God came as Shankara to uplift the atheists who did not care for God

Aham Brahmasmi = I am Spirit Soul. You are not the body (material energy)---you are conscious spirit soul. You are not God.
It means "I am Brahman".

Spirit is the same as prana, it is life energy.

Soul is the same as atman, it is the wave we identify with when we are drowning in maya.

God is the Christian concept for the trinity of brahman, paramatma, and bhagvan.

All words, concepts, do you really want to debate something so irrelevant?

The individual Soul is made of Brahman (spirit)
Yes, Atman is Brahman.

All negation followed by more negation as if something progress is being stated.
Neti neti, the only way to really point at the divine is to say what it is not, there is nothing in normal experience that is equivalent to it so we are at a loss to really say it.

False based upon the real & actual Existence of TIME ---as we know it . . .
It is patently clear time is not real since it is perceived differently depending on mood - when we are bored, it goes slowly, when we are having fun it goes fast. There is nothing concrete which can be called time, it has no reality outside the mind at all.

Okay but why the self-aggrandising?
I am partaking in a discussion, what you perceive as self-aggrandizing is merely the authority of direct experience.

Your mind appears and disappears ---Time is the distroyer of ALL ---that's quite a Job-Title for something that doesn't exist. What about pain & suffering? Illusion?
Pain and suffering arise for whom?

Who has given this title for time?

That does not clairify anything
Clarity does not arise from mind, mind is the nature of all confusion. It is fundamentally a denial engine and brings nothing but fear. Spiritual practice is about entering and living from the heart, where nothing but love arise. Love is never confused.

Because Maya is Real & Temporary ---Insurance and maintenance & Taxes are the owners responsibility--- why consider additional Un-Conscious inert objects to be part of your being?
Maya is only real in a relative sense.

What is transient reality without an observer of it?

Karma yoga means action done without expecting reward knowing who is the recipient of Sacrifice.
You have not said something different from me, except that you bring in the one who might get rewarded. This one is the identification in much action, the one that is trying to get something out of it. You also bring in the recipient, your whole statement rests on the delusion of maya. Who sacrifices? It is only the whole interacting with itself, true sharing.

Your love would be false and Temporary. Love is only real in the company of real Persons ---lest be be called animal instinct.
For me, love is the result of the removal of separation. Love that depends on something other is not true love.

The nature in question is PERSONA. God is the first Person (adi-purusha)
Person is character, it is something acquired to represent ourselves to others. The first person has still arisen from something, that is my interest. This is the difference of Nirguna Brahman and Seguna Brahman, all that arises is maya, the one it arises for is the only true Reality.

So all your concepts are false? Thank you for your candor.
Yes, certainly.

One cannot presume to understand the purport of ancient Sanskrit texts ---unless the purports of ancient Sanskrit texts are explained to them
Having texts explained to us will only result in more concepts, direct personal insight is necessary to truly understand.
 
What is the definition of God?
What definition could possibly be useful?

Whatsoever is said will not be the reality, whatsoever is said can only be a half truth at best. It is because God is all-encompassing, comprising all the opposites, yet being beyond them all.

Language is not capable of expressing it because fundamentally the purpose of language is to convey the finite, it is futile to try to explain the infinite with it.
 
AdvaitaZen said:
---Time is the destroyer of ALL ---that's quite a Job-Title for something that doesn't exist.
Who has given this title for time?
Click to expand...

Who do you "Speculate" gave the Title? Guess yet?

Okay the answer is: Krishna
"Time I am destroyer of ALL"
he said it in the Bhagavad-Gita.
Also, Robert Oppenheimer famous quoted did too.

AdvaitaZen said:
What about pain & suffering? Illusion?
Pain and suffering arise for whom?
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Specificity required? Can't it be catch all?

How about just children, say?

Pain and suffering imposed upon by other living beings ---that ironically, most of us, subsidise.
 
bhaktajan said:
Okay the answer is: Krishna
"Time I am destroyer of ALL"
he said it in the Bhagavad-Gita.
Also, Robert Oppenheimer famous quoted did too.
Click to expand...

Time is the structure of maya, so I can accept him stating he is the destroyer of this. It is by pointing to its fallacy though, so we would not be in disagreement.

bhaktajan said:
Pain and suffering imposed upon by other living beings ---that ironically, most of us, subsidise.
Click to expand...
Suffering is a delusion.

Pain is real, it is a signal from the body about something being wrong. We enter into suffering about this because we wish to avoid the pain, it is ego which tries to escape reality.

There is nothing inherently bad about pain, it is a useful mechanism.

What we inflict on others stems from our own selfishness, which is founded in our delusional identification with the finite. The quality which brings about selfishness is not actually bad either, it stems from our basic misunderstanding about our nature.

When we understand we are the whole, greed becomes a need to perfect existence as a whole, when we believe ourselves finite, it only serves our own lives at the expense of others - there is no true other.
 
Greed is actually our refusal to accept we are so small, we accumulate things to make ourselves appear larger by extension.

There is nothing inherently evil about anything in life, evil stems from our misunderstanding about our nature. If you name any negative quality, I can easily explain why it is there, and how it is transformed when we encounter truth.

Fundamentally, there is no need to "perfect" the person, it is only necessary to see that which observes the person and remain as that. This is the higher self, the Mind, God, Self, no-mind, sunyata, brahman... it is all, whatsoever you want to call it, it observes this you.

Pure awareness.
 
AdvaitaZen said:
What is the definition of God?
What definition could possibly be useful?

Whatsoever is said will not be the reality, whatsoever is said can only be a half truth at best. It is because God is all-encompassing, comprising all the opposites, yet being beyond them all.

Language is not capable of expressing it because fundamentally the purpose of language is to convey the finite, it is futile to try to explain the infinite with it.
Click to expand...

OTOH:

"Vasishtha said, What thou sayest about the indications of the Vedas and the other scriptures (in respect of the matter) is even so. Thou takest those indications in the way in which they should be taken. Thou bearest, however, in thy understanding, only the texts of the Vedas and the other scriptures. Thou art not, O monarch, truly conversant with the real meaning of those texts.

That person who bears in his understanding merely the texts of the Vedas and the other scriptures without being conversant with the true sense or meaning of those texts, bears them fruitlessly. Indeed, one who holds the contents of a work in memory without comprehending their meaning is said to bear an useless burden.

He, however, who is conversant with the true meaning of a treatise, is said to have studied that treatise to purpose. Questioned regarding the meaning of a text, it behoveth one to communicate that meaning which he has comprehended by a careful study.

That person of dull intelligence who refuses to expound the meanings of texts in the midst of a conclave of the learned, that person of foolish understanding, never succeeds in expounding the meaning correctly.

An ignorant person, going to expound the true meaning of treatises, incurs ridicule. Even those possessed of a knowledge of the Soul have to incur ridicule on such occasions (if what they go to explain has not been acquired by study).

Listen now to me, O monarch, as to how the subject of Emancipation has been explained (by preceptors to disciple from days of old) among highsouled persons conversant with the Sankhya and the Yoga systems of philosophy.
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Thank you very much
 
bhaktajan said:
OTOH:



Thank you very much
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Knowledge of the scriptures does not lead to enlightenment.

What use is expounding on the scriptures if you have no experience of divinity? You only show yourself knowledgeable, but knowledge is not understanding.
 
Only an ignorant man, when asked what is God, would blurt out some arbitrary answer.

Ask me anything else, it is idle nonsense, but you have asked me to explain what is Reality. It is this, but what to say of it?
 
If you want to know what is God, delve into your inner silence.
 
AdvaitaZen said:
Only an ignorant man, when asked what is God, would blurt out some arbitrary answer.

Ask me anything else, it is idle nonsense, but you have asked me to explain what is Reality. It is this, but what to say of it?
Click to expand...

Jonestown, Unification Church, Branch Davidians, Charles Manson, Scientology etc etc etc
You don't remind me of any of these Organised CULTS . . . so I am left bemused . . . are you exempt form Government Taxation? I mean are we subsidising your group?

Cult - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Mind control
Studies have identified a number of key steps in coercive persuasion:
People are put in physically or emotionally distressing situations;
Their problems are reduced to one simple explanation, which is repeatedly emphasized;
They receive what seems to be unconditional love, acceptance, and attention from a charismatic leader or group;
They get a new identity based on the group;
They are subject to entrapment (isolation from friends, relatives and the mainstream culture)
Access to information is controlled.

:::::::::::::::::::::::
or is it,
"Zen and the art of preaching to _____"
 
AdvaitaZen said:
If you want to know what is God, delve into your inner silence.
Click to expand...

I am afraid to do this, now that you suggested it.
I am afraid to do this because I am afraid I'll find you instead.
Are my fears founded?
 
bhaktajan said:
Jonestown, Unification Church, Branch Davidians, Charles Manson, Scientology etc etc etc
You don't remind me of any of these Organised CULTS . . . so I am left bemused . . . are you exempt form Government Taxation? I mean are we subsidising your group?

Cult - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Mind control
Studies have identified a number of key steps in coercive persuasion:
People are put in physically or emotionally distressing situations;
Their problems are reduced to one simple explanation, which is repeatedly emphasized;
They receive what seems to be unconditional love, acceptance, and attention from a charismatic leader or group;
They get a new identity based on the group;
They are subject to entrapment (isolation from friends, relatives and the mainstream culture)
Access to information is controlled.

:::::::::::::::::::::::
or is it,
"Zen and the art of preaching to _____"
Click to expand...

What I speak of is based on direct experience, I am sorry this threatens your beliefs.
 
You would also find Hare, though, you would know what Krishna explained to Arjuna.

Or you can keep studying about it.
 
My only point to you is this:

Nothing about can ever be the real thing.
 
AdvaitaZen said:
God is not .. only throwing away both is helpful.
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Agree completely with you. Agree with Bhaktajan too. God is not completely useless, some people need the idea. 'Tat Twam Asi' (You are that) is from Chhandogya Upanishad. Quoting 'Nasadiya Sukta' of RigVeda (known as the Creation Hymn) :

"THEN was not non-existent nor existent, there was no realm of air, no sky beyond it.
What covered in, and where? and what gave shelter? Was water there, unfathomed depth of water?
Death was not then, nor was there aught immortal: no sign was there, the day's and night's divider. .."
http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/rigveda/rv10129.htm
 
Aupmanyav said:
Agree completely with you. Agree with Bhaktajan too. God is not completely useless, some people need the idea. 'Tat Twam Asi' (You are that) is from Chhandogya Upanishad. Quoting 'Nasadiya Sukta' of RigVeda (known as the Creation Hymn) :

"THEN was not non-existent nor existent, there was no realm of air, no sky beyond it.
What covered in, and where? and what gave shelter? Was water there, unfathomed depth of water?
Death was not then, nor was there aught immortal: no sign was there, the day's and night's divider. .."
Rig Veda: Rig-Veda, Book 10: HYMN CXXIX. Creation.
Click to expand...

I have said some ways in which the concept of God can be helpful, yet for me many aspects of it are absurd. Especially for a Westerner, arriving at the point where belief in God causes you to have to say you are God, it looks insane.

In the East, this is more accepted, the scriptures go on saying it, but certainly I feel something like Buddha is more acceptable for the West - even though there is absolutely no difference between Buddha and the Upanishads beyond mere terminology. From personal experience, knowing we are That, it gives a huge opening for the enlightened ego - something I fought for almost two years - so I am apprehensive about allowing people to pursue explicitly theistic paths.
 
Ultimately, we must detach from the mind stream, understand we are not anything arising. If we give no attention to the thoughts, they will not have any hold on us, just passing waves in the ocean. Now, no concept or idea is meaningful, for we come to simply abide as that witness.
 
AZ,

Your POV are indeed (so far) old school Advaita philosophy.

I see Advaita philosophy always concluding with the slogan "All is One" ---yet its proponents hardly ever speak of the rudimentary study of Vedic metaphysics.

But leading up to the CONCLUSION of Advaita philosophy ---"All is One"--- there is the study of old school preliminary courses to study.

By "courses to study" I am not referring to Rituals. But I am referring to Advaita's elementary stepping stones.

The Gita give a primer overview of that requisite understanding of said metaphysics; and also, catagorises the progressive levels of study:

1] metaphysics of karma (and thus "karmic interactions") and its affects upon the living "soul" [soul is also called illusory by Buddhists and adavaitists]

2] metaphysics of "Jnana"(pron gyana), aka "Sankhaya", aka "Dhayana" The study of the physical metaphysical construct and expansion of existence.

3] metaphysics of bhakti the devote "service" of one's faculties outwardly.

Before enlightenment chop wood carry water,
After enlightenment chop wood carry water.​

PS:
The topic of the "SOUL" --its existence and its nature and its destiny and purpose would make great conversation too. For my school of orthodox philosophy has the most to say about the physics of the "Soul".

AdvaitaZen said:
My only point to you is this:

Nothing about can ever be the real thing.
Click to expand...

May I correct you here:

The whole mechanism is Real---
whilst the ZERO Vacuum (the space that the mechanism occupies) also is real.

IOW the whole entire Illusion of transient "Rising and Falling of the ten thousand things" is a beginning-less and endless dynamic.

The world of Illusion and Illusioned beings exists to facilitate Illusion ---this is real.
 
AdvaitaZen said:
Especially for a Westerner, arriving at the point where belief in God causes you to have to say you are God, it looks insane.

In the East, this is more accepted, the scriptures go on saying it, ..
Click to expand...
You are right, AdvaitaZen, we are not Gods. That is evident every day in the morning when we use the bathroom. But there are people who take this meaning of 'Tat twam asi'. What it means is that the entity which constitutes me also constitutes the whole universe and all things contained in it. 'Sarve Khalvidam Brahma' describes it better (all things here are Brahman). And the closest we get to Brahman, we find that it is 'physical energy', because there is no other omnipresent entity. Sorry for your wasted two years. Yes, creation also is a misnomer for our perception. There is nothing created, nothing that is born, and nothing that dies. Do atoms die? Is the energy contained in them destroyed. There is nothing dead in the universe, not even a stone.
 
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