[Buddha-l] Tortoise mind?

[L.S. Cousins]

Erik,

You wrote:
>>>I would say that this is purely concentration (samadhi) and it is 
>>>very much in line with the ontological dualism of the Giita 
>>>(Arjuna is advised to start the battle, because only the bodies of 
>>>the combattants suffer and not the souls). This is in my view due 
>>>to samkhya influence. Samkhya promisses moksha via separation of 
>>>purusha (citta) and prak.rti (kevalam or isolation), so a first 
>>>step would be to 'forget' the sensual stimuli, which then would 
>>>become nonexistent, because when the mind no longer mixes with the 
>>>sensual organs, they stop functioning.

I commented:
>>Just a quick correction. Purus.a is not mind, but rather something 
>>like spirit i.e. 'our real nature'. Both mind and matter constitute 
>>prakr.ti, the alien nature with which we falsely identify. The goal 
>>of Saam.khya (including some Upanis.ads) is the unity which occurs 
>>when false identification ceases.

You objected:
>If you make corrections why not do it correctly? The word 'mind' has 
>such a wide variety of meanings that my first explanation could very 
>well be interpreted as correct. Puru.sa is the mind in Hegelian or 
>Fichtian sense.

But you used the word citta which I rendered as 'mind'. I do not 
think non-Vedaantin Saam.khyas would ever refer to purus.a as citta, 
although I am open to correction on this.

>And if you insist Lance, I would rather call puru.sa the noumenon or 
>logos, but certainly not a spirit. The mind that you consider part 
>of prak.rti, the ahamkara and the manas, I would rather call mental 
>formations, they are phenomena.

Well, I would include also buddhi and the primal generative nature 
itself. I do not recall much about Hegel or Ficht's understanding of 
mind, but it seems unlikely that it corresponds to the wholly other 
and wholly non-interfering purus.a. I rendered that as 'spirit', not 
'a spirit'.

>>Buddhists have traditionally held that this is a misinterpretation 
>>of some kind of formless attainment. I do not know what the 
>>followers of
>>Saam.khya would have replied to that.
>>
>Probably what you already mentioned: that it's about realizing your 
>own nature.

That seems reasonable.

We should probably not discuss Saam.khya at length on a Buddhist 
discussion list. My main reason for commenting is that I think that 
Saam.khya tends to be misrepresented - probably because it has almost 
no present-day adherents. So whereas for Buddhism and Vedaanta we 
have common access to both emic and etic presentations, for Saamkhya 
only etic presentations (and Buddhist or Vedaantin emic descriptions 
of Saam.khya) are available. The result is a rather distorted picture.

Lance Cousins