VOID & VACUUM

Phena Sutta: Foam

Kakacupama Sutta: The Parable of the Saw (excerpt)

Dhamma and Non-duality by Bhikkhu Bodhi © 1998

Emptiness vs. the Void

To open the door so that you can really see inside yourself isn't easy, but it's something you can train yourself to do. If you have the mindfulness enabling you to read yourself and understand yourself, that cuts through a lot of the issues right there. Craving will have a hard time forming. In whatever guise it arises, you'll get to read it, to know it, to extinguish it, to let it go.

When you get to do these things, it doesn't mean that you "get" anything, for actually once the mind is empty, that means it doesn't gain anything at all. But to put it into words for those who haven't experienced it: In what ways is emptiness empty? Does it mean that everything disappears or is annihilated? Actually, you should know that emptiness doesn't mean that the mind is annihilated. All that's annihilated is clinging and attachment. What you have to do is to see what emptiness is like as it actually appears and then not latch onto it. The nature of this emptiness is that it's deathless within you — this emptiness of self — and yet the mind can still function, know, and read itself. Just don't label it or latch onto it, that's all.

There are many levels to emptiness, many types, but if it's this or that type, then it's not genuine emptiness, for it contains the intention trying to know what type of emptiness it is, what features it has. This is something you have to look into deeply if you really want to know. If it's superficial emptiness — the emptiness of the still mind, free from thought-formations about its objects or free from the external sense of self — that's not genuine emptiness. Genuine emptiness lies deep, not on the level of mere stillness or concentration. The emptiness of the void is something very profound.

But because of the things we've studied and heard, we tend to label the emptiness of the still mind as the void — and so we label things wrongly in that emptiness... Actually it's just ordinary stillness. We have to look more deeply in. No matter what you've encountered that you've heard about before, don't get excited. Don't label it as this or that level of attainment. Otherwise you'll spoil everything. You reach the level where you should be able to keep your awareness steady, but once you label things, it stops right there — or else goes all out of control.

This labeling is attachment in action. It's something very subtle, very refined. Whatever appears, it latches on. So you simply have to let the mind be empty without labeling it as anything, for the emptiness that lets go of preoccupations or is free from the influence of thought-formations is something you have to look further into. Don't label it as this or that level, for to measure and compare things in this way blocks everything — and in particular, knowledge of how the mind changes.

So to start out, simply watch these things, simply be aware. If you get excited, it ruins everything. Instead of seeing things clear through, you don't. You stop there and don't go any further. For this reason, when you train the mind or contemplate the mind to the point of gaining clear realizations every now and then, regard them as simply things to observe.
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excerpt from:

Reading the Mind by Upasika Kee Nanayon
translated from the Thai by Thanissaro Bhikkhu © 1995

©1995 Khao Suan Luang Dhamma Community.
The text of this page ("Reading the Mind", by Khao Suan Luang Dhamma Community) is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. To view a copy of the license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/. Documents linked from this page may be subject to other restrictions. Transcribed from a file provided by the translator. Last revised for Access to Insight on 2 December 2013.

What's on your mind razor lips?
Are you concerned the Void can be exhausted?
Rest Easy Friend.
T3
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Asivisa Sutta: Vipers

Arahantavagga: The Arahant or Perfected One
Dhp VII PTS: Dhp 90-99
translated from the Pali by Acharya Buddharakkhita © 1996

90. The fever of passion exists not for him who has completed the journey, who is sorrowless and wholly set free, and has broken all ties.

91. The mindful ones exert themselves. They are not attached to any home; like swans that abandon the lake, they leave home after home behind.

92. Those who do not accumulate and are wise regarding food, whose object is the Void, the Unconditioned Freedom — their track cannot be traced, like that of birds in the air.

93. He whose cankers are destroyed and who is not attached to food, whose object is the Void, the Unconditioned Freedom — his path cannot be traced, like that of birds in the air.

94. Even the gods hold dear the wise one, whose senses are subdued like horses well trained by a charioteer, whose pride is destroyed and who is free from the cankers.

95. There is no more worldly existence for the wise one who, like the earth, resents nothing, who is firm as a high pillar and as pure as a deep pool free from mud.

96. Calm is his thought, calm his speech, and calm his deed, who, truly knowing, is wholly freed, perfectly tranquil and wise.

97. The man who is without blind faith, who knows the Uncreated, who has severed all links, destroyed all causes (for karma, good and evil), and thrown out all desires — he, truly, is the most excellent of men. [11]

98. Inspiring, indeed, is that place where Arahants dwell, be it a village, a forest, a vale, or a hill.

99. Inspiring are the forests in which worldlings find no pleasure. There the passionless will rejoice, for they seek no sensual pleasures.

The Last Act

is

Always

A Total

Vanishing

Act


good day

good bye

ttt
rip

Thanks for these links nathan. They were helpful for me to look over.

Particularly this. I appreciate triggers to question everythin i think i think i know. Pulls the rug right out from unquestioned assumptions. Thanks again. Very timely and synchronous with my own goings on.

Nick

Is it possible to make any (clear ?) reference to aspects of consciousness?
What could we assume about the qualities and/or attributes that could be ascribed to consciousness.
If this universe would be considered as an expression of consciousness and it is given to a human being to
understand that his very being is part of that expression then hence as such the very way consciousness
expresses itself in such a way that, ultimately the human being is conscious of itself as being as it were a fractal
of consciousness itself.
Now keeping in mind that this is an assumption then based on that assumption I would provisionally
answer the above question as:
It is perhaps fair to say that,
Consciousness is that which expresses itself with the ability to
Perfectly refer to itself as itself
Iow. The universe (or multiverse if one prefers so) must be the perfect expression of consciousness and as such it self evident, self explanatory , self descriptive, self simulair and self referring.
So..
It appears that as human beings, we can become aware (by contemplation ) and by inference conclude that it must be fact that we are an expression of this consciousness.
Hhowever this understanding is and will always be limited by the very form that expression has taken on (human body)in a particular stage of expression.
I would welcome any comments and/or questions on this.
JCH








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