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Ultimately can't it be said that both dvaita/advaita seek something?

Sure. The strict advaitist seeks to end all sense of individual existence because he mistakenly believes that individuality itself is Maya. The bhakta, on the other hand, seeks to bring his individual propensities to their perfect, constitutional state.

Which is ultimately an improvement upon the state the seeker began with?

Yes. The strict advaitist is better than, say, a materialistic karmi. At least the advaitist is asking the questions that lead to transcendental knowledge. There are levels of understanding Paramatma, the Supreme Absolute Truth, and the advaitist dwells on the impersonal Brahman platform of understanding. However, this impersonal Brahman is not the final word in transcendental knowledge. There is this common misconception that the impersonal conception of God is the ultimate understanding and wherefrom personal deity forms arise. This conception plagues western academia as well as a lot of other religions' views of the Absolute. Beyond Brahman is Bhagavan. In other words, higher than understanding God as some sort of formless, impersonal "spirit" is understanding God as a person with transcendental form. The impersonal aspect of God is described as being the bodily effulgence of the Supreme Person. And only bhakti can penetrate beyond that impersonal effulgence.

Does dvaita seek moksha?

If by "dvaita" we mean the bhakta, then the answer is no. The bhakta does not seek moksha. Moksha is the servant of Krishna. In other words, it is inferior to Krishna. However, moksha is a natural symptom of having become a devotee of Krishna, even though the pure devotee does not desire any such thing. The pure devotee, rather, simply wants to be able to serve Krishna in love. That is why he is superior to any prospect of moksha.

And his saying that contrasts with you showing a possible projection of his just reifies the contrasting positions between the two(dvaita/advaita). I can't say whether or not either knows what they are doing.

All I was doing at this point was mimicking Atmananda since there wasn't any substance to which I could respond.

But again both dvaita and advaita seek "something"... both serve a purpose as a means to an end

I'm going to try and get away from this "dvaita" versus "advaita" distinction because it isn't exactly what we're talking about. Bhaktas subscribe to a sort of hybrid form of the two, anyway. The real distinction here is between the so-called strict advaitists (i.e. Mayavadis) like Atmananda and the bhaktas or devotees.

Mayavada functions as a means to an end, yes. The Mayavadi philosopher seeks a process that will bring him to the eradication of all sense of individuality, which he perceives as Maya. Bhakti does not function as a means to an end. Bhakti is the end. One does not become a devotee of Krishna in order to ______. There is nothing beyond that devotional state; There is no merging homogenously with the "Divine Spirit;" There is no "suck up to God now and later get a cookie." Bhakti is superior to all of these things. Bhakti is superior to all forms of liberation, even though it entails the ultimate liberation.

The Mayavadi philosopher is likened to someone who watches, from a distance, a green bird fly into a big green tree. Seeing this, he thinks that the bird has merged into the tree; He thinks that there is no more bird, in other words. But the man who is standing near to the tree has the more correct, more confidential understanding. He sees that there is still a bird and, moreover, that this bird is enjoying the tree's fruits.

I agree that it is a bit presumptuous to say the bhakta's pursuit is only fueled by a desire for enjoyment. But he isn't saying the pursuit is dwelling on a mundane platform, the comment (even though speaking about enjoyment) is stating that upon realizing that the enjoyment itself, the pursuit itself (with the natural consequence of enjoyment) and suffering itself are all expressions of the real 'I'-principle, other terms for the I-principle being consciousness, absolute, beingness, awareness(but that which is ultimately unknowable due to the noticing that any/everything including concepts used to describe it arise in it, as it, and that one cannot know it but only be it because you are it.)... the term 'I'-principle which you called word-jugglery is used because he's saying you are THAT which is the supreme consciousness and source of all, not from a theoretical standpoint but from a fully experiential standpoint. So instead of a impersonal view he's truly giving the most personal view one can be said to have. He isn't saying that the enjoyment is inferior, the enjoyment is an aspect of the supreme along with suffering which is its dualistic opposite as you said. Only the mind separates and measures enjoyment from suffering. Enjoyment is the nature of consciousness because it manifests in these apparent pairs of opposites as expressions and does so spontaneously which i'm sure is where the idea of leila comes from. Suffering only arises due to ignorance from the standpoint of the illusory nature of a subject who suffers. He's coming from the perspective of the supreme consciousness instead of an individual body-mind and saying that the bhakta may believe they will lose enjoyment in advaita due to misunderstanding what advaita is from identifying with an idea of what advaita is. But as soon as the bhakta perceives enjoyment as an ornament of the absolute supreme state in it's suchness, manifesting spontaneously not as "someones" enjoyment but as consciousness taking the form of enjoyment then the appearance of one who would seek enjoyment and attempt escape from suffering is removed and there is only "that" (consciousness or whatever term is used to describe it) and the enjoyment IS that. So it's not that the bhakta becomes an advaitin, it's only that the nature of experience is apperceived directly and truly at that point one cannot be called a bhakta or advaitin. He only uses the term advaitin to describe that state which is advaita(one without a second).

What does it mean that the "pursuit itself" is an expression of the I-principle? The bhakta has no pursuit toward anything other than the continual development of devotional service and the loving attitude toward Krishna. The "pursuit" is the end itself. It is still unclear what Atmananda's "I-principle" is all about. Being unclear is the special feature of the mayavadi philosopher. But no matter what he means, he gives himself away by criticizing the bhakta. Whether he views this "enjoyment" as mundane or not, he is still criticizing the bhakta as pursuing it. Only in some neophyte stage is the potential bhakta motivated by a yearning for enjoyment. But the process of bhakti isn't concerned with that. It contains no such motivations. The "this"ness and "that"ness and "such"ness or whatever of the "I-principle" of the "absolute supreme state" is all just dancing around the real subject matter. The bottom line here is that the bhakta is not concerned with whether enjoyment is that of the individual's or that of an expression of the Absolute. The bhakta is only concerned with the individual capacity in so far as it accomodates devotional service. Enjoyment could be an expression of the flying spaghetti monster, for all they care.

Yes, so Krishna being the absolute supreme consciousness (as we and everything are) would BE his vision and happiness non-differentiated and experience experience in the nature of one taste.

This isn't what Atmananda said. He said that Krishna is the vision of the Lord. So, my point stands. There is no difference between God and God's "vision." The implication by Atmananda is that there is some Absolute we call "God" and then there is this personal form we know as Krishna. This distinction is foolishness. Krishna is the Absolute God. Krishna is not a personal expression of an impersonal absolute. The impersonal does not precede the personal. Persons are not inherently Maya. To think that personality and even personal form are inherently Maya is itself to be under the influence of Maya. Mayavada is a philosophy out of negation, but it goes too far. It decides, without justification, that because certain things and qualities are displayed in the material world, that therefore those things and qualities are themselves illusion. Just because I see water in the desert and it turns out to be a mirage, that does not mean that all water is unreal. Similarly, just because individuality and form are present in the material world, that does not mean that individuality and form are themselves unreal. Real individuality and real form simply exists elsewhere.

Again yes, Krishna being the absolute, not as "Krishna" the separate entity, idea, concept, archetype what-have-you.. but Krishna as a full realized being and expression of that just as you and I are that. So swap out Krishna with absolute consciousness and i'm sure yes Atmananda would agree that the real 'I'-principle (being the absolute) which manifests as sat-chit-ananda (being-consiciousness-bliss) happiness, entails an individual in spontaneous, transcendental love with "that" which is themselves abiding in their true nature as the supreme.

The individual Krishna, the cowherd boy of Vrndavan, the chariot-driver of Arjuna, the lover of the gopis and of Radharani is Bhagavan, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Who is the final word in transcendental knowledge, The ultimate understanding of Paramatma. The above attempt to reduce the Personality of Krishna to some less personal conception of the absolute is the plague of the Mayavadi that I mentioned earlier. Atmananda has no real understanding of Krishna. He is incapable of entering into the confidential understanding of texts such as the Bhagavad-gita and Srimad Bhagavatam.

He's merely saying get beyond the conception in the mind, nama-rupa-sat-chit-ananda... go beyond nama rupa(name and form) to experience beingness as existence-consciousness-bliss or being-knowing-bliss... which is the direct experience of reality as that... that to know reality is to be reality. The statement is saying what can you know of the absolute name/form of God? Only what you've acquired as an idea, an idea in it's suchness being a mentation and not that "thing" in-and-of-itself. Just as dirt must be wiped from a window to see through it clearly, ideas on the window of the mind must be wiped clean(or seen for what they are, ideas). Saying don't stop with the idea but BE that and know it intimately as yourself. Of course everything i'm saying being an idea as well but the idea isn't it and to even believe what i say, or you say, or atmananda says etc is doing yourself injustice, there should be keen and uncompromising investigation into what is being pointed to on a fully personal and intimate level. If these "spiritual" endeavors and understandings are doing their job there should be experience in ones own life that goes beyond theory or skewed personal interpretation in favor of or against any given belief structure.

There is no getting beyond the nama rupa of Krishna because there is no beyond the nama rupa of Krishna. Again, the name and form of Krishna and Krishna Himself are nondifferent, dwelling on the absolute platform. And again, notice how the monist mayavadi philosopher wants to transcend the duality except when it comes to Krishna, at which point he has no problem violating his own non-dualistic principles.

 

[LyfeCentenz]

Sure. The strict advaitist seeks to end all sense of individual existence because he mistakenly believes that individuality itself is Maya. The bhakta, on the other hand, seeks to bring his individual propensities to their perfect, constitutional state.

There may be interpretations/translations/commentaries of advaitist commentaries that say the individuality itself is maya, as for whether or not individuality is maya I can't say. That would depend on how one would define maya... and individuality for that matter. As for the bhakta seeking to bring his or her individual propensities to their perfect constitutional state, that again would be based on a preconceived notion of what perfection is. Perfection is a completely relative idea. Formulating or conceiving an idea of what perfection is depends wholly on personal tastes relating to the circumstances one has been exposed to in their environment. It would also depend on a concept of perfection which has been learned and adopted through influence derived from others ideas of what perfection is. In any case perfection is only an idea, and if the person accepting the idea lives with circumstances which don't match that conception of perfect they automatically accept the co-emergent opposite notion of being imperfect. And thus begin seeking the idea of perfection. But the whole search is a structure of concepts and ideas based on the foundation of the first action which was accepting an idea of perfection. This can be taken to an extreme idealistic measure if the source of what perfection is, is said to be of divine origin. But the same game goes for that as well... you have to believe the scriptures and teachings you come across telling you what perfection is or what anything else is for that matter. And anyone can refute this fact as much as they like. Any reasons as to why this wouldn't be the case could only be backed up with regurgitated knowledge which had been learned at one point. This isn't to say there's anything wrong with identifying with a belief system or an idea of what perfection is, but to say the endeavor of striving for that goal is any more or less noble than another's is only a belief or idea as well.

To believe that individuality is somehow unreal is a mistake in-and-of-itself and completely self-contridictory in nature. Who is it who knows there's no self or individuality? Obviously the individual. Identification with thought IS the sense of individuality and the individual is the thought. Believing anything to be true or untrue poisons the endeavor from the beginning, because it creates the endeavor as i was saying above with striving for perfection. These traditions hinge on experience, not on theoretical or philosophical ideas. Formulating a theory or philosophy about advaita, non-duality, dzogchen etc.. any teaching of that nature is like formulating an intellectual understanding about opening and closing your hand, you can do it, but it won't help you open and close your hand any better.

Yes. The strict advaitist is better than, say, a materialistic karmi. At least the advaitist is asking the questions that lead to transcendental knowledge. There are levels of understanding Paramatma, the Supreme Absolute Truth, and the advaitist dwells on the impersonal Brahman platform of understanding. However, this impersonal Brahman is not the final word in transcendental knowledge. There is this common misconception that the impersonal conception of God is the ultimate understanding and wherefrom personal deity forms arise. This conception plagues western academia as well as a lot of other religions' views of the Absolute. Beyond Brahman is Bhagavan. In other words, higher than understanding God as some sort of formless, impersonal "spirit" is understanding God as a person with transcendental form. The impersonal aspect of God is described as being the bodily effulgence of the Supreme Person. And only bhakti can penetrate beyond that impersonal effulgence.

So the strict advaitist would be better than a materialistic karmi because they would be asking questions which lead to "transcendental knowledge"? I would say they're no different. Doing anything to acquire a goal in time is just as materialistic as doing anything else. If there are questions or a process which leads to knowledge, that knowledge is a "thing" to be desired or acquired just like objects a materialistic person would enjoy. Spiritual-materialism is more subtle than blatant materialism, but it's still materialism. As for the rest of that i can't say anything other than it's a belief structure, it is what it is, if that is believed it's believed. A christian believes their dogma with just as much passion, neither is right or wrong. But you weren't born into this world knowing the levels of understanding are paramatma, parabrahman etc... this has been learned and believed.. it very well could be true. It all clearly points to something with some actuality to it. Whether it's this, or that etc.. are all products of who's speaking about the experiences and what their influences and cultural backgrounds are... buddhists speak of the trikaya: saboghakaya, nirmanakaya and dharmakaya all 3 being aspects of the one reality. Christian mystics describe the same state as the impersonal brahman etc in writings like "the cloud of unknowing" and others. And it goes on and on for every religion or belief system. These experiences and realizations have been happening since time immemorial and will continue on. Every being on this planet functions off of the same sentience. But to say the conception plagues western academia as well as other religions views of the absolute could just as easily be said about the conception of the absolute that you just described. Who's to say? I'm sure you'd say you know it's true.

If by "dvaita" we mean the bhakta, then the answer is no. The bhakta does not seek moksha. Moksha is the servant of Krishna. In other words, it is inferior to Krishna. However, moksha is a natural symptom of having become a devotee of Krishna, even though the pure devotee does not desire any such thing. The pure devotee, rather, simply wants to be able to serve Krishna in love. That is why he is superior to any prospect of moksha.

That's all well and good but again it's a constructed belief system.. the properties and ins-and-outs of everything you're talking about is relevant within the religion and though the religion may help to describe certain universal attributes of the human condition it doesn't mean those attributes can't be described any more or less better in a different belief system or intellectual schematic.

All I was doing at this point was mimicking Atmananda since there wasn't any substance to which I could respond.

Word uuup

I'm going to try and get away from this "dvaita" versus "advaita" distinction because it isn't exactly what we're talking about. Bhaktas subscribe to a sort of hybrid form of the two, anyway. The real distinction here is between the so-called strict advaitists (i.e. Mayavadis) like Atmananda and the bhaktas or devotees.

Mayavada functions as a means to an end, yes. The Mayavadi philosopher seeks a process that will bring him to the eradication of all sense of individuality, which he perceives as Maya. Bhakti does not function as a means to an end. Bhakti is the end. One does not become a devotee of Krishna in order to ______. There is nothing beyond that devotional state; There is no merging homogenously with the "Divine Spirit;" There is no "suck up to God now and later get a cookie." Bhakti is superior to all of these things. Bhakti is superior to all forms of liberation, even though it entails the ultimate liberation.

The Mayavadi philosopher is likened to someone who watches, from a distance, a green bird fly into a big green tree. Seeing this, he thinks that the bird has merged into the tree; He thinks that there is no more bird, in other words. But the man who is standing near to the tree has the more correct, more confidential understanding. He sees that there is still a bird and, moreover, that this bird is enjoying the tree's fruits.

While all of this is open to interpretation i will say that in this advaitist mayavadi philosopher business the eradication of individuality shouldn't be any type of goal. The enquiry into what it is that constitutes the sense of individuality and any process of dis-identification are merely tools to help habitual fixations which exist from conditioning to relax. But these things can't be "done" intentionally through identifying with a process which aids in helping the individual to find what he or she seeks. The nature of the whole setup has to be perceived as false through experience. How can a "you" dis-identify with a "you"? It's a ridiculous idea. If anything what happens is a shift in perception is what i would call it. Not a change in a set of thoughts or beliefs, those change with the wind. But the fundamental shift in perception that can be had through these enquiries is irrefutable. Again forming a theory or philosophy about non-duality is impossible. There is no philosophy that can be broken, but at the same time it can be talked about of course and you could call the description a philosophy. But it wouldn't be an exclusive philosophy when described which would claim the status of end-all-be-all and negate others. The seeing is more that everything is just as it is, and any effort in doing anything is all well and good and likewise doing nothing is fine just the same. So the state is effortless. Because this state of being is effortless. It just is. We just are. But the conditioned perception most people function off of has subtleties that can be rearranged in ways to give the experience of reality a completely different appearance and flavor. Which is an actuality rather than a notion or idea.

What does it mean that the "pursuit itself" is an expression of the I-principle? The bhakta has no pursuit toward anything other than the continual development of devotional service and the loving attitude toward Krishna. The "pursuit" is the end itself. It is still unclear what Atmananda's "I-principle" is all about. Being unclear is the special feature of the mayavadi philosopher. But no matter what he means, he gives himself away by criticizing the bhakta. Whether he views this "enjoyment" as mundane or not, he is still criticizing the bhakta as pursuing it. Only in some neophyte stage is the potential bhakta motivated by a yearning for enjoyment. But the process of bhakti isn't concerned with that. It contains no such motivations. The "this"ness and "that"ness and "such"ness or whatever of the "I-principle" of the "absolute supreme state" is all just dancing around the real subject matter. The bottom line here is that the bhakta is not concerned with whether enjoyment is that of the individual's or that of an expression of the Absolute. The bhakta is only concerned with the individual capacity in so far as it accomodates devotional service. Enjoyment could be an expression of the flying spaghetti monster, for all they care.

The flying spaghetti monster? While you expound this and that about krishna? Com'on man... I hope you at least see some irony in that. But the pursuit itself being an expression of the I-principle (i.e. the faculty of sentience going on in all of us) means only that a pursuit, or any activity happening for that matter is due to this awakeness or beingness... life.... in all of us. It is happening because you are present and awake. If this consciousness wasn't there then nothing would be. Speaking about direct experience, and speaking about this present experience right now is what these nondual teachings address. It isn't something to be imagined or a belief to be accepted. I'm not sure if being unclear is a special feature or if the state being described is just hard to formulate into words due to it obviously contradicting itself when placed into language needing nouns and verbs, subjects and objects etc... but if it's all dancing around the real subject matter then what is it you take the real subject matter to be? The use of the term 'that' is only to coin a term that does more of a 'pointing' that a labeling. Since terms and labels can serve to be a block in this. Obviously it's still labeling but it's of a lighter nature because to refer to anything as 'that' requires one to investigate as to what 'that' is to know it. Also using the term 'that' helps to keep the notion of what is being pointed to open, other words like the absolute, sentience, consciousness, god, you, krishna, brahman, dharmakaya, etc.. all have baggage that comes along with them and to use a term like that doesn't allow people who are very concept and intellectually oriented to grasp onto images in the mind or have an idea about what is being talked about because then they seek an idea. Likewise "such"ness is a term used to describe the experience of sensory reality "as it is" without the mind or knower intervening... a type of de-clutched witnessing i guess.. for example thoughts in their suchness are just sounds. The vowels, consonants and verbal articulations in phonetics that create words are merely sounds married with subjective memory of different combinations forming a label that corresponds to an objective "thing". But the thought is just sound. So thought in it's suchness would be mental noise... investigation into things like this could very well be why non-conceptual sounds such as AH, OM, HUM etc are used in meditational practices.

And devotional practice is all well and good, but believing it to be somehow better or worse than some other practice is hardly more than opinion. Devotion is a tool in some spiritual practices to get the individual to look past themselves. Which is the beginning of working towards experiencing the arbitrary nature of self and other. In mahayana buddhism the same principle is used.. that one does the practice for the benefit and liberation of all sentient beings. So that every action is for the benefit of others, taking the focus off of the individual trying to benefit from the practice. In vajrayana buddhism different deities and archetypes (yidams) are used for ritualistic practices that involve devotional acts and visualizations which transform the practitioner into the deity. Ultimately showing the arbitrary nature of both the physical touch-sight-sound and subtle mind emotion-image-thought aggregates that form the usual self one takes oneself to be. But whether the devotion is used as a tool, or used for purely devotional purposes to express love for the object of devotion ultimately only has the value placed on it by the individual... as does anything. It can become an issue if the devotee fixates on the idea of that which is the object of devotion though. Because again they're identified with an idea. These deities are representations. Archetypes. They represent parts of you or the world, or both. The same thing happens in buddhism with the deities. People get stuck on them, really believe they exist and damn near worship them. Which is fine but it isn't the archetypes purpose. The individual becoming the archetype is the point.

This isn't what Atmananda said. He said that Krishna is the vision of the Lord. So, my point stands. There is no difference between God and God's "vision." The implication by Atmananda is that there is some Absolute we call "God" and then there is this personal form we know as Krishna. This distinction is foolishness. Krishna is the Absolute God. Krishna is not a personal expression of an impersonal absolute. The impersonal does not precede the personal. Persons are not inherently Maya. To think that personality and even personal form are inherently Maya is itself to be under the influence of Maya. Mayavada is a philosophy out of negation, but it goes too far. It decides, without justification, that because certain things and qualities are displayed in the material world, that therefore those things and qualities are themselves illusion. Just because I see water in the desert and it turns out to be a mirage, that does not mean that all water is unreal. Similarly, just because individuality and form are present in the material world, that does not mean that individuality and form are themselves unreal. Real individuality and real form simply exists elsewhere.

Krishna is the absolute god if you believe he is. Someone else believes jesus is the absolute god. This has to be made very apparent that krishna is an image, a story, a character, a word, an idea. If you identify with all of that and believe it's true that is your doing. Not to be mistaken as some fundamental truth that you're in on and others aren't. It's not like krishna is the truth but jesus isn't or vice versa. Mayavada is a process of negation because it's removing ideas from the mind that one could fixate on. It surely doesn't take it too far... Nagarjuna who was one of the main founders of mahayana buddhism did the same thing. He would absolutely decimate everything this students could hold onto and when they said ok so what should we identify with he would say "why do you feel you need something to hold onto", nothing would be given and everything would be taken away. Christian mystics did the same thing with apophatic theology.. they would describe god by saying what god isn't.. like removing stone to make a sculpture. If there is an image or idea or anything that is identified with then it's an idea being worshipped. Why you have jesus saying thou shalt not worship false idols.. he didn't mean gods other than him, he was giving the prescription for self knowledge and self realization, don't worship idols... an idol being a person, god, piece of wood or stone... but also being an idea or concept. Negative approaches to theology and psychology don't decide that things and qualities that are perceived are illusion. The illusion is believing that those things and qualities aren't perfect as they are. Maya also means to measure, so it's measuring this perceived reality against an idea or even the measuring itself like rupa or form... using thought to prop up belief that you are "I" seeing a "thing" out there which is separate from me. Subtle ideas like that we all have to function off of to be active in our lives but we forget that these are merely conventions of language and thought. Noticing for example with that seeing reference: that seeing communicates no separation or unity. Seeing just is present without any effort. Seeing is just happening and then thought or language comes in and says "I" am "seeing" this "thing"... But the body we take ourselves to be is in the seeing as well. So the body is in a way "made" of seeing just as the whole sense field of sight is. The eyes aren't windows looking out at a world. The seeing is a sensory perception. Where ever seeing is happening, that is all that is being seen. The mind will come in again and believe that there's a whole world out there beyond what's being seen but this isn't experienced. Which is just a presupposition, because when the seeing gets to those points, those other parts of the world are seen too. But they're never there all at once in direct experience. Just like sound.. whatever sound is heard is all that is being heard. It's not like there's other sound waiting off stage or something to come into hearing. Only one field of sight, one field of sound etc... are being experienced in the immediate now. It's always now. So whatever is being seen now or heard now is all that exists in your direct experience. To think that there's anything else is a thought(useful to function in the world, but it's just a thought)... From there going into sound for example.. is there sound separate from hearing? No... so sound is hearing.. and is there hearing separate from your awareness? Nope... so why even call it a sound.. all that's happening is presence essentially. The hearing IS experience. The seeing IS experience. And YOU are experience. You can see how it all collapses in on itself if you're open to it. It's a shift in perception from how we assume reality functions.. and it's 100% personal and only to be investigated yourself. You can't believe anything i just said... in fact don't! You have to look and listen and come to a conclusion yourself. So yes it doesn't mean all water is unreal because a mirage resembled water. But you didn't see water in the desert. Your mind jumped to make a reference about what it could be you were perceiving. The mirage was real, thinking is was water was the only thing that was illusory. Individuality and form are products of mind.. in whatever world you live in which is also mind. All you know is what you experience... The world appears to be as you believe it to be, but it cannot stand up to investigation and neither can the individuality... neither have any inherent existence and neither does non-individuality and non-form... they are co-emergent concept-based principles... these are all labels being placed onto something you cannot know but only experience. There is no material world, there is no spiritual world.. and there is no elsewhere. You're only here and now. Everything else is a thought, a memory, an idea, a dream. And those are real.. but they aren't what they appear to represent.

The individual Krishna, the cowherd boy of Vrndavan, the chariot-driver of Arjuna, the lover of the gopis and of Radharani is Bhagavan, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Who is the final word in transcendental knowledge, The ultimate understanding of Paramatma. The above attempt to reduce the Personality of Krishna to some less personal conception of the absolute is the plague of the Mayavadi that I mentioned earlier. Atmananda has no real understanding of Krishna. He is incapable of entering into the confidential understanding of texts such as the Bhagavad-gita and Srimad Bhagavatam.

There is no getting beyond the nama rupa of Krishna because there is no beyond the nama rupa of Krishna. Again, the name and form of Krishna and Krishna Himself are nondifferent, dwelling on the absolute platform. And again, notice how the monist mayavadi philosopher wants to transcend the duality except when it comes to Krishna, at which point he has no problem violating his own non-dualistic principles.

And again this notion of non-dualistic principles just doesn't make any sense to me. How could there be non-dual principles? A principle is a set of concepts or ideas that is identified with, and a concept or idea obviously represents a certain thing and doesn't represent other things... so a non-dual principle would be saying "it's this... but not that" which is all good but certainly isn't what's being pointed at in non-duality. The notion that this non-duality business is a set of beliefs or principles a theory etc.. that excludes something else isn't what it is. It also isn't a code of conduct or way of acting or doing anything. There's no "way" to be that is in line with it and another way that is wrong or against it. Which is to say that even identifying with a set of principles isn't wrong. There's no way of violating anything. The idea of violating something comes into play when a set of laws, morals, values etc are identified with. If you're going to the mind (i.e. thoughts, concepts, ideas) to somehow capture nonduality you've missed it. This is why you have Zen patriarchs who throw books against the wall when a student asks a question... or walk into a room to give a talk and wait while a bird outside the window sings and they say thank you and walk off. Or why you hear quotes like "when you're silent it speaks, when you speak it's silent." or "those who know it do not speak, those who speak do not know it" There's nothing to "get" or understand. It's a state of being which removes separation but still keeps it. This is also why it's such a "vague" thing... or why you'd say mayavadi philosophers hide behind being unclear. It's unclear because if you're trying to understand it as a set of ideals, or concepts then it will never be understood because it's impossible. It's paradoxical in speaking of it. It contradicts itself. Any seeming process of "getting there" always flops back on itself and negates any previous statements made about it.

Another reason you don't get a straight intellectual formulation is because alot of the discourses are used to bring about realizations in the seeker from his or her own self. Which is why you'll hear guru's say shit like "desire is the source of bondage" etc.. so subtle games are played with the student to make them see the point the teacher wants them to discover. So with stating that desire is the cause of bondage... if the student is clever will see that any movement towards not desiring is desiring not to desire. And all this is meant to do is to exhaust the use of a method to find some type of liberation. Also why in zen they come up with koans which are bizarre questions to meditate on. Like the famous "what is the sound of one hand clapping" and so on. The student can ponder and think about it as long as they want and they'll continually go to the teacher who will never give them the satisfaction of finding an answer. And eventually they'll give up. The whole thing is false. The student creates the teacher by raising a problem. The teacher is no different than the student. The student just believes there's a difference. These subtle labels we identify with are eventually seen to be empty in these discourses.

No one can transcend duality. The subject-object dichotomy that every sentient being must function off of to be able to live life is totally necessary to deal with daily goings-on. There's nothing wrong with duality. I mean you are right when you say "to even think that personality or personal form are inherently maya is itself to be under the influence of maya". True! There's nothing to accept or reject, the act of doing either is reifying the maya. So once all that business is dropped and let go of you're right where you are.

Devotional spirituality is a method that is used. The devotee gives his love to the object of devotion with such passion that eventually what appears to happen is a merging of the devotee and the object of devotion. There's a short book by Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj about his spiritual path as a bhakta called "self knowledge and self realization". The dialogues in his later books are some of the most in depth and interesting talks i've ever read. He did bhajans 4 or 5 times a day until the day he died. Both bhaktas and advaitists can relate to him you might be into his dialogues.

Goddamn I wrote way too much.

 

[THE ACIDRAPTOR]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/events/japan-quake-2011/beforeafter.htm

speaking of unrecognizable....

DAMN...... smh......

 

[n9newunsixx5150]

There may be interpretations/translations/commentaries of advaitist commentaries that say the individuality itself is maya, as for whether or not individuality is maya I can't say. That would depend on how one would define maya... and individuality for that matter.

No. It is very simple. Individuality and whether or not it is real pertaining to eternity is the issue here. The Mayavadi philosopher (in all cases) argues that individuality is a product of Maya or illusion.

As for the bhakta seeking to bring his or her individual propensities to their perfect constitutional state, that again would be based on a preconceived notion of what perfection is.

No...

Perfection is a completely relative idea.

Not in this case.

Formulating or conceiving an idea of what perfection is depends wholly on personal tastes relating to the circumstances one has been exposed to in their environment.

The perfection to which I am referring transcends relativities/circumstances.

It would also depend on a concept of perfection which has been learned and adopted through influence derived from others ideas of what perfection is. In any case perfection is only an idea, and if the person accepting the idea lives with circumstances which don't match that conception of perfect they automatically accept the co-emergent opposite notion of being imperfect. And thus begin seeking the idea of perfection. But the whole search is a structure of concepts and ideas based on the foundation of the first action which was accepting an idea of perfection. This can be taken to an extreme idealistic measure if the source of what perfection is, is said to be of divine origin. But the same game goes for that as well... you have to believe the scriptures and teachings you come across telling you what perfection is or what anything else is for that matter. And anyone can refute this fact as much as they like. Any reasons as to why this wouldn't be the case could only be backed up with regurgitated knowledge which had been learned at one point. This isn't to say there's anything wrong with identifying with a belief system or an idea of what perfection is, but to say the endeavor of striving for that goal is any more or less noble than another's is only a belief or idea as well.

Your notion that there is no objectivity on this matter is a product of Maya.

To believe that individuality is somehow unreal is a mistake in-and-of-itself and completely self-contridictory in nature. Who is it who knows there's no self or individuality? Obviously the individual. Identification with thought IS the sense of individuality and the individual is the thought. Believing anything to be true or untrue poisons the endeavor from the beginning, because it creates the endeavor as i was saying above with striving for perfection. These traditions hinge on experience, not on theoretical or philosophical ideas. Formulating a theory or philosophy about advaita, non-duality, dzogchen etc.. any teaching of that nature is like formulating an intellectual understanding about opening and closing your hand, you can do it, but it won't help you open and close your hand any better.

Yet Mayavadi/advaita philosophers believe exactly this. They believe that we are all indistinguishable from the supreme Atman.

So the strict advaitist would be better than a materialistic karmi because they would be asking questions which lead to "transcendental knowledge"? I would say they're no different. Doing anything to acquire a goal in time is just as materialistic as doing anything else.

False. Your idea that having a goal is, in all cases, materialistic is some Zen Buddhist crap. You can believe that if you want, but we're talking Vedanta here.

If there are questions or a process which leads to knowledge, that knowledge is a "thing" to be desired or acquired just like objects a materialistic person would enjoy.

Desire, per se, is not the enemy, despite what you may have learned from Buddhists/Buddhism.

Spiritual-materialism is more subtle than blatant materialism, but it's still materialism.

There is no such thing as "spiritual-materialism."

As for the rest of that i can't say anything other than it's a belief structure, it is what it is, if that is believed it's believed. A christian believes their dogma with just as much passion, neither is right or wrong. But you weren't born into this world knowing the levels of understanding are paramatma, parabrahman etc... this has been learned and believed.. it very well could be true. It all clearly points to something with some actuality to it. Whether it's this, or that etc.. are all products of who's speaking about the experiences and what their influences and cultural backgrounds are... buddhists speak of the trikaya: saboghakaya, nirmanakaya and dharmakaya all 3 being aspects of the one reality. Christian mystics describe the same state as the impersonal brahman etc in writings like "the cloud of unknowing" and others. And it goes on and on for every religion or belief system. These experiences and realizations have been happening since time immemorial and will continue on. Every being on this planet functions off of the same sentience. But to say the conception plagues western academia as well as other religions views of the absolute could just as easily be said about the conception of the absolute that you just described. Who's to say? I'm sure you'd say you know it's true.

The problem isn't the conception/realization of the impersonal brahman itself. The problem is the conception that the impersonal brahman is the highest stage of understanding. I know this because I have studied the texts and the arguments, and I hold a good understanding of how to identify pure (spiritual) and mixed (material) logical processes. Spiritual understanding is not predicated on void, a denial of self, nor a denial of individual propensities such as desire and devotion. Spiritual understanding RELIES on the individual and its natural capacity to desire, feel bliss and devotion. Those things are pure experience. If we reject them along with the individual, then we only have empty and self-contradicting words in a book telling us that spiritual knowledge is devoid of those things. In other words, we have no actual reference point, and, thus, we have no sustaining epistemology to begin with. And make no mistake, to reject all desire as being outright materialistic is tantamount to rejecting the individual in toto. Again, there is nothing wrong with the realization of the impersonal Brahman. But using this realization as a stepping stone toward rejecting the Supreme Personality--which one is invariably doing when he regards the impersonal Brahman conception as the final word on transcendental matters--is as self-deprecating, and thus as much in violation of the pure, spiritual process of understanding as outright rejection of individuality in general.

That's all well and good but again it's a constructed belief system.. the properties and ins-and-outs of everything you're talking about is relevant within the religion and though the religion may help to describe certain universal attributes of the human condition it doesn't mean those attributes can't be described any more or less better in a different belief system or intellectual schematic.

You seem to be under the impression that I am merely offering up dogma or a contrived and arbitrary system of beliefs.

While all of this is open to interpretation i will say that in this advaitist mayavadi philosopher business the eradication of individuality shouldn't be any type of goal. The enquiry into what it is that constitutes the sense of individuality and any process of dis-identification are merely tools to help habitual fixations which exist from conditioning to relax. But these things can't be "done" intentionally through identifying with a process which aids in helping the individual to find what he or she seeks. The nature of the whole setup has to be perceived as false through experience. How can a "you" dis-identify with a "you"? It's a ridiculous idea. If anything what happens is a shift in perception is what i would call it. Not a change in a set of thoughts or beliefs, those change with the wind. But the fundamental shift in perception that can be had through these enquiries is irrefutable. Again forming a theory or philosophy about non-duality is impossible. There is no philosophy that can be broken, but at the same time it can be talked about of course and you could call the description a philosophy. But it wouldn't be an exclusive philosophy when described which would claim the status of end-all-be-all and negate others. The seeing is more that everything is just as it is, and any effort in doing anything is all well and good and likewise doing nothing is fine just the same. So the state is effortless. Because this state of being is effortless. It just is. We just are. But the conditioned perception most people function off of has subtleties that can be rearranged in ways to give the experience of reality a completely different appearance and flavor. Which is an actuality rather than a notion or idea.

Most of what you write here is too vague to warrant an in-depth response.

The flying spaghetti monster? While you expound this and that about krishna?

What don't you understand about what I said? Clearly, you're side-tracked on something that is neither of merit nor of consequence if you think there is or is meant to be some sort of parallel between my talks of Krishna and my mention of a flying spaghetti monster. The humor evades you, perhaps.

Com'on man... I hope you at least see some irony in that.

Irony? No. Not so much. I could've said anything. It didn't have to be "flying spaghetti monster." It could've been me pointing out that it doesn't matter if enjoyment is perceived as an expression of Darth Vader or Powdered Toast Man. The point remains.

But the pursuit itself being an expression of the I-principle (i.e. the faculty of sentience going on in all of us) means only that a pursuit, or any activity happening for that matter is due to this awakeness or beingness... life.... in all of us. It is happening because you are present and awake. If this consciousness wasn't there then nothing would be. Speaking about direct experience, and speaking about this present experience right now is what these nondual teachings address. It isn't something to be imagined or a belief to be accepted. I'm not sure if being unclear is a special feature or if the state being described is just hard to formulate into words due to it obviously contradicting itself when placed into language needing nouns and verbs, subjects and objects etc... but if it's all dancing around the real subject matter then what is it you take the real subject matter to be? The use of the term 'that' is only to coin a term that does more of a 'pointing' that a labeling. Since terms and labels can serve to be a block in this. Obviously it's still labeling but it's of a lighter nature because to refer to anything as 'that' requires one to investigate as to what 'that' is to know it. Also using the term 'that' helps to keep the notion of what is being pointed to open, other words like the absolute, sentience, consciousness, god, you, krishna, brahman, dharmakaya, etc.. all have baggage that comes along with them and to use a term like that doesn't allow people who are very concept and intellectually oriented to grasp onto images in the mind or have an idea about what is being talked about because then they seek an idea. Likewise "such"ness is a term used to describe the experience of sensory reality "as it is" without the mind or knower intervening... a type of de-clutched witnessing i guess.. for example thoughts in their suchness are just sounds. The vowels, consonants and verbal articulations in phonetics that create words are merely sounds married with subjective memory of different combinations forming a label that corresponds to an objective "thing". But the thought is just sound. So thought in it's suchness would be mental noise... investigation into things like this could very well be why non-conceptual sounds such as AH, OM, HUM etc are used in meditational practices.

And in its suchness, this paragraph of yours is digital noise. I think it's great that you're giving these topics as much thought as you clearly are, and I realize that my opinion likely means little to you, but there really is no way for me to convey how utterly meaningless the above is to me in light of the understanding I have gained on the path. It reminds me of that line in the movie Fight Club where Edward Norton says something along the lines of, "After being in fight club, everything else gets the volume turned down." If you had come to me with all this and that suchness and de-clutched witnessing maybe 10 years ago, I'd be eating it up and playing the game.

And devotional practice is all well and good, but believing it to be somehow better or worse than some other practice is hardly more than opinion.

It is "better" by dint of the fact that it constitutes the individual in her perfectional state. This is the very meaning of Sanatana Dharma--the eternal capacity of the soul. Any other alleged practice is, at best, a means to that devotional end. I'll make sure to mention when I am giving an opinion.

Devotion is a tool in some spiritual practices to get the individual to look past themselves.

False. Devotion as a tool is devotion as Maya. Real devotion pertains to the real capacity of the spiritual soul.

Which is the beginning of working towards experiencing the arbitrary nature of self and other. In mahayana buddhism the same principle is used.. that one does the practice for the benefit and liberation of all sentient beings. So that every action is for the benefit of others, taking the focus off of the individual trying to benefit from the practice. In vajrayana buddhism different deities and archetypes (yidams) are used for ritualistic practices that involve devotional acts and visualizations which transform the practitioner into the deity. Ultimately showing the arbitrary nature of both the physical touch-sight-sound and subtle mind emotion-image-thought aggregates that form the usual self one takes oneself to be. But whether the devotion is used as a tool, or used for purely devotional purposes to express love for the object of devotion ultimately only has the value placed on it by the individual... as does anything. It can become an issue if the devotee fixates on the idea of that which is the object of devotion though. Because again they're identified with an idea. These deities are representations. Archetypes. They represent parts of you or the world, or both. The same thing happens in buddhism with the deities. People get stuck on them, really believe they exist and damn near worship them. Which is fine but it isn't the archetypes purpose. The individual becoming the archetype is the point.

That the individual becomes God or "the archetype" is more Mayavadi talk. The devotee is meant to fixate on the object of devotion, else he isn't a devotee.

Krishna is the absolute god if you believe he is.

No. My belief on the matter doesn't a lick of difference make.

Someone else believes jesus is the absolute god.

And there is no contradiction between this and the position that Krishna is the absolute God. These two positions are not in competition.

This has to be made very apparent that krishna is an image, a story, a character, a word, an idea. If you identify with all of that and believe it's true that is your doing. Not to be mistaken as some fundamental truth that you're in on and others aren't. It's not like krishna is the truth but jesus isn't or vice versa. Mayavada is a process of negation because it's removing ideas from the mind that one could fixate on.

Which is simltaneously where it succeeds and where it fails. Why? Because what one fixates on is what makes the difference between maya and self-realization. Fixation itself is not the enemy. Try not to be fixated on the idea that it is.

Goddamn I wrote way too much.

Which is why I've decided to cut this response short. Skimming the rest of your post, I don't see myself saying much new. The main point is that you clearly have a very Mayavadi/Sunnyavadi (i.e. Buddist) understanding of these topics, and I cannot agree with the assumptions involved. Nor can I agree with this notion that there is no objectivity to be found here.

 

[iaoish]

To be on topic, watch 'taste the waste'.

 

[0R0]

lol only on the sicc