Hi Alan,alan... wrote: as far as i know, in mahayana, if you become a fully realized buddha you become immortal essentially and can come and go between your "buddha land" and samsara as you please. examples are dizang, amitabha and kuan yin. they are immortal (at least until all of samsara has become buddhas anyway) and answer prayers and help people.
In my opinion, that is a misinterpretation of these teachings.
In Theravada it's the same, believe it or not... one glaring example is the Dhammakaya sect. They're not small either, but very big. If I understand what they teach correctly, they believe that Nibbana is the eternal self, or Atta.in theravada there are no immortal buddhas floating around helping people and answering prayers. so it's like discovering an eternal being within you and becoming that being. as opposed to the theravada realization of having no eternal self.
In Theravada, there's the "unborn," the "deathless element," etc. When a person interprets these in a certain way, do you think that's the fault of the teaching, or the person's interpretation?
For example, Ven. Thanissaro criticizes the Buddha nature I think as an exercise in eternalism (something or other). To me, that is just what he read into it, possibly based on his hidden attachment... it has nothing to do with what I understand as Buddha nature.
Whatever bias a person might have, I think that is what he will read into the teachings, regardless. That's why the Dhamma is very subtle... even when it's glaringly obvious.