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Old 24-12-2016, 08:38 AM
Ground Ground is offline
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Ascender
Join Date: Dec 2016
Posts: 993
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by A human Being
'Pure consciousness' is an interesting expression - my initial reaction is to think, 'Well, consciousness is always pure, isn't it?' It may seem that it's tainted by anger, sadness, regret, guilt, etc., (etc., etc...), but in truth it's eternally untouched by all of its manifestations - all forms are subject to birth and death, but consciousness alone remains.
I think 'pure consciousness' may express 2 views:
Either a dualism, i.e. 'pure' in contrast to 'impure' and that seems to be the sense that is expressed here since conceptual thinking is explicitly excluded Or
'purity' being the property of consciousness like wetness is the property of water.
In the latter case conceptual thinking is just an aspect of purity and nothing, not even anger, sadness, regret, guilt, etc, is excluded from the sphere of purity.

Quote:
Originally Posted by A human Being
Though I still consider myself to be a bit of a noob when it comes to non-duality, even though I've been chewing it over for at least a couple of years. Still kinda baffles me, tbh, because it appears that there is duality - the creator and the created, the permanent and the impermanent. I think (well, I hope) that it's slowly starting to sink in that true understanding doesn't happen on the level of conceptual thinking, though I don't mean to suggest that it's wrong to attempt to conceptualise this understanding, to try to communicate it to others by way of conceptual thinking. It's just important to recognise its limits, I feel.
The problem arises when non-dualism is asserted to be 'truth' or 'truer' than dualism because it is not. Non-dualism is just an alternative to dualism, an alternative mode of consciousness. It is uncommon and not useful in certain contexts where dualism is useful. The non-dualistic mode is useful in rest and/or to detach from 'the world around oneself' because it disappears and the 'purity' can experience itself.
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