Could someone explain the Buddhist belief system to me?

[RongzomFan]

Spot on Jeff. All this stuff is embedded in every faith pathway you just need to know where and how to look for it. Buddhists don't have a monopoly on non duality

 

What do you mean by nonduality?

 

There is the realist like Kashmir Saivism.

 

There is the nonrealist like Madhyamaka etc.

 

Or do you mean the nature of the mind?

 

endless bleddy rituals.

 

Vajrayana is about direct introduction to one's nature and working with the body to gain omniscient Buddhahood. I hope this myth of rituals dies one day.

Edited November 5, 2012 by alwayson

[Apech]

Can you two take this over PM, so as to not derail the thread with such meaningless BS? Please?

 

SJ,

 

This is a conversation like a real live conversation which may well become tangential ... so you'll just have to live with it.

 

A.

[Simple_Jack]

Dvaya Sutta: A Pair

"It's in dependence on a pair that consciousness comes into play. And how does consciousness come into play in dependence on a pair? In dependence on the eye & forms there arises eye-consciousness. The eye is inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise. Forms are inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise. Thus this pair is both wavering & fluctuating — inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise.
"Eye-consciousness is inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise. Whatever is the cause, the requisite condition, for the arising of eye-consciousness, that is inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise. Having arisen in dependence on an inconstant factor, how could eye-consciousness be constant?
"The coming together, the meeting, the convergence of these three phenomena is eye-contact. Whatever is the cause, the requisite condition, for the arising of eye-contact, that is inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise. Having arisen in dependence on an inconstant factor, how could eye-contact be constant?
"Contacted, one feels. Contacted, one intends. Contacted, one perceives. These phenomena are both wavering & fluctuating — inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise. This is how it's in dependence on a pair that eye-consciousness comes into play.
"In dependence on the ear & sounds there arises ear-consciousness...
"In dependence on the nose & aromas there arises nose-consciousness...
"In dependence on the tongue & flavors there arises tongue-consciousness...
"In dependence on the body & tactile sensations there arises body-consciousness...
"In dependence on the intellect & ideas there arises intellect-consciousness. The intellect is inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise. Ideas are inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise. Thus this pair is both wavering & fluctuating — inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise.
"Intellect-consciousness is inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise. Whatever is the cause, the requisite condition, for the arising of intellect-consciousness, that is inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise. Having arisen in dependence on an inconstant factor, how could intellect-consciousness be constant?
"The coming together, the meeting, the convergence of these three phenomena is intellect-contact. Whatever is the cause, the requisite condition, for the arising of intellect-contact, that is inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise. Having arisen in dependence on an inconstant factor, how could intellect-contact be constant?
"Contacted, one feels. Contacted, one intends. Contacted, one perceives. These phenomena are both wavering & fluctuating — inconstant, changeable, of a nature to become otherwise. This is how it's in dependence on a pair that intellect-consciousness comes into play."

http://www.accesstoi...2.044.than.html:


Loka Sutta: The World

"Dwelling at Savatthi. There the Blessed One addressed the monks: "I will teach you the origination of the world & the ending of the world. Listen & pay close attention. I will speak."
"As you say, lord," the monks responded to the Blessed One.
The Blessed One said: "And what is the origination of the world? Dependent on the eye & forms there arises eye-consciousness. The meeting of the three is contact. From contact as a requisite condition comes feeling. From feeling as a requisite condition comes craving. From craving as a requisite condition comes clinging/sustenance. From clinging/sustenance as a requisite condition comes becoming. From becoming as a requisite condition comes birth. From birth as a requisite condition, then aging & death, sorrow, lamentation, pain, distress, & despair come into play. This is the origination of the world.
"Dependent on the ear & sounds there arises ear-consciousness. The meeting of the three is contact... Dependent on the nose & aromas there arises nose-consciousness. The meeting of the three is contact... Dependent on the tongue & flavors there arises tongue-consciousness. The meeting of the three is contact... Dependent on the body & tactile sensations there arises body-consciousness. The meeting of the three is contact... Dependent on the intellect & mental qualities there arises intellect-consciousness. The meeting of the three is contact. From contact as a requisite condition comes feeling. From feeling as a requisite condition comes craving. From craving as a requisite condition comes clinging/sustenance. From clinging/sustenance as a requisite condition comes becoming. From becoming as a requisite condition comes birth. From birth as a requisite condition, then aging & death, sorrow, lamentation, pain, distress, & despair come into play. This is the origination of the world.
"And what is the ending of the world? Dependent on the eye & forms there arises eye-consciousness. The meeting of the three is contact. From contact as a requisite condition comes feeling. From feeling as a requisite condition comes craving. Now, from the remainderless cessation & fading away of that very craving comes the cessation of clinging/sustenance. From the cessation of clinging/sustenance comes the cessation of becoming. From the cessation of becoming comes the cessation of birth. From the cessation of birth, then aging & death, sorrow, lamentation, pain, distress, & despair all cease. Such is the cessation of this entire mass of stress & suffering. This is the ending of the world.
"Dependent on the ear & sounds there arises ear-consciousness. The meeting of the three is contact... Dependent on the nose & aromas there arises nose-consciousness. The meeting of the three is contact... Dependent on the tongue & flavors there arises tongue-consciousness. The meeting of the three is contact... Dependent on the body & tactile sensations there arises body-consciousness. The meeting of the three is contact... Dependent on the intellect & mental qualities there arises intellect-consciousness. The meeting of the three is contact. From contact as a requisite condition comes feeling. From feeling as a requisite condition comes craving. Now, from the remainderless cessation & fading away of that very craving comes the cessation of clinging/sustenance. From the cessation of clinging/sustenance comes the cessation of becoming. From the cessation of becoming comes the cessation of birth. From the cessation of birth, then aging & death, sorrow, lamentation, pain, distress, & despair all cease. Such is the cessation of this entire mass of stress & suffering. This is the ending of the world."

Edited February 5, 2014 by Simple_Jack

[Apech]

What do you mean by nonduality?

 

There is the realist like Kashmir Saivism.

 

There is the nonrealist like Madhyamaka etc.

 

Or do you mean the nature of the mind?

 

 

 

Vajrayana is about direct introduction to one's nature and working with the body to gain omniscient Buddhahood.

 

Madhyamaka is non-dualist, the middle way between nihilism and eternalism.

[RongzomFan]

This is why sometimes I think it's better say that phenomena are illusion-like.

 

Illusion-like is wrong.

 

Its all an illusion.

 

Nagarjuna and sons are pretty clear about this, if anyone cares to read the original Indian texts.

Edited November 5, 2012 by alwayson

[RongzomFan]

Madhyamaka: Nonarising because of dependent origination

Advaita Vedanta: Nonarising because Brahman

Dzogchen Upadesha : Nonarising because of the _________ (secret stuff).

[GrandmasterP]

What do you mean by nonduality?

 

There is the realist like Kashmir Saivism.

 

There is the nonrealist like Madhyamaka etc.

 

Or do you mean the nature of the mind?

 

 

 

Vajrayana is about direct introduction to one's nature and working with the body to gain omniscient Buddhahood. I hope this myth of rituals dies one day.

....

 

 

http://www.theopensecret.com/

 

HTH

[RongzomFan]

This is from Greg Goode. He started out in Adviata Vedanta.

 

http://www.heartofno.../emptiness.html:

 

 

 

Instead of reading websites, you could read the original Indian Madhyamaka authors.

[GrandmasterP]

Once you get to that point wher there is no I sensing the incomprehensible then you are maybe half way there. 'I' sense that we are more or less saying the same stuff here but using slightly differing language to do so. Hence I bid a mery....

 

Namo Guan Shi Yin Pu Sa

 

to all and sundry.

 

;-)

 

 

 

;-)

[GrandmasterP]

Instead of reading websites, you could read the original Indian Madhyamaka authors.

....

Why?

[RongzomFan]

....

Why?

 

Because those websites are trash.

[GrandmasterP]

OIC

Ta

:-)

[GrandmasterP]

Once you have read the books, what next?

Are there classes?

Something one can 'join'.

Badges and certificates maybe?

I mean why would anyone ever want or need to sign up to this whole cod Buddhist cum Hindi schtick NE way?

Honestly...

PL Overground fergawdssake!!!!

a.k.a

 

Sad lads online

 

It's all feckin' illusion I tells ye.

;-)

Edited November 5, 2012 by GrandmasterP

[Simple_Jack]

Once you get to that point wher there is no I sensing the incomprehensible then you are maybe half way there. 'I' sense that we are more or less saying the same stuff here but using slightly differing language to do so. Hence I bid a mery....

 

Nope, Buddha clearly describes consciousness as impermanent, arsing and passing due to conditions:

 

http://www.accesstoi...5.003.than.html

Vinnana Sutta: Consciousness

 

At Savatthi. "Monks, eye-consciousness is inconstant, changeable, alterable. Ear-consciousness... Nose-consciousness... Tongue-consciousness... Body-consciousness... Intellect-consciousness is inconstant, changeable, alterable.......

.....One who knows and sees that these phenomena are this way is called a stream-enterer, steadfast, never again destined for states of woe, headed for self-awakening."

Edited November 5, 2012 by Simple_Jack

[GrandmasterP]

OK

We have stream winning.

Much the same idea I suppose.

That Buddha, he didn't actually write anything you know.

It's all just what the guys who took over thought he should have said had he thought the same way as them.

 

Mr Buddha's message...

 

"Cultivate regularly and stick at it you lazy b*stards"

 

All else is verbiage. Sells books and Buddhist kit, means jack sh*t, none of it.

Just words. Millions of the little beggars.

Signifying Nothing at All.

Edited November 5, 2012 by GrandmasterP

[C T]

C'mon, seriously the websites I've been quoting are from actual practitioners. People who have years of experience. That is such a sour attitude towards your own Dharma brothers.

 

Experiences does not mean what they write become authoritative or truth. Its their journey, meant for them. If you assert otherwise, then you are a dumbass practitioner and all your knowledge's worth jack****. These same experiences can be shared with the aim to benefit others in reflecting, perhaps to gain some perspective, perhaps to broaden the view, but at the end of the day, as Grandmaster P would quite definitely agree, it does not bring the moon to the reader or listener.

 

I did not appreciate your attitude towards the one conversation i had with Grandmaster P a few posts back.

 

Just so you know.

 

Dont mean to burst your bubble.

 

 

 

Word -- aren't you trying a bit too hard, dharma bro?

 

You should try to find some real Dzogchen practitioners and hang out with them for a while. Hopeful that their view can rub off on you.

Edited November 5, 2012 by C T

[gatito]

Dude that's just something akin to Neo-Advaita.

 

Dude, that isn't akin to neoadvaita, that's pure neoadvaita at its most confused and confusing extreme.

 

This is from Greg Goode. He started out in Adviata Vedanta.

 

http://www.heartofno.../emptiness.html:

..............................

 

Greg actually started out as a Christian, after being brought up as an atheist.

 

(Incidentally, he doesn't have a bad word about the Christian phase phase and he apparently found it very useful on his path.)

[rex]

Sounds deep ... what does it mean?

Now there's a question, it can mean whatever anyone wants it to mean and this could change over time. When I heard this originally the teacher was talking about Christians following his teachings and he said not to worry about any apparent contradiction between following a theist and anti-theist path simultaneously. Personally I see a lot of similarity with the Buddhist view and some Western mystical approaches to divinity that don't conceive of God as an old man sitting on a throne, The Cloud of Unknowing and the Kabbalistic symbolism of the Ain Soph Aur and Kether being some examples.

 

 

Edit: tpoys

Edited November 5, 2012 by rex

[C T]

Nah, I'm good. I've had it up to here with dzogchen practitioners:

 

 

Only suitable image I could find

 

[GrandmasterP]

Caption...

 

"OK that was White Crane Spreads Wings, next we'll do Separate Heaven and Earth".

[Stosh]

As I understand it it's not so much that it does or does not exist, it's more about that the object is more than the mere object. Mr. Hanh uses the illustration of a table. The table is really at a molecular level just atoms orbiting around. If you squeezed them all together they'd just be a tiny fraction of the table's original size, and look nothing like the table. As well the table isn't just its molecules. It is sun, air, earth, the people who made the table, the people who made the tools that made the table, etc. ad infinitum. If you take any of the non-table elements away from the table it would no longer exist. I thought about this, how someone would argue that the table would still be built, by a different tool or person or tree, but it would not be the same table at all. The table we are talking about is what it is based off its unique configuration of non-table elements. Any other table made in its place would be a completely different table even if it looked the same. So if the table's existance depends on changable elements, then it is not real in Buddhist thought, because, to paraphrase, "It is only real if it never changes."

 

Anyhow that will either clarify or confuse, I hope for the former not the latter Thanks everyone for all your posts! @ the poster talking about leaving one's faith... I have already said it but I will repeat, I ran into a dead-end with my faith. Maybe there are branches off the Christian tree I could follow, like Chistian Mysticsm. But in the end it comes down to the fact that I don't believe the Bible is accurate and I want nothing to do with a God that consigns people to Heaven or Hell. A God that basically gives me free will then punishes me for using it and not following His chosen faith. Such a narrow-minded entity to my mind could not be God, could not be someone who conceptualized the designs of this planet and all the life on it, as well as the rest of Creation. Too many people project into the Astral Planes and bring back similar reports that are nothing like the afterlife described by the Bible for me to keep those old beliefs. Too many questions... Here;s another... In the Bible there is an uncrossable gulf between Heaven and Hell. Yet in Job what do we see? Satan has come before God, crossing an uncrossable gulf, to basically get God's permission to persecute Job, for not good reason at all, and God grants it! Yeah, that kind of God is no God for me. But I mean no offense to any Christians or returning Christians here. If this faith is what draws you go for it. As for me I will test the Magical, Buddhist, Taoist and Yogic paths for now, drawing from each whatever it is I need to learn to become more aware of what is real, I.E. what is unchanging in Creation. So I guess that'll make me what, a former Christian Mystical Shaman Taoist/Buddhist/Yogic Magician? Maybe I have to invent a catchy label for myself, since everyone loves labels so much...

- DreamBliss

I got a catchy label assigned already- Stoshism , I like it

You could have Blissdom , I dont think its taken

it can be yours for the low low price of 19.99$

But only if you order right now!

 

[Jetsun]

Illusion-like is wrong.

 

Its all an illusion.

 

Nagarjuna and sons are pretty clear about this, if anyone cares to read the original Indian texts.

 

The problem in many of the original texts are the the translations are often inaccurate or don't convey the complete meaning of what was intended. Even the very basic terms like emptiness and suffering don't translate completely accurately, so personally I am not very confident with many other terms like illusion are what is meant to be conveyed 100%. If you speak the original language it is a different matter of course.

[Birch]

I haven't gotten further than page 4 of this thread but I wanted to immediately shout out a 'right on' to Mr Jeff for his explanation of path from (what seems like) the other side of it.

 

Getting caught up in the artefacts of path is one sure way to screw it up for everyone.

 

BUT.

 

All versions of what seems like the same path. So i guess that many (most?) people would then conclude 'Ah, many paths, all leading to Rome', or 'Same paths up the mountain'. All that says to me is that very similar conclusions have been reached via various approaches. Does not make it true, just makes it a more reachable conclusion. Indeed, a path led you here, you did not come here without one.

 

---just saying---

[Birch]

Experiences does not mean what they write become authoritative or truth. Its their journey, meant for them. If you assert otherwise, then you are a dumbass practitioner and all your knowledge's worth jack****. These same experiences can be shared with the aim to benefit others ...quote interlude to get space in the box to reply

 

Dont mean to burst your bubble

 

Word -- aren't you trying a bit too hard,

 

You should try to find some real Dzogchen practitioners and hang out with them for a while. ...quote interlude for space etc

 

I love it when Mr Cow gets nasty:-)

[XieJia]

I have few Dzogchen friends, they are nice bunch.

I'd still not see any real differences between the vehicles.

At the end of the day, one will need to see into the nature of the five aggregates.

 

@jetsun

I'd agree to you about languages.

English's nature and syntax is very precise. Sometimes things are lost in translation. They also have many nouns too.