Mahayana similar to Advaita?

Exploring Theravāda's connections to other paths - what can we learn from other traditions, religions and philosophies?
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Coëmgenu
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Re: Mahayana similar to Advaita?

Post by Coëmgenu »

I have nothing to do with this "saving." Don't loop me into your nonsense, Auto.
What is the Uncreated?
Sublime & free, what is that obscured Eternity?
It is the Undying, the Bright, the Isle.
It is an Ocean, a Secret: Reality.
Both life and oblivion, it is Nirvāṇa.
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Re: Mahayana similar to Advaita?

Post by auto »

Coëmgenu wrote: Mon Sep 26, 2022 3:39 pm I have nothing to do with this "saving." Don't loop me into your nonsense, Auto.
ok i take all the credit then
SteRo
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Re: Mahayana similar to Advaita?

Post by SteRo »

Spiny Norman wrote: Mon Sep 26, 2022 2:58 pm
SteRo wrote: Mon Sep 26, 2022 2:55 pm
Spiny Norman wrote: Mon Sep 26, 2022 2:52 pm

How so?
You want me to verbally describe the particular cognitions so that you may be able to think them? :lol:
:shrug:
I want you to explain your comment.
It's simply that I see what you don't see because I know a diversity of cognitions of which particular ones make these concepts compatible. Verbal expressions are not cognitions but are processed depending on these or those cognitions. Your request is like "I want you to manipulate my cognition so that I can see what you can see." But I can't manipulate your cognition by means of typing words. I can't even know your cognition that doesn't allow you to see that these concepts are compatible depending on particular cognitions.
Cleared. αδόξαστος.
Spiny Norman
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Re: Mahayana similar to Advaita?

Post by Spiny Norman »

SteRo wrote: Tue Sep 27, 2022 4:17 am
Spiny Norman wrote: Mon Sep 26, 2022 2:58 pm
SteRo wrote: Mon Sep 26, 2022 2:55 pm

You want me to verbally describe the particular cognitions so that you may be able to think them? :lol:
:shrug:
I want you to explain your comment.
It's simply that I see what you don't see because I know a diversity of cognitions of which particular ones make these concepts compatible. Verbal expressions are not cognitions but are processed depending on these or those cognitions. Your request is like "I want you to manipulate my cognition so that I can see what you can see." But I can't manipulate your cognition by means of typing words. I can't even know your cognition that doesn't allow you to see that these concepts are compatible depending on particular cognitions.
:redherring:

:focus:
Buddha save me from new-agers!
zan
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Re: Mahayana similar to Advaita?

Post by zan »

In Yogacara, one of the two most influential schools, that influenced nearly all of Mahayana, all is mind, and the true mind is ultimately an unconditioned dharma called tathata (usually translated as "suchness"). This is identical to Advaita. Just call Brahman tathata and they're the same thing. It wasn't until later Yogacara, which was heavily retooled to escape inevitable defeat at the hands of scathing Madhyamaka criticism, that it started to be claimed that mind doesn't exist, but is just a skillful means or whatever, to say "all is mind."


From the Awakening of Faith in the Mahayana:
In its very origin suchness (tathata) is of itself endowed with sublime attributes. It manifests the highest wisdom which shines throughout the world, it has true knowledge and a mind resting simply in its own being. It is eternal, blissful, its own self-being and the purest simplicity; it is invigorating, immutable, free... Because it possesses all these attributes and is deprived of nothing, it is designated both as the Womb of Tathagata and the Dharma Body of Tathagata.
From Huang Po, of the Zen school:
All the Buddhas and all sentient beings are nothing but the One Mind, beside which nothing exists. This Mind, which is without beginning, is unborn and indestructible.

"All the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, together with all wriggling things possessed of life, share in this great Nirvāņic nature. This nature is Mind; Mind is the Buddha, and the Buddha is the Dharma. Any thought apart from this truth is entirely a wrong thought."
From Vasubandhu a founder of Yogacara:
"This [world] is vijñaptimātra, since it manifests itself as an unreal object (artha), just like the case of those with cataracts seeing unreal hairs in the moon and the like."
And Asanga, the other founder of Yogacara:
These representations (vijñapti) are mere representations (vijñapti-mātra), because there is no [corresponding] thing/object (artha)...Just as in a dream there appear, even without a thing/object (artha), just in the mind alone, forms/images of all kinds of things/objects like visibles, sounds, smells, tastes, tangibles, houses, forests, land, and mountains, and yet there are no [such] things/objects at all in that [place].
Finally, even the Madhyamaka has it's branch of Brahman type thinking, as can be seen from this quote from a Wikipedia article:
Shentong (Tibetan: གཞན་སྟོང་, Wylie: gzhan stong, Lhasa dialect: [ɕɛ̃̀tṍŋ], also transliterated zhäntong or zhentong; literally "other-emptiness") is a position within Tibetan Madhyamaka. It applies śūnyatā in a specific way, agreeing that relative reality is empty of self-nature, but stating that absolute reality (Paramarthasatya)[2][note 1] is "non-dual Buddhajnana"[2][note 2] and "empty" (Wylie: stong) only of "other," (Wylie: gzhan) relative phenomena, but is itself not empty[3] and "truly existing."[4] This absolute reality is described by positive terms, an approach which helps "to overcome certain residual subtle concepts"[5] and "the habit [...] of negating whatever experience arises in his/her mind."[6] It destroys false concepts, as does prasangika, but it also alerts the practitioner "to the presence of a dynamic, positive Reality that is to be experienced once the conceptual mind is defeated."[6]
And then the Buddha nature stuff, and other ideas, like an eternal primordial Buddha exist in Mahayana, none of these are particularly different from Brahman:
Buddha-nature
Main articles: Buddha-nature and Tathāgatagarbha Sutras
An influential division of 1st-millennium CE Buddhist texts develop the notion of Tathāgatagarbha or Buddha-nature.[76][77] The Tathāgatagarbha doctrine, at its earliest probably appeared about the later part of the 3rd century CE, and is verifiable in Chinese translations of 1st millennium CE.[78]

The Tathāgatagarbha is the topic of the Tathāgatagarbha sūtras, where the title itself means a garbha (womb, matrix, seed) containing Tathāgata (Buddha). In the Tathāgatagarbha sūtras' the perfection of the wisdom of not-self is stated to be the true self. The ultimate goal of the path is characterized using a range of positive language that had been used in Indian philosophy previously by essentialist philosophers, but which was now transmuted into a new Buddhist vocabulary to describe a being who has successfully completed the Buddhist path.[79]

These Sutras suggest, states Paul Williams, that 'all sentient beings contain a Tathāgata as their 'essence, core or essential inner nature'.[78] They also present a further developed understanding of emptiness, wherein the Buddha Nature, the Buddha and Liberation are seen as transcending the realm of emptiness, i.e. of the conditioned and dependently originated phenomena.[80]

One of these texts, the Angulimaliya Sutra, contrasts between empty phenomena such as the moral and emotional afflictions (kleshas), which are like ephemeral hailstones, and the enduring, eternal Buddha, which is like a precious gem:

The tens of millions of afflictive emotions like hail-stones are empty. The phenomena in the class of non-virtues, like hail-stones, quickly disintegrate. Buddha, like a vaidurya jewel, is permanent ... The liberation of a buddha also is form ... do not make a discrimination of non-division, saying, "The character of liberation is empty".1]

The Śrīmālā Sūtra is one of the earliest texts on Tathāgatagarbha thought, composed in 3rd century in south India, according to Brian Brown. It asserted that everyone can potentially attain Buddhahood, and warns against the doctrine of Sunyata.[82] The Śrīmālā Sūtra posits that the Buddha-nature is ultimately identifiable as the supramundane nature of the Buddha, the garbha is the ground for Buddha-nature, this nature is unborn and undying, has ultimate existence, has no beginning nor end, is nondual, and permanent.[83] The text also adds that the garbha has "no self, soul or personality" and "incomprehensible to anyone distracted by sunyata (voidness)"; rather it is the support for phenomenal existence.[84]

The notion of Buddha-nature and its interpretation was and continues to be widely debated in all schools of Mahayana Buddhism. Some traditions interpret the doctrine to be equivalent to emptiness (like the Tibetan Gelug school), the positive language of the texts Tathāgatagarbha sutras are then interpreted as being of provisional meaning, and not ultimately true. Other schools however (mainly the Jonang school), see Tathāgatagarbha as being an ultimate teaching and see it as an eternal, true self, while Sunyata is seen as a provisional, lower teaching.[85]

Likewise, western scholars have been divided in their interpretation of the Tathāgatagarbha, since the doctrine of an 'essential nature' in every living being appears to be confusing, since it seems to be equivalent to a 'Self',[note 8][87] which seems to contradict the doctrines in a vast majority of Buddhist texts. Some scholars, however, view such teachings as metaphorical, not to be taken literally.[80]

According to some scholars, the Buddha nature which these sutras discuss, does not represent a substantial self (ātman). Rather, it is a positive expression of emptiness, and represents the potentiality to realize Buddhahood through Buddhist practices. In this view, the intention of the teaching of Buddha nature is soteriological rather than theoretical.[88][89] According to others, the potential of salvation depends on the ontological reality of a salvific, abiding core reality — the Buddha-nature, empty of all mutability and error, fully present within all beings.[90]
-Wiki page on Sunyata

Avalokitesvara himself is linked in the versified version of the sutra to the first Buddha, the Adi-Buddha, who is 'svayambhu' (self-existent, not born from anything or anyone). Studholme comments:

'Avalokitesvara himself, the verse sutra adds, is an emanation of the Adibuddha, or 'primordial Buddha', a term that is explicitly said to be synonymous with Svayambhu and Adinatha, 'primordial lord'.' [7
-Wiki page on Kāraṇḍavyūha Sūtra


Āstika derives from the Sanskrit asti, "there is, there exists", and means one who believes in the existence of a Self/Soul[disambiguation needed] or Brahman, etc. and nāstika means the one who doesn't believe in existence of a Soul or Self.[1] These have been concepts used to classify Indian philosophies by modern scholars, and some Hindu, Buddhist and Jaina texts.[2][3][5]

...

According to Andrew Nicholson, later Buddhists understood Asanga to be targeting Madhyamaka Buddhism as nastika, while considering his own Yogacara Buddhist tradition to be astika.

-Wiki page on Astika and Nastika

Compare, from Advaita, Adi Shankara:
The Supreme Spirit or the Brahman is alone real and the individual Self is only the Supreme Self and no other. Brahman is Supreme Intelligence, devoid of attributes, form, changes or limitations. It is self-luminous and all pervading and is without a second. The empirical world is unreal, an illusion born of ignorance. The jiva (Self) continues in Samsara (earthly life) only as long as it retains attachment due to ignorance or Maya (illusion). If it casts off the veil of Maya through knowledge or Jnana it will realize its identity with the Brahman and get merged into it.


That Reality is One; though, owing to illusion, It appears to be multiple names and forms, attributes and changes, It always remains unchanged. [It is] like gold which, while remaining one, is formed into various ornaments. You are that One, that Brahman. Meditate on this in your mind.


The universe is truly Brahman, ... for that which is superimposed (the universe) has no separate existence from its substratum (Brahman). ….
The name, "universe," is superimposed on Brahman, but what we call the "universe" is [really] nothing but Brahman.

In the end, it's difficult to see how Mahayana isn't a form of Hinduism, with all of this in front of us.

The Mahayana apologetic technique is to lean HEAVILY on strict Madhyamaka, and say that all of these ideas are really just saying the same thing as Madhyamaka, which is that all is empty. Yes, even the ones that overtly state the opposite. It's pretty amazing the lengths people will go to. The apologetics are combined with the Mahayana trend toward labyrinthine riddling, and a lot of words being redefined, inexplicably, and arbitrarily, whenever it is convenient to prop up their position. Then the words will switch meaning again, and they'll be talking about multiple levels of conflicting realities, all of which are non dual, yet can be discussed as dual. Dharmas never actually arise, nor cease, but there are dharmas, but also not. Conventional reality exists, but it's an illusion whenever it might prove them wrong, and so on.

Particularly amusing is Yogacara apologetics, which aim to ostensibly demonstrate that Yogacara never held an existent mind, or tathata, or whatever, and even that they weren't idealism. This falls apart when we actually read the words of the founders of Yogacara, some posted above, which overtly state the exact philosophy of idealism, and when we look into what they considered unconditioned, and it turns out to be something called tathata, which is some kind of substantial reality, wrapped up in their "all is mind" teachings. Finally, it fails when we look to ancient texts, and see that the Madhyamaka school charged Yogacara with eternalism/claiming mind exists in ancient times, and the realist Hindus criticized their idealism. So, it seems to be a much later change in tune to declare that Yogacara is the same as Madhyamaka, and not idealism. After this change, the people who like Yogacara are very embarrassed and insecure about the idealism and eternalism inherent in their teachings. This probably came about due to the Madhyamaka defeating them in popularity, and successfully refuting their positions with superior logic, demonstrating that the mind cannot exist alone, and that nothing is eternal, and that tathata is empty.

Further, many scholars state Yogacara is idealism, as is clear from this selection from a Wikipedia article on Yogacara:
Scholars such as Saam Trivedi argue that Yogācāra is similar to Idealism (closer to a Kantian epistemic idealism), though they note that it is its own unique form and that it might be confusing to categorize it as such.[21] Paul Williams, citing Griffiths, writes that it could be termed "dynamic idealism".[22] Sean Butler argues for the idealistic nature of Yogācāra, noting that there are numerous similarities between Yogācāra and the systems of Kant and Berkeley.[23] Jay Garfield also argues that Yogācāra is "akin to the idealisms defended by such Western philosophers as Berkeley, Kant and Schopenhauer."[24]

Jonathan Gold writes that the Yogācāra thinker Vasubandhu can be said to be an idealist (similar to Kant), in the sense that for him, everything in experience as well as its causal support is mental, and thus he gives causal priority to the mental. At the same time however, this is only in the conventional realm, since "mind" is just another concept and true reality for Vasubandhu is ineffable, "an inconceivable 'thusness' (tathatā)."
The only branch of Mahayana that might escape this charge would probably be Madhyamaka, and only classical Madhyamaka, that firmly denies that anything could ever be permanent, existing, or self, including tathata, including buddha nature, including emptiness itself. Some versions of Madhyamaka do acknowledge, implicitly or explicitly, some kind of existent, as demonstrated above. But, I think at least certain Madhyamaka schools of thought are possibly exempt. Beyond that, it seems Mahayana is a return to Hinduism, but under Buddhist terminology. That, or influences from other religions.

Heck, the Mahayana even generally claim all duality is an illusion, just like Advaita, and the truth is non duality, just like Advaita, and guess what the Sanskrit word they're using for this is? Well, it's Advaya. The former means "one without a second" the latter "not two." Hair splitting. They're two branches of a basically similar teaching. Advaita and Advaya.
Last edited by zan on Wed Jan 25, 2023 12:32 am, edited 6 times in total.
Assume all of my words on dhamma could be incorrect. Seek an arahant for truth.


"If we base ourselves on the Pali Nikayas, then we should be compelled to conclude that Buddhism is realistic. There is no explicit denial anywhere of the external world. Nor is there any positive evidence to show that the world is mind-made or simply a projection of subjective thoughts. That Buddhism recognizes the extra-mental existence of matter and the external world is clearly suggested by the texts. Throughout the discourses it is the language of realism that one encounters.
-Y. Karunadasa
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Ceisiwr
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Re: Mahayana similar to Advaita?

Post by Ceisiwr »

zan wrote: Tue Jan 24, 2023 10:39 pm ...
Welcome back.
“The teacher willed that this world appear to me
as impermanent, unstable, insubstantial.
Mind, let me leap into the victor’s teaching,
carry me over the great flood, so hard to pass.”
zan
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Re: Mahayana similar to Advaita?

Post by zan »

Ceisiwr wrote: Tue Jan 24, 2023 11:04 pm
zan wrote: Tue Jan 24, 2023 10:39 pm ...
Welcome back.
Hey! Thanks! Good to see you :)
Assume all of my words on dhamma could be incorrect. Seek an arahant for truth.


"If we base ourselves on the Pali Nikayas, then we should be compelled to conclude that Buddhism is realistic. There is no explicit denial anywhere of the external world. Nor is there any positive evidence to show that the world is mind-made or simply a projection of subjective thoughts. That Buddhism recognizes the extra-mental existence of matter and the external world is clearly suggested by the texts. Throughout the discourses it is the language of realism that one encounters.
-Y. Karunadasa
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Re: Mahayana similar to Advaita?

Post by asahi »

For a start , it seems a Vedantic doctrine identifies the individual self (atman) with the ground of reality (brahman) . But in Mahayana there is no individual self , there are only five aggregates , which is empty of self , big or small . In Tathāgatagarbha teachings , the buddha-nature is qualities that enable one to achieve Buddhahood . In Madhyamaka it teaches dharmas are empty of svabhāva or essences . In Yogacara teachings how we perceive our world are categorized into three classification : for deluded person one perceives through attached and erroneous discrimination, wherein things are incorrectly apprehended based on preconceptions; then the learner perceives through the correct understanding of the dependently originated nature of things; and lastly awakened one perceives by apprehending things as they are in themselves, uninfluenced by any conceptualization at all. Therefore , Mahayana are in no way similar to Advaita .
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Re: Mahayana similar to Advaita?

Post by Microdose »

Mind complicated

Breath simple
zan
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Re: Mahayana similar to Advaita?

Post by zan »

In addition to my post above, this is also relevant:
The Critique of Hongaku Shisa by Hakamaya Noriaki
Hakamaya Noriaki, also a faculty member of the Buddhist
Studies department of Komazawa University, is a noted specialist
in Y ogacara. He is a prolific writer, scholar, and social critic with
a long list of textual studies to his credit, and has recently published
two collections of his essays on the subject at hand: Hongaku shiso
hihan [A critique of hongaku shiso] and Hihan bukkyo [Critical
Buddhism].
In his preface to Hongaku shiso hihan Hakamaya clearly spells out
his intent: to show that hongaku shiso is not Buddhism. In addition,
he claims that Zen, the Kyoto school of philosophy, even the
teaching of non-duality in the Vimalakzrti Siitra, are not Buddhism.
And as a specialist in Yogacara, he hopes eventually to write an
article about the idea that Yogacara is not Buddhism!
By hongaku shiso Hakamaya means a way of thinking that all
things are embraced in a basic, singular, ineffable reality (a state
of "original enlightenment") that functions as an authoritarian
ideology that does not admit the validity either of words or concepts
or faith or intellect. The structure of reality is expressed as consisting of a "pure" basis (object)-expressed as "original enlightement," the basis, essence, or principle-and the (subject) which is
based on this reality-expressed as "actualized enlightenment",
traces, function, or phenomena. This' 'basis" -no matter how it
is expressed-is a dhatu, and anything that admits a dhatu is not
Buddhism.

...

I. The first essay, provocatively titled" Tathiigata-garbha thought is
not Buddhism" [Nyoraizo shiso wa bukkyo ni arazu] leaves no doubt
as to Matsumoto's position or intent. Tathiigata-garbha thought is
not Buddhism-then what is the correct teaching of the Buddha?
Buddhism is the teaching of non-self [muga; aniitman], the teaching
of causality [pratztya-samutpiida]. This teaching of causali ty is not the
teaching of universal mutual co-arising and non-temporal causality
developed later (e.g. by Hua-yen thinkers), but the temporal,
twelvefold chain of dependent arising as discovered by the Buddha
during his enlightenment under the Bodhi tree and classically
expressed in the Mahiivagga. 13 The critical point is a denial of any
eternal, substantial, underlying basis or locus on which everything
else depends or arises from. This "locus" that is denied by the
teaching of causality is given the name" dhatu," and any teaching
that implies the existence of a dhatu is called' 'dhatu-vada," a neoSanskritism coined by Matsumoto. Dhatu-vada is antithetical to
Buddhism, since it is the very teaching that Sakyamuni intended to
deny. The idea of a tathiigata-garbha, the "womb," "matrix," or
"seed" of buddhahood inherent in all sentient beings, is a form of
dhatu-vada and thus is not Buddhism.

...

As for Matsumoto's idea of dhatu-vada, Takasaki adds, it is a
useful proposition with which to criticize tathiigata-garbha and
Yogacara ideas, and it is structurally similar to the Upanishadic idea
of the unity of Brahman and atman.

-"ZEN IS NOT BUDDHISM"
RECENT JAPANESE CRITIQUES OF BUDDHA-NATURE*
PAUL L. SWANSON
Much of Mahayana, and specifically Yogacara, Zen, non dual teachings, and all tathagharba teachings are not Buddhism, but a form of Upanishadic teaching, akin to Brahman. Mahayana apologetics will swear that this is all just Madhyamaka emptiness, and must be reinterpreted, even when it says the opposite, but this entire critique is written using Madhyamaka as the correct position to refute these others, and one of the authors is a specialist in Yogacara, and is coming from precisely the Madhyamaka perspective, and using this position to demonstrate that these other forms of Mahayana are not Buddhism.
Assume all of my words on dhamma could be incorrect. Seek an arahant for truth.


"If we base ourselves on the Pali Nikayas, then we should be compelled to conclude that Buddhism is realistic. There is no explicit denial anywhere of the external world. Nor is there any positive evidence to show that the world is mind-made or simply a projection of subjective thoughts. That Buddhism recognizes the extra-mental existence of matter and the external world is clearly suggested by the texts. Throughout the discourses it is the language of realism that one encounters.
-Y. Karunadasa
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