Dharma Wheel

they don't emanate into different truths I guess you are not a tantric practitioner. Anything in relative truth is a deluded cognition, ergo a first cause is deluded cognition. I did not claim that the first cause is a relative truth. If you had read my other posts on this thread, that would have b...

All dharmas whether compounded or uncompounded are illusory, and illusions do not arise. So it would be a mistake to say that a structure that is an illusion arises. It is not that there is an illusion (i.e. the self) that is actually a structure of the five aggregates which is the real accumulator...

An illusory self does not exist. That is why it is called "illusory". Your question is like asking "are the horns of a rabbit all there is?", "is the son of a barren women all there is?", or "is this massive gold bar in my hand right now all there is?" If you...

But let's not forget that there is an illusory owner of karma, the creator of its own karma, unique to itself, the result of which karma is only experienced by itself. So, the question is whether the illusory self is all there is. An illusory self does not exist. That is why it is called "illu...

The creative power of karma - 'karma can create things'. Right. Karma doesn’t actually ‘create’ things. Not literally, but our perception of a physical and mental 'container universe' with its laws is, according to abhidharma, a function of the ripening of our karma. Everything is originally empty,...

When we have an understanding of Shunyata as ||empty of self||, we really have a problem in the face of deist arguments, but not when we have an understanding of Shunyata as ||empty of others, but full of self||, because this sphere emptiness intrinsically possesses the attributes of a TRUE self (n...

I came across an atheist's counter-argument to the Aristotelian idea of the unmoved mover/initial cause, with parallels with Indian culture. This counter-argument aligns with Buddhism and current cosmology. It suggests placing space and time as the unmoved mover, where instead of a cause, we would ...

Bit of a long and philosophically complex set of questions here. I have a friend who is a deist and they know some arguments for why a God-like first cause of the universe exists, and I have ran into some issues with aspects of the Madhyamaka view on the subject of these arguments. It would be grea...

Conventionally, there are things out there. It's not a problem unless one wants to propose that things exist from their own side. That includes everything, both subject and objects, insides and outsides. As I have argued previously, it is all mental representations based on your argument. Because o...

An appearance indeed belongs to a mind; but an apparent object does not (as Longchenpa shows in both chapter 8 and chapter 12 of his commentary on the Treasury of the Dharmdhātu). For this reasons there are appearances for sentient beings, but not for rocks and trees. Saying that neither appearance...

This phenomena-noumena dichotomy is not found in Buddhist teachings. Positing a noumena beyond your senses is positing a svabhāva. What you say is all in your mind, not mine. Conventionally, there are things out there. It's not a problem unless one wants to propose that things exist from their own ...

What I was asking is whether the thing being referred to in "fundamentally there is no thing", only refers to the mental image in the mind and not to the physical thing from which the perceiving mind generates its image, or the physical thing or both. We all know that the mental image of ...

All the way down, and there is no bottom, Since conventions are mind made, therefore, as far as your analysis goes, it applies only to whatever is in the mind. It cannot say anything as regards whatever is external to the mind, and the nature of whatever is external to the mind. “Mind” is also a co...

Mind is no thing, not inside or outside our body. Mental images are projected from mind and they are no different to mind’s nature of no thing no location, no air, no space. Yet from this physical body, we are distinct individuals as you know you are not me. Maybe we and the physical worlds are onl...

A convention. So, a cause is a convention of a cause which is a convention of a convention of a cause ...... All the way down, and there is no bottom, Since conventions are mind made, therefore, as far as your analysis goes, it applies only to whatever is in the mind. It cannot say anything as rega...

That depends on who you ask. For example, if you ask Chan Sixth Patriarch Hui Neng, he’d say ‘fundamentally there is no thing.’ His successor Master Yongjia Xuanjue also says, ‘When awakened to the Dharmakaya there is no thing.’ But he also said, ‘the delusory appearance without body is Dharmakaya....

Malcolm wrote: ↑Fri Nov 26, 2021 10:17 pm

Sherab wrote: ↑Fri Nov 26, 2021 9:57 pm

Malcolm wrote: ↑Fri Nov 26, 2021 1:21 am

A cause.

And what is a cause which is not a thing but a convention of a cause?

A convention.

So, a cause is a convention of a cause which is a convention of a convention of a cause ......

But be careful that when you say “a thing” that you aren’t implying “thing ness ”. In other words, if you say that a table is established from parts (“…but it arises because of a cause or causes…”) don’t make the mistake of saying that now, some essential “table-ness” suddenly exists as the result....

Malcolm wrote: ↑Fri Nov 26, 2021 1:21 am

Sherab wrote: ↑Thu Nov 25, 2021 10:45 pm

Malcolm wrote: ↑Thu Nov 25, 2021 1:01 pm

A convention.

A convention of what?

A cause.

And what is a cause which is not a thing but a convention of a cause?

In other words, a thing does not arise from itself, or from other but it arises because of a cause or causes. But be careful that when you say “a thing” that you aren’t implying “thing ness ”. In other words, if you say that a table is established from parts (“…but it arises because of a cause or c...