[MD] Is Quality a monism?

[118]

Hi Marsha,
I am not at odds with what you say.  I try to provide a different
perspective.  "Is the optical illusion a picture showing a vase or
showing two faces looking at each other?"  Well of course both are
correct, even if they are entirely different views of the same
picture.  The point is to not assert that one view point is right and
the other is wrong.

I would like to provide some comments to your post below just as an
opinion and not to detract from what you wrote.

On Wed, Jul 18, 2012 at 1:25 AM, MarshaV <valkyr at att.net> wrote:

> Mark,
>
> In acknowledging that the ultimate nature of static quality is Dynamic Quality, I am suggesting that the basis of all static quality, whether "things" or patterns, is not dualistic, not substantial, not determinate, not anything but the ghostly reflections of mind.  These patterns, including my self, are 'not this, not that'!  Consider, as the Diamond Sutra suggests:
>
>          All conditioned dharmas [static patterns]
>          Are like dreams, illusions, bubbles, shadows,
>          Like dew drops and a lightning flash.
>          Contemplate them thus.
>
Mark pontificates:
Yes, you can certainly create the construct that "the ultimate nature
of static quality is Dynamic Quality".  Especially if this brings you
meaning.  For that is what this is all about.  You project an entity
called static quality and using the concept of "ultimate nature" you
project Dynamic Quality as a source.  We can say that the ultimate
nature of mass is energy, if that brings meaning to one's reflections.
 Such contemplation is useful if it gets one into an appropriate frame
of mind from which to deal with one's existence.  It is the
contemplation itself which is of importance, rather than the pointing,
in my opinion.

This is what is brought forth in your translated passage of the
Diamond Sutra.  This passage is not saying that static patterns ARE
dreams, etc.  It is suggesting that one contemplate such a phrase as a
tool by which to gain further meaning.  By contemplating as such one
looks beyond the simple analogy to its meaning in other aspects of
thought.  Such contemplation becomes a prism by which to gain access
to an alternative mode of awareness.  Such awareness is free of the
idea that static quality are like dreams, etc.  And the correlation
shrinks to the point of triviality.  One can then forget about the
analogy and use one's new awareness in other matters of meditation.

This manner of teaching a method of promoting a fundamental paradigm
shift is common in all lasting metaphysics (I wouldn't know of those
which have not lasted).  One can see this in the writing of
Kierkegaard entitled "Sickness unto Death" where he speaks of
fundamental spheres that humans can exist in regarding their
relationship with reality.  He presents three of these.  Each one of
these manners of existence are correct, but only one can be held at a
time.  Just like with an optical illusion, one can only hold one
manner of viewing a picture, at a time, in one's view.  Each form of
metaphysical view requires a release of the one which existed before.

The Western metaphysical view must be released in order to gain access
into a Quality metaphysics.  If not, one is just viewing Quality
through the same set of glasses which one is used to, and nothing is
gained.  This is why I try to emphasize "Quality Awareness" as a
fundamental shift in how one perceives.  This awareness cannot be
reached by reading about Quality as in MOQ, but is arrived at "out of
the blue".  It is like switching from a negative view of a situation
to a positive one.  The situation does not change, just the manner in
which it is viewed.  Some have analogized this switch to
"enlightenment" which is a somewhat arrogant word.  We are enlightened
as it is; we can certainly change the view of enlightenment and say
that it is better, if we feel that it is.  Others use the term
"awakening" again a word with baggage.  I have heard the use of the
word "click", as in "it all just clicked".

I do not believe that there is a magical manner in which to view
reality which is somehow the "right way". (What is good, and what is
bad...?").  This mode of thinking simply creates sides which do
righteous battle with each other (as occurs in this forum on
occasion).

I could say: "if Quality is everything, then what is bad?"  It is not
this kind of statement which is important, it is where it leads one.
In the end, where one arrives at has nothing to do with these words in
a litteral sense.  I am sure you have been struck with the sudden
realization that, after reading a poem or something, that everything
looks a little bit different.  You cannot say exactly why, but it just
does.  Sometimes there is a gradual progression to a new way of
looking at things, and one cannot remember how it used to look.   I
think it is important not hold on doggedly to static quality as an
answer, and that is what the Buddhism instructs with all its manners
of releasing oneself from clinging.  Whether it be contemplating the
the self does not exist, or in its relegation of ones current reality
to a dream.  These are concepts which act like a raft until one
reaches the shore of another awareness.  Once there, none of that
matters.  It becomes foolish to argue on the "right way" to say
something.  What is the right way to look at a baby smiling?

Regards,
Mark
>

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