.e. wrote:For instance, if ignorance is always in the last life, how are you supposed to end it? I mean you can't go back in time and eradicate it there now can you? As you contemplate D.O. it is obvious this process is happening right here and now. All else is nothing but (cultural) belief i.e. societal conventions. Also, I don't see re-birth mentioned in D.O. but birth is.
Wow people, eleven (don't expect me to read them all) pages! Here's hoping Buddhadasa (if and wherever he is) can 'feel the love'.
Um, .e.. "All else is social convention?" So, the earth moves around the sun as a result of social convention? A man must eat because of social convention? We eventually drop dead because of social convention? Seems just a wee bit 'oversimplified' to me.
If this is the only birth, then whence all this endless baggage that also comes with, including the ignorance for that matter. Should have popped out of the womb pristine, no? Why do I prefer blue to red? I've pretty much canvased the length and breadth of this life and lifetime, put it to bed, watched it slip away. And, wouldn't you know... there is more. Much more. Sucks, but there it is, it is for me, that's the honest truth. I have found plenty of evidence of past being and becoming and in it the causes of future being and becoming.
I agree that the causes and conditions for being and becoming, in this very life, require primary attention. However, having attended to it, at length, more has arisen. So am I supposed to simply ignore that stuff, just because this teacher or that teacher 'doesn't seem to believe in it' or because some bboard posters rant against it? Uh, that would be pretty stupid on my part.
I'm completely in favor of taking this approach, to the present, to the present life, etc.. And when that is done, to continue with the rest of what will emerge, the rest of the problem. Do this first and the rest of the problem will seem, at least... approachable.
upekkha
But whoever walking, standing, sitting, or lying down overcomes thought, delighting in the stilling of thought: he's capable, a monk like this, of touching superlative self-awakening. § 110. {Iti 4.11; Iti 115}