thuscomeone

I understand the heart sutra. I know that the heart sutra and what it says is true, as I have said many times. I had it framed on my wall for a year. What I am talking about is Heart Sutra beyond Heart Sutra. It is clear from your last two posts that you are seeking permanence. You are seeking atta in the form of a permanent, unchanging awareness.

You deliberately tried to dodge my question. But I'll take "I'm not a Buddha" as "yes, I do still make errors." So you are seeking permanence? Having a permanent state of insight means that your mind can never change. Which means that, according to you, it is not empty.

You didn't even address my points. Thanks a bunch. I know that it is not a concept. But it is still a perception. It requires the mind, no? Do you realize what you are saying when you claim that arhatship is a permanent eradication of the view of self? You are denying your own doctrine of dependent arising and claiming that your state of insight upon becoming an arhat is permanent and independent. You are saying that your mind is incapable of changing at that point. You are refuting your own belief in emptiness.

You have realization. What is your experience? Are you in a perpetual, unchanging state of wisdom one-hundred-percent of the time? Or do you make errors some times? I am trying to show that the state of insight cannot possibly be anything other than wavering where one might be insightful one moment, but not the next. Otherwise you are claiming that this state of insight is permanent and independent whereas actually it is completely dependent on ignorance. Just like night depends on day, comfort depends on pain, confidence depends on shame.

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Can I ask you something? Can you please reply to me this time without quoting the Buddha, or Nagarjuna, or anyone else? Just for the sake of courtesy in our discussion. Ok, I recognize that everything you just said is the truth. That's not the problem. The only way to see emptiness in one's experience is through the relative mind. Which means that the mind is required to experience it. Correct? As you say, emptiness is a perception of the world in the way that your quote states. It is a perception of truth. Everything you just wrote is a perception of truth. And like I said, I don't deny that it is true. But, if we are able to have valid perceptions of truth, aren't we also capable of having ignorant perceptions? For instance, if you had written above "things are permanent and independent. There is an eternal, unchanging soul," that would be an ignorant perception which is distinct from the correct perception of truth, wouldn't it? You can't deny this. Otherwise you deny that all the beings who have not yet realized the truth have these ignorant perceptions and you say that ignorant beings' perceptions are the same as enlightened beings'. What I am trying to say is that truth is truth whether our mind believes it to be or not. It is independent of our minds. But we only know and experience that truth through the subjective filter of the mind. The truth may be objective and independent of us, but it is not actually the truth for us until we realize it in our subjective minds. Since it is obvious that many people are deluded about the truth, that proves that the mind is capable of perceiving more than just truth. It is also capable of being deluded and creating elaborate fantasies about the nature of reality as well. You should read the entire post that I got that Trungpa quote from and the comments under it: http://wildfoxzen.blogspot.com/2008/12/form-is-form.html

Please. spare me this post-modern, relativist nonsense. Clinging is the source of misery for human beings. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure this out. Just look all over the world. It doesn't matter whether you're black, white, brown, yellow -- clinging is a fundamentally human problem which causes the majority of the suffering for ourselves and others. You cannot be happy with what you have if you cling to it. Why? Because you are afraid of losing it. And you are going to always be afraid of anything ever disrupting your way of life, your little comfort zone that you've carved for yourself. No, I certainly don't go around "handing out aspirin." But I'm cynical enough not to take people at their word when I know they have deeper issues that they are unaware of.

I can't wait to see this...what substantialist view of awareness are you going to propose this time? This realization that you are clinging to doesn't ultimately matter. It's like one little ray of light amongst the giant, vast sky of life. I wish you could see that.

No. You are still caught in attachment to your insight. It is not ordinary mind because you are still making effort to bring your realization into your life. Chogyam Trungpa from Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism: “Form is form, emptiness is emptiness, things are just what they are and we do not have to try to see them in the light of some sort of profundity. “Finally we come down to earth we see things as they are. This does not mean having an inspired mystical vision with archangels, cherubs and sweet music playing. But things are seen as they are, in their own qualities. So shunyata (emptiness) in this case is the complete absence of concepts or filters of any kind, the absence even of the "form is empty" and the "emptiness is form" conceptualization.It is a question of seeing the world in a direct way without desiring ‘higher’ consciousness or significance or profundity. It is just directly perceiving things literally, as they are in their own right.”

Well that's strange. We've had this discussion before and you claimed otherwise. Well I have to use words to communicate. It's more of a feeling of ungraspability and just being an interdependent manifestation of the universe at at any disjointed moment. But that experience isn't really so important anyway because it fades like everything else.

yes? That's what the experience of emptiness is. Seeing that dependent phenomena themselves are ungraspable emptiness. Moving without moving, being hurt without being hurt. Or better yet, moving IS not moving, pain IS no pain.

Ha, we'll see

Oh I've had the experience of emptiness many times. Being in the world, but yet being untouched by the world. Not fearing death because there is nothing to die. It is a liberating experience.

In the days since I have had this insight, my suffering in my day to day life has decreased immensely. You may think I'm wrong and crazy, but I honestly wish you could feel this state. You would believe me then. It is not a jhana. It is complete relaxation, even more relaxing than seeing emptiness. Just effortless ordinary mind. Wherever you are is ok. Now, as the argument on this board shows, I still have a ways to go. But the realization in regard to suffering has been had. But you are right, this discussion is getting nowhere and has been going on for days. I may have been a bit sporadic with my views at times, yes. But if you want an overall summary of what I have been trying to get across, just read post 368.

The ultimate depends on the relative. Again, there is not something or nothing. Something is nothing. Nothing is something. Form is emptiness. Emptiness is form. Ultimately, ignorance and wisdom are beyond the four extremes only because RELATIVELY they are dependent on one another. There is no emptiness that is a "nothing" state. There is no emptiness ever, anywhere, apart from phenomena -- opposites.

Getting closer... Yes, precisely, it is an insight of the mind. It is a perception of the truth, one may say. From here, I'll say this. That perception of truth is just one thing in the mind. If the mind is capable of seeing truth, it must also be able to be ignorant. Right? Before you found out that emptiness was truth, you were ignorant of that fact. Now that ignorance is not gone. It can't be. It is just buried.

And you don't posit a view of relative vs ultimate? Read your posts. The two truths cannot be separated sure, but they are not identical either. I know your view of emptiness. I have studied your view of emptiness. I have no problem with your view of emptiness. I know that it is true. That is beside the point that I have been trying to make this whole time about suffering: "The realization of emptiness arises in your mind, it is ok. A thought contrary to the realization of emptiness arises in your mind, it is ok. You don't cling to either truth or ignorance. Then you are really free, because you are not even bound by the truth -- by the need to be free."

When I say absolute, I mean "ultimate" in the sense that you just used it. Alright, so there isn't something and there isn't nothing. There are impermanent phenomena and there aren't impermanent phenomena (at the same time). The thing here that is most relevant to our discussion is that there isn't nothing. Do you accept then that mind states, on the relative level, do not last forever? If you do, then you accept that the "seeing of emptiness" (through the relative mind, the only way it can be seen) in real-time is impermanent. Meaning that you won't always see it. I really cannot believe that this is difficult. It is self evident.

Absolute cannot be without relative. Right?

AHHHHHH! THIS IS TRUTH FOR YOU! YOU BELIEVE IN TRUTH. IF YOU DID NOT BELIEVE IN TRUTH, YOU WOULD NOT BE ARGUING WITH ME.

This is not difficult. You believe one thing to be truth and another thing to be ignorance. "The truth is that form is emptiness." "It is wrong to think that form is not emptiness." Everything you wrote above is contained in "truth." Everything that is not that is contained in "ignorance." Truth depends on falsity as day depends on night.

You're looking at this from the wrong angle. Everything you just wrote above you consider to be truth. Correct? Ok, that's truth. The opposite of what you wrote above you consider to be ignorance. Correct? That's ignorance. They are different. I have studied Nagarjuna thoroughly. I believe what nagarjuna says is true. I have never denied that. That is not what I am getting at here.

Thought. There is no other mind than the senses and thought.

you are still not getting it. "Ignorance is self liberating" is not ignorance. "Ignorance is not self liberating" is ignorance. Maybe this will make it clearer: X has realized the truth of emptiness and impermanence. This truth is an objective truth about the nature of reality. This truth is cognized by X's subjective mind. The only way he directly knows this truth is through his mind. Whenever X needs to or wants to, he brings up this truth about emptiness in his mind. Because of the truth of impermanence that X has learned about, he has different thoughts. One day, he has a thought that emptiness may not actually be true. Maybe God really created everything. So X pushes that thought about God out. And he fears it ever coming in because it disrupts what he believes to be true. Because it disrupts his other thought about emptiness (remember again that emptiness can only be known through the mind). We can see from this that X's thoughts are different and changing and wanting one (in this case the thought of the truth of emptiness which can only be known through the mind) to be permanent is the source of his pain. This is what "form is form, emptiness is emptiness" means. The realization of emptiness arises in your mind, it is ok. A thought contrary to the realization of emptiness arises in your mind, it is ok. You don't cling to either truth or ignorance. Then you are really free, because you are not even bound by the truth -- by the need to be free. Seung Sahn had a teaching that he called the zen circle. It is the degrees of an enlightened person. 180 degrees is "form is emptiness." 270 degrees is "emptiness is form." Seung Sahn calls this 270 degree stage attachment to freedom. 360 degrees is full circle -- "form is form, emptiness is emptiness." Completely ordinary mind with no attachment to enlightenment or ignorance. It is also the fifth rank of tozan: "Yes, this is the realm of “everyday mind” or “ordinary mind,” but it is far from “no enlightenment.” It includes and transcends both enlightenment and no enlightenment..." http://www.zenforuminternational.org/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=3169

No, the acceptance of that is the path to liberation from suffering and clinging (what you wrote and deleted).