STRUGGLING TO UNDERSTAND AND PRACTICING THERAVADA BUDDHISM

[nirodh27]

You dont want reasons , you want proof which is not possible . Say if i am able to see (superhuman eye) how people dies and how they take birth in another form , as true as it is , describing to you , you wouldnt accept it .

Hi Asahi,

My critique is a little more subtle (or wrong ): I will question you on what ground you could possibly know that your vision (since, as far as I know, the "all" is still limited even for an arahant, sights, sounds, mind, etc) is actually true. You cannot give proof even to yourself that what you have seen will actually be the truth of how cosmos works or a vision/idea/gut feeling created by your own mind or sent by some tricky deva to misguide you. This is actually an argument, it's not about proofs or not. But the most important thing is how an arahant, that have the same sabbe as me, could know about his future destiny with certainty.

I will not question your sincerity, If you were a close friend I would 100% believe that you had that vision. I would ask you how you can discriminate between being true/false given the limits of the sabbe sutta and logic. I see only those responses: one is "I just know that my vision is true by faith or by my new Arahant status" so arguments from faith or authority, "I just know it because i feel that is true" so a justification by gut feeling. All those are the usual justifications that also other religion gives about the existence of heaven, jesus is my savior etc. Another possible response is to give an argument that my argument is fallacious: my vision/idea can be different and I can have certainty of it because "x".

[asahi]

You dont want reasons , you want proof which is not possible . Say if i am able to see (superhuman eye) how people dies and how they take birth in another form , as true as it is , describing to you , you wouldnt accept it .

Hi Asahi,

My critique is a little more subtle (or wrong ): I will question you on what ground you could possibly know that your vision (since, as far as I know, the "all" is still limited even for an arahant, sights, sounds, mind, etc) is actually true. You cannot give proof even to yourself that what you have seen will actually be the truth of how cosmos works or a vision/idea/gut feeling created by your own mind or sent by some tricky deva to misguide you. This is actually an argument, it's not about proofs or not. But the most important thing is how an arahant, that have the same sabbe as me, could know about his future destiny with certainty.

I will not question your sincerity, If you were a close friend I would 100% believe that you had that vision. I would ask you how you can discriminate between being true/false given the limits of the sabbe sutta and logic. I see only those responses: one is "I just know that my vision is true by faith or by my new Arahant status" so arguments from faith or authority, "I just know it because i feel that is true" so a justification by gut feeling. All those are the usual justifications that also other religion gives about the existence of heaven, jesus is my savior etc. Another possible response is to give an argument that my argument is fallacious: my vision/idea can be different and I can have certainty of it because "x".

No , it is simple . You dont know rebirth or i dont know rebirth . You want to know , develop psychic . What is true and false ? According to who ? Why take sabbe sutta and logics as parameters ? Both could be wrong . If you dont believe , why argues or even practicing ? On what ground you chose to practice ? Certainly you have develop some kind of basic beliefs in buddhism . Buddhism isnt just some kind of worldly science knowldege

[Ceisiwr]

…

How do you that when craving is gone it never arises again?

[nirodh27]

I don't think you have really engaged with my argument... That's fine btw! I don't think that we will get somewhere.

If you dont believe , why argues or even practicing ? On what ground you chose to practice?

Because I have seen for myself extraordinary results that removed Dukkha, stress, despair, grief from my life. There are two paths: wisdom and faith. From the 100% faith path, you can believe rebirth from the start and many other things, from the wisdom path, that still requires faith in the practices, you can see how practices (that is really the elephant in the room here) of the Buddhadhamma removes Dukkha here-and-now. It is simply that. The benefits that I had in practicing.

It is simply impossible to notice that Buddhism have a cosmology and a set of practices, an experiential/interior/mystic path that targets the Dukkha that is there now. The practices have worth on their own. The meter of progress to avoid eons and eons of suffering in the future is your ability to remove Dukkha, despair, grief, etc from your life by seeing, tolerating, abandoning and developing.

[Ceisiwr]

From the 100% faith path, you can believe rebirth from the start and many other things, from the wisdom path, that still requires faith in the practices, you can see how practices (that is really the elephant in the room here) of the Buddhadhamma removes Dukkha here-and-now. It is simply that. The benefits that I had in practicing.

This looks like a false dichotomy.

[nirodh27]

From the 100% faith path, you can believe rebirth from the start and many other things, from the wisdom path, that still requires faith in the practices, you can see how practices (that is really the elephant in the room here) of the Buddhadhamma removes Dukkha here-and-now. It is simply that. The benefits that I had in practicing.

This looks like a false dichotomy.

Hi ceisiwr,

I don't think that I've limited the options. There are myriads of mixes of the two options, faith and wisdom and I have not said that faith followers doesn't have to practice. The Buddha says to Vacca that "it is good to be perplexed about perplexing matters" like birth and kamma. If one is perpexled, he can only practice and reflect and results about Dukkha will propel him forward in the path.

[nirodh27]

…

How do you that when craving is gone it never arises again?

Hi Ceisiwr,

In the same way that I know thay craving will arise for me again in regards of sensuality. Because I'm bound to it because I want delight to escape Dukkha as discomfort. If you see delight as a source, cause and root of suffering, then it will not arise for sensuality, existence and non-existence.

It's the good-old example of toxic poison bottle or the bleach in your house. If you know that drinking will only bring certain death, you will not crave for it and you have no reason to think that one day you will start to crave for it. Or the leper's parable of the Buddha. When one have equanimity towards any formation or cessation as options, one will not delight on what it is both inferior and toxic, it will be only Dukkha. What was potentially pleasurable before, it is now seen as potentially unpleasant because you know better and you have a better alternative that is both better and far more reliable.

[asahi]

If you dont believe , why argues or even practicing ? On what ground you chose to practice?

Because I have seen for myself extraordinary results that removed Dukkha, stress, despair, grief from my life.

You must have started practicing with some faith or believe in the beginning .
So it means you must accepted certain concepts of buddhism . But you rejected karma and rebirth .

It is simply impossible to notice that Buddhism have a cosmology and a set of practices, an experiential/interior/mystic path that targets the Dukkha that is there now. The practices have worth on their own. The meter of progress to avoid eons and eons of suffering in the future is your ability to remove Dukkha, despair, grief, etc from your life by seeing, tolerating, abandoning and developing.

But then you accepted there are future life which contradicted yourself .

[nirodh27]

It is simply impossible to notice that Buddhism have a cosmology and a set of practices, an experiential/interior/mystic path that targets the Dukkha that is there now. The practices have worth on their own. The meter of progress to avoid eons and eons of suffering in the future is your ability to remove Dukkha, despair, grief, etc from your life by seeing, tolerating, abandoning and developing.

But then you accepted there are future life which contradicted yourself .

Hi Asahi,

sorry for the confusion. I thought it was clear. What I meant is that the only visible meter of progress by which even believers in eons of rebirths can undestand if the practice is going in the right direction is the destruction of suffering in this very life by the understanding and the practice of the Dhamma. Well-being, happiness that is reliable and freedom are the only meters of progress that are visible before superhuman achievements.

This is shared, I think, between me and you, no matter the belief about rebirth being present or not. This is why discussion about practice and teachings can still be fruitful nonethless.