21.08.09
Posted in Uncategorized
at 12:38 pm
by nemo
3 comments from James on Nibbana is said to be totally uncaused
James said,
21.08.09 at 8:42 am ·
“However, I would no longer really endorse the tie in with chaos theory. The fad of chaos theory explanations gets to be a form of abuse (as is obvious from following the Chaos listserve). (Deterministic chaos is not likely to explain uncaused events)> ”
I’m not a defender of the author, but he doesn’t support them either (i.e. he admits that it is an imperfect analogy). The point is that nirvana isn’t an “uncaused event” but the the end of “events.”
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James said,
21.08.09 at 8:47 am ·
Also, one of the problems with “uncaused events” theories is that they are suspiciously similar to the “ground of being” theories. The early sutras are clearly not referring to it as an “uncaused event:”
“…there has long been — and still is — a common tendency to create a “Buddhist” metaphysics in which the experience of emptiness, the Unconditioned, the Dharma-body, Buddha-nature, rigpa, etc., is said to function as the ground of being from which the “All” — the entirety of our sensory & mental experience — is said to spring and to which we return when we meditate. Some people think that these theories are the inventions of scholars without any direct meditative experience, but actually they have most often originated among meditators, who label (or in the words of the discourse, “perceive”) a particular meditative experience as the ultimate goal, identify with it in a subtle way (as when we are told that “we are the knowing”), and then view that level of experience as the ground of being out of which all other experience comes.”
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.001.than.html
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James said,
21.08.09 at 8:53 am ·
More information:
“Nibbana is the end of samsara. Contrary to a popular misunderstanding, neither nibbana nor samsara is a place. In attaining nibbana we don’t escape from one location to another. For the Buddha, samsara is the process by which clinging gives rise to suffering which, in turn, gives rise to further clinging. He understood that this self-perpetuating process continues over lifetimes as the “fuel” for rebirth, just as the fire from one burning house is carried to a neighboring house by the wind. Nibbana is what is realized when the clinging of greed, hate, and delusion is brought to an end. Some later Buddhist traditions equate nirvana and samsara. However, they likely attribute very different meanings to these words than those understood by the earliest Buddhist tradition. In Theravada teachings, samsara cannot be nibbana any more than a clenched fist can be an open hand, any more than burning ember in your fist can be the same as letting it go. For the Buddha, nibbana had quite positive associations – after all, it is a simile for ultimate freedom and awakening. At times he used other similes to describe this state: “the blissful, the secure, the pure, the island, the shelter, the harbor, the refuge, the ultimate.”
Other, more perplexing, synonyms include “the unconstructed, the ageless, the deathless, the featureless.” These refer to the idea that nibbana does not exist as something that can be made, shaped, or willed. It is not a “ground of being” from which anything subject to death can arise. Although there is a consciousness, “featureless, infinite, and luminous all around,” that is associated with nibbana, it is not dependent on the conditioned world. Nor does it produce the conditioned world. Rather, it is a dimension of consciousness totally independent of circumstances in the world or in one’s personal life. Because nibbana is independent, people who fully realize it are said to be “unestablished” – in other words, free from any clinging that would confine their consciousness to any point in space or time. ”
http://www.tricycle.com/feature/nirvana-three-takes
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Posted in Uncategorized
at 12:33 pm
by nemo
Comment on Spiritual Psychologies
James said,
21.08.09 at 8:39 am ·
“James wants to cut to the Pali tradition, fascinating, and a good topic for this blog, for various reasons (I cannot, however, endorse anything).”
I’m not endorsing anything either and I approach the topic as an amateur scholar. My main point in bringing up the topic is to suggest that Buddhism is not a monolithic entity as Westerners assume, and that we are really dealing with very different religions that are grouped under “Buddhism.” I see absolutely nothing wrong with bringing up the differences between these religions (why should it be any more controversial than bringing up the vast differences between Kant and Hegel?). It is not like Theravadins and Mahayanists are going to start slaughtering each other like Shiites and Sunnis.
Good points, and this approach is both useful and welcome here. I was merely trying to proceed through some of Bennett’s material both critically but also in a way that will show what he was about.
In any case, Pali Buddhism is a useful zone of study, and somthing that the Gurdjieff types might bail out into.
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20.08.09
Posted in Uncategorized
at 3:10 pm
by nemo
Helena Blavatsky (Western Esoteric Masters) (Paperback)
by Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke
After rereading (for the third or fourth time) Madame Blavatsky’s Baboon by peter Washington (looking for issues/material to deal with here) I started looking at some other books on the subject. These books are not always trustworthy, but there is something odd about Blavatsky that neither her deluded followers or critics can pin down. It is easy to misunderestimate Blavatsky, by totally rejecting her life based on her fraudulent streak.
In fact it has nothing much to do with the content of her work, but the situational context of her bio. And, remarkably, Gurdjieff’s is a similar circumstance, an obvious attempt to steal the thunder from the Theosophists.
In any case, the occult dimension to Blavatsky, which she couldn’t grasp herself it seems, is something to reckon with.
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Posted in Uncategorized
at 3:04 pm
by nemo
Wilson is another of the lunatics in need of examination in the whole Gurdjieff/Crowley/…. circuit, exceptionally lunatic, but with some curious hints. Generally these people in trying to recombine their sources never get anywhere. The main obstacle is the expense of books, inaccessible info, etc… The books are basically worthless: some tidbits of useful info/disinfo nonetheless may exist.
His three volume Illuminati nonsense needs some intelligent ‘debriefing’, since he at least did raise the issue of Western occultists.
It would be useful to know Gold connection here. I once saw him intersect with the Gold circle.
http://www.amazon.com/Prometheus-Rising-Robert-Anton-Wilson/dp/1561840564/ref=pd_sim_b_3
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15.08.09
Posted in Uncategorized
at 2:34 pm
by nemo
http://www.gurdjieff-con.net/2009/08/04/the-need-for-a-plain-vanilla-evolutionary-psychology-samkhya-brand/
This post and James’ comment are worth rereading: we may have gotten derailed, or James may have misunderstood my intentions.
He seems to have had a bad reaction to Bennett, echoing my critical stance.
My intent was to pursue the expose of the ‘Gurdjieff Con’, but a figure such as Bennett is a slightly different case (as MBFM insisted, B was really as much a victim as a perpetrator).
I think that Bennett’s The Dramatic Universe is filled with some relevant ideas that need more than blanket rejection.
James wants to cut to the Pali tradition, fascinating, and a good topic for this blog, for various reasons (I cannot, however, endorse anything).
The point about Bennett is that we have lost the key to the most obvious solution to our lack of spiritual psychologies: Samkhya. Can we recover it?
In attempting to do this we get waylaid by the whole Gurdjieff agenda.
We can toss Bennett into the cauldrom and melt it down. It’s basic framework is actually transparent after a while.
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Posted in Uncategorized
at 2:20 pm
by nemo
A passage from Madame Blavatsky’s Baboon, p. 336:
…The Age of Aquarius would then be at hand.
The problem with this process of change was that it required not only the preservation of the world from destruction but the appearance of spiritual leaders of the highest calibre. Such leaders, Bennett knew, were not to be found among ordinary men. Ous¬pen sky and Gurdjieff had both alerted him to the existence of a hidden brotherhood who directed human affairs, and Gurdjieff had hinted that he himself was either a member of that brotherhood or at least in touch with it. The objective of the Work and the System was to render oneself worthy of communion with the Brothers and even – who knows? – to become one of their number. Bennett now wondered whether he himself might not be on the way to such a destiny.
It is hard for many to evaluate the claims of Gurdjieff, but we can see from a passage such as this that he is really recycling Blavatsky’s claims, and these are a mysterious concoction from the nineteenth century, with some hidden figure in the background that serves to mystify and potentially legitimate an occult myth in the making.
The claims about a hidden brotherhood that directs human affairs is, ironically, evidence of how little Gurdjieff knew or understood.
My point here, as already discussed in the G-con series of essays, is to look at the eonic effect, and to see that an immense evolutionary/historical process is at work that is far far beyond a mere ‘hidden brotherhood’.
The point here is that there is a dimension to this beyond the individual, and the attempt by a figure such as Gurdjieff to ensare people into believing him and his claims is preposterous and false. The real thing, which isn’t a hidden brotherhood, is on a scale that dwarfs the con man schems of the likes of Gurdjieff.
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11.08.09
Posted in Uncategorized
at 5:24 pm
by nemo
archive: april 2007, darwiniana
The Gold/sillykitty thread, continued. Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted in Uncategorized
at 5:07 pm
by nemo
archive; november 2006, darwiniana
There are no such private dicks, so the victims will perish anonymously as missing persons. So who will track down Gold’s victims?
The previous post on Gold mentioned the Crazy Wisdon guru tradition, and here is the source, found via the Wikipedia article, a reference to G. Feuerstein. Read the rest of this entry »
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10.08.09
Posted in Uncategorized
at 6:15 pm
by nemo
Zen master’s followers allege Vietnam persecution
By Aude Genet (AFP) – 3 days ago
HANOI — Four years ago, Buddhist master Thich Nhat Hanh drew crowds of thousands on his return to Vietnam after decades in exile — but now his followers complain of systematic repression by the communist regime.
Hanh, who was a confidant of slain US civil rights leader Martin Luther King and has a large following in the West, landed a meeting with then prime minister Phan Van Khai in 2005 even as authorities kept him under watch.
Today, his followers say they are the victims of sustained harassment whipped up by a communist government fearful of the social and religious influence enjoyed by the France-based monk and peace activist.
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Posted in Uncategorized
at 11:16 am
by nemo
Samsara Divided by Zero
by
Thanissaro Bhikkhu
This is from one of the interesting articles linked to by James, which are all worth reading.
However, I would no longer really endorse the tie in with chaos theory. The fad of chaos theory explanations gets to be a form of abuse (as is obvious from following the Chaos listserve). (Deterministic chaos is not likely to explain uncaused events)>
The resemblance to Kantian discourse, and critique of metaphysics, is far more relevant and useful.
Because there are many similarities between chaos theory and Buddhist explanations of causality, it seems legitimate to explore those similarities to see what light chaos theory can throw on the issue of how a causal path of practice can lead to an uncaused goal. This is not to equate Buddhism with chaos theory, or to engage in pseudo-science. It’s simply a search for similes to clear up an apparent conflict in the Buddha’s teaching.
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08.08.09
Posted in Uncategorized
at 3:57 pm
by nemo
Miracles and ‘Christian’ mythology about miracles
This was, of course, an issue Ouspensky wished to clarify with his ‘In search of the miraculous’
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07.08.09
Posted in Uncategorized
at 12:40 pm
by nemo
Comment on Buddhism:hinayana/mahayana…
This post contains some significant commentary, and some good links, and I hope we can have more material like this here.
But before going on I would merely interject that at the end of considerable effort, speaking for myself, at the end of the ‘new age’ movement I remain with nothing, no spiritual path, no spiritual life, no trust of any spiritual tradition, disillusion with all gurus, and contempt for the stupidity of many of those who can be trusted. After enduring the sufis I am not going to be any kind of fan of the Buddhists.
Nonetheless, James has a point: Buddhism is in a different category from Islam and Sufism.
A study of the eonic effect might suggest a reason why: the intersection with the eonic sequence, the issue of the Axial Age, etc….
And that would confirm James’ focus on Hinayana and reserve/mistrust of what comes later.
Since this blog is about The Gurdjieff Con it is appropriate thus to point to the Buddhist tradition, which has been more successful that the sufistic (it seems).
That said, all the dangers discovered with Gurdjieffianity can be found in ‘buddhism’ (a vague word), and we should note that the dark side of Gurdjieff is suspciously connected with his travels in Tibet. Tibetan is a very late form of spiritrual high-class ‘garbage’, so that doesn’t necessarily contradict James’ point!
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05.08.09
Posted in Uncategorized
at 3:34 pm
by nemo
Music and the taliban
I hold no brief for the taliban, but the sufis are surely worse in the sense of being true vultures of the spirit (in some cases) where the taliban are the confused remnants of the ‘jihad’.
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