3bob

Hi Marblehead, I use the John C.H. Wu translation. Don't have much time for the others. Anyway, I think what it boils down to is that suppositions either way (pro or con) are not final, Some schools use affirmation, some use negation... and some feel that others use affirmation incorrectly and some feel that others use negation incorrectly, etc., etc. Hello Lucky7strikes, The historic Buddha had Hindu teachers who helped him reach the 8th Jhana as recorded in Buddhist writings so I find it somewhat strange that Buddhists sometimes (and apparently you) would make asides about Hindu based (or yogi/yogic) teachings? But I've found such is often the way of vested interests so I have basically given up on such - although I have nothing against any religion that is practiced in a humanly spiritual and noble way, including Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Christianity, Jewish, Shamanistic, etc. etc. Good fortune to all

Lucky7strikes, "Have you then crossed the river? Can you now let go of the raft?" - I've been around some of the rafts and parts of the river and bank, but have a very long haul to go. - "Xabir only posts replies, he just clarifies". - his interpretation or view which is fine -.

It is death that dies completely, thus there is a deeper joy that is not touched by a deeper sorrow.

Hi Marblehead, Two in Oneness, and unity in diversity is wonderful. Oops, the excerpt from the T.T.C. that I recently quoted was from chapter 25, not 24. I think Chapter 25 is an excellent type of - pointing towards - and relates to many of the well stated posts shared in this string. What do you think or feel about chapter 21 of the T.T.C.? For myself I hear no mention of or an agreed upon meaning given to the supposition of not being able to know the so called unknowable; and considering the import of the last two sentences of the chapter I'd say an opposite supposition is implied. "How do I know the ways of all things at the beginning? By what is within me." Obviously Buddhists use the term "mind" differently than some other "eastern" systems, so I see some problem in translation and correlation there; regardless of that I do appreciate many of its sayings! The Zen saying that goes something like, "when the many is reduced to one, to what is the one reduced?" comes to mind and granted that is an unknowable to a tool that automatically sees and cuts into two.

From Marblehead, (blue text): "Yep. We can talk about the Manifest after it has been manifested. But we cannot talk about the unmanifested (the Mystery) before it has been manifested because it is only potential - it does not yet exist objectively" It or the Tao always was, is and will be now - there really is no, "does not yet exist objectively" limit for the Tao - such a concept has basis when one's mind is using time and space to try and get some sort of handle on what it can not really get a handle on. "...To be great is to go on, To go on is to be far, To be far is to return..." from T.T.C. 24 which sounds like being in the limits of time and space but - this really means to me being everywhere at once, both in time and beyond time - which is whole different ball game. "Really, the only thing we can talk about is the objective universe - all else is only guesswork - the presuming that we can know the unknowable." Partly agreed, talk does have limits but, "we" realized as the Tao can know the Tao, and thus be finished with the guesswork and doubts of the mind. Best wishes, Bob

On meeting the master the demons have no place to sneek around, and must be faced. but don't open a door you can not close, for such is not to be dallied about with - unprepared! Om

T.T.C. 1: Tao can be talked about, but not the Eternal Tao. Names can be named, but not the Eternal Name. As the origin of heaven-and-earth, it is nameless: As "the Mother" of all things, it is nameable. So, as ever hidden, we should look at its inner essence: As always manifest, we should look at its outer aspects. These two flow from the same source, though differently named; And both are called mysteries. The Mystery of mysteries is the Door of all essence.

all concepts and systems at best may help us to reach a certain threshold but such concepts and systems can not cross that threshold...

"Consciousness is empty of any ontological essence, for consciousness is not a perceiver but the perception" And there is also this part of the Udana sutra listed below, that points to beyond conciousness, but both are getting VERY far ahead of the steps where almost all of us are at... thus tripping by not taking the steps in between is more or less assured. "There is, bhikkhus, a not-born, a not-brought-to-being, a not-made, a not-conditioned. If, bhikkhus, there were no not-born, not-brought-to-being, not-made, not-conditioned, no escape would be discerned from what is born, brought-to-being, made, conditioned. But since there is a not-born, a not-brought-to-being, a not-made, a not-conditioned, therefore an escape is discerned from what is born, brought-to-being, made, conditioned" pushing objective and subjective around with our feet... perhaps? "...Consider life as a revolving wheel set upright with man walking on its tire. As he walks, the wheel is revolving toward him beneath his feet, and if he is not to be carried backward by it and flung to the ground he must walk at the same speed as the wheel turns. If he exceeds that speed, he will topple foward and slip off the wheel onto his face. For at every moment we stand, as it were, on the top of a wheel; immediately we try to cling to that moment, to that particualr point of the wheel, it is no longer at the top and we are off balance. Thus by not trying to seize the moment, we keep it, for the second we fail to walk on we cease to remain still. Yet within this there is still a deeper truth. From the standpoint of eternity we never can and never do leave the top of the wheel, for if a circle is set in infinite space it has neither top nor bottom. Wherever you stand is the top, and it revolves only because you are pushing it round with your own feet." Quoted from Alan Watts

What are some other and if you will more important questions than whether this is real or fake? For instance: would setting out for and attaining such a power also mean that you are truly free? And which would be more valuable to you?

is the quote translatable to you in some way that could be adapted to use in music? (as related to on that level)

THE CHHANDOGYA UPANISHAD by Swami Krishnananda The Divine Life Society - Sivananda Ashram, Rishikesh, India Chapter Three: Sanatkumara's Instructions on Bhuma-Vidya Section 15: Life 1. Prano vava asaya bhuyan, yatha va ara nabhau samarpitah, evam asmin prane sarvam samarpitam, pranah pranena yati, pranah pranam dadati, pranaya dadati, prano ha pita, prano mata, prano bhrata, pranah svasa, prana acaryah, prano brahmanah. Nobody can understand what life is. We utter the word 'life' many times, but we cannot explain what it means. It is not what we do daily that is called life. Though we generally identify life with our activity, it is a mistake that we commit. Life is something inscrutable. Life is really what we are. Here, it is called prana. It is not the breathing process, but the life principle itself, without which there would be neither aspiration, nor self-consciousness, nor anything for that matter. The entry of the universal into the particular is the juncture which is called life operating in our personality. It is the borderland of the infinite, where the individual expands into the expanse of the infinite and the infinite contracts itself into the finite, as it were. This particular junction is what we call life. It has the characteristics of both. Therefore, it is inscrutable. It is neither individual nor universal. We do not know what it is. We are unable to define what life is. But whatever it be, this principle of life is superior to everything else. This is what we call the reality of life. It is not merely the activity of life, the function of life, social life, or personal life or any kind of manifestation of it, but life as such. This is superior to everything. The Upanishad now tells us how inscrutable it is. "Beyond all things, superior to all that I have told you up to this time, is life," says Sanatkumara. As spokes are fixed to the nave of a wheel, so is everything fixed to the principle of life. Whatever there is in this world, anything worthwhile, meaningful, that is nothing but prana, life. Minus life, everything is meaningless. What do we mean by saying "He is my father", "She is my mother", "She is my sister", "He is my brother"? We do not know. We are not referring to the body as father, mother, sister and brother. There is something else in them and that is the father, the mother, the brother, the sister, and so on. We ourselves do not know what we are when we speak about ourselves. Our importance vanishes when the life principle is withdrawn. We are valuable only so long as we are living. If we have no life, what are we? We are nothing. What we regard ourselves in worldly parlance, viz., the body, is not our real personality. 2. Sa yadi pitaram va mataram va bhrataram va svasaram va acaryam va brahmanam va kimcid-bhrsam iva pratyaha, dhik tvastvity-evainam ahuh, pitrha vai tvam asi, matraha vai tvam asi, bhratrha vai tvam asi, svasrha vai tvam asi, acaryaha vai tvam asi, brahmanaha vai tvam asiti. Why do we say that life is superior to everything, and minus life everything is valueless? The Upanishad says that if one speaks irreverently to one's father, for instance, people would say, "How stupid this person is; he talks irreverently to his own father." Similarly, if a person speaks something harsh to his mother, to his relatives, and to revered persons, good people censure him. We revere great people, we value humanity and we respect life in this world. This is something well-known to us. "Fie upon you," say people when we talk irreverently to elderly ones or behave in a stupid manner which would not be becoming of one in a human society. And if we behave in such a way in respect of elders, they say that it is like slaying them, or injuring them. We say, "Do not hurt people." What do we mean by this? Hurting whom? Hurting people. But what is 'people'? Surely not the body. The Upanishad here implies that we are enjoined not to hurt the life in them. The life principle in a person is affected by our reaction to that person. The manifestation of life principle in the embodiment of a particular person is what is referred to as 'a person'. A person is nothing but the life in that person, not the mere shape of that person in the form of a body. So, when we say that one has behaved in such and such a way with one's father or mother, with one's sister or brother, with this person or that person, we mean to say that one has behaved in that way with the life principle present in them, not merely with the body. But suppose the life principle has gone from the father, that revered one whom we have been worshipping. Then what happens? We simply set fire to that 'father', we throw him, we prick him with pokes in the funeral pyre. Then people do not say, "Oh, this man is burning his father." Nobody says anything like that. What happens to that father, the very same father whom we revered just a few hours before, who is just before our eyes and whom we are now setting fire to in the funeral pyre? It may be our sister, it may be our Guru, it may be anybody, it makes no difference to us. It may be an emperor whom we have been respecting so much and regarding so much, and now we throw him into the pitch and bury him in the ground, or float him in the water, or set fire to him. And everybody then says, "Very nice", "Well done". You set fire to the emperor and then say, "It is very nice"! How is it possible? Yes, it is possible, because it is a great ritual that we are performing. But when he is alive, if we do that, it is murder. It is a heinous crime. So, what is our definition of mankind or humanity or any worthwhile thing in this world? Not the body certainly. If the body was our father, we would not set fire to him in the funeral pyre, and we would not prick him with pokes as if he means nothing. Even the dearest and the nearest ones are cast aside if the life principle withdraws itself from them. So, what we love as our relatives and our dear and near ones is the life, and not the body. But we never understand this point. We say, "Oh, my father is no more." Where has he gone? He is there in the way in which he was, but we mistook him for something else. It is the principle of life that is valuable in this world, and not anything that is manifest as name and form. 3. Atha yady-apy-enan utkranta-pranan sulena samasam vyatisandahet naivainam bruyuh pitrhasiti, na matrhasiti, na bhratrhasiti, na svasrhasiti, na acaryahcasiti, na brahmanahasiti. The whole of life is nothing but this inscrutable thing which we call prana. This is the great reality manifesting itself in various names and forms. We mistake the names and forms for this supreme Being which is masquerading here as the objects of sense, as human beings and everything else that we see with our eyes. The supreme reality of every form of visible existence is life. It is manifested in some degree in plants, in greater degree in animals, and in still greater degree in human beings, and it has to manifest itself in still more greater degrees higher up. We have come to a point where it is very difficult to understand where exactly we are. We are in an inscrutable realm. We cannot understand still as to what we are speaking about. We think we have understood what life is, but we have not understood what it really is. It is a mystery that is operating in all names and forms. Whoever understands this mystery as the all-comprehensive Reality which is superior to all names and forms, which is infused into all names and forms, which is the Reality of even the so-called names and forms, including the name and form of our own self, is a master of Knowledge. He is called in this Upanishad as ativadi, a specific term here indicating one who possesses surpassing knowledge and whose utterances are surpassingly true. 4. Prano hy-evaitani sarvani bhavati, sa va esa evam pasyan, evam manvanah, evam vijanan atvadi bhavati, tam ced bruyuh ativadyasiti, ativady-asmiti bruyat, napahnuvita. The greatest knowledge is the knowledge of life, not merely the knowledge of objects of sense. Whoever sees this Reality as it is in itself, whoever can think in this manner, whoever can understand in this way, transcends all, because here the knowledge has gone beyond all objects of sense. It has comprehended them in its own Being. And, therefore, it has become one with Truth. It is not merely a pursuit of truth that we are referring to here as knowledge, but Truth itself that has become one with knowledge. A person who has such a knowledge has really comprehended Truth, and what he speaks in such a stage of knowledge is called ativada. This term ativada means transcended speech, speech which is pregnant with truth, speech which is to materialise in life as truthfulness. Whatever a person with this knowledge speaks will get materialised in life, because the truth or the reality of all things is contained in the knowledge which this person has. Therefore, speech being an expression of one's thought and knowledge, whatever one utters becomes true in this stage of experience. And if people cannot understand him and they say to him, "You are speaking something which we cannot understand." Then he must say, "Yes, I speak something which you cannot understand, because this is a matter which is not supposed to be understood by your mind." Here, we are not in the realm of understanding of objects of sense, but we are in the realm of Being with things. So, one who is capable of attuning himself with the Being of the objects, alone can understand what the truth of this exposition is. It is true when the Upanishad speaks like this; it speaks what one cannot understand. Neither is it intended to be understood by the layman whose mind has not been adequately transformed, because here we are being led gradually from mere sensation and perception, from mentation and understanding, to the intuition of objects, wherein the objects become one with the knowing perceiver, knowing reality-the Subject. At this stage, Narada is unable to speak. His breath is held up, as it were. He does not know what he is hearing from this great master. This master observes the silence of the disciple who now does not say as on previous occasions, "Please let me know if something more is there." He keeps quiet, his mouth is hushed and his mind has stopped thinking. He does not know what to speak. Seeing this, the master himself starts pursuing the subject further without being accosted by the disciple.

No one here is forcing anyone to hear (or read) anything, or to open or follow this plainly marked and posted Hindu related topic string. BTW, I did read earlier upon entering this site what Scotty has reposted.

Hello Glooper, Almost countless volumes of material have been written by almost countless numbers of people on the subjects of dualism and non-dualism (along with their variations related to same). Hearing that doesn't help you any does it? The same could be said about the number of writings related to love. Ideas and concepts may be useful but until we have or unfold understanding deep down inside those ideas and concepts may not relate much to what we are going through... A reading suggestion. I think that Alan Watts (from the 60's) does a fine job of helping explain many of the Taoist and Buddhist concepts or teachings in ways that many of us westerners can at least get a feel for. His books are still available and much of his material can be found on the internet. A lot of the reading materials out there can and will blow your mind... but remember to keep a foundation of general goodnes and a non-violent mindedness for such is in harmony with the supporting spirit! Best wishes, Bob

Hello Blasto, ...how many posts have we seen related to "Hindu" based Kundalini? (and loads of other subjects that are not very Taoist?) Have those members been asked what their point is or have the moderators deleted such posts? If several other members here never want to hear anything related to true Hindu teachings which includes Kundalini, prana, etc. (imo anyway) then I will not submit such material here for any type of correlation, which was part of my point, with another part being what I felt was the universal like aspect of the particular commentary posted. Bob

...well as has often been said (more or less), the right question is half the answer. :-) Don't know much about various planes of existence but more importantly - it is death that dies. Om

Sorry people, I haven't yet read the whole string of posts but it looks like a great deal of great responses so far! If the subject has no yet been raised... how about one helping to pay (or to somewhat lighten or temporarily suspend) anothers karmic debts?

...and or do aliens have Buddha nature?

Hello Marblehead, I can't nail down everything regarding the Kierkegaard quote but I appreciated the feeling of the connotation that it conveys... ...not unlike not being able to nail down everything of the second half of the St. Francis of Assisi quote that follows: "...O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; To be understood as to understand; To be loved as to love; For it is in giving that we recieve; It is in pardoning that we are pardoned; And it is dying that we are born to eternal life". Regards, Bob

"Most people are subjective toward themselves and objective toward all others, frightfully objective sometimes-- but the task is precisely to be objective toward oneself and subjective toward all others". - Soren Kierkegaard

Pardon me - a side note and subject, although in a way not unrelated, if you will - ? Why did schools of Buddhism ever come into existence? In my view largely because of certain permutations that took place in schools of Hinduism as related to certain forces - which brought about corruption of many of its teachings; thus the historic Buddha went in search of what much of Hinduism had permutated away from. Which in no way means that Hinduism in essence (for example as alluded to in the Upanisads) is corrupt.

"My mind, the mind", etc., speculations and thoughts can not give one the answer because they are not capable of doing so. but one is often driven to keep looking there just in case they missed something - gosh darn it... Tao is not the mind, although all of the mind is born of Tao. Om