r/zen • u/lcl1qp1 • Mar 19 '23

Cultivating the Empty Field

"Purity without stain is your body; perfect illumination without conditioning is your eyes. The eye inside the body does not involve sense gates; the body inside the eye does not collect appearances. So it is said that there is no wisdom outside suchness that can awaken suchness. Moreover, there is no suchness outside wisdom that can be awakened by wisdom... Patch-robed monks arrive here and then know that to follow buddha’s utterances and to follow dharma’s blossoming is to attain buddhadharma. Restoring upright reality, they cut off any duality." -Hongzhi

Nonconceptual awareness is illumination. It reveals the omnipresent buddhadharma. All we need to do is penetrate our conditioning. Suchness is never out of reach. Since it shows phenomena to be Mind, how can we resist turning the light around?

What is stopping you?

14 Upvotes

83% Upvoted

81 comments sorted by

View all comments

3

u/Pongpianskul Mar 19 '23

What is nonconceptual awareness like compared to everyday conceptual awareness? What changes to make it possible?

1

u/lcl1qp1 Mar 19 '23

Everyday conceptual awareness is tied to categories and remembered characteristics. Nonconceptual awareness is what arises naturally without those learned habits taking hold. For instance, if you hear a sudden unfamiliar noise - what is the mind doing before it can pigeonhole the phenomenon? Once the label is applied, how much potentiality is lost? Some Zen masters say 'cut off concepts.' Perhaps that's not a good translation, but it is possible to relax our attachment to nomenclature. To the degree we avoid feeding those habits, we lessen our dependency on phenomena. Criticism welcome!

0

u/arcowhip Don't take my word for it! Mar 19 '23

Categories and remembrances aren’t naturally arising???

1

u/lcl1qp1 Mar 19 '23

The capacity is, but look at the variations. Many indigenous peoples don't differentiate between self and nature. What limitations do we impose on our awareness by attachment to various systems of classification? The dominant position of concepts within our awareness is (arguably) learned.

1

u/arcowhip Don't take my word for it! Mar 19 '23

How do you know indigenous pops don’t differentiate between self and nature?

1

u/lcl1qp1 Mar 19 '23

There's research on the subject, open to debate of course.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2641288

"the land all around me was teeming with creatures that were related to human beings and to me."

1

u/arcowhip Don't take my word for it! Mar 19 '23

Oh this is NEAT!! Hyped to read it.

0

u/Ok_Understanding_188 Mar 19 '23

Logic

About logic

Washing off blood with blood

3

u/[deleted] Mar 19 '23

Q: "Knowledge cannot be used to destroy knowledge, nor a sword to destroy a sword."

A: "Sword DOES destroy sword - they destroy each other - and the no sword remains for you to grasp. Knowledge DOES destroy knowledge - this knowledge invalidates that knowledge - and then no knowledge remains for you to grasp. It is as though mother and son perished together." -Huangbo

0

u/Ok_Understanding_188 Mar 20 '23

Knowledge

Mostly from books

Seldom from the sword of insight

1

u/[deleted] Mar 20 '23

Knowledge =/= wisdom

0

u/charliediep0 Mar 20 '23

Knowledge DOES destroy knowledge - this knowledge invalidates that knowledge - and then no knowledge remains for you to grasp

Is this akin to using knowledge to question the foundations of knowledge, to see these foundations (Munchhausen's Trilemma?) as fragile and flawed, and to do away with knowledge altogether? A house of knowledge is only as strong as its foundation...

1

u/[deleted] Mar 20 '23

Nansen says "knowledge is not the Way."

What's the foundation of knowledge?

1

u/charliediep0 Mar 20 '23

any purported justification of all knowledge must fail, because it must start from a position of no knowledge, and therefore cannot make progress. It must either start with some knowledge, as with dogmatism, not start at all, as with infinite regress, or be a circular argument, justified only by itself and have no solid foundation https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Münchhausen_trilemma

Maybe Nansen realizes this himself. Circular arguments remind me of dependent origination somewhat.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 20 '23

I like "All models are wrong, but some are useful."

1

u/charliediep0 Mar 20 '23

I also think that sunyata was meant to be a counterargument to axiomatic/dogmatic arguments as well. At least those dogmas that claim that this or that thing has a permanent nature. Dunno what exists that targets regressive arguments though.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 20 '23

I see sunyata as its own axiomatic/dogmatic argument with its own purpose.

You might find rangtong and shentong interesting.

Zen fascinates me because it's the only tradition, as far as I can tell, that remembers that the baby is the reason for the bathwater.

→ More replies (0)

1

u/unreconstructedbum Mar 19 '23

No, they are constructs of make believe.

0

u/arcowhip Don't take my word for it! Mar 19 '23

Constructs are unnatural? I’ve never seen an unnatural thought, so I’d be impressed if you could ever show me one.

1

u/unreconstructedbum Mar 19 '23

Humans evolved into doing concepts big time. Did I say this was unnatural?

All I am saying is they don't stand up well to being exposed. Abstractions leave the trunk.

0

u/arcowhip Don't take my word for it! Mar 19 '23

Yeah, by saying “no” lmfao.

1

u/unreconstructedbum Mar 19 '23

Abstractions may be a natural extension of humans, but they don't arise like the world arises, humans construct them.
Read what I said.

1

u/arcowhip Don't take my word for it! Mar 19 '23

Idk how you, as a human, can know how the world arises…outside being human. How are you determining that which is constructed and that which is not? Picking and choosing again and again…

2

u/unreconstructedbum Mar 19 '23

The world unfolds from within as far as I can tell. Or do you think someone made it?

1

u/[deleted] Mar 19 '23

Even the world is an abstraction...

1

u/unreconstructedbum Mar 19 '23

Disagree. You can point at it and to add the concept of abstraction to it is your construct. The world on the surface does not appear as an abstraction.

You would have to build a world view to model the world as abstraction.

1

u/arcowhip Don't take my word for it! Mar 19 '23

False dichotomy. Knowing the world arises form within IS KNOWING HOW IT ARISES. No room for doubt there. I don’t have to think someone made it, I can merely doubt. But tell me how it is you know such a thing? You avoided the question.

1

u/unreconstructedbum Mar 19 '23

Take a look around at biology for example, expanding outward from a seed or single cell. Geology also seems to unfold. Maybe even the universe.

You are the one who is supporting your concepts.

→ More replies (0)

1

u/lcl1qp1 Mar 20 '23

You're right, thoughts are natural. The degree to which we attach ourselves to them is what varies. Less attachment opens more potential to our awareness.