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notself
Guest
I give up. What ever.
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Pope_Noah_I
Guest
Question: If there is no higher being to reincarnate souls, than what does?
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rossum
Guest
Buddhism does not believe in souls. You do not have an immortal soul. Part of the problem is that you think that you do; enlightenment involves the realisation that what you thought was your soul was actually a mirage.
There is no âhigher beingâ needed to do reincarnation, it is built into the universe in the same way as gravity - there is no god of gravity needed to make gravity work and there is no god of reincarnation needed to make reincarnation work. The whole thing works by cause and efect. The unresolved causes left at the last moment of your previous life act as the causes for the first moment of your next life. If you are enlightened, then there are no unresolved causes left when you die and you are not reborn. For the rest of us, rebirth is inevitable.
rossum
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Pope_Noah_I
Guest
Erm, if there is no soul, then what enters the new body when reincarnation happens?
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notself
Guest
What is a soul?
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IntenseStudy
Guest
Buddhists donât worship God because in Buddhism there is no God, just a Great Essence that they describe as Nirvana. The âgoalâ of Buddhism is to break the karmic cycle of death and rebirth (reincarnation) and enter into the oneness that is Nirvana. The enlightened state mentioned above is Nirvana.
Hope this helps. I was a Zen Buddhist for many years.
IS
Hope this helps. I was a Zen Buddhist for many years.
IS
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Ahimsa
Guest
The Buddha is a Christian saint.
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water
Guest
I just talked to a friend who is New Age - half Christian / half Buddhist, and the friend said people worship Buddha. I told them I heard the opposite, but she insisted that they do worship him.
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Pope_Noah_I
Guest
If Iâm not mistaken, the essence of oneâs being?
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blacktiger057
Guest
Hi
It is not a small thing to know that all revealed religions have many a thing common. That in other words it proves that they had a common source of guidance.
Thanks
My thoughts exactlyâŠalot of people here donât like it when you say that, though!
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notself
Guest
Fine, now tell me what you mean by essence.
So many times we use words without thinking because we have heard them all our lives.
What do you mean when you say I or myself? Buddhist believe there is no eternal self or ego. There is no static âmeâ. When we use the personal pronoun we are actually referring to five things called aggregates or khandas. They are:
*(1) Matter or Form (rupa) - the physical form responded to the five organs of senses, i.e., eye, ear, nose, tongue and body;
(2) Sensation or Feeling (vedana) - the feeling in reception of physical things by the senses through the mind;
(3) Perception and/or cognition (Pali, sanna) (Skr, sanjna) - the functioning of mind in distinguishing appearances;
(4) Volition or Mental Formation (Pali, sankara) (Skr, samskara) - habitual action, i.e., a conditioned response to the object of experience, whether it is good or evil, you like or dislike;
(5) Consciousness (Pali, vinnana) (Skr, vijnana) - the mental faculty in regard to perception, cognition and experience *
When you begin to meditate the first thing you notice is how little control you have over your thoughts. They appear unbidden. Since they appear unbidden they are not you.
Some people are born without one or more of the senses. As you age you may lose the ability to see or hear or your sense of smell may fade. Your senses are not you.
Your thoughts are subject to experience as are your reactions. Since your thoughts and reactions can be modified through training, your thoughts are not you.
Consciousness varies. Where does it go when you are asleep? Are you still conscious? Is consciousness âyouâ?
Think of a car. Are the wheels the car? How about the engine, is that the car? The doors, the windows, the steering wheel? None of these is the car yet the car exists. The car is a mental construct. Our âselfâ is a mental construct in the same way that the car is. As you remove parts, the car-ness will disappear and the parts will be evident.
Where did the essence of the car go? Take away senses, perceptions, feelings, thoughts, consciousness. Where is the self? Where is the essence of âmeâ? Where is the soul?
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notself
Guest
I donât know why your friend thinks the way she does. She may worship Buddha, her friends may worship Buddha, but Buddhists donât worship Buddha.
You have seen posts by a Zen Buddhist stating that Buddhist donât worship the Buddha.
You have seen posts by a Dhammayut Buddhist saying that Buddhist donât worship the Buddha.
You have seen my posts saying that Theravada Buddhists of the Forest tradition do not worship the Buddha.
This is from Access to Insight, one of the best online sites for Buddhism.
In stark contrast to the worldâs other major religions, however, Buddhism invokes no divinity, no supreme Creator or supreme Self, no Holy Spirit or omniscient loving God to whom we might appeal for salvation. Instead, Buddhism calls for us to hoist ourselves up by our own bootstraps: to develop the discernment we need to distinguish between those qualities within us that are unwholesome and those that are truly noble and good, and to learn how to nourish the good ones and expunge the bad. This is the path to Buddhismâs highest perfection, nibbana. Not even the Buddha can take you to that goal; you alone must do the work necessary to complete the journey:
âTherefore, Ananda, be islands unto yourselves, refuges unto yourselves, seeking no external refuge; with the Dhamma as your island, the Dhamma as your refuge, seeking no other refuge.â
â DN 16*
*According to Buddhist cosmology, every living being dwells in one of thirty-one distinct âplanes,â of which our familiar human plane is but one. Some of these realms are home to beings (the devas) with unusual powers and extraordinarily subtle and refined physical bodies â or even no body at all. Their god-like status is, however, short-lived; like all living beings, they are mortal and ultimately subject to death and rebirth in other planes according to the purity and skillfulness of their actions (kamma). One of these devas, the Great Brahma, is so clouded by his own delusion that he believes himself to be the all-powerful, all-seeing creator of the universe (see DN 11).
I hope this clarifies the matter. You may want to show it to your friend. Perhaps she can talk to a monk or nun and get things cleared up. If the monk or nun says that Buddha is worshipped as a god, then they are Hindu or maybe Falun Gong.
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paarsurrey
Guest
Hi
I present here to start with, one Sutta, quoted by Mirza Tahir Ahmad , Grandson and Foruth-Successor of the PromisedMessiahImamMahid, in his book"Revelation, Rationality, Knowledge & Truth":
alislam.org/library/books/revelation/part_2_section_2.html
"The second source material in order of credibility and authenticity, is such Buddhist literature as came into being five hundred years after Buddha. This too contains enough evidence to indicate that Buddha was neither an atheist nor an agnostic but was indeed a believer in God. We specifically refer to the Theravada texts known as Tripitaka (Three Baskets), which as the name suggests, are divided into three sections. The first part is called Vinaya-Pitaka (Rules of Conduct), the second is called Sutta-Pitaka (Discourses on Truth) and the third is called Abhidhamma-Pitaka (Analysis of Religion).
In Sutta-Nipta there is The Chapter on Going to the Far Shore,5 in which the goal of conquering death is expressed. Buddha explains that birth and death do not mean anything to those who have overcome their ego thus becoming at one with God. These passages may have been misunderstood and confused with the Brahman concept of Mukti (redemption), but it is not right. Buddha clearly speaks of only those who have already reached the other side of the barrier here on earth before their death. This simply means that according to him, no man could have access to the hereafter, unless he had experienced it during his life here on earth, a teaching close to the Quranic precept. He preached that by being at one with God, man rises above life and death and becomes eternal.
At the end of the chapter, Pingiya, a follower of Buddha describes the excellence of his master which becomes instrumental in converting him to Buddhism. Having already expressed that he was enfeebled by old age and close to dying, Pingiya concludes his discussion with the following statement:
'Assuredly I shall go to the immovable, the unshakeable, the likeness of which does not exist anywhere. I have no doubt about this. Thus consider me to be one whose mind is so disposed.'6
This illustrates the hope and expectation of a disciple of Buddha, that after his death he will meet his Lord, who is described as immovable, unshakeable and without likeness. This is a description of God in full agreement with that found in other scriptures."
Unquote
There is however no compulsion for a Buddhis to accept this viewpoint. I respect you religion, however, Buddha is a universal Personality as Moses, Krishna, Zoroaster, Jesus, Muhammad and PromisedMessiahImamMahdi are universal religious heroes. I love Buddha, a Buddhist is only to believe this viewpoint if he is out of his free will convinced it to be true not otherwise.
Thanks
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blacktiger057
Guest
God is in Buddhism, and Buddhists donât worship Buddha. This is a fact of the religion and cannot be debated.
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notself
Guest
What do you mean when you say that God is in Buddhism? Are you referring to the Wiccan belief that there is God in everything in the universe?
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paarsurrey
Guest
Hi
Mirza Ghulam Ahmad 1835-1908, the PromisedMessiahImamMahdi continues presenting evidences that Jesus came to India from Buddhist/Tibetan historic resources:
alislam.org/library/booksâŠindia/ch4.html
"Let it be remembered that this moral teaching and this mode of preaching, i.e., talking in parables, was the method of Jesus. This mode of preaching and this moral teaching, combined with other circumstances, at once suggest that this was in imitation of Jesus. Jesus was here in India; he went preaching everywhere; the followers of the Buddhist Faith met him, and finding him a holy person who worked miracles, recorded these things in their books; nay, they declared him to be the Buddha, for it is human nature to try to acquire a good thing for oneself wherever it may be, so much so, that people try to record and remember any clever remark made by any person before them.
It is, therefore, quite likely that the followers of the Buddhist Faith may have reproduced the entire picture of the Gospels in their books; as for example, fasting for forty days both by Jesus and the Buddha; the Temptation of both; the birth of both being without father8, the moral teaching of both; both calling themselves the Light, both calling themselves Master and their Companions disciples; just as Matthew, chapter 10 verses 8 and 9, states: âProvide neither gold, nor silver, nor brass in your purses,â so the Buddha gave the same command to his disciples; just as the Gospel encourages celibacy, so does the teaching of the Buddha; just as there was an earthquake when Jesus was put on the Cross, so it is recorded, these was an earthquake at the death of the Buddha.
All these points of resemblance arise from the fact of Jesusâ visit to India, which was a piece of good luck for the followers of the Buddhist Faith, from his staying among them for a considerable time and from Buddhists acquiring a good knowledge of the facts of his life and of his noble teaching. Consequently, it was inevitable that a great part of that teaching and ceremonial should find its way into Buddhistic records for Jesus was respected and taken for the Buddha by the Buddhists. These people, therefore, recorded his sayings in their books and ascribed them to the Buddha.
It is indeed a wonder that the Buddha, just like Jesus, should have taught his disciples in parables â especially in those to be found in the Gospels. In one of these parables the Buddha says:
As the peasant sows the seed but cannot say: the grain shall swell today, tomorrow germinate, so also it is with the disciple; he must obey the precepts, practise meditation, study the doctrine; he cannot say today or tomorrow I shall be delivered.
This, it will be noted, is the same parable which has existed in the gospels to this day.
The Buddha, again, narrates another parable:
Again as when a herd of deer lives in a forest a man comes who opens for them a false path, and the deer suffer hurt, and another comes who opens a safe path and the deer thrive; so when men live among pleasures the evil one comes and opens the false eightfold path of right belief⊠(P. Oldenberg, 191-192).
The Buddha also taught:
Righteousness is a safe Treasure which no one can steal. It is a Treasure which accompanies man even after death; it is a Treasure which is the Source of all Knowledge and all Perfection.9
Now it will be noticed that the gospel teaching is just the same. The ancient Buddhistic records of this teaching belong to the period not remote from the time of Jesus â nay, it is the same period. Again, on page 135 of the same book there occurs the saying, wherein the Buddha speaks of his irreproachableness in that no one could point to a blot on his character. This too has a resemblance with a saying of Jesus. Buddhism, on page 45, states:
The moral teaching of the Buddha has a striking resemblance with the Christian.
I agree; nay, I acknowledge; both say: Love not the world; nor wealth; do not hate your enemies; do no evil; conquer evil with good; do to others as you wish to be done by â all this points to such a striking resemblance between the gospel and the teaching of the Buddha that it is unnecessary to mention any more details."
Unquote
Thanks
Mirza Ghulam Ahmad 1835-1908, the PromisedMessiahImamMahdi continues presenting evidences that Jesus came to India from Buddhist/Tibetan historic resources:
alislam.org/library/booksâŠindia/ch4.html
"Let it be remembered that this moral teaching and this mode of preaching, i.e., talking in parables, was the method of Jesus. This mode of preaching and this moral teaching, combined with other circumstances, at once suggest that this was in imitation of Jesus. Jesus was here in India; he went preaching everywhere; the followers of the Buddhist Faith met him, and finding him a holy person who worked miracles, recorded these things in their books; nay, they declared him to be the Buddha, for it is human nature to try to acquire a good thing for oneself wherever it may be, so much so, that people try to record and remember any clever remark made by any person before them.
It is, therefore, quite likely that the followers of the Buddhist Faith may have reproduced the entire picture of the Gospels in their books; as for example, fasting for forty days both by Jesus and the Buddha; the Temptation of both; the birth of both being without father8, the moral teaching of both; both calling themselves the Light, both calling themselves Master and their Companions disciples; just as Matthew, chapter 10 verses 8 and 9, states: âProvide neither gold, nor silver, nor brass in your purses,â so the Buddha gave the same command to his disciples; just as the Gospel encourages celibacy, so does the teaching of the Buddha; just as there was an earthquake when Jesus was put on the Cross, so it is recorded, these was an earthquake at the death of the Buddha.
All these points of resemblance arise from the fact of Jesusâ visit to India, which was a piece of good luck for the followers of the Buddhist Faith, from his staying among them for a considerable time and from Buddhists acquiring a good knowledge of the facts of his life and of his noble teaching. Consequently, it was inevitable that a great part of that teaching and ceremonial should find its way into Buddhistic records for Jesus was respected and taken for the Buddha by the Buddhists. These people, therefore, recorded his sayings in their books and ascribed them to the Buddha.
It is indeed a wonder that the Buddha, just like Jesus, should have taught his disciples in parables â especially in those to be found in the Gospels. In one of these parables the Buddha says:
As the peasant sows the seed but cannot say: the grain shall swell today, tomorrow germinate, so also it is with the disciple; he must obey the precepts, practise meditation, study the doctrine; he cannot say today or tomorrow I shall be delivered.
This, it will be noted, is the same parable which has existed in the gospels to this day.
The Buddha, again, narrates another parable:
Again as when a herd of deer lives in a forest a man comes who opens for them a false path, and the deer suffer hurt, and another comes who opens a safe path and the deer thrive; so when men live among pleasures the evil one comes and opens the false eightfold path of right belief⊠(P. Oldenberg, 191-192).
The Buddha also taught:
Righteousness is a safe Treasure which no one can steal. It is a Treasure which accompanies man even after death; it is a Treasure which is the Source of all Knowledge and all Perfection.9
Now it will be noticed that the gospel teaching is just the same. The ancient Buddhistic records of this teaching belong to the period not remote from the time of Jesus â nay, it is the same period. Again, on page 135 of the same book there occurs the saying, wherein the Buddha speaks of his irreproachableness in that no one could point to a blot on his character. This too has a resemblance with a saying of Jesus. Buddhism, on page 45, states:
The moral teaching of the Buddha has a striking resemblance with the Christian.
I agree; nay, I acknowledge; both say: Love not the world; nor wealth; do not hate your enemies; do no evil; conquer evil with good; do to others as you wish to be done by â all this points to such a striking resemblance between the gospel and the teaching of the Buddha that it is unnecessary to mention any more details."
Unquote
Thanks
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notself
Guest
paarsurrey,
What can I do to convince you that your source of information on Buddhism is full of error?
Various sources hold that the Buddhaâs mother died at his birth, a few days or seven days later. The infant was given the name Siddhartha (PÄli: Siddhatta), meaning âhe who achieves his aimâ.
What can I do to convince you that your source of information on Buddhism is full of error?
the man that would become the Buddha was born around 475-430BCE in a town called Lumbini in modern day Nepal. **His father was King Suddhodana, the chief of the Shakya nation, **one of several ancient tribes in the growing state of Kosala; Gautama was the family name. His mother, Queen Maha Maya (MÄyÄdevÄ«) and Suddhodanaâs wife, was a Kolivan princess. As was the Shakya tradition, when his mother Queen Maya fell pregnant, she returned to her fatherâs kingdom to give birth, but after leaving, she gave birth along the way at Lumbini in a garden beneath a tree.
Various sources hold that the Buddhaâs mother died at his birth, a few days or seven days later. The infant was given the name Siddhartha (PÄli: Siddhatta), meaning âhe who achieves his aimâ.
The records of what the Buddha taught were inscribed on pillars out up all over India by King Asoka in 250 BCE. King Asoka sent missionaries through out the Middle East and also to Sri Lanka. The Pali Canon represents the teachings of the Buddha as preserved in writing at this time.
The Pali Canon was transferred to Sri Lanka where there was no influence by Christ or any of his followers because this happened 250 years before Christ was born. (Sri Lanka is an island off the southern tip of India.)
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paarsurrey
Guest
Hi
You are welcome to differ with, I learn much from the different views and that is the fruit of peaceful discussion.
Thanks
P
paarsurrey
Guest
Hi
Sir , keep on presenting your differing views with references and reasonable and rational arguments for my benefit . I am not a blind faith, I am research oriented.
Thanks
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notself
Guest
Have you read any of the links I have given you or read the Karen Armstrong book on the life of the Buddha?
The links cost nothing to access and you can most likely get the book from the library.
If you are research oriented as you say, then you should be willing to read more than the one reference that you keep quoting.
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