Theos-Talk Archives (July 2004 Message tt00231)

Hi Daniel,

Thanks for that. The first link gives the following (though with
strange speling):

>> Buddha-nature vs. tman

Unlike the Western concept of "soul " or the Indian "tman",
Buddha-nature is not considered to be an isolated essence of a
particular individual, but rather a single unified essence shared by
all beings with Buddha-nature. However in the Mahayana version of the
Mahparinirva Sutra Tathgatagarbha is equated with Atman in direct
contradiction of the Buddhist doctrine of anatman. The Sutra contains
many Hindu Alternate references to Hindu elements and is thought to
have been composed during the Gupta Period which coincided with a
Hindu revival in India.>>

(tman stands for atman in this text)

However it is, if you look at the descriptions of atman in
theosophical literature, it is pretty clear that it too is not a
personal 'principle' but a universally diffused essence. Very much
like the Buddha-nature. It is the base of spiritual experiences where
the I seems to dissolve and the sense of seperateness between observer
and observed falls away.

Kheper.net says the following (and this is usually a good source):

>> In its classical form preserved in the Pali Theravada tradition it
proclaims the absence of substantial eternal «self», or atman as
empirical phenomenon replacing it by five skanhas, or groups of
elements (dharma) which may be understood as elementary and
ever-changing psycho-physical states as well as units of description
of these states. Nevertheless, early Buddhist texts said nothing about
atman in its Upanishadic sense, i.e. about Universal Self beyond
empirical states of consciousness. >>

The last centence especially makes my point: did the Buddha really
deny atman as it is meant in Blavatsky? From e-sangha I understand
that to direct questions on this subject Buddha answered that to
answer yes would be a mistake, but to answer no would also be a
mistake. So anatma isn't simply 'there is no atma'. {see quote at the
end of this rather long mail, right after my name}

Also - just to be clear here (there seems some doubt): Buddha did talk
about his previous lives
(http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/bps/leaves/bl135.html) . Karma IS
part of Budddhist lore. See for instance:
http://www.katinkahesselink.net/tibet/karma.html > So something does
reincarnate. What reincarnates is variously thought to be:

- karma itself (see last link)
- the skandhas (= habitual tendencies, roughly)
- the auric body / Alaya-vijnana (described in previous post here and
in upcoming Lucifer7)

Anatma does NOT mean annihiliation of everything after death. Nor does
even Nirvana mean annihilation of everything after death. I found
another article on that one (see the second article after I sign off)

Katinka

(1) excerpt from the Cula-Malunkyovada Sutta Majjhima Nikaya 63

"It's not the case that when there is the view, 'After death a
Tathagata exists,' there is the living of the holy life. And it's not
the case that when there is the view, 'After death a Tathagata does
not exist,' there is the living of the holy life. And it's not the
case that when there is the view, 'After death a Tathagata both exists
& does not exist,' there is the living of the holy life. And it's not
the case that when there is the view, 'After death a Tathagata neither
exists nor does not exist' there is the living of the holy life. When
there is the view, 'After death a Tathagata exists'... 'After death a
Tathagata does not exist'... 'After death a Tathagata both exists &
does not exist'... 'After death a Tathagata neither exists nor does
not exist,' there is still the birth, there is the aging, there is the
death, there is the sorrow, lamentation, pain, despair, & distress
whose destruction I make known right in the here & now.

"So, Malunkyaputta, remember what is undisclosed by me as undisclosed,
and what is disclosed by me as disclosed. And what is undisclosed by
me? 'The cosmos is eternal,' is undisclosed by me. 'The cosmos is not
eternal,' is undisclosed by me. 'The cosmos is finite'... 'The cosmos
is infinite'... 'The soul & the body are the same'... 'The soul is one
thing and the body another'... 'After death a Tathagata exists'...
'After death a Tathagata does not exist'... 'After death a Tathagata
both exists & does not exist'... 'After death a Tathagata neither
exists nor does not exist,' is undisclosed by me.

"And why are they undisclosed by me? Because they are not connected
with the goal, are not fundamental to the holy life. They do not lead
to disenchantment, dispassion, cessation, calming, direct knowledge,
self-awakening, Unbinding. That's why they are undisclosed by me.

"And what is disclosed by me? 'This is stress,' is disclosed by me.
'This is the origination of stress,' is disclosed by me. 'This is the
cessation of stress,' is disclosed by me. 'This is the path of
practice leading to the cessation of stress,' is disclosed by me. And
why are they disclosed by me? Because they are connected with the
goal, are fundamental to the holy life. They lead to disenchantment,
dispassion, cessation, calming, direct knowledge, self-awakening,
Unbinding. That's why they are disclosed by me.

"So, Malunkyaputta, remember what is undisclosed by me as undisclosed,
and what is disclosed by me as disclosed." 

(2) Nibbana

by Thanissaro Bhikkhu

We all know what happens when a fire goes out. The flames die down and
the fire is gone for good. So when we first learn that the name for
the goal of Buddhist practice, nibbana ( nirvana ), literally means
the extinguishing of a fire, it's hard to imagine a deadlier image for
a spiritual goal: utter annihilation.

It turns out, though, that this reading of the concept is a mistake in
translation, not so much of a word as of an image. What did an
extinguished fire represent to the Indians of the Buddha's day?
Anything but annihilation.

According to the ancient Brahmans, when a fire was extinguished it
went into a state of latency. Rather than ceasing to exist, it became
dormant and in that state -- unbound from any particular fuel -- it
became diffused throughout the cosmos. When the Buddha used the image
to explain nibbana to the Indian Brahmans of his day, he bypassed the
question of whether an extinguished fire continues to exist or not,
and focused instead on the impossibility of defining a fire that
doesn't burn: thus his statement that the person who has gone totally
" out " can't be described.

However, when teaching his own disciples, the Buddha used nibbana more
as an image of freedom. Apparently, all Indians at the time saw
burning fire as agitated, dependent, and trapped, both clinging and
being stuck to its fuel as it burned. To ignite a fire, one had to "
seize " it. When fire let go of its fuel, it was " freed, " released
from its agitation, dependence, and entrapment -- calm and unconfined.

This is why Pali poetry repeatedly uses the image of extinguished fire
as a metaphor for freedom. In fact, this metaphor is part of a pattern
of fire imagery that involves two other related terms as well.

Upadana, or clinging, also refers to the sustenance a fire takes from
its fuel. Khandha means not only one of the five " heaps " ( form,
feeling, perception, thought processes, and consciousness ) that
define all conditioned experience, but also the trunk of a tree. Just
as fire goes out when it stops clinging and taking sustenance from
wood, so the mind is freed when it stops clinging to the khandhas.

Thus the image underlying nibbana is one of freedom. The Pali
commentaries support this point by tracing the word nibbana to its
verbal root, which means " unbinding " . What kind of unbinding? The
texts describe two levels.

One is the unbinding in this lifetime, symbolized by a fire that has
gone out but whose embers are still warm. This stands for the
enlightened arahant, who is conscious of sights and sounds, sensitive
to pleasure and pain, but freed from passion, aversion, and delusion.

The second level of unbinding, symbolized by a fire so totally out
that its embers have grown cold, is what the arahant experiences after
this life. All input from the senses cools away and he/she is totally
freed from even the subtlest stresses and limitations of existence in
space and time.

The Buddha insists that this level is indescribable, even in terms of
existence or nonexistence, because words work only for things that
have limits. All he really says about it -- apart from images and
metaphors -- is that one can have foretastes of the experience in this
lifetime, and that it's the ultimate happiness, something truly worth
knowing.

So the next time you watch a fire going out, see it not as a case of
annihilation, but as a lesson in how freedom is to be found in letting go.

• Access to Insight :
Readings in Theravada Buddhism
from the Pali Canon
> 
--- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, "Daniel H. Caldwell"
<danielhcaldwell@y...> wrote:
> Relevant to recent postings on the Mahatmas 
> and Buddhism, one might find the following
> articles very relevant:
> 
> http://selfknowledge.com/109715.htm
> 
> http://www.saigon.com/~anson/ebud/ebdha191.htm
> 
> http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Tathagatagarbha%20doctrine
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tathagatagarbha_doctrine
> 
> http://www.kheper.net/topics/Buddhism/doctrine_of_self.html
> 
> http://ccbs.ntu.edu.tw/FULLTEXT/JR-PHIL/need.htm
> 
> http://www.blavatskyarchives.com/reigle04.html
> 
> http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/jonang
> 
> http://www.people.freenet.de/gruschke.andreas/Jonang_paper_E.htm
> 
> Daniel
> http://hpb.cc