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Prickly Pete posted:I'm not sure about the hand gesture specifically. Do you mean anjali, liking clasping the hands together? Or is it something done by the sangha while bowing? Thank you. This was a motion Ajahn Brahm did as he said Sadhu three times. I wil try to find the clip once I get home, but with hands together he made three motions that went from around his throat up to his crown. Now that I think about it maybe was just just doing that as a sign of respect toward the sangha, but the motions seemed deliberate and I wasn't sure if this was a Theravada thing.
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Jul 7, 2015 02:01
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I think it is mostly a Theravada thing. That motion is usually done three times by the sangha after bowing, either toward the altar when entering the meditation hall, or to a monk giving a talk, that kind of thing. It usually starts at the chest, rises to the head, then back down, then bow, then repeat x3 with the palms clasped together as if praying. For some reason I thought you meant raising the arms over the head so i was confused.
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Jul 7, 2015 02:38
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Generally, the higher up the hands are put together, the more respect intended. The lower and looser (i.e. just the fingers and done sloppily) the less respect intended.
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Jul 7, 2015 08:12
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Can you imagine reaching a point where you're satisfied and don't care to improve any further? It's one thing to understand intellectually that you have further room for improvement, but a different thing to continue to grow. Would you ever reach a point where you would say, "I'm content to live the rest of my life tolerating these remaining flaws."
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Jul 8, 2015 04:20
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Green_Machine posted:Can you imagine reaching a point where you're satisfied and don't care to improve any further? It's one thing to understand intellectually that you have further room for improvement, but a different thing to continue to grow. Would you ever reach a point where you would say, "I'm content to live the rest of my life tolerating these remaining flaws." There'll always be the unattainable goal for you of making a good post....
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Jul 8, 2015 15:30
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Jul 8, 2015 19:38
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Asked; was told. Thread delivers.
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Jul 9, 2015 03:49
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Isn't Buddha a god
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Jul 19, 2015 19:58
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Friendly Tumour posted:Isn't Buddha a god depends on the school and what you mean by god. Adi-Buddha is the closest you'll get and he isn't a creator and doesn't involve himself in the world except to emanate the Buddhas (in western terms Panentheistic not monotheistic); He's Mahayana/Vajrayana. In Theravada is he absolutely not a god and has no relation to the world since his parinirvana I've attended two Buddhist meetings and am really enjoying it. I feel like I might be a bit too much of a deist to claim to be a Buddhist with clean conscious. PrinceRandom fucked around with this message at 20:41 on Jul 19, 2015 |
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Jul 19, 2015 20:38
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Are there any convincing Buddhist responses to Nietzsche's claim that Buddhism is a life-denying religion?
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Jul 19, 2015 21:11
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Purple Prince posted:Are there any convincing Buddhist responses to Nietzsche's claim that Buddhism is a life-denying religion? Would you mind posting a summary of his argument?
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Jul 19, 2015 21:13
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Purple Prince posted:Are there any convincing Buddhist responses to Nietzsche's claim that Buddhism is a life-denying religion? Most claims of the sort are rooted in fundamental misunderstandings of Buddhism. If Nietzsche is equating Nibbana to nihilism in some way (which is usually what happens), he falls into that category. It is a pretty common critique, and is one that was directly addressed by the Buddha.
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Jul 19, 2015 21:25
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Okay, here goes. Bear in mind that it's Nietzsche so a formalised and precise argument is unlikely, but the rhetorical thrust of his arguments has always been convincing to me and led me much more toward Taoist texts than Buddhist. I find it hard to place where most of his arguments are located, as I don't have notes and I'm not a Nietzsche scholar, but I work in areas related to Nietzsche (power and structure-based accounts of knowledge). I also have personal reasons for believing Nietzsche's account: when I've been most in the grip of anxiety or depression are the very times that the Buddhist and Christian Martyr's accounts of unworldliness have seemed most attractive to me. At the start of The Genealogy of Morality, Nietzsche describes a new nihilism stemming from compassion and equates Buddhism with it: quote:Precisely here I saw the great danger to mankind, its most sublime temptation and seduction -- temptation to what? to nothngness? -- precisely here I saw the beginning of the end, standstill, mankind looking back wearily, turning its will against life, and the onset of the final sickness becoming gently, sadly manifest: I understood the morality of compassion, casting around ever wider to catch even philosophers and make them ill, as the most uncanny symptom of our European culture which has itself become so uncanny, as its detour to a new Buddhism? to a new Euro-Buddhism? to -- nihilism? He also describes Buddhism more explicitly as nihilistic and as a species of pessimism later: quote:[E]xistence in general, which is left standing as inherently worthless (a nihilistic turning-away from existence, the desire for nothingness or desire for the 'antithesis', to be other, Buddhism and such like) And again, he criticises Buddhism's mystical nature: quote:The supreme state, that of salvation itself, that finally achieved state of total hypnosis and silence, is always seen by them as mystery as such, which even the supreme symbols are inadequate to express, as a journey home and into the heart of things, as a liberation from all delusion, as 'knowledge', 'truth', 'being', as an escape from every aim, every wish, every action, as a beyond good and evil as well... the same feeling is expressed as that by the clear, cool, Greek-cool but suffering Epicurus: the hypnotic feeling of nothingness, the repose of deepest sleep, in short, absence of suffering -- this may be counted as the highest good, the value of values, by the suffering and by those who are deeply depressed, it has to be valued positively by them and found to be the positive itself. (According to the same logic of feeling, nothing is called God in all pessimistic religions.)
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Jul 19, 2015 23:10
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Hopefully without derailing I wanted to post a flow-chart from /r/buddhism: It fills me with skillful joy.
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Jul 20, 2015 11:36
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Wow. I actually tried making something like that on my own once and it is amazing how terrible it was compared to this one. Very nice. I really hope the whole dukkha=stress thing doesn't become the norm.
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Jul 20, 2015 15:44
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Grim Up North posted:Hopefully without derailing I wanted to post a flow-chart from /r/buddhism: hahahahahaha
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Jul 20, 2015 23:46
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Hi, Buddhism thread! I have a weird grammatical question for you all. I haven't taken Refuge, but I am interested in Buddhism, and have been attending meditation and other events at a local Tibetan Monastery. Plus, meditating on my own. I'm enjoying it and learning a lot, but what do I refer to it as? Like, if I was going to a Catholic church, it'd be a church, and I could say things like "I'll see you this afternoon, after church." What would one say for a Buddhist equivalent? Would it be 'Sangha', as in 'I'm leaving for sangha in a few minutes, want a ride?" It''s something that I stumbled across, and I couldn't find an answer for it.
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Jul 21, 2015 00:43
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Purple Prince posted:Okay, here goes. Bear in mind that it's Nietzsche so a formalised and precise argument is unlikely, but the rhetorical thrust of his arguments has always been convincing to me and led me much more toward Taoist texts than Buddhist. I find it hard to place where most of his arguments are located, as I don't have notes and I'm not a Nietzsche scholar, but I work in areas related to Nietzsche (power and structure-based accounts of knowledge). I also have personal reasons for believing Nietzsche's account: when I've been most in the grip of anxiety or depression are the very times that the Buddhist and Christian Martyr's accounts of unworldliness have seemed most attractive to me. So "desire for nothingness/anithesis/to be other" is basically just another form of craving that leads to renewed existence (see origin of suffering, paragraph 5). But what is the cessation of suffering? "... the remainderless fading & cessation, renunciation, relinquishment, release, & letting go of that very craving." (paragraph 6). So on one side you have craving for existence (life is worth something) and on the other side you have craving for annihilation (life is worthless). Two types of craving that are transcended by letting go. N-dawg posted:The supreme state, that of salvation itself, that finally achieved state of total hypnosis and silence, is always seen by them as mystery as such, which even the supreme symbols are inadequate to express, as a journey home and into the heart of things, as a liberation from all delusion, as 'knowledge', 'truth', 'being', as an escape from every aim, every wish, every action, as a beyond good and evil as well... the same feeling is expressed as that by the clear, cool, Greek-cool but suffering Epicurus: the hypnotic feeling of nothingness, the repose of deepest sleep, in short, absence of suffering -- this may be counted as the highest good, the value of values, by the suffering and by those who are deeply depressed, it has to be valued positively by them and found to be the positive itself. (According to the same logic of feeling, nothing is called God in all pessimistic religions.) Nietzsche obviously wasn't a meditator, and he thought meditation was like sleep where you don't feel anything. But meditation is the opposite of sleep, it's a state where you are more awake, more alert and more aware. But you can't really blame western philosophers for being confused. Western philosophy was never really interested in consciousness and the mind. They stopped at reason, and never asked "who is the reasoner?" In Indian philosophy though, they were interested in the mind, and the culture that Buddhism appeared in already had a much more precise language for talking about the mind and mental phenomena. I don't see how it would be possible for Nietzsche to understand Buddhism without the conceptual tools of the Indian philosophical traditions. Like, in the West, because of modern psychology we can talk about perception and how it shapes our world. But they were already talking about that 2500 years ago in India. You can read about what is cutting edge psychotherapy today in the west, in 2500 year old Buddhist texts. We're only just catching up.
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Jul 21, 2015 09:56
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Rhymenoceros posted:So "desire for nothingness/anithesis/to be other" is basically just another form of craving that leads to renewed existence (see This is fair enough and a decent response to Nietzsche, but what exactly is being 'let go of' here? It sounds as though it's the passion related to both existence and annihilation, in which case I find it hard to see how abandoning passion would constitute a response to life which doesn't align with a desire for annihilation. But I might be interpreting you (and Buddha) wrongly. Rhymenoceros posted:Nietzsche obviously wasn't a meditator, and he thought meditation was like sleep where you don't feel anything. But meditation is the opposite of sleep, it's a state where you are more awake, more alert and more aware. I used to meditate quite a lot, but I gave up because while it did make me more awake, alert, and aware, it also made me less empathetic, less able to feel strong emotions, and as a result less creative and less social. Perhaps I was doing it wrong (too ascetically?), however; I was always totally focused on removing my focus from whatever it was presently focused on and feeling nothing. My, and I think probably Nietzsche's, deeper concern is that by repudiating passion Buddhism also repudiates everything that makes life meaningful, thus aligning itself with annihilation. Beyond passion, beyond suffering, does Buddhism propose a compelling alternative? Or is it simply a rejection of these things?
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Jul 21, 2015 19:35
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Do (East Asian) Mahayana Buddhists have all laypeople do the stuff with taking refuge, the eightfold path, four truths, five precepts stuff? Or is it all worship of Bodhisattva space gods who will come teleport you to heaven and laypeople don't focus on enlightenment themselves? I guess generally I'm just interested in the theological underpinnings of Chinese/East Asian Buddhism and how it differs from Indian, as I understand it is significantly different given that the original Hindu theology and philosophy did not exist in China and Buddhism had to be adapted to native Chinese metaphysics icantfindaname fucked around with this message at 20:50 on Jul 21, 2015 |
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Jul 21, 2015 20:29
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Purple Prince posted:This is fair enough and a decent response to Nietzsche, but what exactly is being 'let go of' here? It sounds as though it's the passion related to both existence and annihilation, in which case I find it hard to see how abandoning passion would constitute a response to life which doesn't align with a desire for annihilation. But I might be interpreting you (and Buddha) wrongly. The craving that makes for further becoming is specifically: the craving for sensual pleasure, craving for becoming and craving for non-becoming. 'Further becoming' means rebirth, by the way (or reincarnation if you prefer that word). So in order to not be reborn anymore, you let go of three types of craving: sensual pleasures, wanting to exist, wanting to not exist. Edit: You can mentally swap 'sensual pleasures' with 'sensory pleasures'; the pleasures that come from the five senses. We keep getting reborn in part because we want to keep experiencing (nice) sights, smells, tastes, touches and sounds. The work you must actually put in in order to let go of these tree types of craving is the noble eightfold path, which is a practice made up of practical things you do. That practice entails a lot of kindness and compassion, and being generous, all of which feel deeply meaningful when you do it. Still that is the path that leads to letting go of this craving. So there must be something else going on than pessimism and depression. Edit2: Just some clarification: The Buddha, Dhamma-viharin Sutta posted:"Now, monk, I have taught you the person who is keen on study, the one who is keen on description, the one who is keen on recitation, the one who is keen on thinking, and the one who dwells in the Dhamma. Whatever a teacher should do — seeking the welfare of his disciples, out of sympathy for them — that have I done for you. Over there are the roots of trees; over there, empty dwellings. Practice jhana, monk. Don't be heedless. Don't later fall into regret. This is our message to you." (emphasis mine, source) Purple Prince posted:I used to meditate quite a lot, but I gave up because while it did make me more awake, alert, and aware, it also made me less empathetic, less able to feel strong emotions, and as a result less creative and less social. Perhaps I was doing it wrong (too ascetically?), however; I was always totally focused on removing my focus from whatever it was presently focused on and feeling nothing. Edit3: But what you did right was stopping when you noticed that the results of that practice weren't good. Since Buddhism is about what you do, it's super important to evaluate whatever you're doing in terms of the results they produce. Purple Prince posted:My, and I think probably Nietzsche's, deeper concern is that by repudiating passion Buddhism also repudiates everything that makes life meaningful, thus aligning itself with annihilation. Beyond passion, beyond suffering, does Buddhism propose a compelling alternative? Or is it simply a rejection of these things? The underlying principle of the Buddhist teachings is cause and effect. If you do the noble eightfold path, then the result of that is the cessation of stress. Just like if you put a heat source under a pot of water, the result of that is the water boiling. Edit: Or it should say, just like if you remove a heat source from under a boiling pot of water, the result of removing the heat source, i.e. the cause of boiling, is the cessation of boiling. Buddhism is telling us the causes we need to put in place if we want to not have suffering, basically. Rhymenoceros fucked around with this message at 23:03 on Jul 21, 2015 |
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Jul 21, 2015 22:14
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From the heart of Tibetan language studies I emerge to briefly comment on the Nietzsche questions. I will be brief(er than usual, maybe) and unfortunately can't follow up too much as I really need to be speaking Tibetan. But, if I answer in Tibetan, it won't be understood, so, English.Purple Prince posted:This is fair enough and a decent response to Nietzsche, but what exactly is being 'let go of' here? It sounds as though it's the passion related to both existence and annihilation, in which case I find it hard to see how abandoning passion would constitute a response to life which doesn't align with a desire for annihilation. But I might be interpreting you (and Buddha) wrongly. This is a fundamental misunderstanding. There is no abandoning passion, there is avoiding being mastered by passion. These are different things. It would be for example ridiculous to say His Holiness the Dalai Lama is anything but passionate about the Tibetan people, about serving sentient beings, and so on. However, Holiness is not ruled by those things. Because he has some liberation from the comings and goings of the ordinary mind, he is able to focus wholly on his passions, and has for his entire lifetime, unwaiveringly. Buddhism does not advocate an escape from life, it advocates an escape from the suffering that accompanies life. Because we have craving and attachment, we cannot have lasting happiness. Why? Because if we have craving, then so long as we do not have what we crave, we will be miserable. If we have attachment, then inevitably we will be made unhappy by losing that which we cherish. However, the solution to this is not to stop enjoying things we have. It is to recognize these truths, that there is no lasting, permanent happiness to be found anywhere, and so to appreciate these things now, presently, without attachment. Then, when they are lost, no problem! This of course takes a great degree of discipline and practice. To achieve this discipline, there are many different methods or paths. quote:I used to meditate quite a lot, but I gave up because while it did make me more awake, alert, and aware, it also made me less empathetic, less able to feel strong emotions, and as a result less creative and less social. Perhaps I was doing it wrong (too ascetically?), however; I was always totally focused on removing my focus from whatever it was presently focused on and feeling nothing. This isn't a problem of meditating ascetically, it's a problem of fundamentally mistaken meditation. You are, for example, looking at focusing and feeling nothing. That is grasping! That's looking for something that isn't there. Focusing on removing your focus from whatever it was presently focused on is sometimes good, at the very beginning levels it's common practice to directly stop whatever thoughts come to mind, but what's important is having a focus. You don't try to focus on nothing, you try to focus on something that is really real and present. Many people for example use their breath. This is because your breath is with you all the time. You are always breathing, even now, but probably do not often become aware of this unless it's a problem. Strong meditators do not focus on nothing, they remain mindful and aware of what actually is. This is a practice, and it aims to find stability of mind. Normally, our minds go from thing to thing like a monkey jumping from tree to tree. It's just arbitrarily jumping about, topic to topic, attracted to whatever thing (stressful thoughts, happy thoughts, whatever). With no stability, the mind easily becomes distracted or attracted to this or that. Because of this, it is impossible to fully live, to use Nietzsche's language, we cannot possibly embrace life or living. Instead, we just kind of arbitrarily do things, think things, and so on. But the solution is not to avoid life entirely or avoid thinking or aim for nihilism. The source of suffering is not existence. The source of suffering is attachment to existence, craving for things and so on. When we attain mental stability, we can enjoy life moment to moment no matter what is occurring, without any suffering. This does not mean simply rejecting what is happening. For example, presently we are faced with great environmental crises. We can't simply ignore them away, but if we are ruled by attachment then we might be stricken with grief, "oh no, this world is changing and ending!" and so we become immobilized with sadness. If ruled by aversion, we might ignore the problem, or run from it, or otherwise avoid thinking about it. If we are ruled by grasping, we might crave more resources and not care about consequences, or we might be really depressed because we want things to be other than they are. But if we reject those things, attachment, aversion, craving, and so on, then we can acknowledge the problem and cheerfully go about our lives mindfully attempting a solution but without suffering from it. Your issue was that you were trying to focus on nothing. But there isn't a nothing anywhere to be found! Nietzsche's poor understanding of Buddhism led him to think it is nihilistic, but in fact Gampopa has said that while believing things are eternal or have essential characteristics is "stupid like cattle," he says that believing in nihilism, or that things don't exist or aren't real, is "even more stupid than that." quote:My, and I think probably Nietzsche's, deeper concern is that by repudiating passion Buddhism also repudiates everything that makes life meaningful, thus aligning itself with annihilation. Beyond passion, beyond suffering, does Buddhism propose a compelling alternative? Or is it simply a rejection of these things? Buddhism doesn't align itself with annihilation, but it recognizes annihilation as inevitable. No matter what you do in this life, no matter what your philosophies, no matter how happy you live or how miserable you are, no matter if you're a great person who changes history, or another face in the crowd, you are definitely, definitely going to die. There's no avoiding that. Living like that won't happen is living in ignorance, and an ignorant mind, a mind that flees from truth, cannot possibly live honestly or live genuinely or embrace life. Ignorance leads to wrong views and wrong behaviors that inevitably result in a repeating cycle of misery and suffering. The old joke goes, a man goes to a doctor and says "doctor, every time I drink chocolate milk, my eye hurts!" and the doctor says "try removing the spoon!" The doctor doesn't say "better not drink chocolate milk then!" He says take out the spoon. In ignorance, the man has been drinking chocolate milk with the spoon in there and doesn't realize the cause of his misery is the spoon. The wise doctor recognizes that the problem isn't the chocolate milk, or an allergy, or something. He looks accurately at the cause of suffering and prescribes a treatment. Buddha is this wise doctor. We are the ignorant beings that love chocolate milk but don't recognize that we have to take out the spoon of attachment, craving, and aversion. Until we recognize the actual source of our suffering, how can we have even a moment of actual happiness? Once we recognize the source of our suffering, once that ignorance is gone, how can we be miserable? Chocolate milk is delicious. Life is wonderful. But doing life the same way we've always done it, ignorant and craving for sense pleasures and trying to avoid things we don't like or always have things we like, this is like drinking chocolate milk with the spoon still in the cup, and we're doomed to get stabbed in the eye every time. But Buddhism doesn't teach to stop drinking chocolate milk. It teaches to be mindful of how chocolate milk causes us to suffer, and to stop doing that thing. It doesn't embrace or aim for annihilation, or repudiation of life. It does acknowledge though that we're definitely going to die, this life is totally impermanent. If we crave to live forever, or live with aversion to death, or sickness, or these other things that happen, how can we for a moment be happy? How can we enjoy that chocolate milk? icantfindaname posted:Do (East Asian) Mahayana Buddhists have all laypeople do the stuff with taking refuge, the eightfold path, four truths, five precepts stuff? Or is it all worship of Bodhisattva space gods who will come teleport you to heaven and laypeople don't focus on enlightenment themselves? Mahayana Buddhists in East Asia will have different flavors of practice but it's less about culture and more about how it's practiced generally by laity. In many of those countries it's practiced the same way Catholicism or Christendom generally is practiced - lay people go to mass or practices and make some offerings and say some prayers and go about their lives. Generally Tibetans I've met are more devout in that they'll have a home shrine and do some small offering practice every single day, and for the most part they'll take refuge, but they tend not to practice the way many Westerners will practice with a very close relationship to a high lama who very seriously teaches them - if they were going to do that, they'd just become monastics. So you kind of find much more "serious" lay practitioners in the West, where you have devoted practitioners but no monastic institutions and where it's generally not possible to become a monk or nun full time. In the East, the institutions of monasteries and so on, and the differences in costs of living and so on, allow monks to live based on the charitable support of their own families, but in the States that is normally not available, and unlike in say the Catholic church, monks and nuns don't draw a salary to live on. But yeah, most East Asian Buddhists follow their religion the same way most Westerners follow theirs - with some devotion and faith but not expecting to attain in this lifetime, instead relying on the teachings and so on and figuring, correctly, that there will be many more lifetimes to get it right. Meanwhile, they do the best they can with the cards they're dealt. That's really what we should all do, at the end of the day. But no, they definitely don't expect to be saved by space gods, they just recognize that welp, probably ain't gonna achieve Buddhahood this lifetime because there are bills to pay, so do good deeds so maybe next lifetime there won't be so many bills and we can get around to that enlightenment stuff.
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Jul 21, 2015 22:37
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So if you don't believe in reincarnation, is there any point to Buddhism?
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Jul 22, 2015 13:44
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Friendly Tumour posted:So if you don't believe in reincarnation, is there any point to Buddhism? If you think that some aspects of Buddhist philosophy might make your life better, then basically you just apply them and see if it actually makes your life better. In the suttas, the teachings of the Buddha are described as being "good at the start, good at the middle and good at the end". Meaning that it is a path of successively more happiness (or said another way, less suffering). So it's not like you're asked to have a lot of pain in this life because then you will be rewarded in the next life. You're always evaluating, using your own wisdom to check if what you're doing actually makes sense.
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Jul 22, 2015 15:09
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Someone somewhere is wrong in all this, but i can't tell who it is...maybe the Buddha. "Then you're doing it wrong" is probably the most poisonous statement in all of spirituality.
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Jul 22, 2015 15:12
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But there's no statement that isn't some kind of poison in one direction or another. It goes down easy as long as you like getting whipped around this way and that, head down, riding the motion of the ocean. It sometimes even feels like it could be the real thing.
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Jul 22, 2015 15:27
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Tautologicus posted:"Then you're doing it wrong" is probably the most poisonous statement in all of spirituality. As an atheist I am kind of going to agree on that score. Its so often means "you aren't doing things my way". Also, how does this idea of Buddhism in this thread match up with a lot of the stuff that has occured historically within Buddhism in particular, things like the vast lands owned by monasteries and the charging of rents during the T'ang Dynasty, alongside various other dynastic issues. Surely the vast amounts owned and administrated by churches in the middle ages in Europe is at the very least similar if not exactly the same? The problem being that the more removed you were/holier you were the more people wanted to give you stuff in their wills to get into heaven/achieve a meritorious rebirth. And you can hardly turn down all the cash can you? So it ends up with people who have supposedly renounced everything having to act as land owners for areas larger than some potentates.
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Jul 22, 2015 15:55
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Josef bugman posted:As an atheist I am kind of going to agree on that score. Its so often means "you aren't doing things my way".
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Jul 22, 2015 16:45
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Rhymenoceros posted:It doesn't match up. Kind of like you have what Jesus actually said and taught, and a lot of other stuff. I am just wondering about the linkage up. I mean Buddhism has a more substantial (or at least longer term) monastic tradition than Christianity, was wondering if anything had been done to change this set up from within. Sort of like how we see the Franciscans and various other orders take over from some of the Benedictines (before they themselves are taken over by the Jesuits).
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Jul 22, 2015 17:08
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Josef bugman posted:I am just wondering about the linkage up. I mean Buddhism has a more substantial (or at least longer term) monastic tradition than Christianity, was wondering if anything had been done to change this set up from within. Sort of like how we see the Franciscans and various other orders take over from some of the Benedictines (before they themselves are taken over by the Jesuits). Then after a while the fame and wealth becomes too much for the monastery too handle; the monks aren't practicing well nor living simply, and they start doing stuff they're not supposed to be doing. Then some group of monks go "this isn't the way the Buddha taught" and they set out and start their own monastery, where they practice well and live simply. This inspires faith, more donations, the cycle repeats. The Buddha laid out very clear rules for how monastics are supposed to live and behave. So in any tradition there's usually an 'establishment' (that maybe isn't living so close to the original rules) and someone who is reacting to that and trying to 'go back to the source'. Anyway, I'm only paraphrasing things I've heard. Probably there is someone who knows more about that stuff, it's not something I have focused on.
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Jul 22, 2015 17:25
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So there were no big changes? I mean, there obviously were I'm not a dingus, but there were no new sects entirely? See I studied a fair bit about the Christian Monastic traditions and always found it interesting how the cycle repeated with changes in it. Either becoming harder, softer or (in the case of the Jesuits) actively breaking apart most other ideas and just going "gently caress it, we have to be involved in the world so lets just go to town!" I mean I know there is a tradition for such things not to happen technically in the Buddhist faith, but I also wonder how the people justified the extra 600 tonne solid gold Buddha statue? I mean was there any answer inside of the Buddhist (or just the monastic) tradition that presupposed an answer to it when people said "you've had 15 different dancing girls brought into the abbots chamber in the past 2 months". I'd also like to see those arguments because as much as people probably don't want to get attached to things I bet the arguments were something to behold.
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Jul 22, 2015 17:42
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Josef bugman posted:So there were no big changes? I mean, there obviously were I'm not a dingus, but there were no new sects entirely? See I studied a fair bit about the Christian Monastic traditions and always found it interesting how the cycle repeated with changes in it. Either becoming harder, softer or (in the case of the Jesuits) actively breaking apart most other ideas and just going "gently caress it, we have to be involved in the world so lets just go to town!"
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Jul 22, 2015 18:02
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Rhymenoceros posted:I don't know enough to answer any of this :-) Sure thing mate! Was only wondering. Thanks for the responses anyway mate. Josef bugman fucked around with this message at 18:24 on Jul 22, 2015 |
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Jul 22, 2015 18:09
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What is the relationship between the Dao of Daoism and sunyata/Buddha-nature in Chinese thought? From what I understand they're basically referring to the same thing as in the ontological source of reality, but Daoism believes it exists as a unitary thing and Buddhism believes it doesn't? Is that correct? Maybe this is a better question for a philosophy thread?
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Jul 22, 2015 18:40
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Just posting to say that I'm going to respond to the Nietzsche discussion when I have some time free; I want to have time to give the posters before me responses worthy to the effort they gave in answer to my questions. In case it becomes unclear, my aim isn't to attack Buddhism, but to understand and critically evaluate it. It's always been attractive to me, but I have major reservations similar to those which I have about Epicureanism or Christian Mysticism: as a consequence I've come to align myself with Stoic, Taoist and similar syncretic Pantheist / Animist traditions. I'm coming from a spiritually curious angle and was raised in a neopagan household, so I'm framing the debate somewhat in terms of Left Hand and Right Hand traditions, which my readings in Taoism and contemporary philosophical concepts of difference as unified whole have led me to see as two paths to the same destination, but each in their own way ultimately limited. e: This, for example, is what I meant when I said I was meditating 'too ascetically'; I was perhaps adhering more to right-hand (Christian?) values of oblivion and unworldliness than Buddhist meditation would countenance. After all, Buddhism is the 'middle path', and Buddha rejected the Hindu ascetics. Purple Prince fucked around with this message at 19:52 on Jul 22, 2015 |
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Jul 22, 2015 18:51
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Purple Prince posted:Just posting to say that I'm going to respond to the Nietzsche discussion when I have some time free; I want to have time to give the posters before me responses worthy to the effort they gave in answer to my questions. Also, I've been under the impression that Nietzsche and his (much more Buddhism-like) antagonist-mentor, Schopenhauer, didn't have too much access to Buddhist texts in mid-19th century Europe (or at least, texts translated into European languages) - can anyone comment on this? Zugzwang fucked around with this message at 20:05 on Jul 22, 2015 |
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Jul 22, 2015 20:00
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I read a (rather bad) translation of the Dao quite recently and I can't help but think that a lot of it is just a bit bad when it comes to running a nation. "Strengthen the backs and weaken the minds of the people" definitely looks like a later addition by someone who had much too much interest in Lord Shang.
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Jul 22, 2015 20:03
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Josef bugman posted:I read a (rather bad) translation of the Dao quite recently and I can't help but think that a lot of it is just a bit bad when it comes to running a nation. "Strengthen the backs and weaken the minds of the people" definitely looks like a later addition by someone who had much too much interest in Lord Shang. Read the Zhuangzi as well! It's much funnier and clearer in relation to Taoist metaphysics than the Daodejing, and while the earlier books are essentially restatements and elaborations on the Daodejing in prose form, the later books are also chronologically later and have some interesting developments on the earlier books' themes by later Daoist scholars of the Warring States period.
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Jul 22, 2015 23:22
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Purple Prince posted:Read the Zhuangzi as well! It's much funnier and clearer in relation to Taoist metaphysics than the Daodejing, and while the earlier books are essentially restatements and elaborations on the Daodejing in prose form, the later books are also chronologically later and have some interesting developments on the earlier books' themes by later Daoist scholars of the Warring States period. I'll look into that, it sounds interesting. I've been doing a bit of reading based around a brief history of China going from the Qin to the Qing, but one thing I would like to ask about Taoism is how much the people who were constantly touting mercury to Emperors were actual Taoists? Mainly because they are always written about, in the admittedly Confucian tradition, as being hawkers and confidence tricksters.
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Jul 23, 2015 08:56
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Josef bugman posted:I'll look into that, it sounds interesting. As Taoism is a folk religion, it's almost impossible to distinguish between 'actual Taoists' and supposed confidence tricksters. As far as I know, there was never a specific system of lineage or teaching in early Taoism the way there was in Buddhism or Hinduism: the modern schools of Taoism developed later as a result of the fusion of Taoist teachings with the imperial bureaucracy and Confucian academies. Early (or so-called 'philosophical') Taoism is also essentially anarchist in its outlook: for example, in the Zhuangzi there are numerous passages talking about how the discharging of duty is a misguided way for one to go about life. Instead early Taoist texts seem to promote the lives of itinerant teachers, hermits, and sages as the highest ideal. Even when advising on ways to govern, its advice is essentially that the best form of governance is that which allows nature and the Tao to take their course. The 'philosophical' Taoism you find in the Daodejing or Zhuangzi is a sort of codification of the metaphysical assumptions that were underlying folk practices of medicine and spirituality at the time. This is why it's a misnomer to distinguish 'actual' Taoism from the practices of shamen, sages, and hermits: they're one and the same thing. Likewise with the common trend in the West to separate the worship of gods and spirits from 'philosophical Taoism': this says more about the assumptions of the West than about Taoism itself. So the people touting mercury to the Emperors were almost certainly genuine practitioners of folk medicine, but whether they adhered to the specific ideas that we think of as 'Taoist' from the Daodejing and Zhuangzi is unclear and probably varied by person. For these reasons, a lot of Confucians hated Taoism: it specifically rejects the ideas of duty, law, and the academy which drive Confucianist thought and its historical link to governance. In many of the stories in the Zhuangzi, Confucians (including, in at least one case, Confucius himself) are mocked by Taoist practitioners as hide-bound, stuffy, and unable to understand the workings of the Tao because they're so in love with intellectualism. --- I'm not going to respond point-by-point to the kind posts in response to my questions about Buddhism, nor am I going to address the specific difficulties I've had with meditation practices (I think this is probably something I need to meditate on): instead I'm going to discuss some of the key points that both Paramemetic and Rhymenoceros made. The first question I want to ask is How is passion possible without attachment? As both of you seem to be fond of metaphors, I'll use my own to respond. We can clarify this by considering our attachment to life to be similar to a relationship. In a relationship, we might have long-term goals and short-term goals, but the thing which ultimately keeps the relationship together is this attachment. Saying "I have no attachment to you, but I have a passion for you" to your partner is liable to get you either slapped or laughed at, because 'passion' in this case can only be interpreted as lust. Likewise, if we lack attachment to existence, how do we feel passion towards anything we encounter in the course of existence? Outside the context of Buddhism, someone who says they 'lack attachment to existence' is liable to be considered a suicide threat; what makes Buddhism different? Surely attachment is necessary for passion. Paramemetic made a partial response to this by saying that 'if we reject those things, attachment, aversion, craving, and so on, then we can acknowledge the problem and cheerfully go about our lives mindfully attempting a solution but without suffering from it.' But this to me still seems like a nihilism, just a very happy type of nihilism. What reason do we have for attempting solutions to anything if we have no attachment to existence? Why would we attempt good works? In particular, why would we formulate long-term goals or strive towards anything if we are capable of enjoying the present moment regardless of its contents? In many cases, this seems to promote a passive approach to life. Faced with the suffering of the world and atrocities, genocides, and so on, would Buddha laugh? I'm bringing up a specific and ancient philosophical problem here, which is the question of eudaimonia versus hedonia in ethics. While Buddhism seems to be very good at promoting hedonia, which is to say momentary happiness and pleasure, it falls flat on its face when confronted with issues of eudaimonia. If you've ever read Brave New World it's also what Huxley is getting at: the society of Brave New World is perfect in terms of promoting happiness, but terrible at promoting things like art and personal development. It's also what motivates Nietzsche's comparison of Buddhism with Epicureanism, which claimed that the way to perfect happiness was not to indulge ourselves but to live an ascetic life reflecting on the cause of suffering. This motivates my final question: in light of the fact that Buddhism seems to reject the possibility of long-term goals, of personal development, of meaningful relationships, should we accept it in order to avoid suffering? That is, Is the loss of suffering worth the loss of passion? Purple Prince fucked around with this message at 13:49 on Jul 23, 2015 |
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Jul 23, 2015 13:43
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