Sunya

well it is afterall a Buddhist forum. the comparative religion section used to be very popular but debates got pretty heated there so now its only limited to discussing Buddhism, I see nothing wrong with that as there are plenty of other places (like here) to discuss non-Buddhist topics. and as most topics have already been discussed you can just search for them. and yes, only Buddhist meditation is discussed.. as it is as Buddhist forum, I see nothing wrong with that. as for questioning Buddhist teachings, I think if its done respectfully there is no issue with that. I admit people can be pretty dogmatic on there, but we can't generalize and say the whole forum is participating in group-think and comparing them to Bible-thumpers. in the Beginner Buddhism forum you can question all you want, Buddhists afterall are supposed to be critical thinkers and question everything. there is definitely a lot of over-moderating there, but that is just their style. I think if you appreciate E-Sangha for what it is, you can get a lot out of it. I've learned so much on there but only after I learned how to be respectful and ask things the right way. Also, there are so many knowledgable people on there, very highly accomplished, you can find them very easily and send them PMs instead of starting a new thread, people tend to be much more 'giving' in private messages. generally, Buddhists aren't supposed to talk about a lot of things publicly such as experiences and realizations, you discuss that with your teacher not on a public message board. maybe thats why theres so much moderating there... to avoid confusion and further delusion.. in the end, I think, the moderators are your friends.

maybe someone just forgot to enter the numbers 4 8 15 16 23 42 into the computer? its happened before...

its a waste of time to continue this Dwai, everything that you say, I refute. you say A, and I say no thats wrong because thats not what Emptiness is, and then you say B, and I so no.. you're just reifying a mental state of concentration.. so then you say C.. and I say no, Dwai, that's not what Buddhism teaches.. so then you go back to A. what's there to do agree with? that your mental state experience was Ultimate? no I won't agree with that. nor will I agree with your arguments which don't hold up to logic. you dance around the fact that you have no understanding of what I say and cling to your conclusion. if you're arguing what Advaita teaches then yes this is solely about Buddhism and Advaita, nothing to do with you. though you do hold a pretty lofty view that you seem to know about more about Buddhism than I do. this may be so, but what about the Dalai Lama who himself says that there are differences and Emptiness is not Brahman? is he wrong? what about Shankaracharya who argued against Buddhists in his day? or the countless Hindu and Buddhist scholars who have argued these very points? I've already said this, and i'm tired of repeating myself. Shunyata does not equal Brahman. the realizations and goals of Advaita Vedanta Hinduism and Buddhism (Theravada, Mahayana, Vajrayana) do not correlate at all. the practices may be the same but the view, goal, and realization are all different. I will not budge on this. you have not proven your points and your knowledge shows a clear misunderstanding of what Shunyata means. This is fine, you're not a Buddhist, but don't pretend to know something you don't and try to argue in favor of a position that is plain fantasy, unsupported by facts (you have not shown any). "more like you can't agree with me. smile.gif Nothing to do with Buddhism or Advaita..." that's what this is all about then, it's very clear to me now that this has been a waste of time. you were never genuinely interested in debating and seeing the differences between the two traditions. you already made up your mind; if you were genuinely interested you would've seen already the clear differences that I, and others, have mapped out for you over and over and over again. but yet you keep arguing the same damn points, no evolution of thought whatsoever. so yeah, this is all about you, nothing to do with Buddhism and Advaita. this is your need for validation and inability to accept your false position.

wonderful movie

I was not hostile, I simply said that everything you said about Buddhism is wrong and pointed you to Wikipedia so you can learn about Buddhism if you truly desire to do so.

i think we can end this safely knowing Advaita and Buddhism cannot agree

I was just really inspired by Alan Watts at the time, he's a pretty all roads to one goal kinda guy. but past 6 months i've gone deeper and feel like i've understood some subtleties that i've missed before. using the analogy that I previously used (that I got from Alan Watts, which he got from Zen). fingers pointing at the moon, the moon being the indescribable and the fingers being the "way", what I realized is that the realization of the moon depends on the finger! there are different levels of "moon". this is expressed quite well in the article "Recognizing the different phases of insight" here http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com/ I don't think there is any evolution unless you can go back and regret saying something. if you, looking back on yourself, agree with everything you've said or done, wheres the evolution? we are always changing, some for the better, some for the worse. I like to think i'm changing for the better. you said yourself in the other thread that you don't think Buddhism and Hinduism are talking about the same thing, so why would you agree with what i said there? but anyway, this has nothing to do with what Wayfarer is talking about. and that's what I was addressing.. not whether or not Buddhism is the best. you would know from studying 8 months with the Gelugpas that everything he said was wrong, so why pick a fight for no reason?

yes, my views have changed. I'm not a permanent entity, always changing. evolving. really, you have nothing better to do than reading my posts from 1 year ago? keep digging around I guess, maybe you'll find something good in there...

it is obvious that you know nothing of Buddhism. Basically everything that you said is wrong. If you want to learn something and broaden your horizon (Buddhism is one of the largest religions in the world, its good to know about it), you can start here http://www.ecst.csuchico.edu/~dsantina/tree/

I'm not ascribing anything to being Advaitin thought. I'm using your own words here, and quotes from Advaita sources. the idea of "Brahman being self-existent and self-natured and not containing phenomena" is the Advaitin concept that is not compatible whatsoever with Buddhist philosophy, practice, and realization. you are trying very hard to make something fit which won't. this absolutist tendency is very deeply ingrained in you, so i can see why its so difficult for you to see the subtle differences, which are there. phenomena are empty of inherent existence, this does not mean that there IS something that has inherent existence, Brahman.... Emptiness is not self-natured and self-existent and non-phenomenal, therefore Emptiness cannot equal Brahman. they are infact diametrically opposed views. Buddhism does not negate the self-existence of phenomena just to replace that with another idea of Allness. you are taking your thought-train further than the Buddhists do. the Buddhists stop at interdependence, they do not further say that phenomena does not exist and reify that non-conceptuality. Focus on the word inter-dependence, does this automatically point to One-ness or Same-ness? or can phenomena remain in the balance between one and many by simply being interdependent? Can phenomena remain in the balance between existing and non-existing by simply being empty of essence? Dwai: "Brahman is self-existing and self-natured...is not a phenomenon." ---- "That's why Brahman is considered empty." these two statements oppose each other. If Brahman were empty, Brahman would not be self-existent and self-natured. Empty does not mean "non-phenomenal". Empty is a description of phenomena used to denote the lack of intrinsic and inherent essence, individuality, and substance. Since Brahman is, as you say, non-phenomenal, then according to Buddhism, Brahman cannot be empty since this is a description of the nature of phenomena. Reality consists of interdependent phenomena, nothing beyond that, therefore Brahman does not exist, according to Buddhism.

yeah.. I know what you mean. I skimmed through Measuring Meditation last night, and some parts were really interesting, but theres so much! he gets off into these random tangents that are completely off topic, spends 3 pages talking about some Emperor or some other trivial historical anecdote. i'm not being completely negative here, some parts are indeed interesting, but I, like you, am very glad I did not pay money for this.

Bodri seems to mix religious terms like its his hobby and this becomes a problem because the terms do not equate. Emptiness is not something you cultivate. Emptiness is not something you 'attain' in different levels, or attain at all for that matter. This is Buddhist emptiness we are talking about. Emptiness is the insight, or realization, that all phenomena, form, lack self-nature and essence and are interdependent. I don't know what emptiness means in Taoism but that's how it is in Buddhism. I'm sure Master Nan knows what Emptiness means so I doubt he had anything to do with these books, personally. Erdweir, there are many pitfalls on the Tantric path. It is called the Swift path, the Lightning path, for a reason. Since its so fast, there are many pitfalls. this is why its sooo important to have a real guide to help you not get stuck the reason Siddhis, superpowers, are developed is to help sentient beings. the goal of Tibetan Buddhism isn't just to realize Emptiness...it's to attain complete Omniscience and other powerful Siddhis, to become a completely realized super-hero basically

right on Nac, i get what you're saying. like the quote in my sig, its a famous buddhist quote.. even zen maybe, not sure. just 'not two, not one', you can also count not zero in there as well. as these are all extremes to be avoided. duality/monism/nihilism. non-duality doesn't have to be monistic, i think this is why its so important to carefully analyze our expectations and subtle beliefs.

Indeed. I agree. I have Measuring Meditation, Worlds Best and Worst Spiritual Paths and some others by Bodri. I read Worlds Best/Worst book and saw Bodri's flagrant bias towards Tibetan Buddhism. he basically says that Tibetans have no clue what they are doing and do not reach enlightenment because of their attachment to form. he doesn't seem to understand why siddhis are developed in Vajrayana and holds many assumptions about Tantric practices and jumps to conclusions very easily. Not really understanding that samadhi is not the goal of Tantric Buddhism but rather developing samadhi is necessary before the higher teachings of Mahamudra/Dzogchen are practiced. and none of Vajrayana is taken from Taoism! it's all Indian! he says Esoteric Buddhism came from India not China! lol. anyone with wikipedia will know this simple fact. and he constantly insults Tibetan Buddhism saying that its full of sexually obsessed monks doing tantric sex practices, when monks don't have an actual physical consort but rather visualized. this is only at a very high level and the consort is a symbol of the union of form and emptiness. lay people sometimes (very rarely) receive permission to have tantric sex with another practitioner but only at a very high level of cultivation. he doesn't understand what the Yidam (diety) represents and why its used. I really can't trust much of what this guy says since it's very easy to learn about Tibetan Buddhism these days, maybe he is using books written in the 1920s, and due to his bad research I wonder how much more disinformation he is spreading in other topics which I don't have much awareness of. furthermore he doesn't even know what Emptiness means and calls himself a Buddhist: Emptiness is not no-thought! Beware my friends. This guys research is very poor, and he doesn't understand Buddhist meditation. maybe for Taoists he's alright, but if his knowledge of Taoism is as poor as his awareness of Buddhism than i'd stay away.

No that is not what Buddhism states. There would be no reason to practice if one was already perfect and enlightened. the potential is there, not the actuality of it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddha-nature we are not returning to an enlightenment that we had before. beings have been ignorant since beginning less time, unfortunately. if we were already enlightened before, it wouldn't make much sense for us to fall into ignorance. if enlightenment isn't permanent I don't see the point of realizing it. there is no "something" that is empty of phenomena. phenomena are empty, and thats it. nothing to replace phenomena with, no ideas of an ultimate It, no broader picture. phenomena are there but they are empty. as much as you try, you will not get Brahman out of this because Buddhism does not reject phenomena as vividly real in a mirage-like way and Buddhism does not replace phenomena with a non-conceptual background that is ultimate and real. well thats the thing, the relative does not disappear in Buddhism. for Advaita, the relative is an illusion, for Buddhism, the relative is like an illusion. so the apple does not stop being an apple. and the orange does not stop being an orange. this is very much about grasping at an essence since you feel the need to make orange and apple one, just because they are empty of independent nature does not mean that they don't exist as vividly real forms. Buddhism strips away the ideas we have about phenomena containing independence and reality, but that doesn't mean that the phenomena stops existing and you can replace those ideas with a grand ultimate It that is All..... That is NOT non-conceptual. that is a very subtle concept. Brahman is not Emptiness, one is self-existing and real, while form is non-existing..The other is merely a description of mirage-like phenomena. Emptiness is as real as phenomena. if you can't see that you are grasping at essence than you will not understand Buddhism. As much as you'd like to believe that you fully understand it better than Buddhist and Hindu scholars who have argued for a while against each other talking about these very matters themselves... I'm not trying to convert you to Buddhism, I just want you to see that they are very subtly different. but since I have failed at that, I will call it a night. It was great speaking with you. I appreciate you spending the time here to discuss all this.. I've learned a lot from these discussions and I hope you have too.

the ultimate goal of Buddhism (Mahayana) is to realize that there is no ultimate self, or observer, that the self is a phenomenona; Empty of essence and interdependent with all other phenomenona, and that even though other sentient beings are themselves too empty, they still suffer from their own side. so really there is no 'ultimate' goal, Buddhahood is just the beginning. finally you have the tools to help suffering empty and compounded sentient beings the realization of Buddhahood is not a mental state, it's an insight that stays with you no matter which mental state you are in. waking, dreaming, deep sleep, and even deep meditative jhana [absorptions]. this is the difference between realization (insight) and experience. Buddhahood is not an experience.

Hi Nac. about 'finding this level of autophenomenological level of consciousness', according to Buddha if you believe in it, you will find it. the experience of Jhana is the same for Buddhists and Advaitans, but only if you grasp at a self/observer will you come to the conclusion that there exists an ultimate Witness. this is called 'reification' or making something real. Madyamika is very important in making everything empty. this negation of ideas is paramount in clearing the way for true insight to arise the self is just an idea that is being grasped. most likely you will come to the conclusion that it does exist, and become an Advaitan. :-P its impossible to remain neutral, you either grasp at a self or you don't. we all grasp at a self, its almost inherent.. a habit that is reinforced by countless lives. so giving it up isn't easy.. you can pretend to give up the self and say Atman is Brahman, but that is just identifying with the All, meaning there is still an Ultimate Subject. this is very subtle grasping at a self, instead of grasping at a limited self you grasp at an ultimate self. grasping is grasping. Emptiness says there is nothing to grasp because the idea of 'essence permeating All' is removed. without this essence how can one identify with the All and say I am That?

I'm sorry if I offended you. I meant no war has ever been waged in the name of Buddhism and trying to convert people. i don't even remember the context of that conversation since it was said a week ago..

you have many assumptions here such as "you are not a phenomenon", the "you" is a combination of the 5 Skhandas, this teaching is the cornerstone of Anatta, Buddhist teaching of no-self 1) Matter or Form (rupa) - the physical form responded to the five organs of senses, i.e., eye, ear, nose, tongue and body; (2) Sensation or Feeling (vedana) - the feeling in reception of physical things by the senses through the mind; (3) Perception and/or cognition (Pali, sanna) (Skr, sanjna) - the functioning of mind in distinguishing appearances; (4) Volition or Mental Formation (Pali, sankara) (Skr, samskara) - habitual action, i.e., a conditioned response to the object of experience, whether it is good or evil, you like or dislike; (5) Consciousness (Pali, vinnana) (Skr, vijnana) - the mental faculty in regard to perception, cognition and experience; all of these 5 aspects make up the self, and they are interdependent with perceived phenomenon and are themselves phenomenona. therefore you cannot say 'you are not phenomenon" because there is no you that is separate from phenomena. there is no soul or anything beyond the 5 skhandas. yes there are formless realms and are experienced through the 5th skhanda but they are temporary and not to be taken refuge in. ear consciousness is dependent upon sound, likewise all the senses that make up the 1st skhanda are dependent upon their respective phenomena that they sense. same with the 2nd skhanda, the 3rd, cognition, is dependent on form and appearances. the 4th on objects of experience, and the 5th, perception and experience, is dependent on the experience itself. this is the "Witness" and if there would be nothing to witness than there would be no witness itself. so taking this logic further, the example of the ear consciousness being dependent upon sound, the sound IS consciousness. there is no separate "sound" and "ear consciousness", one being aware of the other, the two are one. likewise the witness is not separate from the experience, the experience is consciousness itself. the sound is the hearing, the sight is the seeing, the perception of objects are the objects. the two extremes that Buddhism opposes are eternalism and nihilism. eternalism focuses on the consciousness aspect and ignores phenomena, while nihilism, or materialism, only focuses on phenomena, objects, and ignores consciousness. Buddhist non-dual realization brings them together because phenomena is consciousness. i was taught in Kashmir Shivaism that there are 2 aspects to God, the static and the dynamic. consciousness and creation. Shiva and Shakti, and that Shakti is an aspect of Shiva so everything is Shiva. everything is consciousness.. in Buddhism, there is no static, there is no Shiva. Shiva is Shakti, consciousness IS action, IS process. there is no duality herein.

then this is where Buddhist and Advaita non-duality differ. Advaitins believe that consciousness is behind phenomena, but emptiness means there is nothing behind phenomena. when one says phenomena is empty that is not simply negating phenomena to imply that there is more behind phenomena, no that is not what emptiness means. it is negating the idea that phenomena are self-arisen objects. there is more to emptiness than interdependence of phenomena, there is also the aspect of consciousness being interdependent with phenomena. So since emptiness being form. emptiness is not BEHIND form, emptiness IS form. there is no such thing as objectless consciousness in Buddhism since there are no such things as objects. objects are themselves emptiness. so one can say "everything is phenomena" or "everything is consciousness" because, as xabir said, all phenomenon are consciousness, there is no difference between consciousness and phenomena, they depend on each other, and are empty of essence. but what you are talking about is dualistic since phenomena and consciousness are different, phenomena is contained within consciousness, like drawings on a blank screen. this is simply not so according to Buddhism. phenomena rise and fall, from no source at all. they simply are. there is nothing containing phenomena, no objectless consciousness, no eternal screen or blank page. this is the philosophy of it, and the error in Vedanta philosophy causes you to reify a jhana experience as true and absolute. so i'll quote my friend on this since he already addressed this

never said I know more about Hinduism than you lol, relax there bronco. ok here's some quotes from the Gita Nirvana is not equal to Kaivalyam because Kaivalyam presupposes the essence of all reality being Self or pure consciousness. the insight of Nirvana negates this essence because consciousness is dependently originated. the presupposition of Advaita that there exists something behind phenomena, positing the existence of Nirguna, makes true Kaivalyam impossible because there is already a conceptual basis for the insight. true nonconceptual insight cannot arise because consciousness, essence, and identity have not been negated. Kaivalyam as presented in Hinduism is the insight of phenomena as Self, whereas Nirvana as presented in Hinduism is the insight of phenomena lacking any self. both seem to mean non-conceptual but how they define non-conceptual is different. in Buddhism all views are negated and thats how you arrive at non-conceptual view. in Advaita it is rather the positing of one self-existing essence permeating all reality. according to Buddhism this is not the way things are, and this view contaminates your experience and does not lead to true insight. your whole argument of falls apart if you see that Nirvana does not equal Kaivalyam. I can see that there is a lot in common here between the two respective traditions, but really it all rests on Buddhisms view that negation is important to engender proper insight. and also, the insights gained by the two traditions cannot be the same for another important reason. in Buddhism there is no One Eternal Mind or Pure Consciousness or Pure Being. mind-streams are all separate, infinite, and beginningless. (this view actually differs between Theravada and Mahayana, so I'll post a quote explaining why, from the Mahayana perspective) http://www.berzinarchives.com/web/en/archi...ma_rebirth.html

Hi Dwai, I must say, you are much more pleasing to talk to than your friend. the realization of Nirvana is based on phenomenological inquiry and the realization is that there is nothing behind phenomena. phenemona are empty and yet fully vivid. nothing hiding behind phenomena. the impermanence of phenomena is also included in that realization. different realms exist where the experience is completely formless and that too is impermanent, so that realization also includes the impermanence of consciousness, which is considered a phenomena in Buddhism because it is constantly changing. Nirvana and DO = non-conceptual view. one can not say that Nirvana exists because Nirvana is not a state or a being or 'something' or 'nothing' or anything, really. Nirvana is not a noun. Nirvana has no identity. Nirvana is not a subject, but Nirvana is non-conceptual view free from all extremes. Therefore one cannot say that Nirvana = Brahman. you cannot say I am Nirvana. there is no identifying with Nirvana like Advaitans identify with Brahman because Nirvana, DO, Sunyata etc is view. It wouldn't make sense to say I am proper view. There is no objectifying in Buddhism, the philosophy of Madyamika was painstakingly created by Nagarjuna to correct the errors in objectification. I wish this were the case, I really do. I'm still hopeful.