Cosmic Projection
“36 Tattvas”
¡Ay, Caramba!
In the limited situation of “reality as I know it,” the audience in the movie theatre passively views a film projected from the booth. They are spectators only. In the developed analogy of the 36 Tattvas, vamana or Aeonic emanation, the audience is likewise a projection of the film they are viewing. Included in participation in the film. By choice, or not.
NOTE: If you do not see immediately the brilliance of this analogy, you do not see its veracity at all. Its veracity involves you or leaves you cold. Failure to see the veracity of this clear and explicit analogy excludes you from conscious participation in the world movie, the world-event. Wake up, Rhomé!!!
§ 1 Introduction:
Aggravating Jargon
samadhi: illuminated trance, catatonic state
satori / wu / kencho: sudden illumination, non-attained
anuttara samyak sambodhi: supreme integral illumination, wrongly attributed to the historical Buddha
nirvana: cessation of desire and thought activity
citti vritti, vilkalpa: vibrations of the mind, mental construction
Takeaway: Satori is an entirely different state of mystic illumination from samadhi. Satori happens theater-side, samadhi happens booth-side. The enlightenment imputed to the historical Buddha was neither. Instead, it appears to have been an approximation of satori that falsely added attributes of samadhi. To further deepen the confusion, the state of nirvana he is said to have reached has nothing to do with the direct and immediate enlightened state. Nirvana is the cessation of desire, the extinguishment of all craving, plus the elimination of all mental activity, the cessation of thought. In short, it is a zombie-like state of lifeless self-absorption in which all awareness of a distinct, self-knowing self dissolves. Still, it cannot be equated with the catatonic bliss of samadhi.
Mapping the Tattvas
Kashmiri Shaivism: The philosophical system of India that worships the god Shiva as the supreme reality. The school is idealistic and monistic, as contrasted with the realistic and dualistic school of Shaiva-siddhanta.
The principal texts of the school are the Shiva-sutra, said to have been revealed to Vasugupta; Vasugupta’s Spandakarika, 8th–9th century; Utpala’s Pratyabhijna-shastra, c. 900; Abhinavagupta’s Paramarthasara, Pratyabhijna-vimarshini, and Tantraloka 10th century; and Kshemaraja’s Shiva-sutra-vimarshini.
Shiva is seen as the sole reality and both the material and efficient cause of the universe. His power is known in five aspects: cit (“consciousness”), ananda (“bliss”), icha (“desire”), jnana (“knowledge”), and kriya (“action”). For the adherents of Kashmiri Shaivism, liberation (moksha) comes about through intense meditation on Shiva as the supreme reality and recognition of the supreme reality’s identity with the individual soul.
Example of various modern attempts to schematize the 36 Tattvas. A simplified, user-friendly version will be provided.
Aeonic Dreaming
From NIHI: The generators then follow the example of the Originator: they receive the singularity and selflessly allow it to unfold all by itself. They create indirectly by a process comparable to dreaming, rather than by hands-on, artifactual production of worlds. They do not create at all, they emanate. They transmute the formless singularity into the germ of a formative intent, a discrete emanation. In Hindu Tantra emanation is called parinama, an exact parallel to the Greek word aporria, used in the Second Treatise of the Great Seth: “a single emanation (aporria) from the Eternal Ones, the unknowable Aeons, immeasurable and without definition” (54.18).
KS texts use the term vamana for Aeonic Dreaming, cosmic projection, comparable (with some close and careful qualifications) to the generation of a holographic image. (Pronunciation: VAH-mah-nah or vah-MAN-ah. Many Sanskrit words have the accent on the first syllable, but not all.) Occurrence of this term is frequently associated with the dreaming god Vishnu and his avataric emanations: for instance, the Bhagavata Purana in several passages (1.3.19, II 7.17, XI 4.17 and more…) uses a metaphor: Vamana is “the sacred incarnation of Vishnu.”
Parasamvit, Brahman, Shiva, the Absolute, primordial ground of consciousness and matter: source of the laser beam/projector light as well as the power that runs the projector; hence, source of light and power that produces the world-event.
§ 2 The Holographic Analogue:
Correction @ 13m: diffraction grid, not differential grid
What about widely discussed claims of living in a matrix or simulation, and living in a holographic projection? How these arguments are flawed.
Two procedures in holography: first, the recording process, with the aim to create a holographic plate that contains in optical code all the information required to produce the hologram, and second, the reproduction of the object using light irradiating the plate.
The action of cosmic projection that unfolds through the 36 Tattvas can be described by analogy to the first process, recording the plate, not to reproducing the holographic object from the plate. This is a crucial distinction. Recording requires object and plate, reproducing requires only the plate.
Kamakalavilasa and other Tantric texts, as well as masterworks of Kashmiri Shaivism, describe a field dynamic of activities arising from the primordial ground state that match the components of holographic recording in an astonishing way: As if the same language were applied to two different events, the mechanics of cosmic projection and the operation of the lab device. In this analogy, the primordial ground state (Shiva – Parasamvit) is analogous to the laser-emitting gun driven by electricity, that is, the light-and-power source.
This setup includes the object to be reproduced and the plate to be used in reproducing it.
Instructional video on holography with an exceptionally clear description of both the recording and reproducing processes. (Begin at 5:15.)
Simplified schematic of the recording setup. Note how the object beam goes to the object to be reproduced (sample) and the reference beam goes to the plate (image sensor) where it will be imprinted.
In the analogy, the object beam is Shiva in the prakasha mode, the reference or reflecting beam is Shakti in the vimarsha mode. The original unity divides itself into a polarity, Shiva-Shakti, like two currents arising from the same source and splitting away two distinct paths but eventually re-converging.
Reports from adepts who explored cosmic projection on the booth-side describe each particular stage of deflection by mirrors and the resultant pathways between mirrors up to their re-convergence at the plate, and then continuing projection into theatre mode. The precise technical finesse of the descriptions given for each distinct stage (tattva) of cosmic projection is staggering. The reports continue in an equally lavish and technical manner in the yogic description of what happens through the remaining 23 stages that unfold theatre-side. These reports come from the millennial record of yogis who went deeply into the catatonic trance of samadhi: example shown, from The Autobiography of a Yogi (1945) by Paramahansa Yogananda, which contains a vivid account of the author’s samadhi.
Samadhi affords knowledge of cosmic projection operating booth-side, from the source, while satori applies to realization of how the mind works theatre-side. The non-attained realization of The Dragonfly Sutra is satori-like, limited to theatre-side.
§ 3 Booth and Theatre:
Classic movie projector with cylindrical projection lens clearly seen. Typically, it mounts two reels and the film runs from one (upper) to the other (lower). In cosmic projection, the projection mechanism uses two reels, working parts 13 and 14, both of which feed into the chamber that holds the film in place for the projective beam to radiate through it, frame by frame.
Samadhi – trance illumination, belongs to the booth side. It goes all the way to the light and power source, Parasamvit, the Originator.
Sambodhi, satori – noetic awakening, belongs to the theatre side. It goes only to working part 17, Manas, the lens that protrudes into the theatre.
§ 4 Yogananda on Cosmic Projection
Just today I had the impulse to look for some talks by Paramahansa Yogananda on the internet. This is what came up first [now removed from yt]. Delivered in an almost evangelic tone, this riff uses the analogue of cosmic projection I am developing, and Y actually says he’s in the booth: precisely my assertion about yogic adepts of samadhi. Of course I do not concur on his declarations about the phantom-image character of reality…. Nevertheless, the main part of his riff could almost convince you I was channeling him when I introduced the theatre-booth analogue.
He said this:
Out of that Great Power all atomic energy is throbbing, manifesting and sustaining every cell of the physical universe. As moving pictures are sustained by a beam of light coming from the projection booth of a movie house, so are all of us sustained by the Cosmic Beam, the Divine Light pouring from the projection booth of Eternity. When you look to, and find that Beam, you will behold Its unlimited power to rebuild the atoms and electrons and lifetrons in all body cells that may be “out of order.”
§ 5 The Dreamed Character is Not a Problem
Rupert Spira appears to be another Advaita guru like David Spero. He showed up in my YT suggestions on February 29, 2020. The “direct path” he proposes goes to booth-side. He refers to Dzogchen…. He says he has had a total of 16 million views on his channel.
Amazon.co.uk profile: From an early age Rupert Spira (b 13 March 1960) was deeply interested in the nature of reality. At the age of seventeen he learnt to meditate, and began a twenty-year period of study and practice in the classical Advaita Vedanta tradition under the guidance of Dr. Francis Roles and Shantananda Saraswati, the Shankaracharya of the north of India. During this time he immersed himself in the teachings of P. D. Ouspensky, Krishnamurti, Rumi, Ramana Maharshi, Nisargadatta and Robert Adams, until he met his teacher, Francis Lucille, in 1997. Francis introduced Rupert to the Direct Path teachings of Atmananda Krishnamenon, the Tantric tradition of Kashmir Shaivism (which he had received from his teacher, Jean Klein), and, more importantly, directly indicated to him the true nature of experience. Rupert lives in the UK and holds regular meetings and retreats in Europe and the USA.
“I don’t want to become a Buddha. Buddha is just another name for the nature of our being…. How do we become that?” he says in another talk, Is the Direct Path Appropriate for Everyone?
“The nature of our being (Vedic), the nature of mind (Buddhist)”…. Lama Luv Mutt’s objections to this fa¸on de parler can be heard in the audio attached here.
§ In the talk linked here, the opening question comes hesitantly from a rather constipated Dutch-speaking participant. Spira’s response begins at 2:30: “Let’s use the analogy of the dreamer’s mind and the dreamed character….” Say, how about that. What a novel approach.
Of course, in PT it is not merely an analogy. It is a literal description.
“Bundle” of thinking-sensing-perceiving: skandhas, the components of the projected display on the theatre side; translated as “aggregates.” The infinite consciousness is the light-and-power source on the booth side. Here the clash between Buddhist and Vedic metaphysics comes to attention: these schools deconstruct the fictional status of the apparently separate self-conscious entity in different ways. Ken Wheeler (YT Theoria Apophasis) clarifies this point, citing the error of the annata (no-self) theatre-side doctrine of Buddhism, which ignores and denies the higher self or divine self, Atman, identical with the Godhead, positioned booth-side.
In the schema of the 36 Tattvas the skandhas belong to the lower or external Tattvas, 18 – 36, operating on the theatre side. The 17th Tattva, Manas, is the lens.
PT and Mayavada Vedanta reject the syntax of the two selves, higher and lower.
“The sole reality is the knowing of the dreamer’s mind.” This knowing belongs to and emanates from the infinite consciousness. This statement is the foundational premise of Advaita Vedanta. However, the corollary is: The manifestation of this ultimate reality in the dreamed character is somehow not real and produces suffering.
Digression: The chorus of moaning and whining about suffering, led by the racial Xenosh, drowns out another voice with another message: Kama-Kala-Vilasa. This is the Kalika message of hedonic mysticism. Bhoga – bhaga. Kama is desire, equivalent to Eros. But it also implies love.
(What about bliss, contrasted to pleasure? That would be the topic of another talk.)
Returning to the real status of the dreamer’s mind contrasted to the unreal status of the dreamed character, Lama Luv Mutt asks: But why can’t they both be real: the dreamer’s mind and the dreamed character? Why does it have to be a contest, like a zero-sum game? (The audio commentary runs here up to around 38m: Separation is an illusion, but difference is real.)
The self-reflex or reflex-self arises among the diverse productions of the mind but stands distinct from other productions by the manner in which it induces the sense of single-self identity, the self-awareness of the dreamed character.
The meaning of Severed Rose: between two aspects of a single and supreme reality–call it the presence of what’s now becoming–there must be a severance, a rendering into duality which carries the risk of loss and suffering, so that the two can be consciously reunited at the level of the transcendent witness, the human animal living on earth.
John Gardner: On Moral Fiction
6:18 No separate self in the bundle–a localization of the infinite knowing. King Lear, the character in a play, is the activity of John Smith, not an entity or person in his own right. By analogy, the true actor is not identical with the body of the person who thinks he or she is thinking. Dis-identification from the body is central to this program.
7:50 In this practice, “all that happens is that the thoughts and feelings that depend upon the belief, ‘I am an independently existing self,’ cease arising. As a result, our activities and relationships change.” That’s the takeaway, the aim of this path: to transcend the sense of being an independently existing self. The realization that that is so comes internally–but in PT it is given externally in the self-evident fact of having two mothers and being constantly in the presence of the cosmic maternal source, the living earth.
Lama Luv Mutt comments:
Added March 1, 2020 Flanders