Experience is what is needed

[Dedicated]

On 15/08/2024 at 2:49 AM, stirling said:

 

So many people try to use the intellect to understand realization, picking apart and recombining, interpreting based on dualistic ideas. It is still a path, but a long one where it takes the realization that it is headed nowhere to pick up the pieces and begin from square one, in this moment. 

 

The path becomes clear with practice and experience only. The realization of how things are is ONLY experiential. It is actually quite simple conceptually, but no amount of intellectual energy will tease it apart or reveal it. 

The beauty only reveals itself experientially 

[stirling]

4 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

First off, Stirling, thanks for your responses.

 

_/\_

 

4 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

Kobun lectured on those precepts, the lectures are in "Embracing Mind:  the Zen Talks of Kobun Chino Otogawa", edited by Judy Cosgrove and Shinbo Joseph Hall.  They're not identified as Bodhidharma's, though.

 

I have sat with Joe many times at Jikoji... nice to see his name here.

 

4 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

That much is right, but what about the witness of activity in the absence of a "doer"?

 

The illusion of "witness consciousness" drops out as an inevitable part of the path from insight to completion. Eventually, just as the individual senses are seen experientially to be constructs of "mind", the "self" as a witness drops away somewhere near the final dropping away of "self" and Arhatship, corresponding (I am fairly sure) with the last fetter, "Ignorance". 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_stages_of_awakening#The_four_stages_of_attainment

 

 

4 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

My experience is different.  In my experience, the sense of place associated with consciousness acts. It's hard to believe it can be so until it happens.

 

You'll find it isn't hard to see if your mind is ever quiet for a few seconds while sitting. When you have dropped all techniques and objects and the mind is just resting in its own awareness, ask yourself if you can see how it might be true. I'll bet you can see what I mean. 

 

4 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

[One] dwells, having suffused the first quarter [of the world] with friendliness, likewise the second, likewise the third, likewise the fourth; just so above, below, across; [one] dwells having suffused the whole world everywhere, in every way, with a mind of friendliness that is far-reaching, wide-spread, immeasurable, without enmity, without malevolence. [One] dwells having suffused the first quarter with a mind of compassion… with a mind of sympathetic joy… with a mind of equanimity that is far-reaching, wide-spread, immeasurable, without enmity, without malevolence.

MN I 7; 38; © Pali Text Society Vol I p 48)
 

Gautama said that “the excellence of the heart’s release” through the extension of the mind of compassion was the first of the further concentrations, a concentration he called “the infinity of ether”

(SN 46.54; Pali Text Society Vol V p 100-102).

 

(The Inconceivable Nature of the Wind)

 

Not exactly seeing all appearances as "empty", I think.

 

As I have said previously, you are quoting instructions on the jhanas. The second 4 are formless and are precisely what I am talking about EVEN THOUGH they are not insight. 

 

From the same sutta as your top one:

 

Quote

And again, householder, a monk, (1) by wholly transcending perception of material shapes, by the going down of perception due to sensory impressions, by not attending to perception of variety, thinking: ‘Ether is unending,’ enters on and abides in the plane of infinite ether. 

 

You stopped reading too early. That IS precisely "seeing all appearances as empty". 

 

 

4 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

Well, you and I disagree over whether the sayings in the fifth Nikaya can be trusted.

 

Was the Buddha the ONLY enlightened being that has ever existed?

 

4 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

Arahants with residue left is a funny concept, to me.

 

The Buddha got angry. He became sick and died. He lived in a human body. This is true of all Arhats. The appearance of the body and the phenomenal world as we see it is the "residue".

 

4 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

In Gautama's description of the "seven persons", there are two for whom diligence has been done, and there is no more to be done.  There is no arahant above arahants.

 

Insight is insight. There is only ONE real insight, though it can be more or less clearly understood up to a point. 

 

4 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

The thing I find so useful in Gautama's teaching are the metaphors he provided for each of the first four rupa jhanas ("corporeal" jhanas).  Not sure there's an equivalent in Zen, apart from Hakuin's "golden butter" practice.

 

Shikantaza leapfrogs the jhanas and goes directly to resting in emptiness, the difference is that it is undifferentiated. 

 

4 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

What makes a great teaching, to me, is consistency and applicability.  Zen is strong on negation, but weak on the positive and substantive, when it comes to sitting practice.  Gautama has supplied the positive and substantive, for me.

 

Looks overcomplicated and easily misunderstood from here, but to each his own. The jhanas really require some instruction in my opinion, and aren't directly applicable to the end result of "no-self", as they are analogs NOT the insight itself.

 

4 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

'I appreciate that this is your belief, but it isn't "Buddhism"', said the one who, following in a long line, isn't a Buddhist? 

 

I'd quote Rumi or Adyashanti if I thought it might enlighten someone. Why join the Buddhists? The refuge of the dharma, sangha, and MY teachers. This nice video represents the feeling of gratefulness I have for them:

 

 

 

4 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

I know you'll agree it's not doing something so that "you are there"--at least I'm pretty sure you will... 

 

Enlightenment always happens here, now.  

[Mark Foote]

On 10/23/2024 at 7:26 PM, stirling said:

 

 

  4 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

[One] dwells, having suffused the first quarter [of the world] with friendliness, likewise the second, likewise the third, likewise the fourth; just so above, below, across; [one] dwells having suffused the whole world everywhere, in every way, with a mind of friendliness that is far-reaching, wide-spread, immeasurable, without enmity, without malevolence. [One] dwells having suffused the first quarter with a mind of compassion… with a mind of sympathetic joy… with a mind of equanimity that is far-reaching, wide-spread, immeasurable, without enmity, without malevolence.

MN I 7; 38; © Pali Text Society Vol I p 48)
 

Gautama said that “the excellence of the heart’s release” through the extension of the mind of compassion was the first of the further concentrations, a concentration he called “the infinity of ether”

(SN 46.54; Pali Text Society Vol V p 100-102).

 

(The Inconceivable Nature of the Wind)

 

Not exactly seeing all appearances as "empty", I think.

 

As I have said previously, you are quoting instructions on the jhanas. The second 4 are formless and are precisely what I am talking about EVEN THOUGH they are not insight. 
 

 

 

Gautama said that “the excellence of the heart’s release” through the extension of the mind of compassion was the first of the further concentrations, a concentration he called “the infinity of ether” (SN 46.54; Pali Text Society Vol V p 100-102).

 

"The infinity of ether" is the first of the five "arupa" jhanas, that you are referring to as formless.

 

"The excellence of the heart's release" through the extension of sympathetic joy, as above, constituted the second of the arupa jhanas, "the infinity of consciousness".

"The excellence of the heart's release" through the extension of equanimity constituted the third of the arupa jhanas, "the plane of 'no-thing'".

No instruction on the attainment of "neither-perception-nor-yet-not-perception", the fourth arupa jhana, was given, except to say that equanimity with respect to uniformity with regard to the senses persists.  That  uniformity is overcome by means of lack of desire, resulting in the fifth of the arupa jhanas, "the cessation of ('determinate thought' in) feeling and perceiving", the signless concentration.  That in turn gives way with the thought, "all that is constructed and thought out is impermanent, is subject to end."

The five are the "formless" concentrations, the immaterial concentrations, the incorporeal "peaceful Deliverances which are having transcended material shapes".

 

 

Quote

 

From the same sutta as your top one:

 

  Quote

And again, householder, a monk, (1) by wholly transcending perception of material shapes, by the going down of perception due to sensory impressions, by not attending to perception of variety, thinking: ‘Ether is unending,’ enters on and abides in the plane of infinite ether. 

 

You stopped reading too early. That IS precisely "seeing all appearances as empty". 

 

 

 

 

For me, it's not an experience of seeing anything.  It's something that effects action.

 

I have found that zazen is more likely to “get up and walk around” when the free location of consciousness is accompanied by an extension of friendliness and compassion, an extension beyond the boundaries of the senses. 

 

The Oxford English Dictionary offers some quotes about “ether” (Oxford English Dictionary, s.v. “ether (n.),” March 2024, https://doi.org/10.1093/OED/1514129048):

 

They [sc. the Brahmins] thought the stars moved, and the planets they called fishes, because they moved in the ether, as fishes do in water.

 

(Vince, Complete System. Astronomy vol. II. 253 [1799])

 

 

Plato considered that the stars, chiefly formed of fire, move through the ether, a particularly pure form of air.

 

(Popular Astronomy vol. 24 364 [1916])

 

 

When the free location of consciousness is accompanied by an extension of the mind of compassion, there can be a feeling that the necessity of breath is connected to things that lie outside the boundaries of the senses.  That, to me, is an experience of “the infinity of ether”.

 

... Mayu, Zen Master Baoche, was fanning himself. A monk approached and said, “Master, the nature of wind is permanent and there is no place it does not reach. Why then do you fan yourself?”

 

“Although you understand that the nature of the wind is permanent,” Mayu replied, “you do not understand the meaning of its reaching everywhere.”

 

“What is the meaning of its reaching everywhere?” asked the monk again. Mayu just kept fanning himself…

 

(Dogen, “Genjo Koan [Actualizing the Fundamental Point]”, tr. Robert Aitken and Kazuaki Tanahashi)

 

 

The wind that reaches everywhere was actualized immediately in Mayu’s fanning.

 

(The Inconceivable Nature of the Wind)

 

 

Strange to think of Cohen as having been Sasaki's attendant for so many years.  Great poetry & music, for sure.

 

 

Edited October 25 by Mark Foote

[tao.te.kat]

>the "self" as a witness drops away somewhere near the final dropping away of "self" and Arhatship, corresponding (I am fairly sure) with the last fetter, "Ignorance". 

 

You're pretty wise... That's a pit you see clearly is to be overcomed.

 

The witness is a temporary form of dissociation that should be overcomed in later stages of wisdom. If not, it will create a "non-conceptual witness" quite solid and fake, that's quite close to the atman realization of Advaitins. Many people in Zen is lost there, as mindfulness initially will create this witness. It's not a situation to avoid at all costs, but to be seen as temporary, and also as just a new mind construct.

 

For example in Mahamudra, more detailed, it's overcomed after completing the second yoga.

 

In Zen can be traced to the 8th ox picture (8. Both Bull and Self Transcended)

 

Not the usual personality, not the "non-conceptual witness"

 

And there the non-duality ground starts.

 

Whip, rope, person, and Ox -
all merge in No Thing.
This heaven is so vast,
no message can stain it.
How may a snowflake exist
in a raging fire.
Here are the footprints of
the Ancestors.

 

Best wishes to all

 

 

Edited October 25 by tao.te.kat

[silent thunder]

 

Spoiler

 

Awareness is.  Here.  Now.

 

are words, thinking, logic or explanation required to experience presence, being, awareness?

 

 

rest as awareness

 

 

 

Edited October 25 by silent thunder
rephrased as a query

[stirling]

16 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

For me, it's not an experience of seeing anything.  It's something that effects action.

 

Not literally seeing - I mean realizing, or apprehending. It IS true that the emptiness of all appearances is obvious once seen, and pervades all imagined qualities of them, but is the realization that matters. 

 

Quote

I have found that zazen is more likely to “get up and walk around” when the free location of consciousness is accompanied by an extension of friendliness and compassion, an extension beyond the boundaries of the senses.

 

Zazen is always walking around - also: sitting, baking cookies, washing the car and doing taxes. It is noticing its emptiness that allows you to see it. You don't have to be enlightened see it, but it does help to get some pointing it out sometimes. 

 

Quote

Strange to think of Cohen as having been Sasaki's attendant for so many years.  Great poetry & music, for sure.

 

I agree. I think it appealed to him because he didn't have to BE Leonard Cohen when he as at Mt. Baldy. He could drop all of that and just BE.  That is the refuge of practice, as the video visually presents, and why I keep coming back to it.