Desire in Buddhism is a strong, over attraction towards what lacks any vestige of true or ultimate reality. Using Hua-yen monk Fa-tsang’s golden lion to illustrate what I mean, those who have fallen under the spell of desire see only the lion-shape together with its intricate details. The more they look at this wondrous lion’s details, the more they become bound to it. But a Buddha sees this lion much differently. There is no lion present for a Buddha. There is only the substance of pure gold which the one under the spell of desire is unable to see or even imagine.
We could say that the very presence of the phenomenal world which appears devoid of substance is the potency of desire. Using Fa-tsang's golden lion again, the lion-shape is the phenomenal world which hides the pure substance of gold by means of desire. On the same score, non-desire is seeing some or all of the gold. More exactly, non-desire is an inner illumination of the absolute substance by which the bewitching power of phenomena is reduced. During the first illumination (bodhicitta) phenomenality is realized to fall within the power of the luminous substance just as the golden lion is dependent on the substance of gold.
Ordinary beings (prithagjana) are always suffering from desire. For them the universe of desire is infinite and unending—a thing of wonder. It is like a powerful addiction which can only end if the true substance of reality is made contact with in some measure. But making contact with such a reality is not so easy. Any attempt to do so is more than often rejected by established religion if the history of religion is to be trusted which doesn’t paint a very good picture of mysticism insofar as it leads away from the senses and imagination to the absolute substance. In the case of Buddhism the mystical path leads away from the Five Aggregates of form, feeling, perception, volitions, and consciousness.
Another reason for the unpopularity of mysticism in established religion, is the path of mysticism doesn’t require the mediation of priests who can only minister to those deeply absorbed in desire’s alluring coils. The job of this priesthood is really to repackage true religion, which is based on mysticism, making out of it a ladder of desire that will climb to the most desirous and complete of all desires, namely, God—he who listens to our prayers born of desire.
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