[Buddha-l] Aka-lika Forum

[jkirk]

 -----Original Message-----
From: buddha-l-bounces at mailman.swcp.com
[mailto:buddha-l-bounces at mailman.swcp.com] On Behalf Of Alberto
Todeschini


Curt Steinmetz wrote:

> 
> A little later, Leighton says this:
> 
> "This complex story of the underground bodhisattvas and the
Buddha's 
> inconceivable life span expresses the vastness and the
immanence of 
> the sacred in space as well as time and breaks open limited, 
> conventional, linear perspectives of both space and time....
The 
> visions portrayed in this story demonstrate a foundation for
the 
> development of East Asian Mahayana practices of transcendent
faith and 
> ritual enactment of buddhahood, dependent not on lifetimes of
arduous 
> practice, but rather on immediate, unmediated, and intuitional 
> realization of the fundamental ground of awakening."
> 
> Personally I could nit-pick over the rather broad (vague)
nature of 
> pronouncements about "break[ing] open limited, conventional,
linear 
> perspectives...". But I haven't ready anything more than what
amazon 
> provides in their "preview" - so quite possibly he gets down to

> specifics later on.
=========================
Hi Curt and thanks for the quote.

I don't quite understand. Perhaps I'm spiritually impaired,
transcendentally obtuse or intuitionally challenged. Or am I just
too spatially and temporally linear to get it?

What on earth does that passage from Leighton mean?

Best,

Alberto Todeschini
=================================

Indeed, and also what I'm wondering is what to make of the sci-fi
turn the text is taking, for ex.:
" whereupon, 'from out of the open space under the ground'
simultaneously spring forth vast numbers of experienced,
dedicated bodhisattvas.... Sakyamuni declares that for countless
ages all of these numerous bodhisattvas have been diligently
practicing under the ground,"

and

"Sakyamuni declares that he himself has trained all these
underground bodhisattvas.... 
etc etc.

These underground bodhisattvas remind me of a contemporary theory
in late-night am radio of a separate world of shadow-people.
Maybe they are the undergrounders?

So, aside from hallucinations, what else?

Joanna