This blog was set up so that you can post comments or questions about our readings or class discussions. I hope that you find this medium useful and enjoyable.
Julia
This blog was set up so that you can post comments or questions about our readings or class discussions. I hope that you find this medium useful and enjoyable.
Julia
January 29, 2008 at 10:19 pm
On page 3 of the first Mahayana booklet, the text reads, “… the self does not exist in the nature of permanence or in the nature of creation.” Can someone elaborate a little more on what is meant by “creation” here. Does it refer to ‘compouned things”?
Luis
January 31, 2008 at 4:50 pm
luis… i read this..and i am really not sure… whenever i hear the word creation i think of god….of course i doubt ponlop was thinking about god here…. so i will have to think about this…. later..greg ps.. maybe it is everything is empty…even things that arise from causes and conditions…or compouned things… nothing exists… or he could talking about the imputed self that we create in our minds that we believe to be “I”…
January 31, 2008 at 5:13 pm
I agree, Greg and Luis… this use of the word “creation” is confusing. It cannot refer to the “compounded” because indeed the imputed self is “compounded” (an illusion, a made-up projection of language and concept with some innate basis rooted in the body consciousness, that is -an interdependent and therefore “empty” construct). I tend to think the word “creation” here might be indicated that no outside force, like God, created it, and to point out that the “self” has no essential “essence”, but I would like to hear others’ opinions.
February 24, 2008 at 4:22 pm
three realms / six realms…… what is the deal?.. i will dig up the answer ..but if anyone knows… i would appreciate it…. thanks greg
February 24, 2008 at 5:21 pm
Three realms/six realms… A trisket and trasket, a green and yellow basket.
Buddhist cosmology (or one can also say ‘psychology’ since it’s all “mind”, and from our subjective, experiential vantage point, all “our mind(s)”) gets described from different vantage points. The three realms refer to (1) form realm (2) formless realm (3) desire realm. They inter-penetrate. The form realm would be Tushita Heaven or the various Pure Lands, the deity emanations, dakinis, dharmapalas, protectors, etc. Sambogakaya manifestation; also the lower gods are said to inhabit this realm. The formless realm consists of the higher gods, or ‘entities’ that no longer have form or much left of ‘distinct indentity or boundary’ but still maintain some traces of this.
The six realms describe states of being within samsara — so this includes even hell beings. Everything in these six realms can be said to exist in samsara or the “desire realm’ except the higher gods. The Six realms are taught in this text from a Mahayana point of view to describe ‘psychological states’ rather than ‘real, solid places and beings’. Trungpa also taught them this way, though in Buddhist history and from a hinayana point of view (fundamentalist point of view) they were taken as being ‘real’.
When one says that things are “real”, however (for instance, the yidims and even the Buddhas), one should consider what ‘real’ really means. According to Buddhist philosophy, this world we know (planet earth and all our doing here) is also just an aspect of our ‘mind’. We are just so used to thinking its all real, I mean REALLY REAL, and we have so many things and people reinforcing that belief that we make a real distinction between our ordinariy visible world and the invisible worlds that are interacting with ours.
Does this help?
February 24, 2008 at 7:30 pm
Correction: I was just looking into Indestructible Truth by Reggie Ray, and I see he has Tushita Heaven in the Desire realm. (I’ll bring this as a handout to class Tuesday.) This makes sense when you think of it, because in Tushita Heaven one is still striving for ‘liberation’ and therefore still in the desire realm of samsara.
Julia
February 25, 2008 at 12:03 am
thanks julia.. this helps… i will get to some serious reading tomorrow..
March 6, 2008 at 5:59 pm
julia..susan and i and the rest of our class were wondering if you could repeat the story about the 3 people in the desert and how that relates to the 3 natures..?
March 7, 2008 at 7:20 pm
The anecdote about the three travelers in the desert was told by Jay Garfield up at Columbia. He was presenting a paper he’s written called Taking the Conventional Truth Seriously. Since the class Tuesday, which I’m leading, is on the Two Truths, I’ll spend a minute to talk about this before describing the story in terms of the 3 Natures.
Jay’s point is that Ultimate Truth is the easy. Ultimate Truth == Emptiness. It’s Conventional Truth that’s difficult. He says there’s a team of international philosophers of which he’s one working on the problem currently of ‘What is the Conventional Truth’. The Conventional Truth is difficult because (1)It’s the only truth we have. (2) there can be a false conventional truth or a true conventional truth. A person who mistakes a rope for a snake has a false read on relative reality, for instance. (3) Ultimate Truth is dependent on Relative Truth. This is because Ultimate Truth doesn’t exist independently of Relative Truth. So, Emptiness is another dependently arising cause and condition. This is the ‘emptiness of emptiness’. Otherwise, Emptiness would exist as a solid THING/Object. One way of putting this would be to say that Ultimate Reality is really only conventionally real. (Not very sexy, but really interesting to think about.)
This is the story: Three travelers are going down a road in the desert. One is an experienced desert explorer. One is a novice. A third is wearing polarized sunglasses. The novice sees water in the road ahead and thinks it’s real. The experienced traveler instantly recognizes this as a mirage. The person wearing polarized sunglasses doesn’t see any water.
One of Jay’s points is that the person who doesn’t see any water would not be the wise, enlightened being. An enlightened person SEES relative reality, but recognizes it as not inherently real. So, the person with the sunglasses is just a consumer idiot with expensive sunglasses — totally out of it. The novice is “us” with our ordinary dualistic consciousness perceiving our conventional world. It’s the person who sees both who is the wise one here.
Remember the definition of consciousness is: that which is aware of objects.
Therefore, Consciousness is inherently dualistic.
Mind Only philosophy was developed by Vasubandu as a further refinement of Madhyamaka philosophy to specifically address this dualistic polarity between what is perceived as an objective world ‘out there’ and the subjective mind or consciousness perceiving it. According to this description, all things have three natures which co-exist.
In the story, the ‘mirage’ is the Imaginary Nature. Now, all things/objects perceived ‘out there’ as independly existing, real things are ‘mirages’ or ‘hallucinations’ but the fact that it’s a real ‘mirage’ makes this clearer. The Dependent Nature refers to the fact that the appearance is dependent upon a subjective consciousness perceiving it. The True Nature, or as Jay puts it, the Consumate Nature, is the actual non-existence of this duality described by Vasubandu in positive terms, i.e. the nonreality of duality REALLY EXISTS!!! These apparent things which mascarade as independent phenomena, this nonexistence of apparent reality, is the Consumate or True Nature that all phenomena have.
In our little story, on the subjective side, the one who is fully accomplished intellectually and meditatively — and recognizes the false aspect of relative reality (our experienced desert traveler) represents the subjective aspect of the True Nature and the True Nature on the objective side is the (mirage) which has been thoroughly analyzed and understood.
Nagarjuna’s (negative) definition of Emptiness: Emptiness == lack of essence
Vaubandu’s (positive) definition of Emptiness: Emptiness == lack of subject/object duality, and this REALLY EXISTS.
March 22, 2008 at 5:11 pm
write the bushman… tell him what you really think about the tibet issue… comments@whitehouse.gov