After discussing “How Do We Know What We Know” and the Kalama Sutta, in which Buddha deems that using word-based knowledge is not helpful in the search for an unchanging Truth, we discuss the method Buddha uses for searching and understanding the unchanging Truth, in this post. In Buddhism, the unchanging Truth is the mental nature of all reality. The core teaching of Buddhism is that mentality is the only reality in the cosmos, and why the title of this website is Nothing but Mentality.
Without question, understanding how Buddha can realize the mental nature of reality while no other teachings, such as science, can is the most important thing to know about the uniqueness of Buddhism. Additionally, Buddha teaches that all humans have the potential to understand the world of mentality the way he did if they can practice the same method successfully. In other words, an independent enlightened party can verify Buddhism.
In Buddhism, the means of knowledge is known in Romanized Sanskrit as pramana.
Pramana (Chinese=量), according to The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, is “in Sanskrit, “means of knowledge.”
Buddha teaches two means of knowledge:
A) Anumana (Chinese=比量), according to The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, is “in Sanskrit and Pali, “inference.” Furthermore, “inference allows us to glean knowledge concerning objects that are not directly evident to the senses.”
Anumana is closely associated with another concept known as agamadharma (Chinese=教法), which, according to The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, is “in Sanskrit, “scriptural dharma.” In contrast to adhigamadharma, it refers to the mere conceptual understanding of Buddha’s teachings through studying Buddhist sutras.”
The definition of “inference” as the method that “allows us to glean knowledge concerning objects that are not directly evident to the senses” precisely corresponds to what Dr. Fisch describes when discussing “How do we know what we know.” As discussed in that post, Dr. Fisch started by saying that “we do not know by our eyes or by our ears, but by means of the words we speak.” The human interaction with the outside world starts when “the world impacts on us in a causal manner through all our senses,” i.e., our eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and bodily parts. However, as Dr. Fisch made very clear, these contents immediately become “reading in of the mind” and get conceptualized “in ways we do not govern.” In other words, by passing through the brain and getting conceptualized, the original contents are distorted and become mental constructs. The mind then projects the mental constructs to be seen as phenomena of the universe.
While the original contents that impact our senses are invisible, their distorted conceptualized version becomes our visible phenomena of the world, which, as mental constructs, are the “objects that are not directly evident to the senses” mentioned in the definition of inference. Humans then use inferentially connected words to understand the already-conceptualized phenomenal world. The inference in Buddhism refers to inferentially connected words used to understand the already-conceptualized world.
As the post about the Kalama Sutta discussed, Buddha teaches that inferentially connected word-based knowledge is insufficient in the search for the unchanging Truth, which, in Buddhism, is the mental nature of all reality. In other words, Buddha could not have understood the mental nature of reality if he had used inferentially connected word-based knowledge.
However, Buddha’s second means of knowledge, known as pratyaksa in Romanized Sanskrit, can be used to understand the mental nature of reality.
B) Pratyaksa (Chinese=現量), according to The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, is “in Sanskrit, “direct perception.” Pratyaksa is “nonconceptual in the sense that it does not perceive its object through the medium of an image, as does thought.”
Pratyaksa is closely associated with another concept known as adhigamadharma (Chinese=證法), which, according to The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, is “in Sanskrit, “realized dharma,” which “leads to the direct realization (Adhigama, Chinese=証), rather than mere conceptual understanding.”
The definition of direction perception as not “perceiving its object through the medium of image, as does thought” clearly indicates that it aims to prevent the “reading in of the mind” and the subsequent conceptualization. By avoiding conceptualization, mental constructs and their projections are also avoided. When there are no projections, no phenomena of the world can appear. While the phenomena of the already conceptualized world are “objects that are not directly evident to the senses,” they are also the “objects through the medium of an image, as does thought” that direct perception needs to avoid. Only when these objects are avoided can direct perception lead to a “nonconceptual” understanding and not a “mere conceptual understanding” of the original raw data of nature.
Direct perception is carried out through a meditative technique known as Samathavipasyana.
Samathavipasyana (Chinese=止觀), according to The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, is “In Sanskrit, “calmness (samatha) and insight (vipasyana), a term used to describe a meditative state that combines clarity and stability of samatha with the understanding of the nature of reality associated with vipasyana.” Furthermore, “The presence of vipasyana is the distinguishing feature of the wisdom that derives from meditation (Romanized Sanskrit=bhavanamayiprajna; Chinese=修慧).
The Chinese translation of Samathavipasyana is “stop and insight.” In other words, one must practice Samathavipasyana until the mind is completely still before one can have insight into reality that is “nonconceptual.”
Keeping the mind still prevents the “reading in of the mind” because “reading in of the mind” requires an active mind. In Buddhism, achieving an inactive mind is a milestone accomplishment because it is how Buddha defines enlightenment.
According to the Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, in the Astasahasrika-Prajnaparamita-Sutra (Chinese=道行般若波羅蜜經), Buddha defines enlightenment as the “thought of enlightenment is no thought since in its essential original nature thought is transparently luminous.”
Of course, when one successfully practices Samathavipasyana until their mind is inactive, they have “no thought.” By Buddha’s definition, they are enlightened.
However, as mentioned earlier, while direct perception keeps integral the original content, it also prevents the formation of “objects that are not directly evident to the senses,” i.e., the phenomenal world. In other words, enlightenment leads to the disappearance of the phenomenal world.
Is that possible or real?
Rather than trying to convince you, let me use the experience of an enlightened to verify it. The Verification Category has three examples of enlightenment, one from a contemporary American and two from ancient China. All three testified to the disappearance of the universe. However, we will use the enlightenment of the contemporary American, Adyashahti, for this example. He uses more modern terms and is more relatable.
While you can read Adyashanti’s enlightenment experience here, which includes a link to his actual testimony, I summarize Adyashanti’s enlightenment breifly as follows. The goal of Adyashanti’s meditation was to discover the true nature of his being by asking, “Where is this thing called self, me?.” However, as he meditated, he found, “This elusive self never seems to appear. The more we look for ourselves, the less we find of it. Instead, we seem to bump into an ineffable mystery, a silence, a void.” “In looking at our whole definition of ourselves, it’s wordlessly called into question. This whole definition of ourselves, however we define it, must be called into question because when we look for it, we don’t find it.” “We have assumed that we are a something and a somebody.” “Yet, Whatever you may be, whatever you are, obviously is here.” Whatever you may be, whatever you are, obviously is here.” “So what is there in the absence of somebody? What is there in the absence of something?”
In the complete absence of somebody and something and surrounded by an “ineffable mystery,” the only thing left was Adyashanti’s awareness that he was in a “void,” where the “ineffable mystery” was the absence of everything material. Indeed, the “void” is where there is Nothing but Mentality.
After his enlightenment, Adyashanti teaches that You Are Awareness, “you and awareness are not two different things,” and that “resting in awareness is not a state of doing, it is a state of being.” Indeed, in awareness, he had found the true state of his being.
However, in addition to acknowledging the true state of his being, there is a deeper meaning to “you are awareness” and “you and awareness are not two different things.” The statement, “You and awareness are not two different things,” literally means that he and cosmic awareness became one during his enlightenment.
Samadhi is a term used in Buddhism to indicate what happens at enlightenment.
Samadhi (Chinese=三昧/三摩地), according to The Shambhala Dictionary of Buddhism and Zen, is “a non-dualistic state of consciousness in which the consciousness of the experiencing “subject” becomes one with the experienced “object” – thus is only experiential content. This state of consciousness is often referred to as “one-pointedness of mind;” this expression, however, is misleading because it calls up the image of “concentration” on one point on which the mind is “directed.” However, samadhi is neither a straining concentration on one point nor is the mind directed from here (subject) to there (object), which would be a dualistic mode of experience.”
In other words, enlightenment is “a non-dualistic state of consciousness in which the consciousness of the experiencing “subject” becomes one with the experienced “object.”
While the “experiencing subject” refers obviously to the enlightened person, what is the “experienced object?”
The “experienced object” refers to the quiescent mentality that permeates the cosmos. In contrast to consciousness, which is the fluctuating mentality, the quiescent mentality is awareness. Also, because of its quiescence, awareness fits Buddha’s definition of “no thought” and is enlightened. Spread throughout the cosmos, cosmic awareness is ready to serve as the “experienced object” and become one with the enlightened mentality of the “experiencing subject” anytime and anywhere in the world. Indeed, as this List of Enlightened People shows, since the time of Buddha, enlightened people have come from all over the world across centuries.
In other words, the “void” Adyashanti experienced was more than his awareness, but the cosmic.
In other words, the cosmic “void” is where there is Nothing but Mentality.
The Buddhist term for the “void” is Emptiness, which refers to mentality’s lack of empirical form. Citta is the name for the enlightened cosmic awareness that serves as the “experienced object.” The realm where there is Nothing but Mentality is the Ultimate Reality and Truth. By the way, the Ultimate Reality shares a very important event in the universe with what science calls dark energy: they are both considered where the universe expands.
Adyashanti not only discovered the true nature of his being but also the true nature of all beings in the cosmos. In the process, he discovered the Ultimate Reality, which is otherwise unknowable except by someone enlightened.
Dr. Max Planck was a 1918 Nobel Prize Laureate in Physics and the originator of quantum theory. After a lifetime of investigating quantum mechanics, he came to the following conclusions.
Not only was Dr. Planck right that consciousness is fundamental in our universe, but he was also correct in saying that science cannot solve the seemingly mysterious consciousness. However, his understanding that a human must be a part of the mystery to solve the mystery was most impressive. The union of the awareness of the “experiencing subject” with the “experienced object,” which is cosmic awareness, is, like Dr. Planck said, a person becoming part of the mystery to solve the mystery. For an unenlightened person to understand this is indeed impressive. Of course, once enlightened, mentality is no longer mysterious.
Buddha teaches that all humans have the ability to become enlightened. The inherent ability of all humans to be enlightened is known as buddhadhatu in Romanized Sanskrit.
Buddhadhatu, according to The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, is “in Sanskrit, “buddha-element,” or “buddha-nature,” the inherent potential of all sentient beings to achieve Buddhahood.”
So, what is humanity’s potential to achieve Buddhahood? It is their active mind. Known as consciousness, every person has it. When one can successfully calm one’s consciousness to awareness, they are enlightened. However, while the potential is there, enlightenment is challenging. Many have tried since Buddha, but only a few have succeeded.
For the vast majority of unenlightened humanity, even the brilliant ones interested in consciousness, such as Elon Musk, the alternative is to have faith in Buddha’s teachings. However, faith in Buddhism is not blind because it is verifiable by an enlightened third party.
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