What are virtues?

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SarathW
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What are virtues?

Post by SarathW »

It seems virtues are so powerful so they will naturally guide you to Nirvana. But what it means by virtues?


What do you consider as virtues?

- four noble truths?
- Five/ten precepts?
- Noble eight fold path?
- Elimination of attachment, aversion and ignorance?
- All above?

This question is based on:
http://www.urbandharma.org/pdf1/wh238An ... ikaya3.pdf

7. LAWFULNESS OF PROGRESS
For one who is virtuous and endowed with virtue, there is no need for an act of will: “May nonremorse
arise in me!” It is a natural law, monks, that non-remorse will arise in one who is
virtuous.For one free of remorse, there is no need for an act of will: “May gladness arise in me!” It is a
natural law that gladness will arise in one who is free from remorse.............

And so on
“As the lamp consumes oil, the path realises Nibbana”
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Bhikkhu Pesala
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Re: What are virtues?

Post by Bhikkhu Pesala »

When the Cetanākaraṇīya Suttaṃ talks about one endowed with virtue (sīlasampanassa), I take it to mean the four kinds of virtue as explained in the Visuddhimagga:
  1. Restraint by the 227 Pātimokkha rules (Pātimokkhasaṃvara sīla),
  2. Virtue of sense-faculty restraint (indriyasaṃvara sīla),
  3. Virtue of livelihood purification (ājīvapārisuddhi sīla), and
  4. Virtue of proper reflection on the use of the four requisites (paccayasannissita sīla).
The Visuddhimagga devotes an entire chapter to the explanation of virtue. It is not as easy as it might appear at first sight to be virtuous. For a lay person, one should extrapolate what it says for monks to apply appropriately to a lay person:
  1. Restraint by the five precepts at least.
  2. Refraining from dancing, singing, listening to music, and watching entertainments. Restraining the senses and keeping the mind inwardly focused.
  3. Abstaining from all forms of wrong livelihood, and fulfilling completely all of one's duties to one's employer as described in the Sīgalovāda Sutta
  4. Making use of one's rightfully acquired wealth without vanity or sensual indulgence.
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Ben
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Re: What are virtues?

Post by Ben »

Thank you, Venerable.
“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.”
- Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:
in mountain clefts and chasms,
loud gush the streamlets,
but great rivers flow silently.
- Sutta Nipata 3.725

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SarathW
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Re: What are virtues?

Post by SarathW »

Ven Pesala,
Thanks for your prompt reply. It seems that there are different degrees of virtues based on the progress of each person.
Am I correct?
--------------------------
13. KING PASENADI’S HOMAGE TO THE BUDDHA
“Again, Lord, the Blessed One is virtuous, of mature virtue, of noble virtue, of wholesome
virtue; he is endowed with wholesome virtue.
“As the lamp consumes oil, the path realises Nibbana”
John1122
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Location: Victoria, BC

Re: What are virtues?

Post by John1122 »

generosity, morality, renunciation, wisdom, energy, patience, truthfulness, determination, loving-kindness, equanimity.
SarathW
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Re: What are virtues?

Post by SarathW »

There are 19 types of virtues are listed in Visuddhimaga.

25. (v) Now, here is the answer to the question, HOW MANY KINDS OF VIRTUE ARE
THERE?
1. Firstly all this virtue is of one kind by reason of its own characteristic of
composing.
2. It is of two kinds as keeping and avoiding.
3. Likewise as that of good behaviour and that of the beginning of the life of
purity,
4. As abstinence and non-abstinence,
5. As dependent and independent,
6. As temporary and lifelong,
7. As limited and unlimited,
8. As mundane and supramundane. [11]
9. It is of three kinds as inferior, medium, and superior.
10. Likewise as giving precedence to self, giving precedence to the world, and
giving precedence to the Dhamma,
11. As adhered to, not adhered to, and tranquillized.
12. As purified, unpurified, and dubious.
13. As that of the trainer, that of the non-trainer, and that of the neither-trainernor-
non-trainer.
14. It is of four kinds as partaking of diminution, of stagnation, of distinction,
of penetration.
15. Likewise as that of bhikkhus, of bhikkhunìs, of the not-fully-admitted, of
the laity,
16. As natural, customary, necessary, due to previous causes,
17. As virtue of Pátimokkha restraint, of restraint of sense faculties, of
purification of livelihood, and that concerning requisites.
18. It is of five kinds as virtue consisting in limited purification, etc.; for this is
said in the Paþisambhidá: “Five kinds of virtue: virtue consisting in limited
purification, virtue consisting in unlimited purification, virtue consisting in fulfilled
purification, virtue consisting in unadhered-to purification, virtue consisting in
tranquillized purification” (Paþis I 42).
19. Likewise as abandoning, refraining, volition, restraint, and nontransgression.

Page 14:
http://bps.lk/olib/bp/bp207h.pdf
:reading:
“As the lamp consumes oil, the path realises Nibbana”
SarathW
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Re: What are virtues?

Post by SarathW »

“As the lamp consumes oil, the path realises Nibbana”
lonewolf
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Re: What are virtues?

Post by lonewolf »

In addition to already mentioned virtues dispassion, non-attachment, silence, solitude, harmlessness, equanimity, many others. Anything that is conducive to the growth of wisdom.
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