Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

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ItsRaining
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by ItsRaining »

Malcolm wrote:Nope, the distinctions between Advaita and and Madhyamaka are very subtle, which is understandable since Advaita philosophers cribbed Madhyamaka, causing no end of confusion for modern students who are unaware of the history of Indian philosophy in general. Nevertheless, the differences are important, and that fact that Advaitans had to resort to Madhyamaka, in essence, to Buddhists to refute their co-religionists is just one more proof of the superiority of Buddhadharma. (cue: lion's roar).
This sounds exactly like what the Daoists did in China, some of there works seem to completely copy Buddhist language and in the case of the Chong Xuan (Two Fold Mystery school) uses the tetra-lemma and other devices of the Madhyamaka to advance their doctrine. If it was like that in China it must have been a lot worse in India.

Some of their texts include stuff like:
“Mystery” is a name for what is profound and far; it also implies the meaning of nonattachment. It denotes the ultimate profoundness and the ultimate distance, no attachments and no clinging; when there is no attachment to being and no attachment nonbeing. Then, one is] not only not attached to attachment but also not attached to “nonattachment.” Thus, the hundred negations and the tetra lemma [leave the adept with] no attachments whatsoever. This is called “twofold mystery.” (Yan 1983, 260; Robinet 1977, 256).18
The Three Worlds are empty, the three times are empty, knowing the three times are empty by body is empty, knowing my body is empty all dharmas are empty, the emptiness of dharmas is known as the Empty Sea.
三界皆空,三世亦空;知三世空,我身亦空;知我身空,诸法亦空,以法空故,故名海空
Not existence, not non-existence, though it has a conventional name it as no true body. Why? False natures conventionally combining is known as existence; realising the ultimate is known as emptiness
不有不无,毕竟空寂,虽有假名而无实体。何以故?伪性假合,名之为有;体悟真实,是故名空。

https://gss.grad.uiowa.edu/system/files ... 0Ozkan.pdf

https://zh.wikisource.org/zh-hans/%E5%A ... F%E7%B6%93

http://www.360doc.com/content/13/1019/0 ... 8342.shtml
Schrödinger’s Yidam
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

My personal goal in this life is to be as integrated as I can be. I have still have a lot of work to do on that score, but I am trying. That for me is the main point, in case anyone cares.
https://dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?f ... eg#p102251
Best wishes on your path.
1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
krodha
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by krodha »

Malcolm wrote:Yes, of course [the Bhagavad Gita proposes a freedom from the cycle of birth and death], all Indian schools who propose liberation propose that liberation means freedom from the cycles of birth and death.

Buddha disagreed with all of these schools completely, and taught it was only through adopting right view, i.e., the four truths of nobles, that one could attain freedom from the cycle of birth and death.

He taught that they mistook various types of mental states for liberation, mental states which in some cases last millions and millions of years.

The Bhgavada Gita for example, is an example of an eternalist scripture, and it proposes the best way to achieve liberation is through pure devotion to Krishna as embodiment of Godhead, though it lists other paths as well.

Saṃkhya is described as an incorrect view because it proposes that causes and effects are merely transformations of one substance. Yoga also suffers from this view.

Jainism is clearly refuted by the Buddha. This is a no brainer. The Buddha thought that Mahathera was a complete fool.

Nyaya and Vaishesika did not exist during the time of the Buddha, but their eternalist atomism was soundly negated by later Buddhist scholars such as Bhavaviveka and so on.

The Mimamsas do not believe in liberation at all, but rather believe in appeasing the gods through rites in order to assure mundane good fortune.

Advaita also did not exist by name during the time of the Buddha, but it is refuted for proposing that all reality is ultimately one undifferentiated consciousness.

When one reads the sūtras and tantras taught by the Buddha, one can see very clearly that all these schools are refuted either directly or indirectly as wrong views.

Wrong view cannot be lead to liberation.

There is only one right view, and that is the view of dependent origination.
krodha
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by krodha »

Malcolm wrote:The term "ultimate reality" does not exist in Buddhist texts. This is a very misleading English gloss. The terms we have for an "ultimate" are 1) ultimate truth, i.e, paramārtha or don dam, which means "ultimate meaning" or "ultimate sense"; suchness, i.e. tatāta or de bzhin nyid; dharmatā or chos nyid refer to the ultimate essence of relative phenomena. Indeed, these terms, and others like them, are all pointing out something definitive about relative phenomena or beings.

There are terms in Buddhism that mean "reality," like gnas lugs, bhutatā, but there is no need to add the adjective "ultimate" to such terms because what is real is real. There is no relative reality as opposed to an ultimate reality. The first would be contradiction in terms, since the relative is not real, not constant, not unchanging, etc. The second is redundant since the real is constant, unchanging, etc.

There is no separate unmanifest reality which stands apart from manifest phenomena. This "nonarising" you seek is precisely the nonarising nature of dependently originated phenomena, their emptiness of arising, ceasing, and abiding.

Emptiness is the quality of things that allows them to undergo change and transformation.

Nonarising, aka, emptiness is ultimate truth and reality. Emptiness and nonarising are ultimate truths, veridical cognitions arrived at through an analysis of dependently originated phenomena. Emptiness and non-arising are real because they withstand analysis, i.e., they are the result that one finds upon analysis, they are the content of āryan cognition in equipoise.

But emptiness and nonarising are not ultimate realities because if they were, there would be nothing other than a blank void.
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Harimoo
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by Harimoo »

Malcolm wrote:Advaita philosophers cribbed Madhyamaka
Advaitists would say the contrary and it seems to me more logical.
A swami told me: "mahayana and vajrayana are shaivism for the non-indians" (no cast system) A little bit simple but...
ItsRaining
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by ItsRaining »

Harimoo wrote:
Malcolm wrote:Advaita philosophers cribbed Madhyamaka
Advaitists would say the contrary and it seems to me more logical.
A swami told me: "mahayana and vajrayana are shaivism for the non-indians" (no cast system) A little bit simple but...
Advaita Vedanta came to being and prominence a lot later than the Madhyamaka school though. Their earliest texts were compiled in the fifth century and people like Gaudapada and Shankara even later whereas Nagarjuna lived in the 2nd-3rd centuries.
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Harimoo
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by Harimoo »

ItsRaining wrote: Advaita Vedanta came to being and prominence a lot later than the Madhyamaka school though. Their earliest texts were compiled in the fifth century and people like Gaudapada and Shankara even later whereas Nagarjuna lived in the 2nd-3rd centuries.
Vedanta is just the name of a school of upanishad commentaries.
Anders
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by Anders »

Harimoo wrote:
ItsRaining wrote: Advaita Vedanta came to being and prominence a lot later than the Madhyamaka school though. Their earliest texts were compiled in the fifth century and people like Gaudapada and Shankara even later whereas Nagarjuna lived in the 2nd-3rd centuries.
Vedanta is just the name of a school of upanishad commentaries.
Ergo...? I don't follow.
"Even if my body should be burnt to death in the fires of hell
I would endure it for myriad lifetimes
As your companion in practice"

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Gyurme Kundrol
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by Gyurme Kundrol »

Malcolm wrote:You should understand things from a Vajrayāna point of view, and not reject it. Otherwise, you are just a guy engaged in cosplay.
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

Nāgārjuna again:
For those whom emptiness possible, everything is possible;
for those whom emptiness is impossible, everything is impossible.
Yes, it really should reald:
For those whom emptiness proper, everything is proper;
for those whom emptiness is not proper, for them nothing is proper.
Buddhapalita comments on this:
Those for whom emptiness is proper as an intrinsic nature, everything mundane and supermundane is proper. Those for whom emptiness is not proper as an intrinsic nature, for them everything mundane and supermundane is improper.
viewtopic.php?f=39&t=26738&start=20
1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

posting.php?mode=quote&f=39&p=410560p

Now all of these concepts make sense to me except for buddha nature. After all, how can we have an essential nature if we are ultimately empty and impermanent, with no reality as any single thing?
That is our nature. Nāgārjuna said:
Whatever is the nature of the tathāgata, that is the nature of the world;
as the tathāgata has no nature, so too the world has no nature.
1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
Schrödinger’s Yidam
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
Schrödinger’s Yidam
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

Malcolm wrote: Sat Oct 21, 2017 11:00 pm
smcj wrote: Sat Oct 21, 2017 11:00 pm
The Buddha displayed awakening under the bodhitree, but in actuality, buddhahood is achieved in Akaniṣṭha Ghanavyuha according to Mahāyāna sūtra. And in the case of Śākyamuni, eons and eons ago.
So you're saying Sakyamuni was not human?
Correct, he was an emanation, not a human.
posting.php?mode=quote&f=40&p=411916
1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
Schrödinger’s Yidam
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

Malcolm wrote:Relying on a realized master is in fact the only way to attain awakening in a single lifetime.
viewtopic.php?f=48&t=26588
1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
Schrödinger’s Yidam
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

Malcolm wrote: Mon Oct 23, 2017 3:18 amIn the Hevajra commentary Padmini, another text is cited called Approach to the Utimate. It says:
Because of the power of the Kaliyuga, gurus have mixed qualities and faults,
there are none at all without misdeeds;
disciples should rely on those
whose qualities predominate, and who have been thoroughly investigated.
posting.php?mode=quote&f=40&p=412105[/url]
1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
Schrödinger’s Yidam
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

The distinction is basically this: in cittamatra, phenomena are mental events. The way Lonchenpa explains it is like this. Bodhicitta, awakened mind, is like space, it is the basis, but it is not established in anyway. Its potential or energy [rtsal] arises like the face of a mirror. The display of that potentiality is like the eight examples of illusion. Since the basis, its potential and display are not themselves established because they are all empty, they are nondual. These three are conventionally distinguished because of appearances. Thus, bodhicitta, potentiality and the display are neither single nor plural in terms of their essence, nevertheless, just like the reflections in the mirror cannot be said to be either the same nor different than the mirror's power to reflect, it is understood that the imputations which are the display of the potential of bodhicitta also do not exist either inside or outside of, and hence these appearances are called "nonexistent, clear appearances." Indeed, nothing at all is established in anyway.
viewtopic.php?f=77&t=21104&p=311719#p311719
1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
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CapNCrunch
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by CapNCrunch »

From "The DJKR topic"
...my teacher told me that his job, the job of a Dzogchen guru, is to make one free of the guru.
The polar opposite, btw, of a charlatan - who does everything possible to encourage sycophancy & dependence.
“I say good-bye to hope, but I also say goodbye to hope's disappointment.”

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WuMing
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by WuMing »

The purpose of studying is to remove concepts that block one's practice.
found here
Life is great and death has to be just as great as life.
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People not only don't know what's happening to them, they don't even know that they don't know.
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WuMing
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Re: Illuminating Quotes by Malcolm Namdrol-la

Post by WuMing »

Good luck finding the empty nature of dharmas, though.

[Malcolm] When you don't find it, you have found it.

I've been searching for years... I must be getting close.

[Malcolm] If you are still searching, you haven't found it.

An Account of the Tiāntāi Synthesis
An Account of the Tiāntāi Synthesis
Life is great and death has to be just as great as life.
- Mike Tyson
People not only don't know what's happening to them, they don't even know that they don't know.
- Noam Chomsky
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