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karam-mudra
...Stage 4 (Knowledge of arising and passing away)...

I'm not sure where you got this or what these stages are, but in Buddhism nothing arises, or has ever arisen, that is the fundamental ground of the doctrine of emptiness. There is also no distinction between mental and physical phenomena (given that they are both part of the dream-illusion).

Of course, then the behaviour of those who are realised is therefore pure and hard to understand in terms of an externally viewed conventional morality, however such an internal ethic would seem to call into question any motivation for any behaviour whatsoever, to quote Patrul Rinpoche "Just eat,sleep, piss, shit. There’s nothing else in life that has to be done."

The accounts above seem based on the Ole Nydahl confusion which sound like some version of western esotericism.

There's no possibility of them ever reaching liberation or enlightenment from such a starting point.

Ole believes he has something that in his munificence he wants to share with all the "ignorant and confused" people out there - he's like someone who after years of therapy states that he has stopped believing that aliens are persecuting him, only to then add ...but do the aliens know that? - his pathology is wholly externailised onto the other, that's why he cannot question his own view and the damage that it causes in the very assumptions upon which it is based.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/15/2011 04:54AM by suenam.

I disagree with you, Karam Mudra, that it is essential for me to understand why people are attracted to this 'magic, brutal' system.
Having struggled, with great difficulty, out of the magic brutal belief system that I was born into, I am keen to stay out of any other magic brutal systems. Understanding the dynamic of one magic brutal system has that effect.

Staying out of magic brutal systems involves looking very critically at what the promoters of those systems would have us believe and deciding what we are prepared to give personal headroom to.

The fuzzy notion of superiority that 'spiritual enlightenment' has garnered is something that I am not prepared to give credence or headroom to. I also don't accept the self-serving re-definition of common words in order to create a fuzzy carrot to lead impressionable people astray.

The fact that some Tibetans believe wholeheartedly in this stuff doesn't make it real, factual or achievable--it is rather more a testament to the endless creativity of the human imagination when it comes to manipulating language and thought and exerting power over others.

I wasn't much impressed with the magic brutal 'How to kill a person' either.
One thing human beings have never needed instruction on is how to kill, and most figure out quite early that directing malevolent thoughts at your victim is not nearly as fast and effective as picking up a handy rock and using that.

It is essential for me to understand what I personally believe and to have a rational and reasonable basis for that belief. It is essential for me to be able to critically examine the claims that others make for credibility so that I can draw my own conclusions and have a good grounding for how I personally behave in the world.

I might wind up mad as a hatter as a result but it is never essential for me to understand anyone elses mad take on the world--particularly if it is of the completely ineffectual magic brutal genre that Mr 'How to Kill' subscribes to.

Once I have a grasp on the unending crap swilling around in my own head, I might get a bit interested in other peoples versions of the unending crap--but it is never essential.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/15/2011 05:30AM by Stoic.

Stoic,

you are right, it is not essential to be interested in "other peoples version of the unending crab", but for my reflections it helped.


Of course, then the behaviour of those who are realised is therefore pure and hard to understand in terms of an externally viewed conventional morality, however such an internal ethic would seem to call into question any motivation for any behaviour whatsoever, to quote Patrul Rinpoche "Just eat,sleep, piss, shit. There’s nothing else in life that has to be done."

What a deep wisdom, of course! And so hard to understand! Do you know the fairytale of H.C. Anderson: The New Clothes of the Emperor? The followers of the enlightened in tibetan buddhism seem to have the same blindness for the bareness of the devoted holy men.

I do not agree Ole Nydahl is the bogeyman for all the the followers of the "real" Tibetan Buddhism. The so called "high incarnations" all are psychopaths and even worse than him.

I doubt that the 'high incarnations' are all psychopaths although a fair few might be. They are all, however, products of their medieval culture who have hardly begun adapting to the western culture where they now tend to live, teach and travel.

Nydahl, the subject of the thread, is a product of western culture who has found a very powerful and lucrative niche for himself in promoting his version of Tibetan Buddhism to people who seem to take his word that what he is promoting is the 'real deal'.
People who have doubts about Nydahl discuss and examine his actions here, that is not the same as making him the bogeyman for all of Tibetan Buddhism.

Some of the more flexibly minded TB's do a good job of communicating the basic belief system to interested westerners and people are free to adopt any belief system they choose.

I don't think that it is necessary to trash the entire belief system and all its proponents in order to make the point that there are some nasty scammers there. There are nasty scammers everywhere.

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karam-mudra
What a deep wisdom, of course! And so hard to understand! Do you know the fairytale of H.C. Anderson: The New Clothes of the Emperor? The followers of the enlightened in tibetan buddhism seem to have the same blindness for the bareness of the devoted holy men.

I do not agree Ole Nydahl is the bogeyman for all the the followers of the "real" Tibetan Buddhism. The so called "high incarnations" all are psychopaths and even worse than him.

I think there's some confusion here, just as you wrote about Ole's personal reaction when you "broke the spell", and the various other aspects such as the prejudice, temper tantrums, accumulation of wealth, status, and power on various levels of ego, social, sexual, etc., surely this disproves any "bareness" and goes to show that Nydahl has wholly failed to achieve this ideal of non-self.

While I agree with your basic idea that there is something which a neurotic modern society would label psychotic about the ideal of selflessness and the moving outside of convention, personally I would question the soundness of such a judgement, nevertheless, it seems to me as if Ole Nydahl is operating very much within such norms. The stages you descibe in the post I was referring to seem to address only the mundane and are not contiguous with Buddhism proper. Is it possible that what you are describing has been influenced by Nydahl's tantric BS and that you are conflating Tibetan Buddhism with that when in fact they are very different?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/17/2011 10:49AM by suenam.

@Ole's Brain Scans
[cdasr.mclean.harvard.edu]

@Ole's Brain Scans
[cdasr.mclean.harvard.edu]
You can find the results there. It doesn't even cost anything :)

Thanks Sceptic Watcher. I'll read this later and try and make some sense of it. :o)

A peek inside his head from a different perspective, should make for some interesting observations.
Thanks from me too, Sceptic Watcher.

Quote
Sceptic Watcher
@Ole's Brain Scans
[cdasr.mclean.harvard.edu]
You can find the results there. It doesn't even cost anything :)

As far as I can tell it suggests that the concept of self is located in the right front temporal lobe.

It also suggests that Ole's dissociated state is similar to psychosis, but that he "re-identifies" with himself afterwards.