ScottRoberts wrote: ↑Mon Apr 03, 2023 11:24 pm
Oneness and Manyness are a tetralemmic polarity, meaning one gets into trouble by accepting any of the four horns of the tetralemma: absolutizing any of: Oneness, Manyness, Oneness and Manyness, neither Oneness nor Manyness. The above (and many other remarks you've made) is prioritizing Oneness over Manyness. It evidences a falling off the Middle Way.
Well, you can describe it that way, I'm OK with describing it as tetralemmic polarity. But Oneness is not the absence of forms, Oneness is always simultaneously Mayness, there is actually no polarity here, they are just two co-existing aspects of the same Reality. Reality is Oneness in the fundamental aspect with simultaneous diversity of forms, just like the ocean is made of the same water but manifests a diversity of waves on its surface and they are not in polarity to each other. But when we function in dualistic mode, we only perceive the aspect of multiplicity and do not experience the aspect of Oneness, which makes the world appear to us as a conglomerate of separate things and selves, and sensing ourselves as a separate self, and that's dualistic perception. But within the realm of forms we find a lot of polarities that serve as forces to govern the dynamics of the forms.
I think to get back on, one should just note that Thinking implies Being (Thinking is) and Experience (Thinking is experienced), so the BE of BET are unnecessary add-ons. Adding them on serves no purpose other than to imply the possibility that God might choose to not Think, in which case we and the Cosmos would disappear. So all one needs (ontologically speaking) is Thinking, while noting that Thinking requires the polar forces of Oneness and Manyness. To be sure some wordwork is needed to show that feeling and willing are embedded in Thinking, and that sense perception is a kind of Thinking, which is why the phrase 'ideational activity' might be better.
Agree on "ideational activity", disagree that adding Being and Experience is unnecessary. Knowing these aspects serves a key purpose, because when we disregard them, we neglect the fundamental transcendental timeless and unconditioned aspects of God where we can find and experience Oneness, and so we get entangled in the dualistic mode of perception, see above. The Thinking aspect is not transcendental per se, but rather a bridge between the immanent and transcendental, the creative power of God. As you said, God can choose not to Think, but it cannot choose not to Be and not to Experience, so those two aspects are absolutely immutable and timeless by nature ("unbecome, unfabricated"). That's why Buddha said that knowing the "unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated" has the power of emancipation from the "born — become — made — fabricated". God, in all its aspects, creates forms freely and is never bound by the structures of its creations, yet always fully involved with them. And so we, when we fully realize and connect with our Divine nature with all its fundamental aspects, can also become like God (=Theosis): co-creators that are never bound by the structures of creations but always involved with them.
The Trinity of fundamental aspects of God have been revealed in both Christian and Buddhist traditions. In Buddhism the fundamental nature (Dharmata) is Trikaya and has three aspects: Dharmakaya (Emptiness-Beingness), Sambhogakaya (lucidity of Experiencing-Awareness) and Nirmanakaya (power of manifestation of forms, Thinking). In Christianity it is the Father (Beingness), the Holy Spirit (Lucid Awareness) and the Logos (Thinking, creative power of God). Both traditions emphasize the key importance of realizing all of these three aspects.
"There is, monks, an unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated. If there were not that unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated, there would not be the case that emancipation from the born — become — made — fabricated would be discerned. But precisely because there is an unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated, emancipation from the born — become — made — fabricated is thus discerned."
Buddha, Iti. 2.16