what the buddha taught

Exploring Theravāda's connections to other paths - what can we learn from other traditions, religions and philosophies?
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baratgab
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Re: what the buddha taught

Post by baratgab »

appicchato wrote:
baratgab wrote:That the true path is free from torture, free from groaning and free from suffering.
Sorry...the path is full of torture, groaning, and suffering...it's only when one is liberated that these things are eliminated...then the path has been followed to the end (and the goal has been reached)...i.e. no more path...

My read anyway...
Yes, Bhante, if you define the path as the aggregate of experiences, you are quite right, and I agree. :smile: I just referred to the influence of the dhamma as the path, which should always bring ease to the mind, and not burden. Or at least this is what I am confident in, based on the "elephant's footprint" concept of the Four Noble Truths. My impression is that practitioners are fallible to slipping into a borderline case of the false Jain view that suffering in and of itself is of a value in attaining liberation.

Downright self-torture is rare, of course, but I see all the time the phenomena of not taking up reachable spiritual happiness, which can be seen as a quality of holding onto inferior states, suffering. And since we see the roots of suffering in the defilements, this can be seen as a quality of holding onto the defilements. Undoubtedly, with a less happy mind one have a much harder time being mindful, being upright and being compassionate towards other beings. In the meditation practice it is common that the meditators deny themselves (actively or passively) the bliss that is born from stillness and seclusion. I can't reconcile these things with the path, and I think that our traditions should pay more attention to encouraging spiritual happiness. But of course these are just my own reflections; they can be completely wrong...
"Just as in the great ocean there is but one taste — the taste of salt — so in this Doctrine and Discipline there is but one taste — the taste of freedom"
kayy
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Re: what the buddha taught

Post by kayy »

tiltbillings wrote:Katy,

In reading through your response to me and your “depression” msg, I think I see what you are struggling with. One teacher that I had would say: Keep it light and easy. Do not get so grim about it. Part of the problem is that you are looking at texts that are directed at monastics, and the Buddha can be quite uncompromising in his exhortation to the monks and nuns. It is context and to whom these texts are addressed that is actually quite important to consider. You are not a monastic, so do not have take that level of practice as a model for your practice. There is no need for it.

I would strongly suggest backing off more than a bit from the stuff that is depressing you, that you find difficult. Just give yourself some space. There is really nice book out there by Jack Kornfield called A PATH WITH HEART. He is a very, very experienced teacher. This book, which is the result of his years of teaching, is well worth spending with. It will help you get some balance dealing with these issues. I would strongly recommend it.

tilt

Hi Tilt - I read your message earlier on today and the word "grim" made me laugh. Because I do take things quite grimly, and I guess I need to lighten up about it and take things slowly. Definitely.

Thanks for the book recommendation. I like Jack Kornfield a lot. I like his soft voice and his eyes. Is that a good enough set of criteria for buying a book? I think so... I'll give it a go! :reading:

Best wishes to you,

Katy
kayy
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Re: what the buddha taught

Post by kayy »

baratgab wrote:
kayy wrote:Maybe some people would tell me that by returning to my worldly attachments, I was just running away from my suffering, trying to find solace in impermanent things.

This is true.

But when you suffer from depression, and when you are suicidally depressed, it is simply not a viable option to delve into it. It is too dangerous: what lies further into depression but psychosis and possible suicide?

Distraction is really the only option (in the immediate term anyway). After... then you can deal with the underlying problems. But depressives need external support, distractions, family, friends, exercise, etc.
Most people come to Buddhism with a fault-finding mind, and they practice Buddhism with a fault-finding mind. When the dhamma teaches that there is something better than what we have, we start to see that there is something wrong in what we have... When the dhamma teaches stilling the mind, we wrestle the mind... No wonder that we suffer. :)

And the best part is that suffering Buddhists actually condition others for suffering too, with their involuntary way of expressing the dhamma. Because of this, it is paramount to keep in mind in every single moment that the true doctrine have one taste, the taste of freedom, just like the taste of salt in the ocean. That the true path is free from torture, free from groaning and free from suffering. If your experience differs, the problem is not with the dhamma, but the problem is that what you have is not the dhamma. If there is awareness regarding this in the mind, then there is a chance of discovering the true dhamma.

Basically, if it's making me miserable it's probably cos it's not the Dhamma?

I think you're right.

It's true about the fault-finding mind thing. I'm beginning to realise that I've approached Buddhism in the same way as I approach anything, and it's not in Buddhism as a concept, or in reading, or thinking, or anything external that we call "Buddhism" that I'm going to become happier. It's in changing my own mind.

Thanks baratgab for your thoughts. It's much appreciated.

Best wishes

Katy
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Re: what the buddha taught

Post by kayy »

Apologies to all for the slight detour into depression and whatnot...!

:focus:
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Re: what the buddha taught

Post by nowheat »

kayy wrote:Maybe some people would tell me that by returning to my worldly attachments, I was just running away from my suffering, trying to find solace in impermanent things.

This is true.

But when you suffer from depression, and when you are suicidally depressed, it is simply not a viable option to delve into it. It is too dangerous: what lies further into depression but psychosis and possible suicide?

Distraction is really the only option (in the immediate term anyway). After... then you can deal with the underlying problems. But depressives need external support, distractions, family, friends, exercise, etc.
Oh certainly don't give it all up, Katy. If you want to become a monk and renounce, that is one way to go, but it is not the only way to go, and some people may not be suited to it; or may not be ready for it now and will be later.

Most of us householders will tell you that we find our involvement in life very good for our Buddhist practice. It seems even the Buddha thought it would be easier to "give it all up" cold turkey, just go off in the woods and meditate, but he didn't say everyone needed to do it.

It's not about not caring about people, or not being involved in hobbies, or even giving up all material wealth, it's about how you relate to these. You can still be a part of the world, offer kindness, love, experience joy, and make a difference in the world.

Someday, when we are ready to renounce, we will. Until then you may find your practice enriches your life and the lives of those around you.

metta
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Guy
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Re: what the buddha taught

Post by Guy »

nowheat wrote:
kayy wrote:Maybe some people would tell me that by returning to my worldly attachments, I was just running away from my suffering, trying to find solace in impermanent things.

This is true.

But when you suffer from depression, and when you are suicidally depressed, it is simply not a viable option to delve into it. It is too dangerous: what lies further into depression but psychosis and possible suicide?

Distraction is really the only option (in the immediate term anyway). After... then you can deal with the underlying problems. But depressives need external support, distractions, family, friends, exercise, etc.
Oh certainly don't give it all up, Katy. If you want to become a monk and renounce, that is one way to go, but it is not the only way to go, and some people may not be suited to it; or may not be ready for it now and will be later.

Most of us householders will tell you that we find our involvement in life very good for our Buddhist practice. It seems even the Buddha thought it would be easier to "give it all up" cold turkey, just go off in the woods and meditate, but he didn't say everyone needed to do it.

It's not about not caring about people, or not being involved in hobbies, or even giving up all material wealth, it's about how you relate to these. You can still be a part of the world, offer kindness, love, experience joy, and make a difference in the world.

Someday, when we are ready to renounce, we will. Until then you may find your practice enriches your life and the lives of those around you.

metta
:goodpost:
Four types of letting go:

1) Giving; expecting nothing back in return
2) Throwing things away
3) Contentment; wanting to be here, not wanting to be anywhere else
4) "Teflon Mind"; having a mind which doesn't accumulate things

- Ajahn Brahm
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Re: what the buddha taught

Post by nowheat »

kayy wrote: I was wondering: I have seen/heard many times that the Buddha's teachings were not written down until several hundred years after his death, and that until then, they were passed down from generation to generation of practitioners, monks etc through speech.

How, then, do we know that the suttas are really what the Buddha taught? How can we be sure to take them word-for-word, when the people who put them down on paper were most likely unenlightened beings who spoke a different language from the Buddha himself, half a century after he lived?

I don't mean this as a criticism - it's just something that's bugging me.

Any answers would be most lovely.
Read a lot, especially the suttas if you can. Meditate regularly. Listen to the wise. Think about what you read, see for yourself, and hear, and practice, practice, practice.

I believe that what the Buddha taught had complete internal consistency with no need for complicated explanations*. If you look for truth that fits together seamlessly, and practice it in your life and find it works, you'll find the dhamma underneath all the confusion, and that's what really matters.

* This is, of course, the dhamma I am referring to, not the suttas. The suttas, now, were first transmitted orally for about 500 years. They were first written down in about 100 C.E. Our oldest copies are not nearly that old. The language the Buddha spoke was thought by some to be "Magadhi" (named for the most powerful state at the time he lived) and it is quite close to the Pali, though Pali is a simple, clean language that was, if my understanding is correct, designed specifically to convey the suttas.

It's not reasonable to think that understanding will not have changed in even 100 years of oral transmission, much less 500 years. Heck, the Buddha was scolding his own monks for spreading wrong information even while he was still alive -- how likely is it then that after he died, everyone got everything exactly right? There's even a rule in the monk's books of discipline that says, "if you can't remember where a sutta took place, say 'in Savatthi'" which is a good rule for something minor like setting, but what did they do when they forgot more important things?

And then transcription comes along, and it's sometimes hard to read the copy you have when you're transcribing, so you make the best sense of it you can. Richard Gombrich also points out that when it comes to organizing who is going to remember what sutta, or copy it down, the ones no one really understands, or perhaps the ones they feel are in some way "wrong" -- disagreeing with their understanding of what the Buddha taught -- will not get memorized or copied as being "too low priority". Our oldest copies of Pali texts, Gombrich says, are about 500 years old, giving 2000 years of human error to creep in, of what was written down to possibly narrow to few copies at some points, and then what's left to be copied and spread again when the authors saw the danger of losing all that treasure.

There is a remarkable consistency in what we have, both across different tradition's versions of the same sutta, and in the suttas themselves. I went into reading suttas expecting them to be thoroughly corrupted but am frequently astounded by how much of what's there is clearly remaining from the earliest days. The whole seems to almost make a hologram.

:namaste:
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Guy
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Re: what the buddha taught

Post by Guy »

Hi All,

I know that Bhante Sujato has already been mentioned in this thread, but I thought I'd post this audio link of his analysis of the Satipatthana Sutta. http://www.dhammanet.org/download.php?view.96

It's a four hour audio file...you have been warned.

With Metta,

Guy
Four types of letting go:

1) Giving; expecting nothing back in return
2) Throwing things away
3) Contentment; wanting to be here, not wanting to be anywhere else
4) "Teflon Mind"; having a mind which doesn't accumulate things

- Ajahn Brahm
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baratgab
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Re: what the buddha taught

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kayy wrote:It's true about the fault-finding mind thing. I'm beginning to realise that I've approached Buddhism in the same way as I approach anything, and it's not in Buddhism as a concept, or in reading, or thinking, or anything external that we call "Buddhism" that I'm going to become happier. It's in changing my own mind.
Well, yes. :smile: As I like to say it: All the tidy intellectual concepts in the world don't make any difference in how we feel ourselves or where we get in spiritual practice. The only thing that matters is that how much peace, compassion and appreciation we have towards what is given in any moment.

If you think about it, lay people need so much stuff not because they appreciate them, but precisely because they don't appreciate them. They are continuously discontented, and destined to an endless running for a never-to-be contentment, very much like a dog chasing his own tail. The path of Buddhism is like paying more and more attention, making peace and appreciating things more and more. Consequently we are more and more contented, and eventually we need less and less. This is the recluse life that the Buddha encouraged: one that arises from a mind thoroughly suffused with peace and contentment. And this is quite in contrary with finding faults in what we have and denying ourselves from them, which only leads to frustration, depression and craving, because the underlying attitude problem is not alleviated, but aggravated.

All of this is highly relevant to what the Buddha really taught, in my view. :geek:
"Just as in the great ocean there is but one taste — the taste of salt — so in this Doctrine and Discipline there is but one taste — the taste of freedom"
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Re: what the buddha taught

Post by Sanghamitta »

appicchato wrote:
baratgab wrote:That the true path is free from torture, free from groaning and free from suffering.
Sorry...the path is full of torture, groaning, and suffering...it's only when one is liberated that these things are eliminated...then the path has been followed to the end (and the goal has been reached)...i.e. no more path...

My read anyway...
I have quoted this before but one of the Ajahns trained by Luang Por Chah told me that Luang Por once said to him. " Until your practice has brought you three times to the edge of despair, it hasnt properly started."
Many of us are hard nuts to crack. We need strong nut crackers. Fortunately life is usually ready to supply them.
The going for refuge is the door of entrance to the teachings of the Buddha.

Bhikku Bodhi.
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baratgab
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Re: what the buddha taught

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Sanghamitta wrote:I have quoted this before but one of the Ajahns trained by Luang Por Chah told me that Luang Por once said to him. "Until your practice has brought you three times to the edge of despair, it hasnt properly started."
Many of us are hard nuts to crack. We need strong nut crackers. Fortunately life is usually ready to supply them.
Quite true, but this doesn't mean (for me, at least) that we have to encourage, support or maintain suffering. Suffering just happens naturally as we go along the path, due to our defilements; not due to the dhamma, I would say. My humble guess is that Ajahn Chah said this precisely to encourage peace, acceptance and appreciation towards the suffering, which is the dhamma, leading to calm and happiness. :smile:

The view that one needs rough self-discipline, and it is all-right to suffer from that is a different thing, I think. As I understand it, the need for self-discipline arises precisely from the lack of kindness towards the mind and body. Kindness towards the mind and body creates agreeable conditions from which the mind doesn't crave to escape, rendering self-discipline unnecessary, leading to calm and happy states. This is how it can be a path without groaning. :P

This was not a reply to me, but it occurred to me that it is good to express these thoughts on peace. :anjali:
"Just as in the great ocean there is but one taste — the taste of salt — so in this Doctrine and Discipline there is but one taste — the taste of freedom"
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Re: what the buddha taught

Post by Sanghamitta »

All we need do baratgab is not anaethesise ourselves. Dukkha will do what it does best. I have not seen anyone mention self discipline per se until you did. Just openess to what is anyway the case.
The going for refuge is the door of entrance to the teachings of the Buddha.

Bhikku Bodhi.
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Re: what the buddha taught

Post by retrofuturist »

Greetings Sanghamitta,
Sanghamitta wrote:All we need do baratgab is not anaethesise ourselves
I'm pretty sure somewhere there's a sutta (which of course I can't find right now) which says that for some people the path may be slow, and for some the path may be quick. For some the path may be painful, and for some the path may be pleasant. (Thereby adding up to 2X2 possible combinations)

There's many ways to skin a cat.

Metta,
Retro. :)
"Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things."
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baratgab
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Re: what the buddha taught

Post by baratgab »

retrofuturist wrote:I'm pretty sure somewhere there's a sutta (which of course I can't find right now) which says that for some people the path may be slow, and for some the path may be quick. For some the path may be painful, and for some the path may be pleasant. (Thereby adding up to 2X2 possible combinations
I think the scriptures give enough reason to consider that eventually everyone have to surrender to those nasty pleasures. :tongue: I tend to ponder nowadays about the possibility that accepting happiness might be a much critical point than as we usually recognize it, and it might be much more of a relevant problem in our age than as we usually think.

:popcorn:

Maha-Saccaka Sutta
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
"I thought: 'I recall once, when my father the Sakyan was working, and I was sitting in the cool shade of a rose-apple tree, then — quite secluded from sensuality, secluded from unskillful mental qualities — I entered & remained in the first jhana: rapture & pleasure born from seclusion, accompanied by directed thought & evaluation. Could that be the path to Awakening?' Then following on that memory came the realization: 'That is the path to Awakening.' I thought: 'So why am I afraid of that pleasure that has nothing to do with sensuality, nothing to do with unskillful mental qualities?' I thought: 'I am no longer afraid of that pleasure that has nothing to do with sensuality, nothing to do with unskillful mental qualities ...

... I discerned that 'Birth is ended, the holy life fulfilled, the task done. There is nothing further for this world.'
"Just as in the great ocean there is but one taste — the taste of salt — so in this Doctrine and Discipline there is but one taste — the taste of freedom"
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adosa
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Re: what the buddha taught

Post by adosa »

retrofuturist wrote:Greetings Sanghamitta,
Sanghamitta wrote:All we need do baratgab is not anaethesise ourselves
I'm pretty sure somewhere there's a sutta (which of course I can't find right now) which says that for some people the path may be slow, and for some the path may be quick. For some the path may be painful, and for some the path may be pleasant. (Thereby adding up to 2X2 possible combinations)

There's many ways to skin a cat.

Metta,
Retro. :)
It's in the Mahadhammasamadana Sutta. MN 46

Bhikkhus, what is the observance that is unpleasant now and brings pleasant results in the future. Here, a certain one with displeasure abstains from destroying living things and on account of it experiences unpleasantness. With displeasure abstains from taking what is not given and experiences unpleasantness. With displeasure abstains from misbehaviour in sexuality and experiences unpleasantness.With displeasure abstains from telling lies and experiences unpleasantness.With displeasure abstains from telling malicious things and on account of it experiences unpleasantaness. With displeasure abstains from talking roughly and on account of it experiences unpleasantness. With displeasure abstains from talking frivolously and experiences unpleasantness. With displeasure abstains from coveting and experiences unpleasantness. With displeasure abstains from bearing an angry mind and experiences unpleasantness.With displeasure maintains right view and on account of it experiences unpleasantness. He after death goes to increase and is born in heaven. This is the observance that is unpleasant now and brings pleasant results in the future.
http://www.vipassana.info/046-mahadhamm ... tta-e1.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

adosa :smile:
"To avoid all evil, to cultivate good, and to cleanse one's mind — this is the teaching of the Buddhas" - Dhammapada 183
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