Free Will vs Divine Ordaination

[acorn]

Free will is like a dog on a chain....free to roam within the radius of it's chain.
this is primarily due to karmic law and other "tendencies" brought forth from birth

Love
acorn

[DreamKey]

Originally Posted by no1wakesup

Yes, exactly. There is no separate someone...only apparently there through conditioning. There is nothing outside of that source. The mis-alighnment which produces suffering or happiness ( as it produces a false sense of happiness) is still firmly placed in duality. So reinforcment, in any case, is part of that illussion as well. There is no real choice. That play is for separation only. Beyond that idea and conditioning there is no special agenda for someone not there. That perception itself IS mis-alighnment. That perception IS the ultimate attachment. Everything else is broken down and trickles down from that deeper anchor in identity.

The mind is rediculously fast at reestablishing and claiming itself as primary ...even when noticing moments of audacious favor.


Usually, light or pure consciousness is not a known quality for a separate mind, only a belief of that god interpretation suffices and is needed to carry on in that experience

Right. Choices are a product of conditioning and conditioning is a product of the conditions one is exposed to. Even those conditions are 'mind', even though it seems as if the world conditions the person. It all collapses into a little greasy spot.

[DreamKey]

Originally Posted by acorn

Free will is like a dog on a chain....free to roam within the radius of it's chain.
this is primarily due to karmic law and other "tendencies" brought forth from birth

Love
acorn

I would say you have the free will to make choice within the context of being a person. You just so happen to not be a person.

[William 辰]

Nice explanation:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0xV4Z05Eyw&t=9m28s

[SleepyMind]

I thought I would share here what my own teacher has said about free will:

When people first begin to question the objective world through books or teachings on non-duality, they very naturally assume that non-duality can solve dilemmas like free will vs. determinism. However, this false dichotomy where one concept is pitted against another is solely in the material realm. Neither concept, in fact no concept, can describe reality. While it is true to say that the material realm is not separate, the one who sees this unity is in no way concerned with these concepts....
Non-duality is pointing right past such questions to the core of who you are. You are free. In fact, you are freedom itself. This freedom has nothing to do with the material world or the mind's conditioning. Freedom is free from desire and is absolutely aware of rising desire. The freedom you are is in love with life even as it sees that life is completely illusory. This freedom is much more free than a free will or unchained desires. Do not search for freedom, just be free. This freedom is not found in concepts that attempt to dissect the material world, it is found when deeper questions are contemplated. I highly suggest contemplation of questions such as "Who is it dragging around this corpse?" This question cannot be answered by the mind and points directly to who you are: unbound freedom and pure awareness.

Here is a link to the whole thing plus an audio recording if anyone is interested:
nobodymind.com/free-will-determinism-nonduality

I'm new so I can't link, but if anyone else is interested feel free to link it.

[Within Silence]

Originally Posted by SleepyMind

I thought I would share here what my own teacher has said about free will:

Here is a link to the whole thing plus an audio recording if anyone is interested:
nobodymind.com/free-will-determinism-nonduality

I'm new so I can't link, but if anyone else is interested feel free to link it.

Exactly; the questions, concepts and arguments of freewill vs. determinism are rooted in, and stem from the illusion of duality. If we start with an illusory foundation then everything we build on it must also be illusory and foundation-less. Once duality is seen through, then one no longer asks about, nor is concerned with such. So, first one must see if duality itself it the foundational basis of all existence.

[William 辰]

I suppose if you follow non-dualism you don't believe in channelers.
But what about Aristotle or Holism?

A substance necessarily possesses at least one substantial form. It may also possess a variety of accidental forms. For Aristotle, a "substance" (ousia) is an individual thing—for example, an individual man or an individual horse.[9] The substantial form of substance S consists of S's essential properties,[10] the properties that S's matter needs in order to be the kind of substance that S is.[11] In contrast, S's accidental forms are S's non-essential properties,[12] properties that S can lose or gain without changing into a different kind of substance.[13]
In some cases, a substance's matter will itself be a substance. If substance A is made out of substance B, then substance B is the matter of substance A. However, what is the matter of a substance that is not made out of any other substance? According to Aristotelians, such a substance has only "prime matter" as its matter. Prime matter is matter with no substantial form of its own.[14] Thus, it can change into various kinds of substances without remaining any kind of substance all the time.
Aristotle applies his theory of hylomorphism to living things. He defines a soul as that which makes a living thing alive.[16] Life is a property of living things, just as knowledge and health are.[17] Therefore, a soul is a form—that is, a specifying principle or cause—of a living thing.[18] Furthermore, Aristotle says that a soul is related to its body as form to matter.[19]
Hence, Aristotle argues, there is no problem in explaining the unity of body and soul, just as there is no problem in explaining the unity of wax and its shape.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hylomorphism

A car will not start driving itself just because of the materials it is made of. For any intelligent behavior you need something in addition to the material substance of something. In the case of humans and animals that is, by definition, a non-material source; the soul. Matter; your physical body, eventually dies off and it's form changes. Non-matter; your soul and with it your consciousness, are not dependent on the rules of matter, so it therefore lives forever.
It is technically impossible for everything to be from the same world.

We also say: God created time, matter and space, and thus is not controlled by time, matter and space.

[Still_Waters]

Originally Posted by Joe Mc

Hi Thanks for your reply Jyotir. I was thinking that perhaps free-will exists at certain levels of existence. At a relative level of existence we experience what appears to be free will but at other levels such as the absolute level notions such as free will don't exist. I also get the feeling that we move between different levels and sometimes there appears to be free will and other times it could not possibly exist ?

Nicely put. "Free will" is indeed viewed differently from different angles of vision.

[Still_Waters]

Originally Posted by beesliketoplay

I remember now, my beloved teacher taught us "no personal will" in the love state. Hm.

That's another nice way of putting it.

[Joe Mc]

Originally Posted by Within Silence

Exactly; the questions, concepts and arguments of freewill vs. determinism are rooted in, and stem from the illusion of duality. If we start with an illusory foundation then everything we build on it must also be illusory and foundation-less. Once duality is seen through, then one no longer asks about, nor is concerned with such. So, first one must see if duality itself it the foundational basis of all existence.

I read the article from your teacher and it is a nice article and useful. That thing that is said about not being in control has resonated with me many times and is a really deep and interesting way of coming to some partial or even absolute experience of oneness. However, what i think usually lies behind the question of 'Free Will vs Determinism' is the one of intentionality. Intentionality as regards acts of Good and evil .. do i intentionally choose and cause an act of evil lets say.

This question for me is much harder to answer than the question of 'Free will and Determinism'. Non Duality Teachers such Ramesh Balsekar and other teachers have said or suggested that we have very little control over how our lives unfold. That the unfoldment of our lives is based on genes and up to date conditioning ? Wonder what he means by conditioning in this sense ? I mean in the sense of committing an intentional negative act ?