[Lal]

I don’t disagree with many things you stated, Chah.

Different people become passionate about different issues. I can understand your passion for animal lives.
– But we all are forced to engage in unfruitful or undesirable actions at various levels. That is what I was trying to say. If one gets to the level of abstaining eating meat, one needs to be abstaining from all four types of wrong speech, because that affects other humans and thus would incur much more strong kamma. You could be at that level. I do not know. But I know most people are not.
– Only an Arahant is completely free of dasa akusala.
– There is absolutely nothing wrong with abstaining from eating meat. In fact, that should be commended.
– If we can scrutinize all our actions to that level, that will definitely speed up the process of attaining Nibbana.

[Lal]

Welcome to the forum, Chah!

You wrote, “With regards to the title, can we agree that the taking of life (for any purpose, but in particular for the purpose of the enjoyment of the taste of flesh) is an evil action?”

Yes. No one said otherwise. Taking a life is an evil action.
– But someone buying meat at the supermarket is not taking a life. That animal was killed by someone else days ago.

Now, there are some minor related issues. Those could become major issues depending on the “spiritual level” of the person.
– Some people say that if people stop eating meat, that animal would not have been killed.
– That is true, but that is why I said my statement is not to condone eating meat.
– Some people (especially meditators) do not eat meat due to that way of thinking, and that is great.

But as you pointed out, the Buddha did not want to “make a rule out of it” even for the bhikkhus. But bhikkhus are not supposed to accept a meal if an animal was killed for just that meal (i.e., if a chicken was killed for the meal, for example).

The main point is that most of our actions involve hurting other living beings in some way. It is virtually impossible to live without doing harm to other living beings.
– Even when we walk, we inadvertently kill so many small creatures.
– The water we drink has so many microscopic creatures.
– When we clean the house, we inadvertently kill many living beings.
– Furthermore, if we push your argument a bit more, eating rice or any other food would be bad too. How many animals are killed by farmers when they grow any kind of food? An uncountable number of living-beings are killed when a farmer prepares the soil for planting, and even when harvesting the crop.

It is a good idea to examine the relative strengths of such inadvertent actions versus some other actions we may not think about.
– The “level of existence” or the “level of consciousness” plays a large role in the strength of a kamma. A human life is much more valuable than animal life. Even among humans, hurting one will magga phala would have much larger consequences. For example, killing an Arahant is an anantariya kamma, a much more potent kamma than killing an average human.
– Even verbally hurting another HUMAN is much worse than deliberately killing many small animals.
– Some of these discussed in, “How to Evaluate Weights of Different Kamma”

This and related issues were discussed at the forum several times in the past. The following is one: “Abstaining from damaging plants and seeds”

[Lal]

I was thinking about what cubibobi asked: “Is “Mara” as designation of this deva the same word “mara” as in relating to death?”

Yes. There is also a connection of Māra to death or “marana” in the following sense.

In Ariya Vinaya, death is inevitably “attached” to birth (jāti). Wherever there is birth, there will ALWAYS be death.
– Therefore, in Ariya Vinaya (i.e., for Noble Persons) whatever causes the birth-death cycle to continue is the REAL death or “marana.”
– Now, those who do not realize the drawbacks and dangers in kāma (sense pleasures) are going to be subjected to the rebirth process or “marana”
– That is why Māra Devaputta is associated with marana. He encourages people to enjoy sense pleasures, even though he discourages immoral behavior. But as long as one does not realize the bad consequences and dangers in engaging in even harmless sense pleasures, one will NOT be able to escape the “kāma loka“. As long as one is in kāma loka, the possibility of succumbing to temptations and ending up in the apāyā will be there (until one becomes a Sotapanna/Sotapanna Anugāmi)
– That is why the Buddha always referred to Māra Devaputta as a “bad influence” and equated to “death”. That death or “marana” means the inability to reach release from the cycle of suffering.

It is a bit deeper point. Please feel free to ask questions.

[Lal]

The Pāli word for death is “marana“.

However, I should have mentioned that “Māra” could have one of two meanings, depending on the context.

– One is Māra Devaputta, a Deva, who gave a lot of trouble to the Buddha because he was against people attaining Nibbana. His mindset is as follows: “Deva realms are so blissful. People should engage in good deeds and get rebirth in Deva realms.” He does not understand that he himself could be born in an apāya in the future.

– The other Māra is the “kilesa māra” referring to the defilements in a person’s mind. Those are temptations to engage in sensual pleasures. I think you could be referring to this second usage.

[Lal]

Yes. These are common issues for many people.

I just wrote a lengthy explanation for related issues on a different topic: “Mediumship is it real?”

It may seem that it is a different topic. But the second question he asked was on the current topic. So, please read my comment at July 18, 2020, at 5:07 pm.

Most of the problems that we face are of our own making.
– It is hard to believe, but all these problems go away when we work on purifying the mind.

Here are two posts that I wrote several years ago that address this issue from a different perspective: “Foundation of Dhamma” and “The Importance of Purifying the Mind“

[Lal]

Raja asked, “if anger is a facet of greed, is fear too?”

Yes. Anger is a facet of greed.
– Fear is the RESULT of anger.

Think about it this way.
– When we hurt someone by verbally threatening or even physically injuring another person, we generate a form of fear in that person.
– That mindest (technically called sankhara) in our mind, leads to fuel an existence (bhava) corresponding to that sankhara. Now, this “bhava” is NOT a “bhava” for rebirth, but an existence within a life.

Generation of greed in the mind (greedy sankhara) can lead to a “peta bhava” within this life in the same way.

In both cases, the Paticca Samuppada process proceeds in the standard way: “avijja paccaya sankhara” through “bhava paccaya jati“, “jati paccaya jara, marana, soka, etc” or SUFFERING.

This is the “Idappaccayātā Paṭicca Samuppāda” process.

Now, if one keeps engaging in that kind of behavior, the kammic energy can grow and could lead to a birth in a bad existence.
– That is the “Akusala-Mūla Uppatti Paṭicca Samuppāda” process.

A more detailed analysis at, “Paṭicca Samuppāda in Plain English”

The main point is that we prepare our own futures (whether in this life or in future lives) by thinking, speaking, and doing things in certain ways. As mentioned above, those are sankhara. For details, see, “Saṅkhāra – What It Really Means”
– Those on the “good side” lead to “good results.’
– Those on the “bad side” lead to “bad results”.

As cubibobi suggested, it is a good idea to review AND follow the guidelines in the initial posts of the section, “Bhāvanā (Meditation)”
– That provides the necessary background to comprehend and fully understand the Paticca Samuppada processes.
– Learning Dhamma is to learn Paticca Samuppada, how we create our own futures.

Some of the links above may be somewhat advanced. I would suggest starting with the “Bhāvanā (Meditation)” section.

P.S. Please start a new topic if the new question is not related to the previous question.

[Lal]

For those who are not familiar with the term, “Mediumship” or just “Medium”, it refers to an instance where a subtle-body of another living being (could even be a human gandhabba) enters the physical body of a human and “takes possession” of that human body.
– There is truth to this mechanism. However, most current accounts are fake.

During the “time of possession,” it is the alien being who is in control of the physical body.
– In reality, this can only happen to those with “weak minds.”
– Those of us who follow Buddha Dhamma do not need to worry about it.
– Even more importantly, it is better to just ignore such occurrences, whether real or not. It would not be helpful to get involved.

In the 1990 movie “Ghost,” Oda May is a medium (or a psychic.) See, “Ghost 1990 Movie – Good Depiction of Gandhabba Concept”

P.S. For more information, see, “Mental Body (Gandhabba) – Personal Accounts” and “What Does Buddha Dhamma Say about Creator, Satan, Angels, and Demons?”

P.S. Usually, a psychic or a “medium” is a person who has a relationship with another living-being of “subtle form” and, thus, can invite that being to “take possession” of one’s own body. That is what Oda May in the movie “Ghost” does.
– I don’t want to get into too many details, but that completes the above description.

[Lal]

That explanation does give the right idea, y not.

However, the word dhamma should not be attributed to Vedic teachings. It has origins in the previous Buddha, Buddha Kassapa (and, of course, to even earlier Buddhas). All Buddhas teach the same Buddha Dhamma.

I have touched on that in several posts. I mentioned that again in #5 in the introduction to the new series of posts “Buddhahood Controversies – Introduction.”
– I will write more on that in upcoming posts in that series.

Dhamma means “to bear.”
– Everything in this world arises due to dhammā (created by the mind.) Buddha’s teachings about how that happens is called “Buddha Dhamma.” See, “Dhammā, Kamma, Saṅkhāra, Mind – Critical Connections.”

– More clarification at, “Ye Dhammā Hetuppabhavā.. and Yam Kiñci Samudaya Dhammam..“

[Lal]

Good question, because this gets to the heart of Buddha Dhamma.

The Buddha addressed the issue of future-suffering in the rebirth process.
– Each living being is born only to go through aging, sickness, and eventual death. But it does not end there.
– That living being is born again, only to got through the same process of aging, sickness, and death.
– Furthermore, most births in that rebirth process are in the four lowest realms (apayas) of animal, hungry ghost, asura, and hell. We tend to think of “birth’ as “birth as a human.” But in the rebirth process, human birth is very hard to get.

That is called “suffering associated with the rebirth process” or “samsaric dukkha.”
– The only way to end that suffering is to stop the rebirth process, i.e., to attain Nibbana.

The Buddha realized the “hidden suffering” in the rebirth process when he saw the “Four Great Omens” as a young Prince. See, “Buddhahood Controversies – Introduction“

[Lal]

Issues like this can be easily resolved by looking at what kind of actions will bring “bad consequences” in terms of kamma vipāka.

The following are the dasa akusala or the ten immoral deeds:

Bodily actions: killing, stealing, sexual misconduct
Speech: lying, slandering, harsh words, frivolous talk
Thoughts: greed, anger/hate, wrong views

As we can see meat-eating does not fall into any of them.

When you buy meat at the supermarket, that animal had been killed by someone else. That person had already done the “bad kamma.”
– The Buddha did not prohibit meat-eating (even for bhikkhus) because of that.

However, this is not an endorsement for eating meat.

By the way, a very potent bad kamma is to have wrong views. These include not believing in the laws of kamma, rebirth, etc.

P.S. This is not the correct forum for this question. The ‘General Forum” would have been better. Please pay attention to select the correct forum to post a question/comment.

[Lal]

I did not say it that way, Lvalio.
– Please read my post above.

Please write an email to me if it is still not clear.

P.S.
Tobias is referring to the set of discourses in “Waharaka Thero English Subs Discourse”

They are all in my post dated June 19, 2020, at 9:04 pm there.

[Lal]

Tobias questions:

1. In that post under #4 the word nirodha is explained: “…Nirōdha comes from nir+udaya, where “nir” means stop and “udaya” means “arise”. Thus nirōdha means to stop something from arising. …”
– Waharaka Thero explains it differently as “to stop rounding behind something, stopping the rotation of the cycle”. It is the opposite of “rodha”. I think this is the better explanation. Any thoughts?

Both usages for “nirodha” as “to stop something from arising” AND “stopping the rotation of the cycle” are correct. Which meaning is more applicable depends on the context.

A. As explained in #4 of “Nirōdha and Vaya – Two Different Concepts“, Nirōdha comes from “nir”+”udaya”, where “nir” means stop and “udaya” means “arise”. Thus nirōdha means stop something from arising.
– Particularly in Paticca Samuppada steps, this meaning is more applicable in the reverse of the steps. There we have for example, “bhava paccaya jati” step, and to stop jati from arising one needs to stop bhava, i.e., “bhava nirodha jati nirodho.”

B. In the stopping of the “cycle of rebirth”, nirodha is used to indicate the “stopping of that perpetual cycle”.
– This is explained in #13 of “Nibbāna – Is it Difficult to Understand?”

The Sinhala wording for what you stated above is, “නියරෝධ කරනවා කියන්යන් රවුේ හන එක නතර කරනවා. ඊට පස්යස් ඒක රවුම් හන්යන් නෑ. අන්න නතර වුනා.” (Thanks to Janith Fernando for sending me the Sinhala transcript; that made it much easier).
– It could be translated in the given context as, “nirodha means to stop going around in the rebirth cycle. When one stops acting with avijja, that stops the rebirth cycle. That is nirodha.”

Many key Pali words like anicca and anatta have similarly several meanings that are inter-related. For example, anatta can mean “without refuge” AND “without essence”.

2. Tobias starting line should read, “Also on page 7 of Waharaka Thero discourse No. 6..”
The Sinhala version of what Tobias quoted is: “යම් ධර්මයක් “සාං” තහවේ “සාං + උදය – සමුදය” සාං කියන්තන් යමක් එක්වීම, ස ස් වීම. උදාපවනවා නම්, සකස් පවමින් උදාපවනවා නම්, “සබ් ං තං” – ඒ සියල්ලම “නිතරෝධ ධම්මාං” – රවුම් ෙහන්න වටින ඒවො තනතමයි! “නැතිතවන සුලුයි” කිවුතවොේ වැරදියි!”

I would translate that as “…‘Sañ’+ udaya = Samudaya’. ‘Sañ’ means incorporation or adding. If something X arises due to Y, then X can be stopped from arising by stopping Y. Everything in the world (‘sabbam tam’) arise due to avijja. Therefore, everything can be stopped from arising, they are all ‘nirodha dhammam’, not worthy of pursuing. If we just say ‘nirodha dhammam’ means perishable, that is wrong. because that only refers to the decay and destruction of EXISTING THINGS..”
– That refers to the fueling of the samsaric journey with avijja. The Paticca Samuppada cycle starts with “avijja paccaya sankhara” and ends with “jati paccaya jara, marana, ..and the whole mass of suffering.” Everything that arises will decay and vanish at some point, but the rebirth cycle will continue with another bhava and jati. It is only when avijja is REMOVED (stopped from arising), that the rebirth process will come to an end.

3. Again this refers to discourse #6.

Your question comes up because the term “exists” may be interpreted by different people in different ways. Let me try to explain it this way.

The “eternalists” believe that a “soul” exists. That means a permanent existence.
– The “materialists” believe that a “soul” does not exist, i.e., there is no permanent entity to be called “me” that will go on living forever in one form or another. In this case, there is not even a rebirth process. The death of the physical body is the END.

The Buddha said both are wrong.

So, I would translate that portion that you quoted as following:
“…As the meaning of this phrase, we have been taught that, if some phenomena arise, all those are perishable. Whatever arisen, will decay and perish. That’s how it has been clarified (for nirodha). But that is not nirodha.
Existent is one extreme, nonexistent is the other extreme. Association with either of the extremes, will not facilitate enlightenment.
We do not take it as “someone exists”. That could mean existence forever. ‘Samudaya’ means arising, arising of “a person” for example. When that person dies, “another living-being” will arise due to causes created by that person. If we take it as something existent, that would lean towards eternalism. Something existent would mean something existing eternally. These are things that are forming out of causality. That process can be stopped by removing avijja. …”

In other words, there is a continuance of life after death. But that should not be called eternal life.
– As we discussed above, that process can be stopped. It is COMPLETELY stopped when Arahanthood is attained and that Arahant’s physical body dies (i.e., Parinibbana.) That is nirodha.
– But until that happens, there is existence in some form (in the 31 realms).

It is not easy to express these concepts in words. But as we read more and more, we should be able to grasp the key ideas. As I explained, some words have different (but related) meanings.

[Lal]

It may take some time for me to look at the issues raised by Tobias and to respond. I had not gone through the transcriptions of the discourses other than the first one.

If anyone else has any questions on any of those transcriptions or need to comment on the above, please do so.

[Lal]

Tobias wrote to me and said he could not add the following THREE comments:

1. It is said on page 14/15 of the second discourse. I would also upload the file, but how?

2. Also on page 7 of Waharaka Thero discourse No. 7, it is said: “…‘Sañ’+ udaya = Samudaya’. ‘Sañ’ means union, formation. If something arises from formation, ‘sabbam tam’, all those are, ‘nirodha dhammam’, not worthy of pursuing. If we say ‘nirodha dhammam’ means perishable, that is wrong. …”

That refers to the verse: “Yam kiñci samudaya dhammam, sabbam tam nirodha dhammam”

Lal translated that verse in the post Ye Dhammā Hetuppabhavā.. and Yam Kiñci Samudaya Dhammam..
as “If there are dhammā that give rise to suffering (i.e., any samudaya dhammā), all such dhammā can be stopped from arising (via the Noble Eightfold Path).” (see #7 in that post)

Waharaka Thero translated this verse (summary from above): “If something arises from formation, all those are not worthy of pursuing.”

3. There is more to this on page 7 of discourse No. 7. Here the English translation:

“…As the meaning of this phrase, we have been taught that, if some phenomena arise, all those are perishable. Whatever arisen, will be lost. That’s how it has been clarified.
Existent is one extreme, nonexistent is the other extreme. Association with either of the extremes, will not facilitate enlightenment.
We do not take it as existent. ‘Samudaya’ means arising, arising of the formation, developing. If we take it as something existent, that would hint towards eternalism.
Something existent would mean something existing eternally. These are things that are forming out of causality. …”

Waharaka Thero says we shall avoid the extremes of existent and nonexistent. But he goes very far when he says that “existent means existing eternally”. Also, the word bhava is explained as “potential for existence” (somewhere on puredhamma.net).
I would agree on the view that things arise as formations. A normal person would take this formation as having a face value, which is not there. All we experience is made of satara maha butha with a ghost-like nature (and anicca nature). Therefore it is really of no value (anatta). That explanation does also not require the extremes of existent and nonexistent.

[Lal]

“Waharaka Thero explains it differently as “to stop rounding behind something, stopping the rotation of the cycle”. It is the opposite of “rodha”. I think this is the better explanation. ”

Exactly where does Waharaka Thero say that? I need to look at it before I can respond.
– The two explanations are inter-related. But the above statement needs to re-stated a bit differently.

[Author]

Posts