asunthatneversets

There are no Yogācāra views expounded in snang byang. Dzogchen may adopt certain Yogācārin principles such as the eight-consciousness model, however the Dzogchen view is its own and is not Yogācāra.

Anything can be turned into a security honeypot for grasping and identification if related to in an unskilled way. Most every Buddhist view has safeguards put in place to avoid errors of that nature as much as possible. Madhyamaka avoids this error with the two-truths. The analytical view is always a conventional relative, while the direct unenumerated and solely experiential recognitions and realizations are the ultimate truth. So from the very beginning the analytical meditations are presented as provisional means which if applied correctly will lead to experiential realizations, and in that sense grasping at the conventional view as having ultimate validity (outside of its application) is really pointless. These systems are conscious of this, for instance Nāgārjuna states that emptiness is the cure to all views, and therefore those who turn emptiness into a view are incurable.

I actually have cited this section a few times to point out this error in other's views, for example I wrote on vajracakra: As has been pointed out, you're reading an exposition which is being delivered from the perspective of the natural state, and mistaking it as your own. Jigme Lingpa discusses this error: Jigme Lingpa sets up the main part of his The Words Of The Omniscient One not with his own instructions, but with those of an imagined teacher of the simultaneous method, in order to subject the statements of this teacher to criticism. He begins with this advice from the imagined teacher: "Those meditators who are fatigued by the penance of solitude and the burden of things to be counted and the teachers who support them are a long way from the definitive secret, the truth of the Great Perfection. If they can come to the place of the ultimate truth of meditation, just by recognizing stillness and just by recognizing movement, there is no need for any other kind of contemplation." To which Jigme Lingpa (as himself) replies with: "Although you may achieve an initial acquaintance with the realization of the great ascension to ever-purity by throwing everything out at once as stated above, you will not really have come close to it." Later in the same text Jigme Lingpa quotes a passage from Longchenpa's Lungti Terdzö in which much the same criticism is made: "The sage oriented toward realization who explains to every flawed person with little merit he meets, 'The genuine realization that whatever arises is the nature of the dharmakāya is itself self-arisen wisdom,' and, 'Absorption is accordingly nescience and manas,' teaches what is tantamount to a fabrication that seduces beings. Because of this, one sees [disciples] who are cut off from the profound Dharma, which will not be found elsewhere. Such a teacher is a thief of this vehicle. There are many appearing nowadays."

You missed that the "Those meditators who are fatigued..." quote is actually Jigme Lingpa pretending to be an unqualified lama giving bad advice, to which he then (as himself) corrects in the sentences which follow.

Oh that I don't mistake my view for other than an opinion. Well luckily I don't have to convince you since the fact that we are all only ever sharing opinions goes without saying.

Convinve you otherwise about what?

Uhh, what? Everything that anyone writes is their opinion. Anything you say is also your opinion... this can't be the first time you're figuring this out. And I'm not sure who in their right mind would expect a teacher to read their mind... for the most part, if you want a certain teaching all you have to do is ask for it.

Not to assume that I'm one of the posters you are referring to, but I've actively evaded offering a sound explanation for my position due to the fact that some of the personalities and dispositions here are so venomous that there is really no point in engaging on that level.

Dear god... in this context ralis, not in general. Right, well they don't just hand out upadeśa teachings like bus passes. Really I just come across as a guy sharing his opinion. If sharing my opinion means I'm erring into authoritarianism, then all of us are guilty of authoritarianism, including you.

The authoritarian thing is also your own personal fabrication and issue. Why would you suppose something like that?

Eh, not really. All I did was point out your obvious issues with authority and then pointed out that the lama is a vital aspect of Vajrayāna. On the contrary it is about as irrelevant to the teaching itself as it gets and is quite pointless to fixate on. Who gives a shit what people wear? Ralis does. I'd say that is an inaccurate and biased generalization. This is true. The man is also far from grounded in anything remotely close to what you'd define as a "real world". This is also true. This thread is deteriorating fast.

Interesting. Sort of misunderstands that the dharma is an empirical methodology which is used to bring about genuine tangible insights. Which means if the dharma is 'faith', then anything that you identify with scientifically is also faith. You exhibit biases just like anyone else who holds to views. This is like me saying "I have no interest or need for patriarchical parents who don lab coats and pocket protectors that ralis has an incessant need for". Which is about as low brow as you can get when it comes to finding reasons to reject something because what a scientist wears has nothing to do with science, just like what a Buddhist teacher wears has nothing to do with the buddhadharma.

Not sure if that was directed at me, but if so you may have not read my response in its entirety because it was anything but an argument against what Apech or anyone else believes. It was a move to show how both of our interpretations and opinions are relative and contingent upon what we have been exposed to... and neither is wrong nor right.

I wholeheartedly agree that gzhan stong and Yogācāra are very in line with one another, I was merely saying that apart from adopting a few principles from Yogācāra, a statement that the view of the whole of the tantras (that Vajrayāna is based upon) is that of Yogācāra or gzhan stong is really a view that would reflect the school or teacher one is learning from, just as the view I have learned is. So as you said it really has to do with what school or teacher you are learning from. I also have a Kagyu lama, however he is Drikung and therefore does not adhere to a view which would promote gzhan stong as being an authoritative view in relation to the tantras or Vajrayāna in general. I've also attended teachings on Sakyapa texts and the gzhan stong view was never once mentioned or even alluded to. That was the only point I was making. That statements in support (whether yours or mine) of certain principles, regarding how said principles may or may not accurately reflect the expositions of the tantras is contingent upon our teacher, more than being an accurate statement about the tantras themselves.

Religious mindsets can come in various forms, all it takes is a certain ideology to attach to (and identify with) and voilà. You can attach to a Buddhist box, and/or attach to a scientific materialist box, both have the potentiality to make the individual mind a closed box depending on how that individual relates to said view. Science proper, is interested in advancement and refining itself, it is open, unbiased, willing and eager to investigate things empirically and considers its findings to be tentative conclusions which are never paraded as definitive or ideological statements of truth. The irony of your entire attack on the buddhadharma at the hand of science is that you aren't advocating for science at all. Rather you are advocating for what is called scientific materialism, which is a rigid fixation on a specific paradigm of thought. Hence why you are involved in the very type of conduct you are projecting onto Buddhism and proclaiming Buddhists to be guilty of.

This really depends on what tantras you are referring to, but the tantras as a whole do not contain a view that is inherently gzhan stong in nature. Gzhan stong is actually a later formulation, and many of the main adepts who wrote commentaries on the tantras (in addition to their own expositions) actually assert that the view of the tantras accord more closely with what we think of as a traditional Madhyamaka view such as Prasaṅgika (a view the gzhan stong pas would refer to as 'rang stong' - which is just a straw man created by gzhan stong pas to set their view apart from traditional Madhyamaka). The tantras adopt certain Yogācārin principles, such as the eight consciousness model [aṣṭavijñāna], however they do not necessarily adhere to a view we could state is 'Yogācāra', specifically (or in nature).

This is the pertinent point which must be emphasized: Buddhism draws the critical division differently— i.e., between sentience and non-sentience— because it is primarily interested in the alleviation of suffering and the quest for happiness. In Buddhism, the evolution of the cosmos and the emergence of the sentient beings within it— indeed, effectively everything within the purview of the physical and life sciences— belong within the domain of the first of the Four Noble Truths, which the Buddha taught in his initial sermon. The Four Noble Truths state that within the realm of impermanent phenomena there is suffering, suffering has an origin, the cessation of suffering is possible, and there is a path to the cessation of suffering. As I see it, science falls within the scope of the first truth in that it examines the material bases of suffering, for it covers the entire spectrum of the physical environment—“ the container”— as well as the sentient beings—“ the contained.” It is in the mental realm— the realm of psychology, consciousness, the afflictions, and karma— that we find the second of the truths, the origin of suffering. The third and fourth truths, cessation and the path, are effectively outside the domain of scientific analysis in that they pertain primarily to what might be called philosophy and religion. -- Dalai Lama (2005-09-13). The Universe in a Single Atom: The Convergence of Science and Spirituality (Kindle Locations 1243-1252). Crown Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Agreed, nice website.

I'm well aware of the implications of language and cultural constructs, I was really just interested to see if you were actually planning on citing that as an argument against what is being discussed here. Perhaps some are. For myself, there are quite a few naysayers who post here, whose disinterest with buddhism seems very deeply rooted in various biases, so there's really no point in discussing these things in depth. It does but not for the reasons you cite below. The majority of the main Dzogchen texts are in Tibetan, which is a living language. So while there may indeed be some translational errors as is usually inescapable with translation, there are no inaccuracies which would compromise the integrity of the Dzogchen doxography to the extreme you are alluding to. Which is not the case for the aforementioned reasons provided. It's not the case, so your conclusion is based on a false premise.

What does that have to do with anything? That's good. Ultimately that would be impossible, but is acceptable in a conventional context, sure

So it appears you advocate for the existence of a noumenon or noumena that phenomenal appearances are abstracted from? You are entitled to that opinion but it is divergent from the buddhadharma.

You as the conventional individual recognize it.

Fanatical belief system? I didn't know you thought of Dzogchen that way... better move along then. I will not be citing any more quotes or referencing anything you could get your hands on. I have no interest in seeing you further degrade and eviscerate these teachings and I definitely will not allow it to occur as a result of my own actions.

Ah, no you're still coming at this from a flawed perspective and would need to take into consideration conventional vs. ultimate in the theme of Madhyamaka logic. Your contention that phenomena 'are' and 'isness' just 'is' irrespective of anything is patently false, and the fact that you are asserting that to support your argument means we aren't even having the same conversation.

In the relative sense, since there are certain criteria I would have to meet in order for my assessment to be a genuine projection, and I do not meet that criteria in this context; I am not projecting. It also seems you pull the 'projection' card quite often, which means the probability that such a value judgement is warranted or accurate is slim. Therefore I stand by my statement: the fact you failed to understand what was being alluded to in that text, and misinterpreted said text due to filtering it through your presuppositions is still not my fault.