Namaste Z,
thank you for the post.
_Z_ said:
i can see the emptiness in all things, it is difficult to balance that greater reality with our western vision of the physically real.
i congratulate you on your attainment!
western thought, at least in a physics sense, also demonstrates that phenomena are empty.. at the atomic scale. each molecule is mostly empty space which is, as you can imagine, quite an extraordinary coorelation betwixt schools of thought which have arisen in drastically different cultural millieus.
i know what you mean yet by what are things then manifest? i would have to un-include the universe hmm however i am leaning towards the idea of phenomenal existence as being in the moment without beginning nor end. this would remove the need for a creative force or presence.
from an overall point of view, each moment of consciousness is continually arising conditioned by the previous moment and so forth. it is, in a very real sense, a matter of having an undistracted mind which is focused on the present moment which is arising.
by ‘tao of synchronicity’ i was imagining ‘the way’ [tao] as including all paths.
btw. can the tao be connected to buddhism as i do? it appears quite logical to me that between emptiness and existence there is a tao. for me it is simply ‘the still wind’ [buddha being] and ‘the blowing wind’ [tao].
it would certainly depend on the schools of Buddhism and Tao of which we are speaking. a great many beings do not realize that Tao, like Buddhadharma, has different schools of praxis and philosophical positions. so, having said that, my entry to the Buddhadharma was through the Northern Complete Reality school of Tao.
that said, the Ch'an Buddhist school is, by and large, a Buddhist tradition that has been influced by Tao whereas the Southern Complete Reality School of Tao is a Taoist tradition which has been influenced by Buddhadharma.
regarding emtpiness, perhaps this excerpt will be of some value:
"According to the explanation of the highest Buddhist philosophical school, Madhyamaka-Prasangika, external phenomena are not mere projections or creations of the mind. External phenomena have a distinct nature, which is different from the mind.
The meaning of all phenomena being mere labels or designations is that they exist and acquire their identities by means of our denomination or designation of them. This does not mean that there is no phenomenon apart from the name, imputation, or label, but rather that if we analyze and search objectively for the essence of any phenomenon, it will be un-findable.
Phenomena are unable to withstand such analysis; therefore, they do not exist objectively. Yet, since they exist, there should be some level of existence; therefore, it is only through our own process of labeling or designation that things are said to exist.
Except for the Prasangika school, all the other Buddhist schools of thought identify the existence of phenomena within the basis of designation; therefore, they maintain that there is some kind of objective existence.
Since the lower schools of Buddhist thought all accept that things exist inherently, they assert some kind of objective existence, maintaining that things exist in their own right and from their own side. This is because they identify phenomena within the basis of designation.
For the Prasangikas, if anything exists objectively and is identified within the basis of designation, then that is, in fact, equivalent to saying that it exists autonomously, that it has an independent nature and exists in its own right.
This is a philosophical tenet of the Yogacara school in which external reality is negated, that is, the atomically structured external world is negated. Because the proponents of the Yogacara philosophical system assert that things cannot exist other than as projections of one's own mind, they also maintain that there is no atomically structured external physical reality independent of mind. By analyzing along these lines, Yogacara proponents conclude that there is no atomicly structured external reality.
This conclusion is reached because of not having understood the most subtle level of emptiness as expounded by the Prasangikas. In fact, Yogacarins assert that things have no inherent existence, and that if you analyze something and do not find any essence, then it does not exist at all.
Prasangikas, on the other hand, when confronted with this un-findability of the essence of the object, conclude that this is an indication that objects do not exist inherently, not that they do not exist at all. This is where the difference lies between the two schools."
true. without predestination one thing is anothers environment and each entity interacts with one another. i suppose it would be absurd for there to be a being which decides everything, it seams more true to think of everything as deciding or doing for itself.
a very real way of understanding the Buddhadharma is as a means to experience reality, as it is, without any conceptual interpetation or overlay and this experience is what we are usually going on about with Satori and Samadhi and that sort of thing. it happens, for many beings, like flashes of lighting in the dark of night.. for a moment, everything is completely illumed but we cannot cognitively process the totality of the experience. the aim, then, is to enable the mind to rest in this awareness on the meditation cushion and through our everyday activities.
at a certain stage of the practice the difference between night and day is said to dissapate, though such has not happened for me, the lineage holder from my school has remarked that he does not expereience any difference between day and night he perceives it all in shades of blue. take it for what its worth
in Carteisan terms it would be the subject/object dichotomy where we experience reality in terms of experience and experiencer.
i see your point and it is very interesting and profound. however it suggests as buddhism generally does, that everything is kinda hanging in the air... the mind with thoughts attached to it, would not really exist, much as the universe and phenomenon would not. that is to say; this 'conceptual overlay' is some vague entity that neither exists nor dont exist - so what the hell is it [and existence]?
if your term "really exists" means eternally existing from its own side, then Buddhism would suggest that such is not the case.
have you heard of our teaching called Interdependent Co-Arising?
our conceptual overlay is just that.. the conceptions that we project unto phenomena and they can take myriad forms.
as for existence.. it simply is.... no conceptions need apply
then what are all these things? ok we may say it is all illusion but this is a vague explanation which doesn’t say what things are, to me it gives us a duel view of two realities and negates the universality of the ‘all’!
pheonema are what they are without underlying ideations. a tree is a tree, rock a rock and water is water all without any conceptions about them being applicable.
for instance, when you think of the word "tree" what comes to mind?
one day i must read them sutta’s
. i will give this particular point much thought - thanks. i have always imagined the very opposite where the emptiness [infinity] is the very ground of things, with the tao being the result of this in connection to things, as if the ground rolls along with its emanational forms. again this is a universal thing.
perhaps it is due to equating "lack of inheret permanent characteristic" with "infinity"?
within the context of the Vajrayana, and i should point out that this is particular to the Vajrayana, the inherent luminisoity of mind is the ground from which experience arises, further a case can be made from the Higher Yoga Tantras that such luminosity is inherent and partless existing prior to the arising of birth and death.
if you have a serious interest in this subject, from our point of view, i cannot extol the virtues of Secret of the Vajra World by Reginald Ray sufficiently. he provides an academic text infused with the realizations of a practioner.
i see. once there everything ceases to exist - yet the universe will remain! ~ outside of that ‘more real’ experience of being on the other shore?
remember.. our conceptions about reality are not, in fact, reality themselves.
when your conceptions are all gone and do not arise in response to sensory stimuli, what remains?
metta,
~v
