--- In [email protected], "curtisdeltablues" 
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> > The siddhis sutras aren't mantras; they're *intentions*
> > expressed verbally. The semantic meanings are crucial.
> > They're for a whole different purpose; you aren't using
> > them to transcend. Apples and kiwi fruit.
> 
> I'm not so sure about the semantic meaning since the connection
> between the intention and its result is often kind of obscure.

Well, but the connection is explained in detail
when you learn the TM-Sidhis--at least, it was
when I learned. The intention is condensed, but
it's definitely expressed semantically, in words
that have meaning.

  I have
> never heard Maharishi make that claim.  It is the name for
> relationship at the subtlest level that seems to interest
> him and that is why we don't need Sanskrit according to him,
> right? 

I'm not sure what you mean by "name for relationship
at the subtlest level." Could you elaborate?
Relationship between what and what? Do you mean 
name and form?

> But the fact remains that they are sound vibrations thought at
> the finest level of thought which is exactly where the "problem"
> Maharishi claims unsuitable mantras do their mischief. Maharishi 
> doesn't claim that it is the transcending with the unsuitable 
> mantra that is the problem, it is thinking it at a subtle level.  
> And with or without semantic meanings the sidhi words are thought 
> at the same subtle level.

He also says all languages are the same at that
level, which is why English is OK.

But again, the mantra is just a sound, whereas 
the sutras have semantic meaning and express
an intention.

> You may be right that they are way different but I don't really
> see how.

Boy, it seems a *huge* difference to me.

> In my experience of thinking the sutra and "fallling back on the
> Self" you do transcend with a sutra.  You just have a shorter 
> distance to go.

You consciously *get off* the sutra in order to
fall back on the Self. You don't do that with a
mantra. Everything about sutra practice is
intentional; the results are the response to
the intention.

> Interesting questions, thanks for keeping the ball in play.

De nada, same here.

I have a theory about the mantras, by the way.
Don't know if I've ever run through it here.
But it seems to me that in meditation, the mantra,
which is a devata or process-of-knowing value,
functions as chhandas, an object of knowledge. In
effect, the mantra is knowing itself. This creates
a sort of negative feedback loop, which is why the
mantra disappears, and only Rishi, the Knower, is
left.

That's *very* clumsily expressed, but maybe it
conveys the general idea.


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