And a paper tiger? A lot of strawmen in this one. Maybe this is a relevant criticism (barely) of certain "official" Communist regimes circa 1960, but it´s hardly a serious criticism of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels. Note also the hypocritical "pie in the sky" message. Endure yer suffering, proles! Nupe, won´t happen, comrade. Or should I call you "citizen"?
Is ChatGPT really *Charnel Ground* GPT? Here is a defense of Tantrism (including - at least implicitly - the extreme practices of the Left Hand Path) written by the Artificial Intelligence.
Here is a controversial question: Is there a path, perhaps in Tantrism, which does include even personal anger, bitterness, and the need to feel superior, and so on?
This is a controversial question, and the answer depends very much on what is meant by "include."
The short answer is:
That distinction is fundamental.
In Vajrayāna, there is a famous saying that the kleśas (afflictive emotions) are not rejected but transformed.
For example:
However, this does not mean:
"Remain angry."
It means that the energy underlying anger is recognized without the grasping, aversion, and delusion that make it destructive.
Wrathful deities such as Mahākāla or Vajrakīlaya appear terrifying, but traditional commentaries generally emphasize that their wrath is compassionate wrath, not personal rage.
They are said to be free of hatred.
The picture is similar.
In Śākta and Śaiva Tantra, fierce deities such as:
may display terrifying anger.
But traditionally this anger is not interpreted as wounded ego.
Rather, it is cosmic, protective, or purifying.
The deity destroys ignorance or injustice without being psychologically consumed by resentment.
There are traditions that deliberately use powerful emotions as fuel.
For example:
In these contexts, the practitioner does not pretend the emotions are absent.
Instead, they become material for practice.
This is one reason Tantra has often been described as an "alchemical" path.
But alchemy transforms lead into gold—it does not declare lead to be gold already.
Your mention of "the need to feel superior" is particularly interesting.
Classical Buddhist psychology generally treats this as a form of māna (conceit), which is considered an obstacle.
Even if one is objectively accomplished, clinging to superiority is seen as reinforcing the illusion of a fixed, separate self.
Similarly, many Hindu traditions distinguish between healthy confidence and ahaṃkāra (egoic self-identification).
Tantra does sometimes ask the practitioner to identify with a deity and think:
"I am the deity."
But this is not meant to inflate the ordinary ego.
Rather, it is intended to undermine the ordinary ego by replacing it with an enlightened identity that is ultimately dissolved into emptiness or pure consciousness.
Yes.
Some historical Kaula, Kāpālika, and related Tantric groups deliberately violated social conventions.
However, even these traditions generally claimed that such practices were undertaken:
They did not usually teach that ordinary resentment or arrogance should simply be indulged.
Modern psychological interpretations—especially those influenced by Carl Gustav Jung—sometimes speak of "integrating the shadow."
That idea has often been compared with Tantra, although they are not identical.
Jung would generally say that acknowledging anger, envy, or pride is healthier than denying they exist.
But he would not usually recommend becoming dominated by them.
Likewise, Tantra often says that denying powerful emotions can make them more unconscious, while transformation requires bringing them into awareness.
Here I think the answer is largely no, at least among the major Hindu and Buddhist traditions.
Some traditions value:
But bitterness—understood as long-term resentment, grievance, or delight in another's downfall—is generally regarded as binding rather than liberating.
Your question points toward a real tension in spirituality. Some paths emphasize gentleness and gradual purification; others are willing to enter directly into powerful, difficult emotions. Tantric traditions are among the latter. Yet their aim is not to sanctify egoic anger or superiority. Rather, they propose that the very energies involved in those states can, through disciplined practice, be transformed into wisdom, fearlessness, and compassionate action.
So if someone found themselves saying, "My practice has brought me face to face with my anger, pride, or bitterness," many Tantric teachers might respond, "Good—now you know what needs to be transformed." They would be much less likely to say, "Excellent—keep cultivating those qualities as they are." The distinction between using an emotion as the raw material for transformation and endorsing it as a spiritual goal is one of the defining features of both Hindu and Buddhist Tantra.
On the internet, or is it the Western portion of it, Kurukulla (a form of Red Tara) is sometimes sensationally described as a "Buddhist sex goddess". The video above just came up in my YouTube feed. It´s a public puja (worship service) to Kurukulla from Nepal. Not clear to me whether the people are Tibetans or Newars. ChatGPT claims the latter. Note the Coca Cola bottles in front of the monks?! It seems American civilization has reached even this "Federal Democratic Republic"...and its Buddhist temples.
Note also that Kurukulla is golden rather than red. Wat means? Nor are there any sexual orgies, so I suppose Californians interested in Neo-"Tantrism" might get a wee bit disappointed. I suppose they could always drink the Coke!
I just realized that I posted a lot of negative stuff today. OK, so here is a peaceful pic of Amitabha and Bala. End of transmission!
I never heard of Ushnishavijaya before. Or "The Crown Ornament of Victory"...of all the Buddhas of all time. No less! The two short clips above deal with her Tibetan iconography. Apparently, Ushnishavijaya is associated with Amitayus and Amitabha. There seems to be an obvious family likeness with Tara.
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| Credit: Maitreya Fields / YouTube |
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| Credit: The Devonshire Association(?) |
I never heard of the mysterious Three Hare symbol before, so here we go! It must be some kind of swastiska stuff...
Can you tell me about the Three Hares symbol?
The Three Hares is one of the most fascinating and mysterious symbols in world art. It consists of three hares running in a circle, with each hare sharing an ear with its neighbor. Although there are only three ears in total, each hare appears to have two—a clever visual illusion.
What makes the symbol especially intriguing is that it appears across a vast geographical area—from China to the Middle East and Europe—over more than a thousand years.
At first glance, you see three hares chasing one another.
Looking more closely, you notice:
This ingenious construction has fascinated artists and mathematicians alike.
The earliest known examples appear along the Silk Road.
Some of the oldest surviving examples are in the Mogao Caves, dating to around the 6th–7th centuries CE.
These Buddhist cave temples contain paintings of the Three Hares on their ceilings.
The motif spread westward along Silk Road trade routes.
Examples occur in:
The design appears in medieval Islamic decorative art, where geometric and symbolic motifs were highly developed.
It seems to have been appreciated primarily as an elegant ornamental pattern.
The motif eventually reached Europe.
It is especially famous in:
Many medieval churches have the Three Hares carved into wooden roof bosses.
This is the mystery.
No medieval text explicitly explains the symbol.
Scholars therefore propose several possibilities.
Because the hares form an unbroken circle, the symbol may represent:
Each hare shares an ear.
Nothing is completely separate.
Modern interpreters often see this as expressing:
This interpretation resonates well with Buddhist philosophy, although we cannot say with certainty that it was the original intention.
Since hares are ancient lunar animals throughout Asia, the Three Hares may have had lunar symbolism.
Possible meanings include:
This fits comfortably with both Chinese and Indian traditions.
Because the oldest examples are found in Buddhist cave temples, many scholars think the symbol originally had Buddhist significance.
Possible associations include:
However, no Buddhist scripture specifically explains the motif.
When the motif appears in churches, some have interpreted it as representing the Holy Trinity:
The geometry certainly lends itself to this reading.
However, there is little evidence that this was the original meaning. It is more likely that medieval Christians adopted an already existing motif and gave it a Christian interpretation.
Quite possibly.
Unlike symbols with a fixed doctrinal explanation, the Three Hares seems to have been remarkably adaptable.
As it traveled across cultures, different communities could understand it in ways that fit their own traditions:
Hares themselves already carried rich symbolism across Eurasia.
They were associated with:
Using three hares naturally amplified these associations.
The Three Hares also appeals because of its mathematical elegance.
It demonstrates how:
can all appear anatomically complete.
The design beautifully balances:
I want to see this...
Something tells me this won´t be included in the next tranche of UFO files released by the Were-Trump administration! Nor in Nolan´s "Odyssey"...
So I asked Gemini to make a picture of Yellow Tara (the Mahayana-Vajrayana Buddhist "goddess") as if she was a normal human. This was the result. Some kind of Tibetan grandmama?
En kritisk recension av en AI-översatt bok om shaolin. Men har inte hela shaolin-grejen redan avslöjats som värsta bluffen?
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| Credit: G41rn8 |
OK, so this week the AI is trying to convert me to "Huayan Buddhism". Rather than Soto Zen, that is. A step in the right direction if you ask me. Sometimes there really is progress...
Can you tell me about Huayan Buddhism?
Huayan Buddhism (Chinese: 華嚴, Huáyán; Japanese: Kegon; Korean: Hwaeom) is one of the most profound and philosophically sophisticated schools of Mahāyāna Buddhism. It is based primarily on the Avatamsaka Sutra (also known as the Flower Garland Sutra), a vast scripture describing the universe as an infinitely interconnected web of Buddhas, bodhisattvas, and worlds.
Many scholars consider Huayan to represent one of the high points of classical Chinese Buddhist philosophy.
Huayan developed in China during the Tang dynasty (7th–9th centuries).
Its principal patriarchs include:
Among them, Fazang is especially famous for developing Huayan's philosophical vision.
The school later spread to:
The entire system is based upon the Avataṃsaka Sūtra.
This enormous scripture describes:
Rather than presenting a linear story, it offers a grand vision of reality itself.
Unlike Pure Land Buddhism, where Amitābha is central, Huayan places:
Vairocana
at the center.
Vairocana is not merely another Buddha.
He represents:
Everything exists within Vairocana's enlightened body.
Perhaps the most famous Huayan doctrine is:
The mutual interpenetration of all phenomena.
Nothing exists independently.
Everything reflects everything else.
The traditional image is:
Imagine an infinite net stretching throughout the universe.
At every intersection hangs a jewel.
Each jewel reflects:
Thus:
Every part contains the whole.
The whole contains every part.
This became one of the most influential images in East Asian Buddhism.
Huayan often summarizes reality as:
"One is all, and all is one."
This does not mean everything loses its individuality.
Instead:
Every individual thing retains its uniqueness,
while simultaneously participating in the entire cosmos.
Huayan describes reality through four progressively deeper perspectives.
Ordinary experience.
Trees.
People.
Animals.
Mountains.
Everything shares one ultimate nature:
emptiness.
Ultimate reality and ordinary things are inseparable.
A flower is not separate from ultimate reality.
This is uniquely Huayan.
Every phenomenon supports every other phenomenon.
Everything participates in everything else.
Nothing is isolated.
Huayan strongly emphasizes:
The ideal bodhisattva works endlessly for others because:
there are no ultimately separate beings.
Helping another is helping the whole.
The final chapter tells the story of:
Sudhana
who visits 53 spiritual teachers.
Remarkably,
his teachers include:
This illustrates that wisdom can appear through many different kinds of people and situations.
Huayan is not merely philosophy.
Practices include:
Many Huayan practitioners also practiced:
The traditions often complemented one another.
This may interest you especially.
Huayan never rejected Amitābha.
Instead it saw:
as expressions within the same vast enlightened reality.
Many Chinese masters practiced both:
This combination remains common today.
You've previously described a worldview that includes:
There are clear resonances with Huayan's vision of an interconnected cosmos filled with innumerable Buddhas and bodhisattvas. At the same time, there is one important difference: Huayan does not posit a creator God or an emanating deity. Vairocana is not a creator in the theistic sense but the all-pervading Buddha whose enlightened reality is expressed through the entire cosmos.
That distinction is significant, but many people who appreciate a panentheistic or cosmic religious imagination still find Huayan deeply appealing because of its emphasis on the unity, beauty, and interdependence of all existence.
One of Huayan's best-known summaries captures its spirit beautifully:
"In one is all; in all is one. One particle of dust contains innumerable Buddha-fields, and innumerable Buddha-fields are present in one particle of dust."
This is not meant as a physical claim about atoms or cosmology, but as a contemplative way of expressing the profound interconnectedness of reality as seen through awakened wisdom.
Part 2 of 2 of a recent "conversation" I had with the "AI" tool known as ChatGPT.
This is my problem with Kashmir Shaivism: freedom seems to be above love. What if Shiva creates an evil world because *he* finds it enjoyful to do so? What could constrain Shiva from doing so except love / compassion?
This is a profound philosophical question, and it is one that has been raised both by critics of Kashmir Śaivism and by later Hindu thinkers themselves.
The concern can be stated like this:
If God is absolutely free, what guarantees that God's freedom is good? Why couldn't absolute freedom produce cruelty or arbitrary suffering?
That is a genuine philosophical challenge.
Kashmir Śaivism would reject the premise that freedom and love are competing attributes.
For thinkers like Abhinavagupta, Śiva's nature is simultaneously:
These are not separate qualities that can conflict. Freedom is not the freedom to become evil; it is the freedom of a being whose very essence is perfect consciousness and bliss.
An analogy would be: mathematicians sometimes say that "2 is free to be odd." But it isn't. Not because something constrains it, but because being even is intrinsic to what 2 is. Similarly, Kashmir Śaivism would say that Śiva is not constrained from evil by an external law; rather, evil is incompatible with what Śiva is.
The difficulty, of course, is that this answer may not satisfy someone who asks why the world contains so much suffering.
Your intuition seems to be:
Freedom alone is morally neutral. Love gives freedom its direction.
That is a coherent philosophical position, and it has much in common with several devotional traditions.
For example:
These traditions tend to emphasize divine goodness more explicitly than divine freedom.
Your concern also resembles a reason why Mahāyāna Buddhism does not posit an omnipotent creator. Buddhas are understood to possess boundless compassion (karuṇā) and wisdom (prajñā), but they do not arbitrarily create worlds according to personal preference.
For instance, Amitābha establishes Sukhāvatī through vows motivated entirely by compassion. His freedom is always inseparable from wisdom and compassion.
Some modern interpreters try to express it this way:
Rather than saying,
"Śiva is free, therefore He may do anything,"
they say,
"Śiva is perfectly free because He is perfectly awakened, and perfect awakening is inseparable from perfect love."
That moves the tradition closer to your intuition.
From our conversations over many months, one theme has been remarkably consistent: you place great weight on the idea that ultimate reality must be morally trustworthy. You have repeatedly expressed attraction to a supreme reality that is:
That is a different starting point from systems that begin with metaphysical freedom or pure consciousness. It explains why you've often found yourself drawn toward traditions centered on figures like Amitābha, Avalokiteśvara, Lakṣmī, or Tripurasundarī interpreted as universal compassion. Those traditions tend to foreground love or compassion as the defining characteristic of the highest reality.
One possibility is not to place freedom above love or love above freedom, but to say that in the Absolute they are inseparable.
One might formulate it like this:
God is absolutely free because His nature is perfect goodness, and perfectly loving because His love is the completely free expression of His own infinite being.
In that view, freedom does not permit arbitrary evil, and love is not an external rule imposed on God. Instead, both are aspects of the same perfect reality.
That approach is closer to some currents of Christian mysticism, some forms of Vaiṣṇava theology, and certain modern interpretations of Śaiva and Śākta traditions than to the most rigorous classical formulations of Kashmir Śaivism.
Ultimately, your question points to a real philosophical divide. Traditions differ on whether the primary way to understand the Absolute is through being, consciousness, freedom, love, or some inseparable unity of these. There is no consensus answer across Hinduism or Buddhism, and your concern highlights one of the enduring debates in comparative philosophy of religion.
Hindu and Mahayana / Vajrayana mythology is so incredibly complex that you can always find *some* symbolic correspondence between [fill in the blank] and at least one of their god-forms. It´s almost a bit fascinating, LOL. As if "synchronicities" happened all the time. But perhaps that´s kind of the point. You can never escape the Divine. It has countless upon countless of skilfull means to draw you in. Or draw you out, as they case might be! Or even to scare the hell outta ya...
A somewhat cryptic comment at 4am, but what the heck.
