Buddist on Catholic answers?

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eddie_too said:
mek,

i think, i could be mistaken since i am not a budhhist, that budhhism leaves many questions of this nature unanswered.

for example, and again i could be mistaken due to my ignorance, there is no concept of Creator in budhhism.
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Buddhism does not try to answer all questions of nature. It shows you how the world really is made up.
 
eddie_too said:
does that mean that order is a necessary part of reality?

to posit that human reality is uncreated does not make sense to me since every element of reality that we know of is dependent.

even stars, if we are to believe the scientists, come in to and go out of existence, i.e. are dependent.
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If you do not think that it is logical that there can be a thing that has no initial cause such as an creator.

Then how can you logically explain who the creator of that creator is?

/Victor
 
i believe in an unmoved mover.

i believe there is an uncreated Creator.

i also believe that this Creator is greater than any man or all of mankind together.

a void with no characteristics is an inferior concept to the reality that is a human being.
 
eddie_too said:
i believe in an unmoved mover.

i believe there is an uncreated Creator.

i also believe that this Creator is greater than any man or all of mankind together.

a void with no characteristics is an inferior concept to the reality that is a human being.
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These things does not add up to a Logical system. Which the buddhist standpoint does.

Ergo The Dhamma is more logical than Christianity.

Q.E.D.
 
is it correct to conclude that your rejection of concepts you clearly do not understand are intended by you to be received as absolute truth?

is that what you have learned from your adherence to buddhism?
 
First, do all schools of Buddhism teach reincarnation? Must reincarnation transcend sentience? In my understanding, to live a good life, to find enlightenment, presupposes sentience and free will, to understand the truths of suffering and have the ability to choose whether and what to do regarding the suffering one may control. A tiger may find enlightenment no more than a rock.

I also think that today it is unuseful thinking to avoid killing animals for sustenance while gleefully killing plants for food.
 
mek42 said:
First, do all schools of Buddhism teach reincarnation? Must reincarnation transcend sentience? In my understanding, to live a good life, to find enlightenment, presupposes sentience and free will, to understand the truths of suffering and have the ability to choose whether and what to do regarding the suffering one may control. A tiger may find enlightenment no more than a rock.

I also think that today it is unuseful thinking to avoid killing animals for sustenance while gleefully killing plants for food.
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I’m going to go out on a limb and say that theoretically yes, Theravada and most other Buddhists believe in reincarnation, because that was a central tenant that the Buddha taught. Only those in the human realm have the capacity to find enlightenment. Animals, those in the hell realm, hungry ghosts, and devas cannot find enlightenment.

In terms of being vegetarian: I’m not one and the Buddha wasn’t one. And no, you can’t be reincarnated as a plant or inanimate object because they are lacking a concept of self.
 
eddie_too said:
i believe there is an uncreated Creator.
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The universe is less than 20 billion years old. Hence there cannot have been a creator 20 billion years ago either. In order for the creator to exist, the created must also exist. Hence the creator is just as dependent on the created as the created is dependent on the creator. You cannot be a child unless you have parents; you cannot be a parent unless you have a child. The two are mutually dependent.

You need to look more carefully at your logic here.

rossum
 
eddie_too said:
is it correct to conclude that your rejection of concepts you clearly do not understand are intended by you to be received as absolute truth?

is that what you have learned from your adherence to buddhism?
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If you want a serious answer it would be good if you quote what post you are referring to. As your question is asked it is impossivle to deduct what you mean?
 
mek42 said:
First, do all schools of Buddhism teach reincarnation? .
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The dhamma does not teach reincarnation.
It teaches the path to end dissatisfaction.

It is not at all neccessary to belive in reincarnation according to the old texts to become awakened.
 
eddie_too said:
is it correct to conclude that your rejection of concepts you clearly do not understand are intended by you to be received as absolute truth?

is that what you have learned from your adherence to buddhism?
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I am going to assume you are addressing my latest post/s?

No the only absolute truth value in buddhism is the one about nibbana. Everything else is relative to that. Why do you ask?
 
nibbana is a logical concept, in what way is it logical to believe in reincarnation?

since you neither accept nor reject the concept of creation, how is it that you feel free to comment on its reasonableness?

also, creation having a beginning is far more logical than the concept of infinite regression.

creation having a beginning carries with it the implication that it is not eternal.

if it has a beginning, then at some point it did not exist. ergo, all of creation is finite.

yet, logic tells us that infinity necessarily exists.
 
eddie_too said:
nibbana is a logical concept, in what way is it logical to believe in reincarnation?

since you neither accept nor reject the concept of creation, how is it that you feel free to comment on its reasonableness?

also, creation having a beginning is far more logical than the concept of infinite regression.

creation having a beginning carries with it the implication that it is not eternal.

if it has a beginning, then at some point it did not exist. ergo, all of creation is finite.

yet, logic tells us that infinity necessarily exists.
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For me, it’s logical to believe in reincarnation because life is an energy, and energy is not created or destroyed, it just changes forms. Thus, it’s logical to believe that life energy would go into another life form after your death. In terms of creation having a beginning, there’s no way we can know something like that. I believe the universe and all the matter/energy in it has always existed in different forms, for an infinite amount of time.
 
from a buddhist, "For me, it’s logical to believe in reincarnation because life is an energy, and energy is not created or destroyed, it just changes forms. Thus, it’s logical to believe that life energy would go into another life form after your death. In terms of creation having a beginning, there’s no way we can know something like that. I believe the universe and all the matter/energy in it has always existed in different forms, for an infinite amount of time. "

from me,

what makes “life energy” different from non-life energy?

is the amount of energy in the universe finite?

it is my experience that human life is far more than mere “energy”.
 
eddie_too said:
in what way is it logical to believe in reincarnation?
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Are you the same now as you were at age three days? You can speak English now, you couldn’t then. You have put on weight. You can’t put your toes in your mouth any more. You have different beliefs and different tastes in food (though the food doesn’t come in such nice containers any more).

You are not the same as you were. The present you is conditioned by the past you – like that small scar you still have – but you now are different from the you in the past. You are reincarnated every moment of your life. Without being reincarnated you cannot change, you cannot learn anything new, you cannot add new memories. Without moment-to-moment reincarnation you are stuck in stasis unable to progress at all.
creation having a beginning carries with it the implication that it is not eternal.
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And also that the creator is not eternal. Before the beginning of creation there cannot have been a creator.
if it has a beginning, then at some point it did not exist.
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Only if time exists separately from creation. If time began at the same point as creation then there was no time when creation did not exist.

rossum
 
rossum,

your definition of reincarnation is my definition of individual growth and development.

i had always thought that the buddhist definition of reincarnation was that every human being came back to life and lived another life until they had perfected living human life. so, i apologize for that misunderstanding. i agree completely with the idea of individual growth and development for every human being born in to this world.

so, it is buddhist (at least some buddhists’) belief that the universe had no beginning and that time had no beginning.

is the idea that the univers is infinite also the belief of buddhism (or at least some who profess to be buddhist)?

it is such a relativistic system it seems because there really is no body of accepted buddhist doctrines. at least that is what i am learning from the buddhists who post here.

i wonder how many other buddhists believe that reincarnation is simply human growth and development?
 
since the creator created time, is it really reasonable to speak of “before” creation.
 
eddie_too said:
i had always thought that the buddhist definition of reincarnation was that every human being came back to life and lived another life until they had perfected living human life.
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Are you the same human being you were ten years ago? That human being did not have the extra ten years of memories that you do now. That human being was ten years younger than you are now. That human being was different to the human being alive today. You have been reincarnated as a different human being.

rossum
 
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