Buddhism after death

[Rick O'Shez]

Mind is luminous, but it's not the same as "we"/"I", that's why practice is needed. I mind wouldn't be luminous, there would be darkness.We are a play of shadows in this luminous field, diaphragm involved in ignorant chase driven by craving for becoming. The very working of this diaphragm is dependent origination, driven by stress/contraction. The purpose of practice it to observe its functioning to gain understanding, and remove all taints from it.

So are you equating ignorance with self-view here? Earlier you said it was not knowing the 4 Noble Truths.

 

[crossfire]

So are you equating ignorance with self-view here? Earlier you said it was not knowing the 4 Noble Truths.

In all fairness, the Sammaditthi Sutta: The Discourse on Right View mentions both ignorance of the four noble truths and the conceit "I am."

 

[Rick O'Shez]

In all fairness, the Sammaditthi Sutta: The Discourse on Right View mentions both ignorance of the four noble truths and the conceit "I am."

Yes, I see. So could we say it's self-view which leads to craving and aversion? So in dependent origination, feeling leads to craving when there is the incorrect assumption of "my feeling"?

 

[Banjankri]

So are you equating ignorance with self-view here? Earlier you said it was not knowing the 4 Noble Truths.

Self-view is the result of ignorance and craving. Craving in action, covered by not knowing about how it works.

 

[Rick O'Shez]

Self-view is the result of ignorance and craving. Craving in action, covered by not knowing about how it works.

I can see self-view being the result of ignorance, but how would there be craving without self-view? Isn't craving basically the sense of "I want...."?

 

[Banjankri]

I can see self-view being the result of ignorance, but how would there be craving without self-view?

Certainly, there must be craving for becoming before there is being an "I", or having a self-view. Craving is accompanied by delight and greed, it is like "gravity" which pulls toward the "good stuff". Instinct. It is also beginningless, a default.
“No first beginning of craving for becoming is made known, bhikkhus, before which there was no craving for becoming, and after which there came to be craving for becoming."
It's worth noticing that ignorance is presented in precisely the same way:
“No first beginning of ignorance is made known, bhikkhus, before which there was no ignorance, and after which there came to be ignorance."

 

[crossfire]

Yes, I see. So could we say it's self-view which leads to craving and aversion? So in dependent origination, feeling leads to craving when there is the incorrect assumption of "my feeling"?

Self views (atman or anatman) create what is known as "a thicket of views" that gets in the way of unbinding, so I would venture to say it is more of attachment, which is closely related to craving and aversion.

"As he attends inappropriately in this way, one of six kinds of view arises in him: The view I have a self arises in him as true & established, or the view I have no self... or the view It is precisely by means of self that I perceive self... or the view It is precisely by means of self that I perceive not-self... or the view It is precisely by means of not-self that I perceive self arises in him as true & established, or else he has a view like this: This very self of mine — the knower that is sensitive here & there to the ripening of good & bad actions — is the self of mine that is constant, everlasting, eternal, not subject to change, and will stay just as it is for eternity. This is called a thicket of views, a wilderness of views, a contortion of views, a writhing of views, a fetter of views. Bound by a fetter of views, the uninstructed run-of-the-mill person is not freed from birth, aging, & death, from sorrow, lamentation, pain, distress, & despair. He is not freed, I tell you, from suffering & stress.​

http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.002.than.html

 

[von bek]

I can see self-view being the result of ignorance, but how would there be craving without self-view? Isn't craving basically the sense of "I want...."?

For what it's worth, one of the monks I visit with believes that self-view or I is constructed at the "becoming" stage of the cycle of dependent origination. (With clinging as condition, becoming arises. With becoming as condition, birth arises.)

 

[Vishvavajra]

Perhaps, but I don't think you've made a convincing case yet, just a lot of loose assumptions. I don't accept the argument that everything in Buddhist texts is intended metaphorically, as I said there are many similes in the suttas but they are clearly labelled as such. Perhaps you're reading things in which aren't there because you're uncomfortable with the implications of the straightforward meaning?

Anyway, you've argued that textual references to birth and death don't make sense with the straightforward meaning, so how about providing some specific references which clearly demonstrate that?

I said I'd get to it if and when I can, which will probably be little by little as I snatch a moment here and there. The classicist in me is willing to indulge it and also see where it goes, but this idea of requiring scriptural basis for every teaching is uniquely Theravadin and not actually how most Buddhist operate, so it's not as if I have a list of citations at hand, ready to go the moment someone challenges my view of something. You'll have to be patient.

Incidentally, I'm currently reading the new translation of the Vimalakirti Sutra by the Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research, which our teacher specifically recommended as the best English edition yet, and it's interesting that they've gone with "generation and extinction (i.e. Samsara)" rather than the more common "birth and death," presumably for the reasons I've outlined. Since the context (Autonomous Dharma Bodhisattva's response on how one enters the Dharma gate of nonduality) refers explicitly to dharmas generally, not to persons in particular, this is one example of what I'm talking about. The bodhisattva's response is, "Sirs, generation and extinction (i.e., samsara) constitute a duality. Since the dharmas were fundamentally not generated, now they are without extinction. To attain this [understanding is to achieve] forbearance of the nonarising of dharmas. This is to enter the Dharma gate of nonduality."

That is to say, whether one uses "birth and death" or "generation and extinction" to refer to Samsara is a stylistic choice of the translator, and it's possible that "birth and death" is misleading in certain contexts, since people are so attached to the notion of selfhood that they tend to fixate on only one narrow meaning and miss the fact that the arising and cessation of phenomena is continuous and not restricted to a single context, even when the same basic language is used.

As for similes' being always clearly marked out, it's true that there's a formula for similes, as there tends to be in all ancient poetry, and it serves a particular pedagogical purpose in sutras, but it doesn't follow that everything else is literal. Buddhist thought doesn't have a concept of literalism or objectivity when it comes to words and language. Everything is a mental construct that is at best provisionally true, and its truth is only measurable by how skillful it is. Perhaps you haven't read enough Mahayana sutras, which will break your brain if read literally. That's intentional. It's also a natural development of the intellectual tradition, not something that came out of nowhere.

 

[Vishvavajra]

I think that's over-simplistic. Ignorance is like the default condition, the "natural" state of affairs, it will remain so indefinitely unless we create the conditions for wisdom to arise. It's analogous to the darkness in a deep cave, the darkness will remain indefinitely unless we bring down a torch to provide some illumination.

You could say that ignorance arises in dependence on an absence of wisdom, but that's chicken and egg.

I have no problem with that conceptualization. The danger arises in reifying ignorance and treating it as an existent thing, in which case you end up with the problem of where it comes from, and in which case suggesting that it is a causeless, elemental reality comes with serious doctrinal and practical problems.

If ignorance isn't really a thing in itself, there's no problem. The darkness metaphor is a classic one for a reason, I suspect. It gets the point across. It's also true that people can see all sorts of phantoms in the darkness, thanks to a trick of the optical system, so it also suggests the nuance whereby a passive ignorance leads to a more active delusion.

The question of why people are ignorant by default is still a valid one, though. The idea that our natural self-awareness or ego oversteps its bounds is a popular one these days, and I think it can be traced back to the 12 Links and so forth, with the addition of various developments in both traditional Buddhist and modern psychology. It's analogous to how anger serves an evolutionary purpose but can easily get out of hand and is therefore not seen as skillful. What does it have to do with the Links of Dependent Origination of Self-Conception? Well, that provides a cyclic, self-sustaining (though not self-existent) set of conditions that constantly reinforce the delusion of selfhood, which is ignorance in action. Practice of Buddhadharma can break that cycle by providing alternative conditions, allowing one to see clearly and not indulge in the delusion.

The fact that the sutra begins with ignorance doesn't suggest that ignorance is a preexistent entity or that the links aren't circular, but rather that one had to begin somewhere, and ignorance is a good starting point because it's also the point at which one can most easily take a different path with the application of wisdom, which is what the sutra is offering. Right view is, after all, the first step. Right practice and everything else flows from there. As always, it's a practical consideration.

That's the answer to the question of how ignorance arises in the individual sense, anyway. In the sense of where ignorance in general comes from, I'd say that "ignorance" is an abstract generalization that doesn't exist as such and therefore doesn't have or need a beginning point. All that matters is the ignorance that individuals suffer from, which leads to self-attachment and thus vexations, and I suppose that's been a problem at least as long as there have been humans, which in Buddhist terms might as well be infinite.

 

[Vishvavajra]

Perhaps you're reading things in which aren't there because you're uncomfortable with the implications of the straightforward meaning?

It's not as if I'm making this stuff up myself, or as if these are strictly modern reinterpretations. On the contrary, what I've said is inspired by the Madhyamika and Yogacara treatises against the positions of groups like the Sarvastivadins and Sautrantikas, as well as the Prajñaparamita literature generally, all of which demonstrates a very sophisticated phenomenology and thorough deconstruction of not only individual identity but also any basis for privileging the concept of a biological lifespan above other arbitrary delineations of phenomena (e.g. time, space, etc.), except perhaps as skillful means for those who need it. The idea that "birth and death" constitutes momentary phenomena on all levels, and that the contents of each moment are quantitatively as well as qualitatively different, is one that goes back nearly two millennia. You don't have to adopt these views, but it's a long and respectable tradition on which the majority of Buddhist schools today are built.

But do tell me what the "straightforward" meaning is. I think I can imagine what a literalist reading would get you, and I have a hard time seeing how it could make any sort of coherent sense, but I don't want to put words in your mouth or assume that I know what you believe. There's always the chance that we're just talking past each other.