#FiveWisdoms

The Rūpa Skandha – Part 3: The Body

This is Article No. 7 in the ‘Buddhism’ series.

It is also the third of ten articles, which explore the ’emptiness’, or non-personal nature, of the ‘Form’, or ‘conceptual form’, aspect of our cognitive-perceptual experience – that which Buddhist tradition calls the rūpa skandha. Together these articles make up a single longer article, or ten-part mini-series of articles, which are best read in order. When all these articles are published, you will be able to click on the titles below to access the other parts.

The Rūpa Skandha – Part 1: Thinking and Wisdom

The Rūpa Skandha – Part 2: The Mirror-Like Wisdom

The Rūpa Skandha – Part 4: Mindfulness and Emptiness

The Rūpa Skandha – Part 5: Dharma and Truth

The Rūpa Skandha – Part 6: Consciousness and Qualia

The Rūpa Skandha – Part 7: The Heart Sutra

The Rūpa Skandha – Part 8: Perfect Speech

The Rūpa Skandha – Part 9: Equanimity and Being

Bringing Awareness ‘Into the Body’

I find the notion of Being, which I introduced in my last article (here) to be an extremely useful notion for making a deeper connection with the practice of Mindfulness of ‘the Form of the Body’ (kaya), which is the first of the ‘ Four Foundations of Mindfulness’ and corresponds with the rūpa skandha. In that article, I also pointed out the way the Buddha, not only took the existing ancient Indian ‘Five Skandhas’ teaching and gave his own interpretation of it – but adapted the same five-fold enquiry framework in the creation of his ‘Four Foundations of Mindfulness’ model. The diagram below shows the correspondences between the skandhas and ‘Foundations’.

The implicit choice on the part of the Buddha, to address the rūpa skandha, or ‘Form’, or Thinking aspect of the mind, by the advice to bring awareness into the ‘Form of the Body’ (Kaya) is deeply significant, and has, for me, a wonderfully contemporary feel about it. Many modern psychotherapists, heirs to the various traditions within psychoanalysis and humanistic psychotherapy, would say the same. We could even think of this first ‘Foundation of Mindfulness’ as the first ‘exercise’ at the Buddha’s Mindfulness workshop. The first step in his ’embodied Consciousness’ training – in the Buddha’s systematic and comprehensive program of personal, transpersonal and spiritual healing – was to ‘bring awareness into the body’ by being aware of our body’s position in space as we go about our lives.

‘Bringing awareness into the body’ does not stop there however – with the rūpa skandha and the first ‘Foundation of Mindfulness’, which is kaya, or Mindfulness of ‘the Form of the Body’. It is important to understand, that what the Buddha is addressing in his ‘Four Foundations of Mindfulness’ framework, is not a model in which the first ‘Foundation’, and first skandha, relates to the ‘body’ and all the rest are aspects of ‘mind’. On the contrary, all the Foundations, and all the skandhas, are aspects of an integrated ‘body-mind’ experience. Moreover, the whole four-fold process is one of deepening into the experience of embodied Consciousness, at successively deeper levels – starting with Mindfulness of ‘the Form of the Body’ (kaya), and then working round the mandala in a clockwise direction.

This notion of embodied Consciousness is fundamental to our understanding – there is no Mind / Body split in the Buddha’s model, and it would be a terrible mistake for us to introduce one. This is why it is so important that we do not mistake the rūpa skandha for ‘body’, and do not take Mindfulness of Kaya literally and narrowly as somehow denoting the totality of bodily experience. We would do well perhaps, to think of ‘the form of the body’ (rūpa / kaya), not as ‘the body’ but as our doorway into the body-mind – our doorway into that deeper and fuller experience of ourselves which can be spoken of in terms of ‘ the somatic’, or of ’embodiment’. The form of the body is the venue for, and the starting point for, our exploration – and while as the apparent container of our somatic process, it is, more importantly, itself contained by Consciousness.

June 6, 2020

The Ten Archetypal Buddhas of the Mandala – Part 3: Resting as Consciousness

This article is the third of fifteen articles inspired by the central five verses of the ‘Inspiration-Prayer for Deliverance from the Dangerous Pathway of the Bardo’, in which I shall be aiming to show meditators how each one of the ten deities of the Dharmadhātu Mandala can be felt in the fields of the body as profound suprapersonal sources of somatic healing and wisdom. Those who read the whole series of articles – and it is intended that these articles should be read in sequence – will be able to incorporate these reflections into their meditation practice in a systematic way. The first article in the series can be found here; brief summaries of all the articles can be found here; you can read the previous article in the series here; and you can read the five verses here.

In the five central verses of the ‘Inspiration-Prayer for Deliverance from the Dangerous Pathway of the Bardo’ (you can read those verses here), we are shown the five ‘light-paths’ that lead us from ignorance to wisdom – from identification with the skandhas, and with the self-illusion, to a recognition of the ’emptiness’ of the skandhas and to the realisation of the five Wisdoms. In order to begin to explore each skandha / Wisdom light-path, I shall be describing each of the five kleshas and five Realms; and each of the five Wisdoms, and the five ‘Buddha couples’ that correspond to them.

The Vijñāna Skandha, the Klesha of Spiritual Ignorance (avidyā), and the Deva Realms

When, through spiritual ignorance, I wander in samsara,
on the luminous light-path of the dharmadhātu wisdom,
may Blessed Vairocana go before me,
and White Tara behind me.

We need to start in the centre of the mandala, with the central skandha / Wisdom light-path, which is the white light-path of the ’empty’ vijñāna skandha, which is Consciousness. In conventional egoic perception, we identify with the vijñāna skandha and personalise it – we take Consciousness to be personal. It could be said that this ignorance of the suprapersonal nature of Consciousness is the foundational klesha – the ‘spiritual ignorance’ from which all the other kleshas inevitably follow. To release this personalisation of Consciousness, and the egoic self-view idea that springs from it, is the beginning of Wisdom. When we are truly mindful, and learn to ‘rest as Consciousness’ in meditation, we are resting in the recognition that Consciousness is in fact an objective and collective reality. By ‘seeing through’ our habitual personalisation of Consciousness we begin to recognise that personal self-hood is just an illusion that we have created – an illusion that we will inevitably continue to create, and will move in an out of, until we are fully realised.

In the Buddhist texts there are two words used for this spiritual ignorance. These are moha and avidyā, and both are sometimes used in the ‘five kleshas‘ list. While the term moha is also taken to mean delusion, confusion, and dullness, or unconsciousness in general, the term avidyā is preferable, in my view, because it generally refers more specifically to the spiritual ignorance of personalising Consciousness, and to the egoic belief in a separate self.

It is clarifying to remember that the klesha of ‘spiritual ignorance’ is the deep rooted habit of egoic personalisation that is the distinguishing characteristic of the Deva Realms – and is the reason for the devas’ bondage to conditioned existence, despite their ability to dwell in ultra-refined and extremely ‘positive’ mental states. When we are talking in the context of the five-fold mandala model of mind, which crystalised during the Mahayana period of Indian Buddhism, and became the underlying structure for the Vajrayana teachings of Tibetan Buddhism, it is also helpful to think of this klesha as the ‘spiritual ignorance’ that is the opposite of the Dharmadhātu Wisdom. In other words, avidyā is that ignorance which is our failure to recognise the ’emptiness’, or non-personal nature of Consciousness – the ’emptiness’ of the vijñāna skandha. So avidyā is the klesha that leads us, when we are in the ‘intermediate state’ – the bardo between lives – to be drawn toward rebirth in the Deva Realms, rather than toward recognition of our true nature as the white light of the Dharmadhātu Wisdom, which shines from the figures of Vairocana and White Tara (originally Ākāshadhātvishvari).

April 30, 2020

The Ten Archetypal Buddhas of the Mandala – Part 2: The Inspiration-Prayer

This article is the second of fifteen articles inspired by the ‘Inspiration-Prayer for Deliverance from the Dangerous Pathway of the Bardo’, in which I shall be aiming to show meditators how each one of the ten deities of the Dharmadhātu Mandala can be felt in the fields of the body as profound suprapersonal sources of somatic healing and wisdom. Those who read the whole series of articles – and it is intended that these articles should be read in sequence – will be able to incorporate these reflections into their meditation practice in a systematic way. The first article in the series can be found here; brief summaries of all the articles can be found here; and you can read the five verses here.

Padmasambhava – The Second Buddha

I have a great love of the Bardo Thodol, or ‘Tibetan Book of the Dead’. It contains powerful truths about the nature of mind. I regard Padmasambhava, it’s author, as the second Buddha, as the Tibetan Buddhists do. I see the Bardo Thodol as a wonderful distillation of many of the essential elements of the Mahayana phase of Buddhism, at a crucial time when its Vajrayana phase was being born. While I love early Buddhism and the historical Buddha, my belief is that, if we are seeking radical transformation and self-realisation in this lifetime, our approach to meditation and insight practice benefits enormously from the incorporation of the key Mahayana and Vajrayana insights that can be found in the Bardo Thodol.

An important thing to understand about the Bardo Thodol is that we do not have to believe in it as a literal description of how rebirth takes place, to find it nevertheless, to be of the utmost value. The profound wisdom that it contains is in the form of archetypal psychology. It speaks to us, in the language of imagery and symbolism, of things that can only be pointed to, and felt as a resonance in the fields of the body – not known objectively and conceptually.

The fact that the Bardo Thodol came to be called the ‘Tibetan Book of the Dead’ is probably unfortunate. That was the name, given to it by early Western students of Tibetan Buddhism, of the collection of Padmasambhava’s teachings that includes verses to be read over the corpse after a person has died. It is nothing like the ‘Egyptian Book of the Dead’ with which comparison was made at that time. Bardo, or more correctly the two words bar do, are Tibetan for ‘intermediate state’; and Thodol, is actually two Tibetan words – thos, which is Tibetan for ‘hearing’ as well as ‘philosophical studies’, and grol, which means ‘liberation’. Hence a better translation of Bardo Thodol would be Liberation Through Hearing in the Intermediate State.

Padmasambhava, the ‘Lotus Born’ – also called Guru Rinpoche.

To understand the great value and importance to the Bardo Thodol, we need to understand that a bardo is more than just an intermediate state between lives – i.e. when we have died and are in the process of being reincarnated. Rather, a bardo is any moment of transition, any moment of choice – indeed any moment of Consciousness. To be truly conscious is to recognise that every moment of every life situation is a bardo – a moment of freedom and potentiality in which profound transformation is possible.

April 15, 2020

The Five Skandhas – Dakini Wisdom

This is Article No 3 in the ‘Buddhism’ series.

The Dharmādhatu Wisdom, the central Wisdom in the Five Wisdoms mandala, refers to the non-dual understanding that the historical Buddha referred to in terms of Emptiness (Pali – suññatā; Sanskrit – shūnyatā) – the absence of any separate self-nature in all beings and in all things. So the Dharmādhatu Wisdom can be thought of as the ability to rest as Consciousness knowing that the root of that experience is entirely impersonal. It can also be characterised as the knowledge that Consciousness is like a single universal light; or an all-pervading expanse of benevolent intelligence; or as a infinite compassionate space in which we, and everything else, are held and loved.

The Dharmādhatu Wisdom is also the wisdom of Mindfulness, the wisdom of Balance, the wisdom of Humility – but especially, it is the wisdom of Emptiness. Importantly, Buddhist tradition tells us that if we manage to acheive a degree of spiritual development without endeavouring to also recognise Emptiness, we will personalise our experience of Consciousness, and will be trapped in the spiritual delusion and refined narcissism that are the culture and consciousness of the Deva Lokas, or God Realms – which I briefly described in my previous article (here).

Consciousness, Mindfulness, and ‘Remembering’

Mindfulness and Consciousness are very closely related, but not synonymous. The objective and collective space of Consciousness does not need to be cultivated, but Mindfulness does. To be Mindful is to be choosing to rest as Consciousness in the midst of life. We cultivate Mindfulness by a process of more fully ‘embodying’ Consciousness in various ways. The Buddha talked about this process of embodying Consciousness in a variety of ways – often using four-fold mandala formulations like the brahmavihāras, or five-fold mandala formulations like the ‘Five Skandhas‘ and the ‘Five Spiritual Faculties’ (indriyas). One of the Buddha’s most important formulations however, was the four ‘Foundations of Mindfulness’ (satipatthāna – Pali; smrtyupasthāna – Sanskrit) – yet another expression of the mandala archetype. I shall be exploring these four categories in detail in future articles, but have listed them in the table below, and in the second of the two mandala diagrams below that.

While we might at first think that we become conscious, or realise Consciousness, by a heroic effort of personal will power, this is an inadequate way of describing the process. Rather, we become conscious by acknowledging that Consciousness is who we are – in essence. The path therefore is better characterised as one in which we ‘rest’, and allow Consciousness to pervade all our activities. This allowing, this surrender to our true nature, this ‘letting go’ process, by which the light and space of Consciousness is received into every fibre of our being, and pervades every nook and cranny of our lives, is Mindfulness. This process of the embodiment of Consciousness via an attitude of receptivity, relaxation, surrender, and ‘resting’, can be characterised as feminine, relative to the intentional, purposeful, willful attitude, which is more often associated with Mindfulness, and which can be characterised as masculine. The validation of this more neglected attitude, which we can think of as archetypally feminine, is one of the main themes of this article.

October 6, 2019

Akashadhateshvari / White Tara – Luminous Space

This is Article No. 2 in the ‘Buddhism’ series.

Following on from my last article (here), there is much more that we need to explore in regard to the Dharmadhātu Wisdom. This is the Wisdom which is associated with the recognition of Consciousness, and with the centre of the mandala, and may be regarded as representing the source of the other four Wisdoms. Metaphorically, we can think of the relationship between the white centre of the Buddhist mandalas and its associated Dharmadhātu Wisdom, and the four colours of the quadrants – the other four Wisdoms – in a somewhat similar way to the way we might think of a source of pure white sunlight being split into the colours of the rainbow.

The Dharmadhātu Wisdom is the Wisdom that Buddhist tradition personifies in the figure of the archetypal Buddha Vairocana, the ‘Illuminator’, or more accurately in his female Buddha partner, the mysterious and powerful figure of Akashadhatvishvari (please see my note at the end of this article on the two different spellings of this name). Strictly speaking the male Buddha Vairocana represents the compassionate activities of wisdom teaching that arise from the experience or the Dharmadhātu Wisdom, whereas the female buddha Akashadhatvishvari personifies the Dharmadhātu Wisdom itself. The Sanskrit word ākāsha has a ring of profound mystery about it. It is akin to the quintessence, or ether, in western alchemical thought – the subtle, intelligent substance that pervades all space, and from which the other four elements are created. Perhaps the best modern equivalent would be something like ‘Quantum Space’ or ‘the Quantum Field’. Vibrant with energy and information, ākāsha is the primordial space of Consciousness that is the basis of everything. A reasonable English translation therefore, of Akashadhatvishvari, would be something like ‘Sovereign Lady of Infinite Space’.

Consciousness: Presence and Connection; Light and Space

I have previously talked of the Buddha couple in the centre of the mandala as personifications of Presence and Connection (here), which are the principles at the centre of my ‘NVC mandala’ (the four components in Marshall Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication model – more on that here), but these archetypal Buddhas are multidimensional figures, and are much more than this – indeed all conceptualisations in regard to them are only ways of drawing a little closer to an indefinable mystery. My first response personally, when I reflect on this central ‘divine marriage’ image and its traditional names and associations, is to think of them as representing the metaphorical union of Light and Space in the experience of Consciousness.

The experience of Consciousness, or awareness of being aware, is difficult to describe. The words and images that various spiritual traditions have used to approach that experience are often misleading – being religious projections rather than attempts at objective description. Buddhist tradition, especially that of the Indian Mahayana, whose libraries and culture were unfortunately destroyed by Moslem invasions, is clearly distinguishable from other religions by both its commitment to objectivity in its intellectual analysis, and by the subtlety of the myths, images and metaphors by which it points to the unconditioned reality of Consciousness. Central among these metaphorical pointers were Light and Space.

It is as if Consciousness is an ever-present light within – a bright inner luminosity that never fails us, but is rarely acknowledged or examined. It is the diamond in our pocket that we do not know about; the beautiful gift that has been delivered to us, never to be actually received and unwrapped. It is not surprising perhaps, that in general, humanity fails to recognise Consciousness. While Consciousness is an objective reality, it is not an object like any other, and neither is it the subjective personal self that we often take it to be. The Buddha described it as ’empty’ – empty of self. As the Buddhist tradition established itself over the centuries, it increasingly acknowledged that this impersonal emptiness was also luminous and spacious – still difficult metaphors, but they bring us closer to the experience. And the word shunyata, Sanskrit for Emptiness, came to have these extremely positive associations of luminosity and spaciousness – connoting an infinitely abundant collective source of all truth, goodness, healing and positive transformation.

June 15, 2019

The Dharmadhātu Wisdom

This is Article No.1 in the ‘Buddhism’ series.

In the last article (here) we looked at Compassion through the lens of the All-Accomplishing Wisdom, the wisdom which supports healing, wholeness and compassionate activity, by grounding it in balanced, all-encompassing and multidimensional awareness of the energetic dimensions of our experience. This balanced and comprehensive quality is symbolised by the mandalas of Buddhist tradition. One of the curiosities of the All-Accomplishing Wisdom is that it is associated with the mandala-like symbol of the vishva vajra – the universal vajra, or Vajra Cross – which is usually understood to symbolise ‘the separation and reconciliation of the opposites‘. The mandala, we are being told, is a vishva vajra, and the vishva vajra is a mandala. Non-dual wisdom, it would seem therefore, is most comprehensive, and finds its most practical and effective expression as Compassion, when it is recognised as having five dimensions. And because of the particular dynamics between the components of the egoic mind and their relationship to Consciousness, it is well symbolised by a mandala or a cross.

My intention with the previous articles – in the ‘Meditation Guidance’ series – has been to provide information that may be of interest to readers with a general interest in meditation, self-enquiry practice, and non-duality teachings, while also drawing on relevant information from Marshall Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication (NVC) model, and from other relevant psychological models, especially that of Carl Jung . While I hope to engage the same broad audience in my future articles, this article is the first of a series of longer articles that is aiming to go much deeper into the Buddha’s teachings, so I have created a new ‘Buddhism’ category for them.

The Four Brahmavihāras and the Five Wisdoms

Although my previous writing in this ‘Meditation Guidance’ series has been informed by an awareness of the corresponding Wisdoms in the Five Wisdoms framework from Mahayana Buddhism, the main mandala framework used in the early articles was that of the ancient Indian brahmavihāras: Equanimity, Appreciative Joy, Loving Kindness and Compassion. The Five Wisdoms, which I introduced in a previous article here, have some advantages over the four-fold brahmavihāras framework, but the brahmavihāras give us a simpler ‘way in’ to the experience of meditation, and they give us a necessary initial focus on the ethical and relational aspects of the personal transformation that arises from resting as Consciousness.

The brahmavihāras also represent an earlier, foundational stage in the development of the mandala wisdom within the Buddhist tradition. The Buddha appears to have adopted them enthusiastically and re-framed them, adapting them to the new context of his anatma (no-self) doctrine – more on this below. In the four-fold brahmavihāras framework, the central, fifth part of the model, which is Consciousness, is implied – the brahmavihāras can be seen as the four ‘attitudes’ of Consciousness. In the five-fold Five Wisdoms model, the central principle, of Consciousness, is explicitly included as one of the Wisdoms – the Dharmadhātu Wisdom.

January 1, 2019

Compassion and the All-Accomplishing Wisdom

This is Post 41 in the ‘Meditation Guidance’ series.

Making use of the rich mandala-form analysis of the dynamics of cognition and perception that Carl Jung called the ‘Four Functions of Consciousness’ (which parallels the ancient Indian skandhas), we recognise that the green Northern Quadrant in the Buddhist meditation mandalas, is related to the perceptual function of Intuition-Volition. Carl Jung, who identified himself as an Introverted Intuitive type, was writing in the face of great intellectual resistance from the scientific materialist consensus, when he presented his mandala-form psychological model – a model that is distinguished not just by its inclusion of the function of Intuition, but by its embrace of the archetypal and energetic dimensions of psychological reality.

All Life Energies are Compassionate and Life-Serving

In my last two articles (here and here) I have also been drawing heavily on the psychological model of Nonviolent Communication (NVC) which was developed by Marshall Rosenberg, as a way of illuminating the non-dual wisdom of the green Northern Quadrant, which the Buddhist tradition calls the All-Accomplishing Wisdom. The NVC model stands out as another mandala-form psychological framework, which not only includes the Intuition-Volition component, but includes this dimension in the most practical and powerful way in relation to the practice of self-empathy.

NVC does this by recognising that what we experience as a situation of need or apparent lack, is arising not only from an objective Current Reality in the world of Sensation (Southern Quadrant), but from volitional Life Energies (Northern Quadrant), which are apprehended by the function of Intuition in those who are observing the situation. We can say therefore, that it is our internal relationship to the Life Energies of desire, longing and aspiration, that gives us our perception of a Need – and is the key to the creative and self-empathetic attitude that will bring healing to our psychological parts on the inside, and the communication style that will ‘get our needs met’ on the outside.

December 16, 2018

Overview Part 1 – A Mandala Framework for Meditation and Self-Enquiry

The approach to meditation that I have adopted in the ‘Meditation Guidance’ series of articles is unusual because it brings together elements from philosophical, spiritual, and psychological traditions that do not usually cross-pollinate, and tend not to understand each other. My aim in this article is to provide an overview of my approach, and to show why I have found the relatively unknown brahmavihāras to be so essential to my framework for meditation and self-enquiry.

My Psychological and Spiritual Influences

Although I was born into a nominally Christian family and a nominally Christian culture, my first real spiritual education, in my twenties, was in a Western Buddhist tradition that integrated Theravada, Mahayana, and Vajrayana elements, with a special emphasis on re-creating something of the spirit of the lost Indian Mahayana in a Western cultural context – especially the spirit of the Bodhisattva Ideal. I then became a Quaker for 10 years, and subsequently studied with a number of different Advaita Vedanta (non-Buddhist non-duality) teachers.

Although I worked in General Psychiatry settings for many years (as an Occupational Therapist), the main psychological perspectives that I have drawn on personally are those are Carl Jung, Eugene Gendlin (original developer of the ‘Focusing’ self-empathy/self-enquiry practice), and Marshall Rosenberg (originator of the Nonviolent Communication model).

Returning to Meditation – A Fresh Approach

Since my return to meditation in 2016, my daily practice has been experimental, personal, and driven by my own self-enquiry into the nature of Consciousness. Although it has been informed to some extent by my reflections on my Buddhist studies in my twenties, the new approach that has emerged from my meditative enquiry bares almost no relation to anything that I was formally taught at that time. The success of this new approach – in supporting my own mental and emotional development – has been so marked that I have felt strongly motivated to share my experience as best I can.

The Mandala as a Psychological Map

Like Carl Jung, I love to make connections, and to notice the archetypal patterns that inform our lives and inform our psychological and spiritual models. A particular fascination since I discovered the archetype in my early twenties, has been the mandala. A great diversity of mandala images, representing forms of cosmology and psychology that are based on a four-fold model of the Divine, are seen in vastly different cultures across history and across the globe. The most refined expressions of the mandala archetype, in Carl Jung’s view, and in mine, are the mandala images that can still be seen today in Tibetan Buddhism, but which originally emerged in the form that we are familiar with, during the Indian Mahayana period.

The Bardo Thodol – Tibetan Book of the Dead

Carl Jung found the mandala that is described in the Bardo Thodol (or Tibetan Book of the Dead) to be a revelation. Among other things, the mandala wisdom of the Bardo Thodol integrates, and establishes correspondences between, three key symbolic formulations, each of which can be arranged as a mandala or quaternity: the Five Wisdoms; the Five Skandhas; and five of the Six Realms (all except the Animal Realm). The combination of his understanding of the Tibetan symbolic system, and his years of dream analysis with his patients, gave Jung the conviction he needed to publish his ground-breaking and comprehensively detailed Psychological Types essay, which described a mandala-form model of the psyche.

Carl Jung’s Genius and Gift to Humanity

The importance of Jung’s Psychological Types is not widely appreciated. What made the ideas in that essay so important as a spiritual document was the way it explained the egoic Shadow in such detail, and so comprehensively described the oppositions within the archetypal mandala structure of the egoic mind. It explained, via these oppositions, the various ways in which the natural human ethical sensibility is so easily lost, so that profound inhumanity becomes possible, and has been witnessed so frequently in human history. The weight of the understanding that Jung presented in that paper, was equal to, and similar in importance in my view, to the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths, since, like that teaching, it demonstrated both the nature of our psychological dysfunction and egoic bondage, and the means of our liberation from it, through Consciousness.

Jung_Functions

These oppositions (between Feeling and Thinking; and between Intuition/Volition and Sensation in particular) are a key feature of Jung’s mandala – symbolising the way that Consciousness allows us to ‘hold the tension’ between these opposites. This need to achieve a separation of these opposites and a reconciliation of them at a higher level, that was so well descried by Jung – is seldom highlighted, even in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition where knowledge of these dynamics is identified symbolically as a key aspect of the All-Accomplishing Wisdom, which plays such an important part in that model.

The Five Skandas – Lost in Translation?

In the articles in the ‘Meditation Guidance’ series, I have for the sake of brevity, avoided engaging with the understandable but disastrous historical mistranslations and loss of meaning that has made the wonderful Five Skandhas teaching so impenetrable and almost valueless for most modern students of Buddhism. Instead I have made use of Jung’s Four Functions of Consciousness, which I believe play the same role in Jung’s mandala structure of the psyche that the Five Skandhas teaching is intended to do in the Buddhist tradition.

Skandhas_Jung

Both Carl Jung’s four perceptual functions, and the ancient Indian Skandhas provide a framework for analysing the way in which, in the absence of a deep recognition of the nature of Consciousness, the component elements of the perceptual process collapse into the illusion of a separate self. I would very much like to present an analysis of where the Skandhas appear to have got lost in the course of history. Although I have not yet published on this, I have written about it, I would very much like to post an article on this important theme in the future.

The Male and Female Archetypal Buddhas of the Mandala

Although I have personally found the beautiful symbolic personifications of Consciousness in the Bardo Thodol to be very valuable, a have also chosen, at least in the context of the ‘Meditation Guidance’ series, to avoid reference to the five pairs of male and female buddhas, which the Five Wisdoms are associated with. While it might be interesting to explore these beautiful archetypal figures at a future time, my concern has been that the symbolic imagery of these forms tends to overwhelm us. The cultural richness of Tibetan Buddhist iconography can easily become a distraction from the simple and bodily-felt nature of the non-dual wisdom that these images are intended to point us towards. It is always important, in my view, for spiritual students to be able extract the universal spiritual knowledge from the cultural form in which it comes – as the highest-level Buddhist practitioners have always been able to do, even in regard to their own tradition.

The Four Brahmavihāras and the Five Wisdoms

In place of the Five Wisdoms therefore, I have initially used the Four Brahmavihāras, which are very similar, very closely associated, and very much more accessible as a framework for self-enquiry. Indeed they are so closely related in their symbolic associations, and in the somatic experience that they present in the body, that we can only assume that the brahmavihāras were a precursor in the earlier teachings of the historical Buddha, of the later Mahayana Buddhist teaching of the Five Wisdoms. I have found that studying the two systems concurrently and recognising their inseparability has brought a richness and clarity to my understanding of both – and I thoroughly recommend this study to others.

Brahma_Wisdoms

The Inherently Ethical Nature of Consciousness

In my view the four Brahmavihāras also have the advantage over the four corresponding Wisdoms among the Five Wisdoms, of being much more obviously relational and connected to ethical principles. They point very clearly and concretely to the inherently ethical and beneficial nature of Consciousness, and the way in which, as we explore them in meditation and self-enquiry, the cultivation of a familiarity with the somatic experience of the brahmavihāras is inseparable from the development a natural ethical sensibility and naturally compassionate orientation in life.

The Six Realms – Extreme Cultural Manifestations of the Egoic Mind

It is important to recognise, that while the brahmavihāras are aspects of Consciousness – and can be regarded as a description of the ultimate nature of mind – they also have great practical relevance in everyday life. Indeed the brahmavihāras provide us with foundational insights about conscious communication and ethical behaviour.

Brahma_Realms

These insights become especially keen and incisive when the brahmavihāras are considered in opposition to their counterparts among the Six Realms. The implication when we make these connections, is that the five key Realms can be seen as cultural tendencies that arise out of our collective failure to recognise Consciousness and the four ‘attitudes’ of Consciousness that are the brahmavihāras. The brahmavihāras on the other hand, can be seen as specific antidotes to the Realms – to the psychological and cultural problems that are inevitably generated by the egoic mind – antidotes that are inherent in the nature of Consciousness and always available to us.

The Realms, the Skandas, and the Functions of Consciousness

By opposing the brahmavihāras and the Realms, I have been addressing exactly the same fundamental spiritual choices that we are shown in the symbolic language of Tibetan Buddhism, but hopefully in more accessible form. Indeed the Bardo Thodol associates five of the Six Realms with the Five Skandhas, to give us a powerful way of reflecting on how, to the extent that they are not informed by Consciousness, and recognised as ’empty’, these five components of the cognitive-perceptual process, or categories of cognitive-perceptual data, lead inevitably to five unhelpful egoic mental states and forms of unconscious behaviour that can be seen in individuals and groups – and can be seen represented in the Realms.

So we have five opposed pairs: the Hell Realms or Narakas represent the egoic tendency that is inherent in the Thinking function, and a failure to recognise the brahmavihāra of Equanimity; the Human Realm represents the egoic tendency that is inherent in the Sensation function, and a failure to recognise the brahmavihāra of Sympathetic Joy; the Preta Realm represents the egoic tendency that is inherent in the Feeling function, and a failure to recognise the brahmavihāra of Loving Kindness; the Asura Realm represents the egoic tendency that is inherent in the function of Intuition / Volition, and a failure to recognise the brahmavihāra of Compassion; and the Deva Realms represent an egoic appropriation of Consciousness itself, and a failure to recognise its ultimately impersonal nature.

Brahma_Realm_Function

Gaining Familiarity with the Shadow – Personal and Collective

The immense value of this set of associations does not appear to be widely known, mainly because it is undermined by the previously mentioned problems with the Five Skandhas teaching. The recovery of meaning that we achieve by replacing that formulation with Jung’s Four Functions of Consciousness, is further enhanced by opposing the Realms and brahmavihāras rather that the Realms and the Wisdoms.

The five Realms are powerfully illuminated by these juxtapositions, and hopefully rescued from their status as merely a perplexing curiosity of Buddhist cosmology. When we use Jung’s Functions in place of the Skandhas, and start to see the Realms as the collective psychological landscapes that are generated by the corresponding egoic Functions of Consciousness. By seeing the Realms as the archetypal landscapes of the ever-present psychological Shadow in the individual and collective psyche, we come closer, I believe, both to the Buddha’s intention, and to the intention of the great Padmasambhava, the author of the Bardo Thodol.

The Brahmavihāras – Consciousness Embodied

The fact that the brahmavihāras are very obviously and precisely related to bodily felt states in the first four subtle bodies makes them extremely important for anyone interested in meditation. Essentially, they are four aspects of the deeply paradoxical, but very beautiful way, in which an energetic reflection of the boundless and universal field of Consciousness is embodied in us as a personal and bodily-felt, or ‘somatic’, experience. I shall be providing a summary of this in my next article in this ‘Overview’ series.

Although the subtle bodies have well established associations in Tibetan Buddhist tradition with the Wisdoms, and these can also be recognised in our felt experience when we explore them, the associations with the brahmavihāras that I have been emphasising in this ‘Meditation Guidance’ series are less known, but are actually much more obvious in our felt experience than are the associations with the Wisdoms.

Effortless Transformation by Resting as Consciousness

The associations between the brahmavihāras and the subtle bodies are as follows: Muditā, or Sympathetic Joy, is felt as the resonance of Consciousness in the Physical Body (and Base Chakra); Upekṣā, or Equanimity is felt as the resonance of Consciousness in the Mental Body (and Hara Chakra); Mettā, or Loving Kindness, is felt as the resonance of Consciousness in the Emotional Body (and Solar Plexus Chakra); Karuṇā, or Compassion is felt as the resonance of Consciousness in the Volitional / Intuition Body (or Heart Chakra). Viewing the brahmavihāras as the embodiment of, or as the resonance of, Consciousness, allows us to recognise their entirely impersonal nature. It also releases us from the suggestion that we should be cultivating the brahmavihāras by an effort of the egoic will.

Brahma_Bodies

Rather the brahmavihāras can be seen as innate – as aspects of Consciousness and as aspects of our natural state, that can easily be recognised in self-enquiry. The ‘cultivation’ of them therefore, does not happen by the egoic will holding an intention to do so, but primarily by a recognition of that which has previously been obscured – and by the spontaneous self-release of the energetic residue of egoic habits of mind that have previously been held in place by our egoic identifications. Hence my essential characterisation of meditation practice as resting as Consciousness.

The Direct Path – Every-day Non-Duality

I will be giving more time in future articles to the way in which our unconscious identification with egoic parts – even identification with positive and aspirational egoic parts – locks us down energetically and prevents psychological change. When we approach meditation via the notion of resting as Consciousness, we have a wonderfully simple way of entering experientially into the sort of non-dual way of being that is necessary to break this deadlock, and a powerful way of facilitating the inner energetic transformation that we are seeking.

To read the next article in this overview series – Overview Part 2 – Embodied Consciousness – click here.

December 23, 2017