From the Vajracchedikā [‘Diamond-Cutter’] Sūtra [See Front Page]:
‘Subhuti, what do you think? Let no one say the Tathagata cherishes the idea: I must liberate all living beings. Allow no such thought, Subhuti.
Wherefore? Because in reality there are no living beings to be liberated by the Tathagata. If there were living beings for the Tathagata to liberate, He would partake in the idea of selfhood, personality entity, and separate individuality.’
A millennia later here is Gaudapada, the founder of Advaitha Vedantha, from his Karika:
‘Uttama Satya [the highest truth] is …[the realization] that there is neither dissolution nor creation, neither bondage nor liberation, no one seeking liberation, no one attaining liberation.‘
Absolute Freedom is absolutely absurd. For to be unfree is part of the prerogative of being free. ‘Freedom’ in opposition to ‘Bondage’ originates in Modeled binary construction. ‘Divine Reason’: the old-fashioned term.
Do you smell the presence of the Self-Eating Expression hereabouts?
I am free to be unfree. To be Liberated is to be freed of trying to be free. ‘Liberation’ [Mukthi, Moksha] unlike the expression ‘Freedom’ has an intentional connotation of release.
And Liberation cohabits with no one. You cannot seek ‘Happiness’ and ‘Liberation’ at the same time [in spite of Thomas Jefferson’s silver prose].
‘Happiness’ is a particularly dotty chase. The assured way to miss it is to seek it. Take your happiness when it comes; but don’t compromise on your freedom to be unhappy.
Not-Two 