'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Cause_and_Effect »

"Liberated from reckoning in terms of form..
feeling...perception...volitional formations...Liberated from reckoning in terms of consciousness, the Tathagata is deep, immeasurable, hard to fathom like the great ocean."

SN 44.1
How exactly is total cessation and non-existent nothingness "immeasurable like the great ocean"?

Apparently the Tathagatas like to use poor analogies that befuddle and for no apparent reason give indications of Eternity and Infinity and freedom, when according to you they just could have said more straight forwardly "the body-mind system stops, and there is no more rebirth so there is nothing, no experience and non-existance for the arahant after death.

:(
"Therein monks, that Dimension should be known wherein the eye ceases and the perception of forms fades away...the ear... the nose...the tongue... the body ceases and the perception of touch fades away...

That Dimension should be known wherein mentality ceases and the perception of mind-objects fades away.
That Dimension should be known; that Dimension should be known."


(S. IV. 98) - The Dimension beyond the All
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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

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Ceisiwr wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 10:14 am I think it’s worth remembering that the Buddhas guide you to final death, not to eternal life.
Yes, the latter would be more like Hinduism.
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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Ceisiwr »

Cause_and_Effect wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 7:57 am
There are variations of materialist atheism and yours is one. Many of them believe there is no fundamental self, soul or mind aside from the processes of the brain and body, and that when these cease at death that is the end of it all. Your views whether you realize or not, are heavily shaped by this and are essentially no different, aside from the view that you have to work extremely hard and contemplate the dhamma to achieve the same result that the materialist atheist thinks will happen to everyone anyway.
It's a corruption of the reading of the dhamma.
Materialism is the philosophical view that all that exists is of one substance, and this substance is matter. In its less sophisticated form, it is the view that all that exists are the 4 elements. In a slightly more sophisticated form, it is the view that all that exists is baryonic matter. Today materialism has few supporters since according to science there are non-material aspects of reality, such as the forces of nature. Physicalism (which is still a substance view) is preferred instead, which is similar to materialism but larger in scope as it goes beyond just baryonic matter. On either view conciousness and the mind either do not really exist (eliminative materialism) or they exist but emerge from physical processes (emergentism). A materialist or physicalist atheist then does not believe in the existence of any God or gods, because there are no non-material/physical things (emergentism is a bit contradictory to me, but it's not my philosophy). I have never argued for any of that. As someone who accepts both the material/physical and immaterial aspects to nature, I am not a materialist nor a physicalist. I don't accept that conciousness and mental states do not exist, nor do I accept that they emerge from what is physical. To me conciousness and the mind are also natural phenomenon which arise and cease. They are part of nature as much as atoms are. We are not separate from nature, which tends to be an Abrahamic belief, but rather we are a part of nature. We are an aspect of it as much as stars or nebulae are. Nature then has an objective side (rūpa) and a subjective side (viññāṇa, mano, citta and nāma). This largely tends to get forgotten in our times, partly because of the success of science which can only ever deal with the object side of nature. It can't address the subjective and immaterial side of it, so it tends to be ignored or forgotten about. I am not then a materialist. I'm also not an atheist either, if by atheism we mean a total lack of belief in gods. Whilst I do not believe in one (be it one or in 3 persons) God, I do believe in devas. Whilst this belief isn't strictly polytheism, since these gods age and die (and we were all gods once) it puts me closer to being a polytheist than an outright atheist. As for the self, whilst materialist atheists do not believe in a soul you will find many do believe in an existing self. A self that is destroyed at death. Eliminative materialists are different in that they do not believe in a self, since they do not believe conciousness nor the mind really exists. Their error is slightly different.
You are supposed to develop revulsion towards all formations, all dependently arisen and thus inconstant phenomena of sensory experience. You develop revulsion using awareness, that knowingness is liberated. Your views of revulsion towards all including pure awareness free from sense contacts seem to be an offshoot of some kind of self-revulsion.
It's telling that you think revulsion towards the citta is self-revulsion. It's telling because it shows how you think about the citta. You are right about developing revulsion towards all that is dependently arisen. This would include the citta

Nāmarūpasamudayā cittassa samudayo;
The citta originates from name and form.

nāmarūpanirodhā cittassa atthaṅgamo.
When name and form cease, citta ends.


- SN 47.42
Your corruption of the teaching here and comparing the attainment to a corpse is telling.

“Very good, venerable sir.” And, delighting in and approving of Ven. Kāmabhū’s answer, Citta asked him a further question: “What is the difference between a monk who has died and passed away and a monk who has attained the cessation of perception and feeling?”

“In the case of a monk who has died and passed away, his bodily fabrication has ceased & subsided, verbal fabrication has ceased and subsided, mental fabrication has ceased and subsided, his life force is totally ended, his heat is dissipated, and his faculties are shut down. But in the case of a monk who has attained the cessation of perception and feeling, his bodily fabrication has ceased and subsided, verbal fabrication has ceased and subsided, mental fabrication has ceased & subsided, his life force is not ended, his heat is not dissipated, and his faculties are exceptionally bright and clear. This is the difference between a monk who has died and passed away and a monk who has attained the cessation of perception and feeling.”

SN 41:6

That the ultimate attainment is not, as you claim, associated with the shutting down of consciousness like a corpse, but rather associated with an exceptionally bright and clear consciousness that no longer feels or perceives (i.e is beyond sense contacts and is thus
surfaceless) is telling.
Citta asks the question of what the difference is between a corpse and someone in saññāvedayitanirodhasamāpatti. This shows that the attainment was considered to be corpse like, but the person obviously hasn't died. Hence the question, what is the difference between the two? For both the corpse and the meditator the mind has ceased to function. There is no conscious awareness there. No conciousness at all. The difference is that the meditator is not dead. His "life force" and "heat" have not gone, and his faculties have not passed away. Rather they have become quite pure (vippasanna) through not being used, which is joyful (vippasīdati).
Bhikkhu Bodhi's endnote:
MA says that the faculties during the ordinary course of life, being impinged upon by sense objects, are afflicted and soiled like a mirror set up at a crossroads; but the faculties of one in cessation become exceptionally clear like a mirror placed in a case and deposited in a box.
There can't be conciousness in the attainment, because perception & feeling have ceased (temporarily)

“Feeling, perception, and consciousness—these things are mixed, not separate. And you can never completely dissect them so as to describe the difference between them. For you perceive what you feel, and you cognize what you perceive. That’s why these things are mixed, not separate. And you can never completely dissect them so as to describe the difference between them.” - MN 43

Ceisiwr wrote: "Two quotes here. The first quote, in full

“When that consciousness is unestablished, not coming to growth, nongenerative, it is liberated. By being liberated, it is steady; by being steady, it is content; by being content, he is not agitated. Being unagitated, he personally attains Nibbāna. He understands: ‘Destroyed is birth, the holy life has been lived, what had to be done has been done, there is no more for this state of being.’” - SN 22.53

This is something realised whilst alive."

Cause_and_Effect wrote: "Yes, but that's your very large assumption and speculation on limiting it to not include the after death implications. The imagery given in the Canon doesn't support your position."
I'm not limiting it. Liberation means freedom. Freedom means the absence of something. If you are free from tyranny, that means there is no tyrannical government where you live. It is absent. The liberation here is both the liberation from the āsavā, since they are absent, and liberation from future birth and death since they will no longer occur. What liberation here doesn't mean is that citta floats off somewhere for all eternity, or already exists liberated (for how can eternal things change?) and so freedom is freedom from not realising you are already awakened or whatnot.
A quote from Bhikkhu Bodi is apt here and applies exactly to your wrong views on the after death state of the Arahant.
Bhikkhu Bodhi wrote:

"It might seem logical to suppose that since the five aggregates that constitute experience completely cease with the attainment of the Nibbāna element without residue, this element must itself be a state of complete nonexistence, a state of nothingness. Yet no text in the Nikāyas ever states this. To the contrary, the Nikāyas consistently refer to Nibbāna by terms that refer to actualities. It is an element (dhātu), a base (āyatana), a reality (dhamma), a state (pada), and so on. However, though so designated, it is qualified in ways that indicate this state ultimately lies beyond all familiar categories and concepts."

- Bodhi, Ch.9 - In the Buddha's words

Contemplate this deeply and put aside your materialistic inspired assumptions about what cessation of the defilements and true liberation means according to the Canon.
Indeed, but you should realise that Venerable Bodhi's position (that of orthodox Theravāda) is at odds with both you and I. Venerable Bodhi is arguing for the Theravādin view that nibbāna is an existing dhamma, one that is cognised at the mind base. It is a permanently existing reality, but one that is totally void of all conditioned dhammas and their characteristics (arising, ceasing). It is also one that is totally devoid of citta, according to Venerable Bodhi and traditional Theravāda. Whilst I agree that nibbāna is an element of life (dhātu), that it can be experienced (āyatana) and that it is a natural phenomenon (dhamma) or state (pada) I disagree that it is some hidden alternative reality or realm that is simply beyond all conception. When there is cessation there is an absence and, in that absence, there is the state of not being affected. When alive, upon awakening, the āsavā cease forever. Upon their cessation, there is nibbāna with residue remaining. The awakened person is unaffected emotionally by sense contact, but still has the disturbance of sense contact there. When said person dies, there is total cessation. With total cessation there is final and total nibbāna, where one is not affected by anything ever again. Highly skilled monks can gain a tase of this whilst alive, through the cessation of perception & feeling. What is blissful about final nibbāna is that there is nothing felt. Nothing to experience. Nothing to cognise.
"Liberated from reckoning in terms of form..
feeling...perception...volitional formations...Liberated from reckoning in terms of consciousness, the Tathagata is deep, immeasurable, hard to fathom like the great ocean."

SN 44.1

How exactly is total cessation and non-existent nothingness "immeasurable like the great ocean"?
The teaching here is that because there is no-self, you can't pin the Buddha down as anything. This is hard to fathom, like working out the depths of a great ocean. It's hard to intellectualise what it is like to realise emptiness, because we are so used to thinkning in terms of a self.
Apparently the Tathagatas like to use poor analogies that befuddle and for no apparent reason give indications of Eternity and Infinity and freedom, when according to you they just could have said more straight forwardly "the body-mind system stops, and there is no more rebirth so there is nothing, no experience and non-existance for the arahant after death.
He did say the mind and body totally ceases (which includes citta). He did say there would be no more rebirth and no more existence. He said this is nibbāna. When people asked what comes after nibbāna, he said they have reached their limit. There is nothing after nibbāna. Nibbāna, freedom from being affected by anything at all, is the goal. There isn't anything else there. No eternal citta. No Brahman. No Ātman. No God. No Jesus. No Krishna. No Thor. No sun, no moon, no universe. No-thing at all.
Last edited by Ceisiwr on Sat Sep 24, 2022 1:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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cutting off Māra’s flower-tipped arrows,
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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Ceisiwr »

equilibrium wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 10:59 am
The above are two different things.
Red is where one over-reaches by objectifying based on assumption…..a fabrication.
Blue refers to the actual destruction of the illusion.
One with the correct middle-way transcends the illusion itself.
The illusion is simply that of permanence, lasting pleasure and self.
No, clearly not the case here.
Not-self is the illusion that one needs to see for one self…..so delusion can be resolved.
To say self, once again here, over reaching….an assumption not required really…..for obvious reasons…….the exact reasons why the Buddha didn’t need to answer.

Besides, standing with the view from “self / no-self” is basically wrong view…..based on intellectual and not wisdom.
To see that all dhammas are empty is part of liberating insight. If everything is empty, there is no-self. If I say all things lack blueness (and it's true), then there are no blue things in the world.
“Knowing that this body is just like foam,
understanding it has the nature of a mirage,
cutting off Māra’s flower-tipped arrows,
one should go beyond the King of Death’s sight.”
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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Ceisiwr »

The path of the Buddhas aims at being unaffected by anything (nibbāna). This is achieved via giving up craving, which sustains life, and leads to total cessation. With total cessation, there is nibbāna. One is no longer affected by anything at all ever again.
“Knowing that this body is just like foam,
understanding it has the nature of a mirage,
cutting off Māra’s flower-tipped arrows,
one should go beyond the King of Death’s sight.”
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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by cappuccino »

retrofuturist wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 2:15 am
cappuccino wrote: Fri Sep 23, 2022 11:22 pm No self is annihilationism
No it's not. Annihilationism involves destroying something that exists.
I’m aware of that interpretation
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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

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Ceisiwr wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 12:57 pm With total cessation, there is nibbāna. One is no longer affected by anything at all ever again.
“There is that sphere where there is no earth, no water, no fire nor wind; no sphere of infinity of space, of infinity of consciousness, of nothingness or even of neither-perception-nor non-perception; there, there is neither this world nor the other world, neither moon nor sun; this sphere I call neither a coming nor a going nor a staying still, neither a dying nor a reappearance; it has no basis, no evolution and no support: this, just this, is the end of dukkha.”
~ Ud 8.1
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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Spiny Norman »

cappuccino wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 2:59 pm
Ceisiwr wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 12:57 pm With total cessation, there is nibbāna. One is no longer affected by anything at all ever again.
“There is that sphere where there is no earth, no water, no fire nor wind; no sphere of infinity of space, of infinity of consciousness, of nothingness or even of neither-perception-nor non-perception; there, there is neither this world nor the other world, neither moon nor sun; this sphere I call neither a coming nor a going nor a staying still, neither a dying nor a reappearance; it has no basis, no evolution and no support: this, just this, is the end of dukkha.”
~ Ud 8.1
That's the first discourse about Nibbana.
What's your point?
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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by DNS »

If it's any consolation (misery likes company), this is another one of those 'great debates' issues in buddhism, especially Theravada. See this long thread at Sutta Central, currently 212 posts. :D

https://discourse.suttacentral.net/t/on ... ion/25431/
(I haven't read all the posts over there yet.)

From the Classical view, it does sound a lot like non-existence, i.e., nihilism. Buddhism is not nihilism, but the end-result sure sounds like nihilism. There is rebirth, so it doesn't fit completely with nihilism, but the end-result sounds the same. Then it becomes something like "rebirth in samsara until parinibbana, then nihilism."

I guess that's why Pure Land Buddhism is the most popular form of Buddhism. :D

:coffee:
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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Ceisiwr »

DNS wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 4:49 pm If it's any consolation (misery likes company), this is another one of those 'great debates' issues in buddhism, especially Theravada. See this long thread at Sutta Central, currently 212 posts. :D

https://discourse.suttacentral.net/t/on ... ion/25431/
(I haven't read all the posts over there yet.)

From the Classical view, it does sound a lot like non-existence, i.e., nihilism. Buddhism is not nihilism, but the end-result sure sounds like nihilism. There is rebirth, so it doesn't fit completely with nihilism, but the end-result sounds the same. Then it becomes something like "rebirth in samsara until parinibbana, then nihilism."

I guess that's why Pure Land Buddhism is the most popular form of Buddhism. :D

:coffee:
What are your views on the matter?
“Knowing that this body is just like foam,
understanding it has the nature of a mirage,
cutting off Māra’s flower-tipped arrows,
one should go beyond the King of Death’s sight.”
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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by DNS »

Ceisiwr wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 4:53 pm What are your views on the matter?
Thanks for asking. :anjali:

I'm not an arahant, so keep an open mind on it. I still have some craving for existence. When a bus comes barreling down the road at me, I still get out of the way. :tongue:

I'm open to the idea that it could be some type of subtle bliss, but not existence as we know it with the aggregates, but some kind of blissful state. And I'm also open to the idea that the Classical Theravadins are correct, that it is a complete cessation of all types of existence.
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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

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DNS wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 5:01 pm And I'm also open to the idea that the Classical Theravadins are correct, that it is a complete cessation of all types of existence.
"Does the Tathagata not exist after death?"

"Vaccha, that too has not been declared by me …"

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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by DNS »



deGrasse Tyson, asks, "if you could live forever, would you?"
Larry King: "Yes."

:D
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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Cause_and_Effect »

Ceisiwr wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 12:36 pm
To me conciousness and the mind are also natural phenomenon which arise and cease. They are part of nature as much as atoms are. We are not separate from nature, which tends to be an Abrahamic belief, but rather we are a part of nature. We are an aspect of it as much as stars or nebulae are. Nature then has an objective side (rūpa) and a subjective side (viññāṇa, mano, citta and nāma).
Here you are closer to the reality.
What I have termed 'Protoconsciousness' or 'Original mind' in the Forest tradition is part of the structure of reality. It gives rise to consciousness and mentality. The dependently arisen aspects of nama-rupa are self evident. They arise with sense contacts and cease where they cease.
The protoconsciousness is not dependently arisen. On the contrary it is a field we are all participating in and which can exist in two modes, samsaric nama-rupa with individual locus of identify or it can 'Nibbanize' into the liberated deathless state free from any sense contact. The entirety of the Buddha's teachings are grounded in this implicit understanding, which fits into our shared kammic patterns and causality (eg that giving a gift to virtuous person creates better kamma for the giver than giving a gift to an unvirtuous person).

Ceisiwr wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 12:36 pm
Cause_and_Effect wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 7:57 am You are supposed to develop revulsion towards all formations, all dependently arisen and thus inconstant phenomena of sensory experience. You develop revulsion using awareness, that knowingness is liberated. Your views of revulsion towards all including pure awareness free from sense contacts seem to be an offshoot of some kind of self-revulsion.
It's telling that you think revulsion towards the citta is self-revulsion. It's telling because it shows how you think about the citta. You are right about developing revulsion towards all that is dependently arisen. This would include the citta

Nāmarūpasamudayā cittassa samudayo;
The citta originates from name and form.

nāmarūpanirodhā cittassa atthaṅgamo.
When name and form cease, citta ends.


- SN 47.42
This is merely more intellectualism. It's not experiential wisdom informing your views but rather an attempt at logical deduction of the suttas to try to elucidate what you think is a concept of the goal, something the Buddha warned about.
Ceisiwr wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 12:36 pm
Cause_and_Effect wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 7:57 am
That the ultimate attainment is not, as you claim, associated with the shutting down of consciousness like a corpse, but rather associated with an exceptionally bright and clear consciousness that no longer feels or perceives (i.e is beyond sense contacts and is thus
surfaceless) is telling.
Citta asks the question of what the difference is between a corpse and someone in saññāvedayitanirodhasamāpatti. This shows that the attainment was considered to be corpse like, but the person obviously hasn't died. Hence the question, what is the difference between the two? For both the corpse and the meditator the mind has ceased to function. There is no conscious awareness there. No conciousness at all. The difference is that the meditator is not dead. His "life force" and "heat" have not gone, and his faculties have not passed away. Rather they have become quite pure (vippasanna) through not being used, which is joyful (vippasīdati).
Bhikkhu Bodhi's endnote:
MA says that the faculties during the ordinary course of life, being impinged upon by sense objects, are afflicted and soiled like a mirror set up at a crossroads; but the faculties of one in cessation become exceptionally clear like a mirror placed in a case and deposited in a box.
There can't be conciousness in the attainment, because perception & feeling have ceased (temporarily)

“Feeling, perception, and consciousness—these things are mixed, not separate. And you can never completely dissect them so as to describe the difference between them. For you perceive what you feel, and you cognize what you perceive. That’s why these things are mixed, not separate. And you can never completely dissect them so as to describe the difference between them.” - MN 43
More intellectual quibbling. It's telling that the attainment is not called 'the cessation of consciousness, perception and feeling'.

You are making so many lack of experientially informed judgements and assumptions about what the texts mean based on nothing more than a form of jigsaw deduction. It's a grotesque misuse of the dhamma to try to do this to this extent to support your wrong views.

Consciousness is clear and bright. There no such thing as 'faculties are bright but switched off at the same time'. That's an again twisting the clear implications in an attempt to suit your preconceived view. If thats your strategy it won't hold up well.

Ceisiwr wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 12:36 pm
Cause_and_Effect wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 7:57 am
A quote from Bhikkhu Bodi is apt here and applies exactly to your wrong views on the after death state of the Arahant.
Bhikkhu Bodhi wrote:

"It might seem logical to suppose that since the five aggregates that constitute experience completely cease with the attainment of the Nibbāna element without residue, this element must itself be a state of complete nonexistence, a state of nothingness. Yet no text in the Nikāyas ever states this. To the contrary, the Nikāyas consistently refer to Nibbāna by terms that refer to actualities. It is an element (dhātu), a base (āyatana), a reality (dhamma), a state (pada), and so on. However, though so designated, it is qualified in ways that indicate this state ultimately lies beyond all familiar categories and concepts."

- Bodhi, Ch.9 - In the Buddha's words

Contemplate this deeply and put aside your materialistic inspired assumptions about what cessation of the defilements and true liberation means according to the Canon.
Indeed, but you should realise that Venerable Bodhi's position (that of orthodox Theravāda) is at odds with both you and I. Venerable Bodhi is arguing for the Theravādin view that nibbāna is an existing dhamma, one that is cognised at the mind base. It is a permanently existing reality, but one that is totally void of all conditioned dhammas and their characteristics (arising, ceasing). It is also one that is totally devoid of citta, according to Venerable Bodhi and traditional Theravāda. Whilst I agree that nibbāna is an element of life (dhātu), that it can be experienced (āyatana) and that it is a natural phenomenon (dhamma) or state (pada) I disagree that it is some hidden alternative reality or realm that is simply beyond all conception.
At least you here acknowledge your personal view of nihilism nibbana is not supported by scholar monks such as Bodhi as well as great many TFT monk such as Ajahn Mun, Thate, Boowa, Thanissaro, Ajahn Sumedho etc etc
Ceisiwr wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 12:36 pm
Cause_and_Effect wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 7:57 am "Liberated from reckoning in terms of form..
feeling...perception...volitional formations...Liberated from reckoning in terms of consciousness, the Tathagata is deep, immeasurable, hard to fathom like the great ocean."

SN 44.1

How exactly is total cessation and non-existent nothingness "immeasurable like the great ocean"?
The teaching here is that because there is no-self, you can't pin the Buddha down as anything. This is hard to fathom, like working out the depths of a great ocean. It's hard to intellectualise what it is like to realise emptiness, because we are so used to thinking in terms of a self.
Indeed it hard to intellectualize everything which is why you should stop.
Again this shows nothing more than your personal distortions. The Buddha describing the liberated state free from the aggregates here as "immeasurable" cannot be distorted as a mere intellectual devise. It's simply disingenuous to try to twist that he would use auch an analogy for something which could be simply stated (according to you) "body-mind is ended and there is no further existance or experience after death".
According to you the Buddha is apt at making unnecessary analogies that can give the impression of a in infinite liberated awareness.
"Therein monks, that Dimension should be known wherein the eye ceases and the perception of forms fades away...the ear... the nose...the tongue... the body ceases and the perception of touch fades away...

That Dimension should be known wherein mentality ceases and the perception of mind-objects fades away.
That Dimension should be known; that Dimension should be known."


(S. IV. 98) - The Dimension beyond the All
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Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Coëmgenu »

Its very telling when your only objection left is to admit your opponent's superior intellect and bemoan the practice of actually reading what the suttas actually say!

:rolleye:
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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