The Third Turning of the Wheel (Reb Anderson)
Buddhadrivel, San Francisco Style
[My 1-star Amazon review (NDA) of “The Third Turning of the Wheel: Wisdom of the Samdhinirmocana Sutra†by Reb Anderson.]
If you don’t believe that Bay Area fog can infest human brains, then you owe it to yourself to check out this text by Reb Anderson, a San Francisco Zen teacher who’s about as clear spiritually as Nancy Pelosi is politically.
Because I’m writing a book on Buddhism that turns the Wheel a fifth time – I say there have been four previous Turnings (Gautama’s, Madhyamika’s, Yogacara’s, and Vajrayana’s) – and because, in response to my two-star review of Jay Garfield’s “The Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way,†a commenter strongly recommended it, I decided to procure and review it.
The first problem I encountered with this text was that the title was just a pretext for Anderson’s rambling, reducionist Zen teachings. If I had known this book was going to be the discourse of a clueless, second-rate Zen teacher rather than an-in-depth consideration of the Turnings, then I wouldn’t have bothered with it. But I suffered my way through it in the hopes that my review might save others from my fate.
Because this is just a book review and not a book, I cannot devote the time and energy to thoroughly deconstruct Anderson’s Dharma (for further deconstruction, check out the comments to my two-star review of “The Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Wayâ€). So I will just focus on some of of his statements.
Anderson writes, “In the third turning we find a presentation of the first turning that is in accord with the second turning.â€
Baloney, I say. First off, the Third Turning, is all about Mind (or Consciousness, or Self, or Alaya), which the Lankavatara Sutra Bhagavan equates with Nirvana (see my four-star review of D.T. Suzuki’s “Lankavatara Sutraâ€). And for Anderson to find the Third Turning in accordance with the First, then he would have to point out where Gautama equates Mind-Awakening and Self-realization with Nirvana. And, of course, Anderson does not do this.
Further, the Third Turning is not in accordance with the Second. The Second, Nagarjuna’s Madhyamika, is all about emptiness, or essenceless, as the principle of Ultimate Reality.The Third, Yogacara, in diametrical opposition to Madhyamika, is all about Mind, a universal metaphysical Substance, or Essence, according to D.T. Suzuki, and innumerable other great Buddhist masters and scholars.
As Ayn Rand made clear, “definitions are the guardians of rationality, the first line of defense against the chaos of mental disintegration.†And Anderson’s misleading definitions only foster Dharma disintegration.
For example, he informs us that, “We spiral round and round and round until all beings have a correct understanding of the teachings. The wish to do this is called ‘bodhicitta’ – the way-seeing mind – and the realization of the ability to do this is the fruition of bodhicitta.
Because Anderson is right off the postmodern, egalitarian-centric Dharmadrivel assembly line, he refuses to capitalize important Buddhist terms, such as Buddha and Bodhicitta. In other words, there can be no Absolute in his two-dimensional, anti-hierarchical paradigm.
Unbeknownst to Anderson, Bodhicitta is not “correct understanding of the teachingsâ€; it means En-Light-ened Consciousness/Mind (or Conscious Light), and is asynonym for Buddhahood, or Nirvana.
Anderson, reductively, defines “Bhagavan†as “a person of great respect.†Etymologically, “Bhagavan†means Penis (of Consciousness) in union with Vagina (of Spirit). “Blessed One†is a synonym for “Bhagavan,†because a Bhagavan, or Buddha, is ceaselessly, Blessed by the Sambhogakaya, or Dharmamegha (or Dharma Cloud), which Anderson, egregiously, never mentions.
Anderson tells us that “Alaya is dependently co-arisen... It is impermanent and has no inherent existence.†This is wrong. The Alaya is unborn Mind, and D.T Suzuki himself writes that Alaya is a synonym for Mind. Anderson, ignorantly, conflates the Alaya with the Alaya-vijnana, reducing Absolute Consciousness to dualistic consciousness.
Anderson falls flat on his face when he broaches the subject of the Trikaya. He tells us, “the Dharmakaya, the true body of Buddha, is emptiness.â€
Emptiness is a non-existent, a zero. For there to be emptiness, there must be some Thing or thing to be empty. The Dharmakaya is timeless Awareness, the One Mind. Emptiness is a synonym for dependent origination; hence Anderson, in goosestep with with his fellow contemporary Buddhadrivel writers, reduces acosmic, or hypercosmic, Ultimate Reality to the tenuous principle of cosmic co-dependence. If this weren’t so pathetic, it would be almost laughable.
Anderson fares no better when he broaches the subject of the Sambhogakaya. He writes, “It [the Sambhogakaya] doesn’t really appear or not appear. It is the blissful experience of the complete faith and understanding of the nondual intimacy of the transformation and the formless source.â€
This statement by Anderson exemplifies his inability to think or write clearly. First off, the Sambhogakya is NOT an “experienceâ€; it is the Blissing/Blessing, Clear-Light-Energy Body, or Dimension, of Ultimate Reality (the Trikaya, the Dharmakaya as Dharmadhatu and Dharmata). Second, if it were a mere experience, it would have to appear and disappear, because all experiences appear and disappear. Third, it has nothing to do with faith or understanding, which involve mental constructs. Fourth, Anderson never identifies a “formless source.†Emptiness cannot be a “source,†because it is an essenceless non-existent, a mere synonym for dependent origination. The real formless Source is Mind Itself, but Anderson cannot bring himself to acknowledge Mind, or timeless, spaceless Awareness, as the universal Substratum, or Alaya.
In summary, Anderson has been infected with not one, but three, illusion-producing “viruses†– the Madhyamika virus, the vijnapti-matra virus, and the U.S. school-system virus – and if he wants to escape from the clutches of this trifold Dharma disease, he needs the antidote – a shot of Reality.
[My 1-star Amazon review (NDA) of “The Third Turning of the Wheel: Wisdom of the Samdhinirmocana Sutra†by Reb Anderson.]
If you don’t believe that Bay Area fog can infest human brains, then you owe it to yourself to check out this text by Reb Anderson, a San Francisco Zen teacher who’s about as clear spiritually as Nancy Pelosi is politically.
Because I’m writing a book on Buddhism that turns the Wheel a fifth time – I say there have been four previous Turnings (Gautama’s, Madhyamika’s, Yogacara’s, and Vajrayana’s) – and because, in response to my two-star review of Jay Garfield’s “The Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way,†a commenter strongly recommended it, I decided to procure and review it.
The first problem I encountered with this text was that the title was just a pretext for Anderson’s rambling, reducionist Zen teachings. If I had known this book was going to be the discourse of a clueless, second-rate Zen teacher rather than an-in-depth consideration of the Turnings, then I wouldn’t have bothered with it. But I suffered my way through it in the hopes that my review might save others from my fate.
Because this is just a book review and not a book, I cannot devote the time and energy to thoroughly deconstruct Anderson’s Dharma (for further deconstruction, check out the comments to my two-star review of “The Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Wayâ€). So I will just focus on some of of his statements.
Anderson writes, “In the third turning we find a presentation of the first turning that is in accord with the second turning.â€
Baloney, I say. First off, the Third Turning, is all about Mind (or Consciousness, or Self, or Alaya), which the Lankavatara Sutra Bhagavan equates with Nirvana (see my four-star review of D.T. Suzuki’s “Lankavatara Sutraâ€). And for Anderson to find the Third Turning in accordance with the First, then he would have to point out where Gautama equates Mind-Awakening and Self-realization with Nirvana. And, of course, Anderson does not do this.
Further, the Third Turning is not in accordance with the Second. The Second, Nagarjuna’s Madhyamika, is all about emptiness, or essenceless, as the principle of Ultimate Reality.The Third, Yogacara, in diametrical opposition to Madhyamika, is all about Mind, a universal metaphysical Substance, or Essence, according to D.T. Suzuki, and innumerable other great Buddhist masters and scholars.
As Ayn Rand made clear, “definitions are the guardians of rationality, the first line of defense against the chaos of mental disintegration.†And Anderson’s misleading definitions only foster Dharma disintegration.
For example, he informs us that, “We spiral round and round and round until all beings have a correct understanding of the teachings. The wish to do this is called ‘bodhicitta’ – the way-seeing mind – and the realization of the ability to do this is the fruition of bodhicitta.
Because Anderson is right off the postmodern, egalitarian-centric Dharmadrivel assembly line, he refuses to capitalize important Buddhist terms, such as Buddha and Bodhicitta. In other words, there can be no Absolute in his two-dimensional, anti-hierarchical paradigm.
Unbeknownst to Anderson, Bodhicitta is not “correct understanding of the teachingsâ€; it means En-Light-ened Consciousness/Mind (or Conscious Light), and is asynonym for Buddhahood, or Nirvana.
Anderson, reductively, defines “Bhagavan†as “a person of great respect.†Etymologically, “Bhagavan†means Penis (of Consciousness) in union with Vagina (of Spirit). “Blessed One†is a synonym for “Bhagavan,†because a Bhagavan, or Buddha, is ceaselessly, Blessed by the Sambhogakaya, or Dharmamegha (or Dharma Cloud), which Anderson, egregiously, never mentions.
Anderson tells us that “Alaya is dependently co-arisen... It is impermanent and has no inherent existence.†This is wrong. The Alaya is unborn Mind, and D.T Suzuki himself writes that Alaya is a synonym for Mind. Anderson, ignorantly, conflates the Alaya with the Alaya-vijnana, reducing Absolute Consciousness to dualistic consciousness.
Anderson falls flat on his face when he broaches the subject of the Trikaya. He tells us, “the Dharmakaya, the true body of Buddha, is emptiness.â€
Emptiness is a non-existent, a zero. For there to be emptiness, there must be some Thing or thing to be empty. The Dharmakaya is timeless Awareness, the One Mind. Emptiness is a synonym for dependent origination; hence Anderson, in goosestep with with his fellow contemporary Buddhadrivel writers, reduces acosmic, or hypercosmic, Ultimate Reality to the tenuous principle of cosmic co-dependence. If this weren’t so pathetic, it would be almost laughable.
Anderson fares no better when he broaches the subject of the Sambhogakaya. He writes, “It [the Sambhogakaya] doesn’t really appear or not appear. It is the blissful experience of the complete faith and understanding of the nondual intimacy of the transformation and the formless source.â€
This statement by Anderson exemplifies his inability to think or write clearly. First off, the Sambhogakya is NOT an “experienceâ€; it is the Blissing/Blessing, Clear-Light-Energy Body, or Dimension, of Ultimate Reality (the Trikaya, the Dharmakaya as Dharmadhatu and Dharmata). Second, if it were a mere experience, it would have to appear and disappear, because all experiences appear and disappear. Third, it has nothing to do with faith or understanding, which involve mental constructs. Fourth, Anderson never identifies a “formless source.†Emptiness cannot be a “source,†because it is an essenceless non-existent, a mere synonym for dependent origination. The real formless Source is Mind Itself, but Anderson cannot bring himself to acknowledge Mind, or timeless, spaceless Awareness, as the universal Substratum, or Alaya.
In summary, Anderson has been infected with not one, but three, illusion-producing “viruses†– the Madhyamika virus, the vijnapti-matra virus, and the U.S. school-system virus – and if he wants to escape from the clutches of this trifold Dharma disease, he needs the antidote – a shot of Reality.
