Cory Patrick wrote:If God doesn’t have any cause, and my seeking for enlightenment is part of God, then wouldn’t it be logical to say that my seeking for enlightenment and even my enlightenment itself both have no cause?
If you define enlightenment as the manifestation of the Tao, then there are no causes for it, because it is the Tao.
Or, if enlightenment is being in harmony with the Tao, then it is a part of the Tao, in relation to it. So then it is caused by not-being-in-harmony-with-the-Tao.
My seeking for enlightenment and my enlightenment are undivided from the body of cause and effect. Like you say, there is only one un-caused whole. Therefore, my seeking for enlightenment and my enlightenment, because they are at one with God - are without cause. My seeking for companionship (sexual or otherwise), higher position in my career, my effort to become better physically and mentally, my desire to do drugs, to read a book, to become enlightened, etc…..all of these are un-unique tendencies - -they are simply the superficial expression of ones longing for superiority (which is one with ones sensibility of inferiority). (2 sides of one coin, not causual) The painful/enthusiastic drive to be superior is not a choice, it is simply a fact that mingles with ones logic. The logic that ‘in part’ determines one’s behavior can be idiosyncratic, as well as common, whereas, the emotions, fears, drives and passions (which are akin to root below the branches of logic) are always common.
The belief that one's real nature is really only one side of the coin of Nature does indeed drive all the drives to be superior, and get control of the "other side". Choices based on this belief, whether deliberated or instinctive, are consequently flawed logic. They fail to take into account that one's real nature is the body of all things, which is bodiless cause and effect.
There are simply qualities of conditioning’s, design, pressure, release. All the myriad forms that humanity takes are an attempt at release, relief in response to the involuntary pressure of life. One is enveloped by certain pressures, conditionings, inner and outer. None of which have a cause. There is only one coin. 'Heads' does not cause 'tails'. Conditioning, pressure, and release are not so much outcomes, effects, but are configurations without cause - -and thus, ultimately, ‘ there is only one without cause’.
You seem to be heading towards the notion that there are no causes at all, based on the logic that there is no one thing that can cause everything. It's flawed because it states everything is caused by not-causes!
Ultimately, everything is God. Logical processes are seamlessly part of God. Yet it is obvious that they are not illogical processes. Being responsible for all processes and conditioning, God itself cannot be processed or conditioned. Once this conditionlessness is realised, there is no need to seek freedom from conditions.
I often recall this no-fuss description of how to understand God:
The biggest obstacle for the serious student seeking to become enlightened is his natural habit of trying to grasp at Reality as though it were a "thing" of some kind, as though it were a limited phenomenon separated from himself. He might be aware that he is unenlightened, it might deeply dissatisfy him and strongly motivate him to want to rectify the situation. But because he does not yet comprehend the nature of Reality, he is hampered by his flawed understanding and wrongly interprets Reality to be a realm which needs to be mentally reached in some way.
He might think of it as a state of mind, for example, which needs to be brought into his consciousness; or as a hidden essence which has to be uncovered; or as a kind of spiritual realm which he can open himself up to by breaking out of his web of delusions, much like a young bird breaking out of its egg. All of these conceptions are fundamentally deluded because they are rooted in the illusion of duality. They are based in a division of Nature into two arbitrary realms - that of enlightenment and ignorance, or Reality and non-Reality - which is itself a creation of ignorance. Such a division automatically traps one in a dualistic prison and prevents one from realizing the Infinite Reality in which one is already immersed.
Instead of seeing things in terms of cause and effect, I see only differing qualities of conditionings, relationships and energy. Wisdom is to see what conditionings are misery and what is peace, and from there, deal with what one has no choice to deal with by whatever means ones logic is capable of conjuring. The capability of ones logic isn’t a choice. Ones actions are not a choice. They are simply peaceful or misery bound.
So you say ‘cause and effect’ and I say ‘conditioning’ - - I guess are logic is the same, just a different mask of verbiage?
Deeply-ingrained instincts to regard things as inherent are still based on flawed logic. There are conditions that are free of illogical notions, and there are conditions that aren't.
I read that cartoon: that which is caused is an illuision, that which is an illusion is caused.
It was a neat cartoon, but I don't agree. Illusion are real, they are energy bound into a configuration undivided from outer and inner configurations which extend infinitely comprising the undivided uncaused body of energy(god). Deception is not caused. It simply is, or is not.
I think David is saying that any particular conditions that appear aren't really on their own, and separate from what they aren't. So the finiteness of an appearance is an illusion.
Yet the understanding of the illusoriness of all "separate appearances" is also not on its own, but is seamlessly part of the Tao. Thus, any experience can be understood to be the continuing unfoldings of the Tao.
K
