Zen - worthless practice due to a dramatic misunderstanding?

[Wells]

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[Cheshire Cat]

I'm not sure that this article reports an accurate hagiography of Bodhidharma because It comes from a daoist sect. There are many legends around the man And each school reports the ones that supports their teachings

[joeblast]

If one only builds a foundation and no house on top, its still not a domicile

 

If one builds no foundation and instead only builds a house, it will be weak and toppled by the forces of nature.

[Apech]

@Wells - have you researched the deaths of all Zen masters to see if any of them achieved RB?  I don't know the answer just curious.

[Jetsun]

Rainbow body is a phenomena unique to Dzogchen as a result of specific practises they teach, so it is no surprise that no Zen masters ever exhibited that phenomena. The misunderstanding I think is in believing that Rainbow body or its equivalent are all that matter and are the only signs of enlightenment. 

[dust]

So, obviously Damo (Bodhidharma) achieved rainbow body (or the taoist equivanent of "heavenly immortality"),

but no Zen practitioner ever achieved the same since.

 

Well, he didn't, did he? Because, if taken literally, that's impossible.

[thelerner]

I think the point of zen is insight and enlightenment not rainbow bodies.  Its my understanding that its so focused on here and now that searching for powers might be considered just another distraction. 

 

I don't think the 9 or 10 years immobile in a cave is part of zen training. 

Edited May 23, 2016 by thelerner

[Wells]

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[Wells]

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[Wells]

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[Wells]

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[thelerner]

Rainbow body is enlightenment.

what?? you don't get enlightened until you die (& sit immobile 10 years in a cave?) and your body goes up a rainbow?

I gotta different definition. 

[C T]

You are not informed correctly.

The phenomen of transforming the material body into energy or a hologram oif light exists in many different traditions.

Did Jesus practice Dzogchen?

 

And without enlightening the body, enlightenment is incomplete.

It seems you are also misinformed with that statement. 

[Wells]

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[Apech]

No, but it would help if you could indicate another Zen master who "didn't left a body".

 

 

You are the one making sweeping statements without research - so over to you to back them up.

[Wells]

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[Wells]

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[C T]

There's enlightening body, enlightening speech, and enlightening mind. 

 

Attaining the enlightened body (which may or may not end in jalus) is least of the 3, but somehow, it is the most fascinating maybe because from birth we all gradually develop some habitual fixations to, and fascinations with, the body. So attaining physical rainbow body is actually considered as 'small enlightenment'. 

 

Im sure there are many Zen masters like Hakuin et al who undoubtedly attained middling (speech) and great (mind) enlightenment, which not surprisingly, surpasses that of the lesser enlightenment. 

[Wells]

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[Wells]

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[C T]

First of all, we are not in class in front of your guru where you try to overtrump your classmates,

very to the embarassment of your guru!

 

Secondly, repeating terms you memorized doesn't mean that you understand them or that you are able to put them successfully into practice.

 

Thirdly, the enlightenment of body, speech and mind are all accomplished in the same way and at the same time:

Through completely exhausting (burning up) your karmically conditioned elements into quintessences.

The result of this is the "body of light" if the process is completed during life.

This is considered the highest spiritual achievement.

 

You seemingly confuse the "small rainbow body" attainment (named so because of visible shrinking of the body at death) with being some sort of "small enlightenment".

 

 

Your understanding of enlightenment and its "levels" is completely wrong.

Funny but i had come to the same conclusions about your knowledge since you first got interested in this subject, having switched from another tradition. 

[Michael Sternbach]

According to the OP's logic, any practice which doesn't make the practitioners dematerialize after death must be faulty.

 

That doesn't leave a whole lot... Even most Daoist masters leave their body behind. Safest thing would be to join the order of the Jedi.

 

[Wells]

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[Wells]

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[Apech]

Did you do your research?

If so, name one Zen practitioner who "didn't leave a body behind" as Damo!

 

It's rather up to Zen practitioners to prove that Zen is the authentic practice of Damo's "facing the wall" exercise and produces similar exceptional results in it's practitioners, because Zen practitioners list Damo as the source of their school's practices.

 

A claim which is obviously as true as the Eucharist in katholic church is bestowing people with the blood and flesh of Christ and with the Holy Ghost as it was the case when Christ held the Last Supper.

 

I'm not a Zen practitioner - so no - you research it.