3bob

further what I was getting at is that your interpretation of Buddhism and Vedic teachings is in effect refuting various established schools and or teachers that have a different interpretation from yours regarding key matters and in doing so you or anyone else would then be setting up a counter-refutation from them.... (now whether that includes the founder of Buddhism or the eternal transmission of Sanatana Dharma remains to be seen by same and ones self; also if someone wants to set up their own hybrid like school without stepping on proven and established toes then such should be called by a name variation that honestly fits, but neither you, I or anyone else can then make the claim that such represents what thousands of years of other established traditions really mean - since we would then be outside of such lineages.

I can play a sort of "devils advocate" along these or both lines... which is partly what I'm doing and I believe or at least hoped was somewhat obvious? Also where I'm at or not at per your projected judgement is at least debatable besides not being my or the point, although it does sound like you mean well but are still insisting on your hybrid? (which btw I'm not against out of hand excepting when it is used to assume a transcendent one-up-man-ship over established traditions that already and also include transcendent like teachings.

Nikolai, I'm very familiar with everything you've said (including that sutra) both through study and direct experience - but the problem so to speak as I see it is that you are refuted by both the historic Buddha and by Vedic Sat Guru's since neither teach your hybrid summation from or per their "enlightenment" (nor in their schools unless they to are of some type of hybrid. (thus not following or practicing pure Buddhist or Vedic teachings) Btw, I don't have a problem with such hybrids as long as they don't proclaim that really know better as to what either the Buddhist or Vedic teachings or enlightenment really mean per their hybridization... Another example: the Dalai Lama and I imagine most of the Buddhists under him who meditate often and deeply would never claim your hybrid summation to be where they are coming from per teaching or in meaning. Good luck and thanks for your feedback, Bob

Jetsun, I don't think we should be to sure about what so and so is saying... having said that (lol) it should be very obvious as to who at this site and elsewhere has tried to mix water and oil, including myself at times. btw, I like and appreciate the analogy of letting go or getting off a "raft" yet even with that pointer there are many other pointers and further realizations that various and "enlightened" so and so's may have had and allude to with such still being 180 degrees off or 180 degrees different per their schools and per their (apparent) post enlightenment teachings. Some examples: the historic Buddha and his "no-self teachings, the authors of the Vedas (with great detail in the Upanishads) and its "Self".

regardless of nice sounding and seemingly logical rationalizations Buddhist and Vedic core meanings and their truth are 180 degrees off from each other at the deepest levels... and or in conflict and will always be so even if held tightly or lightly. Thus about the only rational and non-violent course to follow is to show some toleration for each other but still go your own way. (without making the often western orientated error of trying to correlate and also mix water and oil - so to speak)

one can't really join traditional type teachings of "no-self" (Buddhist) and the Self, (Vedic) thus it comes down to choosing one and letting go the other. (Edit: even though there is some overlap in dharmas they are still 180 degrees apart in core teachings - "go figure" if you dare and if doing so expect complications)

if the sun (so to speak as a "higher being") suddenly came to the earth without any adjustment or transformation in its energy then the earth would be burned up... although when or if the energy of the earth is stepped up and adjusted she then evolves the ability to handle higher levels of energy without such burning - in fact that is what is happening now which will conclude with her evolution as an "earth", thus going through a transformation into a being of a higher level of energy than before.

We often hear of the gentle, clam, and or balanced Tao which are fine aspects but we do not often hear of the ferocity of the Tao... a ferocity that is greater and stronger than all others! And in that ferocity the One is born and the One also returns.

I'd say we all know that there is constant change related to the interplay of yang and yin... whereas with the "absolute" there can be no change for if there was it would not be absolute. (per the way I see Chapter 25 of the T.T.C.)

if Tao is connected to a certain ferocity (which it takes to bring the multi-verse or entire cosmos into being) can we say Tao has no ferocity? (although and granted the idea of naming the un-nameable is problematic...)

valid "teachings" or in a lot of cases more appropriately stated as mental methods are not just tossed per-se but set down at the point where they are no longer applicable - but I don't think that means that they can not be picked back up and used where or when they become applicable again.

another aspect for consideration, "cast your bread upon the waters..."

that is correct, the "other side" (so to speak) has to also reach out, for our little will does not dictate to the ways of larger will.

death as it is normally meant is not required for Mystery to know Mystery

(and learning of a better way often comes after going through the school of hard knocks)

"Mystery" does exist absolutely, (as alluded to in the last line of T.T.C. chapter 1)

silence is not a thing, and it is true that 'things' keep moving and also change, but "that" which is moving so fast (so to speak) that it is standing still, silent and synchronized everywhere at once is not a thing, thus things can never catch up to or enter into it, not unlike the saying and meaning of, "only Nothing can enter into no-space. (from T.T.C. 43)

to be a child of Tao does not have to be earned - but to be a Sage and warrior of Tao (or whatever terms are preferred) has to be proven - being that the tested soul of a Sage and warrior is no longer only that of a child. And there are also sayings like, "to whom much is given much is expected", and the lines from the T.T.C. that go something like, "only they who would sacrifice for the welfare of the beings of the world are be fit to be stewards for those beings and the world".

MooNiNite, I'd say your last post sounds logical but in fact we don't evolve into what we already are which is spirit or Atman if you will...then again if you are talking about relative evolution of various and different forms or vehicles (something which we really are not and that live and die) then yes forms do evolve and also devolve. Humans per-se are not trapped for it is spirit that is caught up in limited identification as a this or that form which has relative degrees of freedom - or not.

an attainment by who or what, thus a human being looking from the outside in is not the same as spirit looking from the inside out ... (so to speak - and meaning that the spirit realizes it is not limited to a human type of form but that it only works through same)

an after and before per-se does not exist for "enlightenment" so forget about a related, attached and dependent time line for same... as for doing something such is only apparent since spirit is doing everything, thus whatever is left so to speak is witness to that.

another saying for consideration: "There is only one reality in form, which is the pure consciousness which is conscious of form, and this reality is what realizes itself as formless, timeless, spaceless". by Gurudeva

I haven't seen this chapter mentioned as much as some of the others but I've been interested in it along the lines of possible and multiple levels of meaning, say starting on the human level related to interactions among us and then proceeding to levels beyond our normal recognition or perception... what do you hear it pointing to? 74. WHEN the people are no longer afraid of death, Why scare them with the spectre of death? If you could make the people always afraid of death, And they still persisted in breaking the law, Then you might with reason arrest and execute them, And who would dare to break the law? Is not the Great Executor always there to kill? To do the killing for the Great Executor Is to chop wood for a master carpenter, And you would be lucky indeed if you did not hurt your own hand!

yep, thanks for bringing this string back up

Those sound like applicable interpretations, thanks. I was also thinking of an aspect of karma and trusting in it...