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17461767 No.17461767 [Reply] [Original]

>> No.17462145
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17462145

>Stafford Betty
Already refuted by Michael Levine who demolishes the typical Advaita detractors by misinterpreting Shankara’s doctrine.

>> No.17462228
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17462228

>>17462145
If you're referring to the journal article I posted yesterday, Levine didn't actually refute Shankara's unaccountability for sin and suffering, all he said was that Betty's refusal to accept that pain and suffering is subrated by a higher reality was 'absurd' and cannot be dismissed. But this is not Betty's argument at all, as Betty wasn't discounting the A/R distinction, but that it was 'irrelevant' in light of the fact that suffering is a subjective state, whether its imaginary or real. Therefore Betty could have accepted Levine's suppositions and it would still lead to the conclusion that Atman suffers and therefore Brahman suffers, which contradicts the principle that Brahman is pure bliss.

>> No.17462347

>>17461767
>67 KB JPG What are some books that refute Non-dualism?
the pali canon

>> No.17462358

>>17462347
I thought that the theravada tradition doesn't take a stand on the question, it's seen as irrelevant and pointless.

>> No.17462393

>>17462347
isn't Buddhism non-dual?

>> No.17462547
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17462547

>>17462145
I would be careful about reading Advaita Vedanta interpretations such as Shankara's as a commentary to the Upanishads, they are extremely reliant on Buddhist philosophy (Shankara is called a "cryptobuddhist" by most Hindus, and most scholars agree). If you want to read the Upanishads, work through them with editions and commentaries that aren't sectarian, or at least read an interpretation that is closer to the original meaning of the Upanishads, rather than Shankara's 9th century AD quasi-buddhism.

>> No.17462608

>>17462547
based careful poster

>> No.17462718

>>17462393
It's neither dualistic nor nondualistic

>> No.17463265

>>17462718
Mu

>> No.17463355

Place and Dialectic by Nishida Kitaro.

>> No.17463358 [DELETED] 

discord
.gg
/qZK3jUttFt

>> No.17463461

>>17462547
Based and very retarded

>> No.17463570

>>17462228
>Therefore Betty could have accepted Levine's suppositions and it would still lead to the conclusion that Atman suffers and therefore Brahman suffers, which contradicts the principle that Brahman is pure bliss.
No it doesn't, the Atman doesn't suffer in Advaita at all. Neither Vadiraja nor Betty correctly explain how or why the Atman suffers in Advaita.

Betty writes:
>For the fact still remains that the jiva experiences pain. Whether the pain is imaginary or not is irrelevant, for an imagined snake causes as great a fright as a real snake. And what does it mean to say that the jiva does not really suffer, but may be said to suffer 'as far as the phenomenal world goes'? I know of no distinction between suffering and seeming to suffer: who has ever seemed to suffer who did not really suffer? Suffering is of its nature a subjective state, and thus to make a distinction between 'objective' suffering and 'subjective' suffering is invalid, for there is no such thing as 'objective' suffering: it is, to use the Indian idiom, a hare's horn. It is invalid, therefore, to hold that the soul does not really suffer but only seems to suffer, as Shankara holds.

Betty here seems to confuse the jiva with the Atman-Brahman, he uses the above argument to speak about the jiva suffering and then confuses that with the Atman suffering, mistakenly believing that establishing the empirical reality of the suffering of the jiva establishes that the Atman suffers, he write afterwards:

>We are in the end left with the fact of suffering and the fact of a sufferer. And since according to Shankara this jiva (the 'seeming' sufferer) is really just the Atman
Yes but if you don't understand how this is meaningless to say. The Jiva is not 'just the Atman", but the Jiva's semblance of consciousness takes place through the reflection (chidabhasa) of the Atman in the intellect. It is this reflection of the Atman that seems to be a doer and experiencer and which seems to undergo pain and pleasure. The Atman doesn't suffer or have experiences but only the reflection in the intellect seems to, like the reflection of the moon in the water being impacted by the puddles vibrations despite the moon itself not being impacted. All the while the Atman is unaffected by its reflection and the mental modifications which impact the reflection don't impact the source of the image.

You cannot just automatically equate the jiva with the Atman as Betty does, because Advaita does not do this. There is a very specific relation between the jiva and the Atman, such that things we can say about the jiva don't automatically pertain to the Atman, Shankara explains that they are different and that the jiva is an image of the Atman in his bhasya on Brahma Sutra I, 2, 8.

>> No.17463689

>>17462347
>the pali canon
There is not a single Sutta in the whole of the Pali Canon that refutes non-dualism

>> No.17463695

>>17463570
All these words just to say you're a crypto-buddhist...

>> No.17463758

>>17463695
>Buddha
refuted by Sri Shankaracharya

>> No.17463766

>>17463758
>a buddhist refuding buddhism
Not sure what you mean by this

>> No.17463785

>>17463766
I would be careful about assuming that he was a Buddhist

>> No.17463798

>>17463785
No need, he most definitely was even though he didn't know it himself

>> No.17463799

>>17463798
I would be careful about taking that for granted.

>> No.17463806

>>17463799
You're being too careful

>> No.17463807

>>17463806
Or perhaps you're not being careful enough, eh?

>> No.17463810

>>17463807
For you

>> No.17463829

>>17462547
>>17462228
>>17462145
>>17461767
It is as if you opened this threads purely in order to paste the same series of answers that you always post.

>> No.17463838

>>17463829
He has some special breed of autism that compels him to always sperg in these threads

>> No.17464128

>>17463570
are you saying then the buddhi is the one that goes to naraka and suffers? which is it, jiva or buddhi?

>> No.17464597

>>17464128
>are you saying then the buddhi is the one that goes to naraka and suffers? which is it, jiva or buddhi?
The buddhi is just the power of discrimination of the jiva, the internal organ or mind of the jiva, i.e. the antaḥkaraṇa is fourfold, being comprised of four states or functions of deliberation (mánas), determination or discrimination (buddhi), egoism (ahaṃkāra), and memory (chitta); and these categories are sometimes combined or included within one another by some later texts. The subtle body or sūkṣmaśarīra in which the antaḥkaraṇa is contained is what transmigrates. The antaḥkaraṇa acts as a receptacle for the light of the Atma to be reflected it, this reflection of the Atma's light seems to impart its effulgence to the mind but without really doing so, just as an object placed in sunlight looks brighter even though the object is not itself luminous. This illumination of the jiva's mind by the reflected light allows for the delusion of doership, bondage, suffering etc to inhere in the jiva, but the jiva's delusions don't affect the Atma providing the illumination.

>> No.17464640

>>17461767
>>>/x/

>> No.17464650

>>17463570
>Betty here seems to confuse the jiva with the Atman-Brahman, he uses the above argument to speak about the jiva suffering and then confuses that with the Atman suffering, mistakenly believing that establishing the empirical reality of the suffering of the jiva establishes that the Atman suffers, he write afterwards:
All he said in that quote was that there can be no 'imaginary' suffering, he isn't equating jiva with Atman or jiva's suffering with Atman's suffering. He is saying that you can't have a distinction between 'jivas suffering' and an 'Atmans suffering' for suffering is a subjective state and therefore all or nothing.

>Yes but if you don't understand how this is meaningless to say. The Jiva is not 'just the Atman", but the Jiva's semblance of consciousness takes place through the reflection (chidabhasa) of the Atman in the intellect. It is this reflection of the Atman that seems to be a doer and experiencer and which seems to undergo pain and pleasure. The Atman doesn't suffer or have experiences but only the reflection in the intellect seems to, like the reflection of the moon in the water being impacted by the puddles vibrations despite the moon itself not being impacted. All the while the Atman is unaffected by its reflection and the mental modifications which impact the reflection don't impact the source of the image.
According to Advatia, a jiva is a combination of kutastha and chidabhasa (substratum and reflection). The Atman (Brahman) is superimposed on the antahkarana (ego, intellect, mind, memory) which causes the reflected image (chidabhasa) to appear on the substratum. These are the constituents of Jiva, which is the actual doer and sufferer according to Advaita. Saying that the chidabhasa is the one that suffers just amounts to equivocation.

>> No.17464655
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17464655

>>17464640
>Thread about books on the books board

>> No.17464660

>>17464597
Ok but who goes to Naraka then? Does it not seem absurd to say 'the reflections or mental constituents go to hell and suffer' but not the jiva? Isn't the Jiva the ultimate reference point when it comes to personhood in conventional reality?

>> No.17464858

>>17464650
>All he said in that quote was that there can be no 'imaginary' suffering
It seemed to me that Betty was trying to make the argument that we can attribute the suffering of the Jiva to the Atma if we deny that suffering can be imaginary, but this doesn't necessarily follow as a natural conclusion. Just because Betty would disagree that the suffering of the jiva can be imaginary doesn't establish that the Atma suffers, because the Atma is not imagining anything. The suffering of the jiva is not the imagination of the Atma; Advaita teaches people to discriminate between the Self and the non-Self, the jiva is not the Atma, and so if one has correct discrimination and regards the jiva as not one's Self, how can the jiva's suffering be regarded as the Atma's? The problem is not one of imagined experience but that of misidentification. We can say that another man has empirically real suffering when he is stung by a bee, he is not imagining it. But if you regard yourself as being that man when you are not him, nothing will make his suffering yours in reality.
>He is saying that you can't have a distinction between 'jivas suffering' and an 'Atma's suffering' for suffering is a subjective state and therefore all or nothing.
But those are two things, with one illumining the other, why should the attributes of the illumined thing be supposed to inhere in the source of the illumination? There is no good reason why we should consider it as inhering in that source because it doesn't.

Also, after reading the picture of Vadiraja's text quoted by Betty it's clear that he gets some things wrong about Advaita doctrine.

Vadiraja says (page 287) that "But it is always the Atman or Self whose nature it is to actually experience the affliction, your doctrine says (in effect), while the buddhi is only the impression of the external datum

This is wrong, Shankara explains in his works (such as in his bhasya on Gita 2.69) that the Atman or Self is not the experiencer and is instead just pure consciousness and that it only seems to be the experiencer from the perspective of the jiva because of the association of the Self with the limiting adjunct of the intellect. Shankara in his writings maintains the exact opposite opposite of what Vadiraja and Betty accuse him of, Shankara maintains that the Atma is not identical with the intellect of the jiva who suffers and who has experiences, but for Shankara the latter is only an appearance of the former. If they were identical that would be a contradiction because then same entity would possess liberation and bondage at once. It is because of the point that the jiva and Atman are different and that the confusion of the two results from misidentification that this bondage in the form of misidentification can be eliminated by the removal of ignorance, and not by karma or devotion.

>> No.17464861

>>17464858
>>17464650
>These are the constituents of Jiva, which is the actual doer and sufferer according to Advaita.
Yes, the Jiva is the doer and sufferer, but the Jiva is not the Atma, it is only an image of the Atma; so the Jiva's suffering doesn't prove that of the Atma's
>Saying that the chidabhasa is the one that suffers just amounts to equivocation.
Why?

>> No.17464899

>>17464660
>Ok but who goes to Naraka then?
I don't remember Naraka being spoken of in the Upanishads actually, they say that evil-doers transmigrate into the forms of bugs and motionless plants as punishment. The answer is that the subtle body of the jiva transmigrates throughout various lives as humans, animals, devas, plants, bugs etc, and the intellect of that jiva is the doer and experiencer of those lives, and that the Atma itself doesn't transmigrate but it's light provides the source of illumination for the jiva.
>Does it not seem absurd to say 'the reflections or mental constituents go to hell and suffer' but not the jiva?
That's not what I'm saying, the jiva's intellect or mind is one of its constituents.
>Isn't the Jiva the ultimate reference point when it comes to personhood in conventional reality?
I'm not sure what you are asking with this question, Brahman is a person in the sense of being a living sentient entity, He as the puruṣa is considered the all-pervasive person, He is just a non-individual person. The jiva is the false individuality that is an image of the all-pervasive person. The underlying person never transmigrates or goes to hell or heaven, only the false images of individuality do.

>> No.17464989

>>17463689
huh oh https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/KN/StNp/StNp3_12.html

>> No.17464995

>>17462718
>>17462393
No, buddhism is not about non-duality. Nonduality is a later creation, part of Mahayana and hinduism only.
Even the jains shit on non-duality.

>> No.17465012

>>17464995
>part of Mahayana
so Buddhism is non-dual then. Thanks.

>> No.17465072

>>17464995
"Buddhism" and "Hinduism" are categories invented by Westerners, Easterners themselves don't use them, and they are not traditional.

>> No.17465113
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17465113

>>17464989
>https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/KN/StNp/StNp3_12.html
>“Any stress that comes into play is all from consciousness as a requisite condition. With the cessation of consciousness, there is no stress coming into play. Knowing this drawback—that stress comes from consciousness as a requisite condition—with the stilling of consciousness, the monk free from hunger is totally unbound.
>"That is what the Blessed One said. Having said that, the One Well-Gone, the Teacher, said further: “All sights, sounds, smells, tastes, tactile sensations, & ideas that are welcome, appealing, agreeable—as long as they’re said to exist, are supposed by the world together with its devas to be bliss. But when they cease, that’s supposed by them to be stress. The stopping of self-identity is viewed by the noble ones as bliss.

this nihilist drivel was refuted by Sri Śaṅkarācārya

>"Lastly, the Buddhistic assumption that the extinction of that consciousness is the highest end of human life, is untenable, for there is no recipient of results. For a person who has got a thorn stuck into him, the relief of the pain caused by it is the result (he seeks); but if he dies, we do not find any recipient of the resulting cessation of pain. Similarly I if consciousness is altogether extinct and there is nobody to reap that benefit, to talk of it as the highest end of human life is meaningless. If that very entity or self, designated by the word 'person' -Consciousness, according to you-whose well-being is meant, is extinct, for whose sake will the highest end be? But those who believe in a self different from consciousness and witnessing many objects, will find it easy to explain all phenomena such as the remembrance of things previously seen and the contact and cessation of pain-the impurity, for instance, being ascribed to contact with extraneous things, and the purification to dissociation from them."

- Bṛhadāraṇyakopaniṣadbhāṣya 4.3.7.

>> No.17465132

>>17465113
>the Buddhistic assumption that the extinction of that consciousness is the highest end of human life
Shankara already got the Buddhism wrong, and it isn't even close.

>> No.17465138

>>17465113
Where is the refutation?

>> No.17465144

>>17465132
C'mon bro, that's not a counter-argument, alluding to some hidden "Buddhism" that only you know about, which is un-refutable. At least try to defend your position. I'm not the guy you're responding to, btw.

>> No.17465149

>>17465138
Read the post you are responding to.

>> No.17465162

>>17465144
>I'm not the guy you're responding to, btw.
Then why should I give a shit, I was talking to him not you.

>> No.17465166

>>17465138
kek

>> No.17465190
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17465190

>>17465162
Did anyone force you to give a shit? You could stop posting any time.

>> No.17465212

>>17465190
Lmao why do you even care about our conversation so much, you're literally not even part of the conversation, you just came to cheer lead for a random person you don't know. Please go to bed and let the adults converse on serious matters.

>> No.17465228

>>17465212
No. I'm part of this thread just as much as anyone else, lol. Can't believe you're choosing this utterly pathetic angle to cope with losing an internet argument, "I wasn't talking with you!". Holy cringe bro.

>> No.17465235

Funny you call yourself an "Adult" also, as if anything you've said so far in this thread has born the mark of maturity, be it either physical or mental.

>> No.17465245

>>17465228
>>17465235
>he's still seething
Alright you got that out of your chest, you can leave now and let us continue the discussion.

>> No.17465252
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17465252

>>17465113
>there can't be no self, that means there's no self
Get in the Atmangelion, Shankara-kun

>> No.17465264

>>17465252
>Atmangelion
lol what is this?

>> No.17465268

>>17465245
I'm staying until the thread is archived, just to spite your retarded ass. Kek.

>> No.17465277
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17465277

>I'm staying until the thread is archived, just to spite your retarded ass. Kek.

>> No.17465299
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17465299

>>17465264
So you're actually the Atman which is Brahman and there's also jivas but you aren't really the jiva it is just Brahman piloting your jiva but since everything is Brahman you are actually piloting yourself, which is Atman.

>> No.17465325

Mipham's commentary on the Madhyamakalankara (row 5) "refutes" Advaita Vedanta. Not a fan of the expression because all conceptual thought has holes but whatever. Take the prajñaparamitapill.

>> No.17465339
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17465339

>>17465325
Forgot chart since I am not attached

>> No.17465439

>>17465339
This is a nice chart, thanks and good posts

>> No.17465673

>>17465325
Mipham actually fails to refute Advaita and his arguments are wrong, I'll finish my post explaining why shortly

>> No.17465708

>>17465673
We all look forward to your copy paste autism and googled article

>> No.17465752
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17465752

>>17465673
I'm glad to have created work for you. It is out of cooompassion.

>> No.17465944

>>17465339
Alright I've decided to take the Mahayana pill to see where it leads me.
I've read the Dhammapada, Majjhima Nikaya and the Heart sutra. And the Bardo Thodol if that matters.
Where do you recommend I go from there?
So far I've avoided Mahayana because I was unconvinced by the idea that they were teachings only taught to specific disciplies, or meant to be spread later. I'm also really confused about the huge pantheon of deities and the variety in concepts and interpretations.
I'd appreciate suggestions on where to start in order to not get overwhelmed, first by getting a clear idea on what Mahayana actually is.
Also, do you need to take the bodhisattva vow to apply Mahayana teachings, or can you still have personal liberation as your objective?

>> No.17466052

>>17465944
It sounds like you wouldn't get much from Vajrayana, Shingon, etc., so either skip or save esotericism for later. The chart covers Madhyamaka and Yogacara from row three onward, Huayen at the bottom. To keep it simple all Mahayana comes from the Prajñaparamita literature, which elaborated on the canonical nikayas in a rivalrous way with Abhidharma. Though there are some nuances here that are not really relevant to a non-specialist. With a foundation in Madhyamaka and Yogacara you should be able to follow what any later or extant Mahayana Buddhists have written or are saying. I wouldn't vow anything unless you feel confident in it, but all Mahayana schools agree that the bodhisattva path is superior to what they call sravaka or pratekyabuddha paths of the "Hinayana." Personally, from an agnostic comparative view, to me that seems to be a marketing claim like how the in the canon it says Buddha had 30 something marks that Brahmins wanted to see. But it is something stressed often enough.

>> No.17466106

>>17466052
>you wouldn't get much
The appeal of such schools is that they're supposedly a "fast track" to enlightenment, as I understand it?
>in a rivalrous way with Abhidharma.
Are there any huge disagreements?
I should start with the "introductions to the middle way" books then?
>agree that the bodhisattva path is superior
Why?
I know what the bodhisattva path is but I don't get the reasoning. Is a "mere" arhat seen as unenlightened?

>> No.17466275

>>17463689
>>There is not a single Sutta in the whole of the Pali Canon that refutes non-dualism
All the sutras contradict non-dualism, otherwise mahayanists would not be so butthurt to the point of writing their lengthy diarrhea in the first place.

>> No.17466286

The day hindu and buddhshit nondualists explain creation/world of phenomena we can start to talk.

>> No.17466301

>>17466286
christlarpers are too dumb to understand dependent origination, unironically

>> No.17466352
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17466352

>>17465325
>Mipham's commentary on the Madhyamakalankara (row 5) "refutes" Advaita Vedanta

https://static.sariputta.com/pdf/tipitaka/1052/shantarakshita_madhyamakalankara_adornment-of-the-middle-waypdf.pdf

I was unaware of that any Tibetan thinker had attempted to refute Vedanta. I was only aware of Bhaviveka's attempt at critiquing pre-Shankara Advaita and Santaraksita's and Kamalasila's post-Shankara criticisms of Vedanta in the Tattvasamgraha. Bhaviveka, Santaraksita and Kamalasila all fail to understand Advaita doctrine and they get a lot of basic stuff wrong about it such that their attempted refutations completely fail, and this is pretty easy to show. Mipham seems to have understood Advaita better than any of the previous Buddhist thinkers who commented on in, but even Mipham also gets things wrong about to such a degree that it undermines the basis of his attempted refutation. None of the post-Shankara Buddhists who argued against Advaita seem to have attempted to issue a response to Shankara's arguments against Buddhism, they all just ignored them and only tried to critique Advaita. Truly, Shankara and the doctrine that he clarified remain unrefuted throughout the ages.

After describing a brief overview of what seems to be Advaita Vedanta, Mipham's arguments are:

>Pressed to its logical conclusions, the Vedanta tenets entail the consequence that if one person gains liberation, everyone is liberated, and if one person fails to gain it, everyone does likewise.
That's incorrect, because the Atma-Brahman is eternally liberated and only the jivas or appearance of individual beings are 'liberated', they and the samsara they are a part of are maintained via samsara being expression of Brahman's inherent power. That the whole universe is being sustained by the Lord is what ensures that samsara continues for the other jivas when one jiva attains liberation. I'm not sure why Mipham would think this.
>It follows too that the path is rendered meaningless. For, assuming that there is a difference between things that are to be discarded and their antidotes, if the negative factors to be eliminated exist within
the nature of the self, they cannot possibly be abandoned. Conversely, if the unmistaken primordial wisdom is already fully contained in the self, it is unnecessary to cultivate it. Neither is the self admissible in terms of different aspects of objects and time. In brief, all these unwanted consequences follow for the simple reason that the self is said to be one, permanent, and truly existent.
So, Mipham is arguing, 1) if the thing to be eliminated exists within the nature of the self, it cannot possibly be abandoned, and that 2) if the unmistaken primordial wisdom is already fully contained in the self, it would be unnecessary to attain liberation. These arguments fail for the following reasons:

>> No.17466356

>>17466106
>The appeal of such schools is that they're supposedly a "fast track" to enlightenment, as I understand it?
Pretty much; this is where all the mandalas and dharanis and theurgic practices are emphasized as being expedient or skillful means. It is exactly what it says on the tin, "not for everyone."
>Are there any huge disagreements?
I should start with the "introductions to the middle way" books then?
Madhyamikas like Nagarjuna, Aryadeva, and Chandrakirti will go to great lengths to demonstrate that nothing has any inherent self-nature or substance, right down to particles having sides facing directions and therefore still being partite, in order to refute teachings on lower-case dharmas as being ultimately real. This is widely influential as a doctrine of Mahayana
>Is a "mere" arhat seen as unenlightened?
When they aren't just asserting they are better for dogmatic reasons, the argument is basically that the smaller vehicles are just a lower level of understanding of what Buddha taught; accomplished as they may be in their progression on the path, since they are solitary or not seeking to liberate all beings they do not have the complete understanding of emptiness, no-self, etc. Honestly I sort of gloss over these passages, not unlike the verses at the end of the canonical sutras where they go "and then everyone clapped and were followers from this day forward." I just study the stuff; I'm not a monk

>> No.17466361

>>17466352
1) That if it exists it cannot be abandoned is an invalid argument against Advaita, since Advaita says that the things which are abandoned do not exist absolutely, the only things which can be abandoned for Advaita are things which are unreal. The world objects and samsara are anirvachaniya, they belong to the category of conventionally real, but the conventionally real is neither absolutely real, nor completely non-existent, it is an appearance of the absolutely real on which it is ontologically contingent, this basis is what illusion and falsehood necessarily presupposes. We see from our experience that illusions are sublated like dreams despite never having existed, when you mistakenly superimpose the concept of the snake onto the rope laying on the floor and then correctly discern that it's actually a rope, the snake never existed, but you nonetheless still perceived its appearance and sublation.
2) That if the primordial wisdom, i.e. vidya or liberation were already fully contained in the self it would be unnecessary to attain liberation is also invalid, because the Atma doesn't attain liberation, only the jiva has the delusion of bondage and liberation; the Atma underlying the jiva, who the jiva is an appearance of, is forever liberated. That the Atma is already liberated doesn't automatically ensure the liberation of the jiva because the jiva covers up the self-revealing non-dual knowledge of the Atma with its superimpositions/ignorance. The delusion of bondage inheres in the jiva, this is illumined by the light of the liberated Atma, when that delusion of the jiva ends that discrimination of the jiva which is involved itself induces no change in and has no causal relation with the already eternally liberated Atma, which exists outside time, space/ether and causation as That which they are contingent upon and in which they exist (conventionally). The primordial wisdom doesn't have any impact upon or have consequences for you until and unless you directly grasp it yourself, and which point the jiva stops obscuring what's already there.

Or as the Tibetan Jonang Buddhist Dölpopa Shérap Gyeltsen said:

"That all sentient beings nevertheless do not perceive [the ultimate qualities] is due to being obstructed by adventitious defilements, since those [ultimate qualities] are not objects of consciousness and since they are objects of activity just of self-cognizing exalted wisdom, as it said in the Mahaparinirvana Sutra... and in the Great Drum Sutra.... Thereby, many very profound sutras set forth a plenitude of examples for and reasons why, although the pure nature, the matrix of One Gone to Bliss, dwells in all sentient beings, it is not seen and is not attained if it is not separate from adventitious defilements."

>> No.17466369

>>17466361
>In addition, the example of space as used by the Vedantins can also be negated by the arguments that disprove permanent, truly existent entities.
I have not seen these arguments, but Vedanta doesn't need to prove the existent of permanent and eternal entities in order to be consistent. The permanence of anything or the lack thereof is impossible to empirically verify or debunk because doing so would require lasting long enough to make sure nothing is impermanent, so lack of examples of a permanent, truly existent thing does not prove or show that they cannot exist in principle. The only way to refute Advaita is to demonstrate an internal contradiction in its doctrine, of which the lack of empirical examples for permanent things is not one.

>In this system, wherein the subject (consciousness considered to be by nature permanent and one) is said to arise as a variety of objects, consciousness cannot be a single, truly existent entity.
Consciousness or the Atma in Advaita is not the subject of subject-object distinctions, these occur in the intellect which is illumined by the light of the Atma, the Atma never actually arises as a variety of objects, but in accordance with the Vivartavada theory of causation which Advaita holds to the Atma only wields its dynamic power of maya to engender the appearance of samsara at the level of conventional reality, but that formless consciousness never actually transforms into varied things delimited by form or otherwise enter into any relation with them that would lead to break the law of non-contradiction by having Atma be both formless consciousness and external objects. Thus, Mipham's argument fails here because consciousness or Atma doesn't do anything that would contradict It being a single, truly existent entity, It simply wields the power that It possess as the Lord. Mipham's argument here would only apply to Hindu schools which accept Parinamavada and not Vivartavada, and even the Parinamavadas have rejoinders to this argument.

>> No.17466375

>>17466369
>This is demonstrated by the following argument. Since external objects are said not to exist separately from consciousness, and since consciousness, which is the one and only reality, appears as a variety of objects, all things make up a single whole.
Advaita says that external objects exists outside of the empirical sight etc of the jiva and that there is a shared world of conventionally-real experience in which jivas interact. Advaita is an ontologically idealist but empirically realist doctrine, Shankara in his Brahma Sutra Bhasya refuted the epistemic idealism of Yogachara thinkers like Dharmakirti and Dinnage who denied a world existing outside of consciousness. In Advaita external objects exist non-separately from the Atma in the sense that the Atma is the ground ultimate-reality which they are contingent upon. But Advaita regards the consciousness of the Atma as being intrinsically distinct from the physical objects and elements etc which are superimpositions obscuring the Atma. The Atma and the samsara-objects are not all one single whole but they are fundamentally different from one another.

>This has the nature of the self, which is consciousness and is forever permanent and unchanging. This self therefore is asserted as being the one and only reality. But whether the variety of appearances arises all at once or in sequence, it is impossible to posit a truly existing, single consciousness. If many things appear at once, cognition must be manifold, for it cannot be different (in this respect) from the many things that it observes.
Mipham says "it is impossible to posit a truly existing, single consciousness... why? ... Because if many things appear at once, cognition must be manifold, for it cannot be different from the many things that it observes". Consciousness is by nature different from what it observes, that is the very nature of consciousness or sentience, to be different from the non-sentient. Mipham's argument here fails because he fails to refute the Advaita position that sentience is different from the things observed in it and so he instead tries to insist there is a contradiction in Advaita's position that consciousness is one and unchanging because the objects of consciousness are not, but this wrong because for Advaita they are precisely that, not consciousness, and Mipham doesn't refute anything because in his insistence that the objects of consciousness and consciousness are the same he is no longer even talking about Advaita doctrine. Santaraksita and Kamalasila in the Tattvasamgraha make the exact same mistake. The differences of the things that appear within consciousness cannot be used to establish anything about consciousness, since they are things apprehended in consciousness and not consciousness or sentience itself.

>> No.17466383

>>17466375
Things don't act upon themselves but only upon other things, fire does not burn itself and light does not illumine itself, does Mipham disagree with Nagarjuna when Nagarjuna says in Mūlamadhyamakakārikā verse 3.2 that "That very seeing does not see itself at all"?. No matter the varied appearances in sentience, the underlying continuum of sentience in which they all take place is always the same, which is why its experienced as a continuum with the sentience itself persisting throughout and only the subject-object distinctions in the intellect changing. How would Mipham even know if the consciousness that he posits as self-knowing cognitions would be manifold or not? Because in order to know that, in addition to the content of the original cognition the self-knowing cognition would then have to perceive itself and its relation to other cognitions in addition to that first original content in order to determine that it was manifold, which results in various contradictions. Anything perceived in consciousness like change, manifoldness, bondage, pain, etc can only pertain to things other than consciousness, they are never the thing that is the light by which they are known, they are illumined by it.

>And if they appear sequentially, how can consciousness be other than manifold, endowed with the different aspects of form, sound, and so on?
This argument also relies on the wrong equivocation of sentience and the transient things which appear in it. How could we even determine that the manifold objects of consciousness appear in a sequence, unless there was a persisting undivided consciousness which provided the basis for the contrast that allowed us to identify that change and transitoryness from a position of non-change?

>Furthermore, given that objects appear in sequence, since the first cognition (for instance, an appearance of blue) and the subsequent cognition (an appearance of red) are not different, it follows that even in the first instant of cognition, the subsequent cognition appears. For these are identical in the nature of a single, permanent, and unchanging consciousness (the conscious self). If consciousness does not become multiple, in accordance with manifold appearance, it is impossible to assert that these two (consciousness and objects) are one and the same.
This line confirms that Mipham misunderstood Advaita and shows why his critique fails, Advaita doesn't assert that consciousness and its objects are one and the same. Brahman is not identical with maya.

>> No.17466444

>>17466352
I'm glad I could move another Buddhist rent-free into your storehouse. Your answers amount to "since there is a self, Mipham is wrong about Advaita Vedanta." But throughout his commentary he already establishes in context that there is no self and no Ishvara as permanent ultimate entities, for without chariots there are no selves and no gods on the ultimate level either. From the perspective Mipham is commenting on, if we accepted belief in the Atman or in Brahman it would no longer be possible to achieve nirvana because everything is then already permanent and unable to appear to change. There is no logical way for births to originate if we are all just one eternal self. It would mean this self is divisible or in relation with other things, and thus not permanent or substantial. Since things do appear to change they cannot be eternal. And since they appear they cannot be annihilated. They are ultimately empty of such assertions.

>> No.17466446

>>17466356
Thanks for your help anon.

>> No.17466484

>>17466375
> Shankara in his Brahma Sutra Bhasya refuted the epistemic idealism of Yogachara thinkers like Dharmakirti and Dinnage who denied a world existing outside of consciousness.
I sort of wonder if you even notice that Shantarakshita and Mipham are doing the same thing and without recourse to atman and brahman.

>> No.17466550

>>17466301
explain samsara, how it emerges? or will you tell us that it has always been? is it dependent on what? nirvana? then nirvana causes samsara?

>> No.17466576

>>17466550
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prat%C4%ABtyasamutp%C4%81da

>> No.17466610

>>17466444
>Your answers amount to "since there is a self, Mipham is wrong about Advaita Vedanta."
No, I went through his arguments line by line and explained how they largely all rely on accusing Advaita of holding positions that it doesn't actually have, so they are all fallacious. Show me one argument of his where he nails Advaita for something they actually do teach (there is no argument of Mipham where he does this)
>But throughout his commentary he already establishes in context that there is no self and no Ishvara as permanent ultimate entities,
No he doesn't, you are just repeating this without substantiation, but none of these arguments are refutations of the Vedantic position, you can dredge them up and post whatever you think his relevant arguments are and I'll explain why they are wrong and fail to refute Advaita.
>for without chariots there are no selves and no gods on the ultimate level either.
What does this even mean?
>From the perspective Mipham is commenting on, if we accepted belief in the Atman or in Brahman it would no longer be possible to achieve nirvana because everything is then already permanent and unable to appear to change.
That which changes is not Brahman, so this wouldn't in fact make it impossible to attain liberation
>There is no logical way for births to originate if we are all just one eternal self.
That's why Advaita holds to the Vivartavada or non-origination doctrine. There is no original emergence of the Self from liberation or freedom into bondage, the relatively real doesn't need to originate as a changing and transient thing being emanated from an immutable and eternal thing, the seeming perception of the relatively-real world only needs to be sustained by the power of the eternal thing in order for it to be perceived; but as Brahman exists outside of time as that upon which all time is contingent upon, there was no original origination. There is a beginningless relationship between ignorance and transmigration within samsara, beginningless because Brahman has always been wielding his power of maya, but this relationship is eventually sublated as having always been non-existent in absolute reality,

>> No.17466620

>>17466484
I'm aware that Madhyamakas disagree with the Yogachara analysis of mind, but the Madhyamakas don't themselves replace the Yogacharin model they attack with any consistent theory of mind that accounts for how we experience things despite not have selves

>>17466610
Time itself emerges from and is contained within this power that Brahman possesses, the origination of something in time can only refer to within a frame of reference which Brahman is anterior to and outside of. This is in fact one of the areas where the logical coherency of Vedanta over Buddhism is demonstrated because Buddhism doesn't admit an original origination of samsara either but Buddhist doesn't admit any principal which nonetheless sustains and allows for the samsara to subsist despite it never originally originating.
>It would mean this self is divisible or in relation with other things, and thus not permanent or substantial.
the Self does not originate or change into or become divisible in any way
>Since things do appear to change they cannot be eternal.
Advaita maintains that only non-eternal things change, the Self which is eternal never changes
>And since they appear they cannot be annihilated. They are ultimately empty of such assertions.
What do mean by annihilation? Do you mean the sublating of ignorance and illusion in Advaita? We can establish as true with reference to our everyday life that Illusions appear to us but also are sublated, or vanish, or are annihilated, when one discriminates between the illusion and and underlying object acting as its basis.

>> No.17466654

>>17466576
interesting but a pity how the article does not answer anything about my question, that is about samsara itself and not what is within it. can you answer this or will you be like other buddhists always dodging the question?

>> No.17466666

>>17466610
>the seeming perception of the relatively-real world only needs to be sustained by the power of the eternal thing in order for it to be perceived; but as Brahman exists outside of time as that upon which all time is contingent upon, there was no original origination. There is a beginningless relationship between ignorance and transmigration within samsara, beginningless because Brahman has always been wielding his power of maya,
This is basically a find and replace of sunya with brahman, with the added problem of god being the cause of our eternal ignorance instead of it being our attachment to imputations

>> No.17466712

>>17466666
yes, that is why advaita vedanta is dualist, just like buddhism. they cant explain this duality, they just are eternally conflicting.

>> No.17466750

>>17466654
the article does answer your question
samsara is all that is conditioned, i.e. dependently originated

>> No.17466774

>>17466750
samsara is originated from what? nirvana?

>> No.17466780

>>17466620
>What do mean by annihilation? Do you mean the sublating of ignorance and illusion in Advaita? We can establish as true with reference to our everyday life that Illusions appear to us but also are sublated, or vanish, or are annihilated, when one discriminates between the illusion and and underlying object acting as its basis.
No I was concluding as per the standard explanation of phenomena as per Madhyamaka, not characterized eternalism or annihilationism, since they are empty of a permanent essence but are also apparent and causally effective upon one another. If there were a permanent Brahman that everything were to roll back to as non-dual and unoriginated, that is impossible from a Madhyamika point of view, because both one and many are denied. Since no single thing exists independently and of a self-nature, that means chariots, selves, and gods cannot be posited as ultimately real in the manifold, nor as one real thing, i.e your Atman-Brahman synthesis, which somehow has to cause all these things so radically different from it and still have a self-nature. Madhyamaka tosses that out because it is from that view even less explanatory of conventional appearance than the alayavijnana

>> No.17466800

>>17466712
I think emptiness is far more non-dual as a concept than radiating from a radioactive God who doesn't notice us, but concepts are limited means of expressing something like non-duality, which even as a word has to reference what it isn't. I can't speak to Advaita Vedanta, but Buddhism notes that this is the end of discourse for its own sake and that you'd need to meditate or otherwise achieve a higher state of consciousness. Woo is mandatory for nonduality.

>> No.17466809

>>17466774
it is not originated, there is no starting point
the fact you're asking this question tells me you really don't know anything at all about the basics of buddhist metaphysics so you should really read some suttas

>> No.17466810

>>17466774
You're asking where a rabbit's horns come from as far as Buddhist philosophy is concerned.

>> No.17466839

>>17466809
>>17466810
so here >>17466550 is conffirmed that samsara just is, and then like >>17466620 says, Buddhism doesn't admit an original origination of samsara and doesn't admit any principal which nonetheless sustains and allows for the samsara to subsist despite it never originally originating. therefore dualist.
thank you for proving what i said in my first post in this thread. i have an interest in some strains of buddhism like the tibetan but again it will be reduced to literally hindu trika.

>> No.17466853

>>17466839
you don't understand dependent origination, nor what samsara is
read the relevant suttas and stop acting as if you can "refute" anything given your glaring lack of knowledge

>> No.17466862

>>17466800
Yeah I'm aware of it, still, I think their radical nondualism in order to express a very legitimate apophaticism ends up denying creation, phenomena fully and posits a dualistic aphasia. That is why I prefer much more the platonic, christian and kabbalistic theosophies.

>> No.17466888

>>17466853
I am honestly asking you what samsara is, it is very easy to tell me go read this and that, lefting me without any satisfying answer. Could you not provide me an excerpt that explains this matter? Dependent origination is very intuitive about the material world and its determined condition. Still I don't see how this infinite regress of dependence, like that of a succession, can be both indeterminate (for it is indeterminately successive, dependent) and determinate (for it is conditioned).

>> No.17466911

>>17466888
>I am honestly asking you what samsara is
and I answered you, it is all conditioned phenomena

>> No.17466913

>>17466862
Divine creation is denied but phenomena are not denied, at least in the context of Madhyamaka. I would recommend at least reading some of the texts if you haven't already, since the telephone game played here can be pretty inconsistent.

>> No.17466947

>>17466911
so it is all phenomena regressed indeterminately? it is conditioned in its indetermination?

>> No.17466970

>>17466913
But you see the doctrine of ajativada, like that advaitin anon was holding, doctrine of no-origination, it puts phenomena as neither real nor unreal or deny it as illusory altogether. I can't see any other pertinent explanation but willingly creative act, otherwise the ''emanated'' substance will be just like the spinozist substance, conditioned to its own emanations and modes.

>> No.17467035

>>17466970
I don't see how AV puts no origination together with God. God is literally a hypostatized first cause for origination. I'm not going to call Shankara a crypto-Buddhist since I am not a Hindu with a rent-free sangha in my head but why have a god at all if he is not creating? If our own conscious minds are what are creative of phenomena we experience, and we and these experiences are also god in essence, then he is originating them for us after all. Apparently AV answers this with making maya or illusion a radiant power of Brahman brahmaning but how is that not then origination? Because something non-originated caused it, it isn't origination? I find it to be a mess.

>> No.17467042

>>17466666
>This is basically a find and replace of sunya with brahman, with the added problem of god being the cause of our eternal ignorance instead of it being our attachment to imputations
That's wrong, because sunyata doesn't possess the power to cause anything, while Brahman does. That all things are selfless and dependent on one another and are mutually co-arising and without independent existence does nothing to explain why they are there appearing in samsara to begin with. How one part of the cycle causes the next part is not the same as answering why there is even an existing cycle. The contingent does not give rise to itself. Brahman does explain why there can be samsara because Brahman was there existing eternally and without any beginning as a self-established, independent, non-contingent thing. Eternal ignorance cannot be caused by anything other than God. Attachment to imputations cannot be the cause of avidya/samsara because it presupposes a being who was already existing and sentient before being ignorant, it's a contradiction.
>>17466712
In Advaita all duality is resolved into non-duality.
>>17466780
>If there were a permanent Brahman that everything were to roll back to as non-dual and unoriginated, that is impossible from a Madhyamika point of view, because both one and many are denied.
Okay, but saying that something is denied is not a convincing argument or a refutation of anything
>Since no single thing exists independently and of a self-nature, that means chariots, selves, and gods cannot be posited as ultimately real in the manifold, nor as one real thing, i.e your Atman-Brahman synthesis,
Nowhere in any buddhist work ever written is this fantastical claim conclusively demonstrated. Atma exists independently and has self-nature, and you don't have any arguments that show otherwise and neither does Buddhism.
>which somehow has to cause all these things so radically different from it and still have a self-nature. Madhyamaka tosses that out because it is from that view even less explanatory of conventional appearance than the alayavijnana
If it is Brahman's self nature is to wield His power of maya eternally without any beginning, where is the contradiction or illogic in saying that maya seems to manifest things which are different from Brahman? There is none.

>> No.17467108
File: 217 KB, 600x596, 1597096753542.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
17467108

>>17467042
>How one part of the cycle causes the next part is not the same as answering why there is even an existing cycle.
A cycle is mental imputation and has no ultimate reality. Why do we require an explanation for what causes something unreal? Something unreal would cause unreal things if they are to be of the ultimate self-nature you hold.
>The contingent does not give rise to itself.Brahman does explain why there can be samsara because Brahman was there existing eternally and without any beginning as a self-established, independent, non-contingent thing.
No such thing can be demonstrated as self-established, and if it doesn't exist it cannot cause anything because it has no efficacy. Futher if it truly did exist independently it would be unable to cause anything since it would become relative and lose its independence
>Eternal ignorance cannot be caused by anything other than God.
Great, god makes us retarded and we should assimilate ourselves to him to become more perfectly retarded?
>Okay, but saying that something is denied is not a convincing argument or a refutation of anything
You do this all the time?

>> No.17467220

>>17466862
>express a very legitimate apophaticism ends up denying creation,
Advaita only says that the things engendered by Brahman's power like physical objects are not eternally and absolutely real in the sense of being an immutable and unchanging thing which is forever existent and real at all times. Advaita doesn't deny that Brahman's power is what permeates and sustains the universe and our experience of everything.
>>17467035
>I don't see how AV puts no origination together with God.
Gaudapada's Mandukya Karika and Shankara's bhasya on it explain why clearly. It is a way to say that God or Brahman gives rise to things without that compromising Brahman's immutability, any real act of creation or transformation involves changes that you have to engage in suspect logical gymnastics to reconcile with God being completely immutable, the natural explanation is that there is no modification of or emanation from God but that the perception of this as having occurred flows from God wielding his inherent power. I don't see how Buddhism tries to have non-origination without God, since that is only thing which is good reason for why there would be the non-origination but seeming origination of anything.
>but why have a god at all if he is not creating?
If God is free from desires and is complete in his own nature, why would we consider His existence as only having meaning if He creates something extraneous to himself? There is no reason why. God is the only thing can account for the existence of samsara.
>If our own conscious minds are what are creative of phenomena we experience, and we and these experiences are also god in essence, then he is originating them for us after all.
The mind and the phenomena it apprehends are not the Atma or God, they are not God in essence. There is no purpose to maya other than that it is Brahman's power and it is His nature to always wield it.
>Apparently AV answers this with making maya or illusion a radiant power of Brahman brahmaning but how is that not then origination?
It's not an origination because origination means to for something to be created, maya is never created but is beginningless because it is possessed as a power by Brahman who is beginningless. There is never an emanation of Brahman, or the modification of Brahman from eternal into non-eternal. There is just Brahman there wielding His power eternally, and this power never originates into anything but only seems to from the perspective of the jiva.

Because something non-originated caused it, it isn't origination? I find it to be a mess.

>> No.17467390

>>17467108
>A cycle is mental imputation and has no ultimate reality. Why do we require an explanation for what causes something unreal? Something unreal would cause unreal things if they are to be of the ultimate self-nature you hold.
Because the cycle of dependent origination is given in Buddhism as the reason for why we are ignorant beings in samsara. You contradict yourself by saying on one hand that dependent origination is what accounts for the relative existence of the universe, and on the other hand saying that you don't need to explain why dependent origination exists. If you don't take a position on why dependent origination exists and don't explain why then it no longer holds water as the cause of samsara/avidya. If your position is that dependent-origination is itself ultimately unreal and thus doesn't need to be explained, then you are left unable to explain why we have samsara to begin with, since an unreal thing like dependent origination cannot give rise to another unreal samsara which we experience, but the unreal can only rise with the real as its basis, which is what provides the connection that allows the unreal to be perceived.
>No such thing can be demonstrated as self-established, and if it doesn't exist it cannot cause anything because it has no efficacy.
I don't have to demonstrate a physical object that is self-established in order for the concept of a self-established thing for be coherent and logical. If God exists eternally established in his own eternal nature, there is no inherent contradiction in that concept, there is no reason why He wouldn't be self-established.
>Futher if it truly did exist independently it would be unable to cause anything since it would become relative and lose its independence
Concepts like 'relative' and 'dependent' and 'independent' only have relative meaning within and with reference to the world of multiplicity which Brahman is anterior to and outside of as the only existing thing in Absolute reality. Brahman never engages in any causal relation with anything and so it never does cause anything because causality is unreal in absolute reality and only seems to exist within maya. The illusion of causality is perceived because of Brahman wielding His power of maya. This maya just simply is though, it doesn't enter into casual relations with other things, which don't actually exist in absolute reality. Do you even consider whether or not these arguments are applicable to Advaita or do you just copy and paste them without thinking about it? The mutual-dependence of the two poles of a set of dualistic concepts on one another does not refute non-duality.

>> No.17467516

>>17466352
>I was unaware of that any Tibetan thinker had attempted to refute Vedanta. I was only aware of Bhaviveka's attempt at critiquing pre-Shankara Advaita and Santaraksita's and Kamalasila's post-Shankara criticisms of Vedanta in the Tattvasamgraha.

Indeed both Śāntarakṣita and Kamalaśīla are refuting almost the same view that Sankaràcàrya postulates although neither Śāntarakṣita nor Kamalaśīla mentions his name or his work. It is important to understand that according to Śāntarakṣita and Kamalaśīla, the Upanishadic view (which is older than the Buddha and the most common and popular view held by Hindus today) is that there is a non-dual consciousness or a non-dual knowledge which is eternal and this is the âtmà or this is called the âtmà. It is important to understand that Śāntarakṣita himself has refuted 6 different interpretations of the âtmà as accepted in Hinduism in his time. This non-dual cognition / consciousness / knowledge which is eternal (nitya / rtag-pa) is one of the âtmà-s refuted by Śāntarakṣita in his ‘Tattva Sangraha’. This âtmà is not dualistic; therefore it is not Vijñàna (Tib. rnam-shes). It is non-dual and it is eternal. It is called Gyana (ye-shes) by Śāntarakṣita, who used the very word the Upanishad and Sankaràcàrya uses.
This is how Śāntarakṣita refuted this view:
“The error in the view of these philosophies is a slight one – due only to the assertion of eternality of cognition.”
There is, however, a slight difference between this Upanishadic view refuted here by Śāntarakṣita and Sankaràcàrya’s Upanishadic view. Sankara’s view is called Maya-Vivartavàd – i.e. the illusionist. The view refuted by Śāntarakṣita is called parinàmavàda - modificationist. The difference is that this view considers the 5 elements, etc., and the world as illusory modifications of this non-dual eternal cognition / consciousness, while Sankara interprets the world and its 5 elements, etc., as illusory and therefore non-existent and this non-dual eternal cognition as separate from the illusion. What Khunkhyen Dolpopa states in his ‘bka sdus bshi pa’ of the Shentong Ultimate Reality is exactly this âtmà view.


https://www.byomakusuma.org/VedantaVisAVisShentong.html


https://www.byomakusuma.org/MadhyamikaBuddhismVisAVisHinduVedanta.html

>> No.17467523

Test

>> No.17467540

First of all, to the Buddha and Nagarjuna, Samsara is not an illusion/maya but like an illusion ( mayavat) as the Phenopindopama Sutta found in both Theravadin, Mulasarvastivadin and Mayahayana texts make it clear. To Sankara, the Samsara is an illusion as his famous verse quoted from the Puranas state ‘ Brahman satyam jagan mithya’, which means ‘ Brahman is the truth meaning really existing ( Sat) and the jagat/Samsara is false/illusion.’ According to the rest of the verse, this is the main essence of the thousands of Hindu scriptures described in half a verse: ‘Shlokardhena pravachhyami yaduktam grantha kotibhi’. Also, Sankara repeatedly calls the Samsara illusion ( maya) in his commentaries of the Prasthan Trayi (The three pillars of Vedanta –viz- The Brahman Sutra, the eleven or so main Upanishads and the Bhagavat Gita). There is a quantum leap in the meaning of these two statements. If Samsara is merely an illusion, it cannot be the basis for liberation as it does not exist at all in any way whatsoever. How can a barren woman’s son or a vixen’s horn be the basis of our liberation when there is no such thing?

However, if it is interdependently arising and appears like an illusion, it can become the source of our liberation. Secondly, because it is only “like an illusion”, i.e., interdependently arising like all illusions, it does not and cannot vanish. So, Nirvana does not arisewhen Samsara vanishes like mist and the Brahman arises like a sun out of the mist, but rather when seeing that the true nature of Samsara is itself Nirvana. That is, Samsara transforms into Nirvana as the Hevajra Tantra 2.4.38 clearly states ‘ami dharmas tu Nirvana mohat Samsararupina’, meaning ‘all Dharmas/phenomena ( Samsara) are essentially Nirvana but because of delusion they appear as Samsara.’ It further mentions that ‘amudah Samsaran shuddhaya samsaro nirvrittayate’, that is ‘the undeluded one functions in the world purifying the Samsara into Nirvana.’ Whilst Brahman and Samsara are two different entities: one real, the other unreal; one existing ( Sat) and the other non- existing ( asat). Just like Samsara being superimposed on the Brahman like a snake on a rope, the two can never be one. But, Samsara and Nirvana in Mahayana Buddhism are one and not two separate things.

https://www.byomakusuma.org/MadhyamikaBuddhismVisAVisHinduVedanta.html

>> No.17467556

>>17467516
So Shankara refuted the atmans of his contemporary Hinduism so hard he became Tibetan?

>> No.17467591

>>17467390
Dependent origination is just phenomena appearing to cause each other in the conventional sense. There is no reason for some external hyperreal self-natured entity to give it a push and then also flex his ignorance spreading powers just to dunk on phenomena. They are already illusions. You are saying the illusion maker causes illusions (but doesn't really *cause* them, because he doesn't cause anything, he just happens to make it so). How is he not just another illusion? Because the Upanishads say so?
>Do you even consider whether or not these arguments are applicable to Advaita or do you just copy and paste them without thinking about it?
I suppose you think your canned response 'Brahman wielding his power of maya" dispels all skepticism towards theology as an object of knowledge since god also causes us to be ignorant of him. No such argument is even applicable to Buddhism because it posits no such ultimate self-natured cause.

>> No.17467606
File: 721 KB, 1962x777, 1606685843225.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
17467606

>>17467516
>Indeed both Śāntarakṣita and Kamalaśīla are refuting almost the same view that Sankaràcàrya postulates although neither Śāntarakṣita nor Kamalaśīla mentions his name or his work
In Kamalashila's commentary on the Santaraksita's Tattvasangraha translated into English it pic related, at the very beginning the commentary describes the doctrine being attacked as the view of the Advaita, not of the Parinamavadin non-Advaita Vedantins. If you would like to read how, this post here explains how Santaraksita and Kamalasila misunderstood Advaita and failed to refute it in that text.

>>/lit/thread/S16894953#p16904797

>There is, however, a slight difference between this Upanishadic view refuted here by Śāntarakṣita and Sankaràcàrya’s Upanishadic view. Sankara’s view is called Maya-Vivartavàd – i.e. the illusionist. The view refuted by Śāntarakṣita is called parinàmavàda - modificationist.
The different parinamavadin Vedantin schools each give an analysis of consciousness that is different from Advaita's as well as that of each other's. I would agree with whoever wrote that paragraph that the position of Advaita and that of Shentong doctrine as found in Dolpopa's works are highly similar if not practically identical.

>> No.17467639

>>17467606
>I would agree with whoever wrote that paragraph that the position of Advaita and that of Shentong doctrine as found in Dolpopa's works are highly similar if not practically identical.
He is an ancient Vedantin turned Tibetan Buddhist https://www.byomakusuma.org/TheVidyadhara.html . I would like to have your opinion on this article by him:

https://www.byomakusuma.org/MadhyamikaBuddhismVisAVisHinduVedanta.html

>> No.17467709
File: 171 KB, 753x643, shentong.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
17467709

>>17467606
>I would agree with whoever wrote that paragraph that the position of Advaita and that of Shentong doctrine as found in Dolpopa's works are highly similar if not practically identical.
And Tibetan Buddhism recognizes the orthodoxy of this position, while maintaining the understanding of emptiness. How ? Pic related.

>> No.17467745

>>17467556
No, since the Upanishads already posited that Brahman is separate from and untouched by illusion/maya. Shankara's interpretation is the full exegesis of that.
>>17467540
> If Samsara is merely an illusion, it cannot be the basis for liberation as it does not exist at all in any way whatsoever.
Liberation does not need a basis because it is the ever-present nature of the Atma. It's also incorrect to say that for Advaita the things in samsara "do not exist in any way whatsoever", as this is precisely what Advaita denies when they say that maya exists as empirically and conventionally real but is only ultimately unreal.
>However, if it is interdependently arising and appears like an illusion, it can become the source of our liberation.
Cycles like dependent-origination which are intrinsically contingent cannot arise or exist as a source of liberation to begin with without being predicated on some non-contingent thing, which Buddhism doesn't admit, thus it is incoherent.
>>17467591
>Dependent origination is just phenomena appearing to cause each other in the conventional sense.
>There is no reason for some external hyperreal self-natured entity to give it a push and then also flex his ignorance spreading powers just to dunk on phenomena.
Yes, there is a reason because these phenomena cannot exist without this self-natured entity. If dependent origination just accounts for its own (even relative/conventional or illusory) existence to begin with in a cycle, there is nothing which can cause or allow the aggregation of the 12 links of dependent-origination to take place, but unless they exist in an aggregated form as a chain of 12 links they cannot do anything, but dependent-origination cannot itself be the cause of this aggregation because it relies on it for its existence. This shows that the concept of beginningless dependent origination is illogical and refutes itself, it cannot exist without being contingent on something else that allows the aggregation of the 12 links to take place.
>They are already illusions. You are saying the illusion maker causes illusions (but doesn't really *cause* them, because he doesn't cause anything, he just happens to make it so). How is he not just another illusion? Because the Upanishads say so?
He is not another illusion because all illusion is predicated on there being an existing reality which acts as the basis for the illusion to be experienced. Illusions are not self-aware, nor do they occur where there is no existing basis for them.

>> No.17467808

>>17467745
>beginningless cycle bad
>beginningless entity go(o)d
Weren't you seething that contingent things needed a cause? How is this god non-contingent if he is wielding his power of maya? He has powers over things? Seems contingent!

>> No.17467820

>>17467709
>And Tibetan Buddhism recognizes the orthodoxy of this position
Actually they did exactly the opposite, and until the anti-sectarian Rime movement began to change things the ruling Gelug sect condemned the Jonang sect as heretical and worked to shut down their monasteries and burn their scrolls. However, a number of Jonang monasteries and temples survived intact and exist down to the present day in the more rural areas of Tibet.

It seems that whoever wrote that picture you posted disagrees with the Shentong position espoused by Dolpopa etc and they seem to be interpreting Shentong positions so as to make them more amenable to the Rangtong position, as major Shentong thinkers like Dolpopa disagreed and held that the Buddha-nature does not lack inherent existence and really was inside everyone already like a hidden treasure, and that it was only empty of other-existence and not own-existence.

>> No.17467833

>being this obsessed with concepts and words
shut the fuck up

>> No.17467986

>>17467639
>I would like to have your opinion on this article by him:
The article seems to be centering around pointing out why Mahayana and Vajrayana teachings are different from Advaita Vedanta, which I already agree with. Was there something in particular you wanted me to respond to?
>>17467808
>Weren't you seething that contingent things needed a cause?
Yes, but God or Brahman is not contingent.
>How is this god non-contingent if he is wielding his power of maya?
Because of the reason that Brahman possessing/wielding that power is Brahman's eternal nature which is inseparable from Brahman Himself. Things which are superior or anterior to the 2nd term in a relation of contingent things are themselves not made contingent by that relation of the 2nd and inferior thing to the 1st, the status of being contingent is only one-way; the contingent is rooted in that which it is dependent upon, the non-contingent is not made contingent by that which depends upon it.

>> No.17467997

>>17467833
if you can't handle the heat then step out of the kitchen, only a fool goes in there in the midst of others cooking to say "oh gee whiz it's too hot in here guys"

>> No.17468242

>>17467997
You are deep in your delusion
None of the shit you're talking about matters

>> No.17468272

>>17467986
>The article seems to be centering around pointing out why Mahayana and Vajrayana teachings are different from Advaita Vedanta, which I already agree with. Was there something in particular you wanted me to respond to?
What do u think of the paradigm shift he's talkin about? The maha-vajrayana position

>> No.17468911

>>17468272
>What do u think of the paradigm shift he's talkin about? The maha-vajrayana position
They have some good texts, and some Tibetan teachings are highly similar to Hindu non-dual tantra, but the vast majority of Buddhist schools would not have their doctrine be accepted as being logically valid by Vedanta because the premise of there just being beginningless dependent origination as the cause of samsara was attacked as illogical by Shankara, and so on that basis alone, a lot of Buddhist logic which uncritically accepts things like beginningless ignorance and pratityasamutpada arising without being caused by any non-contingent thing becomes unacceptable to the more onto-theological thought of Vedanta. This doesn't mean that the large repertoire of meditation and other techniques in maha-vajrayism don't have any with at least some level of provisional spiritual value, but it is rather just that there are doctrines which would be unacceptable to the Vedantist as a model that accurately describes the nature of samsara and liberation, causation, absolute reality, etc. The Vedanta also accepts that properly engaging in Vedic rituals really actually does lead to the intended results like prosperity and sons and Shankara in his works also writes seriously of yogis attaining siddhis or spontaneous manifestations of spiritual power, as do most of the classical and medieval Hindu and Buddhist writers, but for Vedanta these are seen as irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, learning for liberation already presupposes the desire to transcend repeated transmigration and anything contained within it.

Advaita avoids the intricate steps along a path strewn with multiple initiations and trainings that one finds in Vajrayana, Advaita as a rule instead focuses on instructing those initiated into its monasticism into attaining Self-knowledge as soon as possible involving a few short steps. I agree that people living in the world with jobs cannot be real monastics unless they give up their possessions and homes etc, you can't fully follow a monastic path as a householder, Advaita is not a path for householders, but there are other spiritual traditions in Hinduism, Buddhism etc which married householders can join and be initiated into its teachings and practices, and which provide the opportunity for a certain level of spiritual progress. If it was me though I just wouldn't choose to become initiated into a school where its metaphysics were something I disagreed with fundamentally for being illogical as I see it. And for that reason I disagree with the author of those articles, nowhere in his articles that I've seen does he address the criticisms of Buddhism made by Shankara in depth, including of pratityasamutpada and anatta. I personally see the majority of Hindu schools as having more consistent logic than the majority of Buddhist schools, although there are a few that can be partially reconciled with Hindu doctrines.

>> No.17469082

>>17468911
thanks <3

>> No.17469090

>>17468911
what are vedanta arguments against physicalism

>> No.17469116

>>17468911
>because the premise of there just being beginningless dependent origination as the cause of samsara was attacked as illogical by Shankara
Where

>> No.17469145

>>17469090
>what are vedanta arguments against physicalism

>"Moreover, the Materialist ought to be asked what is the exact nature of that consciousness which he supposes to be exuded from the elements. For he does not admit the existence of any other principle apart from his four (or any number of) elements. He will perhaps try to define consciousness as consisting in the mere fact that the elements and their products are experienced. But then they would have to be its object, and it could not be a property of them at the same time, for it is contradictory to suppose that anything can act on itself. Fire may be hot, but it cannot burn itself, and not even the cleverest acrobat can climb up on his own shoulders. And, in the same way, the elements and their products cannot form objects of consciousness if consciousness is their property. A colour does not perceive its own colour or the colour of anything else. And yet there is no doubt whatever that the elements and their products are perceived by consciousness, both inside and outside the body. Because, therefore, the presence of a consciousness which takes the elements and their products as its objects has to be admitted, it follows that it has likewise to be admitted that consciousness is distinct and separate from them."

- Shankara

>> No.17469204
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17469204

>>17469116
>Where

https://archive.org/details/BrahmaSutraSankaraBhashyaEnglishTranslationVasudeoMahadeoApte1960/page/n423/mode/2up

>> No.17469232

>>17469145
give me one (1) argument to be vedantin and not catholic
Have you ever studied the solidity of the case for the resurrection of Jesus?

>> No.17469242

>>17469145
>>17469232
how could the vedantin understand this miracle and other Catholic miracles in general?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Our_Lady_of_Zeitoun

Does he have any similar ones in the modern era?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miracle_of_the_Sun

>> No.17469244

Thought I was on /tg/ because I misclicked. At first, I thought OP's book was an old module. Then I thought it was an elaborate shitpost. Now I see it is a simple, honest, blue collar shitpost.

>> No.17469461

>>17469232
>give me one (1) argument to be vedantin and not catholic
It's not my place to try to convince you to switch your religious convictions. People can only become a 'real Advaitin' by moving to a country with Hindu ascetic orders and by giving up all of their wealth, home, possessions to become a monk in the traditional manner until death, it's a path most people are not willing to follow, or at least not until old age. If you really wanted to do this I feel like you would know already and you wouldn't have to ask me. Also, if you have a sense of deep affinity for Christianity then the other more devotional-based schools of Hinduism would likely correspond better to your spiritual inclinations. You also don't have to view them as mutually exclusive, but you can choose to take a perennialist view of religions, as the Traditionalist school and others do.

I've read most of Shankara, and to me what he is says and his metaphysics are self-evidently correct, but at the same time I feel no compulsion right now to become a monk. I view many of the other schools of Hinduism and some of the mysticisms of other religions as being different ways of approaching the same truth of non-dualism that Advaita talks about. In a way I am in a funny situation, arguing for the ultimate correctness of the metaphysics of a school which I myself am not initiated in and do not desire to be initiated into in this life; but that's okay I don't mind. There is nothing wrong with reading, appreciating and agreeing with Shankara's works while not belonging to any religion or while belonging to another religion other than Hinduism IMO.

>Have you ever studied the solidity of the case for the resurrection of Jesus?
No, but seeing a dead body be resurrected in front of me wouldn't make me begin to question the truth of Advaita, so for me the resurrection of Jesus being true wouldn't make a difference in how I view metaphysics.

>>17469242
There are various claims of miracles in Hinduism as well going back centuries, similarly with Muslim saints or walis also; I have never paid much attention to any of them. The Vedantist would not have their position changed by reports of miracles in other religions, classical Vedanta already accepts that supernatural or supranatural things like siddhis happen in the world sometimes and Hinduism accepts and allows for a perennialist viewpoint to a large degree. If people want to be led to choose what religion to believe in on the basis of miracles, that is their own personal decision.

>> No.17469661

>>17467745
>Cycles like dependent-origination which are intrinsically contingent cannot arise or exist as a source of liberation to begin with without being predicated on some non-contingent thing
Why?

>> No.17469692

>>17469661
b-because it just is ok?

>> No.17469709

>>17469242
I'm not familiar with Zeitoun, but wasn't the Miracle of the Sun just space aliens messing with dumb Portuguese people?

>> No.17469710

>>17469661
Cuz um it was always the same thing, I think.

>> No.17469720

>>17469692
>>17469710
I know you guys are shitposting but fr I always found it odd out how guenonfag kept peddling the 'hurr buddhists cant explain samsara' meme for months now all in an attempt to say 'well they can't because you need brahman for samsara to exist'. It's an entirely circular neo-platonist 'becoming qua being' talking point that makes no sense. Basically its a 'God did it' argument.

>> No.17469760

>>17469720
Yeah but also like when you have people sitting around thinking of like anything for thousands of years you get some little nuggets that honestly have nothing to do with the original belief system - they’re like supplementary. I don’t know if samsara is a thing because it’s just impossible like god existing to ever reach the end of the argument, but I think they got a lot of shit about like the Big Bang happening maybe over and over, and how we’re all derivatives of it. That’s sort of more like Hinduism-Buddhism though.

>> No.17469804

>>17469661
Because in the links of dependent origination each link only accounts for the existence of the next link of the chain, but none of the links account for why those 12 links exist in the first place as an aggregation of 12 dependent factors, to say that they exist as 12 links is already to posit an uncaused effect in the form of an unaccounted for pre-existing design in the aggregation or formation of the 12 links. Something has to determine the conditions governing the appearance or manifestation of the links in their specific formation as 12 links, but this cannot be caused by dependent origination itself because it relies on that aggregation of the 12 links into an ordered chain already being in place in order to function, but the Buddhist will not admit any other cause of the aggregation of the links, so it ends being incoherent and unable to account for its own existence, like the idea of a daughter giving birth to her own mother.

>> No.17469816

>>17469804
>Something has to determine the conditions governing the appearance or manifestation of the links in their specific formation as 12 links
Why?

>> No.17469904
File: 715 KB, 1280x818, 1607381802178.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
17469904

>>17469804
>nooooo you can't just say 12 is a good enough number for how all things are interdependent there has to be a 13th thing to do the 12 things

>> No.17470179

>>17469461
>and Hinduism accepts and allows for a perennialist viewpoint to a large degree.
please elaborate. how conciliate perennialism with shankara's comments on buddhism?

>> No.17470185

>>17469461
>and Hinduism accepts and allows for a perennialist viewpoint to a large degree
does the gods of other religions exists too? is it useful to pray god(s) when they are all illusory?

>> No.17470217

>>17469461
How can the saints of the Dharmic religions be truly compassionate when they deny the absoluteness of morality (the absolute is no longer the Absolute Good but Neutral) and the reality of people (either partially in Hinduism where jiva is illusory or totally in Buddhism).

How to be holy when morality is illusory, how to be compassionate/loving when there is no real relationship between two real people? If these paths do not make people holy, and do not diminish the suffering of the world, what good are they?

How do you cope with the fact that there is no survival of personality after death in Hinduism, any more than in atheism, since everything that constitutes a person's personality and differentiates one person from another (jiva) disappears at death? Basically, the Hinduist should fear death and the annihilation of his person as much as the atheist, even if he may try to reassure himself intellectually by saying that Consciousness does not die; he and all those he has loved will die, definitively, making all life meaningless, and morality absurd, in short : drawing the same conclusions as an atheist.

>> No.17470225

>>17469461
>If people want to be led to choose what religion to believe in on the basis of miracles, that is their own personal decision.
what criteria should we choose?

what makes you believe in Hinduism more than in Catholicism when you see the resurrection of Christ?

>> No.17470251

>>17469461
>No, but seeing a dead body be resurrected in front of me wouldn't make me begin to question the truth of Advaita, so for me the resurrection of Jesus being true wouldn't make a difference in how I view metaphysics.
and you would be right: for in itself, a phenomenon, or an experience, never tells us anything certain about the truth.

There are always an infinite number of possible explanations for a phenomenon/experience.

how can we be certain of the truth of the Vedanta, then, other than psychologically, when even the experience of non-dual identity (atman=brahman) tells us nothing about the true absolute, like all experiences, and could be interpreted in a thousand and one ways? (there are already physicalist theories of non-dual experiences, for example, found in the taking of certain drugs, when brain centers associated with the distinction between personal identity and the world are less active, etc.).

Experiments never offer certainty, True with a capital v, and rational arguments no more (that's why mystical ways often call for overcoming rationality).

In the end, all that remains is silence and the absence of taking any position that nagarjuna was talking about.

>> No.17470256

>>17470251
>True with a capital v,
of Truth with a capital T*

>> No.17470279

>>17469461
What do you think of this? It seems that the Hindu scriptures have been altered to talk about Jesus and the Queen of England.

https://www.stephen-knapp.com/jesus_predicted_in_the_vedic_literature.htm

>side from all of this, the Bhavishya Purana also contains quotes relating to various personalities, such as Adam, Noah, Allah, Shankaracarya, Jayadev, Kabir, Nanak, Aurangzeb, Shivaji, and on up to the rule of Queen Victavati, meaning Queen Victoria. It even describes how the British will build factories in Calcutta.

Before you tell me "purana", the problem with the manuscripts seems to be the same for the rest of the scriptures.

>The Bhavishya Purana is considered to be one of the major 18 Puranas of the Vedic canon.(...) The Venkateswar Steam Press edition of the Bhavishya Purana printed in Bombay in 1829 (and reprinted by Nag Publishers in 2003) is probably the most complete version available, containing all the main features of the four manuscripts. Since none of the four editions of the Bhavishya Purana predate British Rule in India, this further suggests a discrepancy. The fact is that the British tried to monopolize the publishing of all Sanskrit literature during the British Raj. They bought or confiscated any Sanskrit literature they could locate. And that is why you practically cannot find any Vedic literature that is published before 200 years ago. It is further known that they liked to publish their own translations, as if India could not produce its own Sanskrit scholars to translate the Sanskrit themselves. Plus, they would also try to interpolate various verses here and there to have the reader draw a different conclusion of the personality or traits of the characters described in the texts. Most were quite noble, but by slipping in verses that said certain persons had less than admirable qualities or degraded habits, or that questionable practices were used, it would change the reader’s disposition and attitude toward such personalities or the Vedic culture itself, even if they were Indian born followers of it.(...) Therefore, the consistent prophecy of Jesus in all four editions of the Bhavishya Purana, in spite of the differences in the editions found, seems to indicate an interpolation regarding the so-called meeting of Maharaja Shalivahana and Jesus. This is found in the 19th chapter of the Pratisarga-parva. However, as B. V. Giri Swami relates, in examining this section, certain flaws can be found which betray its dubious origins.

how can one be seriously astika?

>> No.17470288
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17470288

>I think Hinduism is right but I'm too much a bitch to give up sensual pleasures and would rather LARP instead
Sounds familiar

>> No.17470297

>>17470225
You aren't ready to even entertain the idea of other religions, let alone cross examine someone on them. Start with William James' Varieties of Religious Experience and Huston Smith's The World's Religions. There are billions of people who could not care less about what you think is absolute evidence for your personal beliefs, because they have their own idea of evidence.

>> No.17470298

>>17469461
You don't have to become a monk. You can join a guru, remain a civilian and receive darshan and/or self-realization. As with Ramana Maharshi.

>> No.17470307

>>17470297
>There are billions of people who could not care less about what you think is absolute evidence for your personal beliefs, because they have their own idea of evidence
I am a perennialist, so this number argument has no bearing on me. All these religions have the same mystical states.

>> No.17470320

>>17470298
but that would require him to actually put in effort, do you really think a western shitposter would give up the samsaric nature of this website that easily?

>> No.17470328

>>17470307
You asking how someone could be non-Catholic "when you see the resurrection of Christ" doesn't really square with being perennialist, or you are just spitting out words you've picked up on /lit/. It's an obvious indicator that you believe in an exclusively true religion.

>> No.17470340

>>17470279
Are these the same scriptures where the ancient Vedic Indians have flying saucers too but were published in the 2oth century?

>> No.17470373

>>17469145
>Moreover, the Materialist ought to be asked what is the exact nature of that consciousness which he supposes to be exuded from the elements
Epiphenomenalism, emergentism, functionalism...

+ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/physicalism/#CasForPhy

>> No.17470376

>>17470307
>All these religions have the same mystical states.
All these religion's metaphysics are varying, regardless of what 'mysticism' they might hold. Sufism and Eckhartian Christianity are fringe within their respective communities (especially the latter). The argument for common spiritual traits between religions, which is also argued by the likes of Sam Harris of all people, is rather weak. It is basically the reductionism of comparative religion.

>> No.17470383

>>17470328
I can ask a question without believing in a position. I have my own answer and I want to hear his.

>> No.17470392

>>17470376
>All these religion's metaphysics are varying, regardless of what 'mysticism' they might hold
Yes. So ?
>The argument for common spiritual traits between religions,
I didn't say that. I talked about the identity of their mystical states (devotional and non-dual). And no, these states do not vary.

> (...) In our comparative model of vertical mysticism, one of the core characteristics of introvertive mysticism, namely, sense of loss of self, combines with the complementary common characteristics of noetic quality and ineffability. Vertical mysticism has a revelatory, ineffable character and is comparable in the experience of adherents of the Christian, Islamic, and Hindu traditions. (...)
> https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1468-5906.2010.01508.x

>> No.17470414

>>17470392
>Yes. So ?
So why are you a perennial if every religion is metaphysically counter to your worldview?

>I didn't say that. I talked about the identity of their mystical states (devotional and non-dual). And no, these states do not vary.
So you are basically parroting Sam Harris' argument of mental states being common in believers therefore there is a mystical unity? How does this square the reality that Christianity is fundamentally dualistic, Islam is fundamentally dualistic, Hindu dvaita sects are fundamentally dualistic, etc? A christian losing a sense of self will not make him recite shahadah the next day.

>> No.17470424

>>17470414
>So why are you a perennial if every religion is metaphysically counter to your worldview?
identity of their mystical states

>How does this square the reality that Christianity is fundamentally dualistic, Islam is fundamentally dualistic, Hindu dvaita sects are fundamentally dualistic, etc?
v
>>17470251
experience=/=interpretation a posteriori of it

>> No.17470428

>>17470414
"How can you perceive the same red color as the aborigines who don't believe in atoms and the physical theory of light?"
Experience is not the explanation that is given afterwards.

>> No.17470729

bump

>> No.17470774

>>17464995
>Buddhism is not about non-duality, but the most widely practiced form of Buddhism is

>> No.17470803

Non-duality is kinda impossible to refute since recent studies indicate it does exist, and is built into the deepest layers of our awareness. It's called consciousness-as-such and is like the canvas on which all other mental processes are drawn, the minimum spark of being conscious. What that means for religious experience, or whether it supports the claims to truth of any faith, I leave for other anons to decide.

>> No.17470861

>cause and effect needs a cause
the fuck

>> No.17470873

>>17470774
>mahayana is legit buddhism guys, just trust me

>> No.17470880

>>17470873
>that religion with the stuff about becoming a Buddha isn't Buddhism trust me

>> No.17470891

>>17470861
Lots of people like to sire their own sky father and claim he is the uncaused cause of all things.

>> No.17471013
File: 360 KB, 1133x851, advaya.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
17471013

>>17470774
>Buddhism is about non-duality
Pic related

>> No.17471039
File: 1.81 MB, 1400x5426, causality.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
17471039

>>17470861

>> No.17471125

>>17470861
>>17470891
I don't care about christcuckery but there's one thing about dependent origination I'm wondering about: I understand it's infinite and has no starting point, but why are the twelve links specifically what they are?
Which is to say, there could've been seven links of a completely different nature. So why twelve, and why are they specifically ignorance, formation, consciousness, name-and-form, ayatanas, contact, sensation, craving, grasping, becoming, rebirth, old age and death? I get the Buddha's explanation as to how it works, but it could've been a completely different system, there is no particular reason for dependent origination to exist the way it does instead of another way.

>> No.17471272

>>17471125
>I don't care about christcuckery but there's one thing about dependent origination I'm wondering about: I understand it's infinite

https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1151&amp;context=masters

>> No.17471282

>>17471272
Not what I asked, fuck off

>> No.17471329

>>17471282
I didn't post this for you son of a bitch.

>>17469461
How is matter born from Brahman?

Is it only conventionally true?

Doesn't a convention require two parties?

How can consciousness delude itself being alone and full?

>> No.17471332

>>17471329
Then don't reply to me you braindead nigger

>> No.17471356

>>17471332
Stfu

>> No.17471371

>>17471356
No

>> No.17471424

>>17471371
Yeah open it to suck my dick you cunt

>> No.17471465
File: 44 KB, 393x375, boss.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
17471465

>>17471282
>>17471329
>>17471332
>>17471356
>>17471371
>>17471424

>> No.17471490

>>17471424
Don't include me in your homoerotic fantasies, faggot

>> No.17471841

>>17469816
>Why?
because to already say they exist in an aggregation is to introduce an effect that needs to have a cause, (or else it becomes independent and self-caused and sunyata and pratityasamutpada collapse). Things do not form aggregations until acted upon, threads dont aggregate into a cloth until acted on by the spinner at his loom.

>> No.17471888

>>17471841
How are you people unable to wrap your heads around such a simple concept
First link makes second link arise, which makes third link arise, until the twelfth link which makes the first link arise, etc
Why do you feel compelled to overcomplicate things

>> No.17471939

>>17471841
is this basically Kalam's cosmological argument?

>> No.17471999

>>17470179
>how conciliate perennialism with shankara's comments on buddhism?
Perennialism doesn’t automatically accept that every religious form is valid, just that multiple religious forms of different origins can both be valid in pointing to the same thing. Guenon and the other Traditionalists had perennialist views but generally attacked protestantism for example. I hold or am largely sympathetic to perennialist views but I see Buddhism at the same time as having a lot of simply false doctrines. Following a school whose overall metaphysical doctrine is wrong can still provide one with the opportunity for spiritual growth through encouraging things like introspection and the cultivation of virtues though. In Vedanta all people transmigrate according to their karma and desires, so even Buddhists who work on overcoming desire and uprooting negative tendencies would still be more likely to transmigrate into more auspicious or spiritually-conducive lives, its not like transmigration punishes people for being born as non-Hindus. Guenon also reconciles Vedanta by Christianity by saying in one of his books that Christians who are righteous and who follow exoteric Christianity are admitted to the Brahmaloka realm that lasts until the end of the cycle of universal manifestation.

>>17470185
> does the gods of other religions exists too?
I don’t know, some Hindus believe that Jesus was an avatar of Vishnu or that all gods are just the creations or puppets of Brahman
>is it useful to pray god(s) when they are all illusory?
Advaita doesn’t place a big emphasis on prayer, the other schools of Hinduism do so more. According to Advaita though the (little ‘g’) gods within samsara are no less and no more real than everything else included in samsara like objects, causation etc; so while they might be unreal in an absolute sense this wouldn’t stop them from having empirically-real actions and effects upon us in the empirically-real world of samsara that we both inhabit.

>> No.17472012

>>17471999
There are no false doctrines in Buddhism

>> No.17472504

>>17471888
>How are you people unable to wrap your heads around such a simple concept
>Why do you feel compelled to overcomplicate things
By founding his religion by going around debating various skeptics, Brahmins and sramanics, Buddha opened his doctrines up for fair criticism. I'm just pointing out the inevitable contradictions that result from the Buddhist position of simultaneously holding that God doesn't transcend and produce samsara and that it's instead all dependently originated, *and* the view that dependent origination means that everything is empty of self-essence, and co-dependent on other things, because when you follow the trail of where this leads, it leads to to dependent origination already existing in an organized aggregation of specific linkages, but when in determining what is the origin of this aggregation we have the following options

1) God or Brahman was anterior to this aggregation and caused it directly or indirectly
2) it was uncaused and 'just was' without beginning
3) it was caused by pratityasamutpada itself

The Buddhists can't accept #1, to say #2 that it 'just was' and doesn't need to be accounted for leaves something self-caused, not caused by dependent arising, which violates the Buddhist claim that all things are empty of unconditioned self-existence, dependent on other things, selfless, not permanent; but the Buddhist also cannot accept #3 either because pratityasamutpada cannot cause this if it depends on that aggregation being in existence already for its own existence and functioning. So, no matter which option you turn to there are clear indications that there is some underlying logical contradiction in the doctrine. Maybe there is a purpose for this contradiction, it could be some poorly executed attempt at a zen-like koan, or it could be meant to signal that there was some higher esoteric explanation of it Buddha didn't teach because he thought many might be confused, I can only speculate why it's there. However much some of the Buddhists here want to deny it, there is an obvious logical contradiction which is apparent to the impartial observer who is not personally invested in Buddhism.

>> No.17472565

>>17472504
#2 is true as far as the doctrine goes
>there was some higher esoteric explanation of it Buddha didn't teach
Yes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_unanswered_questions
There's one thing you don't understand which is leading you to write all these pointless walls of text: buddhism is not a metaphysical system and does not claim to provide answers for everything, it's a method to stop suffering

>> No.17472637

>>17472565
>it's a method to stop suffering
Yea, it's a method with a whole elaborate backdrop metaphysics involving rebirth, avidya, pratityasamutpada, heavens, hells, levels of spiritual attainment, the list goes on, and calling it a method ignores that its adherents go around proselytizing it and calling other doctrines inferior, thus opening themselves up to be justly refuted. It's by discerning contradictions that point to an underlying falsity that we distinguish the true from the false when it comes to doctrine.

>> No.17472643

>>17472565
not him but this post is correct. Buddha considered mindless metaphysical speculation an impediment to liberation, accumulating karma and perpetuating his suffering. That is why he set aside such questions. Yes he does present metaphysical presumptions to his teachings, but he didn't encourage his followers to pointlessly ponder on it, as it would be like questioning the type of poison one is afflicted with as one is dying after being hit with a poisoned arrow. You may disparage him and say he's weak or evading issues, but the Buddha considered himself a liberator first, philosopher second.

>> No.17472647

>>17472504
>that God doesn't transcend and produce samsara
god doesn't produce samsara in buddhism

>> No.17472663

>>17472643
>Buddha considered mindless metaphysical speculation an impediment to liberation
Except when he wanted to attack the ideas of non-buddhists in order to proclaim that his doctrine was better. He can dish it out but he can't handle it when others do the same to him, it's quite amusing.

>> No.17472665

>>17472637
>Yea, it's a method with a whole elaborate backdrop metaphysics
Yes, there's nothing wrong is expounded metaphysics as it relates to a specific soteriology. The problem is with metaphysical masturbation.
>calling it a method ignores that its adherents go around proselytizing it and calling other doctrines inferior
Apart from a few instances in history, Buddhists generally don't proselytize. The buddha himself advised against it.
>It's by discerning contradictions that point to an underlying falsity that we distinguish the true from the false when it comes to doctrine.
This is a fallacy, just because something is consistent on paper doesn't actually make it true in reality.

>> No.17472675

>>17472647
Yes, I know, the purpose of mentioning that was in the context of explaining why dependent origination doesn't make sense, even though Brahma doesn't produce dependent origination in Buddhism, God producing dependent origination was mentioned as a potential solution to the inherent logical contradictions in the Buddhist understanding of dependent origination.

>> No.17472678

>>17472663
>Except when he wanted to attack the ideas of non-buddhists in order to proclaim that his doctrine was better
This never happened. He only considers other views as not leading to liberation. It is not a matter of 'mine is better', but that 'mine leads to x'.
>He can dish it out but he can't handle it when others do the same to him, it's quite amusing.
Plenty of detractors existed back then, I'm pretty sure he was fine with their opposition, unlike a certain 'somebody'.

>> No.17472679

>>17472504
>to say #2 that it 'just was' and doesn't need to be accounted for leaves something self-caused,
Huh no.

and anyway dukkha and births are conditioned

>> No.17472682

>>17472665
there's nothing wrong with*

>> No.17472715

>>17472665
>Buddhists generally don't proselytize.
Except for the time they send out missionaries to almost every part of Asia and into the near east.
>The buddha himself advised against it.
While doing it himself often, making him a hypocrite
>This is a fallacy, just because something is consistent on paper doesn't actually make it true in reality.
So are you rejecting the entirety of the Prasangika-Madhyamaka tradition and Nagarjuna which revolves entirely around finding contradictions in the opponents view and explicitly avoiding advancing any arguments for your own position? Aside from devoting time to practicing the teachings of each one which is impractical, discerning falsehood and contradictions are the only tools we have to distinguish valuable spiritual paths from the others of false, less or questionable value. Obviously, no doctrine is ultimately verified as true until you realize and attain the fruit of that doctrine, but until that happens discerning falsehood in the form of contradiction is the next best tool we have available.

>> No.17472739

>>17472678
>This never happened. He only considers other views as not leading to liberation. It is not a matter of 'mine is better', but that 'mine leads to x'.
I know, but given that all the Āstika and sramanic schools already accept the premise to begin with that the purpose of philosophy and spiritual paths is liberation of the soul, to engage in intra-Indian debates on religious and metaphysical doctrine is already to assume this point that you mention as a given. By still attempting to point out why other doctrines don't lead to liberation, Buddha opened himself up for people to fairly examine and debate in public his doctrine to determine why it may or may not be coherent and thus why it may or may not lead to liberation.

>> No.17472740

Plato, Plotinus, Iamblichus, Proclus, Damascius, Simplicius. And all their friends. About 20000+ pages.

>> No.17472758

>>17472679
>Huh no.
Yes it does, the aggregation of the 12 links into pratityasamutpada is an effect, just as much as the aggregation of 12 threads into a cloth are. If it's not caused by dependent origination (which is also logically impossible) there are things existing outside the bounds of dependent origination and the Buddhist claim that nothing exists that is not caused by co-dependent arising is wrong. Thus we can see that there are inherent logical contradictions in Buddhist doctrine.

>> No.17472759

>>17472637
You're completely missing the point, as always
The metaphysics are nothing, just a backdrop. The only thing that matters is direct experience.
I won't humor you because it's useless but I urge you to stop engaging in useless conceptual proliferation

>> No.17472775

>>17471490
Cringe

>> No.17472780

>>17472775
Dilate

>> No.17472788

>>17472715
>Except for the time they send out missionaries to almost every part of Asia and into the near east.
Yes like I said, apart from a few instances in history.
>While doing it himself often, making him a hypocrite
He never did proselytize, he only conducted lectures and answered questions.
>are you rejecting the entirety of the Prasangika-Madhyamaka tradition and Nagarjuna which revolves entirely around finding contradictions in the opponents view and explicitly avoiding advancing any arguments for your own position? Aside from devoting time to practicing the teachings of each one which is impractical, discerning falsehood and contradictions are the only tools we have to distinguish valuable spiritual paths from the others of false, less or questionable value. Obviously, no doctrine is ultimately verified as true until you realize and attain the fruit of that doctrine, but until that happens discerning falsehood in the form of contradiction is the next best tool we have available.
What ought to be doesn't necessarily equate to what it actually is. Pointing out 'metaphysical contradictions via argumentation' is not the best tool we have, again sounding good on paper doesn't mean it is true.

>> No.17472796
File: 202 KB, 606x731, 1594442073105.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
17472796

>guenonfag still stuck on the finger and blind to the moon
Everything in Buddhism makes perfect sense.

>> No.17472806

>>17472759
>but I urge you to stop engaging in useless conceptual proliferation
All I did was refute the attempting debunkings of Advaita by a Dvaitin and by Mipham posted here. I pointed out why they were wrong and then responded to people engaging with what I posted. It sounds like you're just running damage control. If people hadn't posted attempted refutations of Advaita, I wouldn't have had a reason to be in this thread pointing out why they are wrong. No amount of whining about conceptual proliferation will ever browbeat me into accepting the true of a doctrine which possesses internal inconsistencies and logical contradictions, and I have pity for anyone who would ever let themselves be convinced by such whining.

>> No.17472811

>>17472806
You're still doing it

>> No.17472819

>>17472806
Logic is overrated.

>> No.17472822

>>17472739
>I know, but given that all the Āstika and sramanic schools already accept the premise to begin with that the purpose of philosophy and spiritual paths is liberation of the soul, to engage in intra-Indian debates on religious and metaphysical doctrine is already to assume this point that you mention as a given.
No actually is isn't. There is no assumption that 'mine is better' unless its been stated.
>By still attempting to point out why other doctrines don't lead to liberation, Buddha opened himself up for people to fairly examine and debate in public his doctrine to determine why it may or may not be coherent and thus why it may or may not lead to liberation.
His soteriology doesn't require it to be fully coherent, just that its true. You don't have to argue at length about the logical checks and balances to argue something in a debate.

>> No.17472855

>>17472822
> There is no assumption that 'mine is better' unless its been stated.
you misunderstood, the assumption shared by all schools int their debates was that the debate was not about whose was better but was about establishing what leads to liberation
>You don't have to argue at length about the logical checks and balances to argue something in a debate.
Okay, why is it okay for Mipham to write something trying to refute Advaita, but I'm somehow at fault for writing something in response explaining why his reasoning is wrong?

>> No.17472863

>internal inconsistencies and logical contradiction
I really think this dude is stuck in samsara forever. This is the same guy that bumped a previous Advaita refutation for 17 hours just so he could come up with a 10 post wall of text 'debunking' it. All of which consisted of 'well he's wrong because he doesn't get it'.

>> No.17472867

>>17470217
>>17470225
>>17470251
>>17470279
>>17470298
>>17470373
Bump, good questions

>> No.17472875

You don't need books, just go outside. Reality refutes non-dualism

>> No.17472877

>>17472863
>All of which consisted of 'well he's wrong because he doesn't get it'.
In order for refutations to be valid, they have to actually describe and correspond to the doctrines of the metaphysics they are trying to refute.

>> No.17472886

>>17472867
Dharmic religions will always be superior to cucktianity because they don't tell you you're incapable of achieving salvation by yourself.

>> No.17472898

>>17472863
>stuck in samsara forever
Is that possible? Doesn't everyone get liberated eventually?

>> No.17472899

>>17472855
>but I'm somehow at fault for writing something in response explaining why his reasoning is wrong?
There's nothing wrong with that, go ahead and continue to defend Advaita to your hearts content.

>> No.17472903

>>17472898
Not him apparently.

>> No.17472915

>>17470251
>In the end, all that remains is silence and the absence of taking any position that nagarjuna was talking about.
Nagarjuna was some kind of pyrrhonist? I thought he was all about complicated metaphysics

>> No.17472922

>>17472898
>Doesn't everyone get liberated eventually?
no, liberation doesn't happen until the required conditions are fulfilled, and that doesn't happen out of the blue.

>> No.17472927

>>17472855
I don't think you get it. Refutations don't mean shit, Islam has been 'refuted' or claimed to be multiple times in history, yet it still persisted strongly to this day. You don't have to defend the integrity of Advaita online, it all amounts to wasted time.

>> No.17472929

>>17470251
>>how can we be certain of the truth of the Vedanta,
achieve the end of craving and you will know vedanta is wrong

>> No.17472940

>>17472927
This

It's almost going to be 3 years and guenonfag is still the only one talking about Advaita.

>> No.17472943

>>17472927
>You don't have to defend the integrity of Advaita online, it all amounts to wasted time.
Ah but you see, to see sophistry refuted is entertaining for me personally

>> No.17472953
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17472953

>>17472927
>You don't have to defend the integrity of Advaita online, it all amounts to wasted time
This, debates are largley pointless and ego-stroking, distracting you from your spirtual path

>> No.17472959
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17472959

>>17472943
It's also entertaining for us to watch you meltdown occasionally.

>> No.17472963

>>17472922
Yes but given infinite time you'd think everyone would reach nirvana

>> No.17472968
File: 713 KB, 1903x1844, spam.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
17472968

>I'm just doing it for the personal entertainment of refuting others
lmao

>> No.17472977

Reminder guenonfag is literally a Swedish pederast

>> No.17473035

>>17472758


You're stuck on the preposterous idea of the first cause like the jews are. Muh first creation, muh first mover.
All those jewish ideas are worthless in buddhism.

You can't find a sequence where there is no delusion (ie what would be their first mover) then magically delusion and aggregates out of nowhere, then no delusion again (this time by following the path).

The only way to end birth and delusion is the path and once there is no delusion, there can't, be delusion, craving, births and so on again. That's the whole point of the result of the path.


>>17472504
>>By founding his religion by going around debating various skeptics
the buddha doesnt go debating, it 's the brahmins who go to him an debate.

>> No.17473070

>>17472886
>egoic statement
Pretty satanical

>> No.17473080

>>17473070
Yet true

>> No.17473151

>>17473080
No. The ego doesn't save anything, even in dharmic religions.

>> No.17473182

>>17471329
>How is matter born from Brahman?
It never was originally born in time, but Brahman has always been existing and wielding His power of maya, to the jivas this maya has always been appearing as the mula-prakriti, the primordial undifferentiated matter out of which the elements, the ether and the gunas are made, time itself comes from maya
>Is it only conventionally true?
Yes, if things are not absolutely real, which for Advaita entails being without a beginning, existing eternally, immutably without any change, then they are instead relegated to the status of only be only real on the level of conventional reality
>Doesn't a convention require two parties?
Other terms used include empirical reality, contingent reality, Vyāvahārika or samvriti-saya. Does your dreams require two parties? Dreams are only conventional real in relation to the waking state, you experience them and believe them to be real, and in that moment they seem to be real empirically, but they are nonetheless sublated as unreal in the waking state. That contingent existence of the dream as your delusion of waking existence didn't require two parties. In Advaita it does involve two parties though because the jivas are not identical to Atma-Brahman but they are only its images, only the jivas are dreaming and have delusions but the underlying Atma-Brahman or sentience doesn't. This conventional existence relies entirely on Brahman for its existence and not at all on the jivas, since the jivas are a part of it and are appearances of Brahman's power.
>How can consciousness delude itself being alone and full?
It doesn't, the consciousness always abides as itself and is always liberated. The Jivas are beginningless images of that consciousness, in which the light of that consciousness is reflected, but that non-dual eternal consciousness of the Atma doesn't have the jiva as Its object, It eternally free from the distinctions of knower, known and means of knowing. People who are able to isolate their underlying sentience from all of its contents find that there is a non-individual and non-dual sentient presence existing on its own in non-duality without any inherent relation with anything. That this is a newly produced state instead the status of one's and everyone's consciousness all the time is only perceived by the jiva, but not by that consciousness which is the Atma. Only the jivas perceive themselves as existing in a multiplicity and as distinct from the Brahman, so the underlying consciousness is never deluded. Brahman's consciousness doesn't directly perceive your eyesight, but subject-object distinctions occur in the intellect, and Brahman is just the non-dual self-knowing light that illumines and allows these subject-objects distinctions in the intellect to manifest. The mind and intellect can be deluded, and the subject of their subject-object distinctions depends on the intellect, Brahman's light is constant and unwavering.

>> No.17473216

>>17473151
You misunderstood my post
Dharmic religions teach that salvation is not granted, it is reached

>> No.17473232

>>17473182
>the ether and the gunas
Are u serisously believing in this pre-scientific bs?

>> No.17473236

>>17473216
>it is reached
No. Who achieves liberation? The atman is always free, the jiva always remains the jiva. Rather, the dharmic paths make salvation impossible.

>> No.17473239

>>17461767
How has no one in this huge thread mentioned Madhva? I swear, every thread on dharmic religion is filled with pseuds and larpers.

>> No.17473245

>>17473236
Well, stick to cucktianity then. It really doesn't affect me

>> No.17473255

>>17473239
Why would we?

>> No.17473258

>>17473236
>Who achieves liberation?
Easily addressed by a simple google search
>Prince Siddharta attained Nibbana and became the Buddha. But that is a statement in conventional reality. When you say "all phenomena are non-self", it is a statement in ultimate reality. Do not try to mix up the 2 paradigms. Either you speak in ultimate reality or conventional reality. Pick one at a time.

>the dharmic paths make salvation impossible.
Right, and a dead jew makes it possible.

>> No.17473261

>>17473255
Because he's the most notable opponent of nondualism in the history of Indian philosophy?

>> No.17473271

>>17473258
>He really answered this question with a wikipedia biographical quote
Brainlet

>> No.17473277

>>17473239
Vadiraja is actually a Madvhaist theologan. His work Nyayaratnavali is a 901 verse dedicated entirely to the piecemeal destruction of non-dualism.

>> No.17473279

>>17473271
I accept your concession

>> No.17473294

>>17473255
>Madhvacharya stated that both Advaita Vedānta and Mahayana Buddhism were a nihilistic school of thought.[440] Madhvacharya wrote four major texts, including Upadhikhandana and Tattvadyota, primarily dedicated to criticizing Advaita.[440]

>> No.17473355

>>17473294
>another dude doesn't understand buddhism and lets it live rent free in his head because he didn't read the suttas
Many such cases

>> No.17473979

>>17472867
bump

>> No.17474863

Bump

>> No.17475690

bump

>> No.17475711

I believe the experiencer and the experienced are ontologically distinct. I believe enlightenment is the experiencer being freed from the experienced.

I am under the impression that this is at odds with the idea of mutual arising. If so: could you please argue with me dear buddhist-anon so that my understanding my evolve?

>> No.17475869
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17475869

"Self"... I don't buy it. You say to me "self". I ask you: WHOS?

>> No.17476104

bump

>> No.17476159

>Guenonfag is still having the "BRAHMAN IS ALL THAT EXISTS, BUT THE JIVAS EXIST AND ARE DELUDED ABOUT BRAHMAN, BUT THEY DON'T EXIST, BUT THEY DO" argument
>people are still telling him you can't have both
>people are still giving up and leaving him to bump 10x desperately hoping someone will continue the cycle

Is.. is Guenonfag the eternally deluded jiva?

>> No.17476318

>>17476159
bump

>> No.17476567

>>17476159
bump

>> No.17476724

>>17464995
Just because it wasn't yet conceptualized doesn't mean it wasn't a feature of that ideology

>> No.17477023

>>17476159
bump

>> No.17477228

>>17476159
bump

>> No.17477390

>>17476159
Yeah I doubt traditionalists can grasp the law of non contradiction, so much for their talk of rational intuition

>> No.17477417

>>17477390
>Yeah I doubt traditionalists can grasp the law of non contradiction, so much for their talk of rational intuition
*fedora tips*

>> No.17477458

>>17464995
Nonduality only makes sense epistemologically, mahayana buddhism uses it for that purpose. Only dumb fuck cryptobuddhist shankara was so obsessed with buddhism and in love with that he tried to turn this epistemology into metaphysics, creating bastard spawn mix of vedanta and buddhism that buddhists and vedantists both think is silly.

>> No.17477557

>>17477458
Epistemic non-dualism just leads people to a worthless vacuity that is a pseudo-enlightenment. And the related metaphysics are all wrong anyway since its built on beginningless dependent origination accounting for everything which inevitably collapses under its own internal contradictions.
>>17476159
>pretends to not understand the appearance/reality distinction to save face for his lack of good arguments even though he simps for NPCddhism in his free time
mega cringe

>> No.17477576

OP here. I would like to thank this person for bumping my thread and keeping it alive. Keep it going.

>> No.17477623

>>17477557
>mega cringe
There is no way you are dumb enough to not understand his point

>> No.17477652

I wish physicalists would just die and degrade into worm food.

>> No.17477713

>>17477623
>There is no way you are dumb enough to not understand his point
I understand the point he is implying, that Brahman being the only thing existing contradicts the jivas being not-Brahman. But this would only be true if they existed in the same manner, on the same level of reality; they don’t though which is why there is no contradiction, the Jivas and samsara are sublated in liberation as not ever having had any real existence like dreams or optical illusions, the underlying non-duality remains intact and by itself, and it’s revealed that this was always the case and that there was never anything else in absolute reality contradicting its duality; it only seemed to appear that way to the jivas. To say that we only have real experiences and that we also have the experience of dreams is another thing that appears at first to be a violation of the law of mutual contradiction, until you realize that dreams aren’t real and so they don’t contradict waking life; the same analogy extends to Brahman and maya. Since that poster simps for Buddhism and shills mahayana, he already understands this point since the same distinction about appearances and behind the appearance is made in Buddhism as well, and you can’t understand how that works in Mahayana Buddhism without also more or less understanding how it works in Advaita, but he is someone who prefers gaslighting and strawmanning to real debate, so he pretends not to know.

>> No.17477968

>>17477713
I salute you for taking the time to elaborate your position even though I didn't explain my objection properly.
The underlying intuition behind his point is that although eg. the illusion of a dragon can be explained away with an appeal to the distinction between appearance and reality, this tactic cannot be employed without circularity to explain away *the existence of the illusion itself*. If you try explaining away the fact that I am having an illusion as being in itself another illusion, that leaves you with another item of the same sort that you wanted to explain away. Is the illusion that I am having an illusion another illusion? It leads to a vicious regress.

>> No.17478112

>>17475711
in Buddhism the 6 consciousnesses are clearly conditioned

"From fabrications [saṅkhāra] as a requisite condition comes consciousness [viññāṇa]."[24]

In three discourses in the Samyutta Nikaya, the Buddha highlights three particular manifestations of saṅkhāra as particularly creating a "basis for the maintenance of consciousness" (ārammaṇaṃ ... viññāṇassa ṭhitiyā) that could lead to future existence,[25] to the perpetuation of bodily and mental processes,[26] and to craving[27] and its resultant suffering. As stated in the common text below (in English and Pali), these three manifestations are intending, planning and enactments of latent tendencies ("obsessing")[28]

>> No.17478440

>>17477968
>If you try explaining away the fact that I am having an illusion as being in itself another illusion, that leaves you with another item of the same sort that you wanted to explain away.
The same force or power that produces the dragon is also the force that produces the sense of seeing it; in Advaita doctrine, Brahman's power maya is responsible both for the contents of the illusion of samsara (i.e. our everyday life), as well as the fact that the Jivas seem to be experiencing samsara to begin with. And these are not two separate illusions, but it is is all the same illusion viewed from two different perspectives. What accounts for the fact that the illusion is still experienced or seems to be by us, is that it's all taking place within an already-liberated, non-dual, immutable pure consciousness, which provides illumination to the Jiva without being affected in any way by the Jiva's delusions and thoughts. The sort of contradiction which you are speaking of would only apply to Advaita if Advaita said that samsara is an illusion, and that even the experience itself of the illusion of samsara was an illusion, and that it just stopped there and was illusion all the way down with nothing else. Advaita doesn't do this though, but they say that the light of Brahman's consciousness is there fully permeating and sustaining every moment of the Jiva's quasi-existence, and that this is what accounts for the self-evident existence of our own consciousness.

Why does the example of the illusion of normal existence itself being an illusion seem nonsensical on its face? Because the undeniable fact of our experience implies that there is some component to it that must necessarily be non-illusory, and that the explanation of the experience of the illusion itself being an illusion fails to find a place for the existence of us as conscious beings. It is through reference to our own self-evident sentience that we can make this train of thought. But you see Advaita doesn't claim that this sentience or consciousness to which this train of thought makes references is itself illusory, for Advaita it exists absolutely for all eternity as the Atman-Brahman. The person dismissing all relative experience as false and even that experience of falsity as false cannot account for why we still have subject conscious experience that seems real if even the illusion is unreal and there is no reality to anything.

>> No.17478466

>>17478440
Advaita says that the consciousness of the Jiva doesn't actually belong to the Jiva and that it's actually infinite, supra-individual and God Himself, and they say that there is only one illusion which ultimately stems from Brahman's power, this illusion is projected onto the underlying basis of infinite consciousness, and this ultimate background of self-subsisting awareness is what accounts for our self-evident truly existing consciousness underneath the illusion of samsara. This is why the Advaita explanation doesn't result in a regress as it would for someone who dismisses everything as illusion with nothing real underlying it, because the Jiva's don't have "illusions of illusions" but there is instead the consciousness of God, who wields His power which permits to exist on the level of conditional reality Jivas which are fooled by the maya; but the consciousness illumining the Jiva, through which they have their being (unbeknownst to them) is the basis upon which the delusions or illusions of the Jivas rest, their illusions don't rest on other illusions.

The contents of the illusion as well as the fact that one is seeming to experience it are both explained by the same error, the failure to discriminate between the intellect and the Self, and the related superimposition of the intellect/mind and its states onto the underlying consciousness like a colored cloth seeming to impart its color to a clear crystal ball that the cloth is place behind. This indiscrimination between the intellect and the Self causes the Self in the minds of the ignorant to seem to take the form of the subject-object distinctions of the mind (like the ball taking on the color). Are the objects of the subject-object distinction one illusion, and the fact that the witnessing subject of the intellect is witnessing those objects a separate illusion? No, for Advaita they involve the same illusion, namely the indiscrimination between Self and non-Self, and the false interpolation of the intellect and its subject-object distinctions onto the underlying immutable and non-dual consciousness illumining them. It is not another illusion that the consciousness of Brahman experiences this delusion of the Jiva because it doesn't, the consciousness of the Atman is completely unaware of the delusions of the Jiva. The consciousness of the Brahman only seems to be a seer of sight and hearer of sound etc from the perspective of the Jiva when they superimpose the intellect over it, but as It exists in Itself the Atman is non-volitional, and is not a seer or experiencer and doesn't experience illusion but just abides in non-duality.

>> No.17478663

>>17478440
>The sort of contradiction which you are speaking of would only apply to Advaita if Advaita said that samsara is an illusion, and that even the experience itself of the illusion of samsara was an illusion, and that it just stopped there and was illusion all the way down with nothing else. Advaita doesn't do this though
So you *do* accept that there is at least one illusion that is actually taking place? Because I though that the "non-dualist", Guenonian or whatever view was that illusions don't really exist, which would be absurd.
Even so, doesn't this scheme break divine simplicity? You are introducing a whole dream-like experience taking place inside the One.

>> No.17478849

>>17478663
He will keep going in circles about this indefinitely.

>> No.17479155

>>17470217
Still no answer. Based objection tho

>>17472867
This

>> No.17479167

>>17477576
No problem anon. <3

>> No.17479222

>>17478440
I really don't understand how Brahman, who is alone and full, unchangeable, impersonal and without will, can produce Maya, or the world, or anything else, no matter if it is on another level of reality, in the end he produces it somehow and it doesn't make any sense to me. I know you can answer "Brahman doesn't produce anything, Maya and the world doesn't really exist" but for me it's words that don't explain anything and they don't solve the problem of: how do you go from a Brahman like that to a plurality of things, Maya included. You often give the image of the dream but why would Brahman dream to begin with? You say that Maya deludes him but why would he have/create Maya, this second, to begin with? In short, I have the impression that this stage, the passage from one to multiple, is the most sensitive stage in non-dual metaphysics and yet I have never seen anything comprehensible at this level. Theists, who accept some form of reality to the God-world duality, have much less difficulty in explaining the generation of things.

>> No.17479228

>>17479222
>can produce Maya, or the world, or anything else
Without duality*

>> No.17479247

>>17479222
Am I wrong in thinking that vishishtadvaita comes from attempting to explain this movement from brahman to its creations better?

>> No.17479255

So.. first off, some basic assumptions or perhaps facts.

1)God is an infinite expansion of infinite existence-awareness-love.
2) God is a static, homogenous whole.
3) God is Reality or Totality of existence.

The Awareness of God, reaches a limit as it completes the pattern. However, the Omniscience of God continues and spreads outside of itself to produce a Divine Thought.

Because God is Reality, the Divine Thought is also God in essence.

The jiva is a soul, and Atman is the Godhead within the soul. So in a way God exists in his own realm detached and removed from the rest of creation, however, the Jiva really perceives God directly, and this God is Atman. This Atman takes the subjective perspective of the soul, so that one says "I am God!"

>> No.17479256

>>17479247
Idk anon

>> No.17479344
File: 24 KB, 235x282, holy.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
17479344

>>17470217
Holy based

>> No.17479593

>>17478112
>viññāṇa arises as a result of the material sense bases (āyatana)[17]
>there are six types of consciousness, each unique to one of the internal sense organs
>consciousness (viññāṇa) is separate (and arises) from mind (mano)
>here, consciousness cognizes or is aware of its specific sense base (including the mind and mind objects)
is it fair to say that enlightenment involves detaching from the processes that cause viññāṇa, so that there is no consciousness of any thing?

>> No.17479717

ok, that's all fair. but what DOES exist??

>> No.17479754

>>17479717
being-consciousness

>> No.17479761

>>17479155
>no answer.
Because that post is just a bunch of false assumptions and strawmen from a seething crosscuck

>> No.17479788

>>17479761
Dilate harder.

>> No.17479931

how would I best approach reading the Pali Canon? I am under the impression that buddhists kind of have their whole own language for psychology and philosophy and that therefore it can be a bit difficult to approach. Take for instance >>17479754 does this mean consciousness of being? what then is being? does it mean consciousness that is? how is it different from dependent arising? Is it dependent arising? how does it relate to samsara? does it relate to consciousness in any intuitive sense? if all that there is is being-consciousness, is the "being" part selt-referential, ie what is is being, rather than being anything in particular? if so why are there perceived differences?

and so on. are there english editions annotated heavily enough to make sense of these things?

>> No.17479967

>>17479931
>are there english editions annotated heavily enough to make sense of these things?

This guy might help. https://www.swamij.com/

>> No.17479968

>>17479931

reading guide is here


https://readingfaithfully.org/canonical-collections-for-practice/

there is no being-consciousness in buddhism see>>17478112

>> No.17479972

>>17479967
>https://www.swamij.com/
schizo poo's ramblings.

also the original PTS editions have been rewritten

https://americanmonk.org/free-pts-sutta-ebooks/


The Pali Text Society has made its Vinaya, Sutta and Abhidhamma books available for non-commercial use since 2013. The Sutta books have been edited on the Buddhadust Website and Stephen Torrence and myself did most of the work to reformat the web pages into eBook versions.

What is special about these books? These are the unabridged editions of the original PTS Sutta books which were some of the first translations which have been referenced by several modern translators who followed later. Unabridged means the triple dots which used to represent missing repetitions have been expanded or “rolled out” with those missing repetitions. It is cost effective for electronic editions and some people swear that something is “lost” in translation with these repetitions represented by the triple dots (…). The texts have been formatted on the Buddhadust website in a nice grouped poetic way which helps a great deal with sorting through all of the information while reading. Lastly, since these books are quite old, they were written in an older English religious style so your vocabulary could use a little brush up!

Click on the book that you want to download. Epub, Azw, Mobi, PDF formats are supported at the github link location.

>> No.17479992

>>17479788
Seethe

>> No.17480123

>>17479972
>>17479968
>>17479967
is there a significant movement of non-intellectualism in buddhism? maybe this is zen. I come from having read the Dao De Jing, and I can't help but wonder if more philosophy wouldn't just clutter my mind.

>> No.17480169

>>17480123
Somewhat since everything you read is ultimately nothing compared to experience
>more philosophy wouldn't just clutter my mind.
Absolutely

>> No.17480192

>>17478663
>So you *do* accept that there is at least one illusion that is actually taking place?
Yes, but we can only say that it takes place conventionally or empirically, but to Advaita, at no time does anything exist in absolute reality except Brahman's consciousness which is always wielding His power, any sort of illusion that we consider as actually taking place is just that Brahman's power of maya appearing to us. That there seems to be an illusion taking place doesn't establish the real existence of the illusion, but only the existence of Brahman and the power that flows from Him.
>Because I though that the "non-dualist", Guenonian or whatever view was that illusions don't really exist, which would be absurd.
They don't exist on the level of absolute reality, but they only seem to exist from within the illusion, just as dreams seem to be real and are experienced, but then when you awake you realize that the dream you thought was real was actually not real but was the projection of your own mind. But when you transcend the illusion, just like waking up from the dream, it's revealed that the whole universe of samsara was just Brahman appearing to the Jivas as other than Itself through maya. Why is it absurd for Advaita to say that unreal experiences occur in samsara and are then sublated as having not been real in gnosis, but it's not absurd to say that dreams don't exist as real experiences but we nonetheless falsely experience them as real and then wake up from the illusion of them?
>Even so, doesn't this scheme break divine simplicity? You are introducing a whole dream-like experience taking place inside the One.
No, because Brahman is still held to be partless. The whole dream-like experience only seems to arise from the omnipresent and partless Brahman simply wielding his power, it doesn't create or emanate in absolute reality another world of illusion inside Brahman. At all times of wielding His power Brahman remains the same immutable, all-pervasive, formless and undivided entity.

>> No.17480232

>>17480123
Zen is very intellectual and produce lots of lengthy books

>> No.17480424

>>17479222
>I really don't understand how Brahman, who is alone and full, unchangeable, impersonal and without will, can produce Maya, or the world, or anything else, no matter if it is on another level of reality, in the end he produces it somehow and it doesn't make any sense to me.
Brahman's aloneness and fullness are no impediment to Him wielding His power, because Brahman is omnipotent, neither are Brahman being unchangeable, impersonal and without will an impediment to Brahman wielding His power, because Brahman has always been wielding His power, it is Brahman's very uncaused and beginningless nature to so, and to always have been doing so. The act of wielding maya doesn't require an initial beginning in time that has to be set in motion by an act of will, because Brahman exists outside or anterior to time, space and causation as their transcendent cause. The flow of time itself emerges from Brahman's maya, there was never a time when Brahman was not wielding maya. The so-called 'production' of the world just refers to how we as ignorant jivas seem to subjectively experience this maya-world; but at no time does this become something other than Brahman's power.
>I know you can answer "Brahman doesn't produce anything, Maya and the world doesn't really exist" but for me it's words that don't explain anything and they don't solve the problem of: how do you go from a Brahman like that to a plurality of things, Maya included.
Because your entire life has been included within the one single continuum of undivided, formless, transparent, undecaying, self-illumining sentience to which all sense of 'I' ultimately refers back to directly or indirectly. This same formless sentience is Brahman itself, and it has never created anything, that this formless continuum of sentience (which is what you actually are) is even seeming to be associated with 'your' mind and body(which are not you) is itself the illusion. In spiritual illumination it's revealed that there was just this formless and self-revealing non-dual awareness being the only thing existing in absolute reality, the seeming association of it with the intellect, and the attribution of the intellects activities to this consciousness was part of the nescience engender by Brahman's power, when it's removed, one sees 'ah, this formless sentience which has been with me illumining my mind for the whole of my existence is actually unconditioned and timeless, and it didn't actually have any real relationship with the intellect that I was associating it with, but this error persisted due to indiscrimination". Brahman doesn't "go" from oneness and clarity to illusion, the Jivas are beginningless because they are beginningless images of Brahman, there was never an original loss of clarity or liberation/enlightenment for Brahman, the Jivas sustained by His power have been in spiritual slumber for all eternity.

>> No.17480434

>>17480424
The fact that Brahman forms the actual indwelling sentience of every Jiva in the sense of being the consciousness illumining their intellects is what allows the Jivas to exist in conditional reality without beginning and then be liberated. The unreal illusory aspect of the Jiva's experience is explained as being Brahman's power, the seeming real experience of that illusion by the Jiva is not the experiencing of anything by consciousness, which doesn't actually ever experience anything, but it is due to the Jiva having beginningless nescience that causes them to have a lack of discrimination between the Self or consciousness and the Jiva's intellect illumined by the Self's light. So there is never any "going from" Brahman to a plurality or change, because there is just the one infinite and completely changeless Brahman wielding His power forever, and sense of multiplicity and change are like false privations that Brahman seems to impose upon Himself (from the Jivas perspective), but once these are removed, the underlying unity of Brahman shines forth. Consider a long hallway with a very high-powered lamp at one end, the hallway contains sliding very thin Japanese paper sliding doors every 6 or 8 feet, but the lamp is so powerful that it's light shines and permeates through every single doorway in the hallway, it's illumination shining through all of them. When you are in the hallway and the doors are closed and you are only seeing the light coming through the doors, it seems like the paper doors are filled with light and are luminous by nature, but once all the doors are drawn back, you see that there was just the same lamp, remaining unchanging and the same, that had been imparting its light to the hallway and that the doors and hallway were not luminous themselves. In a similar way, once the privations or superimpositions on Brahman are removed, the light that had always been an undivided and unchanging reveals itself as such.

>> No.17480440

>>17480434
>You often give the image of the dream but why would Brahman dream to begin with?
Brahman doesn't dream, Brahman is entirely unaffected by Maya, Brahman is uninterrupted, non-dual, self-revealing and immediate consciousness that is free from the distinctions of knower, known and means of knowning, which entirely precludes Brahman from having dreams or maya-illusions as the object of its knowledge as 'this'.
>You say that Maya deludes him but why would he have/create Maya, this second, to begin with?
There is no reason for it, reasons are just causes spoken of differently. If there was a reason for God or Brahman to do things, then Brahman would be caused or led by that reason to do things, but if Brahman is caused by things like reasons to behave a certain way, then Brahman is no longer the transcendent source of causation while existing outside of causation. There is absolutely no way to say without an inherent contradiction that "reasons for doing things" pertain to God while at the same time making God outside the web of causal relations. God or Brahman existing outside and anterior to causal relations necessitates that God and His nature (in this case, that of always wielding maya) be uncaused and without any reason for its existence other than that it is God's uncaused eternal nature. In order for there to be a reason for Brahman to wield maya, that reason would have to pre-exist Brahman, which is impossible.
>In short, I have the impression that this stage, the passage from one to multiple, is the most sensitive stage in non-dual metaphysics and yet I have never seen anything comprehensible at this level. Theists, who accept some form of reality to the God-world duality, have much less difficulty in explaining the generation of things.
It is one of the most sensitive things to explain to others who have not studied the doctrine, but in my opinion Advaita gives an entirely consistent and working explanation of how it works, you can find this in Shankara's bhasya on Gaudapada's Mandukya Karika. Theists don't have to make recourse to maya, but Advaita rejects the model of real creation (either from ex-nihilio or emanationist) as being logically untenable for involving contradictions in the act of generation that violate God's complete immutability, this is also explained in the text I just listed.

>> No.17480614

>>17480192
>Brahman's consciousness which is always wielding His power
There is clearly a duality there.
Brahman/his power

>> No.17480663

>>17480614
>There is clearly a duality there.
So? Advaita says that it's a non-dual system in the sense of Atman and Brahman being non-different, and they also maintain that in absolute reality there is just non-dual Brahman alone; other dualities just pertain to things that exist only at the level of conditional reality, but nothing in conditional reality establishes a real duality with anything in absolute reality, because the former is sublated and negated as not having real existence, while the latter isn't. In order for there to be a duality that would present a problem for Advaita doctrine that duality would have to persist at the level of absolute reality, but nothing in Advaita does except Brahman Himself. Maya doesn't exist as a distinct entity from Brahman in absolute reality where there is just Brahman alone. Maya itself is sublated as not having really existed to begin with in liberation.

That Brahman does this follows from Brahman being omnipotent. Brahman is omnipotent as the Supreme Lord who is the author of causation, space and time. Maya is that Lord's omnipotence made manifest or expressed as generative magical illusion. Brahman's omnipotent does not exist in a duality with Brahman but is His nature. Maya insofar as it is the illusory generative power flowing from Brahman's omnipotence exists within and making up the conditional reality, but on the level of absolute reality there is just the omniscient Brahman alone without maya existing alongside Him. Brahman's omniscience makes maya only exist at the level of conditional reality, so there is no duality persisting in absolute reality in Advaita since there is no duality between an entity and its own nature.

>> No.17480709

>>17480663
And what do u have to say 'bout:
>>17470217
>>17472867

>> No.17480814

>>17480709
Christcuck schizobabble

>> No.17480930

>>17480814
Actually there are a lot a good points made

>> No.17480947

https://join.skype.com/invite/iqob9YGrR3Ap for butterfly

>> No.17480953

>>17480930
Not really
All the "points" are based on false assumptions that require you take the christian position as truth to be valid

>> No.17480960

>>17480930
>>17480953
And also the typical "anything that isn't my jew worship is atheist nihilism" even though abrahamists are pretty much the only ones to believe in the survival of the ego after death

>> No.17481014

>>17470217
>>17480709
>How can the saints of the Dharmic religions be truly compassionate when they deny the absoluteness of morality (the absolute is no longer the Absolute Good but Neutral) and the reality of people (either partially in Hinduism where jiva is illusory or totally in Buddhism).
1) not every Hindu schools denies the absoluteness of morality and the reality of people (i.e. individualities), Vishishtadvaita and Dvaita don't deny the absoluteness of morality I believe, Vishishtadvaita only partially denies individuality and Dvaita doesn't at all.
2) When you regard other living beings as being animated by the same intelligence that animates you, then compassion and moral behavior naturally results from this, because in this situation then harming other living beings means that you are harming something that is also animated by you or your consciousness, so you are harming yourself more or less.
3) The Eastern or Hindu conception of saints and holiness is different from the Christian conception of sainthood, the latter is the embodiment of Christian virtues, the typical Hindu conception of the saint is that of the awakened sage who has attained to the supreme reality.
>How to be holy when morality is illusory,
Because holy to the Hindu has connotations of purity, enlightenment, clarity, liberation, auspiciousness, these do not have any intrinsic relation with other people or society like morality does, they can all simultaneously abide in the same person doing yoga on his lonesome in some mountain cave far from society. The Upanishads provide a list of essential virtues that people on the spiritual path are supposed to follow regardless of morality being illusory. that morality does not exist in absolute reality for Advaita does not change the situation that immoral behavior like greed, being angered to violence, sexual licentiousness etc all act as insurmountable impediments to liberation until one overcomes them, despite the moral connotations or morality associated with them not existing as some sort of Platonic form in absolute reality.

Now Tapas (austerity, meditation), Dāna (charity, alms-giving), Arjava (sincerity, uprightness and non-hypocrisy), Ahimsa (non-violence) and Satya-vacanam (telling truth), these are the Dakshina (gifts, payment to others) he gives [in life].

—Chandogya Upanishad 3.17.4

>> No.17481024

>>17481014
>how to be compassionate/loving when there is no real relationship between two real people?
So, classic Advaita Vedanta doesn't give advice to people living normal lives in the world on how to be compassionate despite everything being Brahman, because classic Advaita Vedanta only initiates people into their teachings who become monks. If you don't become a monk to pursue liberation, then they would say why bother yourself with such questions? In any case, compassionate behavior and the avoidance of harm is the natural result which happens without any decision-making involved when you sense and know as true in your heart that others are identical with yourself.
>If these paths do not make people holy, and do not diminish the suffering of the world, what good are they?
They forever uproot the suffering of the person who treads them and allow that person to realize their unity with God, wherein lies their main purpose and justification.
>How do you cope with the fact that there is no survival of personality after death in Hinduism, any more than in atheism, since everything that constitutes a person's personality and differentiates one person from another (jiva) disappears at death?
Advaita says that Brahman is the person or personality and that the jiva is the false individuality. God or Brahman is the all-pervasive person who abides inside every individuality. Guenon writes about this in his chapter on the distinction between the Self and ego in his book on Vedanta:

>It follows from this that human individuality is at once much more and much less than Westerners generally suppose it to be: much more, because they recognize in it scarcely anything except the corporeal modality, which includes but the smallest fraction of its possibilities; much less, however, because this individuality, far from really constituting the whole being, is but one state of that being among an indefinite multitude of other states. Moreover the sum of all these states is still nothing at all in relation to the personality, which alone is the true being, because it alone represents its permanent and unconditioned state, and because there is nothing else which can be considered as absolutely real. All the rest is, no doubt, real also, but only in a relative way by reason of its dependence upon the Principle and insofar as it reflects it in some degree, as the image reflected in a mirror derives all its reality from the object it reflects and could enjoy no existence apart from it; but this lesser reality, which is only participative, is illusory in relation to the supreme Reality as the image is also illusory in relation to the object; and if we should attempt to isolate it from the Principle, this illusion would become a pure and simple non-entity. We thus observe that existence, that is to say conditioned and manifested being, is at once real in one sense and illusory in another

>> No.17481032

>>17481024

https://sufipathoflove.files.wordpress.com/2019/04/1925-man-and-his-becoming-according-to-the-vedc3a2nta.pdf

So, to answer your question, the person or personality always survives and continues because it is God or Brahman Himself, and the only things which don't are the illusory individualities imposed upon Brahman. If you regard yourself as being this personality which continues on and that is distinct from the individuality, then you don't fear the death of the body. If you identity yourself with that which you are not in reality (the individuality) then you will wrongly fear its passing, like if you were playing a video game and believe yourself to be the character, and you began to fear the possibility of your video game avatar dying. The Jiva also doesn't disappear at the death but the subtle body of the Jiva transmigrates from life to life, sometimes carrying subtle traces or influences from its the previous life and the unmanifested karma or karma that has yet to fructify of all previous lives. The egoistic identity of that individuality dies and doesn't continue, but the underlying person viz. Brahman does, and the subtle body which is the host of each newly-arisen egoistic identity in each life continues to transmigrate.

>Basically, the Hinduist should fear death and the annihilation of his person as much as the atheist, even if he may try to reassure himself intellectually by saying that Consciousness does not die; he and all those he has loved will die, definitively, making all life meaningless and morality absurd
When you say that Consciousness does not die, and then that he will die, it's a contradiction, since the "he" in question is the Consciousness that doesn't die. The thing that dies never had intelligence or sentience to begin with, it is like an inert machine that stops working after there is no longer an intelligence or intelligent being maintaining and operating it; so since "he" or the Hindu doesn't really die since "he" and all beings are actually the Atman, it doesn't produce the same meaninglessness or absurdity as atheism. Hinduism also generally admits that there is a sub-moksha attainment where people can attain to a heaven-like realm called Brahmaloka which lasts until the end of any given cycle of of universal manifestation. You can attain moksha while there, and after the cycle of universal manifestation is over everyone in the Brahmaloka who didn't attain moksha enters into transmigration again at the start of a new cycle. Theoretically though since the people who enter in Brahmaloka acquire divine powers and can have whatever experiences they want there (not dissimilar to the Islamic paradise) people could encounter their loved ones (that is to say, the subtle bodies of both of the lovers could encounter each other, even though both really have the same Atman) there if both of them enter into Brahmaloka after the death of the body.

>> No.17481046

>>17480953
>All the "points" are based on false assumptions that require you take the christian position as truth to be valid
how is:
>>17470251
based on/compatible with christian faith you dummy?

>> No.17481052

>>17481046
I was only talking about the post guenonfag replied to above you, not the other ones you quoted

>> No.17481114

>>17481014
>2) When you regard other living beings as being animated by the same intelligence that animates you, then compassion and moral behavior naturally results from this, because in this situation then harming other living beings means that you are harming something that is also animated by you or your consciousness, so you are harming yourself more or less
That's what I'm saying: this metaphysics makes love and compassion impossible, since every generous act becomes a selfish act. There can be no love and compassion without two real people.

>The Upanishads provide a list of essential virtues that people on the spiritual path are supposed to follow regardless of morality being illusory. that morality does not exist in absolute reality for Advaita does not change the situation that immoral behavior like greed, being angered to violence, sexual licentiousness etc all act as insurmountable impediments to liberation until one overcomes them, despite the moral connotations or morality associated with them not existing as some sort of Platonic form in absolute reality.
Doesn't advaita vedanta also prohibit sexual/lovely relations (brahmacarya)? While allowing to die on the battlefield (Gita). Seems pretty life-denying.
>because classic Advaita Vedanta only initiates people into their teachings who become monks
Are you sure? Yet they recognize Ramana Maharshi, who was a liberated saint without being a monk. Liberation is quite accessible to civilians, it's just that they won't have the framework to teach it and transmit it effectively like monks do. And even without seeking liberation, you can improve your karma to be reborn into better lives/planes of existence. No need to be a monk to practice yoga, bhakti, jnana.
>They forever uproot the suffering of the person who treads them
This is false, because the jiva always remains the jiva, and the atman was already free. So no one is ever released.

>> No.17481137
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17481137

>>17481032
and what's your answer to:
>>17470225
>>17470251
>>17470279
>>17470373
those are my last questions.

>> No.17481145
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17481145

>>17481137

>> No.17481170

>>17470225
>what criteria should we choose?
I don't believe that you can arrive at the decision of what religion to believe in on the basis of logical steps that can be mapped out from beginning to end, which anyone could read and follow along and be convinced by and see the truth of like a math problem. Are you familiar with the Gettier problem which points out that the typical designation of knowledge as "justified true belief" actually fails to rule out cases which are not correct knowledge? The implication of it is that there is no way to actually come up with a consistent epistemology of how to arrive at correct knowledge that isn't ultimately relying on circular definitions and assumptions. The Gettier problem was first written about (as far as I'm aware) in the 12th century by the Advaitin philosopher and poet Śrīharṣa. I have not encountered any convincing refutation of it yet. This was already something I intuitively accepted, but the Gettier problem is one of the reasons why I hold that there is no foolproof epistemological criteria when it comes to choosing religions and evaluating which claims they make are right. I think that people just have to follow their hearts.

Reason has its own place in the grand scheme of things and should not be discounted, and it's partially because its theology seems more rational than other doctrines that I perceive Advaita as more likely to be correct, but at the end of the day it's still something that I accept as true because it makes sense to me intuitively (logically too, but for me the intuition was more important and it was later confirmed and supported by my rational analysis of it), I found in reading Shankara that what he said about consciousness etc in his writings clearly appeared to me to be intuitively correct, and this was for me confirmed by my own analysis of my own consciousness and lived experience and comparing it to what he says about them, and so in that way it's self-evidently correct to me.

>what makes you believe in Hinduism more than in Catholicism when you see the resurrection of Christ?
Reading Shankara's writings and seeing what he has to say about the nature of experience, consciousness, causation etc are what make me believe in Hinduism more than Catholicism. I have not seen the resurrection of Christ firsthand so it doesn't make much of an impression on me, although I don't dare to claim that it never happened. Seeing paranormal events happen right in front of me when I was in my teens including seeing objects moving that should not have moved on their own had a bigger impact upon me and how I view the world and made me question materialism and other things in a much more fundamental way than learning about the resurrection of Christ ever did for me, because I saw those things firsthand and they were undeniable.

>> No.17481218

>>17470225
Why should the resurrection of Christ be taken as particularly impressive? Superpowers have existed in dharmic religions since before Christianity. I don't know if Jesus came back to life but even if he did, that's not enough of an incentive to get me to be a Christian.

>> No.17481245

>>17470279
>What do you think of this? It seems that the Hindu scriptures have been altered
The Puranas like the Bhavishya Purana are basically apocryphal scriptures, they don't posses the status of being infallible and revealed scriptures like the Upanishads, because the Upanishads are sruti and the Puranas are smriti. The Upanishads originate from the early to mid 1st millenium BC, long before any notable contact with the west.

So for that reason, the altering of some Puranas is not something that really changes my viewpoint on anything. They are basically large fan-fictions composed of an amalgamation of myths, philosophical content, lists of pilgrimage locations, descriptions of historical events and so on all rolled into one large text which people often added to over the centuries.

>>17470298
Ramana Maharshi was not initiated into sannyasin by a Guru, not did he formally initiate others. He did not belong to the initiatic lineage or Guru-parampara of any sampradaya. Taking darshan from non-initiated or non-ordained people like Ramana Maharshi is not the same as taking formal initiation into a sampradaya. There exist other sampradayas within Hinduism which have similar metaphysics to Advaita and which teach that initiated householders can attain Self-realization, like the Veerashaivas and Sri Vidya, I would direct people to join real schools with long histories behind them like these instead of following people who don't possesses both the lineage and ability to bestow it, regardless of whether or not they may have attained very similar states of realization on their own. Some of Ramana Maharshi's positions like his acceptance of Drishti-srishti-vada would be rejected by Advaita as Shankara refutes this very position when arguing against Yogachara Buddhism in his Brahma Sutra Bhasya; did Ramana accept this doctrine because he wasn't initiated into Shankara's lineage? I can only speculate.

>> No.17481277

>>17470251
wtf i never thought of that

>> No.17481291

>>17481137
>and what's your answer to:
>>17470251
There is nothing for me to say to this post. I consider the Buddhist-style epistemic non-dualism he is talking about as being a dead-end that just leads to an empty vacuity that is a pseudo-enlightenment, like how getting a lobotomy stops excessive mental ruminations but without producing gnosis. The Shentong tradition arose in Tibetan Buddhism as a response to and as a correction of that posters position.
>>17470373
I consider arguing with physicalists largely a waste of time. In the philosophy of mind threads that occur here are explaining why epiphenomenalism, emergentism and functonalism and other physicalist explanations for consciousness are ridiculous, you can find these arguments in the archives or by reading about them online, but I have no reason to recap them here.

>> No.17481418

>>17481114
>That's what I'm saying: this metaphysics makes love and compassion impossible, since every generous act becomes a selfish act. There can be no love and compassion without two real people.
Impossible in what way? That love and generosity cannot happen and be experienced as empirically-real on our plane of shared existence? Advaita doesn't deny this but admits that we can experience this in the world and have it be real for practical purposes. Or that love cannot be an absolute truth existing independently and eternally, of which people partake when they are in love? Advaita denies the latter and says that only Brahman is eternal and independently existing; this doesn't preclude love and compassion from happening on the plane of conventional existence though. For Advaita, that love and compassion are not real in an absolute sense is not a problem since Advaita is an ammoral (not immoral) metaphysics, or a liberation ontology. Love and compassion is not one of it's concerns. This may seem like a problem to someone with Christian attitudes but it's not a concern for Advaita, especially since their teachings still result in Advaita monks acting morally by default anyway.
>Doesn't advaita vedanta also prohibit sexual/lovely relations (brahmacarya)?
Only for ascetic monks or sannyasin who have renounced the world, which is pretty standard for senior monks/ascetics in any religion.
>While allowing to die on the battlefield (Gita). Seems pretty life-denying.
Arjuna was a kshatriya and was not a sannyasin at the point in the Mahabharata when the Gita occurs, he was not subject to the same rules that sannyasin follow. As a kshatriya it was his duty to fight.
>Are you sure?
Yes I am, Shankara is unequivocal in his works that one cannot be liberated in this life on earth without both renunciation and initiation into monkhood.

>> No.17481452

>>17481291
Thank you for all your answers.

Actually, I didn't have Buddhist thought in mind at all when I wrote this. I'm relying on fairly classical Western epistemology (Duhem, Popper), and I thought you would agree with this message because I can't see how anyone can deny it.

Just as a set of physical facts can always be explained by an infinite number of possible scientific theories, and the scientist just has to choose the most likely one without ever having metaphysical certainty, an experiment can never tell us anything that is certainly True.

For example: the reincarnation of Jesus, can be explained by an infinity of theories and metaphysical frameworks, and does not necessarily confirm Christianity, as you said.

So even the ultimate experience of the advaita, the experience of non-duality where one realizes the identity between the atman and the brahman, does not tell us anything metaphysical certainly True. An infinite number of theories can account for this experience, and we are already seeing physicalist theories of consciousness emerging that seek to account for these non-dual states, by analyzing the brain with MRIs and finding that the centers of distinction between personal identity and the world are weakening.

In the end, therefore, we can never know anything.

Like I said :

>Experiments never offer certainty, Truth with a capital T, and rational arguments no more (that's why mystical ways often call for overcoming rationality).
>In the end, all that remains is silence of Wittgenstein and the absence of taking any position that Nagarjuna was talking about.

>> No.17481461

>>17481418
>Yet they recognize Ramana Maharshi, who was a liberated saint without being a monk.
Ramana actually did live as a monk at his ashram at Arunachala, Ramana was just not formally initiated into any ascetic order or school of monks as is normally done in Hinduism, where someone seeking to become a monk would seek out and join the Dashnami Sampradaya or the Ramanandi Sampradaya etc. The Advaitin temples and their monks generally did not criticize Ramana Maharshi, but they never recognized him as someone possessing the Advaita lineage or as someone who could formally initiate people into the tradition of Advaita. Ramana himself never initiated anyone or took anyone as his disciple, people would just come and talk to him and sit in his presence taking in his gaze, but this is not the same as initiation.
>Liberation is quite accessible to civilians,
Not in traditional Advaita, but this is only held as true by other schools or by people outside the bounds of orthodox Advaita orders.
>And even without seeking liberation, you can improve your karma to be reborn into better lives/planes of existence. No need to be a monk to practice yoga, bhakti, jnana.
I agree completely
>This is false, because the jiva always remains the jiva, and the atman was already free. So no one is ever released.
I agree that is correct, but for the sake of convention I was speaking in line with how beings normally regard themselves as being the body and mind i.e. jiva. When they are freed from this misidentification that delusion of the jiva ends, but the Atman they were the whole time is and was already forever free, the Atman is not released but It is just no longer obscured by the jivas superimpositons.

>> No.17481514
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17481514

I've always found advaita védanta both great and wobbly. It is brilliant in its analysis of the atman, when it identifies our identity with our phenomenal consciousness. It makes us realize that Being and Consciousness are two sides of the same coin for the conscious beings that we are. But even having gone back to our most radical source, to our Consciousness-Being, there is still a gulf between that and identification with the presupposed Brahman. A creature goes back to its root, its Consciousness-Being, without which its universe would not exist, and concludes that it is the source of the universe. But no, it only goes back to the source of its personal universe, and applies a solipsistic logic. The universe could be totally physical and without Brahman, the same thing would be possible for her: she goes back to its source, not to the source of everything. She takes her universe for the universe as a whole. It's very selfish. I don't know if I'm clear.

>> No.17481522

>>17481452
>So even the ultimate experience of the advaita, the experience of non-duality where one realizes the identity between the atman and the brahman, does not tell us anything metaphysical certainly True.
How would you know for sure if you haven't experienced it? If hypothetically it occurred and it occurred in such a paradigm-shifting and earth-shattering manner so as to completely erase all doubt you may have possessed as to it not being real, then why would someone still doubt it? What way do we have to valid such things outside of immediate experience, and if that immediate experience doesn't validate them, what does?
>An infinite number of theories can account for this experience, and we are already seeing physicalist theories of consciousness emerging that seek to account for these non-dual states, by analyzing the brain with MRIs and finding that the centers of distinction between personal identity and the world are weakening.
This does not challenge the Vedanta doctrine at all though, since they say that consciousness exists outside the body, and indeed beyond or outside time and space, (or rather time and space are inside consciousness) and so observable changes in brain states don't really inform us about or disprove that thesis.
>In the end, therefore, we can never know anything.
I disagree, I think that the ultimate experience of knowing non-duality validates itself without having recourse to anything else.

>> No.17481528

>>17481514
Basically: a creature goes back to the source of its existence and thinks that it is the source of all existence, limiting the universe of creatures to its personal universe. It inflates its subjectivity.

>> No.17481560

>>17481522
>How would you know for sure if you haven't experienced it? If hypothetically it occurred and it occurred in such a paradigm-shifting and earth-shattering manner so as to completely erase all doubt you may have possessed as to it not being real, then why would someone still doubt it?
People on DMT are also certain of their trips, I'm not sure the psychological absence of doubt is a reliable factor.

>I disagree, I think that the ultimate experience of knowing non-duality validates itself without having recourse to anything else.
It is self-validating that consciousness cannot be denied. That does not validate all the intellectual metaphysics that follows.

>> No.17481612

>>17481514
>A creature goes back to its root, its Consciousness-Being, without which its universe would not exist, and concludes that it is the source of the universe. But no, it only goes back to the source of its personal universe, and applies a solipsistic logic.
The doctrine that the Atman-Brahman is the source of the universe is not reached in Advaita on the basis of some empirical analysis which says "I am", "the universe exists through my being", "therefore I am the source of the universe" but they would instead condemn that as unwarranted leaps of logic. The doctrine that the Atman-Brahman is the source of the universe is accepted because it is taught by the Upanishads which are accepted by Vedanta as revealed and irrefutable scriptures, it's a theological exegesis which involves taking as a given certain claims of the Upanishads which are then supplemented and supported with logical arguments, but these positions themselves are not reached through a process of logical deduction. The Vedanta doesn't believe or accept that the Vedic sages produced the Upanishads after a process of discussion and deduction but rather hold that they were revealed to the sages as already existing scriptures that Brahman sounded into their minds or whatever.

>> No.17481635

>>17481612
>The doctrine that the Atman-Brahman is the source of the universe is accepted because it is taught by the Upanishads which are accepted by Vedanta as revealed and irrefutable scriptures
It's even less convincing to me, but thanks for your honesty.

I understand that there is a need for this axiom, since I think that without it we can only go back to the atman, to realize that yes the atman IS the totality of OUR universe, is identical to OUR Being, but to then affirm that it is identical to Brahman, to THE universe and to THE objective Being, there is an impassable chasm.

>> No.17481669

>>17481560
>People on DMT are also certain of their trips, I'm not sure the psychological absence of doubt is a reliable factor.
Yes, but those are sublatable when they return from them, whereas the uprooting of ignorance and the dawning of Self-knowledge is not sublatable according to Advaita but it always remains once it happens. Only false experiences or things are sublated which indicates that the non-sublatable things are real.

>The Advaita tradition puts forward three lesser tests of truth: correspondence, coherence, and practical efficacy. These are followed by a fourth test of truth: epistemic-nonsublatability (abādhyatvam orbādhaṛāhityam). According to the Vedānta Paribhāṣa (a classical text of Advaita Vedānta) “that knowledge is valid which has for its object something that is nonsublated.” Nonsublatablity is considered as the ultimate criterion for valid knowledge. The master test of epistemic-nonsublatability inspires a further constraint: foundationality (anadhigatatvam, lit. “of not known earlier”). This last criterion of truth is the highest standard that virtually all knowledge claims fail, and thus it is the standard for absolute, or unqualified, knowledge, while the former criteria are amenable to mundane, worldly knowledge claims. According to Advaita Vedānta, a judgment is true if it remains unsublated. The commonly used example that illustrates epistemic-nonsublatabilty is the rope that appears as a snake from a distance (a stock example in Indian philosophy). The belief that one sees a snake in this circumstance is erroneous according to Advaita Vedānta because the snake belief (and the visual presentation of a snake) is sublated into the judgment that what one is really seeing is a rope. Only wrong cognitions can be sublated.

>> No.17481680

>>17481669
>The condition of foundationality disqualifies memory as a means of knowledge. Memory is the recollection of something already known and is thus derivable and not foundational. Only genuine knowledge of the Self, according to Advaita Vedānta, passes the test of foundationality: it is born of immediate knowledge (aparokṣa jñāna) and not memory (smṛti). Six natural ways of knowing are accepted as valid means of knowledge (pramāṅa) by Advaita Vedānta: perception (pratyakṣa), inference (anumāna), verbal testimony (śabda), comparison (upamana), postulation (arthapatti) and non-apprehension (anupalabdhi). The pramāṅas do not contradict each other and each of them presents a distinct kind of knowledge. Nonfoundational knowledge of Brahman cannot be had by any means but through Śruti, which is the supernaturally revealed text in the form of the Vedas (of which the Upaniṣads form the most philosophical portion).

https://iep.utm.edu/adv-veda/

>It is self-validating that consciousness cannot be denied. That does not validate all the intellectual metaphysics that follows.
I agree that all the gritty details of the metaphysics cannot be verified in the same way that the attainment of non-dual consciousness verifies itself as such when one experiences it for what it is; but if this attainment and related liberation and the end of ignorance leads to your no longer having the delusion of bondage and suffering, then whether or not the metaphysics that leads to that attainment is itself verified is of little practical concern at that point since you have already attained the fruit of the method being considered and are freed from all desires and concerns.

>> No.17481697

>>17481680
I unironically don't see the difference between that and an induced form of derealization.

>> No.17481749

>>17481680
>leads to your no longer having the delusion of bondage and suffering, then whether or not the metaphysics that leads to that attainment is itself verified is of little practical concern at that point since you have already attained the fruit of the method being considered and are freed from all desires and concerns.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depersonalization

>> No.17481791

>>17481635
>but to then affirm that it is identical to Brahman, to THE universe and to THE objective Being, there is an impassable chasm
An impossible chasm to prove irrefutably with logic perhaps, although after accepting it on the basis of scripture Advaita offers arguments in their works for why it's the most likely scenario; such as for example they present various arguments against the possibility of an eternal and immutable God creating or emanating the world as something separate from Himself, because of how these typically or often (maybe always?) involve actions that contradict God being perfectly immutable and eternal. But at the same time Advaita insists that only God or Brahman accounts for the existence of our universe, often agreeing with the western tradition of classical Theism on many points when it argues for this. So, when you combine these two discussions, you have conditions that demand the existence of God for them to be accounted for, but at the same time they indicate the impossibility of God or Brahman ever emanating or creating the universe as a separate thing from Himself. So the conclusion that results from this is that Brahman necessarily exists but never divided Himself or created anything as separate from Himself and that the Atman in the living being is not different from the ultimate source of everything. So, they have arguments for why the position that their scriptures teach is the more logical position and why all the alternative answers are not logically feasible; while at the same time accepting that gnosis or the fulfillment of the spiritual path is a suprarational endeavor that is not reached through logic.

>> No.17481831

>>17481749
>>17481697
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depersonalization
>Individuals who experience depersonalization feel divorced from their own personal self by sensing their body sensations, feelings, emotions, behaviors etc. as not belonging to the same person or identity.[7][permanent dead link] Often a person who has experienced depersonalization claims that things seem unreal or hazy. Also, a recognition of a self breaks down (hence the name). Depersonalization can result in very high anxiety levels, which further increase these perceptions.[8]
There is no loss of recognition of the Self in liberation, nor is there any anxiety in liberation. Depersonalization results from mental confusion, liberation in Advaita is not confused but is the acme of clarity.

>> No.17481872

>>17462547
>If you want to read the Upanishads, work through them with editions and commentaries that aren't sectarian, or at least read an interpretation that is closer to the original meaning of the Upanishads
Such as...?

>> No.17482446

>>17465012
>>17470774
Mahayana is fanfic