Theos-Talk Archives (January 2002 Message tt00066)

<<<Is this "Buddha" you speak of something which exists inherently or is this "Buddha" a fiction? Is this Buddha merely maya, in which case it would appear that we should not listen to this maya, because that would be merely to listen to an illusion.>>>

Bruce, yes, Mahayana Buddhists will tell you that ultimately even Buddha is maya. If you don't want to listen to maya, then where/what will you listen? Where will you find not-maya? Everything that we know is maya. Blavatsky is maya. Theosophy is maya. I don't understand the point that you are making here. Surely you don't think that Buddha was maya while Blavatsky was inherently real?



<<<But if we "should" listen to Buddha, then there must be some kind of reality to which we listen, some kind of "eternal Higher Self" which exists in a "Buddha field" of some sort.>>>

Buddha taught that the concept of a self is itself caused by ignorance, and is itself the root cause of maya and karma. Most people believe that their physical body is their self. Some believe that their mind or soul (some combination of matter and spirit) is their self, while others believe that spirit is their self. Blavatsky, like Buddha, taught that matter and spirit are two sides of the same coin - two aspects of the same thing. So what is the difference whether we believe in a physical self, a mental self, or a spiritual self? They are all inherently the same thing, and it is this "same thing" that I am saying is maya. A spiritual self is just as mayavic as a material self - two aspects of the same thing. Moving our belief system from matter to spirit is not the answer. Both matter and spirit have to be transcended.


<<<<In which case the very existence of this Buddha field or this Buddha, or the countless Buddhas, would suggest that there IS an eternal Higher Self, especially if, as many Buddhist writings teach, we are to find the "Buddha nature" within ourselves (sort of like the "Christ nature" of the Christians) -- which surely is not merely a matter of finding that our Buddha nature is merely maya and that everything finally has no meaning.>>>

The problem here, Bruce, is that our Buddha nature is not a self. There is not a single Buddhist school that will say that it is a self, spiritual or higher or whatever. It is not subjective. It is also not a thing and is not objective. It is equivalent to the monadic-essence of Theosophy, which is also neither subjective nor objective. What is it? Well, we use the term non-dual for it, but what non-dual means is esoteric and cannot be put into words very well. I can say that it is not subject and not object, but I can't tell you what it is because I don't know of any words for it.

Jerry S.

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