This blog has gotten hits from two cryptic google searches: "suicide due to failure karma" and "suicide with least karma". Obviously I have no idea what was on these people's minds, but I'm intrigued enough to reflect and comment.
The most logical interpretation of "suicide due to failure karma" to me is, "what karma is attached to a suicide committed as a result of (some perceived personal) failure?".
And I think "suicide with least karma" might mean, "what kind of suicide has the least karmic effect?".
As always, I strongly disagree with any notion that karma is some moral model.
It's not "what goes around comes around". Karma is just about mental imprints in our own consciousness (causes) that perpetuate themselves due to whatever effect they have on us (effects). Any irony
or morality attributed to the concept of karma is all human projection.
And
my favorite quote regarding karma is, "every moment is a karma creating
moment; every moment is a karma manifesting moment". Everything any
entity does relates to karma. Just being is karma because just the sensation or idea of being here, experiencing reality through our perceptions, perpetuates and maintains a concept that what we are and experience is reality.
Insects, animals, bacteria, humans – anything that lives in any perceived reality on this planet – perpetuates their own being as a result of karma. As sentient beings, any and every thought and experience is karma, both manifesting and creating.
To break out of the cycle of samsaric existence and the relentless cause and effect of karmic being, i.e. enlightenment, is to fundamentally break any idea or concept of one's being or any being that leads to continued ideas of perceived being or the reality of perceived being.
So regarding "what karma is attached to a suicide committed as a result of some perceived personal failure", I'd say it depends on one's own mental state, which includes "perceived personal failure". Actually, that might be the key karma involved.
No one is in fact a failure. Failure is a personal decision and judgment upon one's life. So as intense an experience as suicide may be, that perceived perception of failure may be very strong karma (or attachment), that can carry over to future existences.
If a person is concerned about karmic effects, I would advise against committing suicide. Karmically, a being would gain far more by confronting those negative issues and dealing with them and understanding them and how they relate towards being.
Regarding "suicide with least karma or least karmic effect", that's interesting to me because I do agree with the notion of greater or lesser karmic effect. Every thought, speech or act has karmic effect, but to lesser or greater degrees.
To that, though, I would state my belief that karma is personal. For any karmic creating moment (meaning all moments), there is a ripple effect, but the most important effect is on oneself. How anyone's actions create a reaction in other people is those other persons' karma.
Karma isn't some objective mechanism that decides between morally good or bad. So a suicide with the least karmic effect is one in which one truly realizes the essence of being, that nothing whatsoever should be clung to.
To the degree a being is attached to perceived reality, one's karma is affected by one's suicide. And very few suicides are committed with a true understanding of reality. Thich Nhat Hanh has argued that monks who have immolated themselves for political/humanitarian causes committed suicide with that true understanding of reality.
They're not martyrs, just examples of realization. They understand that in the ultimate dimension nothing should be clung to, including their own being.
But a strong humanitarian message can be conveyed to alleviate other people's suffering in the physically manifest reality by such an intense act. That sort of selflessness is required for a suicide with little negative karmic effect.
So suicide with the least karmic effect depends on the individual. If there is attachment, there will be varying degrees of karmic effect. If there is some degree of non-attachment, there will be lesser degrees of karma.
And quite honestly, most people contemplating suicide do not have that degree of non-attachment, so if Buddhism is some sort of guide to these people, I say don't do it. Work it out. Make it work.
Showing posts with label Google Buddhism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Google Buddhism. Show all posts
Saturday, March 19, 2011
google hits
Buddhism how to deal with tragedy;
How might Buddhist make sense of/handle tragedy;
How would Buddhist deal with the tragedy in Japan
When it comes right down to it, I'm not sure what to make of these Google searches on Buddhism and tragedy. I guess I would still apply my previous post. Understanding tragedy isn't a matter of scope. Tragedy is tragedy, I shouldn't wonder.
Furthermore, I would find myself perplexed if there were any suggestion of Buddhists experiencing or dealing with tragedies any differently than anyone else. In my experience, there's no correlation.
Every individual has his or her own way of coping or not coping with tragedy. Anyone with a social support group or religious or spiritual affiliation can draw strength from it or not.
Buddhists have their practice, and if they've developed it wisely, it theoretically should help them through difficulties, but not necessarily so, such is the nature of tragedies.
And such is the nature of being human that we react emotionally. Intellectually we know tragedies are part of the deal of being alive, at least Buddhism actively emphasizes that. It doesn't lull people into any sense of 'everything will be alright'.
But theoretically being prepared for a tragedy is different from experiencing one, and Buddhism offers techniques to deal, but so do any number of religious and spiritual traditions. And I imagine none of them lessens the character of the tragedy. Just how we cope, and that's up to the individual.
Regarding the aspect of karma in a large-scale tragedy, it bears repeating that it isn't about what happens to us or what we do or what we deserve. I don't think there is some connective karma between people in a plane crash.
We live in the natural world and the natural world just goes on. Earthquakes occur, tsunamis occur, and they have nothing to do with karma. They're just natural or they're just phenomena that occur in the course of our human existence.
This aspect of karma, I'm proposing, is about the mind. It's a reflection of the plasticity of mind. At any given moment of a tragedy, every individual is constantly reacting and every moment is a karmic manifesting moment, meaning their reaction is the manifestation of how they were conditioned karmically to react.
Likewise, how they react creates karma that will manifest further. It might seem like a downer that this interpretation of karma doesn't reflect some grand design of the universe. All it does is explain why it is best to always cultivate, or strive to cultivate a positive state of mind, along with wisdom and compassion.
How might Buddhist make sense of/handle tragedy;
How would Buddhist deal with the tragedy in Japan
When it comes right down to it, I'm not sure what to make of these Google searches on Buddhism and tragedy. I guess I would still apply my previous post. Understanding tragedy isn't a matter of scope. Tragedy is tragedy, I shouldn't wonder.
Furthermore, I would find myself perplexed if there were any suggestion of Buddhists experiencing or dealing with tragedies any differently than anyone else. In my experience, there's no correlation.
Every individual has his or her own way of coping or not coping with tragedy. Anyone with a social support group or religious or spiritual affiliation can draw strength from it or not.
Buddhists have their practice, and if they've developed it wisely, it theoretically should help them through difficulties, but not necessarily so, such is the nature of tragedies.
And such is the nature of being human that we react emotionally. Intellectually we know tragedies are part of the deal of being alive, at least Buddhism actively emphasizes that. It doesn't lull people into any sense of 'everything will be alright'.
But theoretically being prepared for a tragedy is different from experiencing one, and Buddhism offers techniques to deal, but so do any number of religious and spiritual traditions. And I imagine none of them lessens the character of the tragedy. Just how we cope, and that's up to the individual.
Regarding the aspect of karma in a large-scale tragedy, it bears repeating that it isn't about what happens to us or what we do or what we deserve. I don't think there is some connective karma between people in a plane crash.
We live in the natural world and the natural world just goes on. Earthquakes occur, tsunamis occur, and they have nothing to do with karma. They're just natural or they're just phenomena that occur in the course of our human existence.
This aspect of karma, I'm proposing, is about the mind. It's a reflection of the plasticity of mind. At any given moment of a tragedy, every individual is constantly reacting and every moment is a karmic manifesting moment, meaning their reaction is the manifestation of how they were conditioned karmically to react.
Likewise, how they react creates karma that will manifest further. It might seem like a downer that this interpretation of karma doesn't reflect some grand design of the universe. All it does is explain why it is best to always cultivate, or strive to cultivate a positive state of mind, along with wisdom and compassion.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
"How might a Buddhist make sense of an unexpected tragedy such as the loss of a child?"
I haven't done one of these in a while since most Google searches on Buddhism that have landed on this blog have been about jury duty, to which my answer was: If called for jury duty, go. Why are people who are interested in Buddhism so hung up about jury duty? Sheesh. Buddhism and organ donation is a legitimate topic. Buddhism and paying taxes is not. Do your civic duty.
This search is a little more compelling. It's a toughy. And just tonight, I found "Sophie's World" in the local municipal library and started reading it, and it contained this passage:
The red house was surrounded by a large garden with lots of flowerbeds, fruit bushes, fruit trees of different kinds, a spacious lawn with a glider and a little gazebo that Granddad built for Granny when she lost their first child a few weeks after it was born. The child's name was Marie. On her gravestone were the words: "Little Marie to us came, greeted us, and left again."
That is a very Zen attitude, a good Zen answer, but probably isn't very satisfactory for a question that should be handled seriously and delicately, and there are answers on many levels of Buddhism. Not that I'm speaking for Buddhism or Buddhists, just my own reflections.
The first thing that comes to my mind is to look at the question itself: "Unexpected tragedy" and "loss of a child" (and I'm assuming loss of a child means an infant, as the loss of a child, any child, is a less challenging subject as everyone is someone's child).
The question posits "unexpected tragedy" = "loss of a child", which is fair enough. But it automatically divides the issue into 1) an emotional one (unexpected tragedy), and 2) an objective fact (loss of a child).
If it's a question of making sense of the emotional impact, the tragedy of the loss of a child, then Buddhism has one approach which deals with our own selves and how we deal with our own emotions. There really isn't any sense to be made, only how we handle it among any other hardships and tragedies we naturally and normatively encounter in our (samsaric) human lives.
There are plenty of books by the Dalai Lama and Thich Nhat Hanh among others, those are just the ones I know, that can help guide people through such hardship. Too often we only think of tragedies when they happen and that they're bad, without considering or facing the possibility during other times that they might happen.
Buddhism teaches to consider the possibility of those things happening as part of the transiency of life and to constantly prepare for them through meditation and contemplation. It even goes so far as to teach that there are always positive perspectives to any situation that we sometimes must search for.
And by "prepare", it can be retroactive. Even if you come to Buddhist teachings after a tragedy, they may still help make sense of it.
<tangent> During my time at Deer Park, there was a nun who was . . . if you remembered one nun, it was her. She was so peaceful and compassionate and wise and giving. Just being around her put everyone at ease.
I forget how I fell into a conversation with her, but she told me her story, although I'm sure I'm forgetting details and making other stuff up, but the point is still the same. She told me that when she arrived at Plum Village, she was anything but peaceful. She cried every day, she was a mess. The senior nuns didn't know what to do with her.
She had been a medical student in San Francisco and she had a fiance. During that period, she had made a visit to Plum Village in France and returned gushing about the place. Her fiance told her that if that was a path that she was interested in, she could pursue it. But she was in love and was looking forward to a life with him.
Then one day much later, after she earned her medical degree and license, her fiance went on a day trip down the northern California coast, and while climbing along rocks on the coastline, a wave came up and swept him away.
She was devastated and inconsolable and the only thing she could think of doing was returning to Plum Village. Which she did. And ordained and never left.
There is a lesson for me in her telling me her story, but that's a different story. At the time, I was trying to be delicate about her telling me her personal story, but I wanted to tell her my impression of it and said something along the lines, afraid of saying something offensive, suggesting that it was his sacrifice that led her to become a nun. She smiled at me and knowingly said, "I know".
If you don't know what spiritual love is, if you met this nun, you'd learn.</tangent>
However, if the question is about making sense of the death of a child as an objective fact, then it's more of a metaphysical question and the first idea that comes up for me is karma. I've always wondered about the karma of people who die in infancy or in group disasters like plane crashes.
Contemplating karma is partly about making sense, joining point A to point B. My basic statement on karma is: every moment is a moment of karma manifestation; every moment is a moment of karma creation. This is because that was, that will be because this is. It's not "what comes around goes around".
But what's the sense in the untimely death of an innocent? Someone who hasn't done enough of anything to warrant a "karmic manifestation" of the end of his or her life. Well, that's partly the point. And it's not something anyone can know or be comforted by.
If it's karma, it's from previous lives, something we don't know anything about. Speculative reasons of why a child should die in infancy due to karmic reasons runs in the thousands. All we can do is deal with it in the present tense.
The child had his or her own karma. We have ours. The child died and it hurts like hell, but how we handle ourselves and our own emotions and reactions is also karma. It's not only our own karma, but can influence the child's karma. The effect of the compassion we put out, replacing grief, shouldn't be underestimated. I don't know the effect, but it's a matter of faith.
You lost a child you loved. Don't focus on the lost, but the love.
That's all.
However, I'm still a little intrigued by the wording of the Google search, "unexpected tragedy". What tragedies do we expect? Japan and individual citizens are currently facing a tragedy, was it expected? They expect earthquakes and tsunamis and prepare for them as best as possible. But when it happens, does it matter whether they expected it or not? It's still a tragedy.
And even in our own daily lives we don't know what tragedy might befall us, whether we will receive news of a loved one dying, or dying ourselves. Or an infant child dying. The nature of our human lives has unexpected tragedies assumed.
Whether they manifest or not, Buddhism teaches to prepare for them by looking deeply into the impermanent nature of our human lives. That may not be making sense of it, but rather how to cope.
This search is a little more compelling. It's a toughy. And just tonight, I found "Sophie's World" in the local municipal library and started reading it, and it contained this passage:
The red house was surrounded by a large garden with lots of flowerbeds, fruit bushes, fruit trees of different kinds, a spacious lawn with a glider and a little gazebo that Granddad built for Granny when she lost their first child a few weeks after it was born. The child's name was Marie. On her gravestone were the words: "Little Marie to us came, greeted us, and left again."
That is a very Zen attitude, a good Zen answer, but probably isn't very satisfactory for a question that should be handled seriously and delicately, and there are answers on many levels of Buddhism. Not that I'm speaking for Buddhism or Buddhists, just my own reflections.
The first thing that comes to my mind is to look at the question itself: "Unexpected tragedy" and "loss of a child" (and I'm assuming loss of a child means an infant, as the loss of a child, any child, is a less challenging subject as everyone is someone's child).
The question posits "unexpected tragedy" = "loss of a child", which is fair enough. But it automatically divides the issue into 1) an emotional one (unexpected tragedy), and 2) an objective fact (loss of a child).
If it's a question of making sense of the emotional impact, the tragedy of the loss of a child, then Buddhism has one approach which deals with our own selves and how we deal with our own emotions. There really isn't any sense to be made, only how we handle it among any other hardships and tragedies we naturally and normatively encounter in our (samsaric) human lives.
There are plenty of books by the Dalai Lama and Thich Nhat Hanh among others, those are just the ones I know, that can help guide people through such hardship. Too often we only think of tragedies when they happen and that they're bad, without considering or facing the possibility during other times that they might happen.
Buddhism teaches to consider the possibility of those things happening as part of the transiency of life and to constantly prepare for them through meditation and contemplation. It even goes so far as to teach that there are always positive perspectives to any situation that we sometimes must search for.
And by "prepare", it can be retroactive. Even if you come to Buddhist teachings after a tragedy, they may still help make sense of it.
<
I forget how I fell into a conversation with her, but she told me her story, although I'm sure I'm forgetting details and making other stuff up, but the point is still the same. She told me that when she arrived at Plum Village, she was anything but peaceful. She cried every day, she was a mess. The senior nuns didn't know what to do with her.
She had been a medical student in San Francisco and she had a fiance. During that period, she had made a visit to Plum Village in France and returned gushing about the place. Her fiance told her that if that was a path that she was interested in, she could pursue it. But she was in love and was looking forward to a life with him.
Then one day much later, after she earned her medical degree and license, her fiance went on a day trip down the northern California coast, and while climbing along rocks on the coastline, a wave came up and swept him away.
She was devastated and inconsolable and the only thing she could think of doing was returning to Plum Village. Which she did. And ordained and never left.
There is a lesson for me in her telling me her story, but that's a different story. At the time, I was trying to be delicate about her telling me her personal story, but I wanted to tell her my impression of it and said something along the lines, afraid of saying something offensive, suggesting that it was his sacrifice that led her to become a nun. She smiled at me and knowingly said, "I know".
If you don't know what spiritual love is, if you met this nun, you'd learn.</tangent>
However, if the question is about making sense of the death of a child as an objective fact, then it's more of a metaphysical question and the first idea that comes up for me is karma. I've always wondered about the karma of people who die in infancy or in group disasters like plane crashes.
Contemplating karma is partly about making sense, joining point A to point B. My basic statement on karma is: every moment is a moment of karma manifestation; every moment is a moment of karma creation. This is because that was, that will be because this is. It's not "what comes around goes around".
But what's the sense in the untimely death of an innocent? Someone who hasn't done enough of anything to warrant a "karmic manifestation" of the end of his or her life. Well, that's partly the point. And it's not something anyone can know or be comforted by.
If it's karma, it's from previous lives, something we don't know anything about. Speculative reasons of why a child should die in infancy due to karmic reasons runs in the thousands. All we can do is deal with it in the present tense.
The child had his or her own karma. We have ours. The child died and it hurts like hell, but how we handle ourselves and our own emotions and reactions is also karma. It's not only our own karma, but can influence the child's karma. The effect of the compassion we put out, replacing grief, shouldn't be underestimated. I don't know the effect, but it's a matter of faith.
You lost a child you loved. Don't focus on the lost, but the love.
That's all.
However, I'm still a little intrigued by the wording of the Google search, "unexpected tragedy". What tragedies do we expect? Japan and individual citizens are currently facing a tragedy, was it expected? They expect earthquakes and tsunamis and prepare for them as best as possible. But when it happens, does it matter whether they expected it or not? It's still a tragedy.
And even in our own daily lives we don't know what tragedy might befall us, whether we will receive news of a loved one dying, or dying ourselves. Or an infant child dying. The nature of our human lives has unexpected tragedies assumed.
Whether they manifest or not, Buddhism teaches to prepare for them by looking deeply into the impermanent nature of our human lives. That may not be making sense of it, but rather how to cope.
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
"what are we suppose to be doing on a daily basis in Buddhism?"
I guess that's a legitimate question. And there's probably a legitimate answer.
What furrows my brow about this Google search is the suggestion (that I'm reading into it) of looking for answers or guidance outside of us. Like someone knows us better than we know or can know ourselves. I blanch at the idea that we're supposed to be doing anything, like we aren't what we think we are if we're not doing something sanctioned by someone else.
This has come up as an easy issue for me here in Taiwan where Buddhism is more conservative, dogmatic, authoritarian, and very much linked to Confucian Chinese culture. Easy issue because I don't buy it, never have. At a . . . "class" at a Chung Tai-affiliated . . . branch place, a nun admonished us, "To be a Buddhist you must be vegetarian, if you're not vegetarian, you're not Buddhist". Not that I care about being Buddhist or not, but I smiled and thought, "ok, I'm not Buddhist". Easy. Should I leave now?
And I would have thought the same thing even if I was vegetarian. I wouldn't have thought, with not a little bit of smug self-righteousness, "ah, I'm vegetarian. I belong here and she's speaking to me". Even if I was vegetarian, it was that dogmatic, authoritarian, patronizing tone that turned me off and brought out the snark in me.
And it was a "class", not a Dharma Talk. They even called it a class. The nun was there to teach us something. It wasn't a "talk". Very Chinese, Confucian, paternalistic. And it was a Chung Tai branch, but it wasn't a practice center. No one spoke of practice. This wasn't my only experience with Chung Tai, and from my experience and what I've heard, they're pretty bogus. I gather they're maybe the equivalent of Christian televangelists in the U.S.?
I thought about this today, too, because of ants.
I've always had ants in my apartment and until today I let them be. There weren't that many and their presence wasn't linked to any food source, so as far as I was concerned, they were out for a stroll. They weren't a problem until last night.
Funny how it works, I usually never get into bed without pulling back the covers and looking. I don't know what I expect to find, but in Taiwan you never know. Last night I didn't, and five minutes into falling asleep I felt something crawling on me. Suffice it to say, there were quite a few ants on my pillow and bed. This is the first time they ventured onto my bed, which is also why I've left them alone. I knew once they were in my bed, I would consider it a problem. I didn't freak out, but I killed them. It was a massacre. This morning they were still present and so I went out and got a Combat ant trap. They seem to be gone now. I killed them all.
I found myself asking, "Is it really cool for me to be killing things?" Then I was like, "Who am I asking?" What would that nun say? What would the main teacher at Dharma Drum Mountain monastery, who lived in solitude in the mountains and welcomed critters into his hermitage as friends, say? What would the Deer Park monks or Thich Nhat Hanh say? And how would I react if they told me what I did was wrong and bad, when I don't buy into black and white moralistic notions of wrong and bad?
What do I say when I wake up and find my bed covered with ants, and unless I kill them, I can think of no reason why they'd go away on their own accord? I say I do what I feel I have to do in a given situation. If I was a monk or a hermit I wouldn't have killed them, I would have thought further for some other solution. That would have been my commitment. But for who I am today, with my background yesterday, in the situation I've placed myself into here now and what I had for breakfast that morning and considering my horoscope, every time I think it through, killing them always falls within the realm of reason.
I'm not thrilled about it. I'm not completely remorseless about it, just not to the point of not killing them. Maybe on a daily basis, I'm not supposed to be massacring other living beings. But it always depends. Unless you're ready for sainthood, you might always find yourself in a situation where you're going to decide to kill those ants.
And if none of this is really helpful, then cultivating mindfulness is what you should be doing on a daily basis. There are good ways to do this and bad ways, better ways and worse ways. And some sort of meditation practice is the best way to anchor the mindfulness practice, which might take years to come to any fruition, depending on the depth of practice. But even a weak practice if maintained regularly for years will snowball into a substantial practice. I can almost guarantee that. Maintaining a weak practice for years is a substantial practice.
I guess that's a legitimate question. And there's probably a legitimate answer.
What furrows my brow about this Google search is the suggestion (that I'm reading into it) of looking for answers or guidance outside of us. Like someone knows us better than we know or can know ourselves. I blanch at the idea that we're supposed to be doing anything, like we aren't what we think we are if we're not doing something sanctioned by someone else.
This has come up as an easy issue for me here in Taiwan where Buddhism is more conservative, dogmatic, authoritarian, and very much linked to Confucian Chinese culture. Easy issue because I don't buy it, never have. At a . . . "class" at a Chung Tai-affiliated . . . branch place, a nun admonished us, "To be a Buddhist you must be vegetarian, if you're not vegetarian, you're not Buddhist". Not that I care about being Buddhist or not, but I smiled and thought, "ok, I'm not Buddhist". Easy. Should I leave now?
And I would have thought the same thing even if I was vegetarian. I wouldn't have thought, with not a little bit of smug self-righteousness, "ah, I'm vegetarian. I belong here and she's speaking to me". Even if I was vegetarian, it was that dogmatic, authoritarian, patronizing tone that turned me off and brought out the snark in me.
And it was a "class", not a Dharma Talk. They even called it a class. The nun was there to teach us something. It wasn't a "talk". Very Chinese, Confucian, paternalistic. And it was a Chung Tai branch, but it wasn't a practice center. No one spoke of practice. This wasn't my only experience with Chung Tai, and from my experience and what I've heard, they're pretty bogus. I gather they're maybe the equivalent of Christian televangelists in the U.S.?
I thought about this today, too, because of ants.
I've always had ants in my apartment and until today I let them be. There weren't that many and their presence wasn't linked to any food source, so as far as I was concerned, they were out for a stroll. They weren't a problem until last night.
Funny how it works, I usually never get into bed without pulling back the covers and looking. I don't know what I expect to find, but in Taiwan you never know. Last night I didn't, and five minutes into falling asleep I felt something crawling on me. Suffice it to say, there were quite a few ants on my pillow and bed. This is the first time they ventured onto my bed, which is also why I've left them alone. I knew once they were in my bed, I would consider it a problem. I didn't freak out, but I killed them. It was a massacre. This morning they were still present and so I went out and got a Combat ant trap. They seem to be gone now. I killed them all.
I found myself asking, "Is it really cool for me to be killing things?" Then I was like, "Who am I asking?" What would that nun say? What would the main teacher at Dharma Drum Mountain monastery, who lived in solitude in the mountains and welcomed critters into his hermitage as friends, say? What would the Deer Park monks or Thich Nhat Hanh say? And how would I react if they told me what I did was wrong and bad, when I don't buy into black and white moralistic notions of wrong and bad?
What do I say when I wake up and find my bed covered with ants, and unless I kill them, I can think of no reason why they'd go away on their own accord? I say I do what I feel I have to do in a given situation. If I was a monk or a hermit I wouldn't have killed them, I would have thought further for some other solution. That would have been my commitment. But for who I am today, with my background yesterday, in the situation I've placed myself into here now and what I had for breakfast that morning and considering my horoscope, every time I think it through, killing them always falls within the realm of reason.
I'm not thrilled about it. I'm not completely remorseless about it, just not to the point of not killing them. Maybe on a daily basis, I'm not supposed to be massacring other living beings. But it always depends. Unless you're ready for sainthood, you might always find yourself in a situation where you're going to decide to kill those ants.
And if none of this is really helpful, then cultivating mindfulness is what you should be doing on a daily basis. There are good ways to do this and bad ways, better ways and worse ways. And some sort of meditation practice is the best way to anchor the mindfulness practice, which might take years to come to any fruition, depending on the depth of practice. But even a weak practice if maintained regularly for years will snowball into a substantial practice. I can almost guarantee that. Maintaining a weak practice for years is a substantial practice.
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
"Are there Buddhists who believe in God?"
I nicked this story off a friend's fotolog:
Buddha was gathered together with his disciples one morning, when a man came up to him.
"Does God Exist?" he asked.
"He does," replied Buddha.
After lunch, another man came up to him.
"Does God exist" he asked.
"No, he doesn't," said Buddha.
Later that afternoon, a third man asked the same question:
"Does God exist?"
"That's for you to decide," replied Buddha.
As soon the man had gone, one of his disciples remarked angrily:
"But that's absurd, Master! How can you possibly give such different answers to the same question?"
"Because they are all different people, and each one of them will reach God by his own path.
The first man will believe what I say.
The second will do everything he can prove me wrong.
The third believe in what he is allowed to choose for himself."
I nicked this story off a friend's fotolog:
Buddha was gathered together with his disciples one morning, when a man came up to him.
"Does God Exist?" he asked.
"He does," replied Buddha.
After lunch, another man came up to him.
"Does God exist" he asked.
"No, he doesn't," said Buddha.
Later that afternoon, a third man asked the same question:
"Does God exist?"
"That's for you to decide," replied Buddha.
As soon the man had gone, one of his disciples remarked angrily:
"But that's absurd, Master! How can you possibly give such different answers to the same question?"
"Because they are all different people, and each one of them will reach God by his own path.
The first man will believe what I say.
The second will do everything he can prove me wrong.
The third believe in what he is allowed to choose for himself."
Thursday, February 01, 2007
"Why Do Buddhists Not Believe in God?"
Buddhists don't believe in God? I think that's a hard statement to make, even though there are plenty of Buddhists and non-Buddhists who are perfectly comfortable making that statement. For me, it depends on what you call "God".
The question might be loaded with assumptions and preconceptions about God, and quite honestly, I don't think there is even full consensus among the major Western traditions through all of history about the nature of God.
Buddhist might easily believe in God. There are ideas and concepts in Buddhist thought that when described in particular words, match some of the descriptions of God by writers in the Western traditions! It's just that Buddhists might not call it God.
A short while ago I wrote about a discussion I had with a youngster from Berkeley who was over here converting the heathen and made the mistake of approaching me. He got an earful from me. At one point towards the end of our discussion, I think I asked him, "Do you think I believe in God?", and he thought for a few seconds and said, "Yes, I think you do".
I took that as high compliment, as well as a reason to respect him. He had just gotten a barrage of my alternative theological theories, none of which should have led him to think I believed in the Christian formulation of God, and here he was saying that we have this belief, for him a sacred belief, in common.
I think it was enough for him that I had given these ideas so much thought, and though I told him I was coming from a scientific background (I didn't mention Buddhism at all), there was obviously consideration of what he calls "divine" in my formulations.
I am perfectly comfortable with someone taking my formulations and interpreting them in a way that says I believe in God. Because in those interpretations, I do! It might not be my first choice of language, but if they're the ones saying it, then it's their language they're saying it in, and I believe in God! I have no problem with that.
As for Buddhists "who don't believe in God", and I'm trying to be careful as I would encourage them to be careful, I would caution about further believing that people who believe in God are wrong. I think that should be a hard statement for a Buddhist to make. What's wrong, what's right?
Are Buddhist views wrong or right? No, they're just views. If someone thinks you're wrong, fine, maybe they're right. Who knows who's wrong or right? You can only go by what you feel and what you believe. That's something Buddhists should cultivate and know because it is the more compassionate and peaceful approach. It is not compassionate or peaceful to think someone else is wrong.
Buddhists don't believe in God? I think that's a hard statement to make, even though there are plenty of Buddhists and non-Buddhists who are perfectly comfortable making that statement. For me, it depends on what you call "God".
The question might be loaded with assumptions and preconceptions about God, and quite honestly, I don't think there is even full consensus among the major Western traditions through all of history about the nature of God.
Buddhist might easily believe in God. There are ideas and concepts in Buddhist thought that when described in particular words, match some of the descriptions of God by writers in the Western traditions! It's just that Buddhists might not call it God.
A short while ago I wrote about a discussion I had with a youngster from Berkeley who was over here converting the heathen and made the mistake of approaching me. He got an earful from me. At one point towards the end of our discussion, I think I asked him, "Do you think I believe in God?", and he thought for a few seconds and said, "Yes, I think you do".
I took that as high compliment, as well as a reason to respect him. He had just gotten a barrage of my alternative theological theories, none of which should have led him to think I believed in the Christian formulation of God, and here he was saying that we have this belief, for him a sacred belief, in common.
I think it was enough for him that I had given these ideas so much thought, and though I told him I was coming from a scientific background (I didn't mention Buddhism at all), there was obviously consideration of what he calls "divine" in my formulations.
I am perfectly comfortable with someone taking my formulations and interpreting them in a way that says I believe in God. Because in those interpretations, I do! It might not be my first choice of language, but if they're the ones saying it, then it's their language they're saying it in, and I believe in God! I have no problem with that.
As for Buddhists "who don't believe in God", and I'm trying to be careful as I would encourage them to be careful, I would caution about further believing that people who believe in God are wrong. I think that should be a hard statement for a Buddhist to make. What's wrong, what's right?
Are Buddhist views wrong or right? No, they're just views. If someone thinks you're wrong, fine, maybe they're right. Who knows who's wrong or right? You can only go by what you feel and what you believe. That's something Buddhists should cultivate and know because it is the more compassionate and peaceful approach. It is not compassionate or peaceful to think someone else is wrong.
Sunday, January 28, 2007
"Is Buddhism monotheistic?"
In my opinion, no simple answer to this question. There would be a wide range of answers depending upon the person asked and their level of study, aptitude, and understanding, but also the answer goes to what assumptions are made about the question.
Some would say Buddhism is non-theistic, some would say it's polytheistic, and some would say that when it comes right down to it, it is monotheistic, but not monotheistic in the manner of Western traditions.
My personal answer accepts the polytheistic interpretation as metaphor, and to the extent that the divine is everywhere, here and now, yes, poly. It is also non-theistic in that as everything is sacred, nothing is sacred, there's no god or God to worship, everything is worthy of worship and contemplation. The teaching of emptiness.
And I accept Buddhism as monotheistic, the teaching of oneness. There is one God, meaning there is one indestructible reality that is the basis of all being. God, by definition, cannot be any less than the universe, so to envision God as a being or existing in the universe, meaning being smaller than a given space, means that it is not One, not universal.
Of the Buddhist Three Jewels, God is not the Buddha, God is the Dharma. The Dharma encompasses everything. The Buddha is a catalyst, a representative. The Buddha is "smaller" than the universe, smaller than the Dharma. God is the very fabric of the universe, the very essence of anything possibly in existence, and I dare say a whole lot more. Any less, then God is "smaller than the universe". God is the universe. Or specifically, God is the speed of light, but that's a different formulation.
I can't speak of the God in Western traditions, because from what I hear, that God makes no sense, is ridden with human projection, and is, quite frankly, smaller than the universe. But when I read Jewish, Christian, or Muslim works that mention God, I think of this Buddhist idea of God, one as being much bigger and much more incomprehensible than we can ever know cognitively.
Certainly, God is not partisan. When Muslims kill in the name of God, my heart shudders. When Christians refer to the September 11 attacks and say "God bless America", I wish God never blesses anyone like that again.
In my opinion, no simple answer to this question. There would be a wide range of answers depending upon the person asked and their level of study, aptitude, and understanding, but also the answer goes to what assumptions are made about the question.
Some would say Buddhism is non-theistic, some would say it's polytheistic, and some would say that when it comes right down to it, it is monotheistic, but not monotheistic in the manner of Western traditions.
My personal answer accepts the polytheistic interpretation as metaphor, and to the extent that the divine is everywhere, here and now, yes, poly. It is also non-theistic in that as everything is sacred, nothing is sacred, there's no god or God to worship, everything is worthy of worship and contemplation. The teaching of emptiness.
And I accept Buddhism as monotheistic, the teaching of oneness. There is one God, meaning there is one indestructible reality that is the basis of all being. God, by definition, cannot be any less than the universe, so to envision God as a being or existing in the universe, meaning being smaller than a given space, means that it is not One, not universal.
Of the Buddhist Three Jewels, God is not the Buddha, God is the Dharma. The Dharma encompasses everything. The Buddha is a catalyst, a representative. The Buddha is "smaller" than the universe, smaller than the Dharma. God is the very fabric of the universe, the very essence of anything possibly in existence, and I dare say a whole lot more. Any less, then God is "smaller than the universe". God is the universe. Or specifically, God is the speed of light, but that's a different formulation.
I can't speak of the God in Western traditions, because from what I hear, that God makes no sense, is ridden with human projection, and is, quite frankly, smaller than the universe. But when I read Jewish, Christian, or Muslim works that mention God, I think of this Buddhist idea of God, one as being much bigger and much more incomprehensible than we can ever know cognitively.
Certainly, God is not partisan. When Muslims kill in the name of God, my heart shudders. When Christians refer to the September 11 attacks and say "God bless America", I wish God never blesses anyone like that again.
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