Namaste All,

Continuing with my post on the Buddhist void, Sunyata I suppose?, and the Vedanta. I know in Buddhist thought there are the ‘absorptions, with different modifications like bliss, etc. and then rising above all these. Ending up with ‘nothingness’, and then non-perception nor perception.

Well Vedanta admits to something similar with the five sheaths and kosas and the states of waking, dreaming, deep-sleep, and Turiya. (There are also different levels of Samadhi, Samadhi not being exactly the same as the same concept in Buddhism but nearer the Dhyana.) So waking, and dreaming are really wrong perception, and deep-sleep is non-perception. However with non-perception we have the seed, as not being awake to the true reality, which results in the other states I suppose of wrong perception or an effect. So ignorance causes the effect. So with deep-sleep there is an absence of knowing.

I think that connection with the body conceals the ‘real’, knowledge or Vidya. In dreams the senses cease to function , so everything is happening in the ‘light’, of the ‘Self’. So whatever happens in dream doesn’t attract any karma for it due to previous good and bad karma that the dream takes place. So anything in a dream is not binding, also some dreams are past lives, future lives, and astral travel. We know this ,for when we awake we don’t take any responsibilities for the happenings in a dream, or perhaps you don’t remember. There is an underlying consciousness to all this, otherwise one wouldn’t even be able to detach from the last dream.

In dreamless sleep there is still a veil over our consciousness, which makes it part of Saguna. That is, the consciousness is awake but there is nothing for it to know except nescience prevailing.

In Buddhism, as there are different ‘absorptions’, there are some differences in the Vedanta. Coma, Deep-sleep, Laya, and Yoga-Nidra, all sharing some similarities.

It is all about samskaras or impressions I suppose. It is like a vibration is actually a subtle, kind of lack of ‘True Consciousness’; The more gross the vibration the less the manifestation of this Consciousness, and the greater the veil.

So is the vibration the lack of consciousness or limitations or is the lack of consciousness the vibration, a chicken or egg question, both veiled in avarana and illusory anyway. Like a still ocean and each ripple is the limitation, building up to an individual wave/jiva. So lack of consciousness is ‘movement’, or the illusion of movement. However the seed must still be in the Self for it returns after pralaya or dissolution, as we return from deep-sleep.

In reality there is no ocean of Saguna Brahman only the Nirguna Brahman, perhaps you can call this the void or sunyata or moksha, or Turiya. However one cannot even call it this for then it is modified and thus Saguna.

As Pilate asked Jesus, " What is Truth?". Jesus didn’t answer for that was his answer, No modification, it is above perception and non-perception.

In Vedanta there is the concept of ‘God’, with attributes and also without attributes which is the Truth.

Love and Om Namah Sivaya, Tony.