Anyone got questions about Buddhism?

[cathgal]

There’s no need to belittle Buddhism, especially not since you don’t seem to understand it. I don’t agree with it, but I’d have to be blind not to respect it.

Being reincarnated as an animal is generally a punishment for sins. For very serious sins, though, one is reincarnated into a hungry ghost and banished to one of ten hells for thousands of years. And Pure Land Buddhists, and most Shingon Buddhists, believe one can achieve salvation without becoming a monk.

Work is not suffering. Zen monks invented kung fu; Shingon monks invented ninjutsu; all monks frequently make their living by begging. All monks perform work constantly, both as “dynamic meditation” and from necessity. Many also perform charity work exactly as Christian monks do.

Desire actually has nothing to do with work; to get something one desires one has to work for it, but the desire is there if you work for it or not. Desire is seen as the cause of suffering because it creates attachment to this world. That attachment prevents one from being freed.

There are many beliefs to Buddhism. But all, more or less, believe the same thing. I only need to have an idea of what they believe and they certainly don’t believe what Christians believe.

What do you mean desire has nothing to do with work. Don’t we all desire to have a home, food on the table and some kind of security in our life. But you don’t sit there and expect it to come. You gotta labor for it. It’s a basic human desire. If we don’t meet these desires, we would suffer. But it’s better to suffer while acquiring these desires. To be a human is to suffer.

 

[Montalban]

When extreme ascceticism did not work either he started eating again and sat down under the Bodhi Tree. There he attained enlightenment aged 35. For the rest of his life until he died aged 80 he wandered North India preaching.
One of the differences between nirvana and heaven is that you don’t have to be dead to attain nirvana.

rossum

How was it manifested; that he had reached nirvana?

Why did he die, if he’d reached it?

 

[patrick457]

How was it manifested; that he had reached nirvana?

Why did he die, if he’d reached it?

When Buddha died, it is said that he reached a state known as ‘Parinirvana’, the final Nirvana usually understood to be within reach only upon the death of someone who has attained Bodhi. Parinirvana implies being released from the cycle of death and rebirth as well as the dissolution all worldly physical and mental skandhas. But what happens to a person after Parinirvana cannot be explained since it is outside of all concievable experience.

 

[Montalban]

When Buddha died, it is said that he reached a state known as ‘Parinirvana’, the final Nirvana usually understood to be within reach only upon the death of someone who has attained Bodhi. Parinirvana implies being released from the cycle of death and rebirth as well as the dissolution all worldly physical and mental skandhas. But what happens to a person after Parinirvana cannot be explained since it is outside of all concievable experience.

How was the fact that he’d reached enlightenment manifest in his person? Did he look different (for e.g.) ?

 

[patrick457]

Well, speaking of strange combinations, there’s a tomb of Jesus in Japan
thiaoouba.com/tomb.htm

and in India
tombofjesus.com/home.htm

I’ve heard of them. Most of these allegations are based on the belief that Jesus fled away and never really died, but went to India and/or Japan where He impressed people with His wisdom. But isn’t it odd that Jesus has TWO tombs?

And the first website also ignores the fact that Katakana is invented at the 9th-10th Century, and before Katakana and Hiragana were invented, Japanese did not have any script. Also, Katakana and Hiragana descended from Chinese characters.

Sometimes these things makes me want to think that this Jesus is not Yeshua of Nazareth but Joshua the Son of Joe, who was the next door neighbor of Yeshua bar-Yosef, the Christ.

He then travelled around the world with his wife Mary and his son Jack, making tombs wherever he goes in case he dies in that city, but seeing that he doesn’t, He eventually gives the tomb to people who need it.

He then went to India first, where he astounded people by his genius, then set out to Japan, where he made a friend so close to him that they called each other brother.

After that, they went to America, where many people saw them and became converted to their religion.

After travelling around the world and discovering different cultures, They eventually returned to Japan where they lived the rest of their days and was buried in Herai. 2000 years later, people sadly confused him with Jesus Christ since they are both from Nazareth and were both named ‘Yeshua’.

Now back to the topic…

 

[patrick457]

There’s a famous (and really cool!) quote from Rinzai Gigen, founder of the Rinzai Zen sect, that explains the Zen attitude toward Buddhas.

If you meet the Buddha, kill the Buddha. If you meet your spiritual father, kill your spiritual father. Not held by anything, not bound, all there is is to simply live your life as it comes.
(I translated the Japanese version, because I don’t know any Chinese)

It does seem that Rinzai’s lectures were both conventional and iconoclastic. He once also said,

Those who have fulfilled the ten stages of bodhisattva practice are no better than hired field hands; those who have attained the enlightenment of the fifty-first and fifty-second stages are prisoners shackled and bound; arhats and pratyekabuddhas are so much filth in the latrine; bodhi and nirvana are hitching posts for donkeys.

 

[rossum]

How was it manifested; that he had reached nirvana?

He became enlightened.

Why did he die,

Food poisoning.

if he’d reached it?

All that is born dies, nirvana does not give immunity from death. It is not the case that all that dies is reborn, nirvana does give immunity from rebirth.[The Buddha said:] “What do you think, monks: Which is greater, the tears you have shed while transmigrating & wandering this long, long time — crying & weeping from being joined with what is displeasing, being separated from what is pleasing — or the water in the four great oceans?”

“As we understand the Dhamma taught to us by the Blessed One, this is the greater: the tears we have shed while transmigrating & wandering this long, long time — crying & weeping from being joined with what is displeasing, being separated from what is pleasing — not the water in the four great oceans.”

“Excellent, monks. Excellent. It is excellent that you thus understand the Dhamma taught by me.”

(Source: Assu sutta S.N. 15.3)

rossum

 

[Sam88]

"Sam88:

More importantly however, I don’t see where you are going with a non-nihilist nirvana. I can’t quite see a intermediate state between being and non-being. The closest I can come to that concept at the moment is the idea of a diminishment of “self” so that I become a part of a greater entity, in which my self is extinguished in one sense, but my existence continues in another.

Got it in one–that’s what Nirvana is, as much as it can be described. … In the same way, you neither become existent or non-existent in Nirvana–there is no longer any “you” to be either.

This seems to me to be but a somewhat more subtle nihilism, because in this case “I” do not in any real sense attain Nirvana, nor can anyone - I can only attempt to deconstruct myself.

Suppose for example a teacher were to tell me that in order to attain heaven, I would have to kill myself, and from the molecules of my body someone else would fashion a creature that would be able to enter heaven. Even if true, this would not be a path to heaven at all.

Some religions offer false hope due to thier errors, one offers real hope, but Buddhism doesn’t even seem to offer false hope! Might as well be a materialist.

Fortunately, there is a better alternative, that of Redemption.

 

[rossum]

This seems to me to be but a somewhat more subtle nihilism, because in this case “I” do not in any real sense attain Nirvana, nor can anyone - I can only attempt to deconstruct myself.

Of course “I” cannot attain nirvana, the way to attain nirvana is the realisation that the “I” does not really exist. What we think of as “I” is not what it appears to be:As stars, a fault of vision, as a lamp,
A mock show, dew drops, or a bubble,
A dream, a lightning flash, or a cloud,
So should one view what is conditioned.

(Diamond sutra 32)

Some religions offer false hope due to thier errors, one offers real hope, but Buddhism doesn’t even seem to offer false hope!

Buddhism offers methods that actually work: Buddhists ‘really are happier’.

rossum

 

[Montalban]

He became enlightened.

I see that this is getting no where fast

Montalban: How did he manifest his enlightenment
Rossum: He became enlightened.
Montalban: But how did this manifest itself (appear?)
Rossum: He became elightened.

and so on

Well I suppose it’s very Buddhist to go around in circles

 

[happygal]

If we don’t ask, then how would we know what others think so that we can evangelize. To help others know God is to know what they are believing. Buddists have some good that we all should learn as well:

For example:

• the monks get up very early in the morning to pray. How do we apply that to our Christian life? How often do we get up early to go to the Church?
• the monks are fasting for all their lives. How often do we fast in our faith?

Hi Water

You indeed point out some points here, yup monks lead a monastic live, living in a seclude temple, praying everyday for a certain hours, they don’t eat meal only vegetables or glutton. They do charity for the poor…

In fact if anyone who read their scriptures, you won’t be surprise what they teaches pple are almost the same are what we Christian have in our bible. To be a good soul on earth. Although they don’t really believes in Heaven, what they believes that if they do good deed at least when they go to hell they won’t suffer so much of punishment. To them, hell consist of 18 levels and each level the punishment are different, the more higher level you go, the more serious punishment you receive. Example if you enjoy lying when you’re still on earth thus when you die you will go to this particular hell level, where you have your tongues cut out…blar…blar…i remembered when i was young my mom took me to this place when they have all those explanation of hell underneath…it was very scary…eeee…