True Self

[TheJourney]

I'm in the process of writing my book. Let me show you guys a paragraph from it that I thought may interest you, or lead to an interesting discussion.

 

Hindu thought prior to the Buddha claimed that there was a true, lasting self, which merged with Brahma, or God. The Buddha rejected that claim, and said that there was no lasting self, just impermanence and not self. Here’s the trick to understanding. Your true self IS the impermanence and not self. That is who you truly are. But who you truly are has no one lasting nature. When you get into ultimate truth, words lose their meaning. This is just another example of that. Is there a true self? No words can describe the answer to this. Yes, there kind of is a true self; but that true self has no lasting nature, and there is nothing which you can say is that self. Yet everything is that self, but just an expression of it, and no given thing can be found which is the true lasting self.

 

You are the process of impermanence and not self. All things are not self and impermanence. That is who you are. You are the process of life. You are all things. But "all things" has no set meaning, for it is in flux.

 

 

this may explain it a little better. I'm having a hard time wording all this stuff, as it transcends words.

Edited January 8, 2011 by TheJourney

[xabir2005]

I think you can put it that way too.

Edited January 9, 2011 by xabir2005

[Vajrahridaya]

I think you can put it that way too.

 

 

Yup... he's not establishing anything as a permanent ground of being, except impermanence. Quite in accord with Buddhist dialectic.

Edited January 9, 2011 by Vajrahridaya

[Lucky7Strikes]

[RongzomFan]

[TheJourney]

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_old_is_Hinduism

 

http://www.trueknowledge.com/q/how_old_is_hinduism

 

http://in.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070310230709AAsrkW0

 

Just going with everything i've ever read.

Edited January 9, 2011 by TheJourney

[RongzomFan]

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_old_is_Hinduism

 

http://www.trueknowledge.com/q/how_old_is_hinduism

 

http://in.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070310230709AAsrkW0

 

Just going with everything i've ever read.

 

 

You should read any decent academic elementary book on Hinduism written by a PhD

[TheJourney]

Why would I read an academic book on hinduism written by a phd when i'm not interested in hinduism?

 

Why don't you read an academic book written by a phd about scientology?

[RongzomFan]

Why would I read an academic book on hinduism written by a phd when i'm not interested in hinduism?

 

Why don't you read an academic book written by a phd about scientology?

 

 

If you are not interested in Hinduism don't write stuff about it with invented facts.

[TheJourney]

It's hardly invented facts, seeing as how if you google search it almost every website will agree with me.

 

Please, leave my thread now. Obviously there's some self-esteem issues for you to be putting down a complete stranger over the internet who has never talked to you. The internet is full of people with such issues, so you fit right in.

[RongzomFan]

It's hardly invented facts, seeing as how if you google search it almost every website will agree with me.

 

Please, leave my thread now. Obviously there's some self-esteem issues for you to be putting down a complete stranger over the internet who has never talked to you. The internet is full of people with such issues, so you fit right in.

 

 

Every website still has those fake correspondances with Jesus and Horus that every historian has debunked.

 

Someone creates fake info, and it spreads. For example those budget Virginia textbooks that were not written by a PhD, because the district wanted to save some money. The author just did internet research like you. Now its a big fuckin mess over CNN.

 

I'll leave your thread so you can think about that.

 

 

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=Virginia+textbooks#q=Virginia+textbooks&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbo=u&tbs=nws:1&source=og&sa=N&hl=en&tab=wn&fp=5e05e53c8dca3128

Edited January 9, 2011 by alwayson

[Vajrahridaya]

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_old_is_Hinduism

 

http://www.trueknowledge.com/q/how_old_is_hinduism

 

http://in.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070310230709AAsrkW0

 

Just going with everything i've ever read.

 

The Hinduism that pre-dated the Buddha is very, very different from that which post dates the Buddha.

 

Mostly what we see prier to the Buddha is Brahmanism, which is dealing with the godhead Brahma and the caste system theory where each caste is an emanation from one body part or another of the godhead Brahma and there is no escape from that bloodline.

 

There were also fringe forms that were more shamanistic that did strange rituals and intense meditation techniques, many in the forest through severe renunciation. Some of the very early Upanishads do pre-date the Buddha and these are the types of Hinduism that the Buddha was around growing up through Brahmanism and Vedic assumption and astrology, then moving out of the palace into the forest to study the more fringe forms of Hinduism.

 

Hinduism is not actually one religion and this is one of the worst things that the British has done for Indian spirituality, as Hinduism really just means those traditions born in the Indus valley or the Indu/Hindu Kush and south to Tamil Nadu. Now when you get down to Tamil Nadu, you get all sorts of interesting traditions of spirituality that are not Vedic and even plenty that are anti-vedic.

 

You didn't get Advaita Vedanta until around the 900's when Shankaracharia systematically merged all the traditions of India under a single hypothesis of Brahman with many aspects of his theories taken directly from the teachings of Buddha and Nagarjuna, which is why his teachings are often dubbed by scholars as crypto-Buddhism. Yet, there were still plenty of Shakti cults and Shaivite cults that really didn't get into that. Some of these cults were even into human sacrifices and these crazy followers of the fierce forms of Shiva who went into villages and kidnaped people were called "thugies". Of course not all forms of Shaivism were this extreme. I'm just saying, it's quite multifarious, this "Hinduism."

 

Hinduism is so very complicated, I dare say the most complicated spiritual tradition, because it's not just one tradition but many, many, many traditions that kind of all got swept under one rug called "hinduism" by the Brits. Also by Shankaracharia in the 900's.

 

The Hinduism of ancient India prier to the Buddha is hardly known of by modern people, beyond Brahmanism that is. Supposedly, Brahmanism might have even been an invasion from Persia long, long ago? But, there are many theories... which are just that.

Edited January 9, 2011 by Vajrahridaya

[surfingbudda]

I actually just took a whole course in college about the religious history of India, and my professor(a Phd) taught us that Hinduism is indeed the oldest religion still being practiced and that Buddha did indeed appear much after the creation of Hinduism. The Buddha's radical ideas of equality was one of the reasons why many people left Hinduism to become Buddhis and escape the caste system.AlwaysOn, I am always open to new information and possibly wikipedia as well as my Indian teacher is very wrong, I would be curious as to where you get your information from.

[RongzomFan]

I actually just took a whole course in college about the religious history of India, and my professor(a Phd) taught us that Hinduism is indeed the oldest religion still being practiced and that Buddha did indeed appear much after the creation of Hinduism. The Buddha's radical ideas of equality was one of the reasons why many people left Hinduism to become Buddhis and escape the caste system.AlwaysOn, I am always open to new information and possibly wikipedia as well as my Indian teacher is very wrong, I would be curious as to where you get your information from.

 

 

Me too, although it was a long time ago and I only got a B. Just go to Barnes and Noble or a library and pick any decent ACADEMIC book written by a PhD and tell me where it says hinduism is older than buddhism. I challenge you.

Edited January 9, 2011 by alwayson

[Vajrahridaya]

I actually just took a whole course in college about the religious history of India, and my professor(a Phd) taught us that Hinduism is indeed the oldest religion still being practiced and that Buddha did indeed appear much after the creation of Hinduism. The Buddha's radical ideas of equality was one of the reasons why many people left Hinduism to become Buddhis and escape the caste system.AlwaysOn, I am always open to new information and possibly wikipedia as well as my Indian teacher is very wrong, I would be curious as to where you get your information from.

 

I think what Alwayson means is pretty much what I said, that the term Hinduism is misleading and in fact, Advaita Vedanta or Vedanta as what is considered by the majority to be Hinduism these days is in fact quite a new development compared to Brahmanism, which is what was the majority religion in Buddhas' time and region.

 

Hinduism is really a misleading term coined by I think the Brits? Really... Hinduism does not exist except as a new label throwing together all sorts of traditions that don't have the same ideas about reality, or the same source scriptures. Even the term Sanatana Dharma was stolen from the Dharmapala originally coined by the Buddha in reference to the Buddhadharma.

 

But yes, if you are going to go with the current view that all religions from the Indus Valley are Hinduism, than from this definition, Buddhism as well is part of Hinduism... but, that as well would be totally misleading.

 

From India, there is Shaktism, Shaivism of which there are many types that are very different with different source texts, Vedanta, Advaita Vedanta, Dvaita Vedanta, Brahmanism, Buddhism etc. etc. Only some of these have the same source scriptures and to call them all by one name is a common mistake in my opinion, but a heck of a lot easier than the truth.

Edited January 9, 2011 by Vajrahridaya

[surfingbudda]

Oh I see where your getting at. Ya we learned that Hindu was a term coined by the british which simply means east of Indu river, so everyone east of the Indu river became Hindus. Hinduism is an interesting language that is filled with variation, contradiction and is never practiced the same way in two different places.

[Vajrahridaya]

Oh I see where your getting at. Ya we learned that Hindu was a term coined by the british which simply means east of Indu river, so everyone east of the Indu river became Hindus. Hinduism is an interesting language that is filled with variation, contradiction and is never practiced the same way in two different places.

 

India is the most diverse country on the planet, with more languages than any other. As well as more religions than any other.

 

India is a deeply amazing country, who in fact invented the martial arts in a form that went to China, and actually taught the Chinese many years B.C. But, of course China took the martial arts way further than India. Still, India is so spiritually rich and diverse in history, it's an amazing source of information and anthropological study.

[Marblehead]

May I interrupt this off-topic discussion for the purpose of making a comment to the topic? Thanks.

 

 

Your true self IS the impermanence and not self. That is who you truly are. But who you truly are has no one lasting nature. When you get into ultimate truth, words lose their meaning. This is just another example of that. Is there a true self? No words can describe the answer to this. Yes, there kind of is a true self; but that true self has no lasting nature, and there is nothing which you can say is that self. Yet everything is that self, but just an expression of it, and no given thing can be found which is the true lasting self.

 

You are the process of impermanence and not self. All things are not self and impermanence. That is who you are. You are the process of life. You are all things. But "all things" has no set meaning, for it is in flux.

 

First to the concept of permanence. No thing is permanent (eternal). And this is why Tao can never be properly described as a thing.

 

As to processes: There are processes for all things in the universe. I call these processes "Tzujan" or "the processes of Nature". Science generally call them "the Laws of Physics".

 

Indeed, the word "self" is difficult to discuss because we really can't put our finger on this thing we call "self". No, it is not any one thing in particular. To the human animal, it is a collection of all things that contribute to an individual being who and what they are. And yes, because the processes are constantly changing what is, what was self a minute ago is now different. We have lost some thing and we have gained some things. Constantly changing.

 

However, the self is none-the-less real. Ever-changing? Yes. But real all the same. The mental process of self-awareness creates the self. The self creates a central purpose for the individual.

 

A rock is a rock until it is eroded into sand. But while it was a rock it was a rock. Now it is not a rock but it is sand.

 

What does a human individual erode into? Ha! That is the eternal question of man, isn't it? The answers will vary greatly. But it surely will erode and become something else.

 

So, I suggest that we all enjoy our 'self' while it is definable and not worry too much about what it will become two or eighty years from now.

[Astral_Anima]

huh...yeah I always kinda understood the "true" self as being the faceless force behind the mask (ego, personality, feelings, thoughts, desire) of humanity (6 billion body-minds, played by one force). But yea a human being is definately always changing, I think that's why its so fun playing as humans.

 

But then again it can get tiresome playing humans over and over again. Gets kinda boring, so I think sum evolution would be nice. Perhaps a body-mind that isn't so limited but remembers a time when it was so it can appreciate and more thoroughly enjoy it's new state of being.

 

But if a "true self" were to have no personality, no substance, just pure awareness, pure beingness... why would that be considered "impermanent"? I can understand how the "masks" it may wear could be impermanent but not it itself.

 

Confuzzling...

 

-Astral

[adept]

India is the most diverse country on the planet, with more languages than any other. As well as more religions than any other.

 

India is a deeply amazing country,who in fact invented the martial arts in a form that went to China, and actually taught the Chinese many years B.C. But, of course China took the martial arts way further than India. Still, India is so spiritually rich and diverse in history, it's an amazing source of information and anthropological study.

 

Sorry but this is not correct.

[adept]

So, I suggest that we all enjoy our 'self' while it is definable and not worry too much about what it will become two or eighty years from now.

 

I like this very much and have said it before, many times.

There's far too much emphasis on what will or won't happen after physical death.

Just live in the now, moment to moment, as best as we can.

[Marblehead]

Hi Adept,

 

Agree but I have nothing more to add.

 

 

 

Hi Astral,

 

Oh, we are still evolving. The human animal has been around for about 4 million years but modern man has been around for only about 40,000 years. We have a long way to go before we destroy ourselves. But then maybe we will evolve into something better than what we are now.

[Astral_Anima]

Hi Adept,

 

Agree but I have nothing more to add.

 

 

 

Hi Astral,

 

Oh, we are still evolving. The human animal has been around for about 4 million years but modern man has been around for only about 40,000 years. We have a long way to go before we destroy ourselves. But then maybe we will evolve into something better than what we are now.

 

Haha, yea i know. I was hinting at my personal goal of "ascension". Man is destroying themself but there is a "New Hope" in a movement that is discovering life. However I'm guessing the "Emperor" will "Strike Back" and cause a good deal of trouble (like perhaps an economic collapse along with the continued misinformation and fear mongering) before the "Return of the Jedi" occurs. The Sith may have the Senate, but the Rebels are growing in power and it's only a matter of time before the more powerful (and less forcefull ) win. peace will always prevail in the hearts of the wise.

 

-Astral

[Marblehead]

Haha, yea i know. I was hinting at my personal goal of "ascension". Man is destroying themself but there is a "New Hope" in a movement that is discovering life. However I'm guessing the "Emperor" will "Strike Back" and cause a good deal of trouble (like perhaps an economic collapse along with the continued misinformation and fear mongering) before the "Return of the Jedi" occurs. The Sith may have the Senate, but the Rebels are growing in power and it's only a matter of time before the more powerful (and less forcefull ) win. peace will always prevail in the hearts of the wise.

 

-Astral

 

 

Hey, Hey. You went star wars on me.

 

Yeah, we need to work on self evolution as well. What's that called? Cultivation? Whatever.

 

But now I need go find my self. It seems to have gotten misplaced.

[xabir2005]

May I interrupt this off-topic discussion for the purpose of making a comment to the topic? Thanks.

 

 

 

 

First to the concept of permanence. No thing is permanent (eternal). And this is why Tao can never be properly described as a thing.

 

As to processes: There are processes for all things in the universe. I call these processes "Tzujan" or "the processes of Nature". Science generally call them "the Laws of Physics".

 

Indeed, the word "self" is difficult to discuss because we really can't put our finger on this thing we call "self". No, it is not any one thing in particular. To the human animal, it is a collection of all things that contribute to an individual being who and what they are. And yes, because the processes are constantly changing what is, what was self a minute ago is now different. We have lost some thing and we have gained some things. Constantly changing.

 

However, the self is none-the-less real. Ever-changing? Yes. But real all the same. The mental process of self-awareness creates the self. The self creates a central purpose for the individual.

 

A rock is a rock until it is eroded into sand. But while it was a rock it was a rock. Now it is not a rock but it is sand.

 

What does a human individual erode into? Ha! That is the eternal question of man, isn't it? The answers will vary greatly. But it surely will erode and become something else.

 

So, I suggest that we all enjoy our 'self' while it is definable and not worry too much about what it will become two or eighty years from now.

You're saying: ok there is no permanent car thing, but by the collection of car parts (engine, door, wheel, etc etc) there is a car. But if car is merely a designation for the parts coming together to perform a function, is there an inherent car thing apart or inside the collection or is there simply a conglomerate of parts working interdependently to perform a function with no core and essence anywhere locatable?

 

Please read through this well written article carefully:

 

http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com/2009/02/another-kind-of-self-inquiry.html

 

The Sevenfold Reasoning on the Selflessness of Phenomena:

 

 

1. The car is not inherently the same as its parts.

 

2. The car is not inherently different from its parts.

 

3. The car is not inherently dependent upon its parts.

 

4. The car is not inherently the substratum upon which its parts depend.

 

5. The car is not inherently the possessor of its parts.

 

6. The car is not inherently the mere collection of its parts.

 

7. The car is not inherently the shape of its parts.

 

The Sevenfold Reasoning on the Selflessness of Persons:

 

....

 

Excerpt:

 

6. The self is not inherently the mere collection of the parts of the body/mind. Perhaps the self is inherently the mere collection of the parts of the body/mind. The falsity of this one is a little harder to realize. Our sense of inherent existence of the self seems to put a little distance between the parts and the self. We seem to conceive of a bit of a gap between appropriator and appropriated, between agent and action, between "my" and "body/mind." In this alternative, all there is, is the body/mind. Why even talk about the self? There would be no need to have something called "the self" which is exactly the parts of the body/mind. Agent and action would be one. Self and body/mind would be one. The self would be redundant, and unfindable. Also, in the Middle Way schools of Buddhism that employ the Sevenfold Reasoning, it is said that the conventional self is not the parts themselves, but is posited on the basis of the parts. Based on apprehending those particular parts, a designated self is said to exist conventionally. It is not the parts, but is based on the parts. The appropriator and appropriated are slightly and subtlely different. There is room to make sense of "my life," "my actions." A self redundant with the parts cannot exist inherently.

 

 

 

By the way if you think 'self-awareness' is necessary for proper functioning in life then I can assure you that it is redundant, it is an illusion, and it only causes suffering.

 

'I' (conventionally speaking) still act, perceive, live an ordinary life, even without the illusion of a self, agent, doer, perceiver.

Edited January 9, 2011 by xabir2005