Is mahayana Buddism?

[suttametta]

Monism, pantheism, Vedānta, Mimāṃsā, etc., are all quite incompatible with right view. And without right view there can be no path to bodhi. Again, this has been explained at length by numerous Mahāyāna commentators. Your idiosyncratic opinions are not representative of the Mahāyāna teachings, period.

You cannot explain Guru Yoga without recourse to pantheism. As you mentioned, Vajrayana is part of Mahayana. Mahayana is speaking with a forked tongue.

[Ñāṇa]

You cannot explain Guru Yoga without recourse to pantheism.

Well, again, this is at best a tangential point. I don't need to explain guru yoga, but I do think it can be well accounted for without recourse to a pantheistic view. But at any rate, I'd be interested to see the replies if you were to post this assertion on the Dharma Wheel Tibetan Buddhism Forum.

[suttametta]

You cannot explain Guru Yoga without recourse to pantheism.

Well, again, this is at best a tangential point. I don't need to explain guru yoga, but I do think it can be well accounted for without recourse to a pantheistic view. But at any rate, I'd be interested to see the replies if you were to post this assertion on the Dharma Wheel Tibetan Buddhism Forum.

It's hardly tangential if this is one of the major ways Mahayana is practiced today. Garchen Rinpoche told me the nature of mind is omnipresent and permeates all beings which is why one can unite with the mind of the guru. I asked him if this was similar to Brahman or eternalism? He said the Buddha only meant to refute a Creator God, but the notion of Brahman is basically fine with buddha-dharma. That was surprising. I'll repost this.

[mikenz66]

You cannot explain Guru Yoga without recourse to pantheism.

Well, again, this is at best a tangential point. I don't need to explain guru yoga, but I do think it can be well accounted for without recourse to a pantheistic view. But at any rate, I'd be interested to see the replies if you were to post this assertion on the Dharma Wheel Tibetan Buddhism Forum.

See here:
Is Guru Yoga Based on Pantheism?
http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=9709


Mike

[Dan74]

I apprecate your posts, Paul, I am not here to disagree or debate. Your experience is your experience and I do not doubt it.

My feeling is that what you describe is a pretty fundamental problem in practice. Reification and attachment to sort of a self, a sense of existence, a vibration, of primordial sound, hell, most of us are attached to far grosser things than that!

Ive also heard similar reports from other former Vajrayana practitioners, one being a former member here, PeterB. Some Zen teachers have told me that in Vajrayana there is a lot of emphasis on energy and power.

Perhaps there are good reasons for this sort of practice though. Perhaps without habituating oneself to a swirling warm pool, it is virually impossible to let it go in a still cool one?

I do not know whether Vajrayana has forgotten about relinquishing each and every abiding and fetter, but they certainly have a lot of teachings to this effect and they hold Nagarajuna in very high regard. As for Zen, which is surely a major tradition within Mahayana.there are many clear instructions to this effect like here

http://www.spiritual-learning.com/case-27.html

So I am not sure if what you have related here describes the limits of Vajaraya practice, the limits of your lineage, the limits of specifically what you were taught, or indeed your understanding of it. But I do not think this desribes the limits of Mahayana and when you said that it is a hindrance, I think you overstated your case.

[Ben]

When viewed from this lens, the practices of Mahayana and Vajrayana in particular come into focus as being syncretic modes, attempts to use Vedism as a path to bodhi. They use a monistic or pan-theistic trend in that line of practice, which the practice of Guru Yoga is the best exemplar, as expressed to me by Garchen Rinpoche.

Monism, pantheism, Vedānta, Mimāṃsā, etc., are all quite incompatible with right view. And without right view there can be no path to bodhi. Again, this has been explained at length by numerous Mahāyāna commentators. Your idiosyncratic opinions are not representative of the Mahāyāna teachings, period.

Well said, Geoff!

[suttametta]

But I do not think this desribes the limits of Mahayana and when you said that it is a hindrance, I think you overstated your case.

Mahayana says Sravakayana is a hindrance, that Arahats are frozen in a one-sided samadhi. It is this claim from Mahayana that I am saying is false. It creates doubt in the sravakayana practitioner. This is what I'm calling a hindrance.

[daverupa]

It creates doubt in the sravakayana practitioner.

This claim is certainly something to doubt.

[Ñāṇa]

But I do not think this desribes the limits of Mahayana and when you said that it is a hindrance, I think you overstated your case.

Mahayana says Sravakayana is a hindrance, that Arahats are frozen in a one-sided samadhi. It is this claim from Mahayana that I am saying is false. It creates doubt in the sravakayana practitioner. This is what I'm calling a hindrance.

This is an over-generalization. The Mahāyāna includes a number of different currents encompassing many historical developments occurring over a thousand year period in India. There are numerous early Mahāyāna texts that don't make this claim at all. Moreover, there are Tibetan & Western authors who interpret Nāgārjuna and Candrakīrti as maintaining that a noble disciple has the same discernment of emptiness as an advanced noble bodhisattva.

[tiltbillings]

nagarjuna:

"The teaching of the Mahayana of non-production
And of extinction in the Hinayana are the same
Emptiness [since they show that inherent existence] is extinguished,
And that nothing [inherently existent] is produced;
Then let the Mahayana be accepted [as the Buddha’s word]"

"If emptiness and the great nature of a Buddha are viewed with reason,
how could what is taught in the two vehicles be of unequal value for the wise?" verse 387; Hopkins translations, THE PRECIOUS GARLAND AND THE SONG OF FOUR MINDFULLNESSES, page 75

tsongkapa:

"Hinayana and Mahayana are not differentiated through their view (of emptiness); the Superior Nagarjuna and his sons assert that the vehicles are discriminated by the way of acts of skillful method." sNgags rim chen mo in TANTRA IN TIBET, trans by J. Hopkins, p 99

"There is no contradiction in the fact that for a Mahayanist, Hinayana is an obstacle to full enlightenment, but for one in the Hinayana lineage, it is a method for full enlightenment." sNgags rim chen mo in TANTRA IN TIBET, trans by J. Hopkins p 103.

[Dan74]

But I do not think this desribes the limits of Mahayana and when you said that it is a hindrance, I think you overstated your case.

Mahayana says Sravakayana is a hindrance, that Arahats are frozen in a one-sided samadhi. It is this claim from Mahayana that I am saying is false. It creates doubt in the sravakayana practitioner. This is what I'm calling a hindrance.

Thank you for clarifying that.

I guess I took that statement to go with your earlier one

It is their views about not the extreme of nirvana and not the extreme of samsara that keeps them in samsara.

which I still don't quite understand in the context of Mahayana practice. Could you elaborate?

[suttametta]

Mahayana says Sravakayana is a hindrance, that Arahats are frozen in a one-sided samadhi. It is this claim from Mahayana that I am saying is false. It creates doubt in the sravakayana practitioner. This is what I'm calling a hindrance.

This is an over-generalization. The Mahāyāna includes a number of different currents encompassing many historical developments occurring over a thousand year period in India. There are numerous early Mahāyāna texts that don't make this claim at all. Moreover, there are Tibetan & Western authors who interpret Nāgārjuna and Candrakīrti as maintaining that a noble disciple has the same discernment of emptiness as an advanced noble bodhisattva.

I am aware of that, but there aren't any traditions living that go with it.

[suttametta]

"There is no contradiction in the fact that for a Mahayanist, Hinayana is an obstacle to full enlightenment, but for one in the Hinayana lineage, it is a method for full enlightenment." sNgags rim chen mo in TANTRA IN TIBET, trans by J. Hopkins p 103.

Very strange statement.

[suttametta]

It is their views about not the extreme of nirvana and not the extreme of samsara that keeps them in samsara.

which I still don't quite understand in the context of Mahayana practice. Could you elaborate?

Basically, the Mahayana is denigrating Nirvana so one won't get it, as if it is an obstacle.

[Ñāṇa]

I am aware of that, but there aren't any traditions living that go with it.

Yes, Mahāyāna traditions generally have had to resort to various novel syncretic interpretive strategies to try to make a coherent bodhisattva path out of the vast and diverse body of Indian Mahāyāna texts. Meaningful scriptural authority is problematic in this context. Even moreso in this modern era where textual criticism and historical evidences have established that the Mahāyāna texts have no direct link to the historical Buddha.

However, as far as quality of teachings is concerned, and internal consistency, nothing else comes even close to matching the Pāli Nikāyas. Personally, this is why the Nikāyas are the only corpus of Buddhist discourses that I consider to be authoritative, or am willing to recommend to others without reservation.

[Ñāṇa]

"There is no contradiction in the fact that for a Mahayanist, Hinayana is an obstacle to full enlightenment, but for one in the Hinayana lineage, it is a method for full enlightenment." sNgags rim chen mo in TANTRA IN TIBET, trans by J. Hopkins p 103.

Very strange statement.

He's attempting to differentiate between sammāsambodhi and sāvakabodhi.

[tiltbillings]

"There is no contradiction in the fact that for a Mahayanist, Hinayana is an obstacle to full enlightenment, but for one in the Hinayana lineage, it is a method for full enlightenment." sNgags rim chen mo in TANTRA IN TIBET, trans by J. Hopkins p 103.

Very strange statement.

He's attempting to differentiate between sammāsambodhi and sāvakabodhi.

That is now how I would read it.

[Ñāṇa]

That is now how I would read it.

I'm guessing that you meant to say "not" instead of "now"?

Anyway, I should have read the entire passage in context. Je Tsongkhapa is referring to aspiration, hence although a hīnayāna aspiration will benefit oneself and leads to happiness, it is still an obstacle for a boddhisattva. The larger context is that he is trying to correlate the three vehicle notion with the one vehicle notion (ekayāna) where all paths eventually lead to buddhahood.

[suttametta]

That is now how I would read it.

I'm guessing that you meant to say "not" instead of "now"?

Anyway, I should have read the entire passage in context. Je Tsongkhapa is referring to aspiration, hence although a hīnayāna aspiration will benefit oneself and leads to happiness, it is still an obstacle for a boddhisattva. The larger context is that he is trying to correlate the three vehicle notion with the one vehicle notion (ekayāna) where all paths eventually lead to buddhahood.

When the method of mindfulness incorporates a mind endowed with the four immeasurables, you have the same attitude that Mahayana prioritizes. In Gongchig, Jigten Sumgon says that the four immeasurables are the essence of a Buddha (although in the Pali texts the Buddha equates the four immeasurables with the four formless perceptions). So again, Mahayana fails to offer something over and above what is already there, besides disparaging remarks. In the Drikung Kagyu dedication prayer, Jigten Sumgon writes, "I pray that I will not become a sravaka or a prateykabuddha, due to the four causes of samsara or the eight worldly dharmas." The idea is that someone would only revert to the lower vehicle due to ignorance and greed, etc.

I would further argue that the methods in Vajrayana which are claimed to be very fast are actually slower than the four mindfulness methods, due to the way Mahayana has misinterpreted the dynamic between samatha and vipassana as temporally staggered, and also misinterpreting samatha to mean focused concentration and vipassana to mean an insight akin to an intellectual understanding. The misunderstanding also turns on a misinterpretation of avidya to be ignorance of knowledge, rather than unconsciousness of a running process. Whereas, what makes the Pali method faster is that samatha and vipassana are seen to be simultaneous, where samatha is an effortless relaxation and vipassana is directly perceiving the process of perception. There is a super-efficiency with the original thrust of the Buddha's method.

When viewed in this light, Buddha really was telling the truth in the Mahaparinibbana Sutta when he said he wasn't holding anything back, and wasn't making any distinction between esoteric and exoteric (wasn't using skillful means for the sravakas who can only understand dharma up to their level, but simultaneously giving hidden Mahayana teachings to other higher level students).

[suttametta]

PS The Gongchig quote above is another example of how Vajrayana in particular has promoted samsaric methods to the level of buddhahood, thus having performed a bait and switch, where you think you are getting buddhahood, but you are not beyond samsara. I am asserting that the highest methods of Vajrayana and Dzogchen related to the "Clear Light Mind," are at the level of the form realm of the Pabhassara Brahmas which is why they can attain a form body like the rainbow body.