Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: More Mother India -- "Take your poo to the loo"
That explains why you think you think you are the eh.pee.tomee of lightenmint. You sit on your ass like those pictures of Zen-monks and feel like yer the Buddha. Then you stand up, strut around and proclaim - I'm lightened just by stiiting on my ass. Buddha Dogen says so and I can tell! Ahem ... Better find out how to do mo-chao instead. One minute of sitting - one inch of Buddha. One minute of shitting - one stench of Buddha.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: More Mother India -- "Take your poo to the loo"
You are already awareness itself and don't require some kind of "awareness of awareness". This attempt to locate a self-reflexive awareness is just a mental simulation of what it might be like. A confused one at that. No wonder you are so confused. You'd be better giving up this delusive "taza" for some mo-chao. Read it & weep.
[FairfieldLife] Re: More Mother India -- "Take your poo to the loo"
Great refutation of Chan Master Sheng-Yen and his teaching about Mo-Chao. "I'm practicing lighten-mint - can't you see? I'm the very eh-pee-tomee of it." Yep ... the practice is the end-all of it all. Why it's just sittin' on my ass looking oh-so-lightened. Ca..., Can..., Can't you all see my aura?"
[FairfieldLife] Re: Why TM teachers cannot get Shankara's teachings
Don't worry - you needn't be.
[FairfieldLife] Shikan-taza is NOT Silent Illumination (Mo-Chao)
No one will ever get "enlightened" although they might get some kind of aufklärung. What is yours will always be yours - what is not yours will never be yours. If you have it, it will be given to you. If you don't have it, it will be taken away from you. Blah Blah. So much for "lighten-mint" Shikantaza and Silent Illumination Lecture given by master Sheng-yen during the Dec. 1993 Ch’an retreat The Japanese term “shikantaza” literally means “just sitting.” Its original Chinese name, ,mo-chao means “silent illumination.” “Silent” refers to not using any specific method of meditation and having no thoughts in your mind. “Illumination” means clarity. You are very clear about the state of your body and mind. When the method of silent illumination was taken to Japan it was changed somewhat. The name given to it, “just sitting”, means just paying attention to sitting or just keeping the physical posture of sitting, and this was the new emphasis. The word “silent” was removed from the name of the method and the understanding that the mind should be clear and have no thoughts was not emphasized. In silent illumination, “just sitting” is only the first step.
[FairfieldLife] Why TM teachers cannot get Shankara's teachings
TM teachers are instructed within a yogic-advaita framework - one that underpins their understanding about meditation and reality. Without exposure to Shankara's teachings and the traditional Upanishad methodology, it will be hard for any TM'er to entertain this original view. Shankara says: For there is the statement of the shruti : “The Brahman that is direct and immediate” (BU 3.4.1) and there is the statement, tat tvam asi “you are That” (CU6.8.7) which teaches [that Brahman] is already accomplished. This sentence “you are That” cannot be interpreted to mean "you will become That" after you are dead (i.e in heaven). Comans explains: Firstly, Shankara is committed to the understanding that the Self is self-luminous, for it is by nature simple, sheer Awareness (BUbh 4.3.23). Secondly, in accord with this view of the self-luminosity of the Self as Awareness, Shankara has characterized the Self as “Experience Itself” (anubhavâtman). We should therefore expect that the experience about which Shankara speaks is the “intuition”, “insight”, or even “recognition” of oneself as sheer Awareness. It cannot be a new experience of producing something that did not previously exist. Nor can it be an experience involving the objectification of Awareness. It is rather the “experience” of oneself AS Awareness, without limitations. For that is what one is, and so finds oneself to be, when there is the apprehension of one’s own fundamental Awareness-nature, together with the apprehension of the “seeming”, or the apparent nature (mithyâtva) of all limiting adjuncts (upâdhis) - those that pertain to the individual body-mind (tvam), as well as to the Lordship of Brahman (tat). TM teachers are not educated or trained to receive, apprehend or articulate such a view about the immediacy of direct realization.
[FairfieldLife] Re: What We Did Today
Sounds like a repetition of a Vaj rant with all thse generalizations still intact. That means the info in this rant either hasn't been challenged yet or hasn't been compared to the Ganga Mahamudra of Tilopa, Naropa and Marpa, which in its orignal practice/recognition, was similar to TM - only without using a mantra.
[FairfieldLife] Re: No Mantra will cure willfully arrogant stupidity
Here is a mantra you can use with or without Turmeric on your eggs - Leo-pold ... Leo-pold For your advanced technique you add Phisher ... Phisher When you become very advanced you can add Duh, Duh You'll be claiming lighten-mint in "no-time".
[FairfieldLife] Re: No Mantra will cure willfully arrogant stupidity
And the mantra-devatâ for your scrambled egg sutra is something you got from some householder FFL yogi?... Or did you just cook it up?
[FairfieldLife] Re: No Mantra will cure willfully arrogant stupidity
Dear TurquoiseZee You seem so knowledgeable about nits. Lots of experience ... huh? Must be all them European beds.
[FairfieldLife] No Mantra will cure willfully arrogant stupidity
Recently I have read here on FFL an argument professed by former TM’ers who stopped practicing because they claimed they were deceived about the "meaning" of mantras. Their fundamental claim is that a mantra is the name of a Hindu god. The claim is that a mantra, by definition, encapsulates a method for worshiping a Hindu god but that this fact is withheld from practitioners. Within the domain of this argument, these claimants will often quote some text from a Hindu Tantra. These quotes are passages usually assigning a particular deity to a particular mantra and sometimes even assigning a set of deities to each of the Sanskrit letters composing the written forms of the mantra’s sound. This textual assignment is often done quite haphazardly but occasionally is done in the Vedic format of rishi-deva-chhanda. Along with the quoted Tantric text is sometimes a quoted statement by MMY, declaring that a mantra is a "sound whose effect is known". This argument quotes the TMO claim that a mantra is used in TM for the beneficial effects it produces in causing the spontaneous refinement of perception. This explanation is then paraded as an example of shameful exploitation of Western ignorance of the "Hindu" foundation of TM and of any other Indian meditation that does not confess itself as a form of "Hindu devotionalism". This devotionalist criticism is further paraded around by pointing to various Indian swamis and cross-eyed yogis who make these claims and arguments themselves. Here are some considerations about these claims: SBS taught in India. MMY began teaching in India before coming to the West. They both taught within the context of the Indian Hindu cultural model. Although they taught in India, where there are many Muslims, they did not present their teaching within a Muslim cultural model. Although Buddhism is from India and many Indians consider Buddha as one of their own, neither SBS nor MMY taught within a Buddhist cultural model. Rather, they taught within the cultural context of their listeners. After coming to the West, MMY continued speaking and teaching within the Indian cultural model - for a while. It was the teaching model established by Vivekananda and Paramahansa Yogananda – partly religious, partly philosophical and partly yogic. However, the cultural context of this form of teachings was the 19th and 20th century paradigm of Western Modernity. When MMY realized the limitations brought by this model and the limitations of religious language here in the West he took a left turn. That divergence left some of his teachers behind - Charlie Lutts being an example. This is one reason that pointing to early religious language by MMY or SBS is an inaccurate over-simplification. As far as the “it is all a deceit” claimants, the two groups that are the most antagonist and strident are the materialists and the religionists. Materialists claim mantras are the mumbo formulas of hindoo gods and that the concept of gods/god is a false idea propounded by power brokers to enslave the masses. This is a truncated Marxist view popular among the half-educated. Contrary to this, the fundamentalist religions claim that mantras are secret demonic traps devised to enslave us to hindoo devils. This is the view of true-believing adherents of the Abrahamic religions – Jews, Christians and Muslims. This is not some fundamentalist diatribe from TV evangelicals. This was the original view of Christians from the second century C.E. forward and was used as an ideological propellant for killing polytheists after Constantine’s ascent to Roman power. What is obvious is that both groups are unable to rationally consider the facts because they are ideologues entrenched in a priori conclusions. One example of this is a clear demarcation about the difference between yoga and religion. Materialists dismiss such an idea because yoga historically emerged within in a Hindu cultural context. Semitic monotheists condemn this idea for the same reason. If we consider the role of yoga, it is apparent that most meditating Westerners are functionally ignorant about the nature, range, depth and complexity of yoga lineages - whether Vedic, Hindu, Buddhist or Jain. Most of them do not know the difference between Vedic, Puranic and Tantric lineages of practice. They also do not understand how these three streams developed and then intertwined into Hindu temple rites. They don't know vidhi from vedi.* (*vidhi is a specific method of puja. Vedi is the altar used in yajña. ) Even more surprising, most swamis and imported "yogis" are not Pandits, Indologists, or Sanskritists. Very few are formally educated in the yoga traditions of the Indian subcontinent. Most are only trained in asana, pranayam and japa. A little bhakti here, a few Upanishad citations there and "om tat sat" - I’m a guru. Faced with this, most of us Westerners who meditate are at a disadvantage when prese
[FairfieldLife] State TV says Russia could turn US to 'radioactive ash'
http://news.yahoo.com/state-tv-says-russia-could-turn-us-radioactive-212003397.html http://news.yahoo.com/state-tv-says-russia-could-turn-us-radioactive-212003397.html
[FairfieldLife] ‘Pirated’ Boeing 777 may return to skies as stealth nuclear weapon
http://www.infowars.com/flight-370-passengers-may-still-be-alive-pirated-boeing-777-may-return-to-skies-as-stealth-nuclear-weapon/ http://www.infowars.com/flight-370-passengers-may-still-be-alive-pirated-boeing-777-may-return-to-skies-as-stealth-nuclear-weapon/
[FairfieldLife] Re: Who's been this happy ever in any TMO related activity?
About time! How come they "transcend" but can't transcend their own myopia? Is it because they are drooling cultists? "Let them eat petit fours". ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wrote : Share, I'm generally against people in the TMO having animals because of the attitude generated by Maharishi towards animals which was purely cultural. They treat them like lower forms of life not worthy of our concern, they are a *drain*, yada ,yada, yada. I've seen animals in the care of people employed by the TMO suffer terribly, starved, neglected and denied medical care, "Oh, it's their karma, I can't be involved or distracted", is the attitude, as if they were some feral animal on the streets of CalcuttaOn more than one occasion, I have let it be known that if I ever hear of this kind of treatment towards an animal by TMO people again,I would go to the SPCA and the media and blow a whistle that would be heard all over the country and bring total disgrace to the TMO.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Pundit Sex Talk
The quote, the claim, the view: Shankara, as related in his classic work The Crest Jewel of Discrimination - "A wise man views women as corpses, bags of urine and feces." Shankara and his principle disciples were all renunciates (sannyasin-s). Their lives were not dedicated to achieving as much sensory and sensual pleasure as humanly possible - like most of us. Renunciation is not a objective in itself but is rather a means – a codified consequence of behavior to aid single-minded dedication to a goal. That goal, for Advaita Vedantin-s, is ascertainment of the primacy of the field of essence-awareness as the reality of human identity (satyam-jñanam-anantam or essence, awareness, limitlessness). Afterward there occurs the application of discrimination between that Real and the limited senses/mind/intellect. Finally, following that discernment is realization of the indivisibility of Reality-Brahman and all appearances (i.e. the universe of experience - both external and internal). There is incomprehension and antipathy towards this goal and its lifestyle on FFL, which just demonstrates biased ignorance towards the source-teachings at the root of this lineage. Read it and sleep.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Unity Village in Kansas City
Gotta work tomorrow unrtil 6:30 or 7pm. If you are coming back this way let me know. We can try to find a date/time. Weekends work 1best for me lbecause we only have four people supplying the whole hospital. Time off is a trick. Enjoy Unity - best time is late spring or eary summer. Their teachers are quite positive and seem to just want to help people. Imagine that. Sortta like the old TM days. Email me: emptybillatyahoo.com to get my phone #.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Tantra means loosely – “Sac red teachings” – (thankas)
"Class, today we are going to learn a bunch of big words and the proper way to show love to someone" Oh so right! Let's call our new flavor Prairie Doc lightn-mint. Is them words big enuff?
[FairfieldLife] RE: Funny article from the Guardian Newspaper about TM
Rakshasas raksasas (Sanskrit) [from the verbal root raksh to protect] The preservers; in modern popular superstition in India, commonly associated with evil spirits and demons. Esoterically they are the gibborim (giants) of the Bible, the fourth root-race or Atlanteans: "when Brahma created the demons, Yakshas (from Yaksh, to eat) and the Rakshasas, both of which kinds of demons, as soon as born, wished to devour their creator, those among them that called out 'Not so! oh, let him be saved (preserved)' were named Rakshasas (Vishnu Purana Book I, ch. v.). The Bhagavata Purana (III, 20, 19-21) renders the allegory differently. Brahma transformed himself into night (or ignorance) invested with a body, upon which the Yakshas and Rakashasas seized, exclaiming 'Do not spare it; devour it.' Brahma then cried out, 'Do not devour me, spare me.' This has an inner meaning of course. The 'Body of Night' is the darkness of ignorance, and it is the darkness of silence and secrecy. Now the Rakshasas are shown in almost every case to be Yogis, pious Saddhus and Initiates, a rather unusual occupation for demons. The meaning then is that while we have power to dispel the darkness of ignorance, 'devour it,' we have to preserve the sacred truth from profanation. 'Brahma is for the Brahmins alone,' says that proud caste. The moral of the fable is evident" (SD 2:165n).
[FairfieldLife] RE: Tantra means loosely – “Sac red teachings” – (thankas)
The point of maithuna practice (sexual-union yoga) is to assist in the ascend of the prana-shaktis up the spine, whether that is understood to be a collection of prana-s gathered into the spinal axis or of the ascent of the mula-prana known as kundalini-shakti at the base of the spine. The Buddhist tantric union of shunyatâ (emptiess) and sukha (happiness) is merely a metaphor for ecstatic union and its oceanic manifestations. Sexual experience in this askesis is used because it coincides with death and fainting as entry-points to the most extreme experiences of absorption in the experience of transcendence. This is all explained in the expositions of Tsongkapa upon the six sadhana-s of Naropa. In essence, that means you are spouting off about something you know nothing about. Great display of Prairie Dog 'lighten-mint'.
[FairfieldLife] "God "- the concept
Our Western notions about “God” emerge through the theological lens of Semitic Monotheism - Judism, Christianity, and Islam. That’s why we so casually pitch forth the term “God” rather than “the gods” – as our Greek and Roman ancestors once did. The Semite god is fundamentally a tyrant in the Greek “polis” (city-state) sense of that term. This means the Semitic “God” is a monarch who at will exercises power in a ruthless, pitiless manner – as an oppressive, harsh, arbitrary person. Apposite this cruel despot steps forth the weeping Jesus – wounded in his “heart” by our iniquitous and malevolent self-will. Won’t you open your darkened, ego-obsessed soul to the bleeding Jesu and put his cross in place of your own wickedly defying “I”? Of course, if you fail to replace You with Him, Jesu, like big God, will likewise send you into the pit and the fire! Then you can count on torment without intermission for as long as eternity lasts – all just because He can. Opposite this parody of a Semitic king, is the concept of Patanjali’s Ishvara. The term Ishvara means ruler, owner, master. Patanjali’s Ishvara is a specific, different (viseša) purusha never possessing afflictions, karmic acts and results or deposits of habitual tendencies. However, this Ishvara is was never a creator in the Semite sense. Apparently, Patanjali included the concept of Ishvara because yogins bent upon samâdhi and liberation had direct experience with a cosmic intelligence that was accessible for receiving teachings and grace. His codification of the sound (shabda) of Ishvara and the means to its realization was Patanjali’s contribution to direct realization through “pranava (omkara) repetition and contemplation of its meaning”. Contrary to this, Buddhists believe in puny “worldly” devas but deny a cosmic creator/ruler. The Dalai Lama calls it “the god concept”. However, in Tantric Buddhism they do indeed use “om” as a cosmic sound and as a conceptual construct for transcendence. All of this should show just how insular and self-involved this Semite-rooted concept of Judeo-Christo-Islamic “Godism” has become and just how widely it has infiltrated both our historical and current thinking.
[FairfieldLife] Is Vedanta only a theory to be confirmed through experience? (More Ted Schwartz)
This is a notion prevalent among seekers who have encountered a diluted form of Vedanta and/or have not yet cultivated the qualifications necessary to enable them to properly assimilate the teachings that even though self-inquiry is a means of knowledge, the knowledge it produces is only theoretical, and that it therefore has to be subsequently validated by a direct personal experience of a mystical or otherwise special state of consciousness. The claims that a special experience is required to convert theoretical knowledge into reality are based on the fact that generations of yogis, Tantra masters, and mystics have been talking about and placing great emphasis on the value of experiences and, moreover, prescribing techniques and methods intended to help seekers cultivate various altered states of consciousness. The fundamental error underlying the erroneous notion that enlightenment or self-realization is a particular state of being and all the yogic practices aimed at attaining it is that reality is a duality, that the self is something other than and separate from oneself. The idea that any action is necessary to obtain the non-dual awareness in which all objects appear and of which all are essentially made – the very awareness, in other words, that is now, has always been, and will always be aware of everything, the very awareness that is presently illumining one’s mind, the very awareness because of which one knows both what one knows and what one doesn’t know – is upon even the most cursory analysis absurd.
Re: [FairfieldLife] RE: Funny article from the Guardian Newspaper about TM
Share, Sorry to have to say it again to you but none of us will get any "enlightenment" at all, not now or at any time - never, ever. Enlightenment is a silly scam to get you to want something that you already are by nature. It is more accurately called selling water by the river. There is nothing to obtain other than the direct discernment of your real nature. Read it and weep. http://www.nevernotpresent.com/faqs/relationship-yoga-vedanta/ http://www.nevernotpresent.com/faqs/relationship-yoga-vedanta/
[FairfieldLife] RE: Who Are You Going to Call?
Everybody knows that this aggression is Bush's fault. Maybe you should pose a selfie outside his ranch with a sign ... "W! On behalf of the U.N. you are under citizen's arrest for your crimes! Get out of your car with your hands in the air." So get to it. We'll be waiting for you to post it here. Oh so brave Barry-Two sez: Don't forget that "Springtime is Wartime" be it Hitler or Dubya.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Russell Simmons on TM - Front page of Yahoo.com
Nah In high school everyone was already chanting the shakti form of the vahni-bija - rah rah shish koom bah or the really secret high school mantra - rama longa ding dong. Must be why all the time they wanted to eat and have sex. It wasn't the hormones after all. Just the short uh (as in "ə" - the schwah) is all they need for SM (Simmons Meditation) ... as in rəm rəm rəmə rəmə.
[FairfieldLife] RE: A National Robin Hood Tax To Take Back Our Economy
Sal: Can I wear green tights? I look good in green tights. Only if you use a codpiece. http://www.artofmanliness.com/2011/04/01/bringing-back-the-codpiece/ http://www.artofmanliness.com/2011/04/01/bringing-back-the-codpiece/
[FairfieldLife] RE: Deification and the Uncreated Engergies of God
OK - no prob. I was commenting upon the wiki link that Willy posted in message #374571. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_views_on_monotheism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_views_on_monotheism ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wrote: emptybill, if you're responding to a post (rather than starting a new thread), please click "Show message history" before you send it so we can see what you're replying to. It's not difficult, just one click. Message 16 of this thread pointed out - Wiki is a soph-moronic source - full of generalities and misunderstandings. This article misrepresents the smarta sampradaya. "Supreme Being" is not the meaning of Brahman nor is "Hinduism" a form of monotheism. The terms "monotheism/polytheism ... etc" are all categories used to describe Western philosophy and Semitic theology. It's all so 19th Century.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Deification and the Uncreated Engergies of God
Message 16 of this thread pointed out - Wiki is a soph-moronic source - full of generalities and misunderstandings. This article misrepresents the smarta sampradaya. "Supreme Being" is not the meaning of Brahman nor is "Hinduism" a form of monotheism. The terms "monotheism/polytheism ... etc" are all categories used to describe Western philosophy and Semitic theology. It's all so 19th Century.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Deification and the Uncreated Engergies of God
This suggestion is so inappropriate. Our members driving this very thread are the sheer eh-pee-tomee-s of deification. After all we’re all the apex of evolution. The space bro’s visit us just to admire us. Apparently the "word" is out. Ca Ca Can’t we jus’ jus' get along? Willy sez: Maybe we should just move this whole discussion over to WhatsApp since NOBODY in less than 24 hours is going to EVER again read this discussion about theism and " Deification and the Uncreated Engergies of God". NEVER. Somebody prove me wrong.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Buddhists Protest Against Dalai Lama in SF
It is not so simple. You have to know something about Tibetan Vajrayana, Tibetan exile politics and specifically about this apotheosized guardian-daimon to understand what is happening here. It's all about maintaining workable relationships between the four major sects of Tibetan Buddhism. The Dalai Lama heads only one sect out of four.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Deification and the Uncreated Engergies of God
Wiki is a sophmoronic source - full of generalities and misunderstandings. Most discussions about deity in the current theism/scientism debate are replete with Euro-American myopic views about Western philosophical-theological history and terms. This is particularly true about monotheism’s incipient onto-theology (as Heidegger uses that term). The idea that deity/god transcends both essence (hyperousia) and substance (hypostasis) is either unknown or unrecognizable in this debate by both sides. A short synopsis about Heidegger’s “OntoTheology”: For Heidegger, OntoTheology contributes to the oblivion or forgetfulness of Being. Indeed "metaphysics is Onto-Theo-logy," and Western metaphysics "since the beginning with the Greeks has eminently been both Ontology and theology." The problem with this intermixing of ontology and theology according to Heidegger's analysis, and the reason why Heidegger and his successors sought to overcome it, is at least twofold. First, by linking the philosophical with the theological, and vice versa, the distinctiveness of each respective discourse is clouded over. As such, the nature of philosophy as a factually unknown and structurally unknowable path of thought is restricted by an economy of faith. Likewise, with theology, as the science of faith, theology at its best testifies to the irreducible mystery of its source in revelation and to the unapproachable and incomprehensible aim of its desire in God. However, once theology becomes Onto-Theological that mysterious source and incomprehensible aim are reduced to the order of beings. Second, and on a more fundamental level, the OntoTheological problem is part and parcel of the overall degeneration of Western thought and the consequent troubles of Western technological culture. The problem, in a nutshell, is the human desire for mastery and OntoTheology contributes to this by presuming knowledge regarding the "first cause" of philosophy and the "highest being" of theology. According to Merold Westphal, Heidegger has three main objections to onto-theology: First, it deprives the world of its mystery. Second, it gives us a God not worthy of worship. In a famous passage, Heidegger complains that before the causa sui (a name for the God of onto-theology that emphasizes the need for an explainer that doesn’t need to be explained) no one would be tempted to pray or to sacrifice and that this God evokes neither awe nor music and dance. Onto-theology is hostile to piety. "Third, having deprived the world of both its mystery and of a God worthy of worship, onto-theology opens the way for the unfettered self-assertion of the will to power in the form of modernity, namely the quest of science and technology to have everything at human disposal. This is the ultimate hubris of western humanity, in which, under the banner of modernity, it arrogates to itself the place of Plato’s Good and the Christian God. Heidegger describes this self-coronation as an attack, an assault, an uprising, an insurrection." The óntōS Insurrection
[FairfieldLife] RE: The Truth
And that is just the gross physical level. However, you prove the point ... The self is everything that is.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Deification and the Uncreated Engergies of God
Willy The paragraph saying - "If we were able to unite with the essence of God, we too would become gods in essence. In other words everything would become a god, and there would be confusion so that, nothing would be essentially a god. In a few words, this is what they believe in the Oriental religions, e.g. in Hinduism, where the god is not a personal existence but an indistinct power dispersed through all the world, in men, in animals, and in objects (Pantheism). " This is a typical Semitic Monotheistic misunderstanding of the "Orientals". It is just as prevalent in Orthodoxy as in RC/Protestant theology - only is uses/misuses Western philosophic terminology (i.e. "pantheism"). Since the creature/Creator distinction is paramount, it is the backdrop of every discussion about theosis. The point of the discussion is the doctrine of Theosis and how/why it is the original Christian theological formulation.
[FairfieldLife] Deification and the Uncreated Engergies of God
DEIFICATION IS POSSIBLE THROUGH THE UNCREATED ENERGIES OF GOD Eastern Orthodox Christian theology has been very clear for about 1500+ years that God's essence is transcendent yet manifests uncreated energies/acts. Eastern Orthodoxy teaches that “What God is by nature, humans become by grace.” This is the meaning of the term theosis (deification) – which is declared the true purpose of human life. However, even more provocative is their assertion that God transcends essence (hyperousia). http://www.greekorthodoxchurch.org/theosis_how.html http://www.greekorthodoxchurch.org/theosis_how.html http://www.greekorthodoxchurch.org/theosis_how.html http://www.greekorthodoxchurch.org/theosis_how.html
[FairfieldLife] China Preparing for War with US
http://generationaldynamics.com/pg/xct.gd.e140221.htm http://generationaldynamics.com/pg/xct.gd.e140221.htm
[FairfieldLife] Re: Creepy?
Simone Weil was a Platonist. She was not particularly enamored with the Roman Catholic Church but found affinity with a form of Christian Platonism. That’s because of the historically inherited conglomerate – a term that actually descriptive of the bastard shotgun wedding of Christianity and Platonism. Weil was, in essence, a serious contemplative with typical French political affections. Since my karmic predecessor spoke fluent French, I might have met her (before WWII). Haven’t explored that faint possiblity. However, if so, it would only reveal the personal since that predecessor was not enabled for such things – at least as far as I know. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wrote: Re "Anyone considering these passages, who either sees or believes in supra-material intelligences will conclude that YHVH was not a deity (theos/theon) but rather an evil demon (kakodaimōn). ": The second-century theologian Marcion declared that Christianity was opposed to Judaism and loathed the Old Testament. Marcion did not claim the Jewish Scriptures were false but au contraire should be read as literally true, showing that YHWH was not the God spoken of by Jesus. In a similar vein, French philosopher Simone Weil (who was an anti-Jewish Jew) was incensed that the New Testament was packaged up with the Old Testament in The Bible. The two books she always carried with her were the New Testament and The Gita.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Creepy?
Thanks for posting some of the “holy” evidence against the god of Semitic Monotheism. However, these passages are superseded by Joshua 1-12, where the god of the Jews is revealed to be a genocidal murderer - a Hitler before Adolph. Anyone considering these passages, who either sees or believes in supra-material intelligences will conclude that YHVH was not a deity (theos/theon) but rather an evil demon (kakodaimōn). So much for sacred history.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Ravi Yogi back at it - must need the attention
Dear oh-so-good friend emptyliar. Don't send messages to my wife. Stay off her Facebook page. Then I won't care about your antics.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Ravi Yogi back at it - must need the attention
I don't know why you believe I am interested in what you say. You produce little original content here. Mostly you are Judy-lite, her snide second-in-disdain for those Judy needs to attack . You're wasting my time.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Ravi Yogi back at it - must need the attention
There was no context to explain. Ravi decided to let my wife know he was "thinking about her" even though she doesn't know him except through my descriptions. Originally she had to ask me who this Ravi guy was. When someone you don't know writes "I love you" and "I'm thinking of you" on your Facebook page then I call it stalking. Perhaps, instead, you would feel pleased and excited and call it worship.
[FairfieldLife] Ravi Yogi back at it - must need the attention
My oh-so-great buddy, pycho-Ravi, has sent another unsolicited message to my wife's facebook page ... "I miss you". Nice for her to know that this internet troll is stalking her.
Re: [FairfieldLife] An acute differnce between Eastern Orthodox Christianity and Roman Catholicism
Willy sez: So, where is the part about "man becoming God" in the Eastern Orthdoxy? Look it up: As St. Athanasius said, “God became man, so that man might become a god.” http://www.antiochian.org/content/theosis-partaking-divine-nature http://www.antiochian.org/content/theosis-partaking-divine-nature
[FairfieldLife] An acute differnce between Eastern Orthodox Christianity and Roman Catholicism
Original Sin vs Ancestral Sin Another point of theological contention according to some Orthodox theologians is the Roman Catholic teachings on Original Sin. Orthodox theologians trace this position to having its roots in the works of Saint Augustine. Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy and Eastern Catholicism, which together make up Eastern Christianity, acknowledge that the introduction of ancestral sin into the human race affected the subsequent environment for humanity, but never accepted Augustine of Hippo's notions of original sin and hereditary guilt. The Roman Catholic Church did not accept all of Augustine's ideas, at least as these are commonly interpreted outside the Church, such as the idea that original sin deprives man of free will or that God predestines some people to hell, and also his teaching that infants who die without baptism are confined to hell. It holds that original sin does not have the character of a personal fault in any of Adam's descendants.
[FairfieldLife] The bastard union of psychotherapy and anti-cultism: it's all about the money
http://thenewobserver.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/therapy_short.pdf http://thenewobserver.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/therapy_short.pdf Psychotherapy and counseling are growth industries. The BBC for example finds it necessary to frequently add after stories involving any degree of shock "those effected are receiving counseling" or "are being offered counseling". Psychotherapy and counseling are widely seen as acceptable, meaningful and valid. That they may be unscientific folk practices offered by unscrupulous individuals is not a popular view. But it may be a more accurate assessment. This essay considers psychotherapy and counseling as social movements. We look at the ideology of therapy and ask whether it is really there to benefit the patient. We reflect on the 'long and arduous' training for psychotherapy and find that in fact it is neither long nor arduous. We look at the view of people that therapy holds to; necessarily people are seen as in need of therapy, that is weak and lacking. We suggest that the valuation of emotionalism in therapy is a retreat from a difficult world not a mature response to it. We consider whether therapy is a cult, a religion or a science; it seems that therapy has most in common with folk movements. And finally we ask how it is that people do not leave their therapists; here we catch a glimpse into the power of the therapist, a power not unlike that of the witch-doctor in a primitive society.
[FairfieldLife] It's just sheer awareness (drišti-mâtratâ) and it ain't transcendent
Still believe in the four states of consciousness? While the waker, dreamer, and deep sleeper as well as the worlds they appear to inhabit continuously shuffle in and out of existence, assiduous inquiry does reveal a “fourth factor,” as it is called in the Mandukya Upanishad, that remains a constant though subtle presence throughout all three states of experience. This “fourth factor” is often misunderstood to be a transcendental state, and many a seeker spends years, often a whole lifetime, striving to reach, experience, merge with, and ultimately become permanently established in this blissful realm. All such attempts, however, are inevitably doomed to failure because all states are experiential and, therefore, no state is eternal. Rather than a state, the “fourth factor” is quite simply the limitless, attributeless awareness in which all three experiential states appear. This “fourth factor” never fails to shine, never fades away, never forfeits its all-pervasive existence. It is the singular substratum of the apparent universe. It is the sole reality. It is the eternal self. from the blog of Ted Schmidt
[FairfieldLife] RE: The Robin Carlsen Cult on Fairfield Life
I dub thee Queen Vicious Bitchious.
[FairfieldLife] RE: The Robin Carlsen Cult on Fairfield Life
... with an irrational exuberance bordering on juvenile pathology. Oh yeah ... did I add Share to your poison salad mix? Read it and froth.
[FairfieldLife] RE: The Robin Carlsen Cult on Fairfield Life
Why would any of us still care what you think about Barry? Having paraded it around to everyone, along with Judy, you must consider you personal opinion a prototype for all humanity. Any two consecutive posts by Judy, following a single statement by Barry, is enough for any interlocutor to conclude that you both are obsessed with an
[FairfieldLife] RE: Marshy Enlightened?
Willy sez: "The "separative divide" between Eastern and Western orthodox religions is that the Western orthodox religion teaches that a man became God in the person of Jesus Christ. Eastern orthodox religions do not teach this and even denies it." This is clearly a misinformed statement. You should have consulted the Orthodox Wiki http://orthodoxwiki.org/Incarnation: http://orthodoxwiki.org/Incarnation Incarnation is the act of clothing with flesh, or the state of being so clothed; the act of taking, or being manifested in, a human body and nature. Used by itself, the word refers to the fact that in Jesus http://orthodoxwiki.org/Jesus, God took on flesh and became man. God http://orthodoxwiki.org/God, the Son, has truly lived and died and risen from the dead in the flesh, as a true human being. Doctrine The Orthodox doctrine of Christ incarnate is: True God and true man, one person in two natures, without separation and without confusion: a single person, but endowed with two wills and two energies. From the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed: "... and He was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary and became man."
[FairfieldLife] Now it can be told ... the truth about Vedic/Tantric deities or angry Semetic gods!
The Big Board - by Kilgore Trout … It was about an Earthling man and woman who were kidnapped by extra-terrestrials. They were put on display in a zoo on a planet called Zircon-212. These fictitious people in the zoo had a big board supposedly showing stock market quotations and comodity prices along one wall of their habitat, and a news ticker, and a telephone that was supposedly connected to a brokerage on Earth. The creatures on Zircon-212 told their captives that they had invested a million dollars for them back on Earth, and that it was up to the captives to manage it so that they would be fabulously wealthy when they were returned to Earth. The telephone and the big board and the ticker were all fakes, of course. They were simply stimulants to make the Earthlings perform vividly for the crowds at the zoo—to make them jump up and down and cheer, or gloat, or sulk, or tear their hair, to be scared shitless or to feel as contented as babies in their mothers’ arms. The Earthlings did very well on paper. That was part of the rigging, of course. And religion got mixed up in it, too. The news ticker reminded them that the President of the United States had declared National Prayer Week, and that everybody should pray. The Earthlings had had a bad week on the market before that. They had lost a small fortune in olive oil futures. So they gave praying a whirl. It worked. Olive oil went up.
[FairfieldLife] RE: HC grants bail to Girish Verma
Bail of less than US $800. Think he could afford it?
[FairfieldLife] RE: All About Sadhus and Yogis
These are discussions about claims of tantric sex. No doubt, for you, it is the reverse of Vedanta. The rope you saw suddenly was recognized to be a snake. If you get my meaning. Some Shakti-s just love to be bound so they can be freed.
[FairfieldLife] RE: All About Sadhus and Yogis
You must belong to the P-Dog school of dear professor. I'm sure there's a dog for every school.
[FairfieldLife] Welcome to the United States of paranoia
http://www.palgrave-usa.com/catalog/product.aspx?isbn=0333719662 http://www.palgrave-usa.com/catalog/product.aspx?isbn=0333719662http://nypost.com/2014/02/01/welcome-to-the-united-states-of-paranoia/ http://nypost.com/2014/02/01/welcome-to-the-united-states-of-paranoia/
[FairfieldLife] RE: All About Sadhus and Yogis
There is no such thing as "Tantric Sex". Indian Tantra was transgressive in practice ... so coitus with a low-caste or non-caste woman was a one of the means for breaking the severe behavioral commandants and restrictions of Hindu life. Sex is life ... not Tantra. Tantra is the personal worship of the devâtma-shaktis and devyatma-shaktis that animate the cosmos.Tantric ritual is its yogic codification while the inner agni-hotra (antar-yaga) is the means. Since Western society is already suffused with sex, drugs and rock-n-roll, any Tantra practice based upon such praxis is not transgressive. It therefore lacks the added fuel to break boundaries. In Vajrayana yogas, the only value of a sexual partner (karma-madra) is to more quickly and more powerfully activate the prana-s and pull them into the spine's central channel. In fact, it is considered almost parallel to the withdrawal of the pranas into the spine at death. However, mere sexual enjoyment is tangential and is considered a type of falling-down back to the sense-powers. It is NOT considered either some kind of awakening nor is it considered liberating. About Vajrayana yogas see Tsongkapa's explanation of each the six yogas of Naropa.
[FairfieldLife] RE: All About Sadhus and Yogis
Vedic Chhandas and bijâkshara-s don't work - for the deaf or damn fools. Nor do books about Tantra sadhana.
[FairfieldLife] When Europeans were enslaved by Muslims
Muslim like to portray themselves as the victims of Westerners and Jews. Not only is this portrait false but slavery has always been practiced in Islam and is still legal. One day they hope they can do it again. Following the population trends, they probably will, at least in Europe. A new study suggests that a million or more European Christians were enslaved by Muslims in North Africa between 1530 and 1780 – a far greater number than had ever been estimated before. Pirates (called corsairs) from cities along the Barbary Coast in north Africa – cities such as Tunis and Algiers – would raid ships in the Mediterranean and Atlantic, as well as seaside villages to capture men, women and children. The impact of these attacks were devastating – France, England, and Spain each lost thousands of ships, and long stretches of the Spanish and Italian coasts were almost completely abandoned by their inhabitants. At its peak, the destruction and depopulation of some areas probably exceeded what European slavers would later inflict on the African interior. The enslavement of Europeans doesn’t fit the general theme of European world conquest and colonialism that is central to scholarship on the early modern era, he said. Many of the countries that were victims of slavery, such as France and Spain, would later conquer and colonize the areas of North Africa where their citizens were once held as slaves. Maybe because of this history, Western scholars have thought of the Europeans primarily as “evil colonialists” and not as the victims they sometimes were, Davis said. Christian Slaves, Muslim Masters: White Slavery in the Mediterranean, the Barbary Coast, and Italy, 1500-1800
[FairfieldLife] RE: Complex phil chart - history tree
This chart of European philosophy skips from 4th century B.C. Aristotle to 12th century A.D. scholastic theo-philosophy. Leaving out 1500 years of intellectual history is just another form of 1950's myopia.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Those who reject superstition are displaying extra brain power
They were always fuckheads. Even before Jerry Jarvis left there were too many of them in the movement. Organizational and ideological control went together in the "movement" - which made it a bowel movement.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Those who reject superstition are displaying extra brain power
Contrary to thee, I always lie.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Secret Doctrines
Junior High level philosophy. Wiki punditry. Embarrassing half-baked knowledge. "Against the Buddhist Subjective idealists (Vijñanavadin-s), who denied the existence of the external world, Shankara urges a number of arguments, the first and strongest among which is that we must admit the existence of what we actually perceive. If anyone has any suspicion that Shankara was a subjective idealist himself, let that be laid to rest here. In fact, he almost stoops to sarcasm when he suggests that we should no more pay heed to to a man who, while perceiving external things with his senses, denies their existence than believe the report of a man who, while eating and experiencing the feeling of satisfaction, avers that he does not do so. Strange as it may sound, mâyâvâda implies a very strong affirmation of the reality of the world. In this respect it goes as far as empiricism would want to go. No empiricist ever ascribes absolute reality to the world in any case." Hermeneurtical Essays on Vedântic Topics, John G. Arapura Professor Emeritus, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wrote: So, let's review what we know: These days almost nobody can read and understand the Sanskrit scriptures so it's a really good thing that somebody can elucidate what the ancients were talking about. According to what I've reaed, there is a close affinity between Advaita Vedanta and Yogacara Buddhism. This has been noted by many scholars and historians due to the fact that the BS (Brahma Sutras) seem to indicate that Badarayana may have been a pantheistic realist. This is certainly what Ramanuja and Madhva seemed to have believed - that a dualist or quasi-dualist (dwaita and/or vasisit-advaita) reading is possible from BS. Are we agreed so far? According to Werner, "Their theory of Maya emerges from their belief in experiential reality of the absolute consciousness 'Brahman' (as emphasized in Upanishads), as opposed to Buddhist doctrine of emptiness, which emerges from the Buddhist approach of observing the nature of reality." The Upanishads were composed by transcendentalists, that is, the authors all believed in the existence of an Absolute, which was beyond or transcendental to, the world of the senses. According to what I've read, all the Upanishads were authored after the passing of the historical Buddha. Shankara taught that through direct knowledge one could realize Brahman. He taught that it was only through direct knowledge that one could realize Brahman. Vasabandhu taught that yoga is a direct knowledge experienced as emptiness - there is a co-dependency and non-origination. Werner says, "A perception of the fact that the object seen is a rope will remove the fear and sorrow which result from the illusory idea that it is a snake". Cited from Shankara's "Vivekachuudaamani" verse #12/a metaphor that was borrowed from Yogacara Buddhist thinkers, who used it in a different context." Works cited: 'The Yogi and the Mystic' Karel Werner Routledge, 1995, p. 67. 'Sankaracarya' by S. Vidyasankar http://www.advaita-vedanta.org/avhp/sankara.html http://www.advaita-vedanta.org/avhp/sankara.html On Sat, Feb 1, 2014 at 7:31 AM, mailto:emptybill@...> wrote: Yer so right. "Let's review what we know." Yep, there's nothing here to know and apparently you got nothing out of it. "Are we agreed so far?". Yep, we all agree - nothing here in the beginning, the middle or the end..
[FairfieldLife] RE: All About Sadhus and Yogis
The pundito doesn't want to understand deeply and expansively. Rather he wants to appear "knowledgeable" and "o-so erudite". Professor P-Dog apparently equates humility with humiliation. No other explanation for such repeated, intractable behavior.
[FairfieldLife] RE: All About Sadhus and Yogis
The usual half-baked information from the "professor". You should try reading the Aghora series by Svaboda. Perhaps that might help you not embarrass your self so much.
[FairfieldLife] INVASION USA
How the GOP lost Middle America Pat Buchanan explains impact of Republican Party 'selling its soul to the multinationals' Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2014/01/how-the-gop-lost-middle-america/#mKd2GFGPIAU0zcoA.99 http://www.wnd.com/2014/01/how-the-gop-lost-middle-america/#mKd2GFGPIAU0zcoA.99
[FairfieldLife] RE: Secret Doctrines
Yer so right. "Let's review what we know." Yep, there's nothing here to know and apparently you got nothing out of it. "Are we agreed so far?". Yep, we all agree - nothing here in the beginning, the middle or the end..
[FairfieldLife] The Gutless Wonder - by Kilgore Trout
It was about a robot who had bad breath, who became popular after his halitosis was cured. But what made the story remarkable, since it was written in 1932, was that it predicted the widespread use of burning jellied gasoline on human beings. It was dropped on them from airplanes. Robots did the dropping. They had no conscience, and no circuits which would allow them to imagine what was happening to the people on the ground. Trout’s leading robot looked like a human being, and could talk and dance and so on, and go out with girls. And nobody held it against him that he dropped jellied gasoline on people. But they found his halitosis unforgivable. And then he cleared that up, and he was welcomed to the human race.
Re: [FairfieldLife] The new guru domain
How could I not be jealous of your erudition, wisdom and illimitable awareness? Isn't that why you're known as Mr. TrikaVijñanavad? I feel that's the only explanation of why no one ventured to pony up the $$ to help fund your registration fees for your dot.guru domain. They are just in awe of you and too over-whelmed to say so. For my part, I don't know which domain name you prefer - maybe this: MrTrikaVignanavad.guru (easier to spell for those Westerners). Maybe you could be entitled VladGuru for short.
[FairfieldLife] The new guru domain
I propose that we take up a collection so Willy can create his own special domain: prof-prairiedog.guru. I'm thinking we could launch PDog into orbit until he becomes a star in the firmament of guru worship. We could then claim ... "I used to know him when he was just a TexoHind. But now now that he's Professor HindoBuddha, I can finally tell everyone that I know him as he really is - an' now, above all, it can be told ... He 'lightened me."
[FairfieldLife] Maniacs in the Fourth Dimension
Maniacs in the Fourth Dimension - by Kilgore Trout It was about people, whose mental diseases couldn’t be treated because the causes of the diseases were all in the fourth dimension, and three-dimensional Earthling doctors couldn’t see those causes at all, or even imagine them. One thing Trout said that Rosewater liked very much was that there really were vampires and were-wolves and goblins and angels and so on, but that they were in the fourth dimension. So was William Blake, Rosewater’s favorite poet, according to Trout. So were heaven and hell.wolves and goblins and angels and so on, but that they were in the fourth dimension. So was William Blake, Rosewater’s favorite poet, according to Trout. So were heaven and hell.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Advaita is about inherent freedom
Apparently you can't understand what you read. Gaudapada in Mandukya Karika, 4.99; “naitad buddhena bhasitam” (this was not expressed by Buddha). Shankara comments: The nature of the supreme reality is free from the differences of knowledge, known and knower, and is without a second, etat, the fact: na bhâsitam, was not expressed; buddhena, by Buddha; though a near approach to non-dualism was implied in his negation of outer objects and his imagination of everything as mere consciousness. But this non-duality, the essence of the ultimate Reality, is to be known from the Upanishads only. This is the purport.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Advaita is about inherent freedom
As usual, you are really only interested in spouting off what you have read. However, what you have read is not deep and comprehensive and it shows in your amateurish identifications of the influences between separate traditions. You read about these influences from the common arena of discourse in India and then conclude that x causes y because of similar concerns in two traditions. Advaita means not-two. However, that does not mean that because the use the term "advaita" or "advaya" is used in multiple traditions that one of these traditions has caused, created or even influenced the view of the others. Kashmiri Trika is not and never has been influenced by Shankara's Kevela Advaita. What they share is a common Indian basis for philosophizing. You also know nothing about the pivitol question of causation in the development of Hinayana dharma-pluralism, Vijñanavada Ideationism and HwaYen's Tathata-Causation. This is a topic that was later very important in the refinement and development of Chan/Zen/Sön - both Linji and Caodong traditions. But then you must already know this because you are the professor who discourses upon everything you've read. You must be the ultimate embodiment of mutual-identity and interpenetration between absolute and relative. Hail to Professor P.Dog Willy ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wrote: Thanks for posting the information,but you failed to point out the similarities: Shankara's Advaita claims to be based on the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita and the Brahma Sutras, but many scholars such as Sharma and Raju have noted that Shankara shows many signs of influence from Mahayana Buddhism, Madhyamaka, founded by Nagarjuna, the Yogacara, founded by Vasubandhu and Asanga. Gaudapada incorporated aspects of Buddhism into Hindusim in order to reinterpret the Upanishads and the Brahma Sutras. 1. Gaudapada adapted the Buddhist concept of "ajata", the doctrine of non-origination or non-creation, from Nagarjuna's Madhyamika. Ajata is the fundamental philosophical doctrine of Gaudapada. 2. Advaita Vedanta also adopted from the Madhyamika the idea of two levels of reality - "two truths" - absolute and relative. 3. Gaudapada and Shankara adopted almost all of the Buddhist dialectic, methodology, arguments and analysis, their concepts, their terminologies and even their philosophy of the Absolute. 4. Gaudapada embraced the Buddhist idea that the nature of the world is the four-cornered negation. 5. Gaudapada adopted the Buddhist doctrines that ultimate reality is pure consciousness. P.S. You also did not explain the connection between the non-dualism of Advaita Vedanta and the non-dualism of Kashmere Tantrsim. On Wed, Jan 22, 2014 at 9:28 PM, mailto:emptybill@...> wrote: In Tibetan Buddhism, Nagarjuna is the most important philosophical figure. It is like Thomas Aquinas for Roman Catholics. Madhyamaka is the basis for understanding Buddhism and Vijñanavada is a close correlate. Contrary to the Tibetans, Madhyamaka is not given the same exalted status in the history of Chinese Buddhism. Their conclusion was that the eight-fold negation of Nagarjuna set the framework for a final negation of all elements (dharmas) of experience, whether material, psychological, or celestial. However, according to them, this very conclusion cannot be final. That is because any negation (no matter how subtle or all encompassing) is by definition the opposite of an affirmation - not merely logically but in final meaning and result. It is therefore merely relative and is neither final nor absolute. Consequently, Madhyamaka was superseded by various other Buddhist schools until Hwa-Yen became the view that encompassed all other schools and all other elements of experience. That view about Madhyamaka was echoed by Shankara who characterized Madhyamaka as shunyavada and dismissed it rather swiftly. Shankara in fact saved some of his most pointed criticisms for the Buddhists of his day, particularly Vijnanavada. In spite of this, there are parallels between some of Gaudapada’s statements and the views of Vijnanavada because they both draw from the same milieu of philosophic discourse. This is one reason that assertions that Advaita was a secret Buddhism demonstrate ignorance of the issues and shallow scholarship. As pointed out by K. A. Krishnaswamy Aiyer, Buddhism and Advaita are fundamentally opposed in five key points: 1. Both say that the world is “unreal”, but Buddhists mean that it is only a conceptual construct (vikalpa), while Shankara does not think that the world is merely conceptual. 2. Momentariness is a cardinal principal of Buddhism – consciousness is fundamentally momentary for them. However, in Advaita, consciousness is pure (shuddha), without beginning or end (anadi) and is thoroughly continuous. The momentariness of empirical states of consci
[FairfieldLife] RE: Advaita is about inherent freedom
In Tibetan Buddhism, Nagarjuna is the most important philosophical figure. It is like Thomas Aquinas for Roman Catholics. Madhyamaka is the basis for understanding Buddhism and Vijñanavada is a close correlate. Contrary to the Tibetans, Madhyamaka is not given the same exalted status in the history of Chinese Buddhism. Their conclusion was that the eight-fold negation of Nagarjuna set the framework for a final negation of all elements (dharmas) of experience, whether material, psychological, or celestial. However, according to them, this very conclusion cannot be final. That is because any negation (no matter how subtle or all encompassing) is by definition the opposite of an affirmation - not merely logically but in final meaning and result. It is therefore merely relative and is neither final nor absolute. Consequently, Madhyamaka was superseded by various other Buddhist schools until Hwa-Yen became the view that encompassed all other schools and all other elements of experience. That view about Madhyamaka was echoed by Shankara who characterized Madhyamaka as shunyavada and dismissed it rather swiftly. Shankara in fact saved some of his most pointed criticisms for the Buddhists of his day, particularly Vijnanavada. In spite of this, there are parallels between some of Gaudapada’s statements and the views of Vijnanavada because they both draw from the same milieu of philosophic discourse. This is one reason that assertions that Advaita was a secret Buddhism demonstrate ignorance of the issues and shallow scholarship. As pointed out by K. A. Krishnaswamy Aiyer, Buddhism and Advaita are fundamentally opposed in five key points: 1. Both say that the world is “unreal”, but Buddhists mean that it is only a conceptual construct (vikalpa), while Shankara does not think that the world is merely conceptual. 2. Momentariness is a cardinal principal of Buddhism – consciousness is fundamentally momentary for them. However, in Advaita, consciousness is pure (shuddha), without beginning or end (anadi) and is thoroughly continuous. The momentariness of empirical states of consciousness overlies this continuity. 3. In Buddhism, the “self” is the ego (the “I”) – a conceptual construct that is quite unreal. In Advaita, the Self is the only “really Real” and is the basis of all concepts. 4. In Buddhism, avidya causes us to construct continuities (such as the self) where there are none. In Advaita, avidya causes us instead to take what is unreal to be real and what is real to be unreal. 5. Removal of avidya leads to nirvana/blowning out for Buddhists but for Shankara it leads to perfect knowledge (vidya).
Re: [FairfieldLife] RE: Advaita is about inherent freedom
I have already provided a scholarly synopsis of the real differences between Shankara's Advaita and Vijñanavada Buddhism. Many times I have also explained how and why Shankara refuted the same. You answer has always been the same - "Yeah, but ... and then you continue onward without considering it at all. You only want to appear as "Mr. Professor" so you continue to repeat stuff you read that was written 10-20 years ago. You simply waste my time. Therefore I don't want to waste more with your b.s. and your "it is all about Prof..Willy P-Dog". This is apparently how you understand both Advaita and Trika: "I am the Universe. It's all about Me. It's my Maya". ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wrote: There is nothing absurd about any of my citations and they have not been refuted by any scholars that I know of. If you have any sources you'd like to cite, please list them so we can read them for ourselves. mAyA - illusion , unreality , deception , fraud , trick , sorcery , witchcraft magic RV; an unreal or illusory image, phantom , apparition ib. (esp. ibc= false, unreal, illusory; duplicity (with Buddhists one of the 24 minor evil passions) Dharmas. Illusion (identified in the Samkhya with Prakriti or Pradha1na and in that system, as well as in the Vedanta, regarded as the source of the visible universe. Cologne Digital Sanskrit Lexicon: http://www.sanskrit-lexicon.uni-koeln.de/cgi-bin/tamil/recherche http://www.sanskrit-lexicon.uni-koeln.de/cgi-bin/tamil/recherche On Tue, Jan 21, 2014 at 8:46 PM, mailto:emptybill@...> wrote: All of these absurd assertions have long ago been refuted by excellent scholars. You simply don't know what you are talking about - to put it quite plainly.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Advaita is about inherent freedom
All of these absurd assertions have long ago been refuted by excellent scholars. You simply don't know what you are talking about - to put it quite plainly.
[FairfieldLife] RE: O Mio Babbino Caro
Since it is opera why not listen to it sung by some of the best mezzos? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ow1niq0mOwE http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ow1niq0mOwE http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NU3bJ5JJhlw http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NU3bJ5JJhlw
Re: [FairfieldLife] Advaita is about inherent freedom
This reply demonstrates that you are either unable to understand the post or you didn't read it. It also shows that you are probably unqualified to study advaita. The post was about Advaita - not Kashmiri Trika or Shri Vidya.Your reply is merely inane. Don't sully this one with your quasimoto, pseudo-professorial bullshit.
[FairfieldLife] Advaita is about inherent freedom
A popular view of Advaita Vedanta (sometimes an accusation) is that it is Maya-vada ... the doctrine that everything is mere Maya. This is a classical misrepresentation that began with Ramanuja (11th Century head of the Sri Vaishnava-s) and continues down to today. Probably one reason for the misunderstanding is that different teachers presented alternate explanations of the Brahma Sutras. In essence, they held contrary preconceptions. Another reason is that discussions about the nature of Maya became continuous in debates between Advaita scholars. This led to the belief that “Maya talk” was the core of Advaita. The reality is that Advaita is more accurately call Brahma-vada, the teaching about Brahman. It uses the principal Upanishads, the Brahma Sutras and the Bhagavad Gita as a threefold authoritative Vedic source. However, leading up to the 14th Century, the Yoga Sutras became an alternate source for understanding the path to realize Brahman. By the middle of the 14th-15th Century, this view so infiltrated Advaita Vedanta that the works of Shankaracharya Swami Vidyâranya (who wrote Pañchadâši and Jivanmuktiviveka) presumed that students of Advaita followed a yogic path to realize Brahman. The modern proponent of this view was Swami Vivekananda. MMY just continued that mode – which included the division of the Bhagavad Gita into three topical sections, a theme also found in Sri Aurobindo Ghose. Scholars now call this interpretation “Yogic Advaita” - an interpretation that is more about yoga and less about Advaita Vedanta. Perhaps more perplexing for those studying Advaita, the concept of “enlightenment” (so over-popularized) was borrowed from the Buddhists – and is neither Yogic nor Vedantic. The Yoga Sutras, in fact, do not even propose yoga as a goal but rather discuss the necessity for “vi-yoga” … separating, dis-uniting, dis-joining. Thus the question … “separating what from what”? In this case, separating the apparent con-fusion (fusing together) between awareness (purusha) and the field of experience (i.e. body, senses, mind). Contrary to this Yogic assumption of two orders of reality (purusha and prakriti), Shankara’s Vedanta teaches the inherent unity of Reality (Brahman). Rather than chitta-vritti-nirodha, nirvikalpa-samâdhi or Buddhist dhyana-samâpatti, Advaita points to the direct ascertainment of one’s own true nature. The purpose of such recognition is seeing directly that moksha (freedom) is already the inherent nature of human beings. It also recognizes that moksha is freedom from any experience, while realizing that like waves moving across the ocean, experience is itself nothing but Brahman.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Apostasy, is a terrible thing.
http://www.nelson-atkins.org/ http://www.nelson-atkins.org/ http://www.nelson-atkins.org/ http://www.unitytemple.com/healing/hmedit.asp http://www.unitytemple.com/healing/hmedit.asp http://www.martydybiczphd.com/Pages/MeditationSchedule.aspx http://www.martydybiczphd.com/Pages/MeditationSchedule.aspx
[FairfieldLife] The Art of Amour-cortois: Eros, Jois and Mahäsukha in Tantra and the Troubadours
By Bishnu Charan Dash Now available on Scribd http://www.scribd.com/doc/123957003/BISHNU-CHARAN-DASH-THE-ART-OF-AMOUR-CORTOIS-EROS-JOIS-AND-MAHASUKHA-IN-TANTRA-AND-THE-TROUBADOURS http://www.scribd.com/doc/123957003/BISHNU-CHARAN-DASH-THE-ART-OF-AMOUR-CORTOIS-EROS-JOIS-AND-MAHASUKHA-IN-TANTRA-AND-THE-TROUBADOURS
[FairfieldLife] RE: Apostasy, is a terrible thing.
Not a cult but rather a church. Most Christian don't consider it Christian because it isn't the exclusionary type with which they identity.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Apostasy, is a terrible thing.
I live in the City of Unity. I did a number of residence courses at Unity Village - back in the old days. Unity Village is a fabulous facility but now there are a number of other Unity facilities - such as Unity Temple on the Plaza and Unity Church of Overland Park. Unity Temple on the Plaza is full of meditation groups and classes - Vipassana, Mahayana, Zen, Vajrayana, Dzogchen ... all because they have a Buddhist Center there. This also is where Khachab Rinpoche teaches Dzogchen twice a year when he comes into town.. Unity Church of Overland Park is a few blocks away from my residence. I even live next to a Unity minister. So they are pretty much everywhere. Each Unity facility has specialized in a particular part of the spiritual marketplace so their appeal has been well thought out. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wrote: There are a few splinter Christian churches that do not follow the idea that we are inherently sinful, but are instead, inherently good. One such church is the Unity Church of Practical Christianity. On the other hand the majority of Christian flavours do indeed seem to regard our species as base and vile in some way. Should a creator that makes such defective merchandise really be revered for attempting to patch its mistakes? It really does not make much sense. OK, y'all are bad, doomed, so I'll send my son and kill him for your benefit. After all this time it is hard to tell what Jesus actually taught; it may have had a more esoteric meaning in the beginning, but it is that more abstract way of interpretation that tends to get lost as time marches on.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Apostasy, is a terrible thing.
The Dancing Fool - by Kilgore Trout A flying saucer creature named Zog arrived on Earth to explain how wars could be prevented and how cancer could be cured. He brought the information from Margo, a planet where the natives conversed by means of farts and tap dancing. Zog landed at night in Connecticut. He had no sooner touched down than he saw a house on fire. He rushed into the house, farting and tap dancing, warning the people about the terrible danger they were in. The head of the house brained Zog with a golf club.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Apostasy, is a terrible thing.
Judy - it was a play upon and between words and meaning. You should've gotten it. And finally, I find the notion that one should never feel shame for one's mistakes contemptible. I feel shame that your mistaken notion is contemptible.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Apostasy, is a terrible thing.
This is the essence of confession (a renewal of baptism). It was originally a practice that started with ordinary people seeking out desert monastics who spent their live in askesis. Only later was it usurped by priests whose actual job was just the rite of absolution. The belief of the Greek Church is naturally also that of the Russian in this regard. Russian Orthodox theologians all hold that the Church possesses the power to forgive sins, where there is true repentance and sincere confession. The form in use at present is as follows: "My child, N. N., may our Lord and God Christ Jesus by the mercy of His love absolve thee from thy sins; and I, His unworthy priest, in virtue of the authority committed to me, absolve thee and declare thee absolved of thy sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen."
[FairfieldLife] RE: Apostasy, is a terrible thing.
So many World Teachers ... SBS, MMY and Robin. How many world teachers does it take to liberate everyone? None.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Apostasy, is a terrible thing.
And finally, I find the notion that one should never feel shame for one's mistakes contemptible. I feel shame that your mistaken notion is contemptible.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Apostasy, is a terrible thing.
MMY was not a personal guru and said so many times. How could he, with so many followers? At my TTC in Fiuggi, there were over 2,000 teachers. Just getting the mantras of initiation took about 1-1/2 hours of waiting to go through the whole process. A personal guru (like Shri Yukteshwar) gives strict guideline to help form the personality of a student. Self-evaluation is part of that practice. What MMY gave was simple - practice your own culture's ethics and teach TM. He only gave a general outline about yama-niyama once (at Humbolt TTC). He may have taught more elsewhere but he was moving the TM Movement and that was his focus. Robin probably didn't get anything more than anyone else. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wrote: If I may comment, presumably the disciple doesn't know any better. How can the disciple demand something he or she doesn't know is necessary? FWIW, I've always thought Maharishi didn't give Robin the help he needed after he'd had this profoundly transformative experience on the mountain. Robin didn't think he needed any guidance, but he would surely have accepted it if Maharishi had offered it. Whether whatever Maharishi could have given him in the way of guidance would have made a difference, I have no idea. But it's almost as if Maharishi wanted to see what he'd do if left to his own devices. He kept close tabs on Robin once he'd gone off to teach on his own in Canada but never interfered, and even told Bevan to leave Robin alone when he came to MIU and started causing trouble, leading Robin to assume he approved of what Robin was doing. I sure could be wrong, but I'm inclined to put some of the blame for what ultimately happened to Robin on Maharishi's hands-off approach. << emptybill, following up on your last sentence below, how is it possible for a teacher to cheat a disciple "out of the self-evaluations necessary for real sadhana." Surely the disciple has some say in the matter. Do you think this is what happened to Robin? >> This is what happens when experience itself becomes the object of sadhana (practice) rather than conformity with Reality. It is the same old theme and “gurus” just fool people when they cheat them out of the self-evaluations necessary for real sadhana.
[FairfieldLife] RE: Apostasy, is a terrible thing.
LSD still comes in tabs? How would you know that? Perhaps you read about it on MSLSD. (disclaimer for the NSA snoops: I don't know nothin' bout nothin')
[FairfieldLife] RE: Apostasy, is a terrible thing.
Prof. P. Dog sez: MMY's sadhana is based on yoga practice. If it was Vedantic, MMY would have emphasized the Vedantic notion of maya, which is not real, yet not unreal. Your view of Vedanta is that it is Maya-vada ... a teaching about Maya. This is a classical misrepresentation that began with Ramanuja and continues today. It infiltrated Vedanta with the works of Swami Vidyaranya, who wrote Panchadasi. Its modern proponent was Vivekananda and MMY just continued that mode – including the division of the Bha. Gita into three topical sections, also found in Aurobindo. This form of interpretation is known as Yogic Advaita and is more about yoga and less about Vedanta. The whole concept of “enlightenment” is Buddhist not Vedantic. Shankara’s Vedanta teaches the ascertainment of one’s own true nature, not chitta-nirvikalpa or Buddhist dhyana-samadhi. The purpose of the teaching is realization of moksha (freedom) - liberation from any experience, whether inner, outer or transcendent.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Apostasy, is a terrible thing.
Michael sez: "Robin's experience was that his actions were, as it were, dictated by cosmic forces, rather than that he could just do whatever he felt like. His experience was that he could not do other than what he did, even though at times there was some aspect of himself that didn't want to do what he was doing." So bottom line I don't buy Robin's assertion that he in essence was forced to behave in this way by these "forces." That excuse goes back as long as we have had the idea of a Devil. Emptybill replies: Robin never was interested in a classical Vedantic assessment of his so-called “enlightenment”. All of this, in spite of the fact that Shankara’s Vedanta was the proffered basis of Maharishi’s tradition. Such an assessment would have presented an opposite view about this whole “enlightenment meme”. I pointed this out to Robin a number of times but he wasn’t interested in hearing about it. Rather he just wanted to espouse his chosen narrative about how he was deluded by “cosmic entities” but was now free of them. More of the old - “I didn’t fail … I was fooled” as you also pointed out. This is what happens when experience itself becomes the object of sadhana (practice) rather than conformity with Reality. It is the same old theme and “gurus” just fool people when they cheat them out of the self-evaluations necessary for real sadhana.
[FairfieldLife] The future of Osamacare in a revealing report
Hail Chanukistan! Tens of thousands fled socialized Canadian medicine in 2013 http://dailycaller.com/2014/01/16/report-tens-of-thousands-fled-socialized-canadian-medicine-in-2013/ http://dailycaller.com/2014/01/16/report-tens-of-thousands-fled-socialized-canadian-medicine-in-2013/
[FairfieldLife] RE: All About Zen
What amateurish bullshit.
[FairfieldLife] RE: The Islamization of America in 2013
In chanukistan they proly prefer live and let live. I figure it is the French influence - bend over and take it in the end. However, sometimes I have to remind the frothing critters that I don't make this stuff up but rather advance a traditional view of spiritual life i.e. advaita, tantra, dzogchen. Whether you like, dislike, accept or, reject is incidental to me since you just make it up anyway. You have no basis to evaluate these teachings because you are not trained in them. Your assessment that they are based upon pride is just more self-referenced emotion.to me since it implies that you are an oracle uniquely qualified to assay my intent. It ain't necessarily so but so what? . Perhaps you have become the new World Teacher. Robin would be so proud.
[FairfieldLife] RE: The Islamization of America in 2013
You are absol ... fuckin.. uutaaly right. I was never initiated into Willy-ism. Go finger ...
[FairfieldLife] RE: The Islamization of America in 2013
Obviously defiled ... right commissar?
[FairfieldLife] RE: The Islamization of America in 2013
More appeasement. You are asleep about the constitutional threat. However, don't worry about it. Just take two Valium and call everything "perfectly fine".
[FairfieldLife] RE: The Islamization of America in 2013
Actually, you have no idea what you are talking about . As you know, I had a ritvikâcharya teach me mahârudrâbhishekam. Over a period of 5-6 years he also imparted much of the Vedika view of values. According to him, the Tantrika view was that the universe was actualized by limitless shakti-s that structured its being, patterns and interactions. The only thing he wouldn't yield about was teaching me the mechanics of agni-hotra (although he performed one for me at the installation of my shiva-lingam). I believe he considered me too far from being a renouncer and therefore prone to get into trouble with an agni-hotra ... all because if done properly, the yajñamana receives the results quickly and decisively. You also forget that I have a Vajrayana Tantric and Dzogchen teacher. Certainly different practices but when he first saw my altar he pointed to the traditionally carved shiva lingam and commented “original Tantra”. All this means that your evaluation is a parody of a Willy-ism - which is as much value as I can give it.
[FairfieldLife] RE: The Islamization of America in 2013
After death, bodies are turned with the head facing South to signal the yama-dhutas to come and lead the soul to Lord Yama. Which is why Jñana Dakshinamurti Shiva sits in meditation facing South. He is the preceptor residing in unborn-undying awareness (jñana-chaitanyam) - marking "death" as just an idea in the mind of the deluded. So thank you for the compliment. I'll try and remind the jihadi-s that you are a KINO - a kafir in name only.
[FairfieldLife] RE: The Islamization of America in 2013
Typical clap-trap appeasement.
[FairfieldLife] RE: The Islamization of America in 2013
So will you convert or die? Sufism is the last castle still existing of Neo-Platonism but it is under attack by the Wahabi-s and Jihadists. They hate and kill Sufi-s like they kill kafir-s. You worship polytheistic devils posing as "gods". You say their devil-name emblems in your demon-worship meditations. That make you an enemy of Allah ("al-llah" the deity). However, there is only one deity (La ilaha illa Allah) who has no associates or equals. Also, there is only one final divine messenger (Muhammadun rasulu'Llah) who abrogates all others. Wake up and smell the stink of headless bodies in the streets.
[FairfieldLife] The Islamization of America in 2013
Your Constitution is is not revealed by Allah. The sword is your destiny unless you submit and beg to be His slave. Read it and weep infidel. http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2014/01/09/The-Islamization-of-America-in-2013 http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2014/01/09/The-Islamization-of-America-in-2013