As used in the EBTs.
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Ah, yes. To clarify for others, this happens for example in AN10.29, which also mentions perceiving limited and unlimited (appamāṇa) forms: the same idea as MN128, where the context is developing samādhi. I agree, Bhante, that this is another indication that anidassana is a synonym for formless.
The translation “where nothing appears” seems more adequate than “invisible”, certainly in a Buddhist context. But perhaps, if these lines of verse also refer to Brahmanical ideas, the meaning of the term may be wider than that, mostly poetical and not meant to be that technical and specific.
Although I did not give it much importance in the essay you referred to, I think these connections are actually what these two suttas (DN11 and MN49) are actually all about. Both have a very distinct Brahmanical context, with the Brahmā gods being made fun of, and DN11 is also part of the Sīlakkhandha Vagga of the Dīgha, which is completely aimed at converting outsiders, primarily Brahmins.
These suttas are refuting the Brahmanical belief in a nāmarūpa-less consciousness and reaffirm the Buddha’s idea of the cessation of all existence and hence consciousness, including “infinite” ones. Some small translation issues aside, this much is completely certain to me. This is of course one of the running threads in the suttas: what others took as permanent and as liberation, the Buddha saw as impermanent and suffering. This also goes for this infinite (or “unbounded”) consciousness.
The terminology used is also very Upaniṣadic. You already pointed out some connections. In a recent thread I discussed this in more detail:
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The only thing I’d take issue with is:
Obviously the Upanishads don’t describe meditation explicitly, and we must assume that is an innovation of the Buddha. But there are so many passages and ideas that seem “meditation-ish”, such as the almost obsessive interest in the breath, and the overall tenor seems to me highly contemplative and reflective. So yeah, I disagree with Jayatilleke on this one.
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I also believe Buddha described the cessation of all existence as the cessation of all bhava. But is this the same as a mere cessation? I do not believe this. Because what Buddha refered to as cessation of existence or bhava, is the cessation of a constructed reality, like a building. Dhammapada describes this.
Dhp154:
I’ve seen you, house-builder!
You won’t build a house again!
Your rafters are all broken,
your roof-peak is demolished.
My mind, set on demolition,
has reached the end of craving.
Home here is bhava. Tanha is the builder.
The mind that builds is the grasping mind.
Bhava is like a home the mind builds. This happens all the time, in this very life, also. It is constructed. There is, ofcourse, no bhava without grasping because without grasping there is no constructing. Without constructing the home is not build. That is the whole idea, i believe.
The enligtend mind in this life does not construct the home of an angry mindset, a greedy one, a jalous one etc. Is does not grasp arising formations. It shows no becoming. At least not unvoluntairy, because the cause for building a home, attachment, has been abandoned.
In this life it shows no becoming. Also after death it does not make a home. Not the hell realm as home, not the deva realms etc. These are related: building no home in this very life and after this life.
How does one know that one has attained the end of rebirth, because in this very life mind one has the experiential confirmation that mind does not build a home anymore. It is stable. It tastes the deathless.
The message of the Buddha is, i believe, that the mind that does not make a home anymore, that does not construct, that is stable. Because it does not construct it is also not liable to desintegrate. The EBT texts describe this as attaining the signless, emptiness, the uninclined, the unfabricated, unmade etc.
What is refered to as emptiness, signless, the desireless, uninclined, deathless cannot be considered as a bhava ofcourse because it is not result of grasping. It is not build.
So, this also means that the end of all bhava is attained in this very life, i believe. In this very life, while living one makes an end to existence, meaning to bhava, to the mind that grasps and contructs a temporary home.
It is does not mean that one stops to exist because that is not at all the meaning of the cessation of bhava. That only refers to the cessation of constructing, or building. Of building a home.
Bhava is based upon ignorance and tanha, and when this is gone, one cannot say there is still a bhava.
So in EBT there is such a definition of consciousness that it is understood unambiguously and without divergence by everyone in the same way without exception? That’s how your answer should be understood?
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It seems to me that the ideas explored in this discussion of DN11 echo those we discussed earlier about the meaning of AN4.173 viz. “Is there something else beyond the 6 senses?”. They also tie in neatly with the fire simile in MN72. The failure of the Buddha’s contemporaries to grasp just what he was talking about can be attributed to their sakkayaditthi - the insistence that “Some Thing must Exist!”
When a fire runs out of fuel, it ceases. Another way of stating this would be to say that when the fire runs out of fuel, it no longer appears. That does not mean that the Fire now Exists unseen on another plane / in another dimension - that would be Eternalism. The fire doesn’t ‘go’ anywhere - it just goes out. Yet, at the same time - that does not mean its annihilated. Fire is a Process, without any Permanent Substance - it cannot die because it was never born.
Similarly, Mind and Consciousness are simply dependently originated natural phenomena - empty of any permanent, enduring, exclusively satisfactory controllable Essence (Self).
They are impermanent (AN10.60) and should be abandoned… but that is hard to do as they are the last bastion of the conceit of Self (SN12.61).
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Just a tip, if you didn’t phrase your question as a clumsy gotcha you’d be more likely to get an answer.
On the consciousness where nothing appears
I never questioned Luang Poo Tate directly on this but, having listened to him speak many times about consciousness and states of meditation, my understanding of this would be that he used different terminology to describe the same thing. I am sure that he would say that this kind of consciousness occurs when the singularity is reached. In this state, ekaggatacitta, awareness is present but it only knows itself. In other words, consciousness is aware of consciousness and nothing else. You could say, consciousness withdraws from its object and turns back on itself.
He would also say that a “taste” of this can be experienced in deep samadhi when one-pointedness is reached. However, this singularity of samadhi is not identical to the singularity of enlightenment, when the eight factors of the path converge into Right View. Unlike samadhi, this singularity has no seeds of defilement.
This may not be a scholarly explanation, but it is one that can be verified, when one reaches deep samadhi, in the first instance. I encourage all to practise to this level, then there would an understanding that does not rely on words.
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You mean I should have phrased my question like that:
Unfortunately, the answer I received was a non-answer. So I had to ask a clarifying question in such a way as to show why that answer was in fact a non-answer, and at the same time, since I cannot read minds, find out for myself whether the author himself is able to understand why his answer was a non-answer.
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This is precisely what Ramana Maharshi taught. Consciousness or pure awareness, the natural state, is only aware of itself. Everything else – all of phenomena, experienced as either inside oneself or as outside oneself – only seems to exist. It is ego…which has nothing to do with our contemporary views of the term. It is also what Sunyo refers to above when he writes:
In Vedanta, it is known as cidabhasa. Without going into detail, it is like moonlight or the shining of the moon. The moon seems to shine or give off light. In reality, it is only reflected light – chidabhasa – that comes from the sun, its source or origin. Likewise, ego (not your or my ego) is like a snake that one – ego – takes to be a rope. Hence, ego, defined as the five sheaths (body, prana or the vital elements, mind, intellect and will) is what seems to exist. Yet we remain in perpetual delusion and ignorance because we take what has (falsely) superimposed itself on reality to be true.
English translation: If the ego comes into existence, everything comes into existence; if the ego does not exist, everything does not exist. [Hence] the ego itself is everything. Therefore, know that investigating what this [ego] is alone is giving up everything.
Which ego is he referring to here? The one and only ego there is, namely ourself, so we are that.
However this one ego is not what we actually are, but only what we seem to be, so if we investigate ourself keenly enough, we will see what we actually are and hence this one ego will vanish forever, since it does not actually exist, just as an illusory snake would vanish if we were to look at it carefully enough to see that it is actually just a rope. Therefore, since the seeming existence of everything else depends upon the seeming existence of ourself as this ego, and since this ego will cease to exist if we investigate it keenly enough, Bhagavan says, ‘ஆதலால், யாது இது என்று நாடலே ஓவுதல் யாவும்’ (ādalāl, yādu idu eṉḏṟu nādalē yāvum ōvudal ), which means, ‘Therefore, investigating what this [ego] is alone is giving up everything’.
So to get back to what you were saying, HinMarkPeng, pure awareness is self shining. Meaning, it is only aware of itself. Everything else only appears or seems to be other (because it is a mix of adjunct conflated awareness – ego – that the latter falsely projects as the real thing). Make no mistake, Maharshi’s teachings are very distinct from the usual repetiton nowadays of both the Classic Vedanta and Neo-Vedanta catch all phrase: “Consciousness is all there is.” Maharshi is saying the opposite. All that we see and experince is ego. It would be too long to explain but to sum it up in simple metaphor: the snake is nothing but the rope, but the rope is not a snake.
No worries, I know 99% of readers here will be hardly interested in this. Yet you would be surprised how Ramana Maharshi spelled out – in deeper and subtler detail than the Upanishads as well as the confusion of millenia of Vedantic commentaries – much of what you are discussing here in a few simple texts, notably Ulladu Narpadu.
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So, by the way, as an echo to the title of this post – on the consciousness where nothing appears – I might also add that this statement is also close to what Ramana taught. I briefly outlined the false identity of ego as the phenomena of this (apparent) world. But self inquiry, when taken to its end – manonasa or the destruction of ego – brings the liberation of ego’s illusion/delusion. Though there is talk of such a destruction of mind/ego, actually that is not really the case. When you find the snake to be a rope, did you destroy the snake? No, you just realize that there was never a snake to begin with. In reality there was nothing. Ego is a pseudo or false construct to begin with but unfortunately, a very tenacious one. In other words, nothing appears on consciousness/awareness.
‘It’ in the following verse (Verse 25 of Ulladu Narpadu) is ego:
English translation: Grasping form it comes into existence; grasping form it stands; grasping and feeding on form it grows abundantly; leaving form, it grasps form. If seeking, it will take flight. The formless phantom ego. Investigate.
Explanatory paraphrase: Grasping form [that is, projecting and perceiving the form of a body (composed of five sheaths) as itself] it comes into existence [rises into being or is formed]; grasping form [that is, holding on to that body as itself] it stands [endures, continues or persists]; grasping and feeding on form [that is, projecting and perceiving other forms or phenomena] it grows [spreads, expands, increases, ascends, rises high or flourishes] abundantly; leaving [one] form [a body that it had projected and perceived as itself in one state], it grasps [another] form [another body that it projects and perceives as itself in its next state]. If seeking [that is, if it seeks to know what it actually is by keenly investigating itself], it will take flight [because it has no form of its own, and hence it cannot seem to exist without grasping the forms of other things as itself and as its food or sustenance]. [Such is the nature of this] formless phantom [fiend, demon or evil spirit] ego. [Therefore] investigate [it] [or know thus].
Just to share some ideas:
Buddha does not really see ego as the root of suffering, in my opinion. Ego is just part of the distorted subjective cinematic stream and kind of knowledge that arises when mind has become involved in her own projections. So, when it is lost in conceiving. Like being lost in a mental film. Reality becomes at that moment cinematic, and also oneself, ones life becomes cinematic. This is really wondrous because one can also cut it of any moment.
But it is not ego who instigates this cinematic experience of our world and ourselves and others.
It is due to passions, due to inner drifts, floods arising that overwhelm the mind and it becomes involved in her own projections.
Once mind is involved in conceiving it also conceives a me, I am, and it expereinces the cinematic stream as true, as real, as reality, as how things really are. In this subjective cinematic stream there is also a mental person, a mental figure, a protagonist, an ego, at that moment experienced as oneself.
Ego is the cinematic self, as it were.
One can ask…can one do without?
Remember I said that there are two different types of singularity. What you are describing appears to be similar to the samadhi singularlity. I agree that this can be experienced by anyone who practises well enough. The second singulatiry, the singularity of the Path, is NOT the same. This singularity requires not only concentration but also wisdom. It requires a complete understanding of impermanence, suffering and non-self. Without a thorough investigation of these three signs of being, the second singularity is NOT possible. I don’t think what you are describing meets this requirement, but I do understand why there is confusion.
The ego Ramana spoke of is much more than what you are relating. It is not only the cinematic scene. It is the whole cinema theatre with all its components. In other worlds, the ego Ramana is refering to is creation itself…all phenomena included (as I said in my post above). The passions you speak of are called vasanas in this context and they are part of the the fifth sheath of ego, the will. This sheath could be considered the biggest trouble maker as it keeps pumping out all the hindrances (to use Buddhist lingo) that keeps fueling the machine, from birth to birth.
Of course, I am not expecting you or most Buddhists to agree with this. It is a total paradigm shift in the perspective on reality. Much like Dependent Origination is to the many people who know nothing about it. I was only responding to a part of the thread that contained something of what Ramana taught.
Obviously, I can’t begin going into lectures on Ramana on this forum (nor am I interested in doing so). I gave a few resources so people can go further in them if they are interested. Mostly look up the work of Ramana’s foremost interpreter in English today, Michael James.
I almost pointed this out, HinMarkPeng, but then I have to remind myself that few know about Ramana’s teachings in detail. His rendering of the description I gave has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with meditative states and/or samadhi of any sort. Ramana considered any type of formal meditation (as what most people consider that to be ) from any tradition to be a form of manolaya, a temporary state. They may be interesting, ecstatic and all the rest but they come and go. The insights also come and go (or the definite impact on the changing lives of the practitioners); hence their impermanence.
Awareness only becomes aware of itself alone with manonasa, the complete destruction of ego/mind. It is not temporary but permanent. Maybe there is some confusion because many know that Ramana spoke of self inquiry (or atma vicara) as the only effective means to attain manonasa. But self inquiry has nothing to do with formal sitting meditation and going into temporary states that one leaves once the session is over.
So, are we talking about the same thing? Maybe, maybe not. The means are surely different. I just found it interesting that you brought up the main point that consciousness is aware of itself alone. Maybe I am barking up the wrong tree but people who are of different confessions always seem to make the point that their teacher was the only one true real deal. Though I often play the party pooper and have to dispell many forms of syncretism (all belief systems are definetly not saying the same thing), could it be that a few teachers came to somewhat similar results using different means? I am not saying they have, but maybe in some cases it is a possibilty.
The mind cannot experience ‘its own form of light’ with absolute clarity unless it has completely given up experiencing any external viṣayas even to the slightest extent, but it can completely give up experiencing any external viṣayas without clearly experiencing ‘its own form of light’, as it does in sleep and other states of manōlaya . This is why in this verse Bhagavan places the emphasis on ‘the mind knowing its own form of light’ by making it the subject of the sentence, and relegates ‘having given up external viṣayas ’ to a subsidiary position by making it a participle clause.
That is, giving up experiencing external viṣayas is a necessary condition for manōnāśa , but not a sufficient condition, whereas the mind knowing its own form of light is not only a necessary condition but also a sufficient condition for manōnāśa . Therefore, what Bhagavan teaches us in this extremely important verse — the central gem of Upadēśa Undiyār — is that in order to experience true self-knowledge, which alone can destroy the mind, we must not only give up experiencing external viṣayas but must also experience our own ‘form of light’ — our real nature, which is the absolutely clear light of pure (content-free) consciousness.
In different states of manōlaya there may be differing degrees of clarity of self-consciousness, but because it is not a complete clarity it does not destroy the mind, and hence the mind will rise again. Moreover, because we can make no effort in such a state, we cannot increase the degree of clarity until we come out of that state. Only when the mind has risen out of laya can it make the necessary effort to focus its attention keenly and exclusively upon ‘its own form of light’.
This is why Bhagavan repeatedly emphasised that when practising ātma-vicāra we should not only avoid being carried away by any thoughts but should also avoid subsiding into any form of manōlaya , and that the only means by which we can thus remain firmly established in our natural state of self-abidance or ātma-niṣṭhā (in which our power of attention stands steadily balanced in the central point between its two customary states of thinking and laya ) is by keenly and vigilantly attending to our own ‘form of light’ — the ‘essential cit aspect’ of our mind.
Looking from the outside, I think it would be very difficult to tell the difference between a Samahita puggala and a Parinibbhuta puggala. Even demonstration of great psychic power and so forth is not enough. There are stories in the Suttas I think of people without a trace of apparent defilement in them who thought themselves as Arahants. It depends on what they say and great vicaksana buddhi on our own part I feel.
Here I formatted the end section of a video (there are hundreds) where Michael James goes into the distinction btween manolaya (which he sometimes just calls laya) and manonasa (complete destruction of mind/ego0. This will clarify the sketch I made of this in my earlier posts, for those interested. Note that he also calls self inquiry by other terms such as self investigation or self attentiveness.
English translation: What is devoid of knowledge and ignorance is actually knowledge. That which knows is not real knowledge. Since one shines without another for knowing or for causing to know, oneself is knowledge. One is not void. Know.
Explanatory paraphrase: What is devoid of knowledge and ignorance [about anything other than itself] is actually aṟivu [knowledge or awareness]. That which knows [or is aware of anything other than itself, namely ego] is not real aṟivu [knowledge or awareness]. Since [the real nature of oneself] shines without another for knowing or for causing to know [or causing to be known], oneself is [real] aṟivu [knowledge or awareness]. One is not void [emptiness, desolation, nothingness or non-existence]. Know [or be aware].
The question has been reworded because the original question was asked incorrectly. The fact is that the isolated cessation of the 4 great elements with the liberation/preservation of consciousness is impossible! It would seem that such freedom is given by a certain formless state achieved by yogis, but the Buddha points out that there the 4 elements only do not find support, and do not cease without a trace. And we can talk about cessation as a complete cessation of both materiality and mentality, and it is achieved together with the cessation of the process of consciousness, and not its separation from the 4 great elements. I do not believe that anidassana is the cessation of consciousness, since among the epithets of consciousness there is also “infinite” and “everywhere-shining,” which we certainly cannot call a state of consciousness that has truly ceased. It will not be described in such categories. We are really dealing with the formless sphere of limitless consciousness, which appears very often in the suttas. For this reason I think Bhante Sujato is right. And we have finally come to the solution to this age-old, but not difficult puzzle.
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