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Lal:
“…Don’t we discuss Dhamma here?”
Yes, Lal, so it is. However, those who have not heard about Dhamma at all are not excluded (the way you put it in the quote) and those are by far the majority. Here we ‘preach to the converted’, as it were..well, to put it better, to those on the way to ‘conversion’, in most cases.
Leaving PURE Dhamma aside, just the mention of other humanities on other planets, for instance (something I held as inevitable before I came across Puredhamma, as with other major Dhamma notions) and you get a straight bullet: there is no proof of that! The discovery of exoplanets in the last decade or so will in time pave the way for people to accept that..but in time, with scientific proof. People will not go into things through reason and insight…they need the assurance of ‘authority’, in this case, scientific proof.
I always say those who cannot reason for themselves must believe..most often, that which is believed by those around them. It is useless to try to dislodge them from this conditioning – and the danger is that trying to do so may prove to be worse than useless; it may be harmful, because confusion in their minds will be the result. I used to be accused of this even back in my teens when I put forward some point that goes against accepted beliefs and dogmas. After all your attempts to convey your idea,HAVING MADE IT CLEAR THAT YOUR INTENTION IS NOT TO CONVINCE ANYONE AT ALL, still, all your efforts are refuted by a straight: ‘so we have been taught.’ Even ‘Shh, do not confuse us’. Silence.
So I have learnt to keep silence. I am not sure whether I am guilty of some wrong through omission, even if to the slightest degree. But expereience has brought me to the point where I feel I should just keep silent.
y not
Lal is saying:
“…discussing Dhamma is the best type of talk, since that will help everyone immensely not only to elevate “the quality of life” in this life, but also to work towards getting rid of samsaric suffering and attaining permanent happiness (Nibbana).”
All very well. The trouble with that is: who to? ( I apply all that preceded the quoted para most of the time). One must judge by feel who it is that is ready to even just listen to Dhamma. Most people are established in their belief systems and lead as moral a life as they are able to, so I feel I should not ‘shake their confidence’ in whatever they believe in, if only that they may live serenely and die serenely when the time comes.
Therefore I feel that Dhamma is beyond the reach of most, and I am not talking about the deeper aspects of It or Abhidhamma. It could be I am wrong in taking this approach. Only with self-declared atheists do I feel confident enough to drop a hint or two, then I wait for a sign whether I should keep on or not. So most of the time I am just silent when in company.
I will appreciate any comments …
objections, even, to my attitudey not
Siebe:
Thank you:
“This state of complete detachment cannot be expressed in words, but an arahant knows this state.
This completely detached state of mind cannot be called ‘a being’ anymore, it is beyond the sphere of personal existence. It is also not ‘a being’ who experiences this state. It is the nature of mind which does. ”
To me, not being an Arahant, this does away with all notions of individuality : ‘cannot be called a being’, ‘beyond the sphere of personal existence’, and ‘ it is the nature of mind which (experiences this state)…and in the absence of individuality, of feeling, of perception etc there is no interaction of any kind between the beings there…no,not even the idea of ‘beingS’ there is valid, for there are no individual beingS, only Being. Shades of Mahāyāna!: absorption into the One, dissolution, evaporation…even the ESSENCE of a particular Buddha would be gone There, all merged into the One, no-mind, just undifferentiated Mind. Where is the sense of ‘being alive.? Where is the very basis of it? There remains none.
So I would go no further into this, if I may. It is far more important to concentrate on THE task at hand – and time is running out fast, I feel.
y not
Embodied:
I do not know whether there are levels or grades of Nibbana. So I cannot assume that there are. But, yes.. I equate that condition with Nibbana, the nature of which we do not know, for IT WOULD APPEAR that the absence of the skhandhas amounts to non-existence.
Metta,
y not
The khandhas are there as long as there is conditioned existence.
Now the Buddha could not see a beginning to sansara, that is, He could not see a time in the past when beings were free of, or existed independently, of the khandhas.
Before coming to Buddhadhamma I gave a reasonable credence, one that at least deserved investigation,to the Mahāyāna teaching of the Alayavijnana, a kind of ‘infinite storehouse or repository of UNDIFFERENTIATED consciousness’, out of which sparks, as it were, eternally issue forth in a quest to acquire individualization through conditioned existence, all the while rendering that Alayavijnana itself ever more self-conscious. IT would be the source, the spark would be our original state or condition of being therein, and all our time since, acquiring individuality through skhandhas etc,would correspond to our condition in sansara.
However that may be, I have given up looking for answers to the great issues of life in philosophical concepts,however subtle or esoteric, because that does not address the constant and urgent need to ELIMINATE SUFFERING – and there has arisen in me an even greater sense of urgency on the contemplation, not to say fear, of the Buddha’s FULL exposition on suffering, the great dangers of FUTURE suffering.
Suffice it to reflect on the Sutta about the man wounded by a poisoned arrow: he would want the arrow removed AT ONCE, and the one extracting the arrow would put aside questions about who shot the arrow, what it was made from etc.
y not
‘..If one understood the true dangers of the rebirth porcess, one would not spend much time on SUCH TOPICS.’
I myself am extending this to include practically any activity that is superfluous, that is not necessary for survival or for the our well-being. During the past few weeks I find I am consciously limiting my time spent on following the news or sports events,for instance.
So thank you Lal for driving this home..for the umpteenth time. One does need reminding.
y not
The matter revolves around whether the Buddha touched upon every possible aspect of a main tenet or precept. This is impossible, even for a Buddha, all the more so given the ‘short’ 45-year Ministry.
My position is therefore in line with Lal’s “.. would not have anything significant missing.” In the sense that He may not have spoken about the case when one tells the truth regarding a particular matter, whether in its totality or partially, BUT with the intention of gaining personal advantage thereby, like politicians do. Truth is being applied in a devious way towards a selfish end. But the underlying mindset is an impure one. And it is this that counts, and THAT would not be overlooked by a Buddha.
y not
Hello Kakayanamittal;
I hardly ever download at all, pirated or otherwise. But you rang a bell.
Watching streamed events. I am aware that all this is stolen by the stream site administrators. It is like stealing apples then making them available to whoever wants to help him/herself. But would they carry on if they knew nobody is accessing the streams? No. So at the very least I am participating, giving occasion or cause for the ‘crime’ to arise,even.
I never thought much of it because it is all there available for access, and it is not that one is actually stealing something when accessing the stream. However, some feeling of wrong-doing is there as far as I am concerned.
y not
…further to my post above:
I do not know how many on here share my experience, which I have had since childhood. I always felt that we have been before, and we shall be after this life is over. Looking at the sky, contemplating infinity and eternity, it seemed to me impossible that a human’s life can be restricted to just a few decades, when insentient (at least compared to the human level) planets and stars last for billions of years.
So suicide cannot solve any problem, we shall be just the same, only in a worse or better condition depending on our actions here now. This has been my bulwark, my protection against even the contemplation of suicide.
y not
…”in the case of young, healthy people committing suicide due to depression/breakup of relationships etc”
This is by far the least common outcome. In the majority of cases they survive the ordeal. If thoughts of suicide do occur they are dismissed at once as out of the question and they go on through life, some even dedicating it to the welfare of others,be they few or many.
NO HATEFUL THOUGHTS arise towards anybody, not even towards any who may have been the cause of or involved in that depression or the breakup of a relationship etc. The whole of it is later taken with a sense of equanimity, with a sense of ‘so were things meant to turn out’, whether that feeling is in fact valid or not. Is there any BAD kamma vipaka in such cases?
It is important to take into account that the victim (of the depression) is all the while NOT blaming anyone for the circumstances except perhaps him/herself?
y not
Lal:
Furher to my question: an apt analogy would be asking a mother to love all childen as much as she loves her own. With all the good-will in the world, will any mother be capable of it?
Now should the objection come, ” in beginingless samsara ‘ it is hard, monks, to find that some one has not been one’s father or mother or son or daughter’..” again the answer is no, because we do not remember those attachments, except perhaps the ones that are renewed in the present life.
y not
Lal:
I asked you to re-post only because when it happened last, Inflib (Donna) somehow caused it to show on my page and she said so. I do not know how she did it. So excuse me for asking. Terribly sorry taking your time on this.
As to my reference to Siebe’s question, it seems we are agreed. Regarding philosophers, they ask more and more questions but provide no answers, only more and more questions arise because they do NOT KNOW. That is why I am on here.
Now as to “…Who said that “doing good is in the long run a hindrance and must be abandoned“? Did I say that or did the Buddha say that? I cannot imagine ANYONE sane saying something like that.” This was my main point; Siebe came in only as an afterthought, yet most of your ‘answer’ deals with this.
My position is this (I hope to be understood at last): More than one participant has pointed out that the attainment of Nibbana is of necessity a selfish endeavour, for one must put aside all attachment. Now then, love for your children, for instance, is a personal attachment. From the human through to higher realms there will be personal attachment, but at the Arahant stage that ceases. What??..to love is wrong?? because it impedes one’s way to the ultimate goal? So I am not mad after all. To love is not wrong. Only IMPERSONAL love survives there, Metta for all, but that is not attachment (this much I see).
If now at the Summit personalized affection is a no-no ..that State
would lack ‘humaneness’, warmth, all the feelings that make us feel alive. And here is where the Mahāyāna references to that State as absorption, evaporation, emptiness, sunnyata etc come in. Just because of this. I am not agreeing to Nibbana being that by any means, I am just providing a frame of reference.I do not want to argue the point any further. I cannot see a way of accepting that there can be no personal love at ANY Stage on the Path.It would be that I am not at that stage.
Grateful as ever
y not
Lal:
Perhaps the following is relevant to what Siebe is trying to convey.If it is not, please treat seperately.
For myself, the hard bit, not so much to understand, but to accept, is that even doing good is in the long run a hindrance and must be abandoned.
That is of course from my standpoint. Others may have gone beyond the irresistible urge to do and yearn for ‘the most good’ to those they are attached to and to all others in a general, universal sense (AND DOES THIS CONSTITUTE DASA AKUSAKA, OR LOBHA EVEN TO A DEGEE?)- they have reached where the Metta is exclusively universal. And |I am not there yet.
As I read Siebe, what I think he means is that when a Buddha or Arahant or even anyone else with the gati to do good and distributes Metta all around, he does that automatically, meaning HE HAS NO CHOICE. If you do something because you have no choice, then where is the merit? If you have to choose between loving and hating and you choose to love, that has merits, it is noble. But where you cannot do otherwise, where is the virtue of it? This is what I think he means.
The way I see it one works for one’s good gati for lifetimes to attain. So the merit is there. Then one acts ‘automatically’, subconsciously in other words, because he has dispelled all wrong. True, he has no choice. He is UNABLE even to do wrong now. He can only do good. But AT THAT STAGE, HAVING ATTAINED THAT STAGE, all that is done away with.
Please comment.
y not
Lal:
Perhaps the following is relevant to what Siebe is trying to convey.If it is not, please treat seperately.
For myself, the hard bit, not so much to understand, but to accept, is that even doing good is in the long run a hindrance and must be abandoned.
That is of course from my standpoint. Others may have gone beyond the irresistible urge to do and yearn for ‘the most good’ to those they are attached to and to all others in a general, universal sense (AND DOES THIS CONSTITUTE DASA AKUSAKA, OR LOBHA EVEN TO A DEGEE?)- they have reached where the Metta is exclusively universal. And |I am not there yet.
As I read Siebe, what I think he means is that when a Buddha or Arahant or even anyone else with the gati to do good and distributes Metta all around, he does that automatically, meaning HE HAS NO CHOICE. If you do something because you have no choice, then where is the merit? If you have a choice to choose between loving and hating and you choose to love, that has merits, it is noble. But where you cannot do otherwise, where is the virtue of it? This is what I think he means.
The way I see it one works for one’s good gati for lifetimes to attain. So the merit is there. Then one acts ‘automatically’, subconsciously in other words, because he has dispelled all wrong. True, he has no choice. He is UNABLE even to do wrong now. He can only do good. But AT THAT STAGE, HAVING ATTAINED THAT STAGE, all that is done away with.
Please comment.
Sybe:
By ‘doing right’ you of course mean doing what needs to be done or what you feel you should so. Is that it?
There in something in the way of your authentic self and therefore what you want to express. The habits or natural tendecies of how to react (shyness, reticence, apprehension,fear) form a wall. It has cost me. At one time I saw it as a ‘struggle to the death’ between heart and mind. And the done cannot be undone. Or, the undone cannot be done.
Or can it ever? Nietzsche spoke of the idea of ‘eternal recurrence’ Luckily he was only a philosopher.
y not
