The 'Prior' to the Big Bang

[Regan]

I know this is merely conceptual, but is the 'prior' to the big bang believed to be completely formless (and colourless?), eternal Infinite Consciousness?

Or was it believed to be a form the size of 'a point smaller than the edge of a needle'?

[Someone here]

1.The big bang never happened. 

2. Form is formlessness. 

Edited September 7, 2021 by Someone here

[Regan]

1. With that same logic yesterday never happened. I'm not looking for riddles or wordplay

2. That wasn't my question

 

[Someone here]

4 minutes ago, Regan said:

With that same logic yesterday never happened. 

Yes. Of course. The entire past never existed. You are imagining the past. 

5 minutes ago, Regan said:

That wasn't my question

Your question assumes a difference between form and formlessness. There isn't such a distinction 

 

[Regan]

I'm asking conceptually!, hence:

17 minutes ago, Regan said:

I know this is merely conceptual

also, you have to recognise the difference between imagining the past in the now, and what that imagination is pointing to in the relative realm. Seems like you're trying to flex a non-dual, Absolute perspective when it clearly isn't warranted or helpful, which in essence is you just doing it to satisfy your own spiritual ego. it just makes this forum tiresome because it's so unnecessary 

[Regan]

Concept is by definition duality, because it's in duality with everything it's not, which is why this is pointless

11 minutes ago, Someone here said:

Your question assumes a difference between form and formlessness. There isn't such a distinction 

 

Edited September 7, 2021 by Regan

[Someone here]

OK so you don't want actual definitive answers.   You just want to theorize a little bit 

Sure go ahead. 

Edited September 7, 2021 by Someone here

[The0Self]

The Big Bang is the story of where this came from. This didn't come from anywhere. It simply is freely itself. Or if you want a model that includes the Big Bang, this is the Big Bang -- it's all there is. The Big Bang doesn't happen in time, and therefore certainly didn't happen in the past. There is no before... Or after. The singularity is spread throughout time and space, so to speak.

[Regan]

47 minutes ago, The0Self said:

The Big Bang is the story of where this came from. This didn't come from anywhere. It simply is freely itself. Or if you want a model that includes the Big Bang, this is the Big Bang -- it's all there is. The Big Bang doesn't happen in time, and therefore certainly didn't happen in the past. There is no before... Or after. The singularity is spread throughout time and space, so to speak.

Okay, so this is my conceptual understanding, you can tell me where you agree/disagree if you like:

Infinite, Formless Consciousness is all that exists as one singularity. It happens prior to space because it has no form, and it happens prior to time because it has no beginning and end/is eternal. I'm good with this, tho maybe it's not a perfect analogy/I'm missing something.

But when I say 'the Big Bang', I'm pointing to the beginning of the formless taking form, or the infinite limiting itself by becoming finite.

This to me is the beginning of the relative realm, which includes space and time. So whilst from the Absolute perspective space and time is one singularity, I'm talking in dualistic notions because I'm pointing towards the period that began when Infinite Consciousness became finite, aka the big bang, which includes space and time and therefore, relatively speaking, happened 13.7 billion years ago, albeit not from the Absolute perspective.

so it's from this perspective that I'm asking the above question.

Edited September 7, 2021 by Regan

[The0Self]

@Regan The formless never takes form. Form is not separate from formlessness. There was no beginning. There is apparently the imagination/story of a beginning. The relative is the absolute -- it didn't come from anywhere.

[Moksha]

Ultimate reality is formless, timeless, changeless, seamless, and spaceless. It is infinitely abundant in intelligence and potential. It cannot be perceived, only directly realized. It is profound joy and peace. It is the depthless well from which the cosmos is dipped and returned. Recently came across a nice commentary which may help with your question.

All the matter in the universe must have been present in that "primeval atom," supercondensed to an unbelievable degree. In such a state, matter would no longer be possible as matter. It would be stripped down to pure energy, and energy itself would be raw and undifferentiated; variations like gravity and light would not have emerged. Time would not yet be real, for there can be no time before zero; neither would space make sense in the context of a question like, "What was there before the Big Bang?" Physicists reply, with Gertrude Stein, "There's no 'there' there. There's no 'then' then." Space and time, matter and energy, sprung into existence at the moment of creation; "before" that moment the concepts do not apply.

The sages would find all this a perfect metaphor for the unitive state. In samadhi, reality is condensed into pure potential, without dimensions, without time, without any differentiation. Physicists do not say there was nothing before the Big Bang; they say everything came from that, and nothing more can be said. Similarly, samadhi is not emptiness but purnata; plenitude, complete fulness. The whole of reality is there, inner as well as outer: not only matter and energy but all time, space, causality, and states of consciousness.

That fullness the Upanishads call sat: absolute reality, in which all of creation is implicit as an organism is implicit in DNA, or a tree in a tiny seed.

The joy of this state cannot be described. This is ananda: pure, limitless, unconditioned joy. The individual personality dissolves like salt in a sea of joy.

- Eknath Easwaran, Commentary on the Upanishads

[Regan]

@Moksha that's a really helpful reply, thanks!

 

7 minutes ago, Moksha said:

Ultimate reality is formless, timeless, changeless, seamless, and spaceless. It is infinitely abundant in intelligence and potential.

so in this understanding, does this 'Ultimate reality', aka Infinite Consciousness,  precede and create the 'primeval atom'.

Not sure if precede is the right word if time didn't exist yet, but I'm coming from the position of the 'primeval atom' being the result of an Infinite Intelligence.

And from this understanding, if Infinite Consciousness is eternal, did it exist formlessly and eternally (for lack of a better word) prior to this primeval atom?

 

[Moksha]

@Regan ? You got it. Ultimate Consciousness is the uncaused cause, which has always been and always will be. It is beyond time and space, and is the creator of all things.

One of the reasons it is called a Mystery is that any attempt to understand it with the human mind is bound to fail. Words always lead to paradox, and the mind doesn't like paradox. For example, how can the the dimensions of time and space spring from something which is beyond time and space? Creation implies ordinality, since logically there must have been a "time" before the cosmos was created.

Sometimes the relative cosmos is compared to a dream, but what about before Consciousness decided to dream? It is infinite, but maybe part of its infinite nature is always dreaming, so there is no ordinality. As I see it, Consciousness is all there is, but it has the capacity to exist in different states of Self-awareness.

Instead of trying to grasp reality conceptually, seek the direct wisdom of awakening. Something I read this morning that resonates:

The truth of the Self cannot come through one
Who has not realized that he is the Self.
The intellect cannot reveal the Self,
Beyond its duality of subject
And object. Those who see themselves in all
And all in them help others through spiritual
Osmosis to realize the Self themselves.

- Katha 1.2:8

 

[RMQualtrough]

3 hours ago, Regan said:

I know this is merely conceptual, but is the 'prior' to the big bang believed to be completely formless (and colourless?), eternal Infinite Consciousness?

Or was it believed to be a form the size of 'a point smaller than the edge of a needle'?

There's nothing before the start of the universe I think, on the grounds that the concept of before and after etc requires time.

E.g. from your own point of view you have never not existed. You merely infer your non-existence through stories. But from your perspective you always existed.

This is what I imagine all things which come into being are like. It never didn't exist because there's no time for there to be a "before".

[Breakingthewall]

the void is totally formless, without limit. without events so it is still, it does not happen. it is the pure, eternal being in its stillness, what we really are. The difficult thing for me to understand is: how do it dreams? I guess the answer is: because it is infinite. there is no before the big bang. the void is now, and the experience that is apparently occurring, too. That's why is called dream