Self Liberation in Phenomenology and Dzogchen, Essays
PHENOMENOLOGICAL CONTRIBUTIONS TO
DZOGCHEN
By Rudolph Bauer, Phd Wed, Oct 23, 2013
Rudolph Bauer Ph.D., Author
Phenomenology is the study of different kinds of giveness, the giveness of
experience.There are various ways of being open to experiencing the world and the
phenomena of the world. The phenomena and the objects of the world and the world
itself can be experienced and perceived more or less directly and more or less in the
present. The phenomena, the objects of the world and within the world as the world, can
be experienced more or less in breadth and depth, and more or less in obviousness and
more or less in subtlety. The world can be experienced more or less in translucidity and
more or less in darkness, and more or less in openness and more or less in
hiddenness, and more or less concealed and more or less unconcealed. There are
many ways of experiencing the world and objects of and in the world which are the
appearances of the world.
MULTIDIMENSIONAL
And most amazingly the phenomena of the world can be experienced in its many
different dimensions. Truly we live in a multidimensional world and we are
multidimensional beings in a mutlidimenisional world, a multidimensional cosmology.
Multidimensional beings have multidimensional views and multidimensional experience.
Experiencing through awareness and through the mind the various dimensions of our
experience is the essence of phenomenology and the meditative awareness practice.
Experiencing the phenomena of awareness both within ourselves as our own being and
within the beings around us opens to us the multidimensionality of everything and
everyone. Experiencing through mind alone is very different than experiencing within
awareness. And since the mind can be integrated within this awareness such
experience has its own difference than being located in either mind or awareness alone.
Our capacity to perceive the world in its various dimensions has been reflected upon for
centuries in meditative cultures. And this experience of various dimensions of
phenomena and the world of phenomena is confirmed by contemporary quantum
physics and science .We know this is a multidimensional world and universe. All of the
modes of giveness, appearance and experience are related. There is relationship
intimately between and within them. The awakened modes of experience and
appearance vary in light of their ability to give to us and our ability to enter into and
penetrate the phenomena of the world as directly and clearly as possible. The
phenomena can be given and experienced more or less directly and more or less
translucently. This means that our experience of the giveness of phenomena opens us
to more or less of the various infinite dimensions of the phenomena and the infinite
dimensions of the world. Phenomena itself is awakened as is so eloquently described in
the Guhyagarbha tantra. By world I mean the universe of experience everywhere and
within everyone and everything, from the most subtle to the most gross. Our own level
of perception gives us and opens to us to the levels of the giveness of phenomena, and
the multileveledness of phenomena opens us to our own dimensional perception. Truly
this unfolding is a co- emergent process. Awakened awareness is co-emergent within
awakened phenomena. Awakened awareness is within an awakened world. This is the
essential understanding of contemporary Dzogchen and contemporary phenomenology.
There is the awakened giveness of phenomena of appearance which opens us to our
capacity to experience the different dimensions of presence. From the presence of a
spatio temporal object concrete in its manifestations to the very beingness of the being
of that object. From the presence of color and size and shape of an object, to the subtle
energy of the object being manifested as an object in the field of being as a being. And
so the different dimensions of the world that manifest to us in their giveness and their
appearance reflect different dimensions of reality and of existence. The giveness of
appearance reflects the different dimensions of the Beingness of Being in its
manifestation and in its non manifestation. The giveness of the phenomenological
configurations of the field reflect the field’s giveness as configurations, as an object and
as an object configuration.
OBJECTIFIED OR SUBJECTIVITY
The phenomena of the appearance of the human can be experienced as an object
among other objects. If the mind of the perceiver is objectifying and objectified itself by
itself, then the otherness of an objectified human will be experienced. And the
phenomena of the appearance of human subjectivity can be experienced and given to
another human being if the other human being is in their own dimension of subjectivity
within their innermost awareness which has no shape or form but is known in the
wonderful co-emergent process of becoming aware of awareness in oneself and in the
other. Truly awareness meets awareness...inside meets inside. The unfolding of
intersubjectivity is mutually co emergent. Subjectivity is the primordial openness of
awareness in time and space in the continuum of mind and body. Intersubjective is the
openness passing through the openness of the other.
APPEARANCE OF WORLD AS OPENNESS
Phenomenology focuses on the appearance of the world and its various dimensions.
Phenomenology is an experiential understanding of our experience of phenomena in
and of the world. It allows us and presents to us the different dimensions of the world of
reality and the actuality of the world. So, depending on the phenomena experienced, the
reality and actually of the world shifts in profound and bewildering ways. As we
phenomenologically become aware of awareness, the nature of awareness is
experienced as openness, spaceousness. Experiencing this openness within one’s
own self the openness within the world itself becomes more apparent.
APPEARANCE AS AN UNHAPPY ILLUSION
Buddhist idealists as well as Hindu Vedic idealists declare that the world is an illusion or
delusion and is not real. What is real is the nothingness or spaciousness of the
dharmakaya dimension or in the language of the Hindu, the dimension of shiva, the
spaceous void. This understanding both comes from the experience of the masters of
meditation who use direct perception of meditative experience and also from the
scholastic traditions in both Vedic and Buddhist religions. The Buddhist traditions used
madhyamika reasoning as well as other forms of idealistic philosophy of logic. In a
sense this reasoning is used to point out the unreality of the immediate situation and the
conclusion is that things do not exist and also do exist and that they neither exist or
neither do they not exist - a rather deconstructional stew that would even bewilder
Derrida about what is or is not in this idealistic enframing. It is as if the language
negates itself in the very speaking...and so what is left is only an aphasic experience.
By aphasic I mean nothing can be said, nothing can be affirmed, and nothing can be
thought.
This kind of deconstructionist thinking not only points out the impermanence of
composite reality but moreover makes the attribution about the illusion of all appearance
and the illusion of one’s self, and the illusion of experience and the illusion of the
experiencer. This illusionary way of thinking is challenged by phenomenology in this
matter of appearance and reality. Contemporary phenomenology has a great deal to
offer Dzogchen’s presentation and understanding in this multidimensional and
contemporary world.
THE UNHAPPY BELIEF IN THE ILLUSIONARYNESS OF LIFE
For the most part, many people simply believe these delusionary statements and
attributions and work and live within this illusionary belief system with its advantages
and disadvantages, including, at times the resulting problems of bonding and problems
of schizoid like detachment. The well-established psychology of bonding is overcome by
the nonattachment and nonbonding of detachment ethics. This kind of belief system
over time structures both a personal and cultural viewpoint that can foreclose
experience, invalidate experience and negate the very narrative schema of life’s
experience. For many Buddhist idealists experience itself does not count and is without
validity. In fact the world does not count. The phenomenological experience is without
signification. As some Buddhist writers have said “phenomena never were and never
will be”.
Unhappily the experiential question arises as to whom or for what is the great
compassion if everything is illusion. Is compassion itself illusion? Does the great
compassion manifest illusions? Is this the sport of consciousness…illusion for illusion
sake. And from within whom does compassion arise? And for whom does compassion
arise? Is compassion an experience? Is there an experiencer of givingness of
compassion? And is there a whom who receives the gift of compassion?
In actuality the positiveness in which many Buddhist masters and students live is the
manifestation of the indestructible compassion in action, confirming the worthwhileness of life, the validity of human experience, and the validity of the archetypical
powers. The power and indestructibility of awareness and the manifestations of all of
this vast human action goes far beyond the madhyamika and the idealistic philosophical
view of life, the world and action. The actual action goes far beyond this philosophical
muted view of human experience.
MANIFESTATION OF WORLD AND MANIFESTATION OF SELF
Phenomenology is the study of experience of the world and the phenomena of
appearance both as the manifestation of the world and the manifestation of sense of
self. Contemporary phenomenology can present the light of actuality and reality on
these idealistic ruminations and solipsistic attributions about the invalidity all of human
experience.
PHENOMENOLOGY UNDOES ILLUSION OF IDEALISM and UNDOES THE VIEW OF
MECHANICNISTIC REALISM
Phenomeology challenges certain forms of western realism that sees beings as entities
and thinks of Being itself as a kind of ontic entity. For western realism Being itself is a
kind of Big Being, a Big entity...the Biggest of all the beings…a super Being. And for
some Being is understood as the totality of all the little beings or the Big Being is
thought of as source of all the beings. For the concrete realist all the beings including
the Big Being is an entity. Human beings are entities and God is itself the Biggest entity;
an entity beyond the other entities but entity nonetheless. The big entity Deus is the
cause of all the little entities. And all the entities including the Big entity and the little
entities only have knowledge through mediation of language and priesthoods of some
form. For many, Knowledge is a function of belief and not direct experience. For
phenomenology knowledge is a function of direct experience.
For phenomenology Being is not a being among other beings. Being is not a being. And
Being is not an entity. In this way Being is no -thingness and nonetheless Being allows
beings to be and Being manifests the Beingness of Being in all the beings. BEING itself
is empty or openness, radiant openness luminous openness. If one wants one could
easily come to understand and come to think that Being is Deus. If one also wishes, one
could easily understand Being as the dharmakaya manifesting the Beingness of being
of sambogakaya and the beingness of the beings of nirmanakaya. And also if one
wishes to come to understand that Being is shiva and the manifestation of Being of the
various tattvas and realities as shakti.
The masterful phenomenologist, Heidegger, takes awareness of the experience of
appearance as the source of knowningness. He states that the discursive mind alone
in its discursive conceptualization can easily become solipsistic and foreclose
knowningness of the Beingness of beings. Dzogchen Masters and Shavite Masters
have a similar understanding.
MIND ALONE CANNOT GRASP THE BEINGNESS OF BEING AND CANNOT GRASP
THE NATURE OF AWARENESS AS MANIFESTING SUBJECTIVITY IN THE
CONTEXT OF MIND AND BODY
Phenomenology challenges the view that there are no differences phenomenologically
between perception and hallucination. Phenomenology also challenges the view thatthe
giveness of experience does not depend on whether this object exists objectively and
really or not. Phenomenology challenges the Buddhist views of the world as a
hallucination or delusion. Phenomenology challenges the Buddhist invalidation of
human experience.
Initially, Husserl himself thought that phenomenology was not able to speak about the
reality of phenomena and appearance as reality. This was a very limiting view and
located Husserl in the idealistic discourse wherein he was locked within the
transcendental hidden I; a hidden world and a hidden I. So solipsism seemed to be the
initial fate of phenomenology. The phenomenology whose inspiration was to the things
themselves was becoming locked in the box of the mind alone.
HUSSERL’S EXPANDED VIEW: THE EPOCHE
Happily, Husserl radically transformed phenomenology as he expanded the reduction
and epoche to the suspension of mind, opened the phenomena of actuality to relational
actuality.
Husserl’s epoche and reduction allowed him to suspend the mind and enter into the
experience and appearance of phenomena as they present themselves to us and within
us. Based upon this phenomenological experience of the giveness to the field of
awareness a reflection is possible. Reflection follows the prereflective experience of
knowningness of phenomena. Reflection follows the prereflective awareness of the
phenomena. Reflection follows the nonconceptual intuition of the giveness of
phenomena. Phenomenology now focuses on giveness of experience and the
knowningness of awareness. Gnosis has presidence.
Direct perception has
presidence. The phenomenologist now focuses on and within the dimension of
appearance and giveness in order to reveal the inner structure of the experience of the
world as the manifestation of
phenomena.
The shining of phenomena!
Phenomenology elaborates the radical experience of the phenomena of the world in the
light of their giveness and validity. From the givineness of experience a reflection and
articulation emerges.
SUBJECTIVITY AS AWARENESS, PRIMORDIAL AWARENESS IN MIND AND BODY
The primordial giveness of experience takes place within subjectivity as knowingness.
There is this primordial giveness to the experience of knowingness as the actual as it
presents itself to us. Subjectivity itself is not an entity. Subjectivity is experienced within
the entity of the mind and body, but subjectivity itself is no thing and has no form or
shape…Subjectivity itself is primordial awareness manifesting in a particular time and
place, and manifesting in a particular mind and body within the unfolding in a particular
time and space. Subjectivity is the manifestation of primordial awareness in time and
space. Subjectivity is timeless awareness manifesting in time and a locality of time.
This awareness of awareness which phenomenology undertakes allows awareness not
to be focused on mind alone but in becoming aware of itself, the awareness of
subjectivity openness up as to what it actually is. Subjecitivity is awareness whose
nature is spaceousness, energy, light as in illuminating. To say that the self does not
exist is bewildering and is confusing in the lack of experiential clarity. It is true the mind
and body exist termporally and that as mind and as body the human being is an entity, a
composite. And that this entity exists for a certain limited time . It is also true that the
human being is also subjectivity within mind and body appearing in time and space. It is
also true that this basic subjectivity that is not contained in mind alone is openness, vast
spaceousness, luminousity and pervasive sense of oneness. This is the unborn and
indestructible vajrakumara in dzogchen language. And moreover this subjectivity is
mutldimenisonal as this subjectivity is awareness itself. This awareness is
multidimensional and manifesting in time and space as the nirmanakaya manifestation
of awareness emanating as flesh, the world of the human, the world as desire. It is also
true that this very same awareness is the archetypical dimension that is luminously
energetic and is power that is ontologically prior to the dimension of flesh. It is also true
that this very same subjectivity is the manifestation of the primordial awareness itself
that is unbound and infinite in its dimensions. Pure Subjectivity is the manfestation in
time and space of the dharmakaya. Pure subjectivity is the manifestation of the
dharmakaya in time and space. As Husserl would so often declare: ‘what is the wonder
of all wonders pure consciousness and the door way is our own subjectivity!’
MEDIATED KNOWLEDGE AND UNMEDIATED DIRECT EXPERIENCE
There are two different ways of understanding. There is the understanding of the
analytic objectified knowledge and the direct non-conceptual lucid knowing experience
of appearance of reality that can then be reflected upon and articulated. Understanding
is direct experience followed by articulation; reflected articulation. This is the science of
phenomenology, the science of awareness.
REALITY AS THE PHENOMENAL AND THE ACTUAL
The epoche and the reduction are methods of Husserl’s phenomenology.
Phenomenology does not exclude the actual world from being known and
phenomenology is concerned with meaning of beings and with Being itself. For
phenomenology there is no gap between meaning and the experience of beings. Even
Being itself is a focus of phenomenology. From the phenomenological point of view, the
actuality of Being and beings is the natural focus of awareness.
Later Husserl maintains that the epoche is used to suspend a certain dogmatic mind
enframing towards the appearance of reality. The suspension allows us to focus more
directly on the experience of multidimensional reality just as it is given. Epoche releases
prejudice, releases enframing that is containing appearance and containing the
experience of appearance of reality, not an exclusion of reality. The suspension opens
us to be able to approach the experience of the giveness of appearance and the
manifestations of objects as phenomena and as realities. Suspension of mind allows for
a disclosure and unconcealment of what is given and the possibility of what is to be
given. To speak of the sense and manifestations of the real in this context is to validate
the giveness and significance of the multidimensionalness of phenomena and the reality
of appearance. Suspension of the mind allows the explicit use of the instrument of direct
perception which is vast and subtle and can meet the vastness and subtlety of the
various dimensions that are presented and given to us as reality and actuality.
Suspension allows for gazing to manifest.
Phenomenology as method through the suspension of mind and the openness of the
gaze allows a way of experiencing and consequent reflective thinking of beings and the
Beingness of the world as actuality. Here, situated in the field of awareness one loses
nothing of their own being and is able to enter into the depth and breadth of the
multidimensionality of world and otherness. Through awareness one enters nonduality
within duality, and through duality into nonduality.
BEYOND IDEALISM AND BEYOND MIND ALONE
To perform the epoche and the reduction is to activate awareness of awareness and to
be able to experience the various dimensionality of actuality. Phenomenology does not
stop at the focus on mental content and ideation. To stop at mental content and ideation
alone is to take a path that leads to becoming located in idealism and solipsism.
Phenomenology overcomes Self enclosed ideation of mind alone. In fact to perform the
suspension of mind does not imply any loss of relatedness to realness. The
phenomenological attitude makes completely possible the experience of reality through
appearance and manifestation. In this way the very oneness of manifestation and
subjectivity reveal the immanent oneness of the knower and the known
THE EXPERIENTIAL BASIS OF PHENOMENOLOGY
Phenomenology rejects analytic and those scholastic philosophies preoccupied with the
construction of purely formal and logical hypothesis. This rejection is the same for
contemporary analytic thinking as well as the Buddhist hyperlogic of negation such as
the mahyamaka as well as the mentalization of hindu vedantic thinking. Phenomenology
is in opposition to the mentalization that is experientially distant from the world and its
manifestation. Phenomenology consistently returns to the experiential base of the
giveness of phenomena and appearance which is the manifestation of the
mutltidmenisonal actuality of which both the knower and the known are in oneness,
primoridal oneness. Phenomenology is ultimately the method of direct perception which
is gnosis or jnana. Husserl initially investigated direct perception as intuition and
phenomenologists now understand intuition as gnosis or direct perception. This
understanding was greatly influenced both by Heideggers and Merleau-Pontys work.
APPEARANCE AND REALITY ARE NOT DIFFERENT ONTOLOGICALLY
Phenomenology challenges the understanding that the world we live in might be nothing
but an illusion. Husserl and Heidegger both came to understand that phenomenology
being limited to the world of appearance as it is, in no way describes the world as
illusion. Heidegger, Husserl, Maurice Merleau-Ponty understood there is a prereflective
oneness between us and the world, within us and the world. This prereflective oneness
is the oneness of awareness. The oneness of awareness manifests as us and the
world. This is the oneness of space, this is the oneness of light, this is the oneness of
energy, this is the oneness of presence. There is this natural primordial nonduality from
within which the duality of phenomena arises. Duality naturally arises out of nonduality.
The duality of phenomena (the me and the you) arises out of the naturalness of the
nonduality of primordial awareness. We can experience duality of phenomena within
the nonduality of this primordial base of awareness. This relationship of duality, being
and experience is not some kind of foundational mistake. The view of negation of view
of Buddhism is completely unnecessary and reflects an alliance to tradition wherein
from the beginning there was inadequacy of the use of language, the inadequacy of
negation.
We are in the world and our subjectivity is manifested in the oneness as world. Because
of the innate perceived oneness the knower and the known, the natural ground of
realization is possible to be experienced by all beings, with natural immediacy. There is
no original sin or big mistake of hallucinating a world that does not exist.
Heidegger says the fundamental question as to whether there is a world makes no
sense since ‘dasein’ (awareness as the great expanse) is itself being in the world. The
very asking is a manifestation of being in the world. The query is self-refuting since it
presupposes that which it denies. This is also the understanding of the contemporary
phenomenological neo thomist Jacque Maritan who consistently expresses the giveness
of the world to human experience and that the knower and the known are essentially in
oneness. If there is no prereflective oneness there could be no knowingness. Direct
perception is the natural giveness of being in the world of the knower and known as
knowingness itself.
Just as phenomenology is concerned with meaning, it is concerned with appearance.
How things appear, how they manifest and what significance they have, is an integral
part of what they really are. To grasp the true nature of the object is to grasp how the
object as world manifests and reveals itself to us. The reality of the object is not hidden
behind or beyond the phenomenon, but unfolds itself in the phenomenon and as the
phenomena. As Heidegger once put it, it is phenomenologically absurd to say of the
phenomenon that it stands in the way of something more fundamental which it merely
represents.
Although the distinction between appearance and reality can be
maintained, this is not a distinction between two separate realms. This distinction is
internal to the dimensions of appearance. How the objects might appear in one gaze
and how the objects appear in and through a more subtle gaze will manifest differences
within the sameness. Different dimensions manifested by the same phenomena,
different dimensions manifested through the same phenomena.
For phenomenology the world that appears to us is the actual world although this world
may consist of multidimensional realities and is infinite in its horizons. In this world
there may exist hidden and concealed aspects of the world within the phenomenal world
itself.
Hidden and concealed dimensions of the world that allow the various
appearances to differ depending upon their manifestation of the various experiential
dimensions. There is more than one dimension to every experience. There is more than
one view. Phenomenology has both horizontal and vertical dimensions of knowingness.
The vertical represent ascendant states of the experiential field and horizontal represent
relational states of the field. The two poles are completely contributory to the sense of
stability and continuity of the awareness field. And the appearance of phenomena is
temporal and the very manifestation is duration itself.
AWARENESS AS THREE DIMENSIONS OF GIVENESS
How can we think of the three dimensions of awareness or consciousness as the three
kayas?
Pure awareness in its spaceousness or great expanse
Pure awareness as luminous radiance
Pure awareness manifesting as the embodiments of the worlds
We must think of phenomenological awareness as the three different modes of
giveness. Each of the three kayas is a different mode of giveness or presentation. In a
sense we can be aware of these different dimensions of awareness; the different
manifestations of awareness, as different manifestations of giveness of appearance, the
three dimensions of the one awareness, the three dimensions of giveness of the one
awareness.
The appearance of emptiness and spaciousness of the unmanifest
The appearance of radiance and luminosity of the manifest
The appearance of energy of the manifestation
Thus there are different ways of becoming aware of awareness and there is a relation of
manifestation between them. The appearance and manifestation of awareness has
three dimensions or three manifestations. The first is nirmanakaya which is the world
as it appears with its conventional appearance. The sambogakaya is the world as
radiant light and energy and the dharmakaya is the un-manifest view of spaciousness,
of potentiality.
Depending upon what giveness or what view is being manifested multidimensionally,
that will be the perception of the reality; of this multidimensional reality. Nirmanakaya
will seem and be reality, sambogakaya will seem and be reality and dharmakaya will
seem and be reality. From the dharmakaya view, only the dharmakaya dimension will
be actuality. From the nirmanakaya view sambogakaya and dharmakaya are actuality
and from the sambogakaya view, sambogakaya and dharmakaya are actuality. Each is
real or actual in this multidimensional reality depending upon the view.
Each view is contained within the other and present in the other in potential or in
actuality. In dharmakaya everything is present in potentiality. In nirmanakaya everything
is contained in actuality, namely sambogakaya and dharmakaya. The real or the actual
is the manifestation of each kaya and so there are different realities or actualities in
oneness. Existing or actuality is the manifestation of each reality, although each kaya
implies a different mode of existing or different dimension of existence. Each implies a
different level of subtleness and different kind of subtleness. Each reality is a different
kind of actuality and yet all are the one reality of awareness or consciousness.
From dharmakaya the others kayas are potential but may not be in actuality. From
sambogakaya, dharmakaya is present in actuality and nirmanakaya only in potentiality.
From nirmanakaya, both sambogakaya and dharmakaya are present in actuality.
In meditative awareness one may have the experience of one or all of the kayas. All of
the kayas are in oneness- in the same house, the one house with different floors or
dimensions. One is not more real than the other and one is not less real than the other.
There are three floors in the one house…there is only one house and within the house
three different floors.
The word “real” as it is often used in most Buddhist texts is a mixed and weak signifier.
There is actually nothing signified within this linguistic structure of the word real. This
aphasic view is normalized in Buddhist language, and in this normalization dissociation
is normalized. In the truest sense the real is the actual as in the actuality of potential and
the actuality of phenomena manifesting. The use of the word real as meaning inherent
existence or eternal existence is an arbitrary attribution to the word real. Something can
be composite, completely temporary and briefly real, briefly actual. To be in time does
not destroy reality but actualizes real in time and as time. Time is the manifestation of
the actual… Just as time is the manifestation of the great compassion. The statement
that only emptiness is real is linguistically without signification and inaccurate in this
contemporary language epoch.
Such languaging of the real and unreal meaning delusion is more of a historical political
and polemic statement reflecting a hopeful continuity of philosophical tradition with early
Buddhist understanding and tradition. The path from Hinayanna to Mahayana to
Vajrayana truly stretches the word real beyond all recognition. The quest of validity of
view is a consistent quest and source of quarrels throughout Buddhist history and life.
The sense of validity of thought and empowerment is based on the historical person of
the Shakyamuni Buddha who died over 2500 years ago. Much of what he is attributed to
have said takes place on the mythological dimension.
Then there is the deconstruction frame of Nagarjuna and his relentless use of lack in his
deconstruction of the actuality of experience and validity of person and the world. He
uses Madhyamaka as a way of desconstructing the actuality of time and deconstructing
the validity of a multidimensional view of reality with the use of the language of negation.
Such as it is and is not, neither is nor is not, and never was. This is a way of using
negation of language in speaking about the translucidity of the actual and its inclusive
multidimensionality. This kind of muted language forecloses the actuality of the
innateness of language as expression and manifestation of the primordial awareness
itself. There is no logos. Phenomenology understands that language is the world and is
the manifestation of reality itself. Language is the house of being. The Madhayamaka
kind of aphasia forecloses the actuality of the Samadhi of syllables. This aphasic
approach forecloses the sound dimension as well as the symbolic dimension of the vast
multidimensional reality. This kind of presentation is a loss of and foreclosure of the
power of logos, the power of awareness. Madhyamaka is the path of foreclosure.
The Dzogchen understanding easily holds the multidimensional view and also contains
the independence of the mind view as described by Longchenpa. The porousness of
reality and its various dimensions are expressed in Dzogchen understanding , yet these
teachings can be limiting and psychically unavailable to contemporary cultures because
of the rhetoric of delusion and the declared unreality of experience. In this
contemporary philosophical world, the reality of experience and perception must be
taken into the formulation of Dzogchen. The reason is that naturalistic experience is so
obvious and naturally validating. The way of negation and muteness of the symbolic and
language function as being seemingly apart from the actuality of awareness itself is a
step that actually mutes the experience of self-revelation which is the nature of the
awareness itself. Self-revelation is the nature of the primordial guru. The way of
muteness is a reflection of a view and way of life of rejection and foreclosure on human
experience as valid with a language of melancholia, nihilism and solipsism.
The phenomenological understanding of Dzogchen does not require that everything
arises only out of the mind alone, as a kind of mental projection. In early Buddhism,
there is no independence of mind reality. Outside of the mind alone nothing exists.
There is no independent reality outside of the mind.
Phenomenological understanding of Dzogchen does not require the belief that the world
is an illusion which does not exist but rather that there are multiple realities within the
same phenomena and within the same situation. Each of these realities depends upon
the other in the sense of ontological priority but are different dimensions of actuality.
Phenomena does exist in one dimension and in another dimension the phenomena may
not yet experientially exist, may not be actualized, but only exist in potentiality.
As the philosopher Brentano pointed out, there is physical reality or material reality and
there is psychic reality-one is visible and one is invisible. They are two dimensions of
experience. Because you cannot find or see the psychic does not mean it does not
exist.
UNIVOCACITY
The non-Aristotelian view of one, one substance of the world and different
manifestations does not trouble phenomenology. Or rather, the view that there is one
essence and many different manifestations does reflect phenomenology. If by each
manifestation you mean a different incidental essence with one ontological essence, this
does and can reflect phenomenology. Phenomenology is the approach of univocity
rather then analogy or equivocality. Univocity reflects the oneness of essence, of
awareness, and the world of its manifestations. Univocity is the realization of equality
consciousness and the purity of all beings.
GAZE
Awareness can become aware of its own self by the gaze turning back on the gaze.
This is not the mind turning back on its self. The mind can reflect on itself and this self
reflection can be the mind reflecting on itself, including its self as subject and its self as
object. This is a self-object relationship. When awareness becomes aware of itselfwhen awareness becomes aware of awareness- this is the praxis of knowingness
knowing knowingness. The full depth and breadth of awareness being aware of itself
may require the awareness becoming its own object, awareness being aware of itself
immanently. But this experience will never be objectified as it will never be thought.
Awareness becomes aware of itself from within itself, immanently and intrinsically.
When awareness focuses on itself it does not go outside itself to do so, awareness does
not become otherness to itself. Rather awareness focuses within itself and through
itself. Awareness locates itself within itself. It becomes itself in completeness and
fullness.
This self-manifestation of awareness can be a function of awareness gazing into
awareness but this will be a non-mindful approach or a non-thoughtful or nonconceptual approach, hence there will be no objectification.
So, first as method, there is the differentiation of the mind from awareness. Second,
there is the experience of awareness as awareness wherein the recognition of
awareness as a field phenomenon becomes manifest. This is a non-conceptual, clarity
experience. This knowingness is without conceptualization and is direct perception. This
perception of awareness of awareness in one’s self then allows for the perception of
awareness in the other. Again this experience will be unmediated and come through the
direct skills of the practitioner. The experience can be reflected upon, but the actual
experience of knowingness knowing knowingness has actually taken place. This
reflective step is the step of languaging what has taken place. Putting the experience to
words places the experience in the representational continuum.
Without the mind becoming separate from awareness, the mind reflecting on the mind
will make this an objectified process of the thinking function. And this will be a selfobject experience. The self will be conceptualized. When awareness becomes aware of
its own self directly, this will not be a conceptual experience but a direct unmediated
knowingness. Through this initial knowingness the kayas will present themselves
phenomenologically: nirmakaya, sambogakaya and dharmakaya.
LONGCHENPA: THE RELATION OF PHENOMENA TO MIND AND TO AWARENESS
The Magical Realism of Longchenpa
I will use the words of Longchenpa to describe his understanding of the relationship of
mind to awareness. Longchenpa said “Are you not asserting everything to be mind? Let
me clearly outline the distinction to be made. In general, if the world of appearance and
possibilities (whether of samsara or nirvana) is explained to be awakened mind -which
is awakened awareness, or awareness, or awareness field - what is meant is that
phenomena are alike in that they do not waver from a single awareness, and they
manifest naturally as they display dynamic energy and adornment of that awareness.
They are manifestations of awareness, primordial awareness. In this sense they are
considered to be the mind, just as one calls the rays of the sun “the sun” when one says
sit in the midday sun.”
Longchenpa continues “To hold that apparent phenomena are mind alone is to stray
from me. The manifestation of primordial awareness is not the manifestation of mind
alone. In ordinary speech some people hold apparent phenomena to be one’s own mind
alone. They speak without defining the issues involved and commit error as ordinary
mind and awakened awareness are not identical. Ordinary mind refers to the eight
modes of consciousness and their associated mental events which together constitute
the adventitious distortions affecting human beings in the three realms. Awakened
awareness refers to awareness. Naturally occurring timeless awareness has no
substance or characteristics, the basic space of all samsara and nirvana. Since the
world of appearance and possibilities arises as the dynamic energy and display of
awakened awareness, awakened awareness which is actually their cause is simply the
label applied to them as the result. While that which manifests as samsara and nirvana
is understood to be the dynamic energy of awareness, one should clearly further
understand that awareness itself constitutes an unceasing ground for the arising of
things although it has never existed as a thing, whether of samsara or nirvana.”
Longchenpa continues on, ” apparent objects are understood to be clearly apparent yet
ineffable and have never been mind alone. Empty yet clearly apparent, groundless,
timeless and pure. When freedom occurs, the dynamic energy and display in being
groundless are naturally pure which is like awakening from a dream. Thus one should
know that self-knowing awareness without ever having wavered from its original state of
natural rest. Unchanging dharmakaya is uncontaminated by any substance or
characteristic.”
Longchenpa elaborates that “the Dynamic energy is the creative potential of awareness
and accounts for the fact that samsara and nirvana arise differently, just as the very
same ray of sunlight causes a lotus to blossom to open and a night lily to close. Display
is used in the sense of the radiance of awareness, displaying itself like a lamp,
displaying itself as light or sun, displaying itself as sunbeams. Adornment refers to the
fact that naturally manifest phenomena appearing in full array arise of themselves as
adornment in light of awareness. This is similar to rainbows or the sun and moon being
adornments of the sky.”
“The essence of the dynamic energy is unceasing. Unceasing, non-dual and richly
endowed. I have shown these to be the essence of display.” Longchenpa. These quotes
I have used are from Longchenpa’s great text Words and Meaning.
EVERYTHING IS THE MANIFESTATION OF AWARENESS
Everything is a manifestation of awareness. Manifestation is the primordial giveness.
There are three modes of giveness and three manifestations of awareness, or two with
one mode being unmanifest. The manifest is the appearance of awareness. The
appearance of the manifestation of awareness is in oneness with awareness.
Appearance is ultimately the nondual oneness of awareness becoming manifest. To
become aware of awareness is to become aware of the different modes of giveness. It
is to become aware of the different manifestations as well as the unmanifested
dharmakaya. Ultimately awareness is the actuality of awareness as nirmanakaya, the
actuality of awareness as sambogakaya and the actuality of awareness as dharmakaya.
To perceive the manifestation or the giveness of awareness is to experience
nondual oneness of awareness. All objects are configurations of and within
awareness field or manifestations of the awareness field. As dharmakaya
appearances are manifestations within spaciousness, and within radiance
sambogakaya and within the elements as nirmanakaya.
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Gazing is the manifestation of gnosis. Direct perception or gnosis is our way of knowing
the giveness of awareness. So, gnosis itself has three modes as does the manifestation
of primordial awareness.
Gazing within opens the perception of the three kayas. Then from within the gaze one
gazes into the openness of the world and gazes from the gaze into pure awareness,
manifestations of luminosity and manifestations of the elements.
Gazing bypasses the mediation of the mind and yet can integrate the mediation of the
mind into the awareness field. In the way one gazes both into awareness or the
manifestations of awareness and gazes into the manifestation of nirmanakaya through
the mind in the awareness field. Awareness comes through both in the mind and
beyond the mind.
AWARENESS GAZING INTO AWARENESS
Awareness seeing awareness and awareness sees through the mind, awareness sees
both at the same time. Depending on the Place of the UNFOLDING View, the world will
seem actual or only potential. From the view within Nirmanakaya the world is
actual,phenomena, is actuality and exists. From the view within Sambogakaya
dimension the energy and luminous archetypical dimensions of the world is symbolic
and personalzed as actual and the very dimension manifests within Nirmanakaya. So
these manifestations are considered actualities. From the view of Dharmakaya the
spaciousness and emptiness of phenomena seems to that which is actual, the world of
potentiality is the only actuality...
Gazing into phenomena opens up the phenomena, opens up the giveness of
awareness. As one enters one dimension, the other dimensions of awareness easily
open and become apparent. Initially the openness of the gaze within opens up the
experience of awareness within oneself. The gaze views the same giveness of
awareness in the other and in the physical world itself. One perceives the different
dimensions of the giveness of awareness within one’s own self, within others and within
the physical world.
The oneness of awareness is apparent in the oneness of the three modes of giveness
of awareness. There is the oneness of spaciousness, there is the oneness of light, and
there is the oneness of the elements, there is the sameness of oneness of awareness
as knowingness.
NONDUALITY WITHIN DUALITY AND DUALITY WITHIN NONDUALITY
The nonduality of awareness for phenomenology takes place within the phenomenogy
of duality. And duality takes place within the oneness of nonduality of awareness. Often
in some idealistic eastern philosophical traditions in order to support nonduality the
experience of duality is denied and foreclosed. The experience of duality of me and you
in the oneness of nonduality is unseen and the experience is foreclosed. The
indivisibility between phenomena and awareness is foreclosed. Phenomena are
foreclosed. This view is often expressed in Hindu Advaita and certain forms of
Buddhism. Nonduality does not foreclose the experience of duality within nonduality.
Duality is phenomena in its infinite manifestations and nonduality is singular essence as
primordial awareness. Duality arises from within nonduality. What is called duality is the
differences or differentiatedness within oneness of nonduality. In the dialectics of
phenomenology’s magical realism duality and nonduality are not in opposition
whatsoever. Duality within nonduality is mutually inclusive and using Deluze’s language
the difference is nonessential difference.
GARAB DORJE: DEEP IMMERSION IN AWARENESS
I will utilized and transliterate the wording and understanding of Garab Dorje to describe
the experience of the deep immersion within awareness. I will phenomenologize his
language and understanding. Garab Dorge describes that given pervasive evenness or
sameness of the field in which objects manifest and are conceptualized. Nonetheless
awareness itself is not reified. And so body and mind dwell as a matter of course in the
expanse of that evenness of the field, the oneness of the field. Regardless of how
awareness appears to arise or whatever awareness manifests as a matter of course
there is no wavering from this expanse of evenness and sameness and oneness. All
difference is nonessential difference.
At the level of source or pure awareness objects with characteristics have no existence
as objects when they are abiding in a state of deep potential. They are potential but not
yet actual. Timelessly there is no duality and so no distinctions can be made. There is
only potentiality. And so even within their actuality within the nirmanakahya there are
still No distinctions between ordinary people and buddhas. There is no essential
difference between samsara and nirvana at the level of nirmanakaya. What has
substance and what lacks substance are equal in basic space. Buddhas and ordinary
beings are equal in basic pervasive space of awareness in all of its manfifestations.
Relative or conventional reality and ultimate reality are equal in basic space. These
dimensions are in oneness as oneness. Flaws and qualities are equal in basic space.
Up, down, all directions are equal in basic space. Therefore when arising, things arise
equally without being better or worst. When abiding, they abide equally without being
better or worst. When free, they are freed equally. They abide in the basic space of their
equalness. Although they arise unequally and with nonessential differences they abide
in the basic space of their equalness. Although they manfest within unequally, they
abide in the basic space of their equalness. Although they are freed unequally, they are
free within the basic space of their equalness.
It all comes down to using the term Buddhahood to refer to nothing more than one’s
own true face beholding itself.
The very essence of awareness has never existed as anything other than awareness.
So, nothing exists within awareness that is not awareness itself. There is nothing to be
found within awareness that is not free. This awareness is a field vast and infinite in its
horizons. And although objects exist within the sea of awareness, the variations of the
different objects existing in the sea of immanence are nonessential differences within
awareness . These differences themselves are nonetheless awareness. Even the
nonessential difference is awareness.
In light of this understanding Garab Dorge gives the following suggestions as path.
Rest in suchness itself. Rest within awareness as awareness. Within the ultimate heart
essence there is nothing to improve upon so positive actions bring no benefit. And there
is nothing to deteriorate and so, negative actions inflict no damage. Within infinite
spaceousness there is nothing to improve on. There is no karma within space and there
is no previous life within spaciousness.
Awareness as such, dharmakaya in all its nakedness, regardless of what virtue has
been created, nothing becomes any better and and no benefit is entailed. Since in
essence it has never been anything, karmic traces do not exist. For one immersed in
genuine being, the total resolution is called timeless awareness, pure emptiness in
which phenomena are resolved. By abiding in this very essence of awareness, those
immersed in genuine being realize this awareness. They have merged with the reality of
what is. Those who are immersed in genuine being to the very highest degree relate to
apparent phenomena in an easygoing way since virtue and harm do not exist for them.
They never fall out of self-knowing awareness as such because, for them, there is only
the understanding that awareness manifests naturally. Dakini laughter reflects this
experience.
Many people are bound by fixation. Those immersed in genuine being realize that all
phenomena manifest their freedom within the great expanse of awareness. Awareness
as the sea of potential is nonreferential. This sphere has no edges or corners. There are
no causes and condition. It is spontaneous presence free of limitations. People who
reify this state will reify enlightenment, and try to grasp liberation.
PHENOMENOLOGY OF SUBJECTIVITY WITHOUT A SUBJECT AS ENTITY
One of the great contributions of Heidegger to phenomenology was his deconstruction
of subjectivity as awareness being reduced to being a subject of mind alone or
awareness field as the property of the individual subject as mind. For many, subjectivity
is the subjectivity of the mind alone. Unhappily and unfortunately for most people, the
sense of subjectivity and sense of entity are equated.
Phenomenology allows for the experience of subjectivity without being the subjectivity of
mind alone. Pure awareness that is pervasive and is the source of individualized
awareness and individualized subjectivity understood experientially. There is the
deconstruction of subjectivity being reduced to a individualized subject as mind body
continuum; as individualized awareness. Subjectivity is the vast nonlocalized field
comparative to space. Space as knowingness, space as subject is not experienced as
an objectified thing or localized unit of experience, but is experienced as unbound vast
awareness, a limitless, nonlocalized field of pure awareness. This space both embraces
and pervades all things and beings within it. This is the space of pure awareness or
pure subjectivity or pure knowingness without being located alone as knower as entity
or subject. In other words subjectivity without a subject…knowingess without the
knower. Or as the knower knows knowingness the knower is only knowingness beyond
time and space and in time and space.
So subjectivity is primordial awareness unborn and undying and is located within
subjectivity as mind and body. Hence there is the double play of subjectivity as
awareness within mind and body and awareness which is nonlocal. So the person can
experience the range of subjectivity given to him or her. From highly contained within
mind and body to becoming aware of awareness itself; becoming unbound and
experiencing subjectivity as primordial space itself.
And so all knowingness both localized within a subject and nonlocalized is pervasive, is
the same knowingness. There is knowingness without a knower and knowingness
within infinite knowers. It is impossible to think of knowingness without a knower, but
this is the very ultimate nature of awareness.
Even in death the mind may dissolve but subjectivity is indestructible, the true vajra is
your subjectivity itself. The subjectivity of the mind body configuration is a manifestation
of primordial subjectivity itself. The subjectivity of mind is primordial subjectivity veiled
within the mind and body configuration of space and time. Timeless awareness is
subjectivity without a subject.
In this understanding the very sense of personal subjectivity is the manifestation of pure
awareness, primordial awareness. And thus the simple act of becoming aware of
awareness is the path of oneness, nonduality. As Husserl so often exclaimed “what is
the wonder of all wonders, pure consciousness, and the doorway is our own
subjectivity.”
Rudolph Bauer, Ph.D. A.B.P.P.Author.
The Washington Center For Consciousness Studies. Elizabeth Ebaugh, MSW. Editor