On the authority of the suttas.

A discussion on all aspects of Theravāda Buddhism
danieLion
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by danieLion »

alan wrote:Completely incorrect!
Buddhism exists because of what he taught, and it is recorded in the suttas.
Why is this even a point of discussion?
How is this any different from when Christians say, "God said it. I believe it (pointing to their Bibles). That settles it!!"
daverupa
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by daverupa »

danieLion wrote:
alan wrote:Completely incorrect!
Buddhism exists because of what he taught, and it is recorded in the suttas.
Why is this even a point of discussion?
How is this any different from when Christians say, "God said it. I believe it (pointing to their Bibles). That settles it!!"
Citing any textual authority resembles other text-based religions, so that's to be expected.

To my mind, it's not possible to make reference to the see-for-yourself nature of the Dhamma when held to Nikaya-strata deva-realms, rebirth, psychic powers, Marks, and so forth. These claims are roughly equivalent to God(s), angels, and miracles of any kind, and the broad spectrum of human mystical experience in this respect is broad enough to nullify itself as independent evidence.

It doesn't affect the Dhamma, but it seems to me that it becomes a problem when one does not see their religious texts as products of a historical process; as being comprised of ancient literatures, not modern reports or biographies.
  • "And how is it, bhikkhus, that by protecting oneself one protects others? By the pursuit, development, and cultivation of the four establishments of mindfulness. It is in such a way that by protecting oneself one protects others.

    "And how is it, bhikkhus, that by protecting others one protects oneself? By patience, harmlessness, goodwill, and sympathy. It is in such a way that by protecting others one protects oneself.

- Sedaka Sutta [SN 47.19]
Spiny Norman
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by Spiny Norman »

daverupa wrote:To my mind, it's not possible to make reference to the see-for-yourself nature of the Dhamma when held to Nikaya-strata deva-realms, rebirth, psychic powers, Marks, and so forth. These claims are roughly equivalent to God(s), angels, and miracles of any kind, and the broad spectrum of human mystical experience in this respect is broad enough to nullify itself as independent evidence.
Sure, but I don't think not being able to verify teachings is a good reason for dismissing them.
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Alex123
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by Alex123 »

polarbuddha101 wrote: How do we decide what was most likely spoken by the historical buddha and what was not? Mind you, let us not make slippery slope arguments.
  • 1) We can't prove beyond any doubt that Buddha as historical person even existed.
    2) We can't prove beyond any doubt that even if Buddha did exist that He was fully Awakened.
    3) We can't prove beyond any doubt that even if Buddha did exist and that He was fully Awakened, that He didn't use skillful means.
    4) We can't prove beyond any doubt that such and such tradition accurately carried his message.
1) Are there any material remains? How do we know if they are His and not from some other person living in that time?
2) We have no ability to verify this, even if we could time travel. Only stories remain by devoted adherents, and we know their reliability.
3) We have no ability to verify this, even if we were present as His audience.
4) Same. Theravada today is not the same as Theravada centuries ago, and who knows what was even earlier.

This is obvious but sad to anyone who really studies history, and history of religions.

It is too easy to copy the book with politically correct things added, then burn the original... Eventually nobody will know...


We can't even talk about pragmatical results. As one Bhikkhu has said, Buddhism is faith. A Christian can say that "who cares about Nibbana here and now for 70 years if you are going to spend eternity in hell."



IMHO, practical results is what counts.
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ground
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by ground »

polarbuddha101 wrote: How do we decide what was most likely spoken by the historical buddha and what was not?
Is this relevant?

Somebody wants to get rid of stress and comes across utterances that entail cessation of stress. What purpose does further questioning have? :sage:
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cooran
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by cooran »

polarbuddha101 wrote:A quote from Danielion:
Did the Buddha teach that the suttas are a valid source of authority?

Corollary: are the suttas a proper object for a Buddhist to have faith in?

Add the rapidly growing body of historical-critical scholarship into the mix, and we have a sobering effect on those who believe in the authoritative nature of the texts.
How do we decide what was most likely spoken by the historical buddha and what was not? Mind you, let us not make slippery slope arguments.
Hello all,

From a previous post:
Overview of Tipitaka Scriptures - Narada Maha Thera

"This doctrine is profound, hard to see, difficult to understand, calm, sublime, not within the sphere of logic, subtle, to be understood by the wise." Majjhima Nikaya
The Buddha has passed away, but the sublime Teaching, which He expounded during His long and successful ministry and which He unreservedly bequeathed to humanity, still exists in its pristine purity. Although the Master has left no written records of His Teachings, His disciples preserved them, by committing to memory and transmitting them orally from generation to generation.

Three months after the Death of the Buddha, in the eighth year of King Ajatasattu's reign, 500 pre-eminent Arahants concerned with preserving the purity of the Doctrine held a Convocation at Rajagaha to rehearse it. The Venerable Ananda Thera, the Buddha's beloved attendant who had the special privilege and honour of
hearing the discourses from the Buddha Himself, and the Venerable Upali Thera were chosen to answer questions about the Dhamma (Doctrine) and the Vinaya (Discipline) respectively.

This First Council compiled and arranged in its present form the Pali Tipitaka, which represents the entire body of the Buddha's Teaching.

Two other Councils of Arahants were held 100 and 236 years later respectively, again to rehearse the Word of the Buddha because attempts were being made to pollute the pure Teaching.

About 83 B.C., during the reign of the pious Simhala King Vatta Gamani Abhaya, a Council of Arahants was held, and the Tipitaka was, for the first time in the history of Buddhism, committed to writing at Aluvihara in Ceylon.

Thanks to the indefatigable efforts of those noble and foresighted Arahants, there is no room either now or in the future for higher critics or progressive scholars to adulterate the pure Teaching.

The voluminous Tipitaka, which contains the essence of the Buddha's Teaching, is estimated to be about eleven times the size of the Bible.

The word Tipitaka means three Baskets. They are the Basket of Discipline (Vinaya Pitaka), the Basket of Discourses (Sutta Pitaka) and the Basket of Ultimate Doctrine (Abhidhamma Pitaka).
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http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma/tipitaka.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

From a previous post of mine:
In the Buddha's day, writing was just for things like government and commerce. and there was widespread illiteracy. For really important things, where it was critical that no alteration occur ( as can happen so very easily, deliberately or accidentally when writing is used) - the Oral Tradition was used. The Buddha instituted in his lifetime the Chanting Together by large groups of specially designated Bhikkhus - the Bhanakas (Hearers). The Bhanakas had portions of the Teachings allocated to each group, and so there were The Digha Bhanakas, The Majjhima Bhanakas etc.

It was only hundreds of years later in Sri Lanka, in a time of famine and warfare, with many bhikkhus dying, and with Buddhism all but wiped out in India, that the MahaSangha decided the Buddhist Canon and its commentaries needed to be written down.
They were engraved on Ola Leaves. Many of us have been to Sri Lanka and have had the inestimable good fortune to have seen demonstrations of this being done at the ancient rock temple of Aluvihara Temple (where the Tipitaka was originally written down) in the Matale district 26 km from Kandy.

The Suttas are rather like the memory prompts - the dot points of the most important information to be transmitted - similar to those a public speaker carries on a little card in his hand. Anything that is repeated is to be seen as something important which was highlighted by the repetition.

As I understand it, the Pali Suttas are teaching vehicles whose meanings are densely packed layer on layer. They are not to be read as an ordinary page of print, but require 'unpacking' by someone learned in the Dhamma. This condensed form was necessary in order that the Teachings would not be lost in the years before they were finally put into writing. It allowed them to be memorised by the large groups of bhikkhus (bhanakas) assigned to each portion of the Tipitaka. They are not verbatim reports of chats and conversations. This memorisation is said to have commenced before the parinibbana of the Buddha.

"Thus you should train yourselves: 'We will listen when discourses that are words of the Tathagata -- deep, deep in their meaning, transcendent, connected with emptiness -- are being recited. We will lend ear, will set our hearts on knowing them, will regard these teachings as worth grasping & mastering.' That's how you should train yourselves." (Ari sutta).
Venerable Mahá Kassapa, the elected head of the First Council. Cúlavagga Xl,1,1 (ii,284) reiterated:
"Come, friends: let us recite the Teaching and the Discipline before what is not the Teaching shines forth and the Teaching is put aside, before what is not the Discipline shines forth and the Discipline is put aside, before those who speak what is not the Teaching become strong and those who speak what is the Teaching become weak, before those who speak what is not the Discipline become strong and those who speak what is the Discipline become weak."
http://www.dhammawheel.com/viewtopic.ph ... 9&p=154566" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

with metta
Chris
---The trouble is that you think you have time---
---Worry is the Interest, paid in advance, on a debt you may never owe---
---It's not what happens to you in life that is important ~ it's what you do with it ---
Javi
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by Javi »

Academics will continue to argue this stuff for ages and never come to agreement. I think what matters is how we interpret the suttas and how we use them to aid in our practice every day. I'm currently reading In the Buddha's words and it has really helped. To be honest I don't really care if they Buddha taught hell and deva realms or if it was added on later, it's a non starter for me, it doesn't help me because I just don't think about stuff like that (never believed in them, and I'm not going to start now). What matters is the lessons I can learn from these texts, and how I can apply them to my life. The amazing thing is that these two thousand year old texts can still be relevant every day, compare that to any other ancient texts from this time, full of myths about monsters and tribal gods.
So the suttas are great, they are like maps, and maps must be read by trained eyes (unpacked so to speak), but we must not confuse the map with the territory. Maps are only symbolic representations of the lay of the land, you actually have to travel there to see it.
On Exactitude in Science - In that Empire, the art of cartography attained such perfection that the map of a single province occupied the entirety of a city, and the map of the Empire, the entirety of a province. In time, those unconscionable maps no longer satisfied, and the cartographers guilds struck a map of the Empire whose size was that of the Empire, and which coincided point for point with it. The following generations, who were not so fond of the study of cartography as their forebears had been, saw that that vast map was useless, and not without some pitilessness was it, that they delivered it up to the Inclemencies of Sun and Winters. In the Deserts of the West, still today, there are tattered ruins of that map, inhabited by animals and beggars; in all the Land there is no other relic of the disciplines of Geography. - Jorge Luis Borges
Vayadhammā saṅkhārā appamādena sampādethā — All things decay and disappoint, it is through vigilance that you succeed — Mahāparinibbāna Sutta

Self-taught poverty is a help toward philosophy, for the things which philosophy attempts to teach by reasoning, poverty forces us to practice. — Diogenes of Sinope

I have seen all things that are done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a chase after wind — Ecclesiastes 1.14
alan
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by alan »

Not necessary to revere the suttas. But it is imperative to read them.
And if you haven't read them, you're not in a position to interpret them, are you?
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ground
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by ground »

Either there is immediacy of insight upon eye or ear contact or there is not. If the latter then either the words are abondoned or there arises religious thought (comprising belief and doubt) supported by hope and fear. :sage:
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tiltbillings
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by tiltbillings »

ground wrote:Either there is immediacy of insight upon eye or ear contact or there is not. If the latter then either the words are abondoned or there arises religious thought (comprising belief and doubt) supported by hope and fear.
No.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
Spiny Norman
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by Spiny Norman »

Alex123 wrote:
  • 1) We can't prove beyond any doubt that Buddha as historical person even existed.
    2) We can't prove beyond any doubt that even if Buddha did exist that He was fully Awakened.
    3) We can't prove beyond any doubt that even if Buddha did exist and that He was fully Awakened, that He didn't use skillful means.
    4) We can't prove beyond any doubt that such and such tradition accurately carried his message.
Sure, these uncertainties exist, but I don't see how they will ever be resolved. Pragmatically the suttas are what we have, and they seem to be the best means we have available of trying to understand what the Buddha taught.
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DAWN
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by DAWN »

Buddha Dhamma can be seen directly, there is no reasons to doubt.

Anicca, dukkha and anatta are here, in every fenomena. We can have some doubt about what can not be seen directly, but Buddha Dhamma can be seen directly, experianced here and now.

If peoples have doubt about possibility of liberation, so they have to abandon this doubt, because even logicaly, in this dualistic world, we can understand that if there is dukkha, it's because at there is actualy abcence of dukkha, and only because there is absence of dukkha we can experiance dukkha.

It's because there is day, that thee is night.

It's like a water drop fallen in ocean, this drop can't feel it-self existance, can't feel separation of it self from the rest of ocean. So if we would not experianced dukkha, it would be mean that there is no escape from dukkha, but we alrady not experiance it, so there is needs to be "liberated from freedom".
But, if it would be drop of another substance then water, the self apear, and perception - "it's me, it's water" - apear. And why it's apear in our mind? Because there is dirth in the drop, this drop is dirty, so it feel difference between 'it self' and 'water'. Difference, consciosness, is the heart of dukkha, nature of dukkha.
So, because there is consciosness, because there is dukkha, there is actually freedom. When consciosness will disapear, it would be mean that there is no more difference between the drop and water. Like a body wich is put in water with the temperture of this body, this body have no perception of it self, because there is no difference between temperture of body and temperture of water.

Thats why we feel dukkha, and because we feel dukkha, we can be sure that there is abcence of dukkha, wich can be reached by the one who feel dukkha.


Ud 8.3
There is, monks, an unborn[1] — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated. If there were not that unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated, there would not be the case that escape from the born — become — made — fabricated would be discerned. But precisely because there is an unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated, escape from the born — become — made — fabricated is discerned.[2]
Last edited by DAWN on Sat Dec 01, 2012 11:07 am, edited 2 times in total.
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danieLion
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by danieLion »

daverupa wrote:It doesn't affect the Dhamma, but it seems to me that it becomes a problem when one does not see their religious texts as products of a historical process; as being comprised of ancient literatures, not modern reports or biographies.
Excellent post.

(Setting aside the problem of the validity of the occident/orient dichotomy for the moment):

Westerners influenced by positivism seem to me condtioned to crave verification (Wittgenstein's--who we must remember did not generally approve of the positivistic intepretation of his philosophies--last "book" was called On Certainty) and see the Buddhist texts through this lense. Hence, the desire for authoritative texts.

I suspect easterners are more likely to have a better sense of religious texts as literature (rather than historical documentation) and rely on faith as a basis for the authority of religious texts.
Spiny Norman
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by Spiny Norman »

danieLion wrote:Westerners influenced by positivism..
What about westerners influenced by skepticism? ;)
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danieLion
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Re: On the authority of the suttas.

Post by danieLion »

cooran wrote:The Suttas are rather like the memory prompts - the dot points of the most important information to be transmitted - similar to those a public speaker carries on a little card in his hand. Anything that is repeated is to be seen as something important which was highlighted by the repetition....

They are not verbatim reports of chats and conversations.
Excellent post.
I don't think this diminishes authority. It properly contextualizes it and provides some definitional heurtistics--helps give us a better idea of how much authority the texts have--which grants at least some authority--and what kind of authorities they have.
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