Why I believe in atman over anatman

[TaraTarini]

Also Malcolm doesn’t accept that a unconditoned cause is not dependent for its Own existance and that this is meant by unconditioned reality even if the effect were different from the cause wich it isn’t in Kashmiri shaivism and shaktism.Anyway I don’t debate on Buddhist forums like dharmawheel due to Moderation and censorship.I am open to debating on a platform like this though!malcolm btw has never refuted my unconditioned reality argument just asserting that it’s a solely theistic argument as if it can’t apply to absolute idealism.He hasn’t refuted the premises.

 

 

Edited November 17, 2020 by TaraTarini

[TaraTarini]

5 hours ago, dwai said:

Shankaracharya couldn't have said there is one substance that changes its forms because there isn't really 'many forms', but rather only the appearance of forms (like forms that appear in a dream). I think "cause and substance changing its form" is a misunderstanding of Advaita. 

Shunyata is not the same as Brahman as Brahman is beyond duality (no empty, no full), though emptiness and fullness seem to appear in it. Many a high-level practitioner of Vajrachara and Advaita Vedanta (for some fortuitous reason I seem to know several of them) do state that Buddha nature (Buddha-dhatu or tathagata garbha) is nothing but Brahman. 

 

The way I understand it, Shunya refers to the lack of independent existence of phenomena that appear and disappear in awareness -- so shunya is really 'svabhāva shunya'. Indeed to try and prove that awareness is also dependently originated is a ludicrous exercise as without awareness the exercise itself is pointless. I think if someone claims (usually half-baked Buddhists do that) that awareness is dependently originated, it can be empirically proven as an incorrect statement, since it is perfectly possible to stay aware in absence of any object.

How Can one prove that awareness is not dependently originated?and how can one be aware without an object?You mean like in Samadhi?

[dwai]

6 hours ago, TaraTarini said:

How Can one prove that awareness is not dependently originated?and how can one be aware without an object?You mean like in Samadhi?

That happens to us every day in deep sleep, only there’s no memory so we don’t realize it. We think we are unconscious, but really, deep sleep is not absence of awareness. Rather, it is the awareness of absence (of objects). 
 

Samādhi is a way to pause the mind, but a much simpler way is to simply sit with full attention for the next thought to arise (a type of meditative focus).  

[Creation]

8 hours ago, TaraTarini said:

In my debate with Malcolm all I hear is that I do not understand anything and that I am no shentongpa but a non dual shaivite.I never claimed to be exclusively one above the other but rather follow the tradition of the eight mahasiddhas like machendranath and gorakhnath and follow both(though I consider myself a seeker and do not really label myself Buddhist or Hindu yet let alone exclusively one or the other).Malcolm freaks out about the shentongpa and claims they are nothing like I think they are when in a post in 2010 he had a high Rinpoche admit that shentong and Advaita were no different in how they presented their view.

I have been warned by other users on dharmawheel not to debate with Malcolm as he treats people a certain way(even if I do believe he is a nice guy)in debates.

 

I am open to

written debates all the time however so if you have any of his students come debate me then that would be fine.

Yes, I often see this dismissive attitude when Malcolm or his acolytes engage with others.  I would not particularly want to bring this here, once there were many arguments of this type on this forum, such threads and those who frequented them were jokingly called "The Buddha Bums."  But hey, this place is in kind of a lull...  Anymore, mostly I encounter these debates on Buddhist facebook groups where Malcom and his students post.

 

Apparently the Rinpoche in question said the presentation of the two truths is the same in Advaita as in Shentong, but elsewhere admits they differ on other details, such as momentariness of conventional things. 

 

8 hours ago, TaraTarini said:

Okay,I have never heard this before and was genuinely confused as to what he believed about causation.does Nagarjuna hold that matter and mind are separate yet do not arise and thus are not existent by a certain definition of existance or that matter and mind do

not exist the way that adi Shankara thought they were positing?
 

if nothing arises then matter and mind or mind in the madhyamika yogachara synthesis schools of Tibet wich Dzogchenpas adhere to (and I had Malcolm tell me that in dzogchen that mind creates appearances of matter as it’s a synthesis school )is a self.maybe not as it is not static but it does have a enduring existance and inherent existance thus.thats all I’m arguing for.

This is my personal, non-scholarly understanding:  Theravada took the Buddha's teaching of dependent origination to imply that there is a correct metaphysical picture of things, namely atoms of rupa and moments of vijnana arising dependent on each other, and all compounded categories arising dependent on these.  Nagarjuna asserted that this is a misunderstanding of dependent origination, and re-asserted the Buddha's teaching that "right view" is actually "no view", that no conceptual metaphysical picture of the world is ultimately correct, in particular that even the categories used by the Buddha are "fingers pointing at the moon" rather than truly existent things, and nothing that appears can be ultimately said to exist or to not-exist (even the smallest parts of things), much like an illusion or mirage.  And that this is implies and is implied by the correct understanding of the dependently originated nature of appearances.  Madhyamaka (Nagarjuna and later commentators) took this even further, and said that not only are the categories existence and non-existence ultimately inapplicable, so are all other concepts that are typically said to apply to things, such as part-whole, one-many, cause-effect. 

 

So as to your specific question, on the conventional level that you can talk about mind and matter and separation, for a Madhyamaka mind and matter are separate, but on an ultimate level mind, matter, and separation are all seen as illusory conceptual designations. 

 

But there is a subtlety that came out over centuries of commentary and debate: the question of just what "conventional truth" means in Madhyamaka.  One view (Chandrakirti's) is that conventional means whatever worldly beings believe, there is no one ultimate conventional truth (because then it would be ultimate truth ), the real point is that whatever categories are employed in conventional truth are seen to be illusions from the perspective of ultimate truth. Another perspective is that that there is what I call a "dharmically informed conventional truth", namely explaining conventional things in terms of Buddhist categories like the five skandhas, etc. even though all these categories are seen as illusions from the perspective of ultimate truth.  So then you can use any Buddhist conceptual scheme you like (Sautrantika, Yogacara, Pramanavada, etc.) to explain conventional things.  Yogacara-Madhyamaka, then, explains conventional things using Yogacara categories (where matter does not actually exist, but is a projection of mind), but adds "all these Yogacara categories are actually illusions from the perspective of the ultimate, in particular, non-dual awareness is also an illusion". 

 

Once again, this is my personal understanding.  Nevertheless, does it answer your question?

Edited November 17, 2020 by Creation

[steve]

15 hours ago, TaraTarini said:

 

Hello dear companion.I have read all of my Dzogchen from Dzogchen Acharya malcolm loppon.As far as I know based on his posts, the base is just shunyata and it is shunyata wich I am disregarding in my OP for a few reasons.Shunyata is based on infinite regression of actual produced things.but infinite regression would be impossible because a true infinite without a starting point is impossible,and if it were possible then nothing would exist in the chain as every condition cannot be met by its former condition in the chain as there is no starting point and you can keep going back.furthermore production of actual things is impossible as in production out of nothing(commonly known as without a cause or other,wich is still creation out of nothing unless other is simply the effect and thus cause and effect are the same and there is really only one constant existant thing wich is against shunyata).

 

Shunyata is based on infinite regression and dependant origination and an actual production out of nothing(otherwise you have the View expressed in the brahma sutra bhasya that there is one substance that merely changes its condition or form).I reject both for a few in my opinion airtight reasons.thats just my opinion!

 

Blessings!

 

I appreciate your reply and I continue to disagree with the basis of your argument.

Shunyata is not based on infinite regression, dependent origination, or cause and effect. That is a wrong view, a mental exercise. Perhaps one’s concept of shunyata is based on such things. Shunyata itself is not based on anything, that is the point of emptiness. Another wrong view is that the base is “just shunyata.” Emptiness is simply one characteristic of the base. The others are its clarity and limitless and energetic potential. Malcolm is knowledgeable and articulate and, I suspect, a good teacher but it is very easy for our intellect to misunderstand and lead us astray. But what can we trust if not that very intellect? That’s something we need to find out for ourselves. On the sutric path, intellect is the primary tool. On the tantric and dzogchen paths it is not so useful.

 

Shunyata points to the “baseless” quality of the base. It is primordial, meaning uncreated. It is unimputable and clear. It cannot be grasped and therefore can serve as the basis of all manifestation but, again, these are simply words and ideas. Whether or not you can accept it through logic, it can be directly experienced through practice.

 

At the end of the day what is important is that you find something that supports your understanding and growth. What supports me may be very different and these things can change over time. I trust that if you remain true to yourself, you’ll find what you need.

[ilumairen]

16 hours ago, TaraTarini said:

ultimately if true production cannot be established of concrete things and neither an infinite regress of causes and conditions,then Shunyata would be false as most buddhists outside some shentongpa's schools understand it.

There tends to be a difference between intellectual understanding, and what I will call experiential wisdom. What your argumentation and assertions seem dependent upon are the former.

 

In all honesty we do not have enough information to (intellectually) posit some “starting point” to negate “infinite regression” in any meaningful way. What we do have is what can now be experienced - which supports dependent arising. At an intellectual level, anything else we posit is no more than speculation.

 

And, imo, this is not what the teachings are pointing towards.

 

Nothing is “concrete,” nor can anything be fully separated from it’s dependent origination. It is (intellectually) what you perceive it to be as your mind focuses on whatever (then intellectually limited) “object” you choose to focus on - reifying both it and yourself in the process (a dynamic which can be referred to as “creating appearances”), and it is also empty (perhaps better stated as full) and undifferentiated in “it’s” nature.
 

Emptiness being the true nature (“true self”), and the recognition (and “creation” of various forms) being the means be which the “conventional self” has the potential to recognize it’s “true nature” which is often pointed towards with those phrases that are sometimes difficult for the conventional (intellectualized and intellectually maintained) self to comprehend until enough silence, stillness and/or space arises for recognition to unfold - or a thunderbolt strikes, or perhaps a breeze touches the skin in just the right way at just the right moment.  

 

 

[Apech]

@TaraTarini

 

Congrats on formulating all that and also debating Malcolm and surviving   I thought he left Dharmawheel or has he returned?

 

I think there is always a problem with any intellectual or conceptual formulation of shunyata - and actually i think Nagarjuna said he had no position and nothing to defend - which is why he won his arguments.  I am of shentong leanings as I practice along the Karma Kagyu Mahamudra lines - for me the only 'thing' that could be termed existent is the continuum of Buddha-nature - which is empty of other.  But is not, of course, a thing anyway.

 

The Buddha's wisdom in knowing how things arise and cease.  That all phenomena are empty is one of the dharma seals - and means as far as I am concerned that they lack a durable self or essence - how they arise?  Actually they don't they just seem to because we have no awareness of buddha-nature.

 

Is buddha-nature different to atman?  That depends on whether you are thinking about it or whether you have realised it.

[TaraTarini]

1 hour ago, Apech said:

@TaraTarini

 

Congrats on formulating all that and also debating Malcolm and surviving   I thought he left Dharmawheel or has he returned?

 

I think there is always a problem with any intellectual or conceptual formulation of shunyata - and actually i think Nagarjuna said he had no position and nothing to defend - which is why he won his arguments.  I am of shentong leanings as I practice along the Karma Kagyu Mahamudra lines - for me the only 'thing' that could be termed existent is the continuum of Buddha-nature - which is empty of other.  But is not, of course, a thing anyway.

 

The Buddha's wisdom in knowing how things arise and cease.  That all phenomena are empty is one of the dharma seals - and means as far as I am concerned that they lack a durable self or essence - how they arise?  Actually they don't they just seem to because we have no awareness of buddha-nature.

 

Is buddha-nature different to atman?  That depends on whether you are thinking about it or whether you have realised it.

I heard from some knowledegeable people that buddha nature isn't the same as atman,but rather the inherent potential for nirvana in all beings?it isn't the alaya consciousness wich is the final consciousness,and so isn't like the atman of vedanta and kashmiri shaivism wich is one pure witness.nirvana is not uniting with the alaya,and nirvana does not create samsara.

 

Malcolm returned to dharmawheel.

Edited November 17, 2020 by TaraTarini

[TaraTarini]

2 hours ago, ilumairen said:

There tends to be a difference between intellectual understanding, and what I will call experiential wisdom. What your argumentation and assertions seem dependent upon are the former.

 

In all honesty we do not have enough information to (intellectually) posit some “starting point” to negate “infinite regression” in any meaningful way. What we do have is what can now be experienced - which supports dependent arising. At an intellectual level, anything else we posit is no more than speculation.

 

And, imo, this is not what the teachings are pointing towards.

 

Nothing is “concrete,” nor can anything be fully separated from it’s dependent origination. It is (intellectually) what you perceive it to be as your mind focuses on whatever (then intellectually limited) “object” you choose to focus on - reifying both it and yourself in the process (a dynamic which can be referred to as “creating appearances”), and it is also empty (perhaps better stated as full) and undifferentiated in “it’s” nature.
 

Emptiness being the true nature (“true self”), and the recognition (and “creation” of various forms) being the means be which the “conventional self” has the potential to recognize it’s “true nature” which is often pointed towards with those phrases that are sometimes difficult for the conventional (intellectualized and intellectually maintained) self to comprehend until enough silence, stillness and/or space arises for recognition to unfold - or a thunderbolt strikes, or perhaps a breeze touches the skin in just the right way at just the right moment.  

 

 

even if infinity were a actual thing and a infinite regress could be posited there would still be two problems:1.in a infinite set of conditioned phenomena,no particular condition could be met and so the entire chain ceases to exist at any point in time.

 

2.true production out of nothing and other (wich is still out of nothing in a sence)cannot actually be established and thus we would have two things(Matter and mind,or mind alone in the synthesis schools)being enduring and not subject to flux,and thus one or two selves.this refutes anatman.even if it were subject to a change in condition,it would not be in terms of essence.

 

still we would come to a permanent enduring thing,a atman of sorts.thats just my opinion.

[ilumairen]

7 hours ago, TaraTarini said:

even if infinity were a actual thing and a infinite regress could be posited there would still be two problems:1.in a infinite set of conditioned phenomena,no particular condition could be met and so the entire chain ceases to exist at any point in time.

 

I am not following this. Could you create some form of example to help me understand? What do you mean by “no particular condition,” and in what way would whatever you actually mean by no particular condition being met negate the entire perceivable chain?

 

7 hours ago, TaraTarini said:

2.true production out of nothing and other (wich is still out of nothing in a sence)cannot actually be established and thus we would have two things(Matter and mind,or mind alone in the synthesis schools)being enduring and not subject to flux,and thus one or two selves.this refutes anatman.even if it were subject to a change in condition,it would not be in terms of essence.

The reification of emptiness can be problematic.

 

For me this seems much simpler than the argumentation, debate, or discussion around the ideas presented here. I am human, so my perception of phenomenon is already limited (i.e. created, filtered, and understood through a human mind (in the heart/mind/brain sense that humans experience through). Whatever is thusly filtered/interpreted/understood is (through the process) diminished and made less than it’s entirety, and sometimes expanded beyond practical usefulness/application/reasoning. Anytime I speak of self or other my words will fall somewhere along the spectrum of reification/dissolution, and the words will inherently be (in one form or other) not quite accurate (merely a creation of my mind focused on appearances). So I spent many years tending towards silence.. which assisted in seeing many of the myriad ways we “trap” ourselves in the labyrinthine halls of intellectualization.

 

There aren’t two selves, there tend to be many, many more than that. And what is pointed towards and taught is a settling into the place (which isn’t a place at all) or moment (which isn’t actually constrained by time) before these numerous (rather schizophrenic and limiting) reified notions of self arise. 
 

And I very much believe that a spiritual sense of self can be just another “uniform” worn by the ego - which is why I think the great masters are so clear about there being nothing which can be said, as anything which is said inevitably becomes the establishment of position, but “the experience” is positionless. Words fail...

 

7 hours ago, TaraTarini said:

still we would come to a permanent enduring thing,a atman of sorts.thats just my opinion.

Thank you for sharing your opinion, and engaging in an interesting discussion.

 

Please forgive my rambling, it isn’t so often I have cause to put these ideas into words, and I am enjoying the exercise.

[Apech]

19 hours ago, TaraTarini said:

I heard from some knowledegeable people that buddha nature isn't the same as atman,but rather the inherent potential for nirvana in all beings?it isn't the alaya consciousness wich is the final consciousness,and so isn't like the atman of vedanta and kashmiri shaivism wich is one pure witness.nirvana is not uniting with the alaya,and nirvana does not create samsara.

 

Malcolm returned to dharmawheel.

 

I quite enjoyed malcolm's contributions on dharmawheel - but there was no contradicting him!  he regarded himself as definitive because he is a loppon I guess and the rest of us amateurs  He criticised something I had been taught by a qualified Lama on the Root Downfalls - which confused me - so I just stopped going to Dharmawheel.

 

Obviously conceptually buddha-nature and atman are not the same.  However if realised maybe they are ... Also the treatment of buddha-nature varies slightly between say Mahayana and the tantras.  

 

I see the alaya as simply the capacity of citta to store imprints from events and nirvana and samsara as two sides of the same coin.

[dwai]

19 hours ago, TaraTarini said:

I heard from some knowledegeable people that buddha nature isn't the same as atman,but rather the inherent potential for nirvana in all beings?it isn't the alaya consciousness wich is the final consciousness,and so isn't like the atman of vedanta and kashmiri shaivism wich is one pure witness.nirvana is not uniting with the alaya,and nirvana does not create samsara.

 

Malcolm returned to dharmawheel.

This might help map the Buddhist conceptualization with The Advaita Vedanta one — https://www.medhajournal.com/consciousness-according-to-zen-buddhism-and-how-it-relates-to-advaita-vedanta/