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Simple_Jack

Substance Dualism in Buddhadharma

By Simple_Jack, in Buddhist Textual Studies

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Simple_Jack
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This is a collection of posts, from Loppon Malcolm, explaining the epistemological advantage of Dzogchen, when revealing the false mind-matter dichotomy. Though this comparison is made between the lower yanas of Buddhism: it can be concluded, without doubt, that this mind-body dichotomy is a prominent feature among Eastern and Western philosophical traditions:

 

Now we are entering the realm of Ati yoga, where we discover that actually the fundamental state of our being is our physical body - our existence as body ~ Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche
...only in Dzogchen teachings is the substance dualism that is a prime feature of Buddhist thought from abhidharma right up the the lower tantras truly overcome in an explicit fashion.
The manner in which the other schools resolved this is through recourse to a species of mentalism i.e. the subtle inner madhyamaka, if you will...
No, seriously -- for example, Khyentse Wangchuk declares that there is no difference between mind and matter because everything is established as mind. This is perfectly acceptable thing to say in a Lamdre context. I have seen the same statement [everything is established as mind] coming from Gelugpas when they explain how one is to practice Vajrayāna, as opposed to how the Gelug sutra view is formed and asserted. This is also how the Kagyus phrase things.

This is not how Dzogchen deals with the issue at all. Please bear in mind that not everything said by Nyingmapas necessarily reflects the view of Dzogchen.
If you elevate everything to the ultimate level, even "...matter is unconditioned without anything missing", as it says in the Yum Chenmo, the sutra of Perfect Wisdom in 100,000 lines.

But the Buddhist scholastics from Sarvastivada up to Dharmakirti have always maintained a hard division between mind and matter, between nāma on the one hand and rūpa on the other. For example, in the account of the twelve links in the Vibhanga, the Pali Abhidharma compendium, when discussing the twelve nidanas, it even leaves off the rūpa in the nidana of nāmarūpa, running ignorance, formations, consciousness, name, etc.

The Yogacara school attempts to supercede this dualism through asserting that everything is fundamentally a projection of the mind -- in fact the 15th century Lamdre Master Khyentse Wangchuk states, there is no dualism of mind and matter because everything is mind.

As we know, Madhyamaka adopts the conventional truth either according to the Sautrantika system, or the Yogacara system. But since it's own perspective is grounded in the Prajñāpāramitasūtras, it regards distinctions such as mind and matter to be merely conventional designations that do not have any real basis apart from imputation.

But we can see that this division is well preserved in Buddhist tantric literature (as well as Hindu tantric literature) when we find for example that the mind is described as a rider of a horse, vāyu. This is because both forms of tantra, Buddhist as well as Hindu, are concerned with the mechanics of the body for understanding how to gain realization through our embodiment through the practice of various kinds of yoga.

Granted, this is sometimes is found in Dzogchen literature as well. But when we examine that actual system of Dzogchen according to the ancient Dzogchen tantras, we find that in fact even consciousness itself is generated phsyiologically in the body by a vāyu. I have yet to find in an original Dzogchen tantra the common Buddhist term khams drug, sadadhātu i.e. earth, water, fire, air, space and consciousness. I may yet find it, but at least the Valby KWIC tool does not in fact list it in the 83 or so important Dzogchen tantras that he converted into searchable text files. It also does not list every instance of thod rgal in the Dzogchen tantras as well so its look up routines are not completely infallible. But there are hundreds of references to the five elements ('byung lnga, pañcabhutani).

I have been also examining the Mdzod phug lately, Bon "Abhidharma" and cosmology, is largely freed from the constraints of Buddhist conservatism, has very interesting things to say about the five elements and so on, and when is a text clearly influenced by Dzogchen. A kind of Dzogchen Abhidharma. One of the reasons why I started looking into this text is that the Rigpa Rangshar tantra contains a very brief mention of a primordial egg cosmology which accounts for the formation of the world, similar to the Vedas and Bon:

Now, to demonstrate the ignorance of the object of delusion: delusion is deluded by the forgoing. The field is prior to the formation of the world; a so called “wish-fulfilling tree” grows, a tree growing from the blessing of the youthful vase body of the buddha, born from warmth and moisture which arose from an egg. The Sahāloka formed from the mind disturbing the so-called self-originated wisdom in that. That is called the ignorance of the field of delusion.
A tantra called Uprooting Delusion from the dgongs pa zang thal cycle provides the following description:

The way sentient beings arise:
that nameless general ground,
is non-conceptual and not established at all,
invisible and unclear, from which
when the bifurcation occurs,
since vāyu, vidyā, and space separate, [3/b]
the intrinsic sound of the elements produces vibration.
From the inside of the darkness of the clear part of appearances,
as soon as a storm of fire emerges,
scattering everywhere,
Vidyā, like the mind of a lunatic,
is dazed and reeling.
Since vidyā lacks confidence in its own appearances,
it panics at sound, is frightened of rays,
and through awareness not taking its own place,
the ignorance that arises simultaneously with it
is called “the causal ignorance.

Because of a lack of mindful attention,
self and other are grasped as a duality,
and both outer and inner dependent origination occur.
The whole universe arises
through awareness looking externally.
All sentient being arise
through awareness looking internally.
Through looking there, fearful appearances arise,
through looking here, ‘self’ arises.
Many mistakes arise from the single mistake
about the appearances of here and there.
Because of being mistaken about a self, there is a mistake about other,
attachment to self, aversion to other.
From the seed of attachment and aversion,
the whole outer universe and inhabitants are mistakes.
Because one is held as two, [4/a]
that is called the delusion of dualistic grasping.
Since one imputed and mistook outer and inner,
that is called “the imputing ignorance”.
Because of familiarity of subject and object of that,
from the thick buildup of traces,
there was entrance into the state of samsara.
That is how the six migrations occurred.”
...the String of Pearls states:

Having been gripped by the apprehender and apprehended
in the aggregates, elements and gateways,
one remains in samsara itself for a long while,
within the belly of the three realms
one is placed in the prison of name and matter, [352]
bound by the chains of ignorance,
covered with dense black darkness of samsara,
attached to the spicy taste of passion,
one is bound by the noose of confusion,
tormented by the hot fire of hatred,
one’s head is covered by pride,
the gates of jealously are locked,
surrounded by the armies of resentment and so on,
tied about the neck with the noose of apprehender and apprehended,
stuck in the swamp of past traces,
one’s hands are shackled with ripened karma,
the mother of karma is joined with her child,
one following the other just like a water wheel,
alternating between good and bad bodies,
born in different forms,
and through heightening one’s self-grasping
one sinks to the bottom of the ocean of suffering,
one’s heart is grabbed by the goad of the evil destinies,
one binds oneself with the enemy, afflictions.
Fire appears as water to hell beings,
as hunger and thirst to hungry ghosts,
as fog to animals.
the aggregates, gateways and elements appears as the five elements to humans,
those are also pleasurable, painful and neutral,
as weapons and armor to asuras,
and as desirable things to gods.
For example, just like a rapidly spinning fire wheel
one abides continuously in samsara for a long while.
Such various appearances are like seeing a snake in a rope
since what isn’t there is held to be there,
both the outer and inner container and contents form,
and if that is investigated, it is a rope,
i.e. the container and contents are already empty
the ultimate with the form of the relative."

The mistake then is seeing as there what isn't there, which is why this tantra, among others uses the rope/snake example. What this tantra is stating is that deluded appearances we see that are predicated in the basis do not exist in the basis and are not appearances of the basis, but rather misapprehensions of the appearance of the basis.

 

Sentient beings are deluded about the display of the basis. When they cease to be so deluded, they are buddhas.

The basis never displays as anything other than the five lights.

Further, The Luminous Space states:

  • That mind is produced out of the dualistic grasping
    to the six objects of the manifestation of wisdom.

How can that [mind] be produced? Since [the mind] is produced from that ignorance that does not recognize the intrinsic manifestation of wisdom [the mind] is produced.


Sentient beings, rocks and trees are assembled by delusion about the basis. But the basis only displays one way. It does not display as both samsara and nirvana.


Since that critical point of luminous empty vidyā was not recognized, grasping onto that produced the five elements, and the causal thigle [was produced] from the refined part of those. The body was produced from that [refined part] and energy [rtsal] of wisdom produces the five sense gates in that [body]. Within those [sense gates] the five wisdoms are produced. The five [sense gates] grasping onto those [five wisdoms produce] the five afflictions. After first being created by the energy of wisdom; in the middle, it was not recognized that the body of the refined part of the assembled elements actually is the five wisdoms, since this was not realized, through intellectual views, the non-sentient and sentient both appear, but don’t believe it. Here, it is actually five wisdoms to begin with; in the middle, when the body is formed from assembly of the elements through ignorance grasping onto those [five wisdoms] also, it is actually the five wisdoms. The five aggregates, sense organs, and afflictions also are actually the five wisdoms. In the end, since one transcends accepting, rejecting, proofs, and negations since those are realized to not be real. As such, the sign of non-duality is [the body] disappearing into wisdom without any effluents because the critical point of the non-duality or sameness of the non-sentient and the sentient was understood according to the Guru’s intimate instruction.

The basis only is the five wisdoms and only displays as the five wisdoms -- the rest is delusion. Ignorance [avidyā] is not a display of the basis, it is delusion about the display of the basis. Knowledge is not a display of the basis, it is the absence of delusion about the display of the basis.

One basis, two paths, two results.


http://vajracakra.com/viewtopic.php?f=59&t=1203&start=140

According to the sNying thig tradition, at the time of the result the division between animate and inanimate vanishes.
The distinction vanishes. The basic view of man ngag sde is that the light, the visible expression of wisdom, is reified into the five elements. When that reification is dissolved, also the perception of a difference between the animate and inanimate dissolves, since the five elements pervade all phenomena including mind/consciousness. Actually, the view of man ngag sde is that even consciousness itself is a product of the five elements. But this is not a problem since the actual nature of the five elements is the five wisdoms.
Yes, this is how Dzogchen can give a physicalist account of consciousness while avoiding the charge of being physicalists, i.e., because the appearance of the sentient and the non-sentient arises out of the a misperception of the five lights of the basis.
...Since the brain is made of five elements, it too is made of the five wisdoms (ye shes) of vidyā. Therefore, there is no problem with awareness, etc., having a basis in the body. Actually, what we say in Dzogchen is that the wisdom of vidyā is located in the heart, the energy of vidyā is located in the brain, where it governs sense organs and cognitions.
Wisdom has no origin, it formed naturally. Hence the metaphor of the peacock feather.

The elements form from the non-recognition of of the five lights of connected with the five wisdoms.
The Khandro Nyinthig states:

  • Since that mind arose as automatic manifestation of six mental apprehenders, the five elements are produced. Since those are not recognized as the five wisdoms, the five elements assemble in dependence upon grasping those [five wisdoms]. Since those assemble, the body forms through the action of one [element] assisting the other. With that forms the apprehended and the apprehender.

And:
  • As such, that basis, the natural reality of things, the great intrinsic energy of wisdom, the dharmakāya, was not recognized, and because of the stains of grasping to it, the elements assemble; the body forms from them, and based on that [body], one wanders in samsara until one ages and dies.


And:
  • Since the five energies of wisdom are unceasing, the body forms from the five elements. Since two kāyas are integrated with the relative elements, that previous understanding of the intrinsic energy of wisdom is totally forgotten. The ultimate four elements is the dharmakāya, the relative four elements is the sambogakāya. Nirmanakāya is the lack of sameness and difference of the two kāyas.

And:
  • To sum it all up, ignorant attachment to dualistic appearances assembles the energy of wisdom into the elements, and forms the body in actuality.

And:
  • Energy is produced unceasingly from that wisdom. Since that energy was not recognized, that apparent and natureless radiant luminosity of wisdom arose as the empty luminosity of the five lights. [430] Within that, since this thinker of thoughts grasps the unceasing energy of wisdom, and since that five colored energy is assembled as the elements, therefore, the body, flesh, blood, warmth, breath, channels and so on are formed from that energy of wisdom. For as long as the mind and the body do not separate, the channels, vāyus, bindus, wisdoms and so on are inseparable. Since that is not recognized as such and the one is grasped as many, like the nameless becoming named, since the five wisdoms, the five afflictions, and so on are divisions in one thing, also those wishing for Buddhahood have aggregates, without contacting the meaning of this even slightly. With this everything is recognized as coming from the energy of wisdom. Since inseparability is recognized, therefore the defiled also comes from the energy of wisdom. Also that self-liberated from the mind, and as the defiled does not appear, Buddhahood is attained in the expanse of wisdom. Therefore, it is inseparable. Others hold them as different, and respond with practice.

And:
  • ... after the body formed because the energy of initial vidyā was not recognized as wisdom, there is delusion because of the grasping of materiality, and wandering in samsara.

And:
  • The relative material bindu is the intrinsic radiance of those five wisdoms of the originally pure dharmadhātu externally manifesting as five lights, after which, the elements are produced upon the mere traces of grasping of the mind. Further, the natural reality of that mind (that established in anyway) is space. Whether that is like this or not, the energy of that vivid luminosity arising as the diversity, that is called “vāyu”, it is called “mind”. Though luminosity is called mind, because of movement, it is called “vāyu”. When examined, it is not established in anyway. Also luminosity is not established, also movement is not established, also inseparability is not established.

    Since that is not recognized, since that energy that grasps so called “vāyu” produces heat, there is fire. For example, just as when sweat and heat is produced when a person does hard work, [fire] is produced from that grasping onto heat. When the heat of fire touches the ground, water is produced in the form of vapor. Since grasping onto that energy of wisdom arose, the outer five elements are produced, caused one by one. The five elements form matter. Since grasping onto that arose, the five elements assemble, and the body forms through the condition of the five refined parts of those [elements], one by one.

    If it is asked why, now then to begin with, the energy of wisdom is vāyu, from that is heat; from that, earth; from that, water: since each assists another, the body develops more i.e. the body actually forms out of the refined part of the five elements. That [body] is pervaded by the refined part of the five elements. The refined parts and that energy of wisdom are given the name “channels, vāyus, and bindu”. The energy of wisdom is the five elements. Since wisdom is present in them, there are five wisdoms. That is given the name material bindu. Wisdom is inseparably present within that material bindu.

And:
  • Further, to begin with, the body is formed by ignorance of the wisdom of basis. The nature of wisdom in that body is the refined part of the five elements, present in the material bindu as the play of the kāyas and wisdoms. Since their luminous radiance arose as light, it is given the name “three wisdoms”.

And:
  • Though the body is formed form ignorance of the basis, as soon as that is recognized, it is not beyond wisdom in the beginning, the end and in the middle.

Etc. this text just goes on and on in the same vein.
While there are of course Dzogchen texts that describe mind and body as separate, in general, the innermost secret cycle holds that the perception that there is a difference between the animate and inanimate is a mistaken one. In the state of ultimate liberation [i.e. samyaksambuddhahood], the distinction between animate and inanimate disappears because it is not true. Further, like other Vajrayāna traditions, Dzogchen provides a physical account for the process of rebirth for example in the Vajramala Tantra: it is proposed that the alayavijñāna, which is inseparable with the mahāprāṇavāyu, is responsible for transmigration; for the appropriation of a new series of aggregates. But Dzogchen goes a step further and explicitly identifies consciousness as the operation of a vāyu in the body. Vāyus of course are the function of the refined element of air inside the human body.
The point is that in Dzogchen teachings mind and matter are not treated as different substances as they are in other Buddhist systems. They are equally treated as producers of the five elements. The way in which Dzogchen avoids the charge of being "physicalist" is that the five elements themselves arise from misperception of the nature of the basis [more or less emptiness endowed with light], without needing the intermediate step of proposing everything is an appearance of mind and so on. And of course the awareness that misperceives the basis arises out of a vāyu that stirs in the basis, and so on. It gets a little complex....
...basically the point being underscored is that matter and intelligence are non-dual. For example, it is a special tenet of Dzogchen that even the formless realms are material, i.e., that basically, wherever there is matter, there is consciousness, wherever there is consciousness, there is matter. You can either say that matter is intrinsically conscious or that consciousness is intrinsically embodied. Either way it amounts to the same thing. "Sentient" and "non-sentient" are merely conventional designations based on appearances generated by ignorance....
No, not photons, not physical light in the western scientific sense of the term. Precisely, the basis is ye shes. Empty luminous energetic ye shes which appears to a neutral awareness (which itself rises out of the basis when a vāyu in the basis stirs).
The basis is called the basis because it has not been realized.

At present the basis is not latent, like it is between eons. At present the basis is in a state of manifestation as Buddhas and sentient beings. When the basis is latent, we term it "the time of the basis" or "the bardo of samsara and nirvana". After the basis manifests we term this phase "samsara and nirvana turn their backs to one another".
When we fully realize the path of dzogchen, it is called "the universe manifests as the basis": in other words, our total experience will be the three wisdoms subsumed under the name, great original purity.

The basis itself has not changed in anyway during these three time periods.
When the latent awareness (shes pa bag la nyal] of the basis recognizes the basis as its own display, it becomes prajñā [shes rab] and realizes buddhahood as Samantabhadra.

When the latent awareness of the basis does not recognize itself, under the power of the imputing ignorance that imputs appearances as other and that awarness as a self, it becomes consciousness [rnam par shes pa].

The 'latent awareness of the basis' is an aggregate name for all those beings who have not acheived total buddhahood in the previous eon, but acheived a so called "buddhahood that reverts to the cause", [as I have explained now several times within the last few weeks] in the same way that we refer to the aggregated consciousnesses of all sentient beings as the vijñānadhātu, along with dhātus of earth, water, air, fire and space, the so called sadadhātu, the six dhātus.
It is part of the rtsal of the basis....

The basis is not one thing, it is not many. It is the dharmadhātu...
...This is basically how it is -- but since there is no individuating consciousnesses driven by affliction, the awareness latent in the basis is not discussed in plural terms, that is until there are individuating consciousnesses when samasara and nirvana "turn their back to each other".
Oh, this comes about because of traces of action and ignorance. Nothing in the basis changes, of course, what happens is that there is sort of cosmic pulsation of ignorance and its subsidance which results in the appearance and disappearance of samsara and nirvana; and as we know, traces can accumulate in wisdom.

You have to understand that all of this explanation of cosmic cycles is really intended to be brought down to the level of the individual's life cycle in terms of the four bardos:

The bardo of death == destruction of the universe up to the two higher form realms
The bardo of dharmatā == the arising of the sound, light and rays of the basis
The bardo of becoming == non-recognition of the basis
The natural bardo of this life == the appearance of samsara and nirvana

It is an explanation for practice.
Correct, the aspect of the basis called compassion is the energy of the display of the universe and all its beings....
Real "pure" view means seeing universe and beings arising as the basis. The "pure" view in Vajrayāna is merely a conceptual construction which itself needs to be remedied with the completion stage. Dzogchen skips the two stages....
There are two bases, the original general basis and the basis of the person.

 

A mind or an awareness [shes pa] has a "choice" recognition or non-recognition. The recognizing mind is called vidyā or prajñā. The non-recognizing mind is called avidyā.

There are two kinds of Buddhahood in Dzogchen, abhisambodhi, which has a non-abiding nirvana; samyaksambodhi which enters nirvana without remainder.

Omniscience arises because the capacity for omniscience is present in the form of potential in the basis.

 

When one has eliminated the traces of affliction and action in one's own five elements, one's body reverts to its original state as five lights, hence "The body of light".

 

The theory of the body of light is predicted on the fundamental state of reality being something called wisdom, which has five lights, which are reified as physical matter. Upon completion of the path, one sees this matter in its real nature once again and the elements of the body "revert" to their original nature as wisdom (i.e. through the process of thogal one eradicates all the afflictive obscurations which prevent one from seeing things just as they are (yathabhutaṃ)); Body of light is a realization....

 

It's only necessary, to understand the difference between the use of 'alaya' in Mahamudra and Dzogchen, in this way:

 

In Mahāmudra and Lamdre, ālaya refers to the nature of the mind i.e. inseperable clarity and emptiness [of one's mind]. In Dzogchen ālaya refers to ignorance...

 

If anyone's interested in understanding tathagatagarbha/alayavijnana according to sutrayana and vajrayana here's some links in no particular order:

 

http://www.vajracakra.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=688

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?

f=102&t=6823&p=84637&hilit=alayavijnana%3Bchandrakirti#p84637

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?f=102&t=6731&start=120

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?f=39&t=4056

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?f=51&t=5219

http://www.scribd.com/doc/99264798/A-Comparison-of-%C4%80laya-Vijn%C4%81na-in-Yog%C4%81c%C4%81ra-and-Dzogchen - comparison of alayavijnana in Yogacara and Dzogchen

Edited by Simple_Jack
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http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?f=48&t=3943&hilit=external+approach

 

Prior to analyzing phenomena as mind-only, mind and matter are conventionally regarded as a dualism even in Yogacara. Why, because the imputed nature is exactly the conventional world.

Also in standard Madhyamaka, on the conventional level mind and matter are regarded as distinct.

While the annutarayoga tantras move in the direction of dissolving the distinction between mind and matter, the substance dualism in Buddhism is only satisfactorily resolved in Dzogchen (but not by regarding all phenomena as mind-- which is a point of view rejected by Longchenpa incoherent).

In Dzogchen, mind and matter are regarded as seamlessly welded, not that mind has primacy over matter. Dzogchen texts even go so far as to reject the formless realm as truly formless.

This is why for example the Khandro Nyinthig states very clearly "Sometimes we say "citta", sometimes "vāyu",but the meaning is the same."Vāyu is just the element of air i.e. motility present in matter. This also accounts for rebirth. In the Guhyasamaja, for example, the ālayavijñāna is wedded to the mahāprāṇavāyu -- this union allows rebirth to happen.

...

 

In Dzogchen, mind and matter exist because of avidya. When there is no more avidyā, for you there is neither mind nor matter.

 

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=3979&start=60

 

You cannot separate the pure sadhadhatu (wisdom and five lights) from the impure sadadhātu (consciousness and five elements). The difference is only vidyā or avidyā.

The sadadhātu are a model that is capable of encompassing any state of matter or mind, no matter how subtle or gross, macro, micro, nano, subatomic, etc....

The medicine tantra states:

"No formation without earth, no cohesion without water, no maturation without fire, no development without air, and no room for development without space."

 

http://www.misterdanger.net/books/Buddhism%20Books/Religion%20medicine%20%26%20human%20embryo%20Tibet.pdf - Religion, Medicine, and the Human Embryo in Tibet

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http://www.dharmawhe...15425&start=420

 

... All awarenesses are conditioned. There is no such thing as a universal undifferentiated ultimate awareness in Buddhadharma. Even the omniscience of a Buddha arises from a cause....

 

Omniscience is the content of a mind freed of afflictions. Even the continuum of a Buddha has a relative ground, i.e. a the rosary or string of moments of clarity is beginingless.

Origination from self is axiomatically negated in Buddhadharma,

Each moment in the continuum of a knowing clarity is neither the same as nor different than the previous moment. Hence the cause of a given instant of a knowing clarity cannot be construed to be itself nor can it be construed to be other than itself. This is the only version of causation which, in the final analysis, Buddhadharma can admit to on a relative level. It is the logical consequence of the Buddha's insight, "When this exists, that exists, with the arising of that, this arose."...

 

Cognitions arise based on previous cognitions. That's all.

If you suggest anything other than this, you wind up in Hindu La la land....

 

http://www.dharmawhe...15425&start=440

 

This occurs because of latent traces of karma and affliction left over from the previous eon, according to a commentary attributed to Garab Dorje on the Single Son of All the Buddhas Tantras.

So this neutral awareness that rises out of the basis upon the stirring of vāyu in the basis actually has a cause.

Amazing!
Mere clear vidyā, this mere intermediate realization,
it is not a buddha, is not a sentient beings,
neutral, dependent on both conditions.
For example, it is like a stainless crystal ball,
which can produce fire or water through the condition of the sun or the moon.
Likewise, vidyā, the essence of the mind,
arises as the suffering of samsara or the bliss of nirvana through conditions.

The Three Kāyas Tantra from the Ka dag rang shar...

 

The basis does not have a cause, just like space does not have a cause. But it is a repository for the build up of traces nevertheless.


The way samsara arose at first is, when the trio of vāyu, vidyā and space arose from the undifferentiated basis, since vidyā was unstable because of isolation, and engaged in self-delusion, panicked at sound, frightened of the light, and fainted at the light and was covered by ignorance. After it engages in self-delusion, the duality of outer objects and inner mind arises. The mere thought of self arising from other, and other arising from self, disturbed the karmavāyus. Mind is built up by the vāyu, the analytical mind analyzes objects. The self-deluded awareness demarcated sensation and since it did not recognize it own appearances, apparent objects were apprehended as a duality. Since that accumulated traces of karma, a physical body was appropriated and the suffering of delusion is uninterrupted. For example, sentient being formed out of ignorance are like being stuck pitch dark.

The Clear Lamp from the Ka dag rang shar

The whole process is clearly personal and individual, not transpersonal....

 

Space is a repository for all things, one does not have to reify space to understand that.

"Rang byung ye shes" means "wisdom that arises from oneself". This point is very clearly explained in many places.

In any event, we can consider that the Vima Nyinthig commentary attributed to Garab Dorje authoritative:

"From now on, the stirred pit of samsara will no appear as the six kinds of living beings. for twenty thousand eons, sentient beings, having severed the stream of samsara, will not appear with a bodily form. After that, from the arising of the subtle latent defilements of different actions, it will be equivalent with the production of the previous samsara and nirvana"

Thus we find out that all this business about the basis and so on is really just a way to talk about what happens in the so called dark eons, when everything below the third and fourth rūpadhātu are held to disappear, even though the origin of the basis is often couched in terms to place in an unimaginable primeval beginning.

Its a Buddhist way to try to talk about origins without talking about origins. "I can't find where it started so I am going to call it 'self-originated'." But if someone thinks it is pointing to some transcendental uber consciousness, well, if that is what someone thinks, I think someone doesn't really understand Dzogchen at all. If someone thinks the basis is consciousness, or some cognitive or noetic principle, they have understood nothing...

 

Nyibum* states:

As such, because the basis, one’s unfabricated mind, arose as the essence of reality of a single nature, there is no need to search elsewhere for the place etc., i.e. it is called self-originated wisdom.

The basis is nothing more nor nothing less this.

*the son of Zhang stong Chobar, the terton of the Vima Nyinthig...

 

http://www.dharmawhe...15425&start=460

 

...So basically, all that fancy Dzogchen lingo about the basis and so on is really just talking about a mind stream that is proposed to have a primordial start point which is completely free of proliferation.


We can trust Nyibum about this because his father invented/revealed the Nyinthig tradition and he himself was a great scholar who studied widely...

 

It doesn't really mean anything. The continuum of a mind has no beginning. What is being proposed in (some) Dzogchen texts is that at some idealized point in the most distant past beyond our imagination there was a time when our mind was in a state of non-fabrication. At that time this non-fabricated mind, aka the basis, was not aware of itself or anything else but contains within it all the qualities of buddhahood. Then somehow, and it is never really explained how, our own mind's cognitive potentiality [rtsal] stirs and rises up ['phags] out of itself giving rise to neutral awareness that either becomes prajñā or ignorance depending on whether it recognizes its own potentiality or not. This kicks off the division between samsara and nirvana. It is completely personal and is not transpersonal at all. But unfortunately, because Dzogchen texts are not very clear about this, the account of the basis tends to be interpreted transpersonally, most likely due to the proliferation of Advaita.

It is my deeply held conviction that this transpersonal account which is favored by many people is a total misunderstanding based on reading these texts in Tibetan for the past 20 years and receiving detailed teachings on them from a variety of very qualified masters....

 

I prefer to put my faith in the guy whose father started the whole Nyinthig thing. And what is says is verified in many Dzogchen tantras, both from the bodhcitta texts as well as others.

The basis is not a backdrop. Everything is not separate from the basis. But that everything just means your own skandhas, dhātus and āyatanas. There is no basis outside your mind, just as there is no Buddhahood outside of your mind....

 

So is the basis. They are both dharmas.

Or as the Great Garuda has it when refuting Madhyamaka:

Since phenomena and nonphenomena have always been merged and are inseparable,
there is no further need to explain an “ultimate phenomenon”.

An 12th century commentary on this text states (but not this passage):

Amazing bodhicitta (the identity of everything that becomes the basis of pursuing the meaning that cannot be seen nor realized elsewhere than one’s vidyā) is wholly the wisdom of the mind distinct as the nine consciousnesses that lack a nature.

In the end, Dzogchen is really just another Buddhist meditative phenomenology of the mind and person and that is all....

 

http://www.dharmawhe...15425&start=480

 

Because these things are regarded as afflictive, whereas Dzogchen is trying to describe the person in his or her originally nonafflictive condition. It really is just that simple. The so called general basis is a universal derived from the particulars of persons. That is why it is often mistaken for a transpersonal entity. But Dzogchen, especially man ngag sde is very grounded in Buddhist Logic, and one should know that by definition universals are considered to be abstractions and non-existents in Buddhism, and Dzogchen is no exception....

 

It's your own rigpa, not a transpersonal rigpa, being a function of your own mind. That mind is empty....

 

The distinction is crucial. If this distinction is not made, Dzogchen sounds like Vedanta....

 

The way that great transference body arises:
when all appearances have gradually been exhausted,
when one focuses one’s awareness on the appearances strewn about
on the luminous maṇḍala of the five fingers of one’s hand,
the environment and inhabitants of the universe
returning from that appearance are perceived as like moon in the water.
One’s body is just a reflection,
self-apparent as the illusory body of wisdom;
one obtains a vajra-like body.
One sees one’s body as transparent inside and out.
The impure eyes of others cannot see one’s body as transparent,
but only the body as it was before...

Shabkar, Key to One Hundred Doors of Samadhi

Outer appearances do not disappear even when great transference body is attained. What disappears are the inner visions, that is what is exhausted, not the outer universe with its planets, stars, galaxies, mountains, oceans, cliffs, houses, people and sentient beings....

 

Rigpa is just knowing, the noetic quality of a mind. That is all it is....

 

http://www.dharmawhe...15425&start=520

 

The basis, as I have already shown, is just your own clear and empty mind. There is no vidyā apart from your own mind's vidyā....

 

...the neutral awareness that can become vidyā or avidyā comes from the basis. As I said the basis is just your own mind. It is not some unitary ontological basis for everything. If it were, it would be no different than brahman. Say that it isn't sat is no help, since brahman too is considered beyond existence and non-existence. If there is a difference, it is that the basis, one's own mind, is also not established....

 

http://www.dharmawhe...15425&start=540

 

In the highest Yogacara school, the non-aspectarian school, there is in fact no container universe to reincarnate into since the containers universe is merely a projection of seeds in the ālayavijñāna.

Dzogchen does not reject the outer universe in the same. Instead it interprets the pre/non-afflictive states of the five elements as "the five lights". But we can understand that the most subtle form of the five elements exist within consciousness. Wisdom is also just a name for a pre/un-obscured consciousness.

The basis is not a universal phenomena. though it is discussed in a manner resembling that for convenience. Each person has their own basis. This is why each person experiences delusion and liberation separately and at different times.

Because the basis seems to be discussed as it it were some universal "pleroma", to borrow a phrase from the Gnostics, this causes some people to go off the deep end and conclude it is some universal phenomena out of which everything arises rather than be a quality shared by everything that arises....

 

It is simple: the basis has nothing to do with afflicted mind, the one we ordinarily experience.The two statements may be reconciled in the following way.

The basis is simply a way of talking about the components of the universe — earth, water, fire, air, space and consciousness — from the point of view their luminous intrinsic purity. A way of saying this in Tibetan in Dzogchen terms would be ཆོས་ཐམས་ཅད་རང་བཞིན་གྱིས་ཀ་དག་དང་ལྷུན་གྲབ (all phenomena are pure and naturally perfect by nature); a gsar ma equivalent presentation might run ཆོས་ཐམས་ཅད་རང་བཞིན་གྱིས་དག་པ་དང་འོད་གསལ་བ (all phenomena are pure and luminous by nature).

The Kalacakra tantra makes a very important point about this, as Tagtshang Lotsawa points out in his survey of the Vimalaprabha:

Great bliss and empty forms [śunyatābimba, stong gzugs] are shown to exist in the basis with this wisdom element of the basis [gzhi] because Bhagavan Vajsattva Mahāsukha explains that all three realms exist in oneself in the commentary of the third verse of this [adhyātma] chapter, and it is established through the citation of the root text and commentary of “wisdom merged into emptiness”.

What is this wisdom? He again clarifies:

Bearing the name “wisdom”, this consciousness that exists pervading the bodies of all sentient beings is merged into that emptiness which pervades all sentient beings, including the sentient beings of the bardo and the formless realm. This is taught in the commentary as existing through a relative mode.

In Kalacakra, for example, the wisdom element is considered to be the five elements counted as one. Tatshang again:

As such, from among the ten elements, the first five are enumerated individually, i.e., the elements of space, air, fire, water and earth. Counting the latter five as one, since they are made into one so called “wisdom element”, these six elements form this womb-born body.

The fact that points towards the same meaning as the basis in Dzogchen is provided by him here:

This statement of the root text “Wisdom is merged into emptiness, uniform taste, unchanging, and permanent” is intended for the mind of the apprehending subject that apprehends the object of the empty form established through the power of meditating on the main [devatā]. Here, the meaning of uniform taste, unchanging and permanent are though to be “complete in perfection.” Further, the meaning of permanent is said to be freedom from obscurations. That also intends intrinsically lacking obscuration or without the obscurations of movements. Though there is nothing to identify here in inseparable uniform taste, while produced conditionally, the intention is that the apprehended object and the apprehending subject have a single essence, and that a transforming continuum is not possible.

This is an extremely important point and demonstrates why the body of light is possible through either Dzogchen thögal or the path of the two stages.

Now, someone might object that it is inappropriate to cite the Kalacakra to clarify points in Dzogchen tantras, but then if this is so, then all great masters from Nubchen on down to Dudjom Rinpoche are at fault for using such tantras as the Mañjuśrīnamasamgiti to clarify Dzogchen....

 

http://www.dharmawhe...15425&start=580

 

Defining the basis as a sort of fabric out of which appearances arise does not solve the problem of individuated consciousnesses.

What is the basis in fact? The Dzogchen tantras describe this as "wisdom". This wisdom is said to have three aspects [rnam pa], original purity, its svabhāva; natural perfection, its prakṛiti; and compassion, the inseparability of the first two.

Even discussing wisdom as a the basis, even a nonsubstantiated basis as in Dzogchen does not make sense if that wisdom is not describing a noetic entity. Simplistic solutions like refusing to define it as one or many simply raise more questions than they answer.

There are two propositions:

B1, the basis as a transpersonal field out of which everything in samsara and nirvana is instantiated through its non-recognition.

B2 the basis is meant only to apply to any given sentient beings. Since this applies to all sentient being, here the basis is like fire, fire as light and heat as a quality, every instantiation of fire has light and heat. Likewise, every sentient beings shares common characteristics because they are sentient, they have consciousness.

Dante, your position is B1, and while I can understand how people are lead to accept B1 as the message of Dzogchen teachings, it is an exaggeration in my estimation.

Instead, I think B2 is the more proper understanding, based for example on Nyibum's remark that the basis is one's unfabricated mind. This is an authoritative citation that must be addressed and heeded. For example, the Mind Mirror of Vajrasattva states:

That is one’s own basis but it was not recognized by oneself. The samsaric three realms are formed through delusion. 
Then, after the afflictions become more coarse, different forms of sentient beings emerge, deluded from the basis in that way.”

This just means that each and every sentient being is deluded from their own basis; even though the basis is described in generic terms, it is not the case that all sentient beings ultimate share one basis. The basis is uniform in its nature, if you will, among all instantiations of sentient beings but each and every sentient being's basis is unique to that being. Since the Dzogchen tantras do describe wisdom as being a repository for traces, again we can try to explain this through B1 or B2.

In the B1 scenario, the basis would have to like a bank, where different people placed their traces, kind of like samsara accounts.

A B2 scenario is much simpler, since it is only means that since sentient beings did not recognize their own unfabricated minds, then they begin to develop the traces of action that produce our common karmic visions of the six realms. This is certainly the intent of Shabkar when he writes:

Therefore, since appearances are not fixed,
whatever appears [appears] because of the power of traces.

And:

Therefore, everything is an appearance of the mind.
Since everything is created by the concepts of the mind,
in reality, all of the appearances of the mind are empty.

More importantly Shabkar states:

Self-originated primordial wisdom appearing as vidyā is also the mind...
There are no appearances at all apart from the mind.

And:

This is the introduction that confirms the basis,
the natural reality of the mind essence.

Compare these last two with Nyibum:

As such, because the basis, one’s unfabricated mind, arose as the essence of the sole reality, there is no need to search elsewhere for the place etc., i.e. it is called self-originated wisdom.
(Apologies for the last version, which was from an earlier unedited version by mistake)

My present position therefore, is B2, the basis is just the way a sentient being's consciousness [shes pa rather than rnam par shes pa] or mind [sems, citta] is talked about in Dzogchen texts prior to being afflicted for all the reasons I mentioned earlier....

 

....Wisdom is suitable as a basis for traces, or so the Dzogchen texts tell us....

 

Ka dag or emptiness, the correct description of the basis according the the man ngag sde texts. But as pointed out in these same texts, the basis is not merely emptiness. It also has "wisdom" (ye shes), which is a kind of shes pa or sems, a primordial or pristine consciousness, as opposed to a rnam shes, an aspected consciousness that possesses concepts.

Basically, even though Dzogchen texts describe such a "beginning time", I personally don't believe that there is a start point ever. The description of such a start point is merely a literary device, much as Samantabhadra is a literary device.

The five elements are also included in wisdom, etc., so there is no contradiction between saying that the basis is wisdom, and the basis is empty. The problem comes only if one imagines that basis is somehow a unitary entity, a fabric, which provides the basis for the arising of sentient beings and buddhas on an objective level. But if, as I have come to understand, it is not referring to an objective entity or context, then the basis is easily described as a a set of general features which every noetic entity that we call "buddhas" or "sentient being" shares in common as an idealized "initial" set of conditions. The only difference between buddhas and sentient beings then is the extent to which they recognize this set of general features within their own continuums. Hence in this respect the so called original general basis merely describes an abstract set of qualities, but is not itself an instantiation of those qualities in any way. Those qualities are only instantiated in a sattva, a being. In this way the basis is not one, because it is instantiated individually; it is not many because it is a uniform set of qualities that are being instantiated across all beings.

This way, the general Buddhist dictum which extends all the way down to Vasubandhu's Kośabhaṣ (and clearly the authors of the Dzogchen tantras were familiar with it because they use the Kośa cosmology in such tantras as the Rigpa Rangshar), matter arises from mind/s. I.e. the order of the arising of matter presented in virtually all buddhist texts is:

Consciousness --> space --> air --> fire --> water --> earth.

In Dzogchen texts we see an analogous sequence: wisdom --> blue light --> green light --> red light --> white light -- yellow light; which when reified becomes the standard Buddhist sequence above. The only difference between the two sequences is that the former sequence occurs when the latter sequence is not recognized for being what it is, the display of a given being's own noetic capacity....

 

http://www.dharmawhe...15425&start=600

 

...since this ye shes is personal, never transpersonal, and at the time of the basis, is merely describing the mind (shes pa, sems) in a pre-afflictive state.

 

Tibetans translate jñāna as ye shes. That term "ye shes "is frequently translated as "pristine awareness" or "primordial wisdom", etc. I am saying that Dzogchen authors take this term very literally (a literalism criticized by people like Sakya Pandita) because they are taking this mode of shes pa (jñatā, jñānatā, parijñāna, etc.), which they describe as ye shes to mean that the original state (ye nas) of the mind (shes pa) is pre-afflictive, and Dzogchen is the path to recover that primordial state.

I am not saying that this consciousness is a universal plenum, like brahman, from which all beings arise; that is exactly the mistake I think most people fall into when studying Dzogchen, i.e. they wind up falling into an unintentional brahman trap.

Thus what I am saying is the basis is personal, not universal. Each's being has their own basis since they each have their own mind, the characteristics of the basis (essence, nature and compassion) are general, and apply to all minds, just as all candles on a table are separate and unique, but all flames on those candles bear the same qualities, heat and light.

The fault that I suffered from was not seeing the fact that rnam shes (vijñāna), shes rab (prajñā), ye shes (jñāna), shes pa(jñatā) are all talking about one thing, different modalities of a single continuum from sentient being hood to Buddhahood, based on language in man ngag sde texts, reinforced very strongly by Longchenpa, which make a very hard distinction between sems (citta) and yeshe (jñāna) without recognizing the distinction is not in substance, but merely in mode i.e. afflicted/non-afflicted.

Really, I am not saying anything that is terribly controversial. I am recognizing that I was mislead by the hard distinction made by Longchenpa and others who, for didactic reasons, make a hard distinction between mind and wisdom when what they are really doing is making a hard distinction between utterly afflicted minds and utterly pure minds, and providing a literary mythology (the universe arises out of the basis) to explain the separation of sentient beings and buddhas.

I have similarly come to the conclusion that the account of the basis arising out of the basis and the separation of samsara and nirvana at some imagined start point unimaginable eons ago is just a literary myth, and it does not need to be taken literally.

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Simple_Jack   

Simple_Jack
Posted

http://www.dharmawhe...15425&start=600

 

They are the same thing.

And no, I was slightly mistaken before.

The reason people see the five lights everywhere they look is that they no longer have traces to reify the five elements as the five elements because their consciousness has become free of all traces of the two obscurations, i.e. with those removed, what remains is wisdom.

Of course, there is nothing substantial that is ever removed, from such a mind.

Then we gave this from the Rig pa rang shar:

Son of a good family, one must recognize the awareness [shes pa] free from grasping as one’s own state.

Or the Rang grol:

A vidyā that performs actions does not exist
in the essence of pure awareness.

Or the Mind Mirror of Samantabhadra has an interlinear note:

The nature of one’s vidyā is light. Since kāyas are the gathered in the sphere of wisdom, the meaning of the view of Samantabhadra is realized. Further, there is vidyā and the wisdom that arises from vidyā. Further, vidyā that is free from extremes and beyond multiplicity does not transcend awareness (shes pa) and knowing (rig), endowed with a core of empty wisdom free from the extremes of things.

The Sun and Moon Tantra states:


At that time, that fortunate one
when the appearances are self-evident,
the non-abiding awareness is called “natural”.

 

Anyway, there are too many references in various Dzogchen texts which state quite clearly that the basis is just one's mind. This is consistent with Buddhadharma. Other explanations are not.

 

http://www.dharmawhe...15425&start=620

 

The basis is not the five lights. The five lights are expressions of wisdom.

Those all just exist in one's mind, as Shabkar points out.

The basis is not something separate from you the person, and it is not some uniform transpersonal field. It is just your own mind and it's essence.

By the way, I never thought the basis was a transpersonal field. But have become aware that many people interpret it as such, and therefore, I'm writing to correct this misapprehension.

In other words, Dzogchen teachings about the basis are actually "disappointingly" Buddhist and not so radical after all.

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Simple_Jack   

Simple_Jack
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http://www.dharmawhe...=15528&start=60

 

As such, the three realms are
the five aggregates, the five sense organs,
the five limbs, the five functional organs,
the five objects, the five afflictions,
the five thoughts, the five minds, the five concepts,
the apprehended objects and apprehending subjects established as samsara [… ]
Caught in the aggregates, sense gates and the sense elements,
the apprehended object and apprehending subject,
samara itself persists for a long while.
One is placed in the dungeon of name and matter
in the castle of the three realms,
tortured with the barbs of ignorance and so on,
oppressed by the thick darkness of samsara,
attached to the salty taste of desire,
bound by the neck with the noose of confusion,
burned with the hot fire of hatred,
head covered with pride,
setting a rendezvous with the mistress of jealousy,
surrounded by the army of enmity...
tied by the neck with the noose of subject and object, [29b]
stuck in the mud of successive traces
and handcuffed with the ripening of karma.
Having been joined with the ripening of karma,
one takes bodies good and bad,
one after another like a water wheel,
born into each individual class.
Having crossed at the ford of self-grasping,
one sinks into the ocean of suffering
and one is caught by the heart on the hook of the three lowers realms.
One is bound by oneself; the afflictions are the enemy.
The body of a hell being appears as fire or water.
Pretas are frightened and intimidated.
There is a fog-like appearance for animals.
The aggregates, sense gates and sense elements
of humans appear as the five elements,
and also happiness, suffering and indifference.
They appear as armor and weapons to asuras
and desirable qualities for devas.
Such dualistic appearances,
for example, are like a quickly moving wheel
spinning continuously for a long while.
As such, diverse appearances
are like seeing a snake from a rope;
that [rope] is not [a snake] but is apprehended as a [snake];
forming as both the outer universe and inhabitants.
If that is investigated, it is a rope.
The universe and inhabitants have always been empty,
the ultimate endowed with the form of the relative.

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Simple_Jack   

Simple_Jack
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Tantra of Self-Arisen Vidyā states: [<----- Menngagde/Upadesha tantra]

  • Further, samasara is as follows:
    false view and eternalist view.
    The false vehicle is as follows:
    held to be three hundred and sixty beliefs in a self.


And:



  • Likewise, the countless views of a self are included in two. Those are included in both the eternalist view and annihilationist view. Countless views of self come from those two. Likewise, son of a good family, because you have avoided entering a false path, I have summarized the views of a self and demonstrated them.

And:



  • The true Dharma is free from a self,
    free from the extremes of the taints
    of afflicted minds and so on.

And:



  • ...since there is no appropriation, a self does not exist.

And:



  • All the objects and conditions of the six consciousnesses
    depend on grasping something;
    if there is no one-sided grasping, there is bliss
    free from objects grasped as “mine”,
    empty of phenomena grasped as a self,
    and liberated from objects grasped as permanent.


The Tantra of Self-Liberated Vidyā states: [<----- Menngagde/Upadesha tantra]

  • If one conceives of a self, it is a delusion of Māra.


And:



  • The one great root māra
    is the concept that grasps a self.


The Union of the Sun and the Moon Tantra states: [<----- Menngagde/Upadesha tantra]

  • "Beyond extremes” is not apprehending a self in things.


And:

  • Those of incorrect understanding are the tirthikas i.e. all views grasping to extremes and grasping to a self.

~translated by Loppon Namdrol

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ralis   

ralis
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How many times are the same old Buddhist precepts going to be posted here? Furthermore, this is not the Dharma Wheel and you are not Malcolm. How about some original discussion!

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Simple_Jack   

Simple_Jack
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Tantra of Self-Arisen Vidyā states: [<----- Menngagde/Upadesha tantra]

 

  • Further, samasara is as follows:

    false view and eternalist view.

    The false vehicle is as follows:

    held to be three hundred and sixty beliefs in a self.

 

And:

 

 

  • Likewise, the countless views of a self are included in two. Those are included in both the eternalist view and annihilationist view. Countless views of self come from those two. Likewise, son of a good family, because you have avoided entering a false path, I have summarized the views of a self and demonstrated them.

And:

 

 

  • The true Dharma is free from a self,

    free from the extremes of the taints

    of afflicted minds and so on.

And:

 

 

  • ...since there is no appropriation, a self does not exist.

And:

 

 

  • All the objects and conditions of the six consciousnesses

    depend on grasping something;

    if there is no one-sided grasping, there is bliss

    free from objects grasped as “mine”,

    empty of phenomena grasped as a self,

    and liberated from objects grasped as permanent.

 

The Tantra of Self-Liberated Vidyā states: [<----- Menngagde/Upadesha tantra]

 

  • If one conceives of a self, it is a delusion of Māra.

 

And:

 

 

  • The one great root māra

    is the concept that grasps a self.

 

The Union of the Sun and the Moon Tantra states: [<----- Menngagde/Upadesha tantra]

 

  • "Beyond extremes” is not apprehending a self in things.

 

And:

 

  • Those of incorrect understanding are the tirthikas i.e. all views grasping to extremes and grasping to a self.

~translated by Loppon Namdrol

How many times are the same old Buddhist precepts going to be posted here?

 

 

These aren't just any of "the same old Buddhist precepts": the above is from the Pith Instruction Class of Dzogchen Tantras aka. Menngagde or Upadesha. Dudjom Rinpoche (former head of the Nyingma sect and considered a living buddha) comments on the 9 yana scheme of Nyingma:

 

"The eight lower levels have intellectually fabricated and contrived that which is changeless solely due to fleeting thoughts that never experience what truly is. They apply antidotes to and reject that which is not to be rejected. They refer to as flawed that in which there is nothing to be purified, with a mind that desires purification. They have created division with respect to that which cannot be obtained by their hopes and fears that it can be obtained elsewhere. And they have obscured wisdom, which is naturally present, by their efforts in respect to that which is free from effort and free from needing to be accomplished. Therefore, they have had no chance to make contact with genuine, ultimate reality as it is (rnal ma'i de kho na nyid)."

 

...Dudjom Rinpoche says the Menngagde is superior to Longde and Semde.

 

Dudjom Rinpoche supports this point of view by citing the Supreme Array of Ati (a ti bkod pa chen po):

0 Vajrapani! If the Pith Instruction Class is not established,

There will be those who cling to deliberate examination [Mind Class],

And in particular, those who will believe in nothing at all [Vast Expanse Class].

Therefore, this definitive secret essence [Pith Instruction Class]-

Like a butter lamp amid darkness,

Like an elephant among oxen,

Like a lion among wild animals,

Or like a horseman among those on foot-

Is
superior
to them all.

~RongzomFan

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Simple_Jack   

Simple_Jack
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http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?f=39&t=14040&start=320

 

 

A mind or an awareness [shes pa] has a "choice" recognition or non-recognition. The recognizing mind is called vidyā or prajñā. The non-recognizing mind is called avidyā.

 

There are two kinds of Buddhahood in Dzogchen, abhisambodhi, which has a non-abiding nirvana; samyaksambodhi which enters nirvana without remainder.

 

Omniscience arises because the capacity for omniscience is present in the form of potential in the basis.

 

When one has eliminated the traces of affliction and action in one's own five elements, one's body reverts to its original state as five lights, hence "The body of light".

 

The theory of the body of light is predicted on the fundamental state of reality being something called wisdom, which has five lights, which are reified as physical matter. Upon completion of the path, one sees this matter in its real nature once again and the elements of the body "revert" to their original nature as wisdom (i.e. through the process of thogal one eradicates all the afflictive obscurations which prevent one from seeing things just as they are (yathabhutaṃ)); Body of light is a realization....

 

...I have heard (from ChNN [Loppon-la's root guru] among others) that the disappearance of the body is not necessarily a sign of the body of light.

 

Hindus also gain control over the four elements, also Arhats can gain control over the four elements. Gaining control over the four elements is mundane siddhi, it is not excellent siddhi, nor is it reserved for Vajrayana and Dzogchen people. However, if someone has not studied in detail, they might think that many mundane siddhis are profound. So yes, what I am telling you is that I do not consider the so called rainbow body to be much more than a display of mundane siddhi to create faith.

 

I am glad you have faith in the teachings, but as I said, I do not derive my faith in the teachings through illusions and phantasmagoria...

 

KDL [Kunzang Dechen Lingpa {<-- guru of Loppon-la}] went through all four visions to the end. He told me this personally. Not only me, but others. He did realize rainbow body. Rainbow body, in Dzogchen, does not mean that your body disappears. This is a huge misconception... it is stupidly simple -- once you reach the end of the fourth vision, everything is a display of the five lights, as it is put in the classical text earth, rocks, mountains and cliffs vanish and instead one sees only the five pure lights.

 

Sometimes, your body vanishes. Mostly, it just shrinks after death. For example, Thangtong Gyalpo achieved rainbow body. His kudung is still shrinking. It exists in a small monastery in somewhere in Nepal. A Lama friend of mine knows where it is and has seen it.

 

In other words, rainbow body in essence is actually a realization.

 

~ Loppon Namdrol

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...As we know, Madhyamaka adopts the conventional truth either according to the Sautrantika system, or the Yogacara system. But since it's own perspective is grounded in the Prajñāpāramitasūtras, it regards distinctions such as mind and matter to be merely conventional designations that do not have any real basis apart from imputation.

 

But we can see that this division is well preserved in Buddhist tantric literature (as well as Hindu tantric literature) when we find for example that the mind is described as a rider of a horse, vāyu. This is because both forms of tantra, Buddhist as well as Hindu, are concerned with the mechanics of the body for understanding how to gain realization through our embodiment through the practice of various kinds of yoga.

 

Granted, this is sometimes is found in Dzogchen literature as well. But when we examine that actual system of Dzogchen according to the ancient Dzogchen tantras, we find that in fact even consciousness itself is generated phsyiologically in the body by a vāyu....

According to the sNying thig tradition, at the time of the result the division between animate and inanimate vanishes.
The distinction vanishes. The basic view of man ngag sde is that the light, the visible expression of wisdom, is reified into the five elements. When that reification is dissolved, also the perception of a difference between the animate and inanimate dissolves, since the five elements pervade all phenomena including mind/consciousness. Actually, the view of man ngag sde is that even consciousness itself is a product of the five elements. But this is not a problem since the actual nature of the five elements is the five wisdoms.
Yes, this is how Dzogchen can give a physicalist account of consciousness while avoiding the charge of being physicalists, i.e., because the appearance of the sentient and the non-sentient arises out of the a misperception of the five lights of the basis.
While there are of course Dzogchen texts that describe mind and body as separate, in general, the innermost secret cycle holds that the perception that there is a difference between the animate and inanimate is a mistaken one. In the state of ultimate liberation [i.e. samyaksambuddhahood], the distinction between animate and inanimate disappears because it is not true. Further, like other Vajrayāna traditions, Dzogchen provides a physical account for the process of rebirth for example in the Vajramala Tantra: it is proposed that the alayavijñāna, which is inseparable with the mahāprāṇavāyu, is responsible for transmigration; for the appropriation of a new series of aggregates. But Dzogchen goes a step further and explicitly identifies consciousness as the operation of a vāyu in the body. Vāyus of course are the function of the refined element of air inside the human body.
The point is that in Dzogchen teachings mind and matter are not treated as different substances as they are in other Buddhist systems. They are equally treated as producers of the five elements. The way in which Dzogchen avoids the charge of being "physicalist" is that the five elements themselves arise from misperception of the nature of the basis [more or less emptiness endowed with light], without needing the intermediate step of proposing everything is an appearance of mind and so on. And of course the awareness that misperceives the basis arises out of a vāyu that stirs in the basis, and so on. It gets a little complex....
...basically the point being underscored is that matter and intelligence are non-dual. For example, it is a special tenet of Dzogchen that even the formless realms are material, i.e., that basically, wherever there is matter, there is consciousness, wherever there is consciousness, there is matter. You can either say that matter is intrinsically conscious or that consciousness is intrinsically embodied. Either way it amounts to the same thing. "Sentient" and "non-sentient" are merely conventional designations based on appearances generated by ignorance....
No, not photons, not physical light in the western scientific sense of the term. Precisely, the basis is ye shes. Empty luminous energetic ye shes which appears to a neutral awareness (which itself rises out of the basis when a vāyu in the basis stirs).

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?f=48&t=3943&hilit=external+approach

 

Prior to analyzing phenomena as mind-only, mind and matter are conventionally regarded as a dualism even in Yogacara. Why, because the imputed nature is exactly the conventional world.

 

Also in standard Madhyamaka, on the conventional level mind and matter are regarded as distinct.

 

While the annutarayoga tantras move in the direction of dissolving the distinction between mind and matter, the substance dualism in Buddhism is only satisfactorily resolved in Dzogchen (but not by regarding all phenomena as mind-- which is a point of view rejected by Longchenpa incoherent).

 

In Dzogchen, mind and matter are regarded as seamlessly welded, not that mind has primacy over matter. Dzogchen texts even go so far as to reject the formless realm as truly formless.

 

This is why for example the Khandro Nyinthig states very clearly "Sometimes we say "citta", sometimes "vāyu",but the meaning is the same."Vāyu is just the element of air i.e. motility present in matter. This also accounts for rebirth. In the Guhyasamaja, for example, the ālayavijñāna is wedded to the mahāprāṇavāyu -- this union allows rebirth to happen.

...

 

In Dzogchen, mind and matter exist because of avidya. When there is no more avidyā, for you there is neither mind nor matter.

 

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=3979&start=60

 

You cannot separate the pure sadhadhatu (wisdom and five lights) from the impure sadadhātu (consciousness and five elements). The difference is only vidyā or avidyā.

 

The sadadhātu are a model that is capable of encompassing any state of matter or mind, no matter how subtle or gross, macro, micro, nano, subatomic, etc....

 

The medicine tantra states:

 

"No formation without earth, no cohesion without water, no maturation without fire, no development without air, and no room for development without space."

 

http://www.misterdanger.net/books/Buddhism%20Books/Religion%20medicine%20%26%20human%20embryo%20Tibet.pdf - Religion, Medicine, and the Human Embryo in Tibet

 

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?p=107255#p107255

 

...according to the Kosha, beings in the ārupyadhātu do not possess physical sense organs; they possess a mental faculty, a consciousness and single mental object (the concentration which propels their rebirth). They likewise possess only three faculties (indriya)-- the mental faculty, the life faculty, and the faculty of equanimity.

 

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?p=34231#p34231

 

In early Theravada, it is asserted that formless realm beings have a very subtle form.

 

Also, in Dzogchen it is asserted that formless realm beings actually have subtle form.

 

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?p=65204#p65204

 

The class exists, but here "formless" means "very little form", similar with Theravada Abhidhamma understanding of formless realms. It is kind if like saying that you are broke, even though you can afford a cup of coffee.

 

http://dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?p=264014#p264014

 

...in the Dzogchen tradition formless realm beings are considered to have subtle material bodies.

 

~Loppon Namdrol

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...I have heard (from ChNN [Loppon-la's root guru] among others) that the disappearance of the body is not necessarily a sign of the body of light.

 

Hindus also gain control over the four elements, also Arhats can gain control over the four elements. Gaining control over the four elements is mundane siddhi, it is not excellent siddhi, nor is it reserved for Vajrayana and Dzogchen people. However, if someone has not studied in detail, they might think that many mundane siddhis are profound. So yes, what I am telling you is that I do not consider the so called rainbow body to be much more than a display of mundane siddhi to create faith.

 

I am glad you have faith in the teachings, but as I said, I do not derive my faith in the teachings through illusions and phantasmagoria...

 

KDL [Kunzang Dechen Lingpa {<-- guru of Loppon-la}] went through all four visions to the end. He told me this personally. Not only me, but others. He did realize rainbow body. Rainbow body, in Dzogchen, does not mean that your body disappears. This is a huge misconception... it is stupidly simple -- once you reach the end of the fourth vision, everything is a display of the five lights, as it is put in the classical text earth, rocks, mountains and cliffs vanish and instead one sees only the five pure lights.

 

Sometimes, your body vanishes. Mostly, it just shrinks after death. For example, Thangtong Gyalpo achieved rainbow body. His kudung is still shrinking. It exists in a small monastery in somewhere in Nepal. A Lama friend of mine knows where it is and has seen it.

 

In other words, rainbow body in essence is actually a realization.

 

~ Loppon Namdrol

 

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?p=55972#p55972

 

Third vision = path of seeing, not the eighth bhumi.

 

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?p=56050#p56050

 

To put it another way, when a person ceases to reify phenomena in terms of the four extremes, that is the direct perception of emptiness. Until that point, their "emptiness" remains an intellectual sequence of negations; accurate perhaps, but conceptual nevertheless.

 

The "recognition" of rigpa, which is simply the knowledge (rig pa) about one's state as a working basis for practice, does not require realization of emptiness as a prerequiste, and can't -- since if it did, no one could practice Dzogchen. '

 

In terms of the four visions, for as long as one continues to reify phenomena, for that long, one will never reach the third vision. This is the principal reason in modern Dzogchen practice, emphasis is placed on the basis through tregchö, rather the path, tögal. If you are a first stage bodhisattva and so on, then the four visions in Dzogchen will be very, very rapid. However, there is no gaurantee that one will realize emptiness merely through practicing tregchö. Of this reason then, practices such as tummo, etc. are also recommended.

 

~Loppon Namdrol

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...I have heard (from ChNN [Loppon-la's root guru] among others) that the disappearance of the body is not necessarily a sign of the body of light.

 

Hindus also gain control over the four elements, also Arhats can gain control over the four elements. Gaining control over the four elements is mundane siddhi, it is not excellent siddhi, nor is it reserved for Vajrayana and Dzogchen people. However, if someone has not studied in detail, they might think that many mundane siddhis are profound. So yes, what I am telling you is that I do not consider the so called rainbow body to be much more than a display of mundane siddhi to create faith.

 

I am glad you have faith in the teachings, but as I said, I do not derive my faith in the teachings through illusions and phantasmagoria...

 

KDL [Kunzang Dechen Lingpa {<-- guru of Loppon-la}] went through all four visions to the end. He told me this personally. Not only me, but others. He did realize rainbow body. Rainbow body, in Dzogchen, does not mean that your body disappears. This is a huge misconception... it is stupidly simple -- once you reach the end of the fourth vision, everything is a display of the five lights, as it is put in the classical text earth, rocks, mountains and cliffs vanish and instead one sees only the five pure lights.

 

Sometimes, your body vanishes. Mostly, it just shrinks after death. For example, Thangtong Gyalpo achieved rainbow body. His kudung is still shrinking. It exists in a small monastery in somewhere in Nepal. A Lama friend of mine knows where it is and has seen it.

 

In other words, rainbow body in essence is actually a realization.

 

~ Loppon Namdrol

 

 

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?p=55972#p55972

 

Third vision = path of seeing, not the eighth bhumi.

 

http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?p=56050#p56050

 

To put it another way, when a person ceases to reify phenomena in terms of the four extremes, that is the direct perception of emptiness. Until that point, their "emptiness" remains an intellectual sequence of negations; accurate perhaps, but conceptual nevertheless.

 

The "recognition" of rigpa, which is simply the knowledge (rig pa) about one's state as a working basis for practice, does not require realization of emptiness as a prerequiste, and can't -- since if it did, no one could practice Dzogchen. '

 

In terms of the four visions, for as long as one continues to reify phenomena, for that long, one will never reach the third vision. This is the principal reason in modern Dzogchen practice, emphasis is placed on the basis through tregchö, rather the path, tögal. If you are a first stage bodhisattva and so on, then the four visions in Dzogchen will be very, very rapid. However, there is no gaurantee that one will realize emptiness merely through practicing tregchö. Of this reason then, practices such as tummo, etc. are also recommended.

 

~Loppon Namdrol

 

http://vajracakra.com/viewtopic.php?p=13303#p13303

 

...The nature of the five elements is wisdom. It is like the front and back of one's hand. You only have one hand, but it appears differently based on perceiving its front or its back. As Magnus implies, it is when we rectify our perception of the elements that they then appear as wisdom.

 

Also the cause of ignorance is the wisdom of the basis itself. So vidyā becomes avidyā, lights become elements, and so forth simply due to our ingrained traces of ignorance built up over countless lifetimes.

 

In order to reveal the wisdom light that is the empty substance of the universe and living beings, we have to purify our perception of our personal elements. This is done through togal or klong sde practice.

 

http://vajracakra.com/viewtopic.php?p=13305#p13305

 

Ignorance is deeply embedded in our experience. The Dzogchen teachings exist to release us from being bound by that ignorance. The nature of that ignorance and the nature of vidyā have the same basis, which is why self-liberation is possible.

 

http://vajracakra.com/viewtopic.php?p=13346#p13346

 

The elements are wisdom, they simply are not recognized as such. There is a Bon logic text, very nice, that proves appearances are dharmakāya. The objection is raised, if appearances are dharmakāya why isn't everyone liberated instantly? The answer is that those who recognize appearances as dharmakāya are liberated instantly since instant liberation is as desiderata. Those who are not liberated instantly are those who have not recognized appearances as dharmakāya.

 

Upon what does recognition of appearances as dharmakāya depend? Introduction. Without having been introduced to appearances as dharmakāya, one will not recognize appearances as dharmakāya, just as if one has been sent into a crowd to find a person one has not met, even when one sees them face to face they are not recognized.

 

So the elements are wisdom. Vidyā and avidyā is the deciding factor in recognition. That recognition depends on an introduction, just as our recognition of a face in the crowd depends upon whether we have been introduced to that face or not.

 

http://vajracakra.com/viewtopic.php?p=10349#p10349

 

Vimalamitra writes:

  • The nature of the mind is not free from traces, so it is called “mind”. That knowledge of the dharmakāya as empty is called “vidyā". That also gives rise to recognition of great clear emptiness. Remaining in that stage is called “wisdom”. Remaining without concepts, free from the errors of lethargy, agitation and so on, is called “dharmakāya”.
"Thus, the energy of compassion moves from self-originated wisdom, that cognition arisen towards an object is called 'play arising from energy'. That [cognition] is not self-originated wisdom because of the difference between the existence and non-existence of the object."
- Longchenpa | chos dbyings mdzod
"Self-arisen wisdom [rang byung ye shes] is the primordial nature of vidyā [rig pa]; wisdom that realizes an object, because it arises from that object, is not self-arisen."
- kun byed rgyal po

http://vajracakra.com/viewtopic.php?p=10716#p10716

 

The Luminous Space states:

"That mind is produced out of the dualistic grasping

to the six objects of the manifestation of wisdom.

 

How can that [mind] be produced? Since [the mind] is produced from that ignorance that does not recognize the intrinsic manifestation of wisdom [the mind] is produced."

 

From the Khandro Nyinthig [Per Malcolm]:

"In brief, those delusions also are not delusion that exist in the cause and basis, but as one does not understand the actual state of the basis one is stubbornly deluded about one’s appearances. For example when grasping to a seeming appearance that does not exist in the material, a rope appears to be a snake. Like a conch shell appearing yellow, the actual state of the basis has not been understood, and there is fixated delusion about one’s appearances."

 

From the Tantra Summarizing The Definitive Meaning [nges don bsdus pa'i rgyud]:

"Listen then, to this quintessential summation.

In the very heart of naturally occurring dharmakāya,

the eight avenues of consciousness are absent, so there is freedom from ordinary mind.

So long as ordinary mind fixates on things in all their variety, there is what we call 'my mind.'

Ordinary mind is the root of flaws,

and so one does not awaken to buddhahood through ordinary mind.

 

Ordinary mind is the root of samsara.

Given that sense objects manifest in all their variety,

ordinary mind fixates on concepts in all their variety.

Therefore, ordinary mind is the cause of samsara."

 

From the Uprooting Delusion Tantra from the dgongs pa zang thal cycle [Per Malcolm]:

"Because of a lack of mindful attention,

self and other are grasped as a duality,

and both outer and inner dependent origination occur.

The whole universe arises

through awareness looking externally.

All sentient being arise

through awareness looking internally.

Through looking there, fearful appearances arise,

through looking here, ‘self’ arises.

Many mistakes arise from the single mistake

about the appearances of here and there.

Because of being mistaken about a self, there is a mistake about other,

attachment to self, aversion to other.

From the seed of attachment and aversion,

the whole outer universe and inhabitants are mistakes.

Because one is held as two,

that is called the delusion of dualistic grasping.

Since one imputed and mistook outer and inner,

that is called 'the imputing ignorance'.

Because of familiarity of subject and object of that,

from the thick buildup of traces,

there was entrance into the state of samsara.

That is how the six migrations occurred.”

 

From the String Of Pearls Tantra [Per Malcolm]:

 

"...just like a rapidly spinning fire wheel

one abides continuously in samsara for a long while.

Such various appearances are like seeing a snake in a rope

since what isn’t there is held to be there,

both the outer and inner container and contents form,

and if that is investigated, it is a rope,

i.e. the container and contents are already empty

the ultimate with the form of the relative."

 

http://vajracakra.com/viewtopic.php?p=23504#p23504

 

...the Union of the Sun and Moon Tantra, from which the song of the vajra is taken also says:

 

The teacher replied: “E ma ho! Great Nonconceptual Muni you should listen! There are six afflictions: ignorance [avidyā] grasps the aspect of the conceptual delusion about the basis. Confusion is delusion from the aspect of prajñā. Hatred is delusion from the aspect of the stage of generation. [15/b] Pride is delusion from the aspect of view. Desire is delusion from the aspect of appearance. Jealousy is delusion from the aspect of nonconceptuality. Those afflictions are unfathomable, minds that grasp thoughts, intellects that grasp memories, concepts that becomes the basis for all connecting traces and doubts, the aspect of grasping to objects and things, and so on.

 

Those who do not understand the meaning are those common persons up to anuyoga. Those of incorrect understanding are the tirthikas i.e. all views grasping to extremes and grasping to a self. In brief, there are views grasping mental analysis, views grasping permanence and annihilation and views grasping at perception.

 

Those of partial understanding are the śravakas, pratyekabuddhas and so on, i.e., the nine yānas.”

 

And:

 

  • There, those who are unable to guide their awareness or previously lacked the instructions of the Guru are alarmed, fearful, miserable, terrified and think to escape those appearances and so on and accept addiction to samsara. Also there are twenty-capacities for delusion.

 

And:

 

 

  • The place entered by all sentient beings

    who do not possess this instruction

    is called “the bardo of existence.”

    The doorway to the path of the places of samsara,

    for example, is turning like a water wheel.

    Having separated from the body of ordinary flesh and blood,

    one has an illusory mental body;

    which has two names since it incorporeal.

    The appearances of the consciousness of the past cease,

    the appearances of the future have not arisen,

    the loka has not been determined,

    whatever subsides, whatever appears,

    at that time

    is a bardo because it lasts for an instant.

    One apprehends the shape of whatever birth one will have later,

    and having apprehended the shape that arises later,

    it becomes an appearance of the individual six lokas.

    The outer universe and inhabitants of the desire realm

    are known and clear to oneself.

    Also the universe and inhabitants of ordinary birth

    manifest at that time.

    The desired universe and inhabitants appear clearly.

    Since the limbs of the apparitional sense organs are fully complete,

    one is not impeded by anything.

    One enters mountains and cliffs without impediments.

    The lifespan from other karma is seven days.

    Forty nine days

    is the total lifespan.

    The color of devas and humans is white.

    The color of asuras and animals is yellow.

    The light of pretas is smokey.

    That of the hells is like burnt stumps

    or also like waving black wool.

    Alternately, the animals [color[ is like boiled blood.

    The of asuras is like falling sleet.

    At that time, the way they face is as follows:

    devas and humans face up,

    animals and asuras slant,

    pretas and hell beings face down.

    These are from the perspective of when first born.

     

    These are the signs of accumulation and non-accumulation

    of actions of the bardo of existence:

    There are no ripened traces.

    From the perspective of the bardo, the traces

    of the corresponding cause do accumulate here.

 

 

And:

 

Does the bardo appear

to those of ordinary capacity who have seen this?

Or does it not appear?

 

The teacher said “It appears,

but having exhausted the traces of grasping to the ordinary

one finds solace in the natural nirmanakāya realms

and there one attains buddha without the bardo.

 

The sentient beings who have not seen this,

after they enter the door of the womb

from the cause of the male and the condition of the female

there is mer mer po, nur nur po,

ltar ltar po, gor gor po,

hardening and like a fish, like a tortoise, like a tadpole,

in that way the days are seven weeks.

Their bodies develop from the umbilicus.

At nine months, in the same way, the face turns,

the completed body is expelled from the mother’s womb.

As such, their forms are different,

cycling in samsara.

 

http://vajracakra.com/viewtopic.php?p=23807#p23807

 

  • Since there is nothing to see there, don’t look there. The view that does not go beyond the object of the view is naturally non-existent. One should remain in the state that doesn’t really exist.

 

- Unwritten Tantra

 

http://dharmaconnectiongroup.blogspot.com/2013/07/shentong-yogacara-and-dzogchen.html?m=1

 

"Since neither of those exist [i.e. samsara or nirvana], one understands that the originally pure vidyā [rig pa] which apprehends the basis and the vidyā of insight, the chains, do not exist other than being mere designations..."
...Since the essence of vidyā does not exist, the vidyā of the perduring basis (the source of both energy [rtsal] and qualities, and also the apprehender of characteristics) does not exist.
Since the wisdom appearances of people's own vidyā that are seen in personal experience are not established as entities of any kind, it is the appearance of the exhaustion of dharmatā.'
Further, Vimalamitra states in The Lamp Summarizing Emptiness:
'Now then, the emptiness of dharmatā: natural dharmatā is the emptiness of the non-existence of a primal substance. Thus, all appearances were never established according to the eight examples of illusion. When appearances spread, that basis of the emptiness of dharmatā does not shift whatsoever, never transcending the emptiness of dharmatā. Furthermore:
Everything arose from non-arising;
even arising itself never arose.
Dharmatā in and of itself is empty without a basis, present at all times as the single nature of the great emptiness of the basis, path, and result. Furthermore, primordial emptiness is empty without beginning. [180]
Empty things are empty by nature.
Since the emptiness of dharmatā is present without being contrived and without being transformed in the basis, yogins are also liberated by remaining naturally without contrivance and without transformations.'
And:
'That dharmatā emptiness dwells in a fortress and is captured in a fortress: the fortress (that is like a circle of spears in the sky) encircles (without a beginning or an end) dharmatā, i.e., existence is dharmatā, non-existence is dharmatā, both are dharmatā and neither are dharmatā. As such, [dharmatā] is surrounded by the names “clear and unclear”, “empty and not-empty”, “existence and non-existence”, “permanence and annihilation”, and so on. That lack of finding evidence itself is dharmatā. Further, in reality nothing exists apart from dharmatā. That being the case, that emptiness (as a mere representation, baseless, and non-referential, being non-existent like a pretense) is understood with scripture, accepted by reasoning, proven by argument, and captured in a fortress. Be confident that dharmatā is the unmistaken true emptiness.'

 

~ translated by Loppon Namdrol

Edited by Simple_Jack

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