past week. Start with dependent arising. Dependent arising is emptiness. Dependent arising is not existent and not non existent. Not being existent equates to infinite potential for manifestation. Now, we ARE dependent arising -- we and everything around us (views and no views) are this potential manifesting as dependent arising. It is not views themselves that are the problem. I actually don't think it is possible not to have a view. It is when we take a view and attempt to rest in it as against impermanent reality. That is again clinging to a self. It is us once again trying to manipulate our experience. But when we realize that we are just this spontaneous potential -- both view and no view are just right where they are, when they manifest. They are just what they are supposed to be at that moment.

Oh of course. The most freeing realization one can have is that it is all ok, it has always been ok, and it will always be ok. Right view, in the end, is simply tada -- "as it isness." But, like you say, it takes a while to wipe the dust from one's eyes.

I wouldn't say that the liberated is free from views. Just that he doesn't cling to them as a permanent self and is free whether there are views or no views.

Well there is and there isn't a difference. Afterwards, it's very ordinary. Yes. But that does not make it the same. If this were so, why would the Buddha lay out the path and not just say "you're ok as you are?" "The true man without rank" sees it.

The only problem if that is true is what is the point of the path? What is liberation ? How are you then different from an ordinary samsarin? Remember, dependent origination itself (in other words YOU at this very moment) is neither existent or non existent and not both or neither. Dependent origination is what they mean by freedom from views. It is the viewless view.

Right. I definitely think that there is right view, as the eightfold path is completely based around it. But our knowledge, while being correct, is only one part of the vast manifestations of the potential of emptiness. As I was trying to communicate to you before, our views and the knowledge we have accumulated along the way eventually become another separate permanent self that we cling to. In fact, this seems to be the final subtle self that we have to see through and let go of... Up until about last week, I had been stuck for about two years on "form is emptiness, emptiness is form" --trying to break through to something. Then I saw this oh so subtle grasping and finally just let go.

20+ pages

Exactly. Dependent arising avoids the extremes. Not something because it is dependent and not nothing because it clearly appears. And even to try to maintain the above view as the true resting place is wrong. Because, right view or wrong view, we are that very dependent arising which is free from extremes. Everything is just as it should be.

I'm sure everyone on the path goes through them at one point or another. And again I apologize if I ever came across as abrasive or rude. But I'm interested in whether you yourself have deeply realized what we have been speaking of? I believe you have, but...

And your master is absolutely correct. This doesn't take away the need for discipline in every day life, it just makes that discipline easier to handle

Yes! Had you had this realization already? Xabir, this is... I can't even begin to describe how peaceful this is.

Thanks! Hmmm, would it be correct to say that rigpa is really just knowledge of emptiness, or vidya (which is empty as well)? Or is there more to it?