The religion and the simulation hypothesis. Is Karma a Questioning Algorithm? Is the world an illusion or a dream?
Quests...
Karma simulation hypothesis rationally explains what was previously unexplainable. The world is an illusion or a dream.
Life this; a mirage, a cloud castle, a dream, an apparition -- without essence, but with qualities that can be seen. Know all things to be like this.
As a magician makes illusions of horses, oxen, carts and other things....nothing is as it appears. -- Buddha
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Image courtesy: BuddhistDoorGlobal
I died as a mineral and became a plant.
I died as a plant and rose to animal.
I died as an animal and I was man.
Why should I fear?
When was I less by dying?
--- Rumi
To create a Light Body, to become whole is not magic, nor the result of wishful thinking. It is science intricately, it is an transformational science. A new embodiment made of quarks and photons does not arise without cause, nor without the interaction of many moving parts. Like everything else in our manifest world, the process follows specific steps and stages. Just like a plant, it requires the equivalent of the right soil, moisture, atmosphere, solar energy, temperature, and much else. There must also be a seed in the first place, a lineage stretching back to ancient primal forests. But simple DNA is not enough, for the forces that create the actual shape of our liver, legs, arms, or that of a leaf, are unknown to contemporary science. All growth and development occurs in spirals, in geometric forms whose mathematical formula are written in the ether.
The morphogenic fields are also the stuff of visionaries, the mystic, the meditating tantric, the illuminated yogi, the balanced. An energetic scaffold already exists for living things, for the growing plant, the budding embryo. But in the case of the fully formed human being, trying to form a secondary body, a new spiritual embodiment, there is nothing ready-to-wear. The Light Body structure is present only as a potential, an incomplete outline waiting to be colored in. The fascial sheaths, primo vascular system, cell microtubules, and stabilized fourth state water are our latticework. And the whizzing universe of photons and electromagnetic forces within us are the stuff to be molded into a body of rainbows. These are the templates, as well as the raw material that will become “enlightened.” For, as we know, in some cases the entire body becomes nothing other than luminosity, while others leave a form shrunken down to a miniature version of its previous bulk.
For this creation, we need plentiful raw materials. But the daily allotment of energy we produce to maintain our existence is simply not enough. Some of the required subtle substances are not produced at all by the average person. Others, we make in quantities that are only enough for repair, cellular detoxification, and the millions of mundane operations the organism requires. Sacred traditions, Vajrayana Buddhism primary among them, are intensely involved with helping the aspirant create those special materials in adequate amounts. This process is not child’s play and is the underlying reason why students go into isolated retreat for prolonged periods. Normal life depletes energy. When it comes to our vitality, usually whatever we make, we spend. An enormous amount is also wasted with meaningless talk, scattered attention, ceaseless circular thoughts, and futile activity. While the renunciant may be fed up with the banality of life, this is a simple rejection of society and shunning of ordinary activity. It is about efficiency, energy preservation, and being able to retain the precious substances that come from intense, focused practice. However, raw materials do not a house make. We had better know how to build—and especially in what order.
Stages of transformation
Knowing the working details of our energetic transformation is intellectually fascinating, but it is also highly practical. Understanding which levers to pull, what kind of energy we need, and how to fill in the missing pieces is the essence of tantric practice. But where to look for this information, this hidden manual of step-by-step biological transfiguration?
As a spiritual practitioner, some may say, it is best to follow one tradition and follow it to its end. But if we want an in-depth understanding, it behooves us to look at the meanings contained within many different traditions, existing in different times and places. Every bona fide, well-established lineage holds substantial secrets that others do not. This cross-cultural investigation can only reinvigorate and strengthen our chosen path.
Tantric stages
Vajrayana literature is extremely rich in its description of the anatomy of the subtle body. The branch channels of the various chakras are cataloged and their functions outlined, such as the 64 sub-channels or “petals” of the pelvic chakra. Each has a visual syllable, a sound, and a specific function, described in both Vajrayana and ancient Shaivite texts. Such sounds are recited or folded into mantras for developing and maturing the luminous body. The energies and winds that move within the channels (tsa or nadi) are also laid out clearly. Yet there is very little information about the actual stages of going from a physical form to a light-based body. The exception concerns our old friends the five elements. It is only here that we see a sequential transformation, and then it is only at death. In the process of dying, the denser, coarser elements dissolve into the lighter, more refined. We see earth melt into water, water into fire, fire into air, and air into space. Space will ultimately merge with pure consciousness. This same sequence happens in a temporary way each night when we sleep, as our consciousness separates from the physical form. Or when we move our energies from the side channels into the central channel (uma) through various tantric meditations. But this elemental dissolution is not spoken of as the mechanism by which a Rainbow Body is achieved. And so we must glean clues from other traditions on how this proceeds.
Indian roots
We can start on familiar ground, in the knowledge of Buddhist Vajrayana, Ayurveda, and Hindu tantra. In Western physiology, we know that our digestion breaks food down into its component parts and then recombines these to form flesh, blood, nerve tissue, and the rest. We produce energy in our cells to do work, generating thermal, electrical, and photonic energy along the way. But in the Eastern concept, going back to the ancient Indian Vedas (1200 BCE) and Buddhist Abhidharma (300 BCE), there is the idea of progressive refinement, of producing ever more rarefied levels of substance. In both ancient and modern texts, a seven-step transformation cycle is described. Each phase or dhatu is represented by a particular body tissue, which then transforms into the next. Roughly translated into English these are: plasma, blood, muscle, fat, bone, marrow, and regenerative fluids. A final eighth stage is primal vitality or healing intelligence (ojas). This is mirrored in the Tibetan medical system, itself largely derived from Indian Ayurveda, but with a Chinese and local medicinal contribution. But one bodily organ turning into another makes no biological sense. Like the ancient Greeks who turned the five formative elemental forces into four liquid humors sloshing around inside the body, Ayurveda falls into a materialist trap. In fact, the sequence is actually describing an energetic shift. What is striking is that there is an octave of substances which corresponds to our traditional Western (and Eastern) system of musical notes. It is also echoed in the seven visible colors of the spectrum (although, in fact, there are infinite gradations, limited only by our vision).
This shows up again in certain Indian and Tibetan seven-chakra systems. It also relates to the seven planets of ancient India, China, and Greece, which were understood as a hierarchy of energetic forces, not spinning globes.
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