have you met a Streanwinner?

Textual analysis and comparative discussion on early Buddhist sects and scriptures.
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l_rivers
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have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by l_rivers »

400 million Buddhists in the World. If Buddhism works.... they must be out there. The need for the perspective a sotāpanna would have came up in another thread.
SarathW
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by SarathW »

I would say yes.

If you know what is Sotapanna it is not that hard for you to find out yourself.
However as per Buddhism only a Buddha and yourself will know this. :tongue:
However some Sotapanna people do not know that. In other cases they overestimate themselves :shrug:
Try to find it within yourself.

https://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/stu ... tream.html
“As the lamp consumes oil, the path realises Nibbana”
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confusedlayman
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by confusedlayman »

there are many... they just need to know impermanance of 5 aggregate by experience not just reading books and listening to the words of impermancne in their mind voice and repeating it
I may be slow learner but im at least learning...
dharmacorps
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by dharmacorps »

OP, You may not know, but although a lay person could declare themselves a stream winner if they have cut off the requisite fetters, it is generally considered in very poor taste to do so. I have met several people I think are stream winners, none of whom declare themselves to be.
SarathW
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by SarathW »

dharmacorps wrote: Wed Jan 04, 2023 9:37 pm OP, You may not know, but although a lay person could declare themselves a stream winner if they have cut off the requisite fetters, it is generally considered in very poor taste to do so. I have met several people I think are stream winners, none of whom declare themselves to be.
Basically, that means, at least you are a stream-winner too.
Otherwise, how do you know this?
In my post, I qualify it. :D
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Alex123
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by Alex123 »

l_rivers wrote: Wed Jan 04, 2023 2:26 am 400 million Buddhists in the World. If Buddhism works.... they must be out there. The need for the perspective a sotāpanna would have came up in another thread.
If you were to meet a sotapanna, how would you be able to recognize that?

Or if you saw a quiet monk, how would you know if that monk is an Arahant (and not just a good jhana meditator)? One can only rule it out if the person commits what an Arahant cannot do.

If a person has some peculiarities of behaviour, where do you draw the line between kilesa-s and vasana-s?
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by SarathW »

Alex123 wrote: Wed Jan 04, 2023 10:20 pm
l_rivers wrote: Wed Jan 04, 2023 2:26 am 400 million Buddhists in the World. If Buddhism works.... they must be out there. The need for the perspective a sotāpanna would have came up in another thread.
If you were to meet a sotapanna, how would you be able to recognize that?

Or if you saw a quiet monk, how would you know if that monk is an Arahant (and not just a good jhana meditator)? One can only rule it out if the person commits what an Arahant cannot do.

If a person has some peculiarities of behaviour, where do you draw the line between kilesa-s and vasana-s?
Agree.
It is easier to say if someone is not an Arahant if he blatantly breaks precepts etc.
But there were Arahants in Buddha's time who had harsh speech.
In Sri Lanka, some lay people claim Arahant status while they are married.
Even in that case, we do not know whether he is lying.
“As the lamp consumes oil, the path realises Nibbana”
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by santa100 »

SarathW wrote: Wed Jan 04, 2023 11:00 pm Agree.
It is easier to say if someone is not an Arahant if he blatantly breaks precepts etc.
But there were Arahants in Buddha's time who had harsh speech.
In Sri Lanka, some lay people claim Arahant status while they are married.
Even in that case, we do not know whether he is lying.
First of, if some lay person claiming Arahantship out of the blue, then it seems quite fishy right from the start. But lets' say given the benefit of the doubt, the next checklist should be: did that guy immediately joined monkhood or die soon after? If not, then his/her their claim is bogus.

"If a layman attains arahant-ship, only two destinations await him; either he must enter the Order that very day or else he must attain parinibbàna" ~ Milindapanha III.19 ~
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by SarathW »

santa100 wrote: Wed Jan 04, 2023 11:40 pm
SarathW wrote: Wed Jan 04, 2023 11:00 pm Agree.
It is easier to say if someone is not an Arahant if he blatantly breaks precepts etc.
But there were Arahants in Buddha's time who had harsh speech.
In Sri Lanka, some lay people claim Arahant status while they are married.
Even in that case, we do not know whether he is lying.
First of, if some lay person claiming Arahantship out of the blue, then it seems quite fishy right from the start. But lets' say given the benefit of the doubt, the next checklist should be: did that guy immediately joined monkhood or die soon after? If not, then his/her their claim is bogus.

"If a layman attains arahant-ship, only two destinations await him; either he must enter the Order that very day or else he must attain parinibbàna" ~ Milindapanha III.19 ~
To start with Malindapanha is not a credible document as Tipitaka even though I really like it.
Even if it is in Tipitaka we have to assume that the Tipitaka covers everything.
So we still do not know. As I said the best we can do is to see whether the person has some Sila at least to observe the five precepts.
“As the lamp consumes oil, the path realises Nibbana”
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by santa100 »

SarathW wrote: Wed Jan 04, 2023 11:59 pm To start with Malindapanha is not a credible document as Tipitaka even though I really like it.
Even if it is in Tipitaka we have to assume that the Tipitaka covers everything.
So we still do not know. As I said the best we can do is to see whether the person has some Sila at least to observe the five precepts.
We do know. Those conditions aren't just mentioned in the Miln. but also by the MN's Comys. Furthermore, there are very few instances of lay arahants, and all those cases satisfied either one of the two conditions, as Ven. Bodhi's note from "Connected Discourses":
The Buddha’s statement thus indicates that the lay follower has become an arahant. Apart from the few instances of lay people who attained arahantship just before renouncing the household life (like Yasa at Vin I 17,1-3), this may be the only mention of a lay arahant in the Nikayas, and in his case the attainment occurs on the verge of death. Mil 264-66 lays down the thesis that a lay person who attains arahantship either goes forth that day (i.e., becomes a monk or nun) or passes away into final Nibbana.
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by Johann »

There are very less out there, who gained basic right view, and even lesser in this internet realm. Usually they disappear from this realm or gather at least with others.

A Noble one with still a punch of work doesn't waste off much time usually by being compassionate toward "lazy".

Most popular and most beloved teacher don't have reached the are of Noble and also less monks are found this days, of Noble qualities, starting with, based on, right view.
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by dharmacorps »

SarathW wrote: Wed Jan 04, 2023 9:50 pm
Basically, that means, at least you are a stream-winner too.
Otherwise, how do you know this?
In my post, I qualify it. :D
Not true. One can evaluate based on ones experience and perception of their morality and conduct. Of course, you never really know.
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by Bundokji »

By the logic of statistics, there must be some out there. It is akin to using statistics to conclude that there must be life (sentience) outside of planet earth based on the available information of how big the universe is. And yet, concluding that there must be some is no guarantee of an empirical proof.

When one is trying to identify a sotapanna, what they would be looking for? an original fake?
And the Blessed One addressed the bhikkhus, saying: "Behold now, bhikkhus, I exhort you: All compounded things are subject to vanish. Strive with earnestness!"

This was the last word of the Tathagata.
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by salayatananirodha »

i've talked to at least five people who claimed to enter the stream and heard of one more. one of them subsequently took it back. whether or not i wanted to believe them, i doubted most of them if not all. it's something you just can't know till you know.
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l_rivers
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Re: have you met a Streanwinner?

Post by l_rivers »

I found a text that details the practises a Streamwinner must accomplish. Compiled in NW India somewhere between 125 and 400 CE, it is substantially in accord with traditional Hinayana Jñana Buddhist practices and lifestyle... I'll supply the info on contexts and background and maybe an excerpt (it's a 3 page chapter to itself), this weekend. :buddha1:

Stuart, Daniel Malinowski. 2015. A Less Traveled Path: Saddharmasmṛtyupasthānasūtra Chapter 2, with A Study on Its Structure and Significance for the Development of Buddhist Meditation. Vol. 2 volumes (xiv, 642; xiii). Vienna: China Tibetology Publishing House ; Austrian Academy of Sciences Press, Beijing.

from H-Net:
A Less Traveled Path: Saddharmasmṛtyupasthānasūtra Chapter 2, with A Study on Its Structure and Significance
for the Development of Buddhist Meditation


Discussion published by Daniel Stuart on Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

This is just a brief note to let you know about the publication of my book, A Less Traveled Path. Please find details at the link below:
http://verlag.oeaw.ac.at/A-Less-Traveled-Path

ABOUT THE BOOK
A Less Traveled Path brings to light unique textual evidence of an important transitional moment in Indian Buddhism. In this book, Daniel Stuart introduces the recently discovered Sanskrit manuscript of a third- or fourth-century Buddhist Sanskrit text, the Saddharmasmṛtyupasthānasūtra, which sheds light on the so-called “Middle Period” of Indian Buddhism.

The book argues that meditative practice, rhetoric, and philosophy were intimately tied to one another when the Saddharmasmṛtyupasthānasūtra was redacted, and that it serves as an important historical touchstone for understanding the development of a Buddhist mind-centered metaphysics. The text offers perhaps the clearest available evidence for the process through which philosophical developments grew organically out of specific meditation practices rooted in the early canonical Buddhist tradition. It also evidences an emergent historical ideology of cosmic power, one that ties ethical conduct, contemplative knowledge, and literary practice to a spiritual goal of selfless cosmographical sovereignty. This development is historically significant because it marks a major shift in Indian Buddhist religious practice, which conditioned the emergence of fully developed Mahāyāna path schemes and power-oriented tantric ritual traditions in the centuries that followed the text’s compilation.

The study includes a critical edition and translation of the text’s second chapter based on the recently discovered manuscript, the first installment of a series of critical editions of the chapters of the Saddharmasmṛtyupasthānasūtra.

With best wishes,
Daniel Stuart Assistant Professor of South Asian Literatures and Cultures Department of Religious Studies
University of South Carolina Columbia, SC 29208 [email protected]
SEE ALSO THIS ARTICLE WHICH YOU CAN DOWNLOAD :coffee:

https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/11/6/283
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