non-Buddhist texts on meditation?

Discussion
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Again, it depends on what kind of texts you accept as meditation instruction. What we surely don’t have is something like “First you sit down, then close your eyes, then start to breathe, then x, then y”.

‘Vedanta’ = veda-anta is often understood as the Upanisads, ‘advaita’ is an even later characterization. In the early Upanisads the main ‘meditation’ if you will is realizing that atman = brahman. Please keep in mind that these highly esoteric concepts might have left little place for petty ‘techniques’. So I would argue that the brahmin texts are nessecarily vague/inspirational.

Yet, if you look for example for passages in the Upanisads where desirelessness is conceptualized in brought in connection with Atman/Brahman:
Brhadaranyaka Upanisad 3.5, 4.3, 4.4
Chandogya 3.14, 3.17, 8.3

Those passages are quite good actually, some resemble Buddhist formulas.

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I have read (in A History of Mindfullness by Bhante @sujato if I’m not mistake) there is a tradition in Jainism said that our Buddha (Gotama) once have trained as a Jainist ascetic. Is this mentioned in Jainist canonical texts?

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There are some quite detailed meditation instructions in the 5th century AD Tirumantiram by Saint Tirumular. The Tirumantiram is introduced as such on Wikipedia:

The Thirumantiram is a Tamil poetic work written in the fifth century by Thirumular and is the tenth of the twelve volumes of the Tirumurai, the key texts of Shaiva Siddhanta and the first known Tamil work to use the term. The Tirumantiram is the earliest known exposition of the Shaiva Agamas in Tamil. It consists of over three thousand verses dealing with various aspects of spirituality, ethics and praise of Shiva. […]

You can download an English translation here.

Most of the passages dealing with meditation occur in the 3rd Tantra, verses 549 to 631 (slide 131 to 150). Here are just a few examples to give an idea of its content:

On virtue:

554: Ways of Niyama
He does not kill, he does not lie, he does not steal;
Of marked virtues is he; good, meek and just;
He shares his joys, he knows no blemish
Neither drinks nor lusts
–This the man who in Niyama’s ways stands.

On asanas (here they are sitting postures only):

559: Padmasana–Lotus Posture
Sit cross-legged with soles of feet upturned
Close draw the feet on thighs opposite,
Stretch then the hands afore on feet
That Padmasana is, famed far on earth.

On breath meditation (many passages, here just a couple):

567: Breath Control Yields Life Nectar
Let Prana merge in Mind
And together the two be stilled
Then no more shall birth and death be;
Therefore, learn to direct breath
In streams alternating left and right
And in silentness chant “Aum”

574: How to Practise Pranayama
Inhale deep and steady,
That prana fills the nadis ten;
Exhale slow
That the body does not stir;
Retain prana breath
And downward move Apana breath
Thus sit erect and vanquish Death.

On guarding the senses:

578: Blessings of Mind Withdrawal
Step by step, practise mind’s withdrawal
And look inward;
One by one many the good you see within;
And may you then meet the Lord,
Now and here below
Whom the ancient Vedas still searches
Everywhere.

There is also the turtle simile:

133: Senses Controlled, They Saw This World and Next
Who there be who, like our Lord, distinct know
The great and the small, the difficult and the facile?
They, unto tortoise, drawing in senses five under the shell,
They heard and saw This and Next, all impurities dispelled.

On light and divine bliss while meditating:

582: When Light Appears
If thus meditating,
Luminescence you glimpse at the Eye-brow centre
Know you are destined for bliss unalloyed;
If at the Throat’s Center
Lunar light you behold,
Then will your body,
In divine joy intoxicated be.

On equanimity:

629: Tranquility in Samadhi
Samadhi attained, Siva is attained;
Sakti too will be caught in its fold;
Distracting passions will be dispelled;
In equanimity perfect,
Like unto a balance
Will be the mind
All this, for those who in Samadhi sleep.

Indeed!:

574: How to Practise Pranayama
Inhale deep and steady,
That prana fills the nadis ten;
Exhale slow
That the body does not stir;
Retain prana breath
And downward move Apana breath
Thus sit erect and vanquish Death.
[…]
595: Mind Control Through Breath Control
[…]
They who control breath in measure ordained,
Will sure imprison mind-monkey
Within the body-fortress.
596: Make the Body Immortal

Also @frankk, I recall a post you made about the siddhis, they are mentionned in this text at verses 640 (slide 152) to 711, in case you are interested by how this text treat them…

668: The Eight Siddhis Enumerated
To become tiny as the atom within atom (Anima)
To become big in unshakeable proportions (Mahima)
To become light as vapour in levitation (Lahima)
To enter into other bodies in transmigration (Prapt)
To be in all things, omni-pervasive (Prakamya)
To be lord of all creation in omnipotence (Isavatam)
To be everywhere in omnipresence (Vasitvam)
–These eight are the Siddhis Great.
[…]
705: Conduct of Aspirant For Yoga Samadhi
To give up thoughts of women
To think no more of kith and kin
To be meek in learning
To abound in jnana
To be sparing of speech
To listen to deeds of Siddhi
To sit unruffled
–These the ways of the aspirant of yoga samadhi.

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If this is late enough, the OP may want to look at Philokalia as well.

[The Lord says:] “Rejoice, O young man, in your youth; and walk in the ways of your heart, blameless, expelling anger from your heart; and if the spirit of the ruler rises up against you do not desert your place,” [and here,] ‘place’ mean[s] your heart.

Similarly our Lord also says, “out of the heart proceed evil thoughts”, and “do not be distracted”. And again, “straight is the gate and narrow is the way that leads to life”. Elsewhere He also says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit”; that is to say, blessed are those who are destitute of every worldly thought. Saint Peter says likewise, “Be watchful, be vigilant, because your adversary, the devil, walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour”. […] In short, if you do not guard your intellect you cannot attain purity of heart, and so to be counted worthy to see God. Without such watchfulness you cannot become poor in spirit, or grieve, or hunger and thirst after righteousness, or be truly merciful, or pure in heart, or a peacemaker, or be persecuted for the sake of justice. To speak generally, it is impossible to acquire all the other virtues except through watchfulness. For this reason you must pursue it more diligently than anything else, so as to learn from experience these things, unknown to others, that I am speaking to you about. Now if you would like to learn also about the method of prayer […] I will tell you about this too, in so far as I can.

Above all else you should strive to acquire three things, and so begin to attain what you seek. The first is freedom from anxiety with respect to everything, whether reasonable or senseless - in other words, you should be dead to everything. Secondly, you should strive to preserve a pure conscience, so that it has nothing to reproach you with. Thirdly, you should be completely detached, so that your thoughts incline towards nothing worldly, not even your own body.

Then, sit down in a quiet cell, in a corner by yourself, and do what I tell you. Close the door, and withdraw your intellect from everything worthless and transient. […] Restrain the drawing-in of breath through your nostrils, so as not to breathe easily, and search inside yourself with your intellect so as to find the place of the heart, where all the powers of the soul reside.

To start with you will find there darkness and an impenetrable density. Later, when you persist and practice this day and night, you will find, as though miraculously, an unceasing joy. For as soon as the intellect attains the place of the heart, at once it sees things of which is previously knew nothing. It sees the open space within the heart and it beholds itself entirely luminous and full of discrimination. From then on, from whatever side a distractive thought may appear, before it has come to completion and assumed a form, the intellect immediately drives it away and destroys it with the invocation of Jesus Christ.

This part of Philokalia is from ~900AD, but there are parts from ~300AD.

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I have a copy of the Philokalia! :grin:

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Thanks Gabriel. I’ll take a look at those sections. Do you happen to know of any popular later texts in the Advaita tradition? I was recommended Adi Śankara’s Aparokshanubhuti, but flipping through it didn’t find much there.

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Thank you for your answer.

One more question: According to scholarly studies and consensus, was the teaching of Buddhism influenced by Jainism? Or otherwise?

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Positions have changed on this over the years. I think a position we find nowadays a lot (and which I find the most plausible as well) is that both Buddhism and Jainism shared elements of the sramana culture that was prevalent in Magadha / Kosala.

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I can share what some advaita gurus themselves took as inspiration:

  • Nisargadatta’s teacher Siddharameswar Maharaj regularly praised the 17c “Dasbodh” by Ramdas. I personally find Siddharameswar’s “Master of Self-Realization” an outstanding work.
  • Ramesh Balsekar regularly mentioned the 12c (or 14c) Mukundaraj, but I think his works are hard to come by in translation. I remember I read years ago his “Nectar of Immortality” but don’t know where anymore…
  • Around Ramana some works were circulated which he was asked to comment on: Advaita Bodha Deepika, Ashtavakra Gita, Ribhu Gita, 13c Jnaneshvari, …
  • I don’t remember if Atmananda Menon mentioned influences

Still, these are more books of wisdom than technical meditation instructions - you can find most of them on the net.

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that download link doesn’t exist anymore. can you put your copy on googledrive or something similar and share it?

philokia: Different language, same concepts:

  1. sila / behaving in a way to have pure conscience
  2. viveka / seclusion
  3. piti/sukha : joy in the heart
  4. luminosity: aloka sanna which is prominent from 3rd to 4th jhana, and 4iddhi pada

except for the last part which gets associated with jesus christ. But basically any meditative tradition, or qigong, if you just do one things persistently and correctly, pacify/relax/passambhayam body and mind, you get bliss, light, samadhi if you put enough time into it. And if you put enough time and have energy channels dissolved and clear, then you see these other religious yogis also getting 5 of the 6 abhinna (psychic powers).

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Might be somewhat relevant to the Jain and cross-pollination conversations here:

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The link works well for me, but it does not open a webpage, it downloads the pdf file straigh away; maybe check your download folder. Otherwise, it’s the first result in google if you type ‘Tirumantiram english translation’.

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