The rejection of the mystical in pop buddhism

I am guessing, but the way I look at ‘pop Buddhism’ there are certain ideas which it is uncomfortable with.  One, in particular, comes under the category of mysticism which is about the direct communion with ultimate reality; something which is beyond the pale of the material universe.  Here is one example.  It is from Plotinus.

“So the soul which does not see Him is without light; but when it is enlightened it has what it sought, and this the soul's true end, to touch that Light and see It by Itself, not by another light, by Itself, Which gives it sight as well. It must see that Light by which it is enlightened; for we do not see the sun by another light than his own. How then can this happen. Take away everything!”

The other example, is a poem by Nikos Kazantzakis (Remember the book Zorba the Greek?).

What is the value of subduing the earth, the water, the air,
of conquering space and time,
of understanding what laws govern the mirages
that rise from the burning deserts of the mind,their appearance and reappearance
I have one longing only:
to grasp what is hidden behind appearances,
to ferret out that mystery which brings me to birth and then
   kills me,
to discover if behind the visible and unceasing stream of the
   world  
an invisible and immutable presence is hiding.

Both examples illustrate man’s dissatisfaction with worldly existence; that it is not truly satisfying just to live in a material universe and then to die, absolutely.  Of course, it almost goes without saying this, but not all people buy into mysticism, certainly not those who are interested in what pop Buddhism has to offer which ignores the mystical, unconditioned side of Buddhism.  

Pop Buddhism appears to have taken its chips off the Buddha of the discourses and put them on an invented Buddha of neuroscience which finds no use for mind since everything mental, it believes, can be explained by the neurons of the physical brain which, incidentally, is two percent of the body’s weight.  There is no mind-body problem since there is no mind.

Why some people reject the mystical is difficult to understand.  But it is certainly a fact if one spends a little time looking into those marketing Buddhism these days.  There is almost no mention of nirvana and certainly no interest in the Mind-only teaching found in the Lankavatara Sutra which essentially says that the material world is only a configuration of Mind.  There is no mind-body problem, because there is fundamentally no material body apart from absolute Mind itself.

 

 

Comments

[Jure]

PPS: Excuse my lack of clarity; it's because I'm not a native English speaker. So I ask you to put some effort into "decoding" my ugly text, and I promise it will be worth the effort. Personal experience is worthless. It's like shit: everyone produces it, and it stinks. If I slip some LSD into your tea, you will see Bodhisattvas coming from the sky making "u" enlightened, 9th stage Super Sayan Bodhisattva. But to external observers it will be clear that is only the arbitrary ramblings of an ecstatic mind. Logic, on the other hand, is universal, it is diamondlike and indestructible. By logic we don't mean common sense. We mean what the Lanka does: using language in such a way to display the contradictions inherent in language, so that the "Mind" can show itself through the cracks produced. This is also what Nagarjuna did so they are completely in tune. Not only, the Lanka even refers to Nagarjuna as the one who will embody the wisdom of the Lanka (this is disputed, but still).

[Jure]

Steve: A word of advice. I wouldn't take people who abbreviate pronouns like a 13 year old girl writing text messages on her cell phone too seriously.

Neither would I take people who attack your intellectual faculty seriously. Ad hominems are a sign of intellectual impotence. Don't waste your precious time on trolls.

What seems incredible to you is that the Lanka is saying there is no external world. (Hence that it's embracing an absolute idealist position).

Your position (the subjective idealist one) is that all you see are projections of your own mind, BUT that there's also an external world outside, an external world that's inaccessible to you. This is also how you interpret the Lanka.

While the other interpretation that you cannot accept is that all is mind, and there's really no external world to speak of. This is the "ontological" position, the "absolute idealist" one.

Why I think your position is flawed: because in order to assert the external world beyond your projections, you have to fall into a performative contradiction.

Here's how. I'll assume you think that:

1) All manifestations are manifestations of the mind;

2) but there is also an external world beyond manifestations.

You hold both these hypotheses, but you don't see how they're in contradiction.

(2) states "there is an external world"; now we must question it: isn't this thought itself a manifestation of the mind?

Either it is, or it's not.

Let's assume (a): IT IS. What follows? This follows: If it is, then all is mind.

Assume (b): IT IS NOT. If it's not, then "there is an external world" is not a manifestation of mind.

b.1 Therefore, it's not a manifestation at all.

b.2 Therefore, it shouldn't be manifest to you.

b.3 But it is (since you imply it).

And that's a contradiction. (b.3 with (2)).

The contradiction exists in the fact that hypothesis (2), which states that "there is an external world" ( hence there is something beyond projections ) - IS itself a projection. In other words, it is manifest to you, and therefore it's a manifestation, and therefore just mind. So, the proposition "there is an external world" - is only a manifestation of the mind.

This is exactly the point of disagreement between Kant's and Hegel's philosophy. Kant (a subjective idealist) thought that all we see is "filtered" through our own minds. But he thought there is also a "Thing-in-itself", the Thing itself beyond our minds.

Hegel pointed out the flaw in this thinking when he demonstrated how it is mind itself that posits the "Thing beyond" as an empty abstraction.

IF the "Thing" was really beyond (truly external), then we wouldn't know it exists. As soon as we say it exists, it becomes internal. It becomes OUR thing. It becomes a thought.

All is mind, therefore, and even that which is not mind - is mind. (The "Thing beyond the mind" is nothing but mind.)

P.S.: All this has nothing to do with personal experience. This is true in and for itself. It has nothing to do with what I think or what you think, nothing to do with my state of mind. It's true in all states of mind. It's equally true for Buddha, Santa Claus, Ke$ha and Lady Gaga.

[Steve]

Zennist, I'm not sure why you wrote that to me. Maybe I started more from an epistemic pov because I thought you were asserting a fact about reality that was reductionist. And you're coming from a pov that the highest epistemic state of gnosis is a shift in ontological status. In other words at this stage the line separating epistemic and ontological domains disappears. Or, that the highest cognitive experience constitutes a transformation of existence. I understand that pure logic is not the key to understanding Buddhist philosophy. But pure experience isn't the key either. In the other words, being a guru doesn't make you a good philosopher. And part of understanding the Lanka is to penetrate the rational dimension of mind without which the text would not have been written. That seems lost entirely on your "enlightened" readers who are more interested in asserting how they are better than everyone and liken my reading of the sutra to a 2 year old reading a calculus textbook. So I will end where I started by saying that "this world is made up of, and exists as, Mind, and does not exist in any other way." is a highly misleading statement.

[azanshi]

Steve: Is that right? He doesn't seem to think that the Lanka uses the tetralemma dialectical of the Madyamika. That's a little strange. But if I hang out with you and your friends who have all had low level enlightenment experiences, can I ask Charles Manson for his autograph? Or would that be rude? "

Scratches head with a humongous finger.
 
"Umfff...Azanshi is confused.  Puny man with puny body being nasty,  saying big lies  about dharma. Usually Azanshi smash ant-people  like that with his big fist, especially when they try to say such deluded things, but today Azanshi feel generous.

Need to go now. Need to smash things on other place,  where people dwell in  wrong views about the gift Azanshis big brother offered to ant-people."
 
Jumps away like a green flash…

[thezennist]

Steve:

The Middle-Way in the Lankavatara Sutra is Mind-only. Moreover, there are no objects to be seen in Mind-only. According to The Sword of Wisdom Sutra, "All things are like a magical display; they arise from discrimination."