Reality vs. Unreality

[3bob]

if "satchitananda" is an illusion to anyone then they can kiss their  you know what goodbye...

 

Thanks God for the joy without sorrow.

[neti neti]

Joy sans sorrow is implicit. Consciousness-being-bliss does not think or say "I belong to myself." There is only the supreme "I", which knows nothing. It is knowledge.

 

No ass to kiss. So no arrivals and no departures. Everywhere I am, and yet, I am not.  

 

Edited August 24, 2018 by neti neti

[Marblehead]

And you am what you am.

 

[neti neti]

3 minutes ago, Marblehead said:

And you am what you am.

 

 

Alls I do is just ams, and it's alls that I ams. 

Edited August 24, 2018 by neti neti

[Marblehead]

Yep.  We just gotta do the best we can with what we have.  Applies to both the Manifest and the Mystery (yu and wu).

 

 

 

[Wu Ming Jen]

Nei Dan Barrier 47. Grasping Images

The primordial Way gives form to the formless. It is not all this physical body which does work in the world, so where and when does the formless body begin its work? Leaving the body we can no longer discuss the Way. Grasping onto images we neglect truth. The human body is the combination of five illusions. They are externally expressed as eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and mouth and internally as the heart, liver, stomach, lungs, and kidneys. When death comes, they will be reduced to a pile of bones and rotting flesh. If one is too attached to their body during cultivation how can they achieve unity of nature and life? One must know that the body creates much toil in this life. Therefore, to preserve the Golden Elixir of the Way the Taoists cultivate their nature and life, cultivating the inner spirit as well as taking well care of the physical body. Our true spirit,  the yang spirit has no imperfection. Once the Yang spirit is cultivated, one can enter water without drowning, enter fire without burning, endure as long as heaven and earth, and is as illuminated as the sun and moon.

 

 

 

 

 

The Tao, Nature and Reality are One.  Lao Tzu has it that ultimate reality is also ultimate creation they are one and the same. This is a very unique position. 

 

 

 

The Master doesn’t try to be powerful;
thus he is truly powerful.
The ordinary man keeps reaching for power;
thus he never has enough.

The Master does nothing,
yet he leaves nothing undone.
The ordinary man is always doing things,
yet many more are left to be done.

The kind man does something,
yet something remains undone.
The just man does something,
and leaves many things to be done.
The moral man does something,
and when no one responds
he rolls up his sleeves and uses force.

When the Tao is lost, there is goodness.
When goodness is lost, there is morality.
When morality is lost, there is ritual.
Ritual is the husk of true faith,
the beginning of chaos.

Therefore the Master concerns himself
with the depths and not the surface,
with the fruit and not the flower.
He has no will of his own.
He dwells in reality,
and lets all illusions go.

 

 

[3bob]

the Self knows the Self, that is all there is to it regardless of clever or all encompassing sounding pro or con concepts and words on the matter...

[neti neti]

Not conceptually. Transcendent. Thus beyond the pro of knowing and the con of not-knowing, as well. Cognizing does not cognize itself.

 

Self prevails, spontaneously immanent in all. Know and know-not do not apply.

 

Edited August 25, 2018 by neti neti

[3bob]

apparently you have missed the well recognized teachings of several Satguru's on the matter or don't agree with them?  Anyway such knowing is not mental knowing if that is what you are getting at and if so I agree...the Self knowing the Self is beyond any knowing that any degree of mind stuff can wrap itself around.

Edited August 25, 2018 by 3bob

[neti neti]

4 hours ago, 3bob said:

apparently you have missed the well recognized teachings of several Satguru's on the matter or don't agree with them?  Anyway such knowing is not mental knowing if that is what you are getting at and if so I agree...the Self knowing the Self is beyond any knowing that any degree of mind stuff can wrap itself around.

I think this is a long time coming 3bob.  Apologies if I don't immediately grasp the intent behind your words. I usually do. And apologies if it seems I nitpick or am just trying to sound fancy at times. I just take it seriously. That's how it pours out. I feel the way I must write about it needs to be quite specific, such that there is the least room for misinterpretation as possible. Sometimes, that feeling gets trumped in favor of brevity though. I realize how ambiguous something like "consciousness is an illusion" may read.

 

Our sense of being can be ephemeral, it seems to come and go. We're able to apparently 'forget' ourselves, proof of an awareness which is not steady. Consciousness as it is known dissolves in Self, as I'm sure you are 'aware of' through, for example, the experience of the deep sleep state. It is our nature, but it cannot be who we are which is unknowable, only 'Be-able'. Yet beyond ideas of being and non-being, beyond changing and unchanging, since Ultimate Reality is all there is. Therefore, 'consciousness is an illusion'.

 

It's a very simple yet also very nuanced topic we discuss here within the limitations of language. Making sure we communicate clearly helps us and the reader with what is of most importance: Understanding. The kind of understanding which pushes us beyond the intellect into that true knowing. And it also helps to keep these discussions uncluttered. Naturally, words and ideation cannot touch it. I'm pleased we share the same sense of what that true 'knowing-ness' is all about, as we are That.

 

It is Not the kind of knowing where there is a knower that knows itself as something to be known. This distinction is crucial. Self is symbolically the sole subject, absolute subjectivity, yet it can neither be the subject nor can it ever be an object as that would be within the realm of duality.

 

Feel free to share with me a teacher whose understanding seems to differ, and I'll do my best to either traverse the subtleties to prove there's no difference or I will indeed stand corrected.

 

Om Shanti Shanti Shanti.

 

Edited August 25, 2018 by neti neti

[3bob]

Hey man no apologies needed,  feel free to follow whatever school you best relate to.  I will find a few quotes that we can kick around but it will probably not change anything for either one of us...go in peace.  

[Marblehead]

6 minutes ago, 3bob said:

go in peace.  

But please, just go.  Far, far away.

 

(Sorry.  I couldn't resist.)

 

 

[3bob]

but far^, far away is an illusion...been there done that.

[Marblehead]

1 minute ago, 3bob said:

but far^, far away is an illusion...been there done that.

Ah-Ha!  So you have found out that you nor anyone else can run away from their Self.

 

[3bob]

so now that we have been up in the wee hours of the morning nap time is not to far away...(for the old guys anyway )

Edited August 25, 2018 by 3bob

[3bob]

Just now, Marblehead said:

Ah-Ha!  So you have found out that you nor anyone else can run away from their Self.

 

 

holy cow you are getting mystical on me MH!

 

[Marblehead]

1 minute ago, 3bob said:

so now that we have up in the wee hours of the morning nap time is not to far away...(for the old guys anyway )

I guess we are at different locations on this planet.  I woke up only a couple hours ago.  Ready to live another day.  I'm just waiting to be inspired to turn off my computer so to do something else.  At the moment nothing needs be done.

 

[Marblehead]

2 minutes ago, 3bob said:

 

holy cow you are getting mystical on me MH!

 

Hehehe.  I've been properly accused of that before.  But I see no reason to apologize.

 

[neti neti]

1 hour ago, 3bob said:

Hey man no apologies needed,  feel free to follow whatever school you best relate to.  I will find a few quotes that we can kick around but it will probably not change anything for either one of us...go in peace.  

 

None needed indeed. The only difference between schools is in their approach, all ultimately "best" to relate to, as I never seemed to have a choice in the matter. I've been made to explore most pointers, and found that... the school follows me.

 

Ajata doctrine just doesn't beat around any bushes. How could it? It is the final truth. There is nothing to discuss. Ironically, the school in which one senses an arising of the most aversion, is most likely the one our ego is terrified about being true. I dive in headlong for the 1st hand experience, and that fearlessness has proved to be...enlightening.

 

But in essence they are all just working models of that which cannot be confined or defined, only witnessed in its reflection once "coming down" into the identity of a 'knower'. Hence, my earlier statement of, 'Self knows nothing.'

 

Self alone is.

 

Edited August 25, 2018 by neti neti

[neti neti]

1 hour ago, Marblehead said:

But please, just go.  Far, far away.

 

(Sorry.  I couldn't resist.)

 

 

That's right keep going... yup that way. Uh-huh. You, away from me. That way. Bu-bye. 

Edited August 25, 2018 by neti neti

[neti neti]

Quote

Ignorance gives rise to desires. Desires give rise to the world. When you realise that ignorance itself does not exist, you will discover the illusoriness of your desires. As a result the whole world becomes illusory and non-existent. The world never did exist. If there was no past happening, how then could the desire to have possession of an object arise? If there is no desire, how then could the world be seen as reality? If the desire is ended, you will discover the illusory relationship between the seer and seen. Thus you become the goal where all sufferings end. (Nothing Ever Happened, vol. 3, p. 221)

 

I think that most devotees of Ramana Maharshi can assimilate the idea that an unreal world is created by the seer of it. This, however, is not ajata; it is drishti-srishti vada. As Bhagavan noted in the quote I gave earlier, this is not the final truth.Ajata, flying in the face of logic, common sense and everyday experience, says very clearly that not even an unreal, illusory projected world has been created. The bald truth, the final truth, is ‘No world has ever been created’.

 

Maya, the idea that a power within the Self creates and sustains an unreal illusory world, gives a handy and convenient explanation of why an unreal world appears to exist and be real, but ajata rejects this compromise. It sticks firmly to the position that there is no creation and no causality.

 

Gaudapada declared ‘non-creation’ to beparamartha, the final truth, and Bhagavan endorsed this conclusion, saying that it tallied with his own experience. Papaji too sided with Gaudapada on the issue of whether creation ‘never happened’ or whether it appeared to happen on account of maya:

 

Somehow, I have to accept Gaudapada’s teaching. And that teaching is ‘Nothing ever existed at all’. This is the teaching which I like. Even Sankara did not agree with him. He started this mayaphilosophy, the idea that all is an illusion. (Nothing Ever Happened vol. 3, p. 218)

 

Papaji was fond of saying, ‘Nothing ever happens,’ or ‘Nothing ever happened’. For him this was the ultimate truth, even if it appeared to violate common sense and everyday experience. Bhagavan used this phrase himself in a reply he gave to Swami Madhavatirtha:

 

…one who is properly established in the Atmanknows that nothing happens in this world, and that nothing is ever destroyed. Something is felt to be happening only when we are in the state of pramata, the knower. This state is not one’s real nature. For the jnani who has given up the idea of the knower, nothing ever happens. (The Power of the Presence part one, p. 238)

 

This is an interesting comment that explains, to some extent, the paradox ofajata. Something can only happen or exist if there is a knower or an experiencer of it. If there is no seer of the world, the world itself is not there, and never was.

 

It is hard to defend any of this logically or rationally, so don’t expect me to do so in the ‘responses’ section. All I can say is that this is what certain masters have said on this topic, and I can add that they have all said this on the basis of their own direct experience of the Self. That experience does not seem to be governed by the rules of logic.

 

The issue is complicated even further by their statements that the world still ‘appears’ after realisation, even though theajata position would seem to indicate that it shouldn’t be there at all. Bhagavan said on several occasions that the world can be taken to be ‘real’ when it is known and experienced to be an indivisible appearance within one’s own Self, and unreal when it is perceived as an object by a seer.

 

He [Sankara] said that (1) Brahman is real, (2) The universe is unreal, and (3) Brahman is the universe. He did not stop at the second, because the third explains the other two. It signifies that the universe is real if perceived as the Self, and unreal if perceived apart from the Self. (Guru Ramana p. 65)

 

Papaji gave a very similar explanation in a conversation I had with him in the mid-1990s:

 

In that place [the silence of the Heart] and in that place alone, one can say, ‘Nothing has ever happened. Nothing has ever existed. The world never came into existence or disappeared from it.’ 

That place is my real home. It is where I always am. One can say this with authority only when one abides in that ultimate place where nothing has ever happened. 

A few weeks ago someone asked me, ‘You say that the world is a projection of the mind, and that you yourself have no mind. If you have no mind, how does the world still appear to you?’

I answered, ‘I don’t see any world, so I don’t need any explanation for its appearance. If I ever see a world in front of me, then I will have to think up an explanation for it.’ 

That’s one way of answering this question. I could also have said that the world is Brahman, and that everything that is seen is Brahman. 

You can see the world as real, as Brahman, or, like the Buddha, you can say that it is not there at all. He never saw anything. Both statements are equally valid. 

I can say the world never existed or that the world is Brahman. Both statements are equally true, but this is very hard to understand. The world is real because it is Brahman, not because it appears as names and forms. It is the names and forms that never existed. (Nothing Ever Happened, vol. 3, pp. 223-4)

 

This elaboration of the points that Bhagavan made in the earlier quote from Guru Ramana gives an indication of how some of the perplexing tenets of ajata can be resolved, at least on an intellectual level. The next quotation is what I wrote as an introduction to some Guru Vachaka Kovaiverses that deal with the topic of creation. I included this explanation in a post I made three months ago (http://sri-ramana-maharshi.blogspot.com/2008/05/is-world-real.html), but it is worth repeating here since it dissects some of the terms that are used in Hindu theories of creation:

 

The question ‘Is the world real?’ is a recurring one in Indian philosophy, and Bhagavan was asked for his views on this topic on many occasions. To understand the context and background of his replies it will be helpful to have a proper understanding of what he meant by the words ‘real’ and ‘world’.

 

In everyday English the word ‘real’ generally denotes something that can be perceived by the senses. As such, it is a misleading translation of the Sanskrit word ‘sat’, which is often rendered in English as ‘being’ or ‘reality’. Bhagavan, along with many other Indian spiritual teachers, had a completely different definition of reality:

 

Bhagavan: What is the standard of reality? That alone is real which exists by itself, which reveals itself by itself and which is eternal and unchanging. (Maharshi’s Gospel, p. 61)

 

In Indian philosophy reality is not determined by perceptibility but by permanence, unchangeability and self-luminosity. This important definition is elaborated on in the dialogue from which the above quotation has been taken. It appears in full as a note to verse 64. As for the word ‘world’, Muruganar points out in his comments to verses 63 and 64 that the Sanskrit word for world, ‘loka’, literally means ‘that which is seen’. The Tamil word for the world, ulagu, is derived from loka and has the same meaning. If one combines this definition of the word ‘world’ with the standard of reality set by Bhagavan, the question, ‘Is the world real?’ becomes an enquiry about the abiding reality of what is perceived: ‘Do things that are perceived have permanence, unchangeability and self-luminosity?’ The answer to that question is clearly ‘no’. The names and forms perceived by a seer do not meet the standard of reality defined by Bhagavan, and as such they are dismissed as ‘unreal’. 

According to Bhagavan these names and forms appear in Brahman, the underlying substratum. Brahman does meet the stringent test for reality outlined above since it, and it alone, is permanent, unchanging and self-luminous. If one accepts these definitions, it follows that Brahman is real, whereas the world (the collection of perceived names and forms) is unreal. This formulation, ‘Brahman is real; the world is unreal’ is a standard and recurring statement in vedantic philosophy. 

Vedanta is the philosophy that is derived from the Upanishads, the final portions of the Vedas, and the subdivision of it that tallies with Bhagavan’s teachings is known as ‘advaita’, which translates as ‘not two’. ‘Not two’ means, among other things, that there are not two separate entities, Brahman and the world; all is one indivisible whole. This point is important to remember since it is at the crux of the apparently paradoxical statements that Bhagavan made on the nature and reality of the world and its substratum. Since there is nothing that is separate from Brahman, it follows that the names and forms that appear and manifest within it partake of its reality. This means that when the world is known and directly experienced to be a mere appearance in the underlying Brahman, it can be accepted as real, since it is no longer perceived as a separate entity. If one knows oneself to be Brahman, one knows that the world is real because it is indistinguishable from one’s own Self. However, if one merely perceives external names and forms, without experiencing that substratum, those forms have to be dismissed as unreal since they do not meet the strict definition of reality.

 

Once these terms (‘world’ and ‘real’) are analysed and understood, some of the more perplexing conundrums that characterise advaitic creation theories can be seen in a new light. If a world is ‘seen’, it is created and sustained by the ignorance of the ‘seer’; it is not a creation of the Self. In these circumstances, it is still possible to say that in the Self creation has ‘never happened’. But what of the world that ‘appears’ to the jnani? This may seem to be semantic hair-splitting of an extreme kind, but ‘appearance’ does not mean ‘creation’. Ajata means ‘not caused’ or ‘not created’. It doesn’t necessarily mean ‘not existing at all’. The world of the jnani is an uncaused and uncreated appearance within the Self; the world of the ajnani, on the other hand, is a creation of the mind that sees it.

 

[3bob]

one can't really have all this denial of the important Vedic/Upanishad teachings and still talk of any "Hindu" or Sanatana Dharma alignment with same.

Thus another sub-forum should be created for this slant on things.  

Edited August 25, 2018 by 3bob

[neti neti]

37 minutes ago, 3bob said:

one can't really have all this denial of the important Vedic/Upanishad teachings and still talk of any "Hindu" or Sanatana Dharma alignment with same.

Thus another sub-forum should be created for this slant on things.  

 

Could you please elaborate on this?

[3bob]

try the Chandogya upanishad which refutes the above summation.

[neti neti]

31 minutes ago, 3bob said:

try the Chandogya upanishad which refutes the above summation.

 

I've read it. But elaboration would require that you actually address at least one point of the above summation, using whichever text you please. 

 

I offered to navigate the subtleties if possible, or stand corrected, to which you replied you could provide a few quotes to kick around.

 

If you're unwilling, that is fine. But your assertion remains without substance and helps no one.

Edited August 25, 2018 by neti neti