Buddhism based on fear/hope?

Exploring Theravāda's connections to other paths - what can we learn from other traditions, religions and philosophies?
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Sekha
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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

Post by Sekha »

notself wrote:It bothers me that someone else will suffer because of my unskillful actions in this life. At the same time I am extremely grateful for the skillful actions of those who preceded me.

Am I off base with my understanding?
I don't think this is the way anatta should be understood. You are not more the one you were 10 min ago than the one you were 10 lives back.
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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

Post by Annapurna »

Dukkhanirodha wrote:I was not attracted to the Buddha's teaching by fear. But I don't take any pride in this. This fearlessness was rather based on ignorance than wisdom.

Over time, seeing suffering all around, getting conviction in the Buddha's words, I began to get this fear. I used to strive for enlightenment out of craving for attainments. I would say that now, it is rather the fear of great future suffering, and the fear of becoming lost in dukkha and samsara as the people I see all around which makes me strive even harder.

I remember the day I started reading the Buddha's words. I was in Bodhgaya and I had just bought 'Numerical discourses of the Buddha' by BB. And I came across that sutta where he says that few among humans are those who are not reborn in decrease. It shook me deeply, and I can't explain this reaction on the basis of logic. Then I set out of my guesthouse and I was receptive to these qualities within people which are conducing to lower states of being. And I noticed that even in such a place, everyone, Indian or Asian, or westerner was filled up with those qualities. And I was as well.

Anyway, 'Taking refuge' is something which is done out of fear of a danger isn't it?
And I came across that sutta where he says that few among humans are those who are not reborn in decrease.
What does that mean: reborn in decrease?

Sorry, I'm not a Native speaker. :(
Anyway, 'Taking refuge' is something which is done out of fear of a danger isn't it?
That sounds like a very acceptable way of saying it.

It's no shame to seek shelter of a danger.
I was receptive to these qualities within people which are conducing to lower states of being. And I noticed that even in such a place, everyone, Indian or Asian, or westerner was filled up with those qualities. And I was as well.
Like what, in particular?

Just not following the Noble 8 fold path and the precepts, or deeper subtleties?

Thank you, Dukkanirodha.
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Sekha
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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

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'to be reborn in decrease' simply means being reborn in a lower state. The Buddha speaks of hells, animal world and hungry ghosts world.

As for the qualities I couls see, it would be difficult for me to describe exactly what happened at that moment. Actually, it has become my everyday way of seeing people now. When I see someone, the first sign that comes up is an element of suffering, being different for everyone. Some frustration of unfulfilled desire, some fear, some hatred, an unwholesome desire, some greed etc. It helps in keeping a mind of compassion and it prevents me from getting fooled by appearances of happiness or beauty born of sensual attachment in others.
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Laurens
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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

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I think that any faith that speaks about life time after life time of suffering is based upon fear.

Suffering is something we naturally fear as humans, and it is given an awful lot of weight in Buddhism. I would say definately there is a large element of fear involved.
"If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?"

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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

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Laurens wrote:I think that any faith that speaks about life time after life time of suffering is based upon fear.

Suffering is something we naturally fear as humans, and it is given an awful lot of weight in Buddhism. I would say definately there is a large element of fear involved.
So if Buddhism taught that at the end of your life that's it, you totally cease to exist is that something that you think would not evoke fear in people?

Fear comes from within not from outside. Two people boarding a plane at the same time, one fears crashing and/or terrorists and the other doesn't, who's fault is that?
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“Peace is within oneself to be found in the same place as agitation and suffering. It is not found in a forest or on a hilltop, nor is it given by a teacher. Where you experience suffering, you can also find freedom from suffering. Trying to run away from suffering is actually to run toward it.”
― Ajahn Chah
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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

Post by acinteyyo »

I think Buddhism is based on wisdom. The whole talking about suffering is because of knowledge and wisdom about what suffering really is, what it really means, its origin, its cessation and the path leading to its cessation. It is said that the Dhamma is to be known by the wise, not by the afraid ones or the hopeful ones. Those are not called to be the wise, they're called to be the foolish, because of their ignorance with respect to the truths of suffering.

best wishes, acinteyyo
Thag 1.20. Ajita - I do not fear death; nor do I long for life. I’ll lay down this body, aware and mindful.
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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

Post by Laurens »

Goofaholix wrote:
Laurens wrote:I think that any faith that speaks about life time after life time of suffering is based upon fear.

Suffering is something we naturally fear as humans, and it is given an awful lot of weight in Buddhism. I would say definately there is a large element of fear involved.
So if Buddhism taught that at the end of your life that's it, you totally cease to exist is that something that you think would not evoke fear in people?

Fear comes from within not from outside. Two people boarding a plane at the same time, one fears crashing and/or terrorists and the other doesn't, who's fault is that?
Fear does come from inside, but is a response to external stimili. Even schitzophrenic people base their paranoid delusions on some kind of misdirected logic that is based upon external events (or seemingly external events ie hallucinations). A fear that the government is watching them through their TV set is not entirely conjured up in their head - it is a response to things they see and hear (including hallucinations) that they interpret as being evidence to back up their delusion. Perhaps they hear a sentence on the TV that stands out, and is interpreted to mean something other than that which it was intended to mean and so on. A fear does not often spring up from nowhere, it usually has its grounding in external phenomina. So I would say that fear is an internal response to something external. That is not to say fear is always founded in truth or rationality - it is often founded in delusion, but nonetheless it is still a cognitive response to something outside of one's self.

That means that what people teach you, whether it be on the news or at your local church or dhamma centre can have an impact upon your fears. During the Cold War there was mass paranoia in America due to the supposed threat of communists - this was not something that sprang up of its own accord in people's minds, conjured out of nowhere, it was a response to what they were reading in the newspapers, what they were hearing on the radio and what they were seeing on the TV. Obviously not all beings are affected like this, some can see through hysteria and thus remain unafraid, but fear is something that can easily be imposed upon people.

Humans are afraid of suffering. To teach people that there is a beginingless cycle of suffering, is in most people going to touch upon that fear. In Buddhism suffering is talked about all the time. I feel that it has an almost brainwashing affect. You start to think in terms of everything being suffering, and when you think in those terms, of course everything appears to be suffering and the notion reinforces itself. Suffering and fear go hand in hand. A religion that constantly speaks about suffering is in most people going to raise some kind of fear. I personally feel that there is a lot of fear in Buddhism. It might be subtle, but its there. Fear is intergral to the survival of most religions, and I don't think that Buddhism is immune to this.

I do not fear rebirth in a lower realm, nor do I hope for rebirth in a higher realm. I think it is extremely unlikely that conciousness, in any form can survive the death of the brain, and to assume that it can, based upon what some guy 2500 years ago said is, in my view, utterly irrational.
"If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?"

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

Post by notself »

Dukkhanirodha wrote:
notself wrote:It bothers me that someone else will suffer because of my unskillful actions in this life. At the same time I am extremely grateful for the skillful actions of those who preceded me.

Am I off base with my understanding?
I don't think this is the way anatta should be understood. You are not more the one you were 10 min ago than the one you were 10 lives back.
Anatta is the concept of no eternal unchanging self. When the kamma stream continues in all of its complexity it continues in a new form, with new feeling, perception, and mental formation. Since these things in a conscious person form the conventional self, no such conventional self is reborn. I would not be "me" if all of these things were different. 10 lives back could be a tiger. That tiger would have a different conventional self. The one who follows after will not have the same conventional self.
Though one may conquer a thousand times a thousand men in battle, yet he is indeed the noblest victor who conquers himself. ---Dhp 103
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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

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Laurens wrote:In Buddhism suffering is talked about all the time. I feel that it has an almost brainwashing affect.
Not in my experience. None of the teachers I have heard, nor my teacher I have studied with extensively, emphasized suffering. Life is what it is. And what it is becomes clearer through meditation. Dukkha is more of an unsatisfactoriness inherent in all impermanent phenomena as long as clinging is present. It becomes clear through insight, not because anyone tells us so. And the whole purpose is to let go. Then life is just what it is, not what is lacking or what we don't want.
_/|\_
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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

Post by Ben »

Dear Laurens

I hope you get the opportunity to go and do a residential retreat of intensive meditation. I think it will give you the clarity that you seem to be seeking. The Buddha, as far as I am aware, never required blind acceptance of this or that doctrine. What he did say was that the Dhamma was discoverable by oneself, by one's own efforts. He invited people to try it for themselves, ehi passiko.
kind regards

Ben
“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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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

Post by Sekha »

acinteyyo wrote:I think Buddhism is based on wisdom. The whole talking about suffering is because of knowledge and wisdom about what suffering really is, what it really means, its origin, its cessation and the path leading to its cessation. It is said that the Dhamma is to be known by the wise, not by the afraid ones or the hopeful ones. Those are not called to be the wise, they're called to be the foolish, because of their ignorance with respect to the truths of suffering.

best wishes, acinteyyo
I would say the whole path is based on suffering and the will not to suffer any more, which could be the fear of suffering
The knowledge of destruction [of effluents] with respect to destruction has a supporting condition...
And what is the supporting condition for the knowledge of destruction? 'Emancipation' ...
And what is the supporting condition for emancipation? 'Dispassion' ...
And what is the supporting condition for dispassion? 'Disenchantment' ...
And what is the supporting condition for disenchantment? 'The knowledge and vision of things as they really are' ...
And what is the supporting condition for the knowledge and vision of things as they really are? 'Concentration' ...
And what is the supporting condition for concentration? 'Happiness' ...
And what is the supporting condition for happiness? 'Tranquillity' ...
And what is the supporting condition for tranquillity? 'Rapture' ...
And what is the supporting condition for rapture? 'Joy' ...
And what is the supporting condition for joy? 'Faith' ...
And what is the supporting condition for faith? 'Suffering' should be the reply.
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Last edited by Sekha on Sun Feb 28, 2010 12:33 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

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Laurens wrote:Fear does come from inside, but is a response to external stimili. Even schitzophrenic people base their paranoid delusions on some kind of misdirected logic that is based upon external events (or seemingly external events ie hallucinations). A fear that the government is watching them through their TV set is not entirely conjured up in their head - it is a response to things they see and hear (including hallucinations) that they interpret as being evidence to back up their delusion. Perhaps they hear a sentence on the TV that stands out, and is interpreted to mean something other than that which it was intended to mean and so on. A fear does not often spring up from nowhere, it usually has its grounding in external phenomina. So I would say that fear is an internal response to something external. That is not to say fear is always founded in truth or rationality - it is often founded in delusion, but nonetheless it is still a cognitive response to something outside of one's self.

That means that what people teach you, whether it be on the news or at your local church or dhamma centre can have an impact upon your fears. During the Cold War there was mass paranoia in America due to the supposed threat of communists - this was not something that sprang up of its own accord in people's minds, conjured out of nowhere, it was a response to what they were reading in the newspapers, what they were hearing on the radio and what they were seeing on the TV. Obviously not all beings are affected like this, some can see through hysteria and thus remain unafraid, but fear is something that can easily be imposed upon people.

Humans are afraid of suffering. To teach people that there is a beginingless cycle of suffering, is in most people going to touch upon that fear. In Buddhism suffering is talked about all the time. I feel that it has an almost brainwashing affect. You start to think in terms of everything being suffering, and when you think in those terms, of course everything appears to be suffering and the notion reinforces itself. Suffering and fear go hand in hand. A religion that constantly speaks about suffering is in most people going to raise some kind of fear. I personally feel that there is a lot of fear in Buddhism. It might be subtle, but its there. Fear is intergral to the survival of most religions, and I don't think that Buddhism is immune to this.

I do not fear rebirth in a lower realm, nor do I hope for rebirth in a higher realm. I think it is extremely unlikely that conciousness, in any form can survive the death of the brain, and to assume that it can, based upon what some guy 2500 years ago said is, in my view, utterly irrational.
Dan74 brings up a good point, though we use the word "suffering" as a translation of dukkha most of us realise that this is a pretty poor translation and a better translation is unsatisfactoriness.

I really don't think a lot of people are going to be too fearful of lifetimes of unsatisfactoriness, bored or depressed maybe but not fearful.

Yes you are right that while fear does come from inside it is generally stimulated from outside, and we are right not to trust religious groups that rely on such stimulation I guess is your main point. This doesn't however explain why nobody here has been willing to admit that their Buddhist path is motivated by fear, do you think we are all deluded?

I too don't hope for a better rebirth nor fear a lower one, I've got my handsful with this life and all the Buddhist teaching I've received focuses on this life downplaying possible future lives. The only certainty I have is that if there is a future "me" then this life won't be remembered, so my focus is on making the most of this life by learning to live in accordance with wisdom. I don't see the relevance of fear in that.

Now it could well be that uneducated village folk in SE Asia are motivated by fear, I don't know, but I seriously doubt any westerners come to Buddhism or stay in it motivated by fear.
Pronouns (no self / not self)
“Peace is within oneself to be found in the same place as agitation and suffering. It is not found in a forest or on a hilltop, nor is it given by a teacher. Where you experience suffering, you can also find freedom from suffering. Trying to run away from suffering is actually to run toward it.”
― Ajahn Chah
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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

Post by appicchato »

...uneducated village folk in SE Asia...
As opposed to the educated urban Occidental?...in so many ways, and so much more meaningful, the exact opposite has been my experience...
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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

Post by Ben »

appicchato wrote:
...uneducated village folk in SE Asia...
As opposed to the educated urban Occidental?...in so many ways, and so much more meaningful, the exact opposite has been my experience...
Sadhu!
“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

Compassionate Hands Foundation (Buddhist aid in Myanmar) • Buddhist Global ReliefUNHCR

e: [email protected]..
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Re: Buddhism based on fear/hope?

Post by retrofuturist »

Greetings bhante,
appicchato wrote:
...uneducated village folk in SE Asia...
As opposed to the educated urban Occidental?...in so many ways, and so much more meaningful, the exact opposite has been my experience...
That the village folk in SE Asia are not motivated by fear, whereas the urban Occidental is?

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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