The Zennist

Then non-illusory self

I have read a goodly portion of the Pali Nikayas such that when I read them now I generally look for anything that I may have overlooked.  I rely heavily on Buddhist scholars, also, in the hope that they can show me something I’ve overlooked.

I have noticed over the years that such study helps me to form a pattern of Buddhism from which I can make, sometimes, a great leap forward seeing more of the forest of Buddhism than individual trees and shrubbery.

Just recently, I made one of those great leaps.  It concerns the Buddha’s notion of self or atman.  The kernel of it is this:  the self or atman in Buddhism always refers to what is not an illusion and finite, or the same, what is real in contrast with what is false, impermanent, and suffering.  When the Buddh said, with regard to the Five Aggregates, “This is not mine, I am not this, it is not my self” it was from the side of non-illusory self that he was speaking.  Directly, he saw the world, including his physical body, to be an illusion and his self as being real and non-illusory.   

Virtually, without exception, the Buddha’s discourses in the Pali canon that have to do with the Five Aggregates treat, invariably, the aggregates as being illusory; and something to be rejected since they are not the self.  

For example, form, which is the first aggregate, is said to be like foam.  Feeling, the second aggregate, is like a bubble.  A mental perception, the third, is like a mirage.  Latent volitions (samskâra) are like a plantain-tree (i.e., when the leaf-sheaths are taken away, no core remains).  Finally, consciousness is said to be like a juggler’s creation.  It is important to add to this that Five Aggregates are always impermanent and in a state of suffering in contrast to the self which is not fundamentally connected with the aggregates.

Never once did the Buddha deny the self, the self that he recognized to transcend the Five Aggregates.  But, on the other hand, the Buddha was also aware that many people lacking his insight might mistake one or more of the illusory Five Aggregates to be the self such that consciousness (i.e., sensory awareness), for example, might be taken to be the true self.  This is why, in one discourse, the Buddha said, “Those recluses and Brahmanas who while seeing in various ways see the self (atman), they actually see the five aggregates of attachment” (S. iii. 46).

The Buddha never departed from treating the atman or self as standing for what is non-illusory and real.  His views are entirely in accord with Hinduism which also treats the Atman in the same manner, i.e., as being completely non-illusory.  One could almost say that the Buddha was more thorough than any of his predecessors in removing the notion of self from any possibility of mistaking it for a finite mental condition or state such as consciousness.  On this score, the Five Aggregates covered every possible type of illusion from physical illusion such as form, to the most subtle of all, namely, the illusion of sensory consciousness or vijñâna.  

Craving

Very much, craving (trishna) as a study is very relevant to a modern secular society.  However, craving's modern excesses need not be mentioned here—they are obvious.  Notwithstanding this, craving as a serious religious issue for Buddhism will determine if we realize nirvana or remain stuck on the wheel of samsara.  

In the practice of Buddhism, unwholesome craving is something to be avoided.  This is not done for the sake of morality but because such craving blocks whatever opportunity we might have to see pure Mind emptied of its perturbations and win nirvana.  I hasten to add that the avoidance of unwholesome craving is instrumental enabling mind to recognize itself in its native purity.  In this light, craving is to be looked upon, not as a 'sin' but as a kind of spiritual navigation error which can end up being very costly. 

Craving, itself, is a lack or want—or we could say an incompleteness.  Craving, it should be mentioned, is not something apart from mind.  It falls completely within mind, itself.  To the question of who or what craves, it is mind (citta) that craves although the term craving (trishna) is not used specifically with mind.  However, other terms are used in conjunction with mind such as, chanda, upadana, and raga not to mention others.  Mind,we could also say, binds itself to its own phenomenal creations through craving.  Hence, any phenomenon is liable to induce in mind an attraction which then gives rise to a thirst or craving that has to be filled—but never is.  

Looking at someone of the opposite sex is a perfect example of the process of craving.  The more attractive in appearance someone of the opposite sex is for us, in proportion, craving arises also within us.  Such craving on the part of mind almost completely closes off any access to its pure nature.  Moreover mind, as a result of craving, becomes even more strongly bound to the body, consciousness and the five senses such, than it can’t separate from them, finding itself.

For the Buddha, the mind that is susceptible to craving and the perils of craving such a suffering and rebirth is the untrained mind.

A Western bias

Westerners generally conceive of mind as some sort of cognitive organ that is brain dependent and were it not for the brain would simply not exist.  This bias runs through the Western interpretation of Buddhism to some extent.  How much, it is difficult to say, exactly.  

With the ongoing research of neuroscience the place of mind or, if you like, consciousness, as anything incorporeal or fundamentally dimensionless, is being challenged while, at the same time, the unresolved question lingers, viz., is mind caused or causal?  And given that science would like to limit any causal agency such as a mind to something physical like a brain, Buddhism will face an uphill battle trying to prove, otherwise, that mind or citta is an immaterial, non-dimensional potency.

However, Buddhists should protest any tendency on the part of Western science to materialize the mind as if to make it seem to be brain produced.  For several thousand years both Hindu and Buddhist yogis, through personal experience, have learned to regard the mind as an increate potency which when put into the framework of modern scientific terms, is etheric.  In fact, the principle substance of the universe is mind—not matter, according to Buddhism, which I hasten to add is the real dividing line between East and West.  The West is simply addicted to materialism and can’t kick the habit—and certainly lets its cognitive biases stand in the way of real progress.

As far as the immaterial is considered, both Hindu and the Buddhist yogis, for well over two millennia, have understand that the material comes from the immaterial, the material being mind’s own resistance to itself which can be gradually overcomes such that one can, indeed, fully awaken to Mind, itself.  

To understand the potency of mind; to fully grasp that the world is mind-only and that as minds we are potentially free of birth and death, although it doesn’t seem to be the case, one has to follow the Buddha’s teaching or a comparable Hindu teaching in which mind is led to converge with itself; no longer being always dependent on an intermediary biological mirror (a painful mirror to be sure).

One-sided focus

Many Dharma centers (which includes Zen centers) focus more on meditation than understanding the discourses of the Buddha and other such works of a later period such as The Awakening of Faith or the Platform Sutra of Hui-neng.  Often Dharma centers might touch on some elements of Buddhism other than meditation but often do so on subjects which are geared to psychology.  

Still, there is a need for these centers to spend a great deal more time teaching what the Buddha taught, than teaching how to meditate.  But then of course this requires some knowledge of what the Buddha actually taught on the part of Dharma center teachers who, themselves, may not know very much about Buddhism—and for a very good reason.  Their teacher’s teacher who may have come from Japan didn’t know much about Buddhism except how to do zazen and do funerals.

Keep in mind that in Japan someone going to a respected Rinzai or Soto training monastery will learn virtually nothing about Buddhism or Zen.  It is all a kind of grand extended boot camp to turn sons of abbots into full-fledged abbots who will eventually inherit their father’s temple and wealth.  With this in mind, what has come to America and Europe by way of Japan, for example AZI (Association Zen Internationale), carries with it a very limited and sectarian view of Zen and, for that matter, Buddhism.  While the superstructure appears to be Buddhist, beneath it an authoritarian structure dominates to insure its own perpetuation. 

In some cases the only winners in the modern system of Dharma centers are those who are salaried and run these organizations.  For the most part, the losers are the people who contribute to these organizations who don’t learn very much Buddhism learning, instead, how to sit on a zafu; who are even told that sitting itself is Buddha Dharma or the same, the Buddha’s teaching!

Awareness of the samsaric moment

Pop Buddhism has a unique spin on Buddhism that reflects a small part of Buddhism while leaving out huge chunks.  The most prominent features of pop Buddhism that I see addressed are awareness, mindfulness, and living in the here and the now which I take, means being aware or mindful of the present moment.  What I don’t see discussed or mentioned are the specifics of how to reach nirvana and the important role of Mind (citta) in Buddhism which is not the same as being aware or mindful.  

If one were to believe the message of pop Buddhism is actually what the Buddha taught, then being aware of the present moment is nirvana and the end of suffering.  But rest assured, being aware of the present moment is never discussed in the canon of Buddhism as a means to nirvana or to the higher meditations.  

Buddhism is not a particularly big fan of the samsaric present or the samsaric future or the past, let alone being aware of it.  In the Ratnakuta Sutra a passage reads: “The past is gone, the future is not yet, and the present does not abide.”  If we consider that the present moment does not actually abide or persist, then being aware or mindful of it is an exercise in absurdity—not a means to nirvana.  

While I admit that it is useful to be aware of what you are doing, keeping your mind on the task at hand, nevertheless, it is important to also realize that our awareness is of samsara—not otherwise.  While being aware of the moment, our consciousness, to be sure, is hardly aware of the non-manifesting, infinite and luminous (D. i. 223) all of which pertain to nirvana.  

On the general notion of ‘awareness’, which is used a lot in Zen circles these days, pop Buddhists are probably using the term incorrectly.  Being fair, trying to guess what awareness might be in Pali and Sanskrit, I found in The Pali Text Society’s Pali-English Dictionary, the term appamâda, which seems to hit the mark.  It means thoughtfulness, carefulness, conscientiousness, watchfulness, vigilance, earnestness, zeal.  In Sanskrit, apramâda is defined pretty much the same, as attentive or careful.  As the reader can see, the scope of appamâda is much wider than awareness.  When the Dhammapada at verse 21 says appamâdo amatapadam (awareness is the path to the undying) the context points to a state of mind higher than being aware of the samsaric moment or the same, the samsaric here and now.  

In the Dhammapada’s context, awareness has more to do with good qualities and good conduct which “is the fundamental cause of all wholesome dhammas and for the benefit of others, pertaining to this world and the next” (Carter & Palihawadana, Dhammapada, 431).  Perhaps more to the point, awareness, by which we are always mindful, results from dedication to religious practices such as observing the precepts, meditating, and study. 

Personally, I have nothing against pop Buddhism—but it is not authentic Buddhism.  It is skillful means.  In enables the very immature (bala) to begin to establish good qualities and conduct in themselves so that at some later time they might decide to get serious about dumping the samsaric life.  But by no means should anyone take being aware of the present moment as being the alpha & omega of Buddhism—it ain't.

Dimensionless mind

Last week, thinking about dimensions and trying to find out more information about the subject (yes, even the ancient Chinese notion of dimensionality), it occurred to me, seemingly out of the blue, that the pure Mind, of which I preach a lot about on this blog, is without dimension or in Chinese “wu-hou”.

As I began to recall many passages from Buddhist Sutras and other works it became more apparent to me that the Buddha would have been very comfortable with calling Mind, non-dimension or the same, dimensionless.

As you might guess, treating Mind as a dimensionless and luminescent animative power might prove a pain in the arse for our neuroscientists who are busily trying to prove that mind springs from our multidimensional brain—and a computer.

“In particular it is important to leave open the possibility that minds might emerge not only in brains but also in radically different things such as computers” (Evian Gordon, Integrative Neuroscience, 58).

But now think about this:  what if our ordinary, everyday mind is, in fact, non-dimensional?  This would mean that it is intrinsically free of the corporeal body but only seems bonded to it out of ignorance.  With such a mind, how could a brain, which is certainly dimensional, give rise to something as dimensionless as our mind?  

On this track, for Mahayana Buddhism it is absurd that brains should produce minds.  Rather, instead, Mahayana Buddhism might say that the dimensional arises from the non-dimensional so that it makes perfect sense to say as the Lankavatara Sutra does, “cittam hi traidhâtukayonih”, i.e., the source of the triple world is Mind. (Yes, it is entirely plausible that the dimensional springs from the non-dimensional.)

Drawing further thoughts from this, we could say that the effective attainment of nirvana lies in uncovering the dimensionless Mind by means of special kinds of meditation.  On the other hand, samsara is when our ordinary mind, in a state of ignorance beginning at inception, strongly clings to the three dimensional brain and its body (skandhas) so that it believes this is mine, I am this, this is my self.

Nothing much has changed

Over the many centuries Zen and other sects of Buddhism have remained almost constant in one area:  the disease the Tathagata tried to cure, so we might see our Buddha-nature (or if you like the ultimate ground of Mind), is often mistaken for the cure!  

P'ei-hsiu, a ninth century T'ang Dynasty official who was a Zen adept, observes the following about the various Buddhists schools of his time which surprisingly seem to describe our own time.

"Thus, for the last several decades, the Teaching has been going to ruin.  [Pupils] take what they have received from their teachers as signboards with which they advertise themselves.  They take written teachings as spears and shields and attack each other, their sentiments varying according to whether they are attacking or defending.  Teachings are considered high or low depending on whether they are one's own or someone else's.  Right and wrong are confused and made complicated, and no one can tell them apart.  Thus, the various teachings of the buddhas and bodhisattvas of the past are now used to create controversy.  Latter-day people are adding to the affliction and disease—how can this be beneficial?" (J.C. Cleary, Zen Dawn, 10–11).

While Buddhist sects should be teaching students how they might open up their enlightened Mind and thus realize their Buddha-nature or the same, realize the pristine ground of Mind (C., hsin-ti), these same sects are, instead, bent on obstructing the real intent contained in the Buddha’s discourses.  What results from this is the arising of a noticeable contradiction between practice and the real meaning behind the discourses of the Buddha.  In short, the contemporary practices of Buddhism, for the most part, err just like they did during the time of P'ei-hsiu.

I don't assume this to be me

Sometimes translations from the Pali canon can be confusing in which the main point to be underscored doesn’t seem to ring a bell for the modern mind.  Here is such an example from the Pali canon.

“There is the case, monk, where a well-instructed disciple of the noble ones—who has regard for nobles ones, is well-versed & disciplined in their Dhamma; who has regard for men of integrity, is well-versed & disciplined in their Dhamma—does not assume form to be the self, or the self as possessing form, or form as in the self, or the self as in form. He does not assume feeling to be the self... does not assume perception to be the self... does not assume fabrications to be the self... He does not assume consciousness to be the self, or the self as possessing consciousness, or consciousness as in the self, or the self as in consciousness” (M. iii. 18).

What, essentially, the above is saying is that the disciple doesn’t mistake the self—what he is intrinsically and what is to be saved—for any one of the Five Aggregates beginning with form.  But to drive home the main point, the Buddha’s discourse, updated, should be summarized to mean the well-intstructed disciple of the noble ones realizes that his true self is not to be found in the aggregate of form, feeling, perception, fabrications, or consciousness, namely, the psychophysical, aggregated being.  Nor should the disciple assume that there is no self when in fact there is except that it is never found in the aggregates—and for good reason.  The Five Aggregates belong to Mara the Evil One who is the archenemy of the Buddha.

“When there is form, Radha, there might be Mara, or the killer, or the one who is killed.  Therefore, Radha, see form as Mara, see it as the killer, see it as the one who is killed.  See it as a disease, as a tumor, as a dart, as misery, as really misery.  Those who see it thus see rightly.  When there if feeling ... When there is perception ... When there are fabrications ... When there is consciousness, Radha, there might be Mara, or the killer, or the one who is killed” (S. iii. 189).

By the way, either intentionally or by sheer ignorance, the above passage is kept out of Buddhist books and journals for obvious reasons.  Its implication is unassailable:  the highly praised no-self which modern Buddhism proudly proclaims is, actually, Mara, the one who kills!  And on the same track, by implication, what is our self is neither Mara, the one who kills, nor the Five Aggregates.

At Kusinara

Those with either great faith or great spiritual vision understand that the Buddha’s parinirvana at Kusinara was not his end nor did he actually become extinct. From the perspective of Mahayana Buddhism, the Buddha’s parinirvana at Kusinara was his convergence with the Buddha-nature that is in each being which lies buried and uncultivated beneath a pile of ignorance and other such perturbations.  This means that the Buddha is still here, in a manner of speaking, trying to resonate with our higher being so that we might put aside this life of suffering for a life free of suffering.  

Gautama’s life in ancient India as a corporeal being was, in reality, the universal Buddha-nature become corporeal in a heroic effort to teach those most capable how to see their own Buddha-nature; also laying down a visible course of Dharma (i.e., teaching) that might last for many years to be passed onto future generations.  

It would be quite unthinkable that the Buddha’s disciples, at Kusinara, saw their teacher as other than, in essence, the universal Dharmakaya—which is the true body of a Buddha which is not subject to death.  The Buddha did not, in other words, die in the way that ordinary people do.  He did not become reborn into one of the six destinies (gati); nor did he become extinct as some modern Buddhists are inclined to believe.  The Buddha-nature still flourished in the hearts of his followers after his parinirvana; and to this day is potentially active within us at every moment but remains concealed from our view owing to the degree of our spiritual ignorance.

Wholesome desire

Outwardly, the ever changing, painful, and unstable in man desires that which, in various forms, is ever changing, painful, and unstable.  And so it makes sense to say that if man seeks an escape from such he must take a different road desiring, instead, the eternal, blissful, and stable within the depths of himself.  In doing so, he must set aside, as much as he can, unwholesome desire for the ever changing, painful, and unstable.  

Said again, unwholesome desire must be exchanged for wholesome desire.  This exchange or setting aside, it is important to underscore, is what makes up the inner life of the moral man, i.e., the Buddhist.  It is at the apex of human morality, in fact.  Accordingly, we are to be judged by our ability, or lack thereof, to reign in unwholesome desires that if left unchecked will lead, eventually, to spiritual neglect and moral turpitude.

Of course the Buddha’s reason behind avoiding as much as possible unwholesome desire was based on his enlightenment.  He realized the strength of desire occludes the mind in such a way that it is virtually impossible to see mind’s true nature (cittaprakriti) which is pure, animative (prabhâsvara) and incorporeal.  Hence, the need to control desire and at least turn it to wholesome desire.  

What we should draw from this is that morality is not an end in itself.  Right morality is about cutting down on the amount of desire for the ever changing, painful, and unstable so as to make possible mind’s liberation which frees us from rebirth and suffering.