Two Teachers same Guru.

[iamthat]

Originally Posted by Joe Mc

About 20 years ago me and a spiritual friend of mine were browsing in the world famous Watkins Book Store Charing Cross London. ... To cut a long story short I tried to steal Ramesh Balsekar's book by stuffing it inside my jacket or something, my friend freaked out

Aah, Watkins - fond memories. I have spent countless hours there over the decades.

If you had been apprehended stealing the book then you could always have said in your defence that you had no free will and you were not the doer.

But stealing the book indicates a desire to avoid having to pay for it, which suggests that you regarded money as having some reality rather than just being a temporary manifestation of Source.

Regarding Balsekar vs Adamson, to me they are just giving two different perspectives on the same thing. Adamson's approach seems more useful because most readers are stuck in the relative condition. Balsekar's assertion that there is no doer and both seeking and waking are just expressions of Source may be true, but this is of little practical help to the person stuck in the relative condition.

And if there is no free will and no doing then why does Balsekar write so many books, because by his own teachings these will make no difference to anyone?

Peace

[Joe Mc]

Originally Posted by winter light

Hi Joe I find both of these teachings to be distracting from Nisargadatta's intention. The short answer is the difference is between means and method. Nisargadatta offered his complete presence as the means to teach. .

Thanks very much, yes I see what you mean about presence. I had a quiet few moments to myself the otherday,
the first time in along time, and had a very beautiful and profound moment when I gazed in the mirror and silently
said who the hell is that felt like a bit of an Eckhart Tolle moment tbh having read a little about his awakening.
So in the light of what you're saying that realisation I had in the mirror can't really be added to by written or spoken teachings,
sometimes it seems that the teachings themselves can often block one from experiencing the pure presence of an enlightened teacher
or coming into our own presence. Very nice post thanks for sharing.

************************************************** *****

[Joe Mc]

Originally Posted by iamthat

Aah, Watkins - fond memories. I have spent countless hours there over the decades.

If you had been apprehended stealing the book then you could always have said in your defence that you had no free will and you were not the doer.

Yes indeed a true Oasis of a Bookshop was/is Watkins.
Your honour you obviously know I am not the doer of this crime
so fine me 100 imaginary pounds and close the case and take the day off
yourself.

Some might have saw some 'earnestness' in my desire to have the aforementioned book ..some ignorance etc. Today I wouldn't take the book
off your hands even if you paid me lol.

Yes Sailor Bob Adamson seems like a really really nice chap and a very good
teacher. Yes good point about the relative reality as another teacher put it
if someone's house is on fire you don't offer them a treatise on doership but a bucket of water. All good thanks for the imput.

************************************************** ******

Originally Posted by Joe Mc

manuscripts devoted to the subject of Ethics Kant, Aristotle and the rest and the Church Fathers to name but a couple within the
Western side.

Not really, It's all a part of human evolution, allegedly. Often Spirituality isn't about Spirituality.

[Joe Mc]

Originally Posted by Greenslade

Not really, It's all a part of human evolution, allegedly. Often Spirituality isn't about Spirituality.

Maybe Ethical training in a formal religious setting and adapted sociologically
through various avenues is often seen as a form of control or abuse. I'ts right
to love such and such a group of people and it's wrong to hate such and such
a group of people or individual being one example of ethics used to order our society.
I suppose what emerges from a holy or enlightened mind is what religion in particular
lays claim to. It lays claim to the knowledge of right and wrong based upon the principle
of absolute love and exemplified in various figures or persons. I suppose the ostensibly
absurd act of blessing a bomb before it is used on men women and children has got to be
looked at in our modern world. Anyway I'm just waffling a bit to try and draw some new
insight up for myself but to no avail.

************************************************** ***

[Gem]

I'm an ethicist in the sense of virtue, and good and bad are not arbitrary. It's do with ill-will and goodwill which, though subjective, are universal, and you know what's going on with yourself, but that only means something if you're truthful. If morality were not a thing, but some sort of construct or delusion, then truthfulness would not be a thing either. Since we have a sense for being truthful, like an internal guide that is based upon being true to ourselves and honest with others, or that ability to look back and see where we went astray - knowing how stealing a book would lead us into a lie - it is as though morality comes into being when the universe becomes self-aware.

This implies will, be it well or ill-intended, but not free in that you should to whatever you want. What is for the best and what you want are often two different things. How do we know which is which? Because of that ability or truthfulness. This is a a question that will always be rhetorical because you have to be willful to just do whatever you want, but you have to be willing to do what's for the best.

If we want to frame it intellectually, we will say there is free-will or not free-will as though what we think can be absolutely true, but annoyingly, reality never conforms to our ideals, so the best thing to do is try to have the kind of life you want. You basically visualise how you'd like your life to be and live it out if you can. But consider this, there is no one before what's 'happening' and no one in the future from it, so it's all happening at once. Hence, paying attention to 'this' is literally where it's at. We tend to find if we're attentive and take care with what's present, everything is more in control and outcomes are better. I don't know why. I doubt very much that anyone does.

[Joe Mc]

It's a difficult area (Ethics) Gem, a challenging one, sounds like you've paid quite a bit of attention to it. No mean feat. I would probably have to speak from a political point of view and unfortunately we can't do that here as you well know. I just can't seem to shake off the idea of 'ownership' shared ownership, values and all that type of stuff, it's probably because I grew up in a working class area lol.

I was thinking you live in an interesting place Gem. Could I say your country at least in part grew from the convicts who arrived there often with absurd sentences for menial crimes ? I suppose it's also an amazing thing that such good and nice things have grown out of your country beginning as they did from someone stealing a loaf of bread perhaps.

I became aware recently of how strongly harmony can play an important part in perhaps what you call virtue. To be in harmony is a very strong position. Conflict, starting with personal conflict and leading all the way up to major conflict seems regressive and when it happens it seems very disappointing. I felt genuinely disappointed when this international conflict broke out.

Hope you are well Gem thanks for your imput. Ps just picking up on your idea of self sacrifice, deferring pleasure or interest for the sake of another or the community ? Interesting.

************************************************** ********

[FallingLeaves]

personally i think, neither of those teachers realized that simple not talking about what it 'is' is a further shore they have no knowledge of just yet.

But as winter light said, not necessarily a bad thing...

[Gem]

It's because morality lies at the most fundamental level of humanity: the nature of volition. How can even start to talk about the implications?

Lets just say there is a thing that exists that we call 'trust'. No one says there is no such thing because it's not only real in everyone's life, but extremely important. If there is trust, that means there is truth, transparency etc. We can say it is a social construct only in the sense that people trust each other. We cant say that to mean people just made it up.

If trust is a real thing, no doubt, and not an arbitrary thing some people believe in, then morality is also real, and where morality is lax, trust is diminished. Everyone knows this, and I merely state the obvious. Hence, to make the argument that morality isn't a real thing is the best philosophical gymnastics ever performed.

For me, I listened to gurus for several years and ended up thinking, how does this fellow know an answer to every question ever asked? I conclude they do not know, and for most questions I suspect there is no answer at all. Therefore, at some level they either lying to themselves and/or fooling people, or it's a farce in some other way.

That's when I became alone and have no where to turn for any relief from my own uncertainty, but I don't mind that discomfort. I prefer it to what is the fundamental deception of non-dual guristics (yep I just made up that word).

Not hat I don't listen to what the nondualists say. I still listen to it and I like it, but not because they are great and wise in reflection of my pathetic diminished form. Just because they are guys like me and they are pretty interesting, albeit a bit too smug for my liking, generally speaking.

I think people would get a lot more out of basic things like being a little bit more radical with truthfulness, internally and externally, and cultivate as much trust as they can - then morality is seen to be necessary.

Of course, the non-dual guru has already defeated all of this by saying morality is a small time thing for unenlightened minds... and who am I to say something different to some bloke who knows everything about everything in comparison to whom you and I are so dismally dull?

[Joe Mc]

If Samadhi is established then I think your acts in
the outside world prove to be more peaceful and harmonious.
I think some of the non-duality teachers have a samadhi just like
Dhamma teachers and their actions are harmonious and lives are
by and large peaceful.

These Non Duality teachers speak from that
space on alot of topics but the message is pretty simple and says
Samadhi is not 'Self' and so the host of questions they face and
complications are to do with the questioners mind and not theirs.

Sila as spoken about in the Buddhist path is an aspect of Samadhi,
just as Sila is as aspect of Annica, Anatta, Dukkha. In that respect
Sila and virtue are conditions of Panna. I think what i'm trying to say
is Sila is not something that is imposed like a heavy Morality but is more
like an integral aspect or reflection of something that can be spoken about
in different ways. I chose in this instance to speak about it through the subject
of Samadhi but I'm sure it could be spoken about through other
aspects of the Buddhist Path ?

**************************************************