What the hell is the abyss anyways?

[idiot_stimpy]

Thanks FieryWind

[iain]

Hello folks,

Interesting thread, in response to the op, the tradition that I am studying has a couple of extra elemental notions which may relate, I believe, to the concept of the abyss to which you are referring ...

There are points in time, moments in time which are the best for the focus of meditation, it is to us to find and explore them these are known as the sāndhya meditation open them is critical if we are to know of the self.

In a more solid context, the three different planes of mundane life, the connection between the material objective world and the spiritual subjective world, between the loka or dimensions there are 3 inherent divides. The elements on either side of these divides are of inimical nature vis - jala and agni (water and fire being a very lose translation of these tattva, there are in total 5 mahatattva).
To see just what energy can emerge from the void between these two tattva; try putting water into a chip pan and you will get a fair idea.
Or prithvi and agni which gives simply breakage and dust.
Think molten lava pouring into the sea and deserts as two very different extremes. As an interesting side note; life has been observed as on the edge of this void, on the boundary between the earths molten core and the sea bed in volcanic vents.

Another name for the void is "Śūnya", it has applications in jyotiṣh theory and practices. It means zero in Sanskrit, and is the origin of our modern 0 in the decimal counting system.

Kind regards.

iain

Edited September 26, 2014 by iain

[Marblehead]

I think too that when we search too deeply into our mind to find answers that don't exist it is there too that we will find the abyss.

[GrandmasterP]

Someone give me directions so I can jump in.

 

It'll come soon enough.

Once it does, as it does to everyone now and again through life; you'll be glad enough once you're on the other side of whatever 'abyss' it was that opened up.

 

[3bob]

I think too that when we search too deeply into our mind to find answers that don't exist it is there too that we will find the abyss.

,

A strong point MH,

 

I'd say relative heaven and hell exist in the mind (so to speak) and we can find both somewhere in it, thus being dualistic mind will never be able to give us complete unity, joy and rest in Truth beyond opposites, and if one tries to extract or force such from the mind it may or can give tormented madness.

[3bob]

...along with the meaning that madness of various forms (some well hidden, some pretty or ugly, some smart or not so smart, some religious or nihilistic, etc..) is not our or the truest reality that is alluded to in Chapter 21 of the T.T.C..

[Marblehead]

What a challenge it is going to be to respond to this without suggesting that the TTC (Chapter 21) is not saying something that it isn't.!

...along with the meaning that madness of various forms ... is not our or the truest reality that is alluded to in Chapter 21 of the T.T.C..

Lines 2 - 7 (Henricks' translation):

Note: Please understand that in Line 2 the words "the Way" should be read as "Tao".

 

2. As for the nature of the Way—it's shapeless and formless.
3. Formless! Shapeless! Inside there are images.
4. Shapeless! Formless! Inside there are things.
5. Hidden! Obscure! Inside there are essences.
6. These essences are very real;
7. Inside them is the proof.

So when we look for the nature (essence) of Tao all we will see is the Abyss. We cannot see the essence of Tao. But then, even though not stated here, we can see the Te of Tao, that is, the way Tao functions. This is implied in Line 7.

 

I think that this supports what I said in my above post # 179.

 

But looking for Tao, being shapeless, formless, hidden and obscure, would be nothing more than looking into the abyss. However, the Te of Tao can be seen by way of looking at the Te (ways) of Tao, its processes and its manifestations.

Edited September 26, 2014 by Marblehead

[3bob]

What a challenge it is going to be to respond to this without suggesting that the TTC (Chapter 21) is not saying something that it isn't.!

Lines 2 - 7 (Henricks' translation):

Note: Please understand that in Line 2 the words "the Way" should be read as "Tao".

 

2. As for the nature of the Way—it's shapeless and formless.

3. Formless! Shapeless! Inside there are images.

4. Shapeless! Formless! Inside there are things.

5. Hidden! Obscure! Inside there are essences.

6. These essences are very real;

7. Inside them is the proof.

 

So when we look for the nature (essence) of Tao all we will see is the Abyss. We cannot see the essence of Tao. But then, even though not stated here, we can see the Te of Tao, that is, the way Tao functions. This is implied in Line 7.

 

I think that this supports what I said in my above post # 179.

 

But looking for Tao, being shapeless, formless, hidden and obscure, would be nothing more than looking into the abyss. However, the Te of Tao can be seen by way of looking at the Te (ways) of Tao, its processes and its manifestations.

 

I'd agree up to a point but then I'd go further in saying that the "Tao" is not the abyss like "vanity of vanities" of not seeing or knowing its own essence. (thus there is more to seeing and knowing which is beyond only the ways and processes of its own manifestations or aspects)

 

"How do I know the ways of all things at Beginning? By what is within me." T.C.C.,Chapter 21.

From the John Wu translation - a translation which like all the others is of secondary importance if one has the first hand experience of what such words point to.

 

...thus by discovery of the Tao-essence "by what is within me", which is more than just the super-mental and also important seeing and knowing of ways and aspects that are BORN and can be named starting with the One, the deeper seer's and or fortunate nobody's sees and knows essence beyond only mental seeing and knowing. The great discovery or eureka is right under our big noses, it is the inscrutable and indestructibly free, "Wonder of Wonders" that various well studied and famous Sages have been alluding to and also the unrecognized and unsung hero's have been singing of for thousands of years...

 

Om Tat Sat

Edited September 26, 2014 by 3bob

[Bud Jetsun]

 

The abyss that we should be aware of is really the third chaos which is the lowest of the three, the tenebrous underworld where darkness and misery reigns, the ones who deny their Innermost by divorcing themselves from Divinity will eventually migrate into the submerged layers of the earth within the inferior fifth dimension, clothed with their lunar protoplasmic bodies such souls enter into greater and greater levels of density as the laws multiply deeper down they go. The downward journey of the left hand path leads directly to the second death as mentioned by Dante Alighieri in his poetic work 'Dante's Divine Comedy'.

 

In the 8th and 9th spheres of hell the complete disintegration of the ego takes place, said to be an unimaginably painful experience, the soul after being purified of the former aggregates is liberated back into the elemental kingdoms of nature starting at the bottom which is the mineral kingdom, slowly the soul, pushed by the evolving forces of mechanical nature, is raised into increasingly more complex mineral bodies until graduating into the plant kingdom which signifies a new level of development. From here the soul migrates from body to body until reaching the animal kingdom where it learn to fornicate in line with instinctual impulses for the generation of its species. Gradually the soul progresses to the stage where it learns individuality, it no longer moves with the herd as such, this signifies that the soul is close to entering into the humanoid kingdom which it lost previously before entering into the abyss.

 

Upon entering into the humanoid kingdom, the soul is equipped with rationality, the intellect. With this newly acquired faculty, such a soul is capable of distinguishing the difference between purity and impurity (Good and Evil) the higher purpose is to transcend his lower animal nature and all the behaviors associated with those levels in order to enter into the higher planes of consciousness.

 

If the soul is incapable of transcending his lower animal nature and gives in to the passions and lure of his/her ego, then after exhausting their karma to enter into new humanoid bodies, such souls devolve back into the lower kingdoms to again enter into the infernal worlds, aka hell, deepening their suffering and experiencing the horrors associated with the shadow worlds which are devoid of Divine qualities, they are actually inverted aspects of the higher Divine spheres or Sephiroth.

 

There is no "final, absolute liberation" after the second death, the abyss is a revolving door back into the mechanical process of nature. The wheel of Samsara as some call it, the teachings of all the great Masters, such as Jesus, Buddha, Samael Aun Weor all teach how to consciously transcend this mechanical process, the ego is a child of mechanicity, thus the ego will eventually drag one back into the underworld to experience the horrors of hell.

 

Read the book 'Hell, the Devil and Karma' by Samael Aun Weor if you are interested in this whole subject.

 

 

This is all delusion from one peering into the abyss whom has never entered. The abyss is devoid of thought or it couldn't be the abyss. The abyss has no suffering because it would be impossible to know how to suffer in the abyss.

 

Your description is something I too have seen. It is a reflection of one's own fear while peering into the abyss.

 

There was a time when I had not yet gained awareness I could simply conquer all fear rooted thought-paths and use mindfulness to prevent them completely. When I would gaze into the void from outside, the act of doing so can be interpreted as frightening, and hence it reflects the culmination of all your most intense human fears back to you, so you see the hell in your mind you created.

 

When you enter the abyss, you will immediately know why there can be no suffering in the abyss of any kind. When you are liberated from thought, you are liberated from all concepts of hot or cold or sharp or uncomfortable, and you don't have any notion of what a material body would be to have discomforts imposed upon it in the first place.

 

The abyss is indescribable peace and purity. The above is exclusively the delusions shared by those who dared to peer at it and reflect there own mind's fears, but had no experiences entering/becoming the abyss.

Edited September 26, 2014 by Bud Jetsun

[dawei]

The legendary warrior king, Xiang Yu, the overlord of Western Chu, victorious in the epic battles of Julu and Pengcheng, notably remembered for his fearless tenacity in taking 60,000 men to face armies of nearly ten times that. Eventually succumbing to his own thirst for power, he was trapped at Gaixia, and, staring into the abyss, he composed the Song of Gaixia (垓下歌), fondly thinking of his horse, Dapple, and his consort, just before he took his own life.

 

《垓下歌》

The Hegemon's Lament

力拔山兮氣蓋世。

My strength plucked up the hills,

My might shadowed the world;

時不利兮騅不逝。

But the times were against me,

And Dapple¹ runs no more;

騅不逝兮可奈何！

When Dapple runs no more,

What then can I do?

虞兮虞兮奈若何！

Ah, Yu,² my Yu,

What will your fate be?

 

The idiom he is remembered by, "Courage without tactics", is best exemplified by his getting trapped in Gaixia.

 

He fell for a well worn tactic to take the opposing general's great love (Yu, in this case) and taking her down into the canyon... Yu wildly chased to simply find himself in the very pit of the canyon's abyss, surrounded with no escape.

 

In this bowled cavern, the captured troops were forced to sing “Chu Song from Four Sides” which is a lament for missing one’s family. Defeated troops simply put their weapons down and cried... Xiang Yu's wife committed suicide for feeling the cause of the fall of Chu.

 

This is as much a physical abyss as one can endure... but Xiang Yu escaped the canyon !

 

He slit his throat after locals pointed him in the wrong direction to the Wu River and his entire fleeing army killed.

 

Xiang Yu endured two abyss in a short time.

[C T]

The idiom he is remembered by, "Courage without tactics", is best exemplified by his getting trapped in Gaixia.

 

He fell for a well worn tactic to take the opposing general's great love (Yu, in this case) and taking her down into the canyon... Yu wildly chased to simply find himself in the very pit of the canyon's abyss, surrounded with no escape.

 

In this bowled cavern, the captured troops were forced to sing “Chu Song from Four Sides” which is a lament for missing one’s family. Defeated troops simply put their weapons down and cried... Xiang Yu's wife committed suicide for feeling the cause of the fall of Chu.

 

This is as much a physical abyss as one can endure... but Xiang Yu escaped the canyon !

 

He slit his throat after locals pointed him in the wrong direction to the Wu River and his entire fleeing army killed.

 

Xiang Yu endured two abyss in a short time.

happy that you saw the appropriateness of quoting Xiang Yu's final moments in relation to the OP, and thank you for expanding it nicely.

[Marblehead]

I'd agree up to a point but then I'd go further ...

Yep. You went further. Hehehe.

 

I couldn't do that because I'm the Materialist on this forum.

[Nungali]

:shh:

 

(us discordians are supposed to   stick apart    

[Nungali]

Yep. You went further. Hehehe.

 

I couldn't do that because I'm the Materialist on this forum.

 

 

That ? ... thats just stems from your 'monkey mind'

 

( I was going to put up the 3 monkeys to demonstrate what it is you do that developed your attitude ... but you probably get more fun outa this version;

 

 

 

 

 

Now Marblehead, if you could develop some type of non-materialistic spiritual / religious outlook perhaps you would be able to see , speak and hear evil just as good as the rest of them?

[3bob]

Yep. You went further. Hehehe.

 

I couldn't do that because I'm the Materialist on this forum.

 

up to a point we're all "materialists" until such spelling changes to "mystery"

Edited September 27, 2014 by 3bob

[Marblehead]

 

Now Marblehead, if you could develop some type of non-materialistic spiritual / religious outlook perhaps you would be able to see , speak and hear evil just as good as the rest of them?

That's rather ironic, you know, mostly because of its truth.

[Marblehead]

up to a point we're all "materialists" until such spelling changes to "mystery"

Oh, I don't have problem with "Mystery" (Taoist view). It is when everyone is telling you that they know what the mystery is and they can teach you to be like them that causes me to be so doubtful.

[Bud Jetsun]

The idiom he is remembered by, "Courage without tactics", is best exemplified by his getting trapped in Gaixia.

 

He fell for a well worn tactic to take the opposing general's great love (Yu, in this case) and taking her down into the canyon... Yu wildly chased to simply find himself in the very pit of the canyon's abyss, surrounded with no escape.

 

In this bowled cavern, the captured troops were forced to sing “Chu Song from Four Sides” which is a lament for missing one’s family. Defeated troops simply put their weapons down and cried... Xiang Yu's wife committed suicide for feeling the cause of the fall of Chu.

 

This is as much a physical abyss as one can endure... but Xiang Yu escaped the canyon !

 

He slit his throat after locals pointed him in the wrong direction to the Wu River and his entire fleeing army killed.

 

Xiang Yu endured two abyss in a short time.

 

 

If he endured something, it was a condition of his own mind in a state capable of having a suffering concept.

 

Nothing described there involves the abyss in any way beyond a man's own lack of mindfulness reflecting his fears back to him from the Abyss he did not enter. You may have heard statements like, "the abyss stares back as it's observer", if you are still seeing describable things, thinking describable thoughts, recognizing concepts like suffering, one is merely peering at the reflection of ones own mind.

 

Men of courage would not be soldiers. Men of courage would not tremble before there minds fear driven reflection of the abyss for days, they would enter it.

 

Dante Alighieri did not have courage to enter, he approached the sideline and recorded his experience of trembling in fear.

 

Nietzsche also only dared to tremble in his own fear reflections rather than enter.

 

One may only enter through choosing to enter. Fear of the ever-growing repulsion of human fears reflected and compounded as they are reflected is the limit of experience the abyss provides one if one chooses it to be.

 

Exacting precise mindfulness can take you there, but one may never use the same path twice (at least in my own experience), and the journey can't be rushed or deliberate, as the act of rushing or determination removes the capacity to be aware of ones destination.

 

The abyss is always awaiting new visitors to have there lives forever changed by experiencing the eternal timeless existence.

Edited October 3, 2014 by Bud Jetsun

[Marblehead]

Nietzsche also only dared to tremble in his own fear reflections rather than enter.

Interesting that you mentioned Nietzsche and I agree with you that he never did enter. Would he have had his health not become so poor? The desire would have been but would he have had the courage? I don't know.

 

But I will suggest that Camus did enter. He knew what was in there. But he didn't stay, he came back out.

[Bud Jetsun]

Interesting that you mentioned Nietzsche and I agree with you that he never did enter. Would he have had his health not become so poor? The desire would have been but would he have had the courage? I don't know.

 

But I will suggest that Camus did enter. He knew what was in there. But he didn't stay, he came back out.

 

 

After reading a bit from Camus, it seems he did experience the abyss.

 

One may only experience the illusion of leaving as one experiences the illusion of entering.

 

"Entering the abyss" is a convenient misnomer like "becoming enlightened" or "reaching liberation" etc.

 

There is nowhere to "go" to experience the abyss, just as there is nothing to "do" to become enlightened, both are states of awareness of what always was.

[Marblehead]

Nice observations. Chuang Tzu told us that there is no where to go in order to attain awareness. He didn't speak of these other concepts. I can't even recall the usage of "abyss" in The Chuang Tzu.

[RiverSnake]

Some useful insights on this topic: http://www.theomagica.com/on-crossing-the-abyss

[Jadespear]

The abyss:

 

Timeless, spaceless, nothingness

Un originated eternal 

Continuum through all centers of existence

Awaiting us to find, always enjoying a new discovery

un created source of creativity

the abyss is you, the abyss is me, the abyss is eternally free

[Nungali]

Some useful insights on this topic: http://www.theomagica.com/on-crossing-the-abyss

 

I haven't read that but I have read his paper on the ' Order of  the Asiatic Brethren ' - very interesting.  He writes and researches pretty good for a self-stated non academic. 

Edited June 2, 2015 by Nungali

[Bud Jetsun]

Have you entered sir?  You have better than the 2nd hand non-descriptions that abound. 

 

 

With unlimited Love,

-Luke

 

 

The abyss:

 

Timeless, spaceless, nothingness

Un originated eternal 

Continuum through all centers of existence

Awaiting us to find, always enjoying a new discovery

un created source of creativity

the abyss is you, the abyss is me, the abyss is eternally free