Nondualism

Exploring Theravāda's connections to other paths - what can we learn from other traditions, religions and philosophies?
MattJ
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Nondualism

Post by MattJ »

Ianand in another topic wrote:
Yet, as anyone with a background in the Pali canon who studies these ideas with any discernment will be able to attest, the non-dual take on awakening is as far from anything the Buddha ever taught as it can possibly be.
As some one "mesmerized" by non-dualism, I would like to hear the Pali take on things.

For example, nondual emptiness appears to me a direct result of seeing the classic three characteristics of Buddhism. In Madhyamika Buddhism, emptiness means empty of inherent, independent existence. How is this contradicted by the suttas? It seems to me that this is applying the 3 marks of existence to things, and not just people.

Matt
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tiltbillings
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Re: Nondualism

Post by tiltbillings »

Non-dualism is a vague expression that carries way too much baggage and it best not used in reference to the not non-dual Pali suttas which are also not dualistic.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
Reductor
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Re: Nondualism

Post by Reductor »

I've just recently begun readings Zen books, and I've noticed that this non-dualism(ND) stuff has more than one facet. One is the emptyness the OP mentioned, which seems alright from the Nikaya angle (so far that I've been able to discern), although it moves the doctrinal emphasis from an experiential view point to a metaphysical one which the Buddha didn't really employ. The other theme of ND seems to be this linking conciousness, or super consciousness or what have you. Everyone is supposed to have it, but it does not sound like anything that correlates to the Nikaya's. It also seems to superseed Nibbana as the goal of practice, which places the 'goal' well within the confines of Samsara. This does not seem like the view the Buddha wanted us to have about about Nibbana or the 'goal'.

This 'super consciousness' thing can be additionally harmful I think because it leads to 'view clinging' and 'clinging to a doctrine of self', both of which result in renewed birth (ie, not the goal of the historical teachings).

Whether or not it is a valid conclusion drawn out of the Nikaya's, this talk of ND moves the emphasis of practice away from the subduing of unwholesome patterns in the mind and puts it on the realization of this metaphysical principal of 'oneness'. From that point on there is much less talk about 'the end of stress' and more about unity.

Now, the big question is: does this realization of ND reduce suffering? If it does, then it is not all bad, although I would hesitate to say it leads to Nibbana. In order to know, the practice has to go to its own end. But since life is short and this practice could be long, you might spend the entierty of you life chasing the wrong goal.

Of course, I am a rank amateur in terms of the ND stuff, as I suspect one could study the doctrinal fine points until the cows come home without being sure of its truth one way or another. So, take all this blather of mine with a large grain of salt.
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jcsuperstar
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Re: Nondualism

Post by jcsuperstar »

Nondualism as a tool that can be used when needed is just fine, Nondualism as a view to be clung to is just another thing to be let go of.
สัพเพ สัตตา สุขีตา โหนตุ

the mountain may be heavy in and of itself, but if you're not trying to carry it it's not heavy to you- Ajaan Suwat
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Re: Nondualism

Post by Shonin »

jcsuperstar wrote:Nondualism as a tool that can be used when needed is just fine, Nondualism as a view to be clung to is just another thing to be let go of.
Absolutely right.

As someone with a degree of understanding of both Theravada and Zen, I'd say that Nonduality is an experience that corresponds to the absence of processes of identification, that is to the end of 'I-making'.

However, as with many experiences, it can be grasped and objectified as some sort of metaphysics. Such 'mistakes' are not generally seen as a true understanding by the important figures in Zen. But people do turn these things into beliefs sometimes and get into all sorts of tangles.
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tiltbillings
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Re: Nondualism

Post by tiltbillings »

Shonin wrote:
jcsuperstar wrote:Nondualism as a tool that can be used when needed is just fine, Nondualism as a view to be clung to is just another thing to be let go of.
Absolutely right.

As someone with a degree of understanding of both Theravada and Zen, I'd say that Nonduality is an experience that corresponds to the absence of processes of identification, that is to the end of 'I-making'.
The problem with that is that it can be easily mimiced by experiences that are not quite what they seem to be. I still think non-duality is dog-poop, best not stepped in and really has no place in the Theravada or the Pali suttas.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
PeterB
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Re: Nondualism

Post by PeterB »

Some years ago out of interest I went to a " Satsang" with a teacher of non duality. At one point he asked me to sit opposite him and he closed his eyes. I sat there.
I am a very bad hypnotism subject and quick to spot auto suggestion and the like,so I expected nothing,
and then I got it...All subject and object disappeared. I was in a state of non duality.
It was very joyful and I felt a sense of great peace.
It lasted for several hours, in fact until I was at the station on the way home.
At first I wanted to repeat the experience so I went to the next public teaching .....nothing.
After some time and after a lot of refection I reached a couple of conclusions ;
I think that the teacher probably had a low degree of iddhis/siddhis. I dont think it was simply suggestion. It was too strong an experience.
That the experience was worth absolutely nothing, and was not worth pursuing. It was transient. It was not the end of dukkha. It was in fact no different from a chemically induced experience.
And more importantly..it was in the end not wholesome or indicative of realisation. It was in fact a pleasant variety of alienation...That if one achieved the state permanently one would end up as alienated as those Gurus with their blissed out stoned eyes.
That there are are no short cuts. That the path of feedom from suffering was not a quick trip, or vacation from the everyday. That it was a process to be worked through on a daily basis hour by hour in all moods and all circumstances. That it was all contained in the 8FP.
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mikenz66
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Re: Nondualism

Post by mikenz66 »

I recently read Rupert Gethin's book The Foundations of Buddhism and as Tilt observes:
http://www.dhammawheel.com/viewtopic.ph ... 678#p37716" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
tiltbillings wrote: Rupert Gethin’s THE FOUNDATIONS OF BUDDHISM does a nice job of putting Nagarjuna into a broader Indian Buddhist context.
I think there's enough of an overview there to put the excesses of emptiness/non-duality over-enthusiasts who surface from time to time into perspective...

Gethin observes (p238-239):
... Nagarjuna presents 'emptiness' as equivalent to that fundamental teaching of the Buddha, 'dependent arising', and, as such, as articulating the 'middle' between the extremes of eternalism and annihilationis. If something arises in dependence upon some other thing, as a dharma is supposed to, then how, Nagarjuna asks, can it be defined in the manner of certain Abhidharma theorists want, as that which exists of and in itself, as that which possesses its own existence (sabhava). For if something is sufficient to explain its own existence, the it must exist as itself for ever, and could never be affected by anything else... And if things cannot truly change, the the whole of Buddhism is undermined, for Buddhism claims that suffering arises because of causes and conditions and by gradually eliminating unwholesome conditions and cultivating wholesome conditions we can change from being unawakened to being awakened. Thus one who claims that dharmas exist in themselves must either fall into the trap of eternalism by denying the possibility of real change, or, if he nevertheless insists that change is possible, fall into the trap of annihilationism since, in changing, what existed has gone out of existence. Therefore, concludes Nagarjuna, the teaching of the Buddha s that everything is empty of its own inherent existence.

But Nagarjuna was quick to point out that we should not conclude that emptiness itself is equivalent to the view that nothing exists; in fact those who see emptiness as some kind of annihilationism have a faulty view of emptiness and 'when t is wrongly seen, emptiness destroys the dull-witted, like a snake that is wrongly grasped or a magical spell that is wrongly cast'. It is not that nothing exists but that nothing exists as an individual essence possessed of its own inherent existence. In particular, to see 'emptiness' as undermining the teaching of the Buddha is to fail to take proper account of the basic Abhidharma distinction between conventional and ultimate truth. The point is that, for Nagarjuna, the Abhidharma account of the world in terms of dharmas cannot be the ultimate description of the way things are; rather, it still falls within the compass of conventional truth. The ultimate truth about the way things are is emptiness, but conventional truth is still truth, not conventional falsehood, and without it the Buddha's teaching is hopeless:
The buddhas' teaching of Dharma depends equally on the two truths: ordinary conventional truth and truth from the point of view of the ultimate; those who do not perceive the difference between these two truths do not perceive the deep 'reality' (tattva) in the teaching of the buddhas. Without resorting to ordinary conventions, what is ultimate cannot be taught; without recourse to what is ultimate, nirvana is not attained.
But nirvana is not some 'Absolute Reality' existing beyond the phenomenal conditioned world, behind a veil of conventional truth, for again this would commit us to eternalism. Emptiness is the ultimate truth of the reality of nirvana---it too is empty of its own existence, it is not an existent. It follows that nirvana cannot e understood as some thing, some existent, which is other than the conditioned round of existence, samsara.
There is nothing that distinguishes samsara from nirvana; there is nothing that distinguishes nirvana from samsara; and the furthest limit of nirvana is also the fullest limit of samsara; not even the subtlest difference between the two is found.
In emptiness, then, Nagarjuna attempts to articulate very precisely what he sees as the Buddha's teaching of dependent arising and the middle way between annihilationism and eternalism: emptiness is not a 'nothing', it is not nihilism, but equally it is not a 'something', it is not some absolute reality; it is the absolute truth about the way things are but it is not the absolute. Nothingness is precisely to turn emptiness into a view of either of either eternalism or annihilationism. But in fact the Buddha taught Dharma for the abandoning of all views and emptiness is precisely the letting go of al lviews, while those for whom emptiness is a view are 'incurable'
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Re: Nondualism

Post by Shonin »

tiltbillings wrote:
Shonin wrote:
jcsuperstar wrote:Nondualism as a tool that can be used when needed is just fine, Nondualism as a view to be clung to is just another thing to be let go of.
Absolutely right.

As someone with a degree of understanding of both Theravada and Zen, I'd say that Nonduality is an experience that corresponds to the absence of processes of identification, that is to the end of 'I-making'.
The problem with that is that it can be easily mimiced by experiences that are not quite what they seem to be. I still think non-duality is dog-poop, best not stepped in and really has no place in the Theravada or the Pali suttas.
Any Buddhist experience, any experience at all can be mimicked. I'm not sure how an experience can be dogpoop. Presumably you mean that you don't like it as a concept? Well, the concept by itself is pretty useless, it's an experience really. It certainly has no place in Theravada, it just depends on whether we are interested in understanding the relationship between various schools of Buddhism and correspondence or lack of between the language used in each (which is what I thought this thread was about).
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jcsuperstar
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Re: Nondualism

Post by jcsuperstar »

the reasons for aversion to nondual ideology as i've seen it is that people who buy into it usually try to make everything fit into a nondual paradigm and a lot of the time use it as some reason to never take a real stance on anything and dismiss morality.
สัพเพ สัตตา สุขีตา โหนตุ

the mountain may be heavy in and of itself, but if you're not trying to carry it it's not heavy to you- Ajaan Suwat
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Re: Nondualism

Post by Shonin »

mikenz66 wrote:I recently read Rupert Gethin's book The Foundations of Buddhism and as Tilt observes:
http://www.dhammawheel.com/viewtopic.ph ... 678#p37716" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
tiltbillings wrote: Rupert Gethin’s THE FOUNDATIONS OF BUDDHISM does a nice job of putting Nagarjuna into a broader Indian Buddhist context.
I think there's enough of an overview there to put the excesses of emptiness/non-duality over-enthusiasts who surface from time to time into perspective...
That seems like a fair and accurate summary of Nagarjuna as I understand him. I also have no taste for metaphysics. It's a shame (and rather ironic) that so much metaphysics arises from misunderstanding a philosopher who was really an anti-metaphysician. (The modern Western anti-metaphysician Wittgenstein was sometimes misunderstood in similar ways, such are the foibles of the human mind)
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tiltbillings
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Re: Nondualism

Post by tiltbillings »

No, I don't like the term. Far too much stuff gets stuffed into it. It is all to easy to mistake a spontaneous samadhi experience as being more than it is where there is a sense of egolessness, a sense of oneness, all of which can be colored by any number of beliefs. No, I don't like the term.
it just depends on whether we are interested in understanding the relationship between various schools of Buddhism and correspondence or lack of between the language used in each (which is what I thought this thread was about).
Then it is important to define the term as closely and as carefully as possible, and then never use it. As pointed out above in reference to Nagarjuna, I have no problem with comparative stuff. it is useful and interesting, but I do chafe at back-reading stuff into the Pali suttas and I see no reason to assume out of a warm fuzzy feeling that it is all the same. But can we look at Nagarjuna and Yogacara and get something useful out of it? Sure. it goes both ways.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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tiltbillings
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Re: Nondualism

Post by tiltbillings »

jcsuperstar wrote:the reasons for aversion to nondual ideology as i've seen it is that people who buy into it usually try to make everything fit into a nondual paradigm and a lot of the time use it as some reason to never take a real stance on anything and dismiss morality.
And if you do not agree with the non-dualist, you are being ~ GASP!! ~ dualistic, making non-dualism into the most dualistic approach ever. A lot of Zen wannabees and Zen shouldknowbetters step into this and track it all around, smelling up the place (and they are not the only Mahayanists who do this). I tried to look at this issue here http://dhammawheel.com/viewtopic.php?f= ... aya#p15465" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; but it did not go very well, and no one got Guenther's point in the quote in the linked msg.

It may be that "non-dual" can be very carefully defined so as to avoid the pitfalls. That would be good, and as I said, once that is done the word non-dual should be avoided like the plague.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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mikenz66
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Re: Nondualism

Post by mikenz66 »

Hi Shonin,
Shonin wrote: That seems like a fair and accurate summary of Nagarjuna as I understand him. I also have no taste for metaphysics. It's a shame (and rather ironic) that so much metaphysics arises from misunderstanding a philosopher who was really an anti-metaphysician. (The modern Western anti-metaphysician Wittgenstein was sometimes misunderstood in similar ways, such are the foibles of the human mind)
Thanks. I don't find it helpful to read too much philosophy into such things as non-duality, the Abhidharma projects, or the Suttas for that matter, for the reasons expressed in the extract I posted.

Mike
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Re: Nondualism

Post by PeterB »

I quite agree Tilt. And I think that it is pernicious.
The dog poop analogy is apt..it gets everywhere and clings.
It is a weekly or at least monthly experience that someone will come to this forum with a formed view that non duality is a) desirable and b) must be found in the Theravada if only they can find the words to convince the wayward Theravadins that it has been there all along really.
Well imo it is not desirable ( see above ) its a sign of alienation, an escape from the day to day just as much as pot or booze. and b) The Buddha did not teach it.
Now there is more than one reason for this, one of those reasons being that the reductionist philosophy of the Neo -Vedantins... Ramana, Papaji, Gangaji, Adyashanti, Osho etc etc did not exist in his time in that form. The Upanashadic mileu that he came from and which he refined, was a far more broad and subtle expression, which addressed the whole range of human functioning social and religious, not just one expression of one view of "mental" functioning.
But due to the popularity of the Neo- Vedantin view and its all pervasiveness there has been in some "Buddhist " circles a leaking in of such views even among some students of the Dhamma who have no conscious knowledge of being influenced in this way.
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