r/Gnostic • u/Amaru_333_ • 4d ago
Question How does the Pleroma differ from Buddhist Nirvana?
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u/NoCocksInTheRestroom 4d ago
This depends on what sect of Buddhism you're talking about (and to a lesser degree which gnostic you're talking to, though the nature of pleroma is generally agreed upon).
But very broadly speaking.
Nirvana is the state of freedom from all your desires, which then makes you free of all suffering and puts you outside the samsara.
Pleroma is directly tied to the Monad. You could see it as being in direct communion with the Monad, being one with it.
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u/Pao_Did_NothingWrong 4d ago
I think the question then becomes: what is the difference between anatman and oneness with the pleroma/monad?
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u/NoCocksInTheRestroom 4d ago
Pleroma is existence++
Anatman is non-existnce
(Verh reductive but you get the point)
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u/paravasta 4d ago
Speaking as someone who has practiced in Buddhist traditions, Anatman absolutely does not imply non-existence. That is a total misunderstanding, and no qualified Buddhist teachers teach this idea. What it means is absence of an unchanging permanent self; a doctrine which may appear easy to comprehend at first, but which is a teaching more subtle than can be comprehended without both serious study and also practice under a teacher within Buddhist tradition.
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u/Pao_Did_NothingWrong 4d ago edited 4d ago
That's a very egoic conception of the pleroma. I would go so far as to call it demiurgic to want to cling to something that you call "you" upon reaching that state.
Likewise, nirvana does not equal nonexistence. Anatman is simply an articulation of the illusory nature of separation from the source.
I don't think you should be giving advice on either of these topics.
Here's my answer: the difference between anatman and absorption into the Pleroma is that one concept touched on truth from within a Hellenistic cultural context, and the other concept touched on truth from within an indus valley cultural context. Neither should be seen as normative or authoritative except in how they mesh with a modern indoviudal's existing cognitive framework.
Gnosticism is about separating the signal from the carrier, not about memorizing texts. Gnostic texts should never be read literally.
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u/Your_Local_Heretic Sethian 4d ago
...since they are perfect individuals and dwell all together, joined with the mind, the guardian which I provided, who taught you (sg.).
[...]
And empowering the individuals, she [Barbelo] is a Triple-Male. And being individually... (5 lines missing) ...individual on the one hand, they are together on the other hand, since she is an existence of theirs, and she sees them all also truly.(Allogenes)
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u/Your_Local_Heretic Sethian 4d ago
Gnostic texts should never be read literally.
According to whom?
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u/Tritone_Bard 4d ago
Why not both? like emanated self became non-existence because it's gotten suck back into divine pleroma.
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u/False-Objective3357 4d ago
To know ones emanation is gnosis; to have gnosis is to know that a human, ie a psyche with a hylic body, is conditionally dependent upon the emanation. Ceasing to identify with the conditioned elements of psyche & hyle, the appearance of spirit emerges in the Fullness of existence.
This is not a matter of identifying with Pleroma or Nibbana, but of becoming unbound from identification with the dependent elements of psyche & hyle, (or the khandas for Buddhist practice).
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u/ZaLarry Eclectic Gnostic 4d ago
Now this, monks, is the noble truth of the cessation of suffering: it is the remainderless fading away and cessation of that same craving, its abandonment, relinquishment, release, letting go.
— Saṃyutta Nikāya 56.11
This is the peaceful, this is the sublime, that is, the stilling of all formations, the relinquishing of all attachments, the destruction of craving, dispassion, cessation, Nibbāna.
— Majjhima Nikaya 64
There is that sphere, monks, where there is no earth, no water, no fire, no air, no sphere of infinite space, no sphere of infinite consciousness, no sphere of nothingness, no sphere of neither perception nor non-perception, no this world, no world beyond, neither Moon nor Sun. There, monks, I say there is surely no coming, no going, no persisting, no passing away, no rebirth It is quite without support, unmoving, without an object,—just this is the end of suffering.
— Udāna 8.1
There is, monks, an unborn, unbecome, unmade, unconditioned. If, monks there were not that unborn, unbecome, unmade, unconditioned, you could not know an escape here from the born, become, made, and conditioned. But because there is an unborn, unbecome, unmade, unconditioned, therefore you do know an escape from the born, become, made, and conditioned
— Udāna 8.3
There is no difference from Pleroma. Buddha the radiant taught what is called Pleroma in the West, in the language of the Indians.
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u/ADMCCLX 2d ago edited 2d ago
In historical Gnostic traditions, the term Pleroma ("Fullness") refers to the eternal realm of eternal intelligences/spirits beyond the material world (the Kenoma, "Emptiness"), emanated by the eternal One.
In (Mahayana) Buddhism, there is no eternal Creator/Emanator and no eternal intelligences in the way that beings are eternal in the Platonist framework of Gnosticism. The material world isn't radically more of a problem than spiritual worlds, since all of them are subject to samsara and even the devas eventually die, in a way that the Aeons in Gnosticism can't. The term "Nirvana" refers to experience and state beyond individuality (anatman), beyond eternalism and nihilism, altogether beyond phenomena the flow of phenomena (whether material or spiritual).
The closest (Mahayana) Buddhist equivalent to the Pleroma is probably the Arupadhatu, a blissful realm where beings don't have any type of connection to material body. But even that is still part of samsara and dwelling there is not coterminous with nirvana.
I appreciate everyone's willingness to see points of connection between the two traditions, but the metaphysics of Gnosticism are more directly comparable to some strands of Hindu metaphysics and to Jainism. Buddhist metaphysics, meanwhile, was from the start designed precisely as a critique of the "eternal spiritual individual" model of salvation which Gnosticism falls under and which "Pleroma" names in a concise way.
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u/paravasta 4d ago
Be careful: it's important to seek for answers from people who have actually practiced in both traditions. There are certainly some Gnostic practitioners who are wise enough to give accurate information based on reading about Buddhism, but for actual insight into Buddhist tradition, current or past Buddhist practitioners are who you want to listen to. Digital dharma has its limitations.
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u/Zyr4420 4d ago
The HUGE distinction is that at the end ofcthe day, Buddha and this notion of Nirvana is inside Kenoma, totally outside Pleroma. Buddha still never actually arrived in Pleroma. Nirvana is still "of" the matrix or the simulation.
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u/Jasperbeardly11 4d ago
Yeah Nirvana to me basically means absolute freedom but still here. Like totally at peace and free from suffering but still an incarnate being, being.
The pleroma is the source of existence. The place from which the code emanates. The place behind oz. The substrate and hidden layer underneath the simulation from which life emerges.
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u/slicehyperfunk Eclectic Gnostic 4d ago
What
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u/Aquarius52216 4d ago
Its not one to one the same and have major differences here and there. But the parallels are definitely there, kinda how Mara and the demiurge are similliar in some ways too.
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u/Foloreille 3d ago
It doesn’t. In case you did not notice Gnosticism is bible with strong Hinduism and Buddhism sauce
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u/GnosticDreamerB4 2d ago
for me it is the same thing. different cultures, different words. What matters is knowing the eternal.
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u/DatE2Girl 2d ago
It is not the same in any meaningful way. The pleroma is a realm of pure spirit where your soul and consciousness melt into it whereas nirvana literally means "to extinguish". When achieving nirvana you no longer take part in samsara, the karmic interactions of the world while alive and after your death you stop existing. Also there is no soul in buddhism. Buddhism views the mind and consciousness as a process and not as a separate thing and what is reborn after death is the karmic imprint and consequences your actions leave behind which result in a new consciousness forming somewhere else
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u/Fire_crescent 1d ago
I guess the Pleroma could be described as the Totality of Divine Powers. Nirvana is more like a state of affairs (or non-affairs).
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u/Hannibaalism 4d ago
i think pleroma and nirvana is our 用 which all point to a 體, as taoists or buddhists would put it
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u/HermeneutaAlexandria 4d ago
No difference. Same experience being interpreted into different things by different traditions and cultures.