3bob

VJ, How many times have we heard that worn out line...? Get off it. Grow up. Get real.

VJ, I never said anything about hating you (who could really hate a deluded nut-job anyway?), it's just that you are sick and spreading it here. Someday a Buddha will help you crack your coconut then you'll see what an ass you have been parroting this and that as if you authority to do so.

Well you gave it a decent shot Twinner. Do many of us a favor VJ and move on to a real Buddhist web site and see how long they tolerate a nut-job like yourself... Om

I'm not against any belief system that follows the ways of kindness, down to earth spiritual help, relief from continued suffering, etc. etc.. Nor do I automatically equate religion(s) with fanaticism, but with vehicles that can be used for parts of the journey. Om

"When we invalidate the beliefs of others, it is violence" Well said Steve

I may have to search out some of Mat's posts for a look see. Anyway, imo the instances of breaking "right speech" (which is a fine teaching) is not an entertaining show.

Ok, and it is a spiritual law that when we help others in various universal and kind ways as moved by the great force to do so, then we to are also benefitted in various ways by the great force. (thus comes about the fading away of boundaries of an us, a them, and also being separated from the great force) Om

Well along different lines all are not ready for to much light (so to speak) and that is well since harm can be done. A simple analogy: a plant seed is not ready for the full force of the sun or wind, and it needs to be covered or "hidden" in moist earth as a place to begin its life. Om

An overwhelming, unconditional, all encompassing boundlessness of Love with Wisdom is the instant way! Although...the blown mind or humpty-dumpty also have to be put back together again with certain preparations and maintained for such an instant to always remain instantly and fully manifest. Om

"I see it the same as how Native Americans will not share some sacred dreams with anyone but their mentor because in doing so will lose the power they gained by it. This seems to be one of those things that reaches other areas of life as well. like above, it's good to remember that keeping our power secret can make it more powerful, while displaying it often ends in us losing it, whether to jealous competitors, or perhaps higher powers which decide we are not fit to carry them" Good point HE and also very valid on the internet... Although since we are mostly walking around "asleep" anyway it is not hard to keep things "secret" even though such are in plain sight but often or mostly missed or invisible to everyone, including ourselves. (unless they happen to be one of those exceedingly few people who are fully awakened while the rest of us 7 billion people are "dreaming openly" with great gusto...which btw is mostly my condition. :-) Om

Om

One is the transition between none and two. Also none is connected to one and one is connected to two and two is connected to three, etc..

Killing the Buddha "There's an old saying, "If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him." Who's that Buddha? What does it mean to "meet" the Buddha? What does killing the Buddha imply? The historical Buddha, Shakyamuni, on attaining enlightenment, is said to have realized that all beings, just as they are, are Buddhas. If that's so, meeting a Buddha on the road should be a pretty commonplace event! So should being a Buddha on the road! But that's where the word "meeting" comes in. It implies encountering something or someone outside or other than oneself. We all come to practice carrying around images or ideals of who we should be and what we imagine a Teacher or Buddha should look like. And we may chase after individuals that for a while seem like they live up to our image, ignore those who do not, and generally treat ourselves with contempt for not living up to the standards set by our imaginary inner "Buddha." All this may keep us pretty busy, but it has nothing to do with real practice, which is an awareness of who and what we actually are, not the pursuit of some ideal of who we think we should be. So "killing the Buddha" means killing or wiping out this fantasy image, and "the road" is two fold: the road outside where we look outside ourselves for the ones who have all the answers, and the inner mind road, where we set up all the "shoulds" we must obey to turn ourselves into the Buddhas we don't believe we already are, but think we must become. It is said that Shakyamuni's last dying words to his disciples were, "Be a lamp unto yourselves." Be your own light, your own authority, your own Buddha. Kill off every image of the Buddha, see who and what you are in this very moment, see that there is no Buddha other than THIS MOMENT. A psychologist friend recently complained that Buddha's last words themselves were a trap. (Actually he called them something much less polite!) How can anybody TELL you to be your own authority? In the guise of liberation, these words become just one more dogma that the disciples submit to. Anybody who TELLS you to "Kill the Buddha" is giving a command as self-contradictory as "Be spontaneous!" It's a good point, and one that shows that this koan and Buddhism in general can't escape a more complex involvement with issues of authority. Our psychological reality is that we have to learn and practice to achieve our independence, and that learning almost inevitably has to take place within the context of some kind of disciplined practice. Remember we have to "kill the Buddhas" inside as well as outside ourselves. If we take this saying to mean only that we should reject all forms of external authority, we will end up leaving ourselves at the mercy of all sorts of, often unconscious, inner "Buddhas." Isaiah Berlin distinguished two kinds liberty he called positive and negative liberty. Negative liberty is freedom FROM, freedom from outside interference of one kind or another. Killing the outside Buddha may give us a version of this negative liberty. Positive liberty is freedom TO, the liberty of enabling conditions. And these are what are provided by a Teacher, a practice, a discipline. Berlin emphasized that the two kinds of liberty were conceptually at odds with one another, and an increase in one automatically meant a decrease in the other. And yet, we cannot thrive without both. Without a formal practice, we will never engage the deeply ingrained unconscious determinants of our character. But any practice, any teacher inevitably offers the risk and the temptation to hand over responsibility to someone or something outside of ourselves. The middle way is our balancing of these two truths. There is no one correct way to balance them, and every teacher, every discipline will offer a unique mix. No one can tell you how you, as a particular individual, ought to practice. Each of us must decide and take responsibility for the balance works best for us. That is how we truly can be a "lamp unto ourselves.""

Death as a teacher... washes away various types of passing dust.

Thanks for the replies folks. As stated or implied by the quote a very wide range of words could also be subsituted for Buddha... Further, it's all more or less in vain without Love, a meaning that can not be subsituted for. Om

VJ, If you want converts you'll never get them this way, in fact you will turn them away... take an example from some other Buddhists here who are more or less at peace and proceeding along their way without overdone doctrine hammerings. Om

VJ, I suggest you start another one of your, "I'm a Buddhist and know it all" threads somewhere else...(Btw, note what the original poster was bringing up subject wise...) Believe it or not you don't have to try and take over almost every thread with your never ending, hypnotically-baked excuses for having superior insights, along with put downs of other ways. Frankly your constant breaking of Buddhist dharmas and or precepts is embar-assing to witness. Maybe you'll get lucky someday and bump your thick skull up against a Buddhist who won't put up with your malarky. Om

An "enlightened mind" is directed by its master or "Spirit" if you will. It's that simple, so simple that mind can not wrap its mind around it.

Thinking we are a mind and searching throughout the entire gamut of mind will never give a "final conclusion" or rest because even the best of mind can never give such.

Thanks Steve ...Om

A comparison with the upanishads and the "utterly local connection" mentioned earlier if you will? Chhandogya: (from an old translation) EIGHTH PRAPÂTHAKA, FIRST KHANDA. 1. Harih, Om. There is this city of Brahman (the body), and in it the palace, the small lotus (of the heart), and in it that small ether. Now what exists within that small ether, that is to be sought for, that is to be understood. 2. And if they should say to him: 'Now with regard to that city of Brahman, and the palace in it, i. e. the small lotus of the heart, and the small ether within the heart, what is there within it that deserves to be sought for, or that is to be understood?' 3. Then he should say: 'As large as this ether (all space) is, so large is that ether within the heart. Both heaven and earth are contained within it, both fire and air, both sun and moon, both lightning and stars; and whatever there is of him (the Self) here in the world, and whatever is not (i.e. whatever has been or will be), all that is contained within it.' 4. And if they should say to him: 'If everything that exists is contained in that city of Brahman, all beings and all desires (whatever can be imagined or desired), then what is left of it, when old age reaches it and scatters it, or when it falls to pieces?' 5. Then he should say: 'By the old age of the body, that (the ether, or Brahman within it) does not age; by the death of the body, that (the ether, or Brahman within it) is not killed. That (the Brahman) is the true Brahma-city (not the body). In it all desires are contained. It is the Self, free from sin, free from old age, from death and grief, from hunger and thirst, which desires nothing but what it ought to desire, and imagines nothing but what it ought to imagine. Now as here on earth people follow as they are commanded, and depend on the object which they are attached to, be it a country or a piece of land, 6. 'And as here on earth, whatever has been acquired by exertion, perishes, so perishes whatever is acquired for the next world by sacrifices and other good actions performed on earth. Those who depart from hence without having discovered the Self and those true desires, for them there is no freedom in all the worlds. But those who depart from hence, after having discovered the Self and those true desires, for them there is freedom in all the worlds. TTC 21: "...How do I know the ways of all things at the Beginning? By what is within me."

VJ, thanks for being a constant example (aka talking head) of how seriously messed up you are, and that we to can become...

well not to try an circumscribe and or disect... but an important realization is the connection, thus even a so called great and apparently distant transcendent is still utterly and locally connected to what may not be seen as so great. Om

In the following commentary a common denominator is pointed to...it may be of use on this thread? ------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE CHHANDOGYA UPANISHAD by Swami Krishnananda, The Divine Life Society, Sivananda Ashram, Rishikesh, India Chapter Three: Sanatkumara's Instructions on Bhuma-Vidya (minus original sanskrit) Section 15: Life "Nobody can understand what life is. We utter the word 'life' many times, but we cannot explain what it means. It is not what we do daily that is called life. Though we generally identify life with our activity, it is a mistake that we commit. Life is something inscrutable. Life is really what we are. Here, it is called prana. It is not the breathing process, but the life principle itself, without which there would be neither aspiration, nor self-consciousness, nor anything for that matter. The entry of the universal into the particular is the juncture which is called life operating in our personality. It is the borderland of the infinite, where the individual expands into the expanse of the infinite and the infinite contracts itself into the finite, as it were. This particular junction is what we call life. It has the characteristics of both. Therefore, it is inscrutable. It is neither individual nor universal. We do not know what it is. We are unable to define what life is. But whatever it be, this principle of life is superior to everything else. This is what we call the reality of life. It is not merely the activity of life, the function of life, social life, or personal life or any kind of manifestation of it, but life as such. This is superior to everything. The Upanishad now tells us how inscrutable it is. "Beyond all things, superior to all that I have told you up to this time, is life," says Sanatkumara. As spokes are fixed to the nave of a wheel, so is everything fixed to the principle of life. Whatever there is in this world, anything worthwhile, meaningful, that is nothing but prana, life. Minus life, everything is meaningless. What do we mean by saying "He is my father", "She is my mother", "She is my sister", "He is my brother"? We do not know. We are not referring to the body as father, mother, sister and brother. There is something else in them and that is the father, the mother, the brother, the sister, and so on. We ourselves do not know what we are when we speak about ourselves. Our importance vanishes when the life principle is withdrawn. We are valuable only so long as we are living. If we have no life, what are we? We are nothing. What we regard ourselves in worldly parlance, viz., the body, is not our real personality. Why do we say that life is superior to everything, and minus life everything is valueless? The Upanishad says that if one speaks irreverently to one's father, for instance, people would say, "How stupid this person is; he talks irreverently to his own father." Similarly, if a person speaks something harsh to his mother, to his relatives, and to revered persons, good people censure him. We revere great people, we value humanity and we respect life in this world. This is something well-known to us. "Fie upon you," say people when we talk irreverently to elderly ones or behave in a stupid manner which would not be becoming of one in a human society. And if we behave in such a way in respect of elders, they say that it is like slaying them, or injuring them. We say, "Do not hurt people." What do we mean by this? Hurting whom? Hurting people. But what is 'people'? Surely not the body. The Upanishad here implies that we are enjoined not to hurt the life in them. The life principle in a person is affected by our reaction to that person. The manifestation of life principle in the embodiment of a particular person is what is referred to as 'a person'. A person is nothing but the life in that person, not the mere shape of that person in the form of a body. So, when we say that one has behaved in such and such a way with one's father or mother, with one's sister or brother, with this person or that person, we mean to say that one has behaved in that way with the life principle present in them, not merely with the body. But suppose the life principle has gone from the father, that revered one whom we have been worshipping. Then what happens? We simply set fire to that 'father', we throw him, we prick him with pokes in the funeral pyre. Then people do not say, "Oh, this man is burning his father." Nobody says anything like that. What happens to that father, the very same father whom we revered just a few hours before, who is just before our eyes and whom we are now setting fire to in the funeral pyre? It may be our sister, it may be our Guru, it may be anybody, it makes no difference to us. It may be an emperor whom we have been respecting so much and regarding so much, and now we throw him into the pitch and bury him in the ground, or float him in the water, or set fire to him. And everybody then says, "Very nice", "Well done". You set fire to the emperor and then say, "It is very nice"! How is it possible? Yes, it is possible, because it is a great ritual that we are performing. But when he is alive, if we do that, it is murder. It is a heinous crime. So, what is our definition of mankind or humanity or any worthwhile thing in this world? Not the body certainly. If the body was our father, we would not set fire to him in the funeral pyre, and we would not prick him with pokes as if he means nothing. Even the dearest and the nearest ones are cast aside if the life principle withdraws itself from them. So, what we love as our relatives and our dear and near ones is the life, and not the body. But we never understand this point. We say, "Oh, my father is no more." Where has he gone? He is there in the way in which he was, but we mistook him for something else. It is the principle of life that is valuable in this world, and not anything that is manifest as name and form. The whole of life is nothing but this inscrutable thing which we call prana. This is the great reality manifesting itself in various names and forms. We mistake the names and forms for this supreme Being which is masquerading here as the objects of sense, as human beings and everything else that we see with our eyes. The supreme reality of every form of visible existence is life. It is manifested in some degree in plants, in greater degree in animals, and in still greater degree in human beings, and it has to manifest itself in still more greater degrees higher up. We have come to a point where it is very difficult to understand where exactly we are. We are in an inscrutable realm. We cannot understand still as to what we are speaking about. We think we have understood what life is, but we have not understood what it really is. It is a mystery that is operating in all names and forms. Whoever understands this mystery as the all-comprehensive Reality which is superior to all names and forms, which is infused into all names and forms, which is the Reality of even the so-called names and forms, including the name and form of our own self, is a master of Knowledge. He is called in this Upanishad as ativadi, a specific term here indicating one who possesses surpassing knowledge and whose utterances are surpassingly true. The greatest knowledge is the knowledge of life, not merely the knowledge of objects of sense. Whoever sees this Reality as it is in itself, whoever can think in this manner, whoever can understand in this way, transcends all, because here the knowledge has gone beyond all objects of sense. It has comprehended them in its own Being. And, therefore, it has become one with Truth. It is not merely a pursuit of truth that we are referring to here as knowledge, but Truth itself that has become one with knowledge. A person who has such a knowledge has really comprehended Truth, and what he speaks in such a stage of knowledge is called ativada. This term ativada means transcended speech, speech which is pregnant with truth, speech which is to materialise in life as truthfulness. Whatever a person with this knowledge speaks will get materialised in life, because the truth or the reality of all things is contained in the knowledge which this person has. Therefore, speech being an expression of one's thought and knowledge, whatever one utters becomes true in this stage of experience. And if people cannot understand him and they say to him, "You are speaking something which we cannot understand." Then he must say, "Yes, I speak something which you cannot understand, because this is a matter which is not supposed to be understood by your mind." Here, we are not in the realm of understanding of objects of sense, but we are in the realm of Being with things. So, one who is capable of attuning himself with the Being of the objects, alone can understand what the truth of this exposition is. It is true when the Upanishad speaks like this; it speaks what one cannot understand. Neither is it intended to be understood by the layman whose mind has not been adequately transformed, because here we are being led gradually from mere sensation and perception, from mentation and understanding, to the intuition of objects, wherein the objects become one with the knowing perceiver, knowing reality-the Subject. At this stage, Narada is unable to speak. His breath is held up, as it were. He does not know what he is hearing from this great master. This master observes the silence of the disciple who now does not say as on previous occasions, "Please let me know if something more is there." He keeps quiet, his mouth is hushed and his mind has stopped thinking. He does not know what to speak. Seeing this, the master himself starts pursuing the subject further without being accosted by the disciple..."

the dharma of a "householder" is not the dharma of a "monk" or renunciate... one trying to do both spoils two. come to terms with and decide your path and affairs one way or the other, although such may change again at another time, in the meantime do well with one choice.