Showing posts with label Rangtong. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rangtong. Show all posts

 [8/5/23, 12:36:45 AM] Awakening to Reality Blog : ‎Messages and calls are end-to-end encrypted. No one outside of this chat, not even WhatsApp, can read or listen to them.

[8/5/23, 12:36:45 AM] Awakening to Reality Blog : ‎You created group “Awakening to Reality Blog ”

[8/5/23, 12:36:48 AM] Soh Wei Yu: Hi

[8/5/23, 12:38:13 AM] Yin Ling: Got it! Hi both haha

[8/5/23, 12:38:17 AM] Yin Ling: Thanks

[8/5/23, 12:38:36 AM] Yin Ling: First thing I’m going to do is to delete all the all posts of mine u saved 😂

[8/5/23, 12:38:44 AM] Soh Wei Yu: 🤣🤣🤣

[8/5/23, 12:38:48 AM] Soh Wei Yu: Pls dont hahahah

[8/5/23, 12:39:05 AM] Yin Ling: Long time I want to do that already

[8/5/23, 12:39:07 AM] Yin Ling: Lol

[8/5/23, 12:39:12 AM] Soh Wei Yu: Lol

[8/5/23, 8:33:57 AM] John Tan: I was telling soh to shift those conversations including fb comments into other places.  The current ATR blog is like a dumping ground.🤦

[8/5/23, 12:40:44 PM] Yin Ling: It’s a huge blog haha. But the link of the right should help direct others I guess . 

But my older posts are confusing.😅those need to go lol

[8/5/23, 12:41:13 PM] Soh Wei Yu: Replace with your newer posts then 😂

[8/5/23, 12:42:28 PM] Yin Ling: Lol noooo

[8/5/23, 12:42:41 PM] Yin Ling: Most of what ppl needs to read for guidance have been written

[8/5/23, 12:42:48 PM] Yin Ling: I think they just didn’t go and read it lol

‎[8/5/23, 7:07:07 PM] Soh Wei Yu: ‎<attached: 00000018-PHOTO-2023-05-08-19-07-07.jpg>

[8/5/23, 7:15:51 PM] Yin Ling: Hahaha yeah I sign in using another acc. Is that ok?

[8/5/23, 7:16:13 PM] Soh Wei Yu: Yeah no problem just wanted to check

[8/5/23, 7:16:17 PM] Soh Wei Yu: Later kena hacked lol

[8/5/23, 7:16:31 PM] Yin Ling: Haha 👌

[8/5/23, 8:25:30 PM] John Tan: Jessie?

[8/5/23, 8:25:39 PM] John Tan: Ahha🤦‍♂️

[8/5/23, 8:37:02 PM] Yin Ling: 🤣 my email was created when I was 12 😂 after watching a cowboy show 🤦🏻‍♀️

‎[8/5/23, 8:39:27 PM] Yin Ling: ‎


[8/5/23, 8:40:28 PM] Yin Ling: It’s from a monk I don’t personally know but got added on in fb and then I got emailed 😂amituofo

[8/5/23, 9:46:38 PM] Soh Wei Yu: For these kind of people i just paste them my standard template:


Hi


Thought this might interest you, on nondual awareness and its nature and the subtleties of insight:


https://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2007/03/thusnesss-six-stages-of-experience.html


https://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2007/03/mistaken-reality-of-amness.html

[8/5/23, 9:46:41 PM] Soh Wei Yu: 🤣

‎[8/5/23, 9:47:23 PM] Soh Wei Yu: ‎<attached: 00000030-PHOTO-2023-05-08-21-47-23.jpg>

[8/5/23, 10:45:50 PM] Yin Ling: I tried reply once already, but cannot pass through. I think I will stop. Haha. Abit hard for me to talk to monks as Though I know better , just a weird situation

[8/5/23, 10:46:20 PM] Yin Ling: My god so many 😶‍🌫️

[8/5/23, 11:08:15 PM] John Tan: Yin Ling, the shengtong vs rangtong u pasted is from which book?

‎[8/5/23, 11:32:46 PM] Yin Ling: ‎


‎[8/5/23, 11:33:05 PM] Yin Ling: 


[8/5/23, 11:33:25 PM] Yin Ling: I don’t get it 😅

[8/5/23, 11:49:28 PM] John Tan: Lol no wonder

[8/5/23, 11:52:00 PM] John Tan: Tsultrim Gyamtso Rinpoche is Nyingma and champions the shengtong view.  I think Malcolm ever confronted him and said that habouring that sort of view is no different from advaita view.

[8/5/23, 11:52:56 PM] John Tan: Wei yu may have the text since he compiles Malcolm answers and comments

[8/5/23, 11:54:50 PM] Yin Ling: Oooo I see

[8/5/23, 11:56:14 PM] Yin Ling: But describing shentong as “aware and empty” . I find that makes sense no?

[8/5/23, 11:56:32 PM] Yin Ling: But rangtong makes sense too . All makes sense 😅😅😅

[8/5/23, 11:57:39 PM] John Tan: However it is not exactly wrong to emphasize clarity/awareness when one somehow missed the "clarity" aspect when negating inherent ness of refried mental constructs.  In order words, negation involves 2 authentications of critical insights: one is in clear seeing of how refried constructs is mistaken as real,

And 2, the direct recognition that appearances are one's empty clarity.

[8/5/23, 11:58:58 PM] Yin Ling: Yes Rangtong emphasise the former. And sheng tong emphasise the latter. 


But what I don’t understand is how do their experiential insight differs?

[8/5/23, 11:59:22 PM] Yin Ling: Can you have one without the other ? 😅 I can’t imagine

[8/5/23, 11:59:39 PM] John Tan: It is not their experiential insights differ, it is how it unfolds.

[9/5/23, 12:01:33 AM] John Tan: The two can be treated as separate which resulted in 外道 view.  Means direct taste of clarity yet without realizing it's empty nature.  This resulted in self-view.

[9/5/23, 12:03:37 AM] Yin Ling: I see.

[9/5/23, 12:04:11 AM] John Tan: For example, one can have very powerful experiences and authentication of clarity as "I-I" in phase one as in my case or sim's case but still not realized that sound, sensations, thoughts...etc (appearances) as one's radiance claritym

[9/5/23, 12:04:52 AM] John Tan: Then when we authenticate that later in anatta insight it becomes very clear.

[9/5/23, 12:05:46 AM] John Tan: For these practitioners, clarity/presence/awareness is nothing special at all and more often than not, it is missed understood.

[9/5/23, 12:09:13 AM] John Tan: Appearances are treated as external.  Even in the case of non-dual where it is clearly experienced, it is still treated that Self is special and something beyond.  Which is a mis-conception due to our inherent pattern of analysing things.

[9/5/23, 12:09:13 AM] Yin Ling: I see

[9/5/23, 12:11:31 AM] Yin Ling: So is this what Rangtong is trying to put forth?

[9/5/23, 12:13:46 AM] John Tan: These practitioners (shengtong) do not understand "self-aware" as "sounds hear itself" as u wrote or as how u understand satipathanna sutta.  They see "self-aware" as a special Awareness apart from luminous appearances.  Many can't get around that.

[9/5/23, 12:15:52 AM] John Tan: Rangtong is pointing out what u r saying.  Rangtong is not against appearances or union of appearances and emptiness.  Shengtong can be skewed towards pointing some super awareness which is advaita.

[9/5/23, 12:16:19 AM] Yin Ling: Oohh I see. Thanks. Understand now

[9/5/23, 12:16:41 AM] Soh Wei Yu: I skim through mountain doctrine on dolpopa texts before

[9/5/23, 12:16:50 AM] Soh Wei Yu: To me no different from advaita at all lol

[9/5/23, 12:16:53 AM] Soh Wei Yu: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolpopa_Sherab_Gyaltsen#Teachings

‎[9/5/23, 12:16:59 AM] Soh Wei Yu: ‎


‎[9/5/23, 12:17:00 AM] Soh Wei Yu: ‎


‎[9/5/23, 12:17:01 AM] Soh Wei Yu: ‎


[9/5/23, 12:17:10 AM] Soh Wei Yu: But that is the founder of shentong

[9/5/23, 12:17:23 AM] Soh Wei Yu: The modern proponents of shentong, often are clear about anatta and empty clarity

[9/5/23, 12:17:58 AM] Soh Wei Yu: Even thrangu rinpoche taught the view of shentong but instead of the original “empty of everything else but not itself” he taught shentong as even ultimate is empty

[9/5/23, 12:18:12 AM] John Tan: However there r some rangtong practitioners that somehow does not get the clarity part but those are not the teaching of rangtong.

[9/5/23, 12:18:16 AM] Soh Wei Yu: Which imo seems to be different from the original dolpopa teaching but more aligned with anatta

[9/5/23, 12:18:43 AM] John Tan: Yes

[9/5/23, 12:19:38 AM] John Tan: It is simply tradition and sect biasedness to present rangtong as denying clarity.

[9/5/23, 12:19:44 AM] John Tan: 🤣🤦

[9/5/23, 12:20:32 AM] John Tan: Mipham also rejected shengtong.

[9/5/23, 12:21:13 AM] John Tan: Tibetan Buddhism has this problem of stereotyping and present one-sided view.🤣

[9/5/23, 12:21:37 AM] Yin Ling: Yeah to me this book seems to say Shengtong emphasise clarity whilst rangtong emphaisse emptiness of inherent existence (freedom from elaboration) but they know the other insight . 


So I was wondering why do their experiential insight differs and why do they keep arguing lol

[9/5/23, 12:21:47 AM] Yin Ling: Ya

[9/5/23, 12:22:06 AM] Soh Wei Yu: Yeah.. i read even longchenpa anticipated and rejected shentong even if he lived before his times. He rejected the buddha nature is empty of everything else but its own existence kind of view

[9/5/23, 12:22:08 AM] Yin Ling: I see

[9/5/23, 12:24:32 AM] John Tan: In Buddha's time, there is no need to emphasize Presence and clarity.  It is the Orthodox view and taught in the vedas, upanishads, bagavatgita  throughout india.  This do not require the birth of Buddha to point out.

[9/5/23, 12:24:36 AM] Yin Ling: But it feels like an insult to shentong intelligence to say they don’t know Buddha nature is empty?

[9/5/23, 12:25:04 AM] Yin Ling: Yup

[9/5/23, 12:25:13 AM] Yin Ling: Hence he teaches no self

[9/5/23, 12:26:32 AM] Yin Ling: But now I see the point of all these arguments and debates in Tibetan Buddhism 😝

[9/5/23, 12:26:35 AM] Soh Wei Yu: Depends on who the shentong writer is.. some teachers like thrangu and many others are v clear.. still i find most buddhist teachers are also not clear today. Mostly awareness teachings

[9/5/23, 12:26:40 AM] John Tan: There maybe an overemphasis of emptiness without clarity that gave birth to yogacara teaching to bring out this clarity aspect.

[9/5/23, 12:27:49 AM] Yin Ling: Ya there is an opinion that yogscara needs to be combined with madhyamaka to produce insight in this book 🤣

‎[9/5/23, 12:27:55 AM] Soh Wei Yu: ‎


[9/5/23, 12:28:02 AM] Yin Ling: I forgot who said. Jamgon kongtrul I think

[9/5/23, 12:28:03 AM] Soh Wei Yu: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rangtong_and_shentong

[9/5/23, 12:28:37 AM] Soh Wei Yu: This part.. which is the general understanding of shentong from the start shld be criticised.  But ppl like thrangu rinpoche doesnt see that way when explaining shentong

[9/5/23, 12:28:46 AM] John Tan: Shengtong and Rangtong are invention of tibetans inherited from the roots of madhyamaka and yogacara in India.

[9/5/23, 12:28:47 AM] Soh Wei Yu: Also it will fall under same criticism as this:

[9/5/23, 12:29:24 AM] Yin Ling: Ooohhhhh now I see

[9/5/23, 12:29:59 AM] Soh Wei Yu: “

Also, Mipham Rinpoche, one of the most influential masters of the Nyingma school wrote http://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2020/09/madhyamaka-cittamatra-and-true-intent.html :


...Why, then, do the Mādhyamika masters refute the Cittamātra tenet system? Because self-styled proponents of the Cittamātra tenets, when speaking of mind-only, say that there are no external objects but that the mind exists substantially—like a rope that is devoid of snakeness, but not devoid of ropeness. Having failed to understand that such statements are asserted from the conventional point of view, they believe the nondual consciousness to be truly existent on the ultimate level. It is this tenet that the Mādhyamikas repudiate. But, they say, we do not refute the thinking of Ārya Asaṅga, who correctly realized the mind-only path taught by the Buddha...


...So, if this so-called “self-illuminating nondual consciousness” asserted by the Cittamātrins is understood to be a consciousness that is the ultimate of all dualistic consciousnesses, and it is merely that its subject and object are inexpressible, and if such a consciousness is understood to be truly existent and not intrinsically empty, then it is something that has to be refuted. If, on the other hand, that consciousness is understood to be unborn from the very beginning (i.e. empty), to be directly experienced by reflexive awareness, and to be self-illuminating gnosis without subject or object, it is something to be established. Both the Madhyamaka and Mantrayāna have to accept this...”

[9/5/23, 12:30:16 AM] John Tan: It is not easy to sort out all these and take some time to get use to it.

[9/5/23, 12:30:18 AM] Soh Wei Yu: Malcolm says rangtong is totally a strawman by shentong lol

[9/5/23, 12:30:26 AM] Soh Wei Yu: It doesnt actually exist

[9/5/23, 12:30:32 AM] John Tan: Ahahaha

[9/5/23, 12:31:22 AM] John Tan: This is good (Soh: pointing to the Mipham excerpt above)

[9/5/23, 12:31:46 AM] Soh Wei Yu: “Yes, realization of emptiness automatically entails having right view. 


Your next statement presumes that those debating gzhan stong and rang stong have realized emptiness.


Since rang stong is just a strawman set up by gzhan stong pas, there is really no debate between gzhan stong and rang stong since there is no rang stong Madhyamaka except in the imagination of those who call themselves "gzhan stong" Madhyamakas. 


N

Pure because purity has always been a nonexistence.

Sound Tantra, 3:12.5”


“I mean that there is no rang stong at all from a Madhyamaka perspective: Nāgārjuna states:


If there were something subtle not empty, there would be something subtle to be empty, 

as there is nothing not empty, where is there something to be empty?


I mean that there is no rang stong at all, apart from what the gzhan stong pas have fabricated. 


The gzhan stong controversy arose out of a need by Tibetans to reconcile the five treatises of Maitreya with Nāgārjuna's Collection of Reasoning based upon the erroneous historical idea that the five treatises were authored by the bodhisattva Maitreya rather than a human being (who incidentally was probably Asanga's teacher). 


In my opinion, the five treatises were a collection of texts meant to explicate the three main thrusts of Indian Mahāyāna sutras, Prajñāpāramita, Tathāgatagarbha, and Yogacāra. Four of the five are devoted to these three topics independently, with the Abhisamaya-alaṃkara devoted to Prajñāpāramita; Uttaratantra devoted to Tathāgatagarbha; and the two Vibhangas devoted to Yogacāra . The last, the Sutra-alaṃkara is an attempt to unify the thought of these three main trends in Mahāyāna into a single whole, from a Yogacara perspective. 


When these treatises arrived in Tibetan, at the same time, a text attributed tothe original Bhavaviveka, but probably by a later Bhavaviveka, translated under Atisha's encouragement, called Tarkajvala, presented the broad outline of what we know call today " the four tenet systems". 


In this text, the three own natures and so on were presented in a very specific way from a Madhyamaka perspective and labelled "cittamatra".


So, the gzhan stong controversy (with additional input from Vajrayāna exegesis based on a certain way of understand the three bodhisattva commentaries) is about reconciling Madhyamaka with Yogacara. 


Personally, I see no need to attempt to reconcile Madhyamaka and Yogacara. Madhyamaka is the pinnacle of sutra explication. But Tibetans did and still seem to need to do so, and they have passed on this need to their students. 


But from my perspective, one cannot go beyond freedom from extremes. 


N”

[9/5/23, 12:35:28 AM] Yin Ling: Ooooo

[9/5/23, 12:35:31 AM] Yin Ling: Thanks