question about the "source"

last SG · 2007-07-25T19:00:39+00:00

Anyway still can discuss this lah, since we all also mentioned about rebirth in this topic, somehow. But try to create new topics next time so that the disc...

Isis SG

i have this question to ask..

if there is no source/ no God, then why do we feel this loving kindness for others, aversion on others and other emotions... ?

where does this emotion comes from?

An Eternal Now SG

Dear Isis, long time no chat Wink

There is Source. You can all it God, but there are too many connotations with the word 'God' that it's almost always misunderstood, that's why in Buddhism we don't, or very rarely, use this word.

Source is not an entity or any existence that can be found, and neither is it a personal creator as in some religious beliefs. Source is simply our luminous Buddha Nature, it is just the nature of intrinsic Awareness.

Funny, something made me post the following text just a while ago in, which I find very suitable for this thread Mr. Green

Master Padmasambhava said (Self-Liberation through Seeing with Naked Awareness),

....6.As for this sparkling awareness which is called "mind,"

Even though one says that it exists, it does not actually exist.

(On the other hand) as a source, it is the origin of the diversity of all the bliss of Nirvana and all of the sorrow of Samsara.

And as for its being something desirable, it is cherished alike in the Eleven Vehicles.

With respect to its having a name, the various names that are applied to it are inconceivable (in their numbers).

Some call it "the nature of the mind" or "mind itself."

Some Tirthikas call it by the name Atman or "the Self."

The Sravakas call it the doctrine of Anatman or "the absence of a self."

The Chittamatrins call it by the name Chitta or "the Mind."

Some call it the Prajnaparamita or "the Perfection of Wisdom."

Some call it the name Tathagatagarbha or "the embryo of Buddhahood."

Some call it by the name Mahamudra or "the Great Symbol."

Some call it by the name "the Unique Sphere."

Some call it by the name Dharmadhatu or "the dimension of Reality."

Some call it by the name Alaya or "the basis of everything."

And some simply call it by the name "ordinary awareness."....

Everything, everything is an expression of Awareness. There is absolutely nothing in the world that is not the expression of our Buddha Nature.

But then if everything is Buddha Nature, why is there suffering in the first place? Because our primordially Luminous Mind is clouded by attachment, by defilements. This causes suffering.

The Buddha taught:

Luminous is this mind,
Brightly shining, but it is
Colored by the attachments
That visit it.
This unlearned people do not
Really understand,
And so do not cultivate the
Mind.

Luminous is this mind,
Brightly shining,
And it is free of the
Attachments that visit it.
This the noble follower
Of the way really understands;
So for them there is
Cultivation of the mind.

- Anguttara Nikaya

The following is one of the Q&A in the Lankavatara Sutra sharing session with Thusness earlier this year: Transcript of the Lankavatara Sutra Sharing Session by Thusness

sinweiy SG

try the "Wisdom Opener" - Shurangama Sutra.

The Reason for Continual Arisal:
http://online.sfsu.edu/%7Erone/Buddhism/Shurangama/ps.ss.02.v4.020526.screen.pdf

Shurangama Sutra, Volume 4, Part One
http://www.buddhistinformation.com/shurangama_sutra.htm

The Buddha said, "Purna, you have asked why in fundamental purity the mountains, the rivers, and the great earth suddenly arise.
....

you read on, very interesting.

...
"The womb-born, egg-born, moisture-born, and transformation-born beings come about in response: the egg-born come from thought, the womb-born are due to emotion, the moisture-born arise from union, and transformations occur through separation.
"Emotion, thought, union, and separation go through further changes, and the maturation of such karma causes one to rise or sink. From such causes and conditions comes the continuity of beings....

/\

TheGoodEarth SG

I supposed the "Source" and the the "Beginning" has the same meaning here. Our curiosity to know how we began and how all things 'originate' has been around for a long long time, and the answers are as varied as our beliefs.

Honestly, I don't think any religion has an answer, not even science yet!

Before Buddha, is there 'Buddha naure'? Which comes first? Buddha-nature or Buddha?

An Eternal Now SG

Before Shakyamuni Buddha, there is Buddha Nature. In fact, all beings' Buddha Nature is already complete, they just don't know.

There's a term for the first Buddha -- Adi Buddha, or the Primordial Buddha, that is the First Buddha, "a metaphor for our true condition".

The Mind in terms of the Absolute is the one World of Reality (dharmadhatu) and the essence of all phases of existence in their totality.

That which is called "the essential nature of the Mind" is unborn and is imperishable. It is only through illusions that all things come to be differentiated. If one is freed from illusions, then to him there will be no appearances (lakshana) of objects regarded as absolutely independent existences; therefore all things from the beginning transcend all forms of verbalization, description, and conceptualization and are, in the final analysis, undifferentiated, free from alteration, and indestructible. They are only of the One Mind; hence the name Suchness. All explanations by words are provisional and without validity, for they are merely used in accordance with illusions and are incapable of denoting Suchness.

The term Suchness likewise has no attributes which can be verbally specified. The term Suchness is, so to speak, the limit of verbalization wherein a word is used to put an end to words. But the essence of Suchness itself cannot be put an end to, for all things in their Absolute aspect are real; nor is there anything which needs to be pointed out as real, for all things are equally in the state of Suchness. It should be understood that all things are incapable of being verbally explained or thought of; hence the name Suchness.

The way to correct this error is to make clear that the five components are unborn in their essential nature and, therefore, are imperishable - that what is made of the five components is, from the beginning, in nirvana.

An Eternal Now SG

Here are some Dzogchen teachings:

The Dzogchen teachings themselves view the process of cosmic origination in a way that is parallel to, but slightly different from, the Bon tradition. In the Dzogchen teachings, it is considered that the primordial state, which is beyond time, and beyond creation and destruction, is the fundamentally pure base of all existence, both at the universal and the individual levels. It is the inherent nature of the primordial state to manifest as light, which in turn manifests as the five colors, the essences of the elements. The essences of the elements interact (as explained in the Bon cosmology) to produce the elements themselves, which make up both the individual's body and the whole material dimension. The universe is thus understood as the spontaneously arising play of the energy of the primordial state, and may be enjoyed as such by an individual who remains integrated with his or her essential inherent condition, in the self-liberation, self-perfected state, the state of Dzogchen.

But if, through fundamental misperception of reality, the individual enters into the confusion of dualism, primordial consciousness, which is in fact the source of all manifestation (even of dualistic consciousness and, in fact, of all phenomena), itself becomes obscured. The individual's deluded mind then mistakes the manifestations of its own pure, innate primordial awareness for an external reality existing separately from itself, which it endlessly, and ultimately unsuccessfully, attempts to manipulate, trying in vain to bring an end to the continual underlying sense of dissatisfaction and unease which is the inevitable experience of the obscuration of pure awareness. The experience of underlying dissatisfaction (or 'dukha', in Sanskrit) that unavoidably arises with a deluded mind, continues, no matter how 'successful' the individual becomes in dealing with his or her world in materialistic terms, until the individual regains the experience of the primordial state.

All the various passions arise from the fundamental misperception of reality just described, and the passions once they have arisen continually condition the individual into dualism, deepening the individual's sense of confusion about the nature of reality. This is why samsara, the endless round of conditioned existence, is often described in the teachings as bing a 'vicious cycle'.

The Dzogchen teachings, in the explanations of the Base, the Path, and the Fruit, set out to show how the illusion of dualism has come about, how it can be undone, and what the experience of an individual is when it is undone. But all examples used to explain the nature of reality can only ever be partially successful in describing it because it is, in itself, beyond words and concepts. As Milarepa said, we may say that the essential nature of the mind is like space, because both are empty, but mind is aware, while space is not. Realization is not knowledge about the universe, but the living experience of the nature of the universe. Until we have such living experience, we remain dependent on examples, and subject to their limits.

~ 'The Crystal and the Way of Light - Sutra @ Tantra, and Dzogchen' by Chogyal Namkhai Norbu p.93-94

"Buddha and God" (7)

The relevant scripture is not officially a sutra (although it does on occasion refer to itself as such), but a Buddhist "tantra" (a more mystical, secret manual for Buddhist practice). It is entitled The All-Creating King. This is what it teaches: all things spring from the Awakened Mind (bodhicitta), which is called Samantabhadra Buddha. "Samantabhadra" means "All-Good" (we remember that one of the definitions of God earlier in this study stated that God is "all good"). This Samantabhadra Buddha is the source of all Buddhas and all beings. Apart from Samantabhadra Buddha, nothing truly exists, since all depends on Buddha, but Buddha depends on nothing. This Primaeval Buddha is called "Adi-Buddha" (Primordial Buddha) elsewhere in Buddhism, and is sometimes named Vairochana or Vajrasattva. The important point, however, is that this Buddha represents the Ultimate Source of all things, whether of the past, present or future. Without Samantabhadra Buddha - the all-good, universal Mind of Awake-ness - nothing can exist. Here are some quotes from the All-Creating King Tantra, in which Samantabhadra speaks directly to the listener:

"I, the supreme source ["All-Creating King"], am the sole maker, and no other agent exists in the world. The nature of phenomena is created through me ... The very manifestation of existence itself depends on me ... I am self-arising wisdom that has existed from the beginning. I am the supreme source of everything, pure and total consciousness ...'Consciousness' means that self-arising wisdom, the true essence, dominates and clearly perceives all the phenomena of the animate and inanimate universe. This self-arising fundamental substance, not produced by causes and condition, governs all things and gives life to all things ... As my nature is unhindered and all-pervading, it is the celestial abode of wisdom and luminous space: therein abides only self-arising wisdom. As I am the substance whence everything arises, the five great elements, the three worlds [i.e. the worlds of Desire, Form, and Formlessness] and the six classes of beings [hell-denizens, ghosts, animals, humans, Titans, and gods] are only my body, my voice, and my mind: I myself create my own nature ... The root of all phenomena is pure and total consciousness, the source. All that appears is my nature. All that manifests is my magical display. All sounds and words express only my meaning ...

"I am the core of all that exists. I am the seed of all that exists. I am the foundation of all that exists. I am the root of existence. I am 'the core', because I contain all phenomena. I am 'the seed', because I give birth to everything. I am 'the cause', because all comes forth from me. I am 'the trunk', because the ramificationsof every event sprout from me. I am 'the foundation', because all abides in me. I am called 'the root', because I am everything [emphasis added]" (Translation of "The All-Creating King", published as The Supreme Source, tr. by Adriano Clemente and Andrew Lukianowicz, Snow Lion Publications, Ithaca, New York 1999, pp. 137-141, 157).

Beyond Religion SG

There is Source. You can all it God, but there are too many connotations with the word 'God' that it's almost always misunderstood, that's why in Buddhism we don't, or very rarely, use this word.

Source is not an entity or any existence that can be found, and neither is it a personal creator as in some religious beliefs. Source is simply our luminous Buddha Nature, it is just the nature of intrinsic Awareness.

The sad thing about humanity is that there has been so many killings, wars and sufferings over disagreements on a divine identity to be ascribed to this "Source".

Apparently, such delusions over the anthropomorphization of this "source" has contributed to the attachment and defilements which ironically separated humanity from our Buddha nature.

An Eternal Now SG

Yes yes.. so true. It is so sad that such things are so easily turned into an object of egoic identification.

I wrote a year ago:

Exerpt from A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle, page 13 to 19

THE ARISING NEW CONSCIOUSNESS

Most ancient religions and spiritual traditions share the same common insight that our normal state of mind is marred by a fundamental defect. However, out of this insight into the nature of the human condition we may call it the bad news arise a second insight: the good news of the possibility of a radical transformation of human consciousness. In Hindu teachings (and sometimes in Buddhism also), this transformation is called enlightenment. In the teachings of Jesus, it is salvation, and in Buddhism, it is the end of sufferings. Liberation and awakening are other terms used to describe this transformation.

The greatest achievement of humanity is not the works of art, science, or technology, but the recognition of its own dysfunction, its own madness. In the distant past, this recognition already came to a few individuals. A man called Gautama Siddhartha, who lived 2,600 years ago in India, was perhaps the first who saw it with absolute clarity. Later, the title Buddha was conferred upon him. Buddha means the awakened one. At about the same time, another of humanitys early awakened teachers emerged in China. His name was Lao Tzu. He left a record of his teaching in the form of one of the most profound spiritual books ever written, the Tao Te Ching.

To recognise ones own insanity is, of course, the arising of sanity, the beginning of healing and transcendence. A new dimension of consciousness had begun to emerge on the planet, a first tentative flowering. Those rare individuals then spoke to their contemporaries. They spoke of sin, of suffering, of delusion. They said, Look how you live. See what you are doing, the suffering you create. They then pointed to the possibility of awakening from the collective nightmare of normal human existence. They showed the way.

The world was not yet ready for them, and yet they were a vital and necessary part of human awakening. Inevitably they were mostly misunderstood by their contemporaries as well as by subsequent generations. Their teachings, though both simple and powerful, became distorted and misinterpreted, in some cases even as they were recorded in writing by their disciples. Over the centuries, many things were added that had nothing to do with the original teachings, but were reflections of a fundamental misunderstanding. Some of the teachers were ridiculed, reviled, or killed; others came to be worshiped as gods. Teachings that pointed the way beyond the dysfunction of the human mind, the way out of the collective insanity, were distorted and became themselves part of the insanity.

And so religions, to a large extent, became divisive rather than unifying forces. Instead of bringing about an end of violence and hatred through a realisation of the fundamental oneness of all life, they brought more violence and hatred, more divisions between people as well as between different religions and even within the same religion. They became ideologies; belief systems people could identify with and so use them to enhance their false sense of self. Through them, they could make themselves right and others wrong and thus define their identity through their enemies, the others, the nonbelievers or wrong believers who not infrequently they saw themselves justified in killing. Man made God in his own image. The eternal, the infinite, and unnameable was reduced to a mental idol that you had to believe in and worship as my god or our god.

And yet. And yet in spite of all the insane deeds perpetrated in the name of religion, the Truth to which they point still shines at their core. It still shines, however dimly, through layers upon layers of distortion and misinterpretation. It is unlikely; however, that you will be able to perceive it there unless you have at least already had glimpses of that Truth within yourself. Throughout history, there have always been rare individuals who experienced a shift in consciousness and so realised within themselves that toward which all religions point. To describe that nonconceptual Truth, they then used the conceptual framework of their own religions.

Through some of those men and women, schools or movements developed within all major religions that represented not only a rediscovery, but in some cases an intensification of the light of the original teaching. This is how Gnosticism and mysticism came into existence in early and medieval Christianity, Sufism in the Islamic religion, Hasidism and Kabala in Judaism, Advaita Vedanta in Hinduism, Zen and Dzogchen in Buddhism. Most of these schools were iconoclastic. They did away with layers upon layers of deadening conceptualisation and mental belief structures, and for this reason most of them were viewed with suspicion and often hostility by the established religious hierarchies. Unlike mainstream religion, their teachings emphasised realisation and inner transformation. It is through these esoteric schools or movements that the major religions regained the transformative power of the original teachings, although in most cases, only a small minority of people had access to them. Their numbers were never large enough to have any significant impact on the deep collective unconsciousness of the majority. Over time, some of those schools themselves became too rigidly formal or conceptualised to remain effective.

TheGoodEarth SG

In a nutshell: There is no beginning and no ending. There is existence yet no existence. There is myself yet noself.
I am beginning to understand Duality but not Reality.
So some kind of 'nature' existed long before Gautama 'discovered' this nature. This is termed the First Buddha. So where did First Buddha come from?
Nowhere, it merely existed out of Emptiness!

There were indeed tortures, atrocities, wars and inhumanities brought about by our desires to find the Source, the Beginning, the God. Often-times, these were the 'works' of the very people in the organisations and hierarchies of religious orders. So sufferings and devastations were brought about in the name of God. But in truth, they were our own doings, coming from our defiled nature - foolishness, mindlessless, unconsciousness and unawareness?

Indeed, Man make God. If there is God, would such things happen?
And why it is the animals don't do the silly things that human does?

An Eternal Now SG

Originally posted by TheGoodEarth:
In a nutshell: There is no beginning and no ending.

That's right.

There is existence yet no existence.

No, and I didn't say that.

Emptiness means Empty of the 4 extremes: existence, non-existence, both existence and non-existence, neither existence nor non existence.

You cannot say there is existence, yet you also cannot say there is no existence. Both belong to the understanding of eternalist/realist and nihilist. Buddha did not teach these extremes, he taught middle way, and middle way = Emptiness. Empty of all the 4 extremes.

I need to explain emptiness a bit.

Why empty of any inherent, separate existence? Because all things are conditioned arising/interdependent origination, completely transient and not even staying for one moment, ungraspable.

Let's take cloud as an example. As you know cloud is always changing form, and we know that we cannot find any graspable entity, or the 'cloudness' of cloud. Such things simply cannot be found, it is in a constant state of fluctuation, transiency. Or let's say weather. Weather is not an entity that can be found, but is actually a completely random, well not random but 'conditioned' and ever-changing patterns of clouds, wind, rain, lightning, and etc. It is ever changing, empty of any inherent existence or 'thingness'.

Now, 'Self' is also like that. There is no 'Self' at all apart from the everchanging thoughts, emotions, feelings and perceptions, in other words the 'clouds' of 5 aggregates passing by and ever changing. There is really no self to be found, just as the word 'weather' really does not mean any permanent and findable entity. Since there is no self to be found, there is no separate and permanent Agent such as a Self -- means there is NO Watcher, NO Doer, NO Thinker. There is only watching, doing, and thinking arising moment to moment. This part clear?

So as you can see, 'clouds', 'weather', and 'self' are empty of inherent existence. In reality ALL phenomena are empty. Not only are they empty of inherent existence, they are also empty of non-existence, neither, and both. Why empty of non-existence, etc? Because if 'cloud', 'weather', 'self' is ultimately not even a findable entity in the first place, how can they have non existence? Non-existence is the flip-side of existence, and they always refer to a 'something', but there is really 'no-thing' to be found. Get it?

HOWEVER, for conventional purpose, for communication, we have to use relative truths and our conceptual models to communicate with others, so we say 'cloud' or 'weather' and 'self'. No problem, like I said, as long as you recognise they are only relative truths and NOT ultimately true.

There is myself yet noself.

No, there is really no self, the notion 'myself' is illusory. In fact I stressed this a lot of times, didn't I say clearly that even 'physical self' and 'metaphysical self' or 'conscious self' and all the kinds of self are also empty? There is only completely empty and transient aggregates, the 5 aggregates. No self to be found.

But we do not have choice but to talk about 'myself', this is just a conventional way to communicate with other people, to understand things conceptually. No problem with this as long as you do not take it as ultimately True. The Ultimate Reality is that it is empty.

I am beginning to understand Duality but not Reality.

That's because you misunderstand my words. Try to understand the essence of what I am saying, don't just sweep through the words without understanding. But if you really don't get it pls ask.

So some kind of 'nature' existed long before Gautama 'discovered' this nature. This is termed the First Buddha. So where did First Buddha come from?
Nowhere, it merely existed out of Emptiness!

Our Buddha Nature does not come out of Emptiness. It IS Emptiness! It is Luminous-Emptiness. It is Unborn. Since it is unborn, you also cannot say it has 'inherent existence', yet it has Awareness. So Buddha Nature is Luminous(Aware)-Emptiness inseparable. All things are empty, but not just empty otherwise you can't even be here. You are also aware. Everything you touch, hear, see, everything that feels so real including suffering is an expression of intrinsic Luminosity, Awareness. All phenomena are expressions of this Luminous-Emptiness nature, our Buddha Nature.

Oh and, do you understand the meaning of the word 'nature'? The reason why the word 'nature' is used is to tell you that it's not an entity or a 'something'. It's more like an intrinsic characteristic. For example, people say 'it's my nature to help the animals', 'he is by nature compassionate'.

Similarly, Buddha Nature is not a 'thing' or an 'entity', it is the characteristic of Reality, and of all beings. All beings are BY NATURE Buddhas (though they didn't realise it), and ALL phenomena in their essence is also the expression of Buddha Nature. Just like 'Impermanence' is not a thing, but is the nature of all things, get it? Emptiness and Awareness are not 'things', they are the NATURE of all phenomena.

I believe this should clear some of your confusion.

There were indeed tortures, atrocities, wars and inhumanities brought about by our desires to find the Source, the Beginning, the God. Often-times, these were the 'works' of the very people in the organisations and hierarchies of religious orders. So sufferings and devastations were brought about in the name of God. But in truth, they were our own doings, coming from our defiled nature - foolishness, mindlessless, unconsciousness and unawareness?

Indeed, Man make God. If there is God, would such things happen?
And why it is the animals don't do the silly things that human does?

Yes I agree... so much ignorance and violence has been attributed to religion and God, supposingly a holy figure but really just a mask for our egos.

An Eternal Now SG

Elaboration:

Just like 'Impermanence' is not a thing, but is the nature of all things, get it?

Since Emptiness, Awareness, Impermanence, are not even a 'thing', but rather is the nature and characteristic, it doesn't make sense to say things like 'Where does Impermanence come from'? or worse, 'Who created impermanence?' It is silly to ask this way. It just is -- all phenomena is just impermanence, and permanence is just an illusory concept, a cognitive error. Similarly you can't ask 'where does Emptiness or Awareness or Buddha Nature comes from?' It just is!

It is only our illusions that make up ideas about existence, self, permanence and etc, and obscures our instrinsic luminosity. Actually all along it is just so.

------------
Questions on No Self

Regarding Source and Unborn nature, I posted this reply to Omniknight regarding the existence of God:

Originally posted by An Eternal Now:
There is also something you must know. Nothing is ever created, ever. Nothing is ever born and all is empty, unborn.

Look at my forum signature:

The world exists only when we think about it; creation stories are for children. In reality the world is created every moment. ~ Jean Klein

You can talk about Source, but Manifestation is the Source, ultimately. Just like waves do not exist apart from ocean.

If you see manifestation as apart and created from a Source, then that is because you are caught up with ideas that the world is inherently existing, created in time. This is a fallacy. All there is is what is apparently happening in Awareness, arising and passing away simultaneously moment to moment.

"There is only Source appearing. All that manifests is always and only the appearance of Source-the apparent universe, the world, the life story, the body- mind, feelings, the sense of separation, and the search for enlightenment. It is all the one appearing as two-the nothing appearing as everything." -- Tony Parsons

Oh and, don't think too much and practise. Don't think about creation theories and creator and things like that. Buddha said these topics are useless and does not lead to Liberation.

Lastly, Source is not an entity or a 'something' that can be found anywhere and is empty of inherent existence. Unfortunately whenever you think of a Creator or a God, it's almost inevitable to think of it as some sort of entity.

The world is empty, ungraspable, and yet miraculously there is awareness of all appearances. But they are just that -- dream-like appearances, no solidity or objective reality.

An Eternal Now SG

Oh and TheGoodEarth, I really hope you have read my latest replies at Questions on No Self I have corrected many of your misunderstandings.

AndrewPKYap SG

Why do you think that if people "feel this loving kindness for others, aversion on others and other emotions..." it means that there is a God or that God put it there.

You have to be careful because many times, people tend to "blame God" or "conclude that it is God". This is a human tendency.

Man used to think that Lightning was caused by a God (Zeus) and thunder also (Thor).

You should learn to find out the real reasons instead of blaming God or conclude that it is the work of God. You do that, you will be filled with delusions in your head (like the delusion that a God caused lightning).

Where do emotions come from? The short answer based on science is evolution. The long answer is very long.

An Eternal Now SG

Ya lor. Why does emotions have anything to do with a Creator?

Anyway conventionally the emotions come from ourselves what.

TheGoodEarth SG

Let me try to understand one thing at a time:

Emptiness means Empty of the 4 extremes: existence, non-existence, both existence and non-existence, neither existence nor non existence.

You cannot say there is existence, yet you also cannot say there is no existence. Both belong to the understanding of eternalist/realist and nihilist. Buddha did not teach these extremes, he taught middle way, and middle way = Emptiness. Empty of all the 4 extremes.

So, if Emptiness is not the same as Nothing. Emptiness = No Extremes and that/there is the Middle thingy, since there are No Extremes.
How could the Middle thingy be empty of the 4 extremes: existence, non-existence, both existence and non-existence, neither existence nor non existence?

An Eternal Now SG

That's right. Emptiness is not 'nothing' or 'void'. It is not a void as opposed to phenomena, it is in fact the nature of all phenomena -- that there is no inherent, separate, graspable existence to be found in anything. There is no objective reality in them.

Everything arises interdependently, they are conditioned arising, and utterly transient, but no inherent existence can be found.

Just like 'Weather' is not an entity and has no findable inherent existence, but is just made of utterly transient conditioned arising and the aggregation of various conditions -- clouds, lightning, rain, etc. Weather is not a fixed entity -- it is completely momentary, just Weather1, Weather2, Weather3, Weather4, arising and passing away simultaneously and another conditioned arising happens. It is empty of inherent existence, there is only conditioned arising, interdependent origination and transience. Reality is just activities apparently happening, dream-like and ungraspable.

So now you know, all phenomena are empty of inherent existence. But why also say they are also empty of non-existence, etc?

Because if 'cloud', 'weather', 'self' is ultimately not even a findable entity in the first place, how can they have non existence?

Non-existence is the flip-side of existence, and they always refer to a 'something', but there is really 'no-thing' to be found.

Existence is always of a something, Non-existence is also always of a something, of an entity. If there is no entity to be found in the first place, but only empty and transient conditioned arising, then on what basis do we talk about Existence or Non-existence? Therefore, Emptiness is Empty of Existence, Non-existence, Both existence and non existence, Neither existence nor non existence.

Herzog_Zwei SG

I call it death.

An Eternal Now SG

It depends on what you mean by death. If you hold onto the view that death is annihilation, that is one of the false views and extremes that Buddha has rejected.

Herzog_Zwei SG

Did Buddha reject death? Annihilation is not rejected.

An Eternal Now SG

Originally posted by Herzog_Zwei:

Did Buddha reject death?

No, Buddha did not reject death at the relative level.

Although in Ultimate truth, Reality is Emptiness, there is no birth and no death.

Annihilation is not rejected.

Annihilation is definitely rejected BOTH at the relative and ultimate level.

At the ultimate level, to annihilate there has to be a 'self' to be annihilated. In the first place, there is no self, and no self can be found.

At the relative level, one does not end at death but is always being reborn.

Therefore, Annihilation is rejected at both levels (ultimate and relative) in Buddhism.