More nails in the Coffin of the non-existent Self

[dwai]

[dwai]

[Lucky7Strikes]

Knowing != Consciousness

 

Knowing == Consciousness + Objects

 

Pure Consciousness == Knowing - Objects

 

and this Pure Consciousness always IS, beyond time and space (or Non-Phenomenal)

Consciousness is not separate from phenomena.

 

Space is not separate from objects.

 

Time is not separate from events.

 

Blowing is not separate from wind.

 

Mirror is not separate from reflection.

Edited July 30, 2010 by Lucky7Strikes

[Lucky7Strikes]

It is a good idea to read Shankara's critique of specific thoughts within Buddhism:

 

 

 

Shankara and Buddhism - 1

 

Read the rest here. I have brought this up for discussion with some silly responses from VH, Mikz et al...hopefully the Buddha-bums will read this carefully and then formulate their replies.

Dogen, via Xabir,

 

"Firewood becomes ash, and it does not become firewood again. Yet, do not suppose that the ash is future and the firewood past. You should understand that firewood abides in the phenomenal expression of firewood, which fully includes past and future and is independent of past and future. Ash abides in the phenomenal expression of ash, which fully includes future and past. Just as firewood does not become firewood again after it is ash, you do not return to birth after death.

 

This being so, it is an established way in buddha-dharma to deny that birth turns into death. Accordingly, birth is understood as no-birth. It is an unshakable teaching in Buddha's discourse that death does not turn into birth. Accordingly, death is understood as no-death.

 

Birth is an expression complete this moment. Death is an expression complete this moment. They are like winter and spring. You do not call winter the beginning of spring, nor summer the end of spring."

Edited July 30, 2010 by Lucky7Strikes

[Lucky7Strikes]

[3bob]

It is a good idea to read Shankara's critique of specific thoughts within Buddhism:

 

Shankara and Buddhism - 1

 

Read the rest here. I have brought this up for discussion with some silly responses from VH, Mikz et al...hopefully the Buddha-bums will read this carefully and then formulate their replies.

 

Dwai, A more or less related tangent (which I'm quoting below) that your post got me to thinking about:

 

"A Question of Karma"

 

"I read with interest Arvind Sharma's article, "Karma and Gravity, " (Jan/Mar, 2004). It is a bit confusing when he states, "In order to reach a karma-free state, we must give up not only bad karma, but good karma as well. We must perform only that karma which is appropriate for the attainment of zero karma." This raises more questions than answers. First, if we give up both bad karma as well as good karma, what is there left to do? Second, what is a karma-free state? Third, what is zero karma? And fourth, how does one attain a karma-free state or zero karma?

 

(From) Pradeep Srivastava,

 

(Reply from a Hindu Order)

Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami addressed this same issue in his book Merging with Siva. He wrote, "One does not have the experience of realizing the Self until all of his karma is in a state of resolve. This means that the action-and-reaction patterns were balanced out, one against the other, through his ability to be steadfast in his yoga, brahmacharya and previous superconscious insights which have revealed the true nature of himself. When this begins to occur in him, he actually sees that man is not man, man is the Self, God, for his karma and the forces of his dharma have begun to become transparent to him. Through the power of his realization, the karma is created and simultaneously dissolved. This occurs for the one who lives in the timeless state of consciousness. If one were to realize the Self each day, he would live his life like writing his karma on the surface of water. The intensity of the Self is so strong that action and reaction dissolve, just as the water's surface clears immediately when you remove your finger from having written upon it."

 

(underline made by me)

Edited July 30, 2010 by 3bob

[dwai]

Consciousness is not separate from phenomena.

 

Space is not separate from objects.

 

Time is not separate from events.

 

Blowing is not separate from wind.

 

Mirror is not separate from reflection.

 

These are all phenomenal things...Consciousness is not. So your fine poem would be better articulated this way:

 

Awareness is not separate from objects.

 

Time is not separate from events.

 

Blowing is not separate from wind.

 

Mirror is not separate from reflection.

 

And my addition:

 

Not-Self is not separate from Self.

[dwai]

This is a problem that arises from asserting the extremes of "existing" and "non-existing." My understanding of Buddhism (disclaimer, it's not so good) does not say moment A causes moment B, it is rather that no definable moment A or B can be found. Neither past, present or future can be located upon investigation. Shankara's understanding of momentary existence objectifies that moment, which is against emptiness teachings.

 

This is actually a good critique against inherent existence. If any moment could be objectifies, it falls into the problems Shankara addresses above. Indeed, no cause or effect could every happen nor any change.

 

This problem arises because of seeing dualistically as "perceiver" and "perception." It is a similar problem of objectifying certain way or moments of perception and discriminating one as perceiver and other as perceived, kind of like saying, hearing "taste", or touching "sound." Of course, this is impossible, what is actually happening is the mind and language symbolizes them in order to relate them in non sensical manners.

 

Shankara's arguments show that the concept of Alaya Vijnana, in other words, a continuum of momentary entities (call it a stream) is an illogical/irrational construct. If you (Lucky) are not a "self" but a continuum of disparate momentariness, then you are not you, nor would be able to type and speak and breath and walk with your identity (no matter how much you would like to prove it as otherwise). Your confusion stems from a mistaken understanding of the Madhyamika prasanga...

 

any asti/nasti argument (existent/non-existent) in the phenomenal realm can be reduced to absurdity and contradiction. Therefore, it helps understand that phenomena are svabhava shunya (or empty of self-existence) and highlights the dependent origination of phenomena (and fall in the realm of samvritti (or in Vedantic parlance, Vyavaharika) or mundane reality. They don't fall in the category of Absolute Truth (or Paramartha).

 

That is indeed a good way to show that the world and the phenomena in it are empty by nature (therefore, not falling in any absolute category). It is however a cop-out when it comes to the topic at hand...because it has no bearing on consciousness underlying the perception/conception of the phenomenal (samvritti) world. So, in other words, don't try to hide behind concepts and words...your assertions make no sense whatsoever. That which makes you able to say "hearing taste or touching sound" is the one that is being discussed here.

[Lucky7Strikes]

Shankara's arguments show that the concept of Alaya Vijnana, in other words, a continuum of momentary entities (call it a stream) is an illogical/irrational construct. If you (Lucky) are not a "self" but a continuum of disparate momentariness, then you are not you, nor would be able to type and speak and breath and walk with your identity (no matter how much you would like to prove it as otherwise). Your confusion stems from a mistaken understanding of the Madhyamika prasanga...

That's exactly right. I am not I. There was no "I" to begin with. Only the flowing of consciousness-phenomena in various forms, there is typing, there is speaking, there is breath, just like a rock that falls to earth by gravity, does my consciousness function from moment to moment according to laws, habits, nature, and harmony.

 

There is no confusion. Even your confusion is the expression of luminous emptiness expressing itself by the very laws of this universe. Please (I say this with real respect) note that what you wrote above addresses nothing that I wrote, but is just a pure re assertion of your views. Discussions like this is often difficult to carry out and again, fruitless.

 

Buddhism does not dismiss that each momentary experience is luminous, that is is aware. And awareness is the very nature of the phenomena being expressed and perfectly non dual. There is no "seer" and no "objective phenomena." There never was. So although I say there is the action of typing, speaking, and breath, it is different than when these activities are experienced as bare sensations. The habitual symbols we use to label typing as "typing" or speaking as "speaking" in the mind drop off. This is what I am beginning to experience more and more than in the past when I, like you (in a desperate attempt to preserve my free will, the pride of struggle, etc.).

 

I too desperately wanted there to be the absolute, the God, the holy, but it limits the mind to solidifying experiences and states of consciousness or bliss. Any "absolute" term, be it no-self, Self, This, That, is a limitation and a grasping.

 

That is indeed a good way to show that the world and the phenomena in it are empty by nature (therefore, not falling in any absolute category). It is however a cop-out when it comes to the topic at hand...because it has no bearing on consciousness underlying the perception/conception of the phenomenal (samvritti) world. So, in other words, don't try to hide behind concepts and words...your assertions make no sense whatsoever. That which makes you able to say "hearing taste or touching sound" is the one that is being discussed here.

I think you misread my post. I used "hearing taste" and "touching sound" to show the mistaken way of viewing a perceiver. I'm not hiding behind concepts. It is these concepts that greatly hinder actual practice. Any identification or solidification through symbolic terms such as "consciousness" or "book" or "chariot" in a continous manner (of course, this is beneficial to certain states of practice, kinda like "noting") is a limitation on oneself.

 

You can call consciousness as beyond phenomena all day. But it just doesn't make sense. Tell me what that experience is. Is it blissful? Then the feeling of bliss is its phenomena. Is it empty? Than formlessness is its phenomena. Is it nothing? Than it is no conscious. Is it pure? Than it's purity is its phenomena. Searching for this ultimate state or identifying it, glorifying it, is like dreaming the impossible goal, an imagination that is worst, it is imagining the impossible, so you will never be satisfied no matter what stage of practice you arrive at.

Edited July 31, 2010 by Lucky7Strikes

[Lucky7Strikes]

These are all phenomenal things...Consciousness is not. So your fine poem would be better articulated this way:

 

Awareness is not separate from objects.

 

Time is not separate from events.

 

Blowing is not separate from wind.

 

Mirror is not separate from reflection.

 

And my addition:

 

Not-Self is not separate from Self.

Sure Dwai, you can say that last part too. But in my opinion, you have to apply it in a different manner as it is easily susceptible to dualistic misunderstanding. You see phenomena and consciousness as different things so the last edition also wouldn't make sense. It contradicts your very first sentence.

 

There is no denying there is the continual "taste" of consciousness from one event to another. Indeed, there is no experience without the consciousness aspect. Let's say you look at the desk and it is brown. Then you see the window as white. Then you see the sky as blue. Do you think "ah, it is the background of "color" or the doing of "color" that is producing all these various colors? Probably not. Color is an continuous aspect of the varying phenomena, not an agent or a substream.

 

But what I wrote above is just what Xabir has written over and over to you. You refuse to open your mind to an alternative due to attachment to tradition.

[xabir2005]

I think Lucky7Strike's posts are great and there's nothing much more for me to add...

 

Dwai clings to non-phenomenal Self, because that is his current experience. It is hard to argue any further because he insists that Consciousness must be a non-phenomenal substratum of phenomena, whereas Buddhism says that if you continue investigating Consciousness you will eventually find that all phenomena are 'conscious'/luminous in essence and empty in nature (One Taste). As such there is no 'The Consciousness', every manifestation is 'a consciousness'. Lucky7Strike has gone through the non-phenomenal Self phase before, but is now having experiential non-dual insight/realization and is now able to appreciate Buddhist teachings better.

 

In light of lucky7strike's post, here's a post by Daniel M. Ingram that hopefully should be more understandable now:

 

http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com/2009/09/rigpa-and-aggregates.html

 

Dear Mark,

 

Thanks for your descriptions and analysis. They are interesting and relevant.

 

I think of it this way, from a very high but still vipassana point of view, as you are framing this question in a vipassana context:

 

First, the breath is nice, but at that level of manifesting sensations, some other points of view are helpful:

 

Assume something really simple about sensations and awareness: they are exactly the same. In fact, make it more simple: there are sensations, and this includes all sensations that make up space, thought, image, body, anything you can imagine being mind, and all qualities that are experienced, meaning the sum total of the world.

 

In this very simple framework, rigpa is all sensations, but there can be this subtle attachment and lack of investigation when high terms are used that we want there to be this super-rigpa, this awareness that is other. You mention that you feel there is a larger awareness, an awareness that is not just there the limits of your senses. I would claim otherwise: that the whole sensate universe by definition can't arise without the quality of awareness by definition, and so some very subtle sensations are tricking you into thinking they are bigger than the rest of the sensate field and are actually the awareness that is aware of other sensations.

 

Awareness is simply manifestation. All sensations are simply present.

 

Thus, be wary of anything that wants to be a super-awareness, a rigpa that is larger than everything else, as it can't be, by definition. Investigate at the level of bare sensate experience just what arises and see that it can't possibly be different from awareness, as this is actually an extraneous concept and there are actually just sensations as the first and final basis of reality.

 

As you like the Tibetan stuff, and to quote Padmasambhava in the root text of the book The Light of Wisdom:

"The mind that observes is also devoid of an ego or self-entity.

It is neither seen as something different from the aggregates

Nor as identical with these five aggregates.

If the first were true, there would exist some other substance.

 

This is not the case, so were the second true,

That would contradict a permanent self, since the aggregates are impermanent.

Therefore, based on the five aggregates,

The self is a mere imputation based on the power of the ego-clinging.

 

As to that which imputes, the past thought has vanished and is nonexistent.

The future thought has not occurred, and the present thought does not withstand scrutiny."

 

I really found this little block of tight philosophy helpful. It is also very vipassana at its core, but it is no surprise the wisdom traditions converge.

 

Thus, if you want to crack the nut, notice that everything is 5 aggregates, including everything you think is super-awareness, and be less concerned with what every little type of consciousness is than with just perceiving them directly and noticing the gaps that section off this from that, such as rigpa from thought stream, or awareness from sensations, as these are golden chains.

Edited July 31, 2010 by xabir2005

[xabir2005]

How is Neti Neti not letting you realize Anatta (An-Atman)?

Neti Neti is disassociation, not Anatta.

 

Here's a way to contemplate Anatta:

 

http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com/2009/03/on-anatta-emptiness-and-spontaneous.html

 

There is thinking, no thinker

There is hearing, no hearer

There is seeing, no seer

 

 

In thinking, just thoughts

In hearing, just sounds

In seeing, just forms, shapes and colors.

 

(observe and feel this in direct experience until insight arises)

[xabir2005]

Hi Lucky7Strikes,

 

Thusness told me that after a practitioner has sufficiently de-constructed both the subjective and objective poles, one tends to experience mere happening, mere action, mere experience... your posts suggest you are beginning to experience this... the following links may help.

 

http://books.google.com.sg/books?id=ifcbndKry8UC&printsec=frontcover&dq=albert+low+hakuin&source=bl&ots=ojxxBWay0-&sig=bN8hNW1ttIvbtihV7_4kODQP0cw&hl=en&ei=U7RSTMPQO4-0rAf1ppneAQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBQQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Hakuin on kensho: the four ways of knowing, by Zen Master Albert Low:

"...The transformation body is the nirmanakaya, and this is the body that Buddha has in the world: the physical body. In terms of practice, it means yet another awakening: awakening to the fourth way of knowing.

 

Yasutani Roshi, in the Three Pillars of Zen, points out, "Ku [shunyata] is not mere nothingness. It is that which is living, dynamic, devoid of mass, unfixed, beyond individuality or personality - the matrix of all phenomena" The universe is not static; it is dynamic, alive.

 

Action is the way of life: even the flowers reach up to the sun and the trees spread out their arms. Someone asked Zen master Joshu, "What is my essence?" Joshu said, "The tree sways, the bird flies about, the fish leaps, the water is muddy."

 

A master will ask, "Who walks? Who talks?" Sometimes a hapless student will claim, "I do." But what muscles will he use, what nerves? We can exercise self-will as much as we like, but still the body does not arise.

 

How fascinating it is that we can talk and yet do not know the words we are going to use until we have said them.

 

Then I walk, the universe walks; and my dancing and songs are, as Hakuin tells us, the voice of the dharma.

 

Knowing-in-action is sometimes called the "function." A mondo (question and answer) helps make the point more clear.

A master and his student were hoeing a field. The monk asked, "What is it?"

 

The master stood up and planted his hoe in the ground.

 

The monk said, "You have the essence, you do not have the function."

 

The master said, "Then what is it?"

 

The monk went on hoeing.

 

The master said, "You have the function, but you do not have the essence."

Zen master Yuishun makes a similar point when, coming to awakening, he wrote:

 

"Why, it's but the motion of eyes and brows!

And here I've been seeking it far and wide.

Awakened at last, I find the moon

Above the pines, the river surging high."

 

Everything that we do is the dharma in action; everything that we do is the samadhi of action. When we ask , "Who walks?" we inquire about the samadhi of action. The samadhi of walking walks; the samadhi of seeing sees; the samadhi of talking talks. Samadhi is all. Let me repeat, this is the samadhi that cannot be attained, the samadhi that is your true nature. It is your state right now. Your state is a state of samadhi. It is just mind only.

 

p.s. regarding the last sentence 'It is just mind only', it is not the mind of Self, it is sunyata.

 

This is also the experience of Maha...

 

The articles Tada and Stainless will also be helpful.

Edited July 31, 2010 by xabir2005

[Lucky7Strikes]

BOW BOW BOW***

 

 

Thanks Xabir!

[3bob]

"Ananda, the nature of the Absolute is that it is total enlightenment. It is beyond name and form and beyond the world and all its living beings. Ignorance creates an illusion of birth and death, but when ignorance is dispelled, the supreme and shining Absolute is there. Then suffering is changed into insight, and death is transmuted into nirvana". Surangama Sutra

 

And this "Absolute" (or "Self" to use another term that some do not like and imo misunderstand, and who also go to very great lengths to prove their misunderstnding about) is not changing, for if it were then its nature could not be referred to as Absolute and thus beyond the changes of life and death, although it has insight beyond the samsara p.o.v. that suffers in attachment to the apparent or relative realities of life and death. (in any realm)

 

Om

Edited July 31, 2010 by 3bob

[Lucky7Strikes]

Edited July 31, 2010 by Lucky7Strikes

[dwai]

That's exactly right. I am not I. There was no "I" to begin with. Only the flowing of consciousness-phenomena in various forms, there is typing, there is speaking, there is breath, just like a rock that falls to earth by gravity, does my consciousness function from moment to moment according to laws, habits, nature, and harmony.

 

There is no confusion. Even your confusion is the expression of luminous emptiness expressing itself by the very laws of this universe. Please (I say this with real respect) note that what you wrote above addresses nothing that I wrote, but is just a pure re assertion of your views. Discussions like this is often difficult to carry out and again, fruitless.

 

Buddhism does not dismiss that each momentary experience is luminous, that is is aware. And awareness is the very nature of the phenomena being expressed and perfectly non dual. There is no "seer" and no "objective phenomena." There never was. So although I say there is the action of typing, speaking, and breath, it is different than when these activities are experienced as bare sensations. The habitual symbols we use to label typing as "typing" or speaking as "speaking" in the mind drop off. This is what I am beginning to experience more and more than in the past when I, like you (in a desperate attempt to preserve my free will, the pride of struggle, etc.).

 

I too desperately wanted there to be the absolute, the God, the holy, but it limits the mind to solidifying experiences and states of consciousness or bliss. Any "absolute" term, be it no-self, Self, This, That, is a limitation and a grasping.

 

 

I think you misread my post. I used "hearing taste" and "touching sound" to show the mistaken way of viewing a perceiver. I'm not hiding behind concepts. It is these concepts that greatly hinder actual practice. Any identification or solidification through symbolic terms such as "consciousness" or "book" or "chariot" in a continous manner (of course, this is beneficial to certain states of practice, kinda like "noting") is a limitation on oneself.

 

You can call consciousness as beyond phenomena all day. But it just doesn't make sense. Tell me what that experience is. Is it blissful? Then the feeling of bliss is its phenomena. Is it empty? Than formlessness is its phenomena. Is it nothing? Than it is no conscious. Is it pure? Than it's purity is its phenomena. Searching for this ultimate state or identifying it, glorifying it, is like dreaming the impossible goal, an imagination that is worst, it is imagining the impossible, so you will never be satisfied no matter what stage of practice you arrive at.

 

If you can describe it, it is a phenomenon. If it is not, it is non-phenomenon. Consciousness cannot be described, it's structure cannot be explained...there can be feeble attempts, like "hearing taste and smelling sound" but these are not sound. It cannot be experienced because it is the source of experience...without it no dependent origination...it is the only and absolute requirement for existence. Without it, Buddhists would not be able to try and prove that it is a phenomenon.

 

As a corollary thereof, a phenomenon is something with a beginning and an end. It is either a percept or a concept or both percept and concept (so in other words, it has a form or a label or both). It is either temporal or spatial+temporal or temporal or spatial.

Edited July 31, 2010 by dwai

[dwai]

Neti Neti is disassociation, not Anatta.

 

Here's a way to contemplate Anatta:

 

http://awakeningtore...pontaneous.html

 

There is thinking, no thinker

There is hearing, no hearer

There is seeing, no seer

 

 

In thinking, just thoughts

In hearing, just sounds

In seeing, just forms, shapes and colors.

 

(observe and feel this in direct experience until insight arises)

 

Neti neti is a process...it leads to realization of the Anatman. I think you understand what I'm trying to say, but hide behind words.

[dwai]

I think Lucky7Strike's posts are great and there's nothing much more for me to add...

 

Dwai clings to non-phenomenal Self, because that is his current experience. It is hard to argue any further because he insists that Consciousness must be a non-phenomenal substratum of phenomena, whereas Buddhism says that if you continue investigating Consciousness you will eventually find that all phenomena are 'conscious'/luminous in essence and empty in nature (One Taste). As such there is no 'The Consciousness', every manifestation is 'a consciousness'. Lucky7Strike has gone through the non-phenomenal Self phase before, but is now having experiential non-dual insight/realization and is now able to appreciate Buddhist teachings better.

 

In light of lucky7strike's post, here's a post by Daniel M. Ingram that hopefully should be more understandable now:

 

http://awakeningtore...aggregates.html

 

 

 

I think you guys cling to "Non-Self" because you haven't really experienced the Self.

If you would prefer it, I could call "Self" something else...but you guys won't buy that either. Non-Phenomenal Self stabilizes into Non-Dual realization. There is no "A consciousness", there is only Consciousness...which doesn't need an object to make one realize it, because one is already that consciousness.

 

 

 

[Marblehead]

I think you guys cling to "Non-Self" because you haven't really experienced the Self.

 

That was so funny! I must have lost 1/4 pound off my belly from the laughing.

 

Peace & Love!

[Vajrahridaya]

ame='dwai' date='25 July 2010 - 10:50 AM'

The first quote from Samyutta Nikaya seems to suggest that there is some kind of rebirth. If there is rebirth then there has to be something that is common between the two births. That would suggest that there is a self.

 

 

 

That's exactly what I said to V the Buddhist. He just ignored me.

 

I don't think I did ignore you. I cannot remember. Anyhow, what is in common is the deeply formless clinging to self, which is what the Alaya Vijnana is. All that is needed to remember past lives is awareness of connections. The identifying with connections as a self sustained self is all that's happening in each moment. It's a necessary function of the aggregates. It is what makes mind streams unique. When one realizes Anatta or no-self anywhere, then the Alaya Vijnana with all it's information since beginningless time turns into the endless expression of Buddhahood and thus the Alaya Vijnana is the basis for the result Dharma-body or Dharmakaya. Until the Alaya Vijana has been emptied of all it's seeds of clinging, it continues to produce the effects of clinging from formless to form realms from deep in the unconscious of a sentient being from a bug to a horse to a human or alien.

 

It does not take a transcending of phenomena essence to remember past lives according to the Buddhas take on re-birth.

[Vajrahridaya]

I think you guys cling to "Non-Self" because you haven't really experienced the Self.

 

The opposite could be said.

 

I've experienced deep formless samadhi with shining bliss. I experienced what Hindus call the Self daily as a devout Shaivite living in an Ashram meditating 4 hours a day and chanting 6 while offering Seva in the food service line amongst other Sevas. It wasn't until I really started studying Buddhadharma that I realized my error in identifying the deep concept-less states of consciousness as a Self. Just like the Buddha taught, the formless samadhi of "infinite consciousness" arises dependent upon a certain type of focus and that's it and is not to be considered a Self of all. Through these various states of formless samadhi I experienced the blue light of "The Self" suffuse everything and I experienced heightened powers of perception. Buddha tantra just calls this the conscious illumination of infinite space and not the light of an absolute Self. So I realized that the experiences are relative and arise dependently, endlessly.

 

If you would prefer it, I could call "Self" something else...but you guys won't buy that either. Non-Phenomenal Self stabilizes into Non-Dual realization. There is no "A consciousness", there is only Consciousness...which doesn't need an object to make one realize it, because one is already that consciousness.

 

This understanding only leads to positive future rebirths in a Brahma realms of one sort or another as the Buddha said. This understanding also leads to a slight obscuration of pride of existence, thus the seed of ignorant re-becoming and forgetfulness is not obliterated because dependent origination is not realized on an intuitive level.

 

The Buddha discovered the insight of dependent origination only after he experienced the samadhis of infinite space, infinite consciousness, infinite nothingness and neither perception nor non-perception. He said that dependent origination is a subtler insight. I do agree based upon personal and direct experience.

 

Shankaras critique of the Alaya Vijnana is quite weak in my opinion as he doesn't understand dependent origination and how it applies to the subtle obscuration of Alaya Vijnana. It is a formless unconscious that persists due to the persistent clinging to existence as absolute and not relative.

Edited July 31, 2010 by Vajrahridaya

[Lucky7Strikes]

If you can describe it, it is a phenomenon. If it is not, it is non-phenomenon.

This doesn't make much sense. Describe the phenomena of a tissue box. And you would give me a list of descriptions, its shape, its form, it's atomic structure, its purpose, its place in culture, and so on. But none of descriptions would be the very experience of the tissue box, only representations of experiences related to "tissue box." Experience of tissue box is vastly different from context to context when it is represented via symbols, only direct experience reveals it as it is. So the tissue box can't really be described, because description creates another "tissue box" within the mind, the mind formulates a representation, which is yet another tissue box altogether. And from these false habits of thought, be believe "tissue box" as an inherently existing phenomena.

 

So is "tissue box" a phenomenon that can be found? Is a separate phenomena actually locatable?

 

Consciousness cannot be described, it's structure cannot be explained...there can be feeble attempts, like "hearing taste and smelling sound" but these are not sound. It cannot be experienced because it is the source of experience...without it no dependent origination...it is the only and absolute requirement for existence. Without it, Buddhists would not be able to try and prove that it is a phenomenon.

 

As a corollary thereof, a phenomenon is something with a beginning and an end. It is either a percept or a concept or both percept and concept (so in other words, it has a form or a label or both). It is either temporal or spatial+temporal or temporal or spatial.

Everything neither has a beginning or an end. When does spring begin and the winter end? When is childhood over and adulthood begin? Where does my body begin and end?

 

I used the examples of "hearing taste" and "smelling sound" for different uses than the reasons you use them.

 

Consciousness cannot be experienced, but is the source of experience? Can you clarify this statement? Are you saying that we cannot experience consciousness?

 

Moreover, I don't think Buddhists see consciousness as phenomena. Rather that in experience the two are inseparable. It is not a materialist teaching, as in there is only a material, phenomenal reality because then we wouldn't be conscious, unless you want to say that a piece of rock is conscious. The teaching but lies in the middle of both, so it's said "luminous-emptiness", seeing both elements in experience as one manifestation.

Edited July 31, 2010 by Lucky7Strikes

[Vajrahridaya]

If you can describe it, it is a phenomenon. If it is not, it is non-phenomenon. Consciousness cannot be described, it's structure cannot be explained...there can be feeble attempts, like "hearing taste and smelling sound" but these are not sound. It cannot be experienced because it is the source of experience...without it no dependent origination...it is the only and absolute requirement for existence. Without it, Buddhists would not be able to try and prove that it is a phenomenon.

 

When you have insight into the 12 links, you realize that consciousness is a dependent arising and thus this pride of existence does not persist. Also the idea that the cosmos is a manifestation of a divine and transcendent being does not persist as well. One finally has the insight of infinite regress.

 

As a corollary thereof, a phenomenon is something with a beginning and an end. It is either a percept or a concept or both percept and concept (so in other words, it has a form or a label or both). It is either temporal or spatial+temporal or temporal or spatial.

 

Consciousness does not inherently exist but exists relative to subtle causes and conditions within the elements, and one can have insight that transcends it's persistence through ones mind stream since beginningless time. So the insight of Buddha transcends itself you see. It is not based upon an independently originating self, other than the fact that it's transcendence is based upon the fact that there is a relative self to transcend, and that there are those that cling to a notion of an absolute Self that this too is possible to be transcended.

Edited July 31, 2010 by Vajrahridaya

[3bob]

Interesting V, if I'm hearing you correctly in regards to your sentence: "...It is a formless unconscious that persists due to the persistent clinging to existence as absolute and not relative"; as being one of your key interpretations of "Buddhism" then you have just attempted to refute the Buddha in his teachings of the Surangama Sutra concerning the "Absolute"... since the Absolute he points to does not exist relatively as you imply but "beyond".

 

Om