Buddhist Halloween

Buddhist Halloween?

Should Buddhists celebrate the ancient Celtic Druid festival of Halloween?

What's the connection between this pre-Christian Druid festival and Buddhism?

Buddhism teaches that the mind is not a physical entity.

Consequently,  physical factors can neither create nor destroy it.



The mind exists before conception, and survives after death to be reborn into another body.

The Druids were ancient Celtic priests who shared the Buddhists' belief in rebirth and the indestructibility of the mind.




They regarded the seasons of the year as being a metaphor for the death and rebirth of the human being.

Halloween represented the death of the old year and was believed to be the time of year when the veil separating the human and ghost realms was at its thinnest.



Yule (the winter solstice) was the time of conception of the coming year and Imbolc (Candlemas) was the actual birth of the New Year, with the appearance of the first lambs and green shoots.

The period between Yule and Candlemas was the gestational period when the new animal and plant life, though growing and stirring, was still hidden in the body of its mother, or in the case of vegetation within the body of mother earth.


The significance of Halloween to Buddhists now becomes clear. In the Druid system the period of seven weeks between Halloween and Yule is the gap between death of the old and conception of the new year. This corresponds to the 49 days of the bardo.


Halloween thus symbolises the entry of the disembodied consciousness into the intermediate state between leaving one body and occupying another.

In traditional Buddhist beliefs the bardo-consciousness will experience hideous apparitions - ghosts, demons etc.


If the mind reacts with panic then a samsaric rebirth, possibly in unpleasant realms, is inevitable.

However if the bardo-being recognises these apparitions as hallucinations - projections and reflections of its own negative karma resulting from evil actions - then liberation remains possible.



The reasons for the Druidic custom of dressing up as ghosts, demons and so on may be to symbolise that these scary bardo apparitions are in fact nothing other than aspects or appearances of the person's own self.

In tantra, gruesome visualizations are used to purify negativities






Among Western Buddhists, the festival of Samayatara, the female Buddha of the Northern direction associated with midnight and the wisdom of action, is commemorated at Halloween.

From Buddhizing Halloween by Ataraxia

"...The point here being, of course, that as Buddhism has moved into new cultural spaces it has adopted the forms of those cultures, using them to express peculiarly Buddhist themes and sometimes supplanting their original meanings entirely [1].  Naturally, as Buddhism becomes rooted in the West we should expect the same treatment to be applied to Western cultural forms, even though by all accounts it appears to be appalling to many culturally conservative Buddhists that Westerners should want to practice and celebrate Buddhadharma in ways that resonate for their own cultures.  But, speaking for myself, I see this as a good thing - I am not Tibetan/Japanese/Chinese/Thai/etc. and I do not wish to be [2].

Which brings me to an upcoming and super-fun holiday: Halloween [3]!  If there is any holiday that I want/is a good candidate for being Buddhized, this is it.  There are several reasons why this is so:

• Although the broad outlines of the origins and meaning of Halloween are known, they are not believed in.  The holiday is widely celebrated by Western (at least, North American) society, but is largely devoid of meaning.  Indeed, the actual meaning of “trick or treat” never occurred to me until I was an adult – it had always just been a phrase that got you candy (which was good enough).
• More specifically, Halloween has no Christian content, which makes Buddhization much easier for two reasons.  First and most importantly, to Buddhize Halloween will not cause outrage among/backlash from the Christian community.  Secondly, there’s no metaphysics that will need abandonment or difficult reworking in order to fit with Buddhist thought.
• The West needs to take the dark side of life more seriously.
• There are tantalizing hints of existing traditions that could, by mere suggestion, be transformed from simple fun into meaningful ritual.
• It’s so so so fun.

I can think of a few obvious ways this could be done:

• Teachings about hungry ghosts/hell realms.
• Pointing out the emptiness of ‘external’ perceptions (what’s behind the mask?).
• Transforming emotional reactions, demonstrating purity of the world (the old peeled grapes as eyeballs, spaghetti as brains, etc.).
• Chod practice!
• Death and rebirth teachings/meditations."

Dr Yutang Lin blessing a ghost to leave a haunted house and be reborn in the Pure Land

Giving of fearlessness - bringing peace to haunted houses





Festival of the Hungry Ghosts





The Halloween Monk



Halloween Asian Style



Halloween and World Religions

Buddhist Blog on Halloween


Tibetan Buddhist Halloween

Thai Halloween Party May End

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Gruesome Tantric Visualizations Transform and Purify Negativities

Buddhism Subject Index

THE RUGBY LEGEND WHO BECAME A BUDDHIST BY READING QUANTUM PHYSICS

Jonny Wilkinson discovered Buddhism via Quantum Physics

From LankaWeb 

by Walter Jayawardhana

"The rugby legend Jonny Wilkinson hit world headlines due to his 2003 World Cup final heroics, when his drop goal in the last minute of extra-time delivered the trophy to England. He made another sensation when he told the London Times that he became a Buddhist by reading Quantum Physics.

Wilkinson, a millionaire by then, has revealed that he has found inner peace through Buddhism.

The former England Rugby star,  who became a national hero after the world cup victory, said Buddhism  had helped him overcome a fear of failure which was ruining his life ironically due to the victory...'

'...He continued: “I came to understand that I had been living a life in which I barely featured. I had spent my time immersed in the fear of not achieving my goals and then spent my time beating myself up about the mistakes I made along the way. Quantum physics helped me to realise that I was creating this destructive reality and that all I needed to do to change it was to change the way I chose to perceive the world.

‘Failing at something is one thing, but Buddhism tells us that it is up to us how we interpret that failure.

‘The so-called Middle Way is also about having the right intentions.

“[Buddhism] a philosophy and way of life that resonates with me,” he revealed. “I identify with it. I agree with so much of the sentiment behind it. I enjoy the liberating effect it’s had on me to get back into the game...”  Read it all

Wave or particle? - It depends on the mind of the observer

- Sean Robsville



TIP - If some aspects of Buddhist beliefs seem unfamiliar, obscure, or confusing, then bear in mind that Buddhism is a process philosophy.   Difficult aspects of Buddhism (and quantum physics) often become much clearer when viewed from a process perspective.

More on Buddhism and Quantum Physics:

Quantum Buddhism

Buddhism, Quantum Physics and Mind

Buddhist Particle Physics

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Buddhism Subject Index

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Buddhist statues in local bar are disrespectful

Dharma-burger

Letter to the editor, Stirling Observer.

Feb 15 2012 by Jean Pedder, Stirling Observer Wednesday

"Dear Editor – I have lived in Stirling for nearly seven years and love everything about the area – the friendly people, food, wonderful landscape, etc – but as a Buddhist, originally from Sri Lanka, I am upset and angry that statues which are very similar to the ones in temples across Sri Lanka are being used in bars and clubs, mostly in Glasgow but one has now opened up in Stirling.

I wonder how people would react if someone tried to open a Jesus Bar, Virgin Mary Club, Hindu or Islam Bar. I am sure there would be a public outcry. The bar in question has statues behind the bar, next to bottles of spirits, etc, and also one next to a gaming machine.

Religious statues, images and any other material relating to various religions are sacred to each faith. The use of Buddha statues for unholy purposes, mainly by non-Buddhist business people, might mislead many people (especially people from other religions) to think that Buddhism is associated with alcoholic beverages, gambling and disco music.

Why has Stirling Council’s licensing board allowed this to go ahead? Schools in Stirling promote respect for other faiths to children and young people. Surely the local business community should lead by example.

It is wrong for religious symbols to be used for commercial purposes. I am sure other Buddhists locally and in other parts of Scotland, also people from other religious backgrounds, find this practice in very bad taste."


These are what are known as 'Dharma-burgers' 

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Buddhism Subject Index

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Where do pets go when they die?

Does a dog have Buddha nature?

Grieving for dead animals and rituals to strengthen your karmic bond with your dead pets.

A recent article on the BBC website discussed how people grieve for the death of a pet.

Many of those facing up to such sadness want spiritual reassurance. When humans die, many religious relatives have the consolation of their belief in an afterlife, however in the case of deaths of animals no such consolation is available from the Abrahamic religions, where funeral rites for animals would be considered blasphemous.

There have been recent attempts to fill the gap left by the neglect of the spiritual welfare of animals in these religions, which do not normally recognise the spiritual and karmic significance of the human-animal bond.

Traditionally, the Abrahamic religions state that only humans have souls, whereas animals are automata (biological machines) whose minds cease at death.   

Joseph Rickaby SJ, an influential Jesuit theologian, said that animals had no souls, no rights and no feelings and were no more than automata - like clocks - and if they squeaked or made noises when damaged this was equivalent to the mechanical sounds a clock would make if it fell to the floor and was similarly damaged.

In contrast, the Buddhist view is that animals' minds survive death just as humans do.  All sentient beings (creatures that experience suffering and happiness) have non-material minds. Consequently, the funeral rituals to help pet animals in future lives are essentially the same as for humans...
 


Powa Ceremony Transference of consciousness for the deceased
"We understand that throughout this world millions of humans and billions of animals die every day from so many different causes. If these living beings have the opportunity to take rebirth in a Buddha’s Pure Land they will attain permanent liberation from suffering and experience pure and everlasting happiness.

Our practice of this powa offers them this precious opportunity. By engaging in this practice we ourself will create a great collection of virtue, which will also lead us into the pathway to the Pure Land of a Buddha.

We perform this powa practice on behalf of those who have recently died, traditionally within forty-nine days of their death. As preparation for this ritual practice we begin by arranging beautiful offerings such as candles and flowers. On a piece of paper we write in red ink a large letter ‘R’, which symbolizes the contaminated rebirths of all the deceased. We attach the paper to a stick to resemble a flag, and place this flag in a suitable container such as a small vase. We also prepare a candle, which should be placed on a flat plate. Both the flag and candle should be arranged on a table in front of us.

When we engage in this practice in a group, it can begin with a senior Dharma teacher giving some practical teachings about how to develop compassion for all living beings. When we engage in this practice individually, we should generate compassion for all living beings by remembering how they experience immense suffering. Then, with compassion for all the deceased throughout the world, we perform the following stages of the ceremony:

1 On behalf of the deceased, we accumulate a great collection of virtue and merit. We do this by making prostrations and extensive offerings to the holy beings, so that the deceased gather the necessary conditions to take rebirth in the Pure Land of a Buddha.

2 On behalf of the deceased, by sincerely making requests to Buddha Vajrasattva with the recitation of the hundred-letter mantra, we purify the four main obstacles to their taking rebirth in the Pure Land of a Buddha. These obstacles are their non-virtues and negative actions created (1) physically, (2) verbally, (3) mentally, and (4) by their body, speech, and mind together.

3 Through the power of our compassionate intention, strong prayer, and concentration on the practice, we transfer the consciousness of the deceased to the Pure Land of the Buddha of Compassion so that they will experience pure and everlasting happiness.

4 Through the power of our concentration on the final special ritual practice, together with the mantra recitation, we create a special auspiciousness for the deceased to attain permanent liberation from samsaric rebirth."

More here

Pure Land

General background at  Buddhist Philosophy

Buddhist Mindfulness Meditation Alleviates Depression

Medicine Buddha

Meditation therapy should be routinely available on the National Health Service to treat recurring depression and to help tackle Britain’s growing mental health problems, according to a new report.

The study, commissioned by the Mental Health Foundation, found that fewer than one in 20 GPs prescribed meditation therapy for patients suffering depression, despite NHS guidance suggesting that it could halve depression relapse rates.

The report calls for much wider use of “mindfulness” treatment, which combines meditation with orthodox “thought training”. The report argues that if more GPs offered the therapy it would sharply reduce the financial burden of depression, which costs Britain £7.5 billion a year.

Mindfulness brings peace

Replacing reliance on antidepressants
Mental health specialists said that greater use of meditation would reduce an over-reliance on antidepressants. They said that while the drugs were effective, they did not help address the possibility of future depressive episodes.

Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT), which has its roots in Eastern philosophy and Buddhism, trains people to focus attention on one place instead of allowing the mind to be “hijacked” by emotional issues, regrets, worries about the past and future, and other distractions. This can be done in a number of ways, for example by focusing on breathing, parts of the body, or movement.

The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence issued guidance on meditation in 2004 after studies suggested that it might bring benefits.

Five years later, only a fifth of GPs said they can access the treatment for their patients, and just one in 20 regularly prescribes the therapy, according to the Mental Health Foundation report Be Mindful.

MBCT costs on average £300 per patient for a course of two-hour sessions over eight weeks. Since patients are treated in groups of up to 20, the cost is said to be much lower than one-to-one cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT).

A key difference between the new approach and traditional CBT is that patients are seen between episodes of depression, and not when they are in the grip of the illness. Another difference is the inclusion of meditation, as research has shown that relying on CBT alone to prevent recurrent depression does not work as well.

Abandon self-destructive guilt

Switching off brooding recrimination
Mark Williams, Professor of Clinical Psychology at the University of Oxford, who contributed to the report, said that meditative therapy enabled people to switch off “brooding recrimination” and, while acknowledging these thoughts, move beyond them.

“People begin to see thoughts and feelings as a temporary weather pattern in the mind, and realise they don’t have to judge themselves,” he said.

More than 100 studies, some involving Buddhist monks, have shown that brainwave activity changes during meditation, and that areas of the brain linked to controlling emotion are bigger in people who have meditated regularly for five years.

Mindfulness training has also been shown to increase activity in the pre-frontal cortex, a part of the brain associated with positive emotion that is normally subdued in depressed individuals.

One in 10 people in Britain is affected by clinical depression — defined by a range of symptoms within a single two-week period — and 50 per cent of sufferers experience it more than once. After two bouts of depression, there is a 70 per cent risk of relapse, which rises to 90 per cent after three episodes.

Andrew McCulloch, chief executive of the Mental Health Foundation, said that doctors prescribed antidepressants too often. “Mindfulness-based therapy could help prevent thousands of people from relapsing into depression every year. This would have huge knock-on benefits both socially and economically, making it a sensible treatment to make available, even at a time when money is short within the NHS,” he said.

At least as effective as antidepressants

Preventing relapses
“Depression tends to come back for many people, with the odds of further bouts increasing each time. A single episode is serious enough, but having the illness return year after year can have a devastating impact on people’s jobs, relationships, and their chances in life generally.”

The case for making MBCT available on the NHS relies on two key studies of patients with recurring depression. One, undertaken ten years ago, showed a 37 per cent relapse rate for patients given MBCT, compared with 66 per cent for those not given the treatment. The other, conducted in 2004, showed an even bigger difference between the two groups, with relapse rates of 36 per cent and 78 per cent. Another recent trial in Exeter, with results published last year, indicated that MBCT is at least as effective at preventing relapses as antidepressants.

Jonty Heaversedge, a South London GP who learnt to meditate at a Buddhist centre and believes the practice can improve many aspects of health, said: “Depression is something that affects a huge number of my patients, often year after year, with devastating consequences. MBCT gives them the opportunity to develop a healthier, more accepting relationship with their thoughts and feelings.”

From http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/mental_health/article6975797.ece

Medicine Buddha Mandala

UPDATE FROM THE GRAUNIAD:

"2010 could be the year that mindfulness meditation goes mainstream in the UK. It's already endorsed as a treatment for depression by the National Institute for Clinical Excellence, and today a major mental health charity is calling for meditation-based courses to be offered much more widely on the NHS.

A report I wrote for the Mental Health Foundation highlights the impressive clinical evidence for an approach called mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) – the eight-week courses have been shown to reduce relapse rates by half among people who have suffered several episodes of depression. The report also finds that very few patients who could benefit from mindfulness training are currently being referred for the treatment – just one in 20 GPs prescribes MBCT regularly, despite the fact that nearly three-quarters of doctors think it would be helpful for their patients with mental health problems. Changing that could make a massive difference not only to them, but to the economy – the cost of depression to the UK has been estimated at £7.5 billion every year.

Despite its convoluted name, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy is pretty straightforward – a set of classes that teach meditation practices which help people pay attention to their breathing, body sensations, thoughts and feelings in a kind, accepting, non-judgemental way. Mindfulness training shows us how to notice and work with our experience rather than engaging in a futile struggle to fight or run away from it. That may sound simple – perhaps because it is – but developing this mindful way of relating seems to alleviate some of the suffering that struggling with life's pain creates.

Mindfulness is especially relevant to depression, in which sufferers tend to get caught up with cycles of 'rumination' - when people get depressed they churn negative thoughts over and over in their minds, a pattern which actually perpetuates their low mood. Mindfulness short-circuits rumination – by learning how to pay attention to our present moment experience, rather than getting tied up in negative thinking about the past or future, we create more space in our minds from which new, more effective decision-making can emerge. It isn't a miracle cure – while simple, the techniques take time and effort to master, but mindfulness-based therapies are now supported by a substantial and rapidly-growing evidence base that suggest they can help people cope better not just with depression, but also with the stress of conditions ranging from chronic pain and anxiety to cancer and HIV.

Mindfulness-based therapies are fundamentally and unapologetically inspired by Buddhist principles and tools – the Buddha both noted that suffering (as opposed to pain) is created by struggling with experience and prescribed mindfulness meditation as a way of working with it skilfully. However, the B-word rarely, if ever, gets a mention on MBCT courses – their reputation in health services has been built on scientific evidence rather than spiritual conviction. This is the only way it could be – while some of us Buddhists might argue that practising mindfulness can open up insights about the nature of mind that go way beyond what can be measured in a randomised-controlled trial, the most important thing here is that techniques which reduce suffering are presented in whatever way will make them most accessible to the largest number of people.

By secularising mindfulness training, and packaging it in a form that makes it amenable to clinical testing, an approach that might otherwise have been seen in medical circles as new-age flim-flam is being taken very seriously. So seriously that according to an ICM survey of GPs conducted for the Mental Health Foundation report, 64% of doctors would like to receive training in mindfulness themselves.

For that we can partly thank Morinaga Soko-Roshi, a zen teacher of Jon Kabat-Zinn, the doctor who first brought mindfulness training into US healthcare services in the 1970s. Kabat-Zinn knew that it would be considered unacceptably 'religious' to offer Buddhist training to his patients - however, he also had a strong hunch that the meditation techniques said to lead to insight on the Buddhist path might also help people cope with chronic illness. Unsure of what to do, he went to see Soko-Roshi and asked his advice. "Throw out Buddha! Throw out Zen!" came the abrupt reply.

From that, Kabat-Zinn's secular mindfulness-based stress-reduction course, a progenitor of MBCT, was born. MBSR is now taught in hundreds, perhaps thousands of institutions across the US – not just hospitals and medical settings, but schools, community centres, prisons and workplaces.

We are some way behind in the UK. Although there are now mindfulness centres at universities such as Oxford, Exeter and Bangor (the Scottish government also deserves great credit for investing strongly in mindfulness training for health professionals) most NHS trusts lack the infrastructure and personnel to offer MBCT courses to patients who could benefit from it. Even though the scientific evidence is persuasive, and GPs are on board, there simply aren't the courses for people to access.

But with the embracing of mindfulness by a growing range of powerful institutions, whose support is based on hard-nosed evidence rather than any particular commitment to Buddhism, that may now be about to change."


A beneficial religion! (Dawkins confounded?)
At a time when a certain 'religion' seems to be intent on causing as much death, destruction and mutilation as possible, it's good to know that the Buddha's gentle teachings from 2500 years ago are relieving the sufferings of growing numbers of people in the modern world.

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Buddhism Subject Index

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Shared Heritage - Hellenism, Humanism and Rationalism

Eurocentric Cultural Nationalism
Cultural nationalism is on the rise in Europe.  At present this movement takes the form of rejection of Islam, which is gaining increasing support among the 'chattering classes', including the secular humanists.

Cultural nationalists at present regard Islam as public enemy number one, however we must be aware that this targeted Islamophobia may eventually spill over to become a more general Eurocentric cultural xenophobia, with even the growth of Buddhism in Europe being resented as a cultural encroachment.


Enlightenment values


So maybe the time has come to stress the shared values, civilization and history of Buddhist and European cultures going back over 2000 years to the Hellenistic period (roughly 323BC to 10AD) . Hellenistic civilization followed in the wake of Alexander the Great, extending from the Ancient Greek world to Southwest Asia as far as modern Afghanistan and Pakistan, which formed the culturally brilliant civilisation of Gandhara

Gandhara Buddha - Greek Buddhist Sculpture

Menander (Milinda) was Gandhara's most famous king. He ruled from Taxila and later from Sagala (Sialkot). He became a Buddhist and is remembered for his discussions on emptiness with a great Buddhist philosopher, Nāgasena. From Gandhara many missionaries went out to spread Buddhism to China, Korea, Japan along the Silk Road.


Cutural exchange
There was contact, communication and mutual influence between Greek and Buddhist philosophers. According to the Edicts of Ashoka, set in stone, some of them written in Greek, he sent Buddhist emissaries to the Greek lands in Asia and as far as the Mediterranean.

Buddhism prospered under the Indo-Greek kings, and it has been suggested that their invasion of India was intended to protect the Buddhist faith from the religious persecutions of the new Indian dynasty of the Sungas (185–73 BCE) which had overthrown the Mauryans.


Although the philosophical systems of Buddhism and Christianity have evolved in rather different ways, the moral precepts advocated by Buddhism from the time of Ashoka through his edicts do have some similarities with the Christian moral precepts developed more than two centuries later: respect for life, respect for the weak, rejection of violence, pardon to sinners, tolerance.


Buddhism and Christianity
One theory is that these similarities may indicate the propagation of Buddhist ideals into the Western World, with the Greeks acting as intermediaries and religious syncretists.

Scholars have often considered the possibility that Buddhism influenced the early development of Christianity.

Early 3rd-4th century Christian writers such as Hippolytus and Epiphanius write about a Scythianus, who visited India around 50 AD from where he brought "the doctrine of the Two Principles". According to these writers, Scythianus' pupil Terebinthus presented himself as a "Buddha". Terebinthus went to Palestine and Judaea where he met the Apostles ("becoming known and condemned" Isaia), and ultimately settled in Babylon, where he transmitted his teachings to Mani, thereby creating the foundation of what could be called Persian syncretic Buddhism, Manicheism. One of the greatest thinkers and saints of western Christianity, Augustine of Hippo was originally a Manichean.

In the 2nd century CE, the Christian dogmatist Clement of Alexandria recognized Bactrian Buddhists (Sramanas) and Indian Gymnosophists for their influence on Greek thought:

"Thus philosophy, a thing of the highest utility, flourished in antiquity among the barbarians, shedding its light over the nations. And afterwards it came to Greece. First in its ranks were the prophets of the Egyptians; and the Chaldeans among the Assyrians; and the Druids among the Gauls; and the Sramanas among the Bactrians ("Σαρμαναίοι Βάκτρων"); and the philosophers of the Celts; and the Magi of the Persians, who foretold the Saviour's birth, and came into the land of Judaea guided by a star. The Indian gymnosophists are also in the number, and the other barbarian philosophers. And of these there are two classes, some of them called Sramanas ("Σαρμάναι"), and others Brahmins ("Βραφμαναι")." (Clement of Alexandria "The Stromata, or Miscellanies"

The main Greek cities of the Middle-East happen to have played a key role in the development of Christianity, such as Antioch and especially Alexandria, and "it was later in this very place that some of the most active centers of Christianity were established" (Robert Linssen, "Zen living").

Artistic influences


Although there is still some debate, the first anthropomorphic representations of the Buddha himself are often considered a result of the Greco-Buddhist interaction. Before this innovation, Buddhist art was "aniconic": the Buddha was only represented through his symbols (an empty throne, the Bodhi tree, the Buddha's footprints, the Dharma wheel).



This reluctance towards anthropomorphic representations of the Buddha, and the sophisticated development of aniconic symbols to avoid it (even in narrative scenes where other human figures would appear), seem to be connected to one of the Buddha’s sayings, reported in the Digha Nikaya, that discouraged representations of himself after the extinction of his body.

Probably not feeling bound by these restrictions, and because of their cult of form, the Greeks were the first to attempt a sculptural representation of the Buddha.



Enlightenment values
Buddhist and European civilizations spent their formative years immersed in Hellenistic culture, from which they derive their shared values in art, philosophy, humanism, rationalism and love of learning. The commonality of these values needs to be emphasised and defended as both traditions come under attack from the growing forces of Jihadist barbarism.







Read more at Buddhist Philosophy

 

Numinous Symbolism - Pagan, Buddhist and Christian

The mind has several levels, the main distinctions being

(i) Gross mind
(ii) Subtle mind and
(iii) Very subtle or root mind.

The gross level corresponds, more or less, to our waking mind and the subtle level to our dreaming mind.

Buddhists believe that only the very subtle root mind goes on from life to life to life, so it is this level of the mind that we need to transform to make progress on our spiritual path.




There are a number of ways of producing long term changes to the root mind. One of the easiest to understand is analytical and placement meditation, where we use discursive philosophical reasoning and/or intellectual analysis to generate a realisation of a particular idea. We then attempt to hold this realisation for as long as possible (placement), and mix and imprint it into the deeper and more subtle levels of the mind.

As well as analysis and placement, we can also use intuitive experiences to transform the root mind. The three main ways of accessing intuitive levels of the mind are symbolism, visualisation and ritual. Symbolism may be used on its own, or in combination with visualisation and ritual.




Symbolism
The concept of symbolism has two aspects - Representational Symbolism and Evocative Symbolism, though sometimes a representational symbol can, with familiarity, become an evocative symbol.


Representational symbols
These are shorthand representations for substances, numbers, instructions etc. Examples are chemical symbols such as Na, Au, Pb for sodium, gold and lead; p for 3.14159, and the warning symbols in road signs. These types of symbols are interpreted by, and affect, the gross levels of our minds, and are used for our normal day-to-day business.


Evocative symbols
Evocative symbols are interpreted by and affect the more subtle levels of the mind.



Evocative symbolism is associated with art, architecture and poetry, especially where there is a spiritual aspect. Examples of evocative symbolism in the visual arts are icons, thangkas, mandalas, stained glass windows and statues of holy beings.




Evocative symbolism does not use direct representation, reference or explicit analogy. As the symbolist Mallarme said "Don't paint the thing itself, paint the effect that it produces".




Similarly with symbolist poetry. Direct description is avoided because it engages the grosser levels of the mind. Intuitive realisations are produced by indirect allusion and subtle evocation.




Representational symbols may evolve into evocative symbols.
On first meeting with Buddhist teachings, many Westerners ask about the meanings of unfamiliar symbols such as the lotus, wheel, vase etc. These are explained, and at first understood, intellectually (they are thus representational symbols) .

But later, as intellectual understanding of the concepts transform into intuitive realizations, the symbols may become evocative. Merely seeing the symbol may then evoke the associated realization.


Visualization.
Visualization usually begins with representational symbolism. For example, in the Tonglen 'taking and giving' visualization the black smoke and white light represent suffering and happiness. But with practice the understanding may become more deeply intuitive and less intellectual. Presumably the same thing happens as Tantric practitioners gain greater experience of visualizing themselves as the Yidam.


Ritual
Ritual is acting out or watching someone else acting out a symbolic role in order to bring about deep changes in one's mind. Rituals may be performed individually, but often involve numbers of practitioners.

The theatre may have originated out of pagan Greek religious rituals. For example, ritualised acting out of tragedy was used to produce catharsis in the minds of the audience.


Ritual actions often involve some form of symbolic transformation, purification or gift, such as these symbolic gifts on a shrine at a Kadampa Buddhist festival.





Other rituals evoke a symbolic journey, and may involve traversing a path through a processional or meditational landscape. Examples are the ritual landscape around Stonehenge in England, and the circumambulation of Mount Kailas in the Himalayas.

- Sean Robsville


RESOURCES FOR SYMBOLISM


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Buddhism Subject Index

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Consciousness and mind are not emergent phenomena or emergent properties of the brain.

Summary: The mind cannot be an emergent property of the brain or any other physical system, since emergent properties and emergent phenomena are psychological in origin, and require the pre-existence of an observer's mind in order to become manifest.

Is the bunch of cherries an emergent property 

of the 13x15 pixel array,  or does it emerge

from the mind of the observer?

Emergent properties and emergent phenomena

A frequently used materialist argument against the existence of the mind as a non-physical continuum is to claim that it is an 'emergent property' or 'emergent phenomenon' of the brain.

The definition of emergence given in the Dictionary of Philosophy of Mind is

'Emergence - Properties of a complex physical system are emergent just in case they are neither (i) properties had by any parts of the system taken in isolation nor (ii) resultant of a mere summation of properties of parts of the system.

Thus a boat which drifts northwestwards in response to a southerly wind and a current flowing from the east is not exhibiting emergent behavior, whereas the products of chemical reactions could be considered emergent. To quote the Dictionary of Philosophy of Mind:

"Consider the following chemical process: CH4 + 2O2 --> CO2 + 2H2O (Methane + oxygen produces carbon dioxide + water). For Mill, the products of such chemical reactions are not, in any sense, the sum of the effects of each reactant. 

While the mechanics underlying chemical reactions are understood well enough today to render Mill's point dubious, we can see why the above chemical reaction would impress Mill and his contemporaries as significantly different in kind from the Composition of Forces for moving bodies. In the case of the chemical reaction, the resulting compounds exhibit properties significantly different from those of the reactants. For instance, methane is violently combustible, whereas carbon dioxide and water are not. 

This contrasts sharply against the case of a north-westerly moving object being propelled by two forces--one towards the north, the other towards the west--insofar as the subsequent motion is so obviously decomposable into the effects of the conjoint causes. A very live possibility to consider in connection with these examples is that an enhanced understanding of the processes that underlie some observed property of a system may show that system not to be an example of emergence. 

That is, an increase of knowledge about the way certain effects are obtained may reveal that certain effects are decomposable into the effects contributed by subcomponents of that system. Mill's chemical examples fail as properly emergent for just this reason. With the development of quantum mechanical explanation, we have been able to see how chemical reactions are composed of additive properties of individual electrons (McLaughlin, 1992, p.89)."

Note that in the case of a chemical reaction, the attribution of emergence differs according to the extent of knowledge of the observers (19th century bucket chemists versus 20th century quantum physicists).

Nevertheless, it is still commonplace to think of certain phenomena, such as biological systems, as as showing complex behavior which somehow emerges uncreated out of far simpler behaviors such as the chemistry of carbon compounds.

The Game of Life as an emergent phenomenon.

One of the most familiar examples of emergent behavior is exhibited by cellular automata, such John Conway's Game of Life and its variants (eg Brian's Brain). These are available as animations on the web:

http://www.math.com/students/wonders/life/life.html

http://www.bitstorm.org/gameoflife/

http://www.argilo.net/funjava.html?lng=en

The Game is what a computer programmer would nowadays define as an object, which consists of a datastructure (the two dimensional pixel array) and associated algorithms (the rules which determine whether pixels switch on or off according to the state of their neighbors).

The algorithms are extremely simple:

• A dead cell with exactly three live neighbors becomes a live cell (birth).
• A live cell with two or three live neighbors stays alive (survival).
• In all other cases, a cell dies or remains dead (overcrowding or loneliness).

Amazingly, out of these simple rules operating on a simple datastructure, a complex system of gliders, oscillators etc appears.

But is this really an emergent phenomenon? If the gliders were to emerge out of the screen and glide around the top of our desk (as distinct from being pixel patterns gliding around our PC desktop), then we should have to concede that something had emerged. But all we can say is that an appearance has emerged. 

So, from where has the appearance emerged?

If we search carefully, we come to the conclusion that we cannot find the complex behavior within the object. The movements of the pixel-structures are algorithmically compressible, with no remainder, back into the rules that generated them. There is no mysterious addition of procedural complexity.

The two-dimensional pixel array remains an array of pixels in two dimensions - it hasn't suddenly changed its nature and become a cube or magically sprouted chess-pieces.

Yet we can't deny that we have observed a phenomenon which has properties which 'look different' and 'feel different' from its constituents.

But if the phenomenon hasn't emerged from the object, then the only other place from which it could have emerged is the mind of the observer. We are therefore left with the conclusion that emergence is a psychological, not a physical phenomenon. The pixel array is 'nothing but' sequentially illuminated squares on the computer screen. All else is imputed by mind.

David Chalmers makes a similar point in his notes on emergence, quote:

"The notion of reduction is intimately tied to the ease of understanding one level in terms of another. Emergent properties are usually properties that are more easily understood in their own right than in terms of properties at a lower level. This suggests an important observation: Emergence is a psychological property. It is not a metaphysical absolute. Properties are classed as "emergent" based at least in part on (1) the interestingness to a given observer of the high-level property at hand; and (2) the difficulty of an observer's deducing the high-level property from low-level properties"

Similarly...
"The properties of complexity and organization of any system are considered by Crutchfield to be subjective qualities determined by the observer.

"Defining structure and detecting the emergence of complexity in nature are inherently subjective, though essential, scientific activities. Despite the difficulties, these problems can be analysed in terms of how model-building observers infer from measurements the computational capabilities embedded in non-linear processes. An observer’s notion of what is ordered, what is random, and what is complex in its environment depends directly on its computational resources: the amount of raw measurement data, of memory, and of time available for estimation and inference. The discovery of structure in an environment depends more critically and subtly, though, on how those resources are organized. The descriptive power of the observer’s chosen (or implicit) computational model class, for example, can be an overwhelming determinant in finding regularity in data."(Crutchfield 1994) "  from Wiki

So we can dismiss all claims that consciousness, mind and awareness are emergent properties of matter or brains, because we need the presence of a mind for emergent properties and phenomena to appear in the first place. The subjective activity of the mind of the observer, together with the 'objective' procedures and the structures upon which they operate, is an irreducible component of emergent phenomena.

The behavior of cellular automata gives a vivid illustration of the three levels of dependent relationship, as discussed in the article on Buddhist teachings on sunyata :

(1) Gross dependent relationship - the dependence of phenomena on their causes (the algorithms or rules of production).

(2) Subtle dependent relationship - the dependence of phenomena on their perceived parts (the pixels which go to make up the emergent structures).

(3) Very subtle dependent relationship - the dependence of phenomena on imputation by mind.

Emergent all the way up and all the way down?

In addition, the article on sunyata demonstrates that instead of viewing the world in terms of 'things', we should understand all phenomena in terms of three types of relationships - causal, organisational and imputational.

The universe consists of relationships and only relationships. To ask what the participants in these relationships are in themselves only leads to paradox.

One interesting aspect of emergent phenomena is the different causal and organisational relationships which appear at different levels of investigation.

For example, ecology emerges out of biology, which emerges out of chemistry, which emerges out of physics, which emerges out of mathematics, which emerges out of the mind contemplating the empty set.

Each level of investigation has its own explanatory relationships, yet if we check carefully there is no 'added extra' coming from the side of the objects. (Everything is algorithmically compressible without remainder, there are no mysterious ingredients added as we progress from lower levels to higher levels).

The only place from which these relationships/phenomena can emerge is the mind. Hence we are again forced to conclude that these emergent phenomena are psychological phenomena.

So, even the relationships themselves are imputed by mind and have the nature of mind.


TIP - If some aspects of Buddhist beliefs seem unfamiliar, obscure, or confusing, then bear in mind that Buddhism is a process philosophy.   Difficult aspects of Buddhism often become much clearer when viewed from a process perspective.

 

- Sean Robsville

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