[20/12/23, 11:07:53 PM] John Tan: if from beginninglessness time, every moment u r given a new face, then I asked u, what is ur original face, how will u answer?
[20/12/23, 11:17:46 PM] Soh Wei Yu: i might express something similar to what i wrote in 2012 lol “Every moment is an encounter of my thousand faces. The sound of thunder, every drop of rain, every heart beat, every breath, every thought. Experience, experience, experience, experience!”
[20/12/23, 11:18:28 PM] Yin Ling: There is a sense of pervasive knowing that is there no matter what face you change . That’s the original face
[20/12/23, 11:24:57 PM] John Tan: (quoting Soh:) Yes so the question is more important then the experience, therefore how would u answer?
[20/12/23, 11:26:23 PM] John Tan: Pervasive knowing as deep intimacy of being fully just "that"?
[20/12/23, 11:28:18 PM] Soh Wei Yu: there is no original face, therefore every face is original, new, fresh and alive
[20/12/23, 11:32:20 PM] John Tan: Good. How do u understand "emptiness" from this "no original face", every face is original, new and alive?
Is no original face = emptiness
or
Every face is original, new and alive = emptiness
[20/12/23, 11:33:21 PM] Soh Wei Yu: both actually
[20/12/23, 11:33:43 PM] Soh Wei Yu: the latter becomes more pertinent after D.O. and non-arising of vivid presence
[20/12/23, 11:33:54 PM] Soh Wei Yu: the former is just anatta
[20/12/23, 11:34:35 PM] John Tan: Former is not exactly anatta to me.
[20/12/23, 11:34:48 PM] Soh Wei Yu: i see
[20/12/23, 11:35:03 PM] Soh Wei Yu: yeah if there is no original face without authentication of "Every face is original, new and alive" that is not anatta
[20/12/23, 11:35:19 PM] John Tan: Yes
[20/12/23, 11:39:33 PM] John Tan: So imo defining
emptiness = freedom from all elaborations is just to get one into direct authentication of
No original face, very face is original, new and alive, which is, the authentic meaning meaning of anatta and also the beginning path of insights of "emptiness".
[20/12/23, 11:42:55 PM] Yin Ling: This thing here that is ever changing
[20/12/23, 11:43:18 PM] Yin Ling: And there is a sense
[20/12/23, 11:43:25 PM] John Tan: This also bring forth the question of "original face" as a wrong question, invalid from start. It is only valid from the standpoint of "inherent view" where a starting, a beginning is needed.
[20/12/23, 11:43:25 PM] Yin Ling: Like being alive
[20/12/23, 11:43:52 PM] Yin Ling: True
[20/12/23, 11:44:19 PM] Yin Ling: But I think it’s trying to point “beyond” this face
[20/12/23, 11:44:25 PM] Yin Ling: Like this physical self
[20/12/23, 11:45:10 PM] Yin Ling: But if read logically it doesn’t work that’s true
[20/12/23, 11:45:20 PM] John Tan: Yes as a start to directly point to this empty luminosity as a direct authentication.
[20/12/23, 11:46:42 PM] Yin Ling: Yes every sensation has that empty luminosity and eventually one sense door with different radiance all over , that face 😂
[20/12/23, 11:48:49 PM] John Tan: We have to be careful not abstract out this empty clarity, that is y Tsongkhapa rejected self-reflective awareness as one of his 8 difficult points.
[20/12/23, 11:49:32 PM] Yin Ling: Meaning how?
[20/12/23, 11:51:42 PM] John Tan: Meaning awareness is always "awareness of", awareness cannot be self-existence and independent. Similar to Buddha's teaching in mn38 Mahatanhasankhaya Sutta.
[20/12/23, 11:52:01 PM] Yin Ling: Oh I see yes
[20/12/23, 11:53:02 PM] John Tan: In other words, awareness post anatta is always about otherness. Every authentication of consciousness is at the same time an authentication of "otherness".
[20/12/23, 11:55:01 PM] Yin Ling: Don’t quite get
[20/12/23, 11:55:09 PM] Yin Ling: 😂sorry
[20/12/23, 11:56:36 PM] John Tan: Means there is no pure consciousness, on sound-consciousness, thought-consciousness, taste-consciousness
[20/12/23, 11:56:58 PM] Yin Ling: Ok yes
[20/12/23, 11:57:41 PM] John Tan: When we experience sound, it is at the same time an experience of consciousness as sound-consciousness
[20/12/23, 11:58:04 PM] John Tan: Or sound as self aware to put in a more poetic form.
[20/12/23, 11:58:15 PM] Yin Ling: Yes
[20/12/23, 11:58:19 PM] Yin Ling: Got you
[21/12/23, 12:00:27 AM] John Tan: So this again put forward another question it blurified the boundaries until no boundaries can be actually found between consciousness and it's conditions except being conventionally designated as such.
[21/12/23, 12:01:21 AM] Yin Ling: Yeah then we only describe it as nature of appearances
[21/12/23, 12:01:44 AM] Yin Ling: Once it unified
[21/12/23, 12:03:00 AM] John Tan: So this suble-relationship upon breaking up and coming together back due to conventional designations is what dependent designations and dependent arising is about.
[21/12/23, 12:03:55 AM] John Tan: Which led to the common misconceptions of the need to do away with conceptual conventions.
[21/12/23, 12:04:48 AM] Yin Ling: I see. Kinda get it but not sure
[21/12/23, 12:06:01 AM] Yin Ling: To me in daily life it is more of seeing this nature of “conventional”. I do not know how to practice doing away with conceptual conventions
[21/12/23, 12:06:21 AM] Yin Ling: I wonder how ppl practice doing away with conventions . Like how?
[21/12/23, 12:07:02 AM] Yin Ling: Do they really just empty their mind and sit there? 😅
[21/12/23, 12:07:15 AM] Yin Ling: How am I supposed to do that ? 😂
[21/12/23, 12:09:53 AM] John Tan: We can be not confused by conceptual conventionalities with clear insight and teaching of dependent origination and emptiness but it is a big question mark whether we can do without "conceptualities" esp if karmic propensities are also part of subtle conceptualities by definition.
[21/12/23, 12:10:34 AM] John Tan: That is y to Tsongkhapa everything is conceptual in certain deep sense.
[21/12/23, 12:11:33 AM] John Tan: However I split up learnt from natural luminous presence.
[21/12/23, 12:12:28 AM] Yin Ling: Yeah. For eg conception of self. For me I know that if I’m clear and not confused during daily events, and the self energy is open up evenly during any criticism or difficult patients, it doesn’t land as much as when I completely forget. That’s the only difference I can find in practice.
[21/12/23, 12:12:49 AM] Yin Ling: I cannot be in non conceptual state, not sure how to do that?
[21/12/23, 12:13:43 AM] Yin Ling: Meaning how?
[21/12/23, 12:14:38 AM] John Tan: Same for listening to music. We can be in state of natural non-dual free from sense of a hearer hearing in anatta, but still not free from conceptual conventionalities.
[21/12/23, 12:15:02 AM] Yin Ling: Yeah
[21/12/23, 12:15:11 AM] Yin Ling: We will know it is music
[21/12/23, 12:15:47 AM] John Tan: Yes, can even dance, can even sing, body can even move with the known rythm
[21/12/23, 12:16:10 AM] Yin Ling: The only thing I think will work is penetrating into the nature and see it as own empty clarity, as mind manifestation through dependent arising. That really reduce some suffering
[21/12/23, 12:16:15 AM] Yin Ling: Hahahaha
[21/12/23, 12:16:25 AM] Yin Ling: Will even affect emotions
[21/12/23, 12:16:33 AM] John Tan: Yes
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Greg goode wrote:
Soh
Dr. Greg Goode wrote in Emptything:
It looks your Bahiya Sutta experience helped you see awareness in a different way, more .... empty. You had a background in a view that saw awareness as more inherent or essential or substantive?
I had an experience like this too. I was reading a sloka in Nagarjuna's treatise about the "prior entity," and I had been meditating on "emptiness is form" intensely for a year. These two threads came together in a big flash. In a flash, I grokked the emptiness of awareness as per Madhyamika. This realization is quite different from the Advaitic oneness-style realization. It carries one out to the "ten-thousand things" in a wonderful, light and free and kaleidoscopic, playful insubstantial clarity and immediacy. No veils, no holding back. No substance or essence anywhere, but love and directness and intimacy everywhere...
"[4/3/25, 7:16:53 PM] John Tan: For example,
Tsongkhapa: The Need for Conceptual Analysis as a Precursor to Direct Insight.
And
Mipham makes it systematic. In Beacon of Certainty, after going through logical examinations, he essentially says the most crucial knowledge is “knowledge by presence” – an intuitive gnosis that is felt rather than thought.
Between these 2 ways, lies a very crucial insight that integrates the 2 into one that is often not properly articulated.
[4/3/25, 7:17:59 PM] John Tan: Let's that about atr stanzas, when the insight of anatta arise from realising the stanzas,
There is direct recognition of what?
[4/3/25, 7:19:11 PM] Soh Wei Yu: The simultaneous absence of an inherently existing initiating agent and subject-action-object/seer-seeing-seen paradigm and the vivid presence/radiance as mere appearances
[4/3/25, 7:23:13 PM] John Tan: Yes simultaneously 2 insights in a single go.
One is the negation (not about presence) but negation is not by way of constructs. There is no analysis nor reasoning involved in that seeing that "agent" does not exist.
So there is "negation" but it is not by reasoning nor analysis. Just direct recognition of seeing through constructs which is part of seeing through of inherentness 【自性见】though not in a mature way.
The second is direct authentication of presence.
[4/3/25, 7:25:11 PM] Soh Wei Yu: Ic..
[4/3/25, 7:25:34 PM] Soh Wei Yu: So both tsongkhapa and mipham points to that right but missed out in the paper?
[4/3/25, 7:30:24 PM] Soh Wei Yu: Are there any books or papers on mipham and tsongkhapa that talks about this?
[4/3/25, 7:30:28 PM] Soh Wei Yu: The dialectic book?
[4/3/25, 7:42:18 PM] John Tan: No lah
[4/3/25, 7:45:02 PM] John Tan: So I agree about pointing out of negation. But "negation" is not necessary by way analysis but it is extremely critical and I consider that as part of "prajna".
However that is a form of direct insight of "negation" and can be extended to for example, "body" and "mind". <This message was edited>
[4/3/25, 7:46:14 PM] John Tan: But it is not "presence" although the insight must be accompanied by direct authentication of "presence" to be complete. <This message was edited>
[4/3/25, 7:47:46 PM] John Tan: That said, analysis plays a role especially in maturing ones understanding of how "inherentness" affects our mind and it's implications for example in the case of cause and effect, object and it's characteristics...etc
[4/3/25, 7:51:17 PM] John Tan: So although I agree with Tsongkhapa part on the emphasis of "negation", I disagree that it must be via way of analysis and must be conceptual.
Next, "presence" is must from the wisdom of "yeshe". This part in think presenting the "positive" aspects but not the way the dialectics r talking about.
[4/3/25, 7:54:35 PM] John Tan: This direct knowledge of "presence" is not via analysis -- yes but the path is not just about "resting" in the nature of nothing can be said about it or it's effable. In fact many critical aspects can be said and must be pointed out albeit being contradictory in first impression.
[4/3/25, 7:59:32 PM] John Tan: Also the important role of "appearances" and how the 2 teachers define the term. Mipham actually emphasize a lot on appearances.
What I don't like is the emphasis of "awareness" as reality (ultimate) as if mipham is talking about some awareness teaching.
[4/3/25, 8:01:05 PM] John Tan: And how it presents Tsongkhapa understanding of conventional and emptiness. There is just no clarity and insight at all.
[4/3/25, 8:04:10 PM] John Tan: Now imagine in a non-substantialist world where emptiness of conventional is a given, there is no "substance" at all. So how can the conventional be "not important"?
[4/3/25, 8:04:31 PM] John Tan: Do u get what I mean?
[4/3/25, 8:09:37 PM] John Tan: Also to me, when I talk about spontaneous presence or empty appearances, I m not talking about "awareness" at all. That is y the term "appearances". I believe Mipham understand that too.
Spontaneous presence, in a world of non-substantialist, there is no extrapolating the "appearing" into "something" be it awareness, consciousness, chi, energy, matter, field or whatever.
It is just plainly vivid, insubstantial happening...rest is the act of abstraction of vivid happening into deluded appearances.
[4/3/25, 8:11:37 PM] Soh Wei Yu: Ic..
[4/3/25, 8:11:44 PM] Soh Wei Yu: Yeah
[4/3/25, 8:12:08 PM] John Tan: If u see "fire", so what is that "fire"?
[4/3/25, 8:29:12 PM] Soh Wei Yu: Just the burning, the flickering red patches that we call flame <This message was edited>
[4/3/25, 8:29:27 PM] Soh Wei Yu: Fire is conventional
[4/3/25, 8:38:40 PM] John Tan: When u approach nearer, there is sensation of "heat", a burning feeling.
[4/3/25, 8:41:49 PM] John Tan: when we use languages and conventions, we often missed out "awareness" as if some existing independent "fire" exists out there in externality.
Now before we jump too quickly about there is no externality or internality, I want to u to use Ur own words, to best describe these phenomena but eliminate "substance" view, r u able to do it?
[5/3/25, 12:22:25 AM] Soh Wei Yu: I guess would just express in a descriptive way without attributing them to be characteristics of objects. for example if I see red rose, I describe it as very self-luminous 【本自光明】 vivid sense of red but don't attribute it as 'redness belonging to solid rose'
when walking to fire, there is just a gradually intensifying gradation of warmth feeling starting with mildly and pleasantly warm to increasingly intense and uncomfortable/unpleasant/painful heat sensation, and so on. it is all these vivid happening that are then given conventional names like "fire" and then reified into objects and characteristics and so on <This message was edited>
[5/3/25, 12:22:52 AM] Soh Wei Yu: basically all these are not apart from awareness nor do we need to posit some standalone awareness
[5/3/25, 12:23:38 AM] Soh Wei Yu: whenever 'awareness' is spoken it is just conventional, like buddha said, named after conditions. cannot be spoken apart from whatever conditions present at the moment... if in the case of fire, it is just the pleasant/unpleasant sensation of warmth <This message was edited>
[5/3/25, 7:41:15 AM] John Tan: Very good"
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Buddha’s conversation with bhikkhu sati:
“Absolutely, sir. As I understand the Buddha’s teaching, it is this very same consciousness that roams and transmigrates, not another.”
“Sāti, what is that consciousness?”
“Sir, he is the speaker, the knower who experiences the results of good and bad deeds in all the different realms.”
“Futile man, who on earth have you ever known me to teach in that way? Haven’t I said in many ways that consciousness is dependently originated, since consciousness does not arise without a cause? But still you misrepresent me by your wrong grasp, harm yourself, and create much wickedness. This will be for your lasting harm and suffering.”
Then the Buddha said to the mendicants, “What do you think, mendicants? Has this mendicant Sāti kindled even a spark of ardor in this teaching and training?”
“How could that be, sir? No, sir.” When this was said, Sāti sat silent, dismayed, shoulders drooping, downcast, depressed, with nothing to say.
Knowing this, the Buddha said, “Futile man, you will be known by your own harmful misconception. I’ll question the mendicants about this.”
Then the Buddha said to the mendicants, “Mendicants, do you understand my teachings as Sāti does, when he misrepresents me by his wrong grasp, harms himself, and creates much wickedness?”
“No, sir. For in many ways the Buddha has told us that consciousness is dependently originated, since without a cause, consciousness does not come to be.”
“Good, good, mendicants! It’s good that you understand my teaching like this. For in many ways I have told you that consciousness is dependently originated, since without a cause, consciousness does not come to be. But still this Sāti misrepresents me by his wrong grasp, harms himself, and creates much wickedness. This will be for his lasting harm and suffering.
Consciousness is reckoned according to the very same condition dependent upon which it arises. Consciousness that arises dependent on the eye and sights is reckoned as eye consciousness. Consciousness that arises dependent on the ear and sounds is reckoned as ear consciousness. Consciousness that arises dependent on the nose and smells is reckoned as nose consciousness. Consciousness that arises dependent on the tongue and tastes is reckoned as tongue consciousness. Consciousness that arises dependent on the body and touches is reckoned as body consciousness. Consciousness that arises dependent on the mind and ideas is reckoned as mind consciousness.
It’s like fire, which is reckoned according to the very same condition dependent upon which it burns. A fire that burns dependent on logs is reckoned as a log fire. A fire that burns dependent on twigs is reckoned as a twig fire. A fire that burns dependent on grass is reckoned as a grass fire. A fire that burns dependent on cow-dung is reckoned as a cow-dung fire. A fire that burns dependent on husks is reckoned as a husk fire. A fire that burns dependent on rubbish is reckoned as a rubbish fire.
In the same way, consciousness is reckoned according to the very same condition dependent upon which it arises. …
Mendicants, do you see that this has come to be?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Do you see that it originated with that as fuel?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Do you see that when that fuel ceases, what
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Dalai lama’s comments:
Sāti’s view is that consciousness exists in and of itself, independent of conditions. Saying the self is that which speaks shows the I as an agent of the action of speaking. Saying the self feels is the notion that the I is a passive subject that experiences. “Here and there” indicates the self as a transmigrator that remains unchanging as it passes through many rebirths. This consciousness or self goes from life to life, creating karma and experiencing its results, but not being transformed or changing in the process. It has an unchanging identity that remains the same as it experiences one event after another and goes from one life to the next. In short, Sāti views the consciousness as an ātman or Self.
The commentary explains that Sāti was an expert in the Jātaka Tales, in which the Buddha recounts his previous lives, saying, “At that time, I was[…]”
Excerpt From
Realizing the Profound View
Bhikṣu Tenzin Gyatso, Bhikṣuṇī Thubten Chodron
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