Metaphysical Questions

[Echoes]

Hey,

I have a few questions and hope you can give me some answers  

1. If God is emptiness/nothingness, how can "it" have attributes like Love or Consciousness? aren't these some-things and not no-thing?

2. If reality is infinite, does Hogwarts , Gandalf/middle earth and The Force from Star Wars exist?

3. Does it make a difference if you die as Donald Trump or as Ramana Maharshi? If yes, which difference?

4. What is the Atman? Is it a personal Soul bounded to a specific human? But that wouldn't make any sense since only emptiness/brahman exists?

[Leo Gura]

If those questions could be answered for you, spiritual practice wouldn't exist.

Time to roll up them sleeves and put some sweat on your brow

[Aware]

2 hours ago, Echoes said:

Hey,

I have a few questions and hope you can give me some answers  

1. If God is emptiness/nothingness, how can "it" have attributes like Love or Consciousness? aren't these some-things and not no-thing?

2. If reality is infinite, does Hogwarts , Gandalf/middle earth and The Force from Star Wars exist?

3. Does it make a difference if you die as Donald Trump or as Ramana Maharshi? If yes, which difference?

4. What is the Atman? Is it a personal Soul bounded to a specific human? But that wouldn't make any sense since only emptiness/brahman exists?

All these questions, can be brought back to your own sense of self. The beLIEf a person within that body exists.

A person, in relationship to....

And because of this, all other things are labeled in a similar fashion.  Have attributes etc. Which of course is not wrong to see it like this, all is a composite indeed, but the belief you are someone, means it gets projected in such a manner, that the attributes are as real as you think you are really an existing  some kind of person that dwells or is stuck in the brain.

How about this: Previous situations, has led to this situation, and this situation shall lead to other situations. Thus, everything is a result of our actions. So, to be very critical, investigate how you came to these questions. What where the previous situations, in relationship with the here and now, and learn deeply about its fundamental law of action and result.

It will contemplate, that if all things work in such a manner, action result, that there is no place for an I, because everything is melting, constant changing. Its a lot of work, but its worth it.

[123456789]

Why don't you first find out who is the one asking all of those questions?

[Prabhaker]

5 hours ago, Echoes said:

If God is emptiness/nothingness

God is everything, emptiness/nothingness is the door. You cannot conceive of the whole except by way of emptiness.

5 hours ago, Echoes said:

Does it make a difference if you die as Donald Trump or as Ramana Maharshi? If yes, which difference?

Donald Trump will born again in a body of bones and flesh, Ramana Maharshi will not. 

5 hours ago, Echoes said:

What is the Atman? Is it a personal Soul bounded to a specific human? But that wouldn't make any sense since only emptiness/brahman exists?

Hindus believe in God and the soul. Jainas don't believe in God at all but only in the soul. And Buddhists don't believe in the soul or God either. But about reincarnation all three agree — even Buddhists agree, who don't believe in the soul. A very strange thing…then who reincarnates?

Even they could not deny the phenomenon of reincarnation, although they could deny the existence of the soul; they say the soul does not exist but reincarnation exists. And it was very difficult for them to prove reincarnation without the soul; it seems almost impossible. But they found a way — of course it is very subtle and very difficult to comprehend, but they seem to be closer, the closest to the truth.

It is easy to understand that there is a soul and when you die the body is left on the earth and the soul enters into another body, into another womb; it is a simple, logical, mathematical thing. But Buddha says there is no soul but only a continuum.

It is like when you kindle a candle in the evening and in the morning when you are blowing it out a question can be asked of you: Are you blowing out the same light that you started in the evening? No, it is not the same light, and yet a continuity is there.

Buddha says that just as the candle flame is not the same — it is changing constantly, although in another sense it is the same because it is the same continuum — exactly like that, there is no soul entity in you like a thing but one like a flame. It is continuously changing, it is a river.

Nirvana means to extinguish this illusory flame of life.

[kurt]

@Echoes

11 hours ago, Echoes said:

1. If God is emptiness/nothingness, how can "it" have attributes like Love or Consciousness? aren't these some-things and not no-thing?

God is not nothingness or emptiness.  These two words emptiness and nothingness are taken from a religion called Buddhism, which is an atheist system of thought.  Buddhist dont subscribe to the concept of God a creator, they are stuck inside the material universe and the aim is to free the relative person from dualistic "thinking" and call this void in the mind "emptiness" . Buddhism is a humanistic philosophy that has been subject to many changes over its history, meaning that is a man made religion.  It is essentially based on pantajalis yoga sturas, and is related to a bunch of religious ideas floating around at the time, one of which was the popular enlightenment misconception "chitti vritti narhodha" - which means that in order to reveal the nature of reality, one must rid themselves of their mind.

Nobody has ever become enlightened using this method.  It is good for preparing the mind for enlightenment, but its not quite right as a statement of enlightenment itself, because the enlightened self is beyond thought, is beyond the person, is beyond experience, it is nir-guna (free FROM experience) whereas nir-vana is the extinction of experience itself.  

So God is actually "fullness" it is the Self, and the Bhraman which you mentioned.  

11 hours ago, Echoes said:

4. What is the Atman? Is it a personal Soul bounded to a specific human? But that wouldn't make any sense since only emptiness/brahman exists?

Brahman is the one sentiency that pervades existence, the knower, the SEER, the conscious indweller behind the mind, witnessing the mind of all sentient beings (Atman).  It is not human specific, it is the all pervading substrate, the knower in all subtle bodies - animals and plants all have subtle bodies, and therefore are all Atma.

Atma refers to Brahman when we look at the world through the conventional perspective that there are many "Atmans". Brahman is when you look at life from the perspective of the one self, when you understand that YOU ARE the sentiency, the all pervasive consciousness that looks out through every "other" apparent beings eyes.  Brahman realization is when you understand that there are no others, that there is only one principle operating here - you, consciousness associated with and deluded by many different bodies and minds.

11 hours ago, Echoes said:

1. If God is emptiness/nothingness, how can "it" have attributes like Love or Consciousness? aren't these some-things and not no-thing?

We dont know, we will never know the why or how, that is for Bhraman as the creator to know. Human beings will never know this because really we will always only ever be Atmans, the knowers of self knowledge revealed in a specific subtle body. Enlightenment takes place in the psyche of the human being, so we are bound by that instrument and its limitations.  

But your confusion lies in the fact that you confuse the Buddhist No-thing with the Hindu Bhraman, Bhraman is not no-thing, it is the witness with the power to create.

11 hours ago, Echoes said:

2. If reality is infinite, does Hogwarts , Gandalf/middle earth and The Force from Star Wars exist?

Same answer to previous question, we dont know why. 

11 hours ago, Echoes said:

3. Does it make a difference if you die as Donald Trump or as Ramana Maharshi? If yes, which difference?

Donald Trump and Ramana Maharshi, from the perspective of Brahman are the same Bhraman, the individual stories of each person are irrelevant.  

They are forms appearing in Bhraman, they arise, are sustained, and dissolve like everything else.  

IF you are ignorant and take these two characters to be their individual stories and dont see them as yourself, then there is a duality between them, but when we die we just die, reincarnation is not actually a thing, it is just being "reborn" into another ignorant thought that has been generated by believing in yourself as a separate person with separate karmas to live out.  Once you realize who you are, you will understand that you were never born ad you dont die, only the physical bodies and the thought stories associated with these characters are the things that die.  But it doesnt matter because all the material aspects are just mechanics.