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Showing posts with label six senses. Show all posts
Showing posts with label six senses. Show all posts

20130217

The Eight Consciousnesses Revisited (poem)

Introduction

In this world of birth-life-death,
when we do not interact with the world we live in,
reality appears non-existent.
Through the six senses organs
and their corresponding objects
we interact with the world.
During sleep or unconscious,
our six consciousnesses are dormant.

The Sixth Consciousnesses Arise

Reality exists through our experience of phenomena.
By interacting with it through the six senses,
we constantly experience reality as being real.
Our experiences are moderated by our mind as consciousness.
Therefore reality exists because we constantly interact with it.
While awake and fully conscious, our six consciousnesses arise.

When eyes see a visual object, sights lead to visual consciousness arising.
When ears hears a sound, sounds lead to auditory consciousness arising.
When nose detects an odor, smells lead to olfactory consciousness arising.
When tongue detects tastes, tastes lead to gustatory consciousness arising.
When body feels tangibles, feelings lead to tactual consciousness arising.
When mind ideates, thoughts leads to mental consciousness arising.

the Seventh and Eighth Consciousness

From the mind arises
two more consciousnesses,
base consciousness and
storehouse consciousness.

When mind experiences a disturbing emotion or attitude, self grasping leads to deluded awareness.
When mind experiences reflexive awareness, memory leads to all-encompassing foundation consciousness.

The Sense of Self is of the Mind

According to the Tibetan Lama Thrangu Rinpoche,
When sometimes you have a sense of self,
and you think “I”, that is an operation
not of the seventh consciousness
but of the sixth.


The Three Mental Consciousnesses

In the Chittamatra and Svatantrika-Madhyamika schools,
three mental consciousnesses exist, mental consciousness,
base consciousness, and store-house consciousness.
Of these three consciousnesses, mental consciousness
and base consciousness are active, and
the store-house consciousness is not active
being a subtle, neutral level of consciousness.
In it, traces of past actions are stored as "seeds"
ready to ripen into future experience.
For their further manifestations and activities, these seeds are potential energy
retained by the store-house consciousness, which receives impressions
from all functions of each of the other seven consciousnesses.

Seventh Consciousness as Source of the Other Consciousnesses


According to conventional Yogacara tradition, deluded awareness,
being the base consciousness, is the "source" of
the other seven consciousnesses, which all evolve and transform
based on experience of phenomena which make up reality.

The Names of the Seventh and Eight Consciousnesses

According to the Tibetans lamas of Vajrayana,
base consciousness is called emotional consciousness.
Lama Chökyi Nyima calls it afflictive aspect of consciousness.
Padmakara calls it defiled emotional consciousness.
Gyurme Dorje, the Agyur Rinpoche, calls it deluded consciousness.
The store-house consciousness is called all-ground consciousness.
Called the "seed consciousness" or container consciousness,
it serves as the "container" for all experiential impressions

Store-house Consciousness Empowers Rebirth

The store-house consciousness accumulates all potential energy
for the mental and physical manifestation of a sentient being's existence.
It is the storehouse-consciousness which induces transmigration
or rebirth, causing the origination of a new existence.

Base Consciousness Focuses Inward

In Tibetan Buddhism, the base consciousness
focuses inwards on the ground of all (alaya)
that is mistaken for a self that is real,
which results in all experience of reality
then consists of the choice of wanted or unwanted.

Always present, it is the basis for
all ordinary mental states,
be it virtuous, non-virtuous or neutral,
The base consciousness only stops
when the Bodhi Mind arises,
in the highest state of samadhi,
or during the non-abiding nirvana —
the great nirvana beyond
both ordinary existence in Samsara —
this world of birth-life-death, —
and in the basic nirvana of self-power.

Tathagata and Alaya Vijnana are One

Both the Lankavatara Sutra and Ch'an & Zen agree:
the Tathagatagarbha and alaya vijnana are one,
identical and fundamentally pure.
Atman is the permanent, unchanging self,
and prakrti, the original and primal nature
from which all things evolve, whether
it be mental, emotional and physical.
Though the Tathagatagarbha looks similar to atman
and alaya vijnana, prakrti, the Tathagatagarbha
conforms to the non-self doctrine,
and alaya vijnana is the mind-stream.
Mind-stream or consciousness-stream,
both streams are the same, but
cannot be reified as atman at all.


Ayatana (sense bases): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayatana
Salayatana (the six sense bases): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E1%B9%A2a%E1%B8%8D%C4%81yatana
Eight consciousnesses: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight_Consciousnesses
http://www.rigpawiki.org/index.php?title=Eight_consciousnesses

20130105

Who Knows the Way to the Pure Land?

"Buddhist thought may be considered to have followed this order of human thinking; from the scientific form to the religious through the philosophic. The ultimate end of Buddhism is perfect self-realization, enlightenment. For the attainment of this purpose two basic principles are to be recognized. Firstly, the individual self must be negated. Secondly, the universal self and the oneness of all life must be affirmed." — Ryuchi Fujii, The True Meaning of Buddhism - Muryoko, Journal of Shin Buddhism

Buddhist psychology affirms that the individual self is a social fiction which arises out of the interconnection of all sentient life.

"Self exists in mutual relationship to all things, to the totality of all things and to the oneness of all life. Self-realization is achieved through the mutual understanding of the nothingness of all selves." — ibid.

Thus, self is reflected in all things.

Just as I have a mind, so too do other people. Furthermore, so do all sentient beings have a mind. Since a mind is conscious of the six senses (ear, eye, smell, taste, touch, and cognition), thus is it the same as consciousness. For only in the mind does consciouness arise for each of the senses.

Buddhist philosophy holds that conflict, fights and war between sentient beings are due to the illusion of ignorance.

Yet Buddha Nature is reflected in all things nd is known as the oneness of all things.

"Self-realization is attained through the wisdom of self-effort." — ibid.

In Buddhist practice, each sentient being is limited and ignorant by nature when it remains an individual.

This is why people have a community and when why the most inquisitive of them seek the truth both through their interaction with other sentient beings and through solitude.

"Self is ever perfectible, but it cannot be perfectly realized in this world. Self is perfectly realized only in the Pure Land through the aid of Amida Buddha." —

On hearing the Buddha's Teaching, the practitioner comes to realize that, like a bodhisattva, one gains the truths about Amida Buddha through practice to realize the purpose in life is to be of service to others.

In this way is the path to rebirth in the afterlife is the Pure Land of Bliss.

For only Amida Buddha knows the way to the Pure Land.

20060311

Right Concentration: Transcending the Six Worldly Dusts

"In your seeing," he said, "there should be only the seeing. In your hearing, nothing but the hearing; in your smelling, tasting, and touching, nothing but smelling, tasting, and touching; in your thinking, nothing but the thought."

-Khuddaka Nikaya


According to Buddhism, the six worldly dusts are form, sound, taste, touch and dharmas (external opinions).

As a metaphor for all the mundane things that can becloud our True Nature, they correspond to the five senses and the discriminating, everyday mind (the six sense).

Thus the above quotes is part of the sutra Khuddhaka, which instructs the seeker on how to use the six senses so as to transcend the worldly dusts of form, sound, taste, touch, and dharmas.

Simply put, do not analyze sense data.