MAHAYANA SUTRA

The seventh lecture
"The Attainment and the Perfection of Causal Yoga"


Controlling fire and water - the levitation of buddha Sakyamuni

The Buddhism of Buddha Sakyamuni is based on Raja Yoga. The reason why I can say so is because I could find such supernatural power of Buddha Sakyamuni; Buddha Sakyamuni levitated with his lower part of the body as water, and upper part of the body as fire. And all people were cured by watching this water and fire. This corresponds with the expression written in "Yoga Sutra" of Patanjari. This is a sutra of Raja Yoga. It is written in this book as follows; When a man adjust Apana vayu, he becomes imvisilbe, or becomes the state like water. And when a man adjust Samana vayu, he creates fire.

So it is natural to think that Buddha Sakyamuni adjusted Apana vayu and Samana vayu which made his lower part of the body water, and his upper part of the body into flame. By the way, this adjustment means the process of concentration, meditation, and Samadhi. And we can do as Budhda Sakyamuni had done when we attain to this Samadhi.

There also is a discription about levitation in "Yoga Sutra". It is said that one can levitate if he adjusts Prana vayu. Or that one can levitate if he adjusts Udana vayu.

Buddha Sakyamuni is the ultimate enlightened one!

I had told you that the limit of Raja Yoga comes from the point that it all begins from denial. In Buddhism, there are systems of practice of Raja Yoga. For example, there is a meditation of the four state of mindfulness in Agama sutra.

They are; "My body is dirty.", "Sense is suffering.", "Thoughts are impermanent.", and "The law (fixed idea) is not myself.". They are based on the idea to deny everything. This is the system of practice in order to enter so called "Pratiyahara" in Raja Yoga. It is a same practice. Pratiyahara is the state when one had detached from everything.

Then how is this fault written in the Buddhist text?

One man asked Buddha Sakyamuni, "I saw a beautiful girl. And the suffering occured because I wanted to be loved by her, and I wanted to love her. What can I do so as to detach from this suffering?" Buddha Sakyamuni replied, "Don't see her.", or "Don't meet her, don't speak with her.".

These are all denial. He says that that it should be denied in such manner. However, Buddha Sakyamuni didn't have to deny such thing at all. For example, without any problem, he can meet with various women such as Khema who was the queen of the king Pinbisara, or Uppalavanna who was considered to be the woman of matchless beauty. In other words, Buddha Sakyamuni didn't have any necessity to deny them.

This tells us that the level of Budhda Sakyamuni is different to the attainment of Raja Yoga which is based on the complete denial. Buddha Sakyamuni had made the perfection of not only Raja Yoga or the Kundalini Yoga which comes next, but also much further Yogas such as Astral Yoga, or Causal Yoga. He had attained ultimate enlightenment.

The causal world - the world of thoughts

Yesterday I spoke about the Astral Yoga. Today comes "Causal Yoga". The other name for this stage is "the real enlgihtenment".

In Causal Yoga, one transfers his consciousness to the body of essence so as to enter the high Causal world. The body of essence is the body made of nothing but consciousness.

There is no material at all but only thoughts in the Causal world. I told you that the lower one third is the threefold structure which is overlapped to the phenomenal world and the lower Astral world. And the next one third is the double structure which is overlapped to the high Astral world. And the rest of one third is the genuine Causal world which is not overlapped to any other world.

The lowest part of the Causal world is the world of complete darkness. So called "eternal hell" also exists here.

Gradually it gets brighter as you go higher. And when you come up to the genuine Causal world where there are no connection at all with the phenomenal world nor the Astral world, you will find the world without any color. This is the reason why this world is called "the realm of non-color" in Japanese Buddhism. In this world as well, the higher you go, the brighter the world is. And if you break through the top of the Causal world, you go into the Mahayana.