People place too much importance on this word "direct introduction", so much so they have no idea what it means anymore.Jnana wrote: With Chan, everything is a direct introduction. Every moment of every experience.
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People place too much importance on this word "direct introduction", so much so they have no idea what it means anymore.Jnana wrote: With Chan, everything is a direct introduction. Every moment of every experience.
That's very poetic. But I'm talking in pragmatics.Jnana wrote:With Chan, everything is a direct introduction. Every moment of every experience.deepbluehum wrote:Let's just say Chan's method of introducing is equivalent to this. I don't think so. I think such an introduction is special to Vajrayana
It might occur to you that this instruction is a method to cause the student to give up grasping at methods when the case is that the method has been given too much focus. Saraha did teach methods. In fact the most profound methods take Mahamudra as the base, and practice visualizations and pranayama with that view already realized. The only reason why this would be so is because just realizing the view is not the end of the story. There are still the practices to generate conditions favorable for helping every sentient being.Jnana wrote:Saraha:deepbluehum wrote:Or there are other secretive teachings involving channels and winds. The main point is one has an inner experience of bliss-emptiness that makes letting go of externals very easy. Again, this is not a point of faith, but yogic direct knowledge. The more powerful methods make more powerful bliss-emptiness experiences.
- Don’t hold your breath and think on yourself;
wretched yogin, don’t focus in on the tip of your nose.
Hey, fool! Savor yourself fully in the innate;
don’t just wander around, bound by the lines of existence.
Geoff seems to think that giving a blizzard of citations from some post 12th century mahamudra text is sufficient for proving the path of seeing is buddhahood.deepbluehum wrote:That's very poetic. But I'm talking in pragmatics.Jnana wrote:With Chan, everything is a direct introduction. Every moment of every experience.deepbluehum wrote:Let's just say Chan's method of introducing is equivalent to this. I don't think so. I think such an introduction is special to Vajrayana
Reasoning and explanation are just word play. Saraha:Namdrol wrote:These don't say anything, absent contextualized reasoning and explanation.
The "path of seeing" is just a conceptual designation employed by gradualists. Lama Shang:Namdrol wrote:Geoff seems to think that giving a blizzard of citations from some post 12th century mahamudra text is sufficient for proving the path of seeing is buddhahood.
Chan is all about giving up grasping at methods. The same as early, pristine dzogchen:deepbluehum wrote:It might occur to you that this instruction is a method to cause the student to give up grasping at methods when the case is that the method has been given too much focus.
Jnana wrote:Chan is all about giving up grasping at methods. The same as early, pristine dzogchen:deepbluehum wrote:It might occur to you that this instruction is a method to cause the student to give up grasping at methods when the case is that the method has been given too much focus.
- Seeing that everything is self-perfected from the very beginning,
the disease of striving for any achievement is surrendered,
and just remaining in the natural state as it is,
the presence of non-dual contemplation continuously spontaneously arises.
LOL.... Too funny.Namdrol wrote:There is no such thing as an early, pristine Dzogchen.
You are mistaking songs of realization as substituting for the path that got them there.Jnana wrote:Reasoning and explanation are just word play. Saraha:Namdrol wrote:These don't say anything, absent contextualized reasoning and explanation.
- Others run around in the Great Way,
where scripture turns to sophistry and word play.
[/quote]Lama Shang:
- The three kāyas are primordially, naturally present
in the nature of the mind, which is like space;
the Jewel of the Buddha is completely within it...
The superior realization of your own mind as
nondual luminosity is the path of seeing,
its unbroken continuity is the path of meditation,
its effortlessness is the path of complete attainment.
Jnana wrote:LOL.... Too funny.Namdrol wrote:There is no such thing as an early, pristine Dzogchen.
There's no need to refute the path of seeing. It's simply a question of emphasis. Chan emphasizes effortless recognition. The same emphasis can be found in numerous sutras, tantras, dohas, and so on.Namdrol wrote:This does not refute the path of seeing in anyway.
Not all Chanists denied the paths and stages. Bojo Jinul's Encouragement to Practice: The Compact of the Samādhi and Prajñā Community:Namdrol wrote:But it certainly has nothing to do with Indian Mahāyāna nor how Chan deviates from it.
Which tenets would those be?Namdrol wrote:Anyway, it is pretty clear you are not someone who is speaking from personal experience of the tenets which you espouse, otherwise you would not be wasting your time here.
Effortless recognition /= buddhahood. It just doesn't. Otherwise, Arhats are also Buddhas. Now, you might think that is true, and certainly tilt billings does, but that is not a Mahāyāna perspective on the issue.Jnana wrote:There's no need to refute the path of seeing. It's simply a question of emphasis. Chan emphasizes effortless recognition. The same emphasis can be found in numerous sutras, tantras, dohas, and so on.Namdrol wrote:This does not refute the path of seeing in anyway.
Namdrol wrote:But it certainly has nothing to do with Indian Mahāyāna nor how Chan deviates from it.
I know, we are concerned here with those that do, primarily.Not all Chanists denied the paths and stages.
There is no one basic tathagarbha view, there are a couple.It's a basic tathāgatagarbha view,
mere recognition = buddhahood.Jnana wrote:Which tenets would those be?Namdrol wrote:Anyway, it is pretty clear you are not someone who is speaking from personal experience of the tenets which you espouse, otherwise you would not be wasting your time here.
Well then how about giving up grasping at no method? Every heard of the deity primordially present in the base? Or nonmeditation with visualization? Or the effortless presence of the mantra? The method of visualization is introduced as a method, then as a non-method, then as a non-method method. Each time to combat the grasping that happens at the previous stage.Jnana wrote:Chan is all about giving up grasping at methods. The same as early, pristine dzogchen:deepbluehum wrote:It might occur to you that this instruction is a method to cause the student to give up grasping at methods when the case is that the method has been given too much focus.
- Seeing that everything is self-perfected from the very beginning,
the disease of striving for any achievement is surrendered,
and just remaining in the natural state as it is,
the presence of non-dual contemplation continuously spontaneously arises.
I already agreed with you on this point on page 3 of this thread:Namdrol wrote:Effortless recognition /= buddhahood. It just doesn't.
The other extensive quotations were simply to highlight that there are numerous passages in the Buddhist literature which either downplay paths and methods or rhetorically deny the gradual paradigm altogether. This isn't unique to Chan.Jnana wrote:Agreed.Namdrol wrote:Of coure what we are dealing with here is a specfies of tathāgatagarbha thinking, but even hear, I don't think that the type of instant buddhahood you see some Chan masters proclaiming can be justified on the basis of any Indian sutras, tathāgatgarbha or otherwise.
[Psst: It was said to get a rise out of Namdrol. As were the quotes from Lama Shang.]deepbluehum wrote:Also there is no early pristine dzogchen.
And FTR, I wasn't criticizing the vajrayāna, nor even Tibetan Buddhism per se. I was criticizing this modern internet phenomenon of "Tibetan Buddhists" who have convinced themselves that they know non-Tibetan traditions better than everyone who practices those traditions, and run around shooting their mouths off all the time.Namdrol wrote:Your non-sequitors about Vajrayāna are a distracting waste of time.
I don't pretend to know Chan better than Chan Buddhists.Jnana wrote:And FTR, I wasn't criticizing the vajrayāna, nor even Tibetan Buddhism per se. I was criticizing this modern internet phenomenon of "Tibetan Buddhists" who have convinced themselves that they know non-Tibetan traditions better than everyone who practices those traditions, and run around shooting their mouths off all the time.Namdrol wrote:Your non-sequitors about Vajrayāna are a distracting waste of time.
We are talking about what is buddhahood to Chan. I mentioned that what we have in common with Chan is an idea of no buddha. So to recap it would be common to both that 24/7 nongrasping is buddhahood. My point to you is that this is not a matter of faith, but of fact. It is truly possible to be in a state of 24/7 nongrasping. Buddha-mind or whatever name is that state. That the major and minor marks are interdependent with that state is also not faith, because in one's practice of vajrayana the visualizing of those marks is also co-arising with samadhi which is also that state. This is also not contradictory to the Diamond Sutra's statement that the Tathagata is not the major and minor marks.Jnana wrote:[Psst: It was said to get a rise out of Namdrol. As were the quotes from Lama Shang.]deepbluehum wrote:Also there is no early pristine dzogchen.
Now deepbluehum, are you here to discuss Chan/Seon/Zen, or do you just want to extol the superiority of Tibetan Buddhism some more???
The classical definition of Chan:Namdrol wrote:What I do know is that certain Chan claims have no basis in Mahāyāna sutra.
Record of Linji, tr. Sasaki wrote:"According to the masters of the sutras and śāstras, the threefold body is regarded as the ultimate norm. But in my view this is not so. Th e threefold body is merely a name; moreover, it is a threefold dependency. ... you must recognize the one who manipulates these reflections. ‘He is the primal source of all the buddhas,’ and the place to which every follower of the Way returns."
"There is only the man of the Way who depends upon nothing, here listening to my discourse—it is he who is the mother of all buddhas. Therefore buddhas are born from nondependence. Awaken to nondependence, then there is no buddha to be obtained. Insight such as this is true insight."
"Seeking buddha and seeking dharma are only making hell-karma. Seeking bodhisattvahood is also making karma; reading the sutras and studying the teachings are also making karma. Buddhas and patriarchs are people with nothing to do. Therefore, [for them] activity and the defiling passions and also nonactivity and passionlessness are ‘pure’ karma."