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So I had a very annoying argument on Discord. I've pondered why Buddhists support social change. If life is fundamentally dukkha, why support capitalism or socialism? We will all still suffer from desire and lack no matter what political arrangement. My theory was that how can people be enlightened to the Buddhist Path if they are in miserable conditions? Like chattel slave or a poor African-American child with lead poisoning. Equality is the urest path to helping people understand the Four Noble Truths. I was then promptly told material conditions mean nothing in Buddhism and I'm just a dumb Westerner who doesn't understand Buddhism at all. Well...I kinda am. But I've read Buddhist Socialist stuff from fuckin' Japan. I don't think I was wrong. But I wanted to ask actual Buddhists what you think?
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Aug 10, 2021 02:36
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1. Buddhist theory says over and over again that the most fortunate of the 6 worlds is the realm of humans as humans are best equipped to realize enlightenment. Animals rely too much on instinct, gods and Asuras have lives filled with too much pleasure to develop the intention to set upon the path or realize these pleasures are temporary while hell beings and hungry ghosts are too consumed with suffering too even imagine the possibility of an existence free from it. If material conditions were completely irrelevant to the pursuit of the dharma, none of the sages would have told us this. 2. As Buddhists we give offerings to the Buddha as thanks for providing us with a gift of such immeasurable value as the dharma. It’s natural to want to serve those who have served you. The Buddhas have told us that they are served best when we serve other sentient beings. 3. The doctrines of Anatta, karma, and interconnectedness mean that the suffering of others is the same as our own suffering. An enlightened one would not even need to protect others out of compassion but in could in self-interest alone understanding that their misfortune is theirs. both now and in the future. 4. If the issue is not with compassion but the idea that society and institutions should act within this compassion is unbuddhist why did Shakyamuni speak about Chakravatrins? Why did he minister to King Bimbisara? Why is Ashoka revered by Buddhists? Why for that matter does anyone pray to boddhisatvas or gods? It is a fact that those with power possess greater ability to alleviate other suffering or to cause it. Just as they possess greater ability to do anything. People resolve to become bodhisattvas due to a recognition that they do not yet have enough power or wisdom to help the world? Should we critique Avalokitesvara and Kshitigarbhas understanding of Buddhism? To stop critiquing your friend however (assuming I’m not misunderstanding his point; extremely likely since all I have is a secondhand summary) but instead critique your theory: you’re greatly overthinking it in my opinion. One comes to understand the dharma through righteous behavior. if you never engage in righteous behavior because it is pointless to do anything except try to understand the dharma you will never understand the dharma and the point is moot. BIG FLUFFY DOG fucked around with this message at 04:10 on Aug 10, 2021 |
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Aug 10, 2021 03:33
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+1 to the big fluffy dog we're all suffering from greed hatred and delusion. some of us are also suffering from starvation, discrimination, sickness, and so on. if we eliminate the latter suffering, those people are in a better position to eliminate the former suffering. moral luck is real. it's easier to be good when you don't have occasion to want to do bad. it's easier to follow dharma when you aren't starving to death or just trying to make ends meet. the more we can help people live comfortably, the better they'll be situated to do The Buddhist Thing so yeah, feed the hungry and clothe the naked and heal the sick and don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good
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Aug 10, 2021 04:11
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NikkolasKing posted:I was then promptly told material conditions mean nothing in Buddhism and I'm just a dumb Westerner who doesn't understand Buddhism at all. Whoever told you this has no idea what they’re talking about. It sounds like they might be basing this on a very simplistic reading of the Lotus Sutra and/or the buddha-nature doctrine. The idea that all beings have the capacity for enlightenment, regardless of their circumstances, doesn’t mean that those circumstances don’t matter at all. The entire doctrinal basis of the Japanese Pure Land schools is that the Pure Land is our only hope because we’re in the final age of the dharma, so the conditions necessary for enlightenment in this world are completely gone. Buddhists have obviously not always agreed on what political or economic system is most conducive to the flourishing of the dharma, but they have largely agreed that those things do matter. The concept of the chakravartin—the ruler who keeps the dharma wheel turning—is a long-standing ideal for a reason. That said, many Buddhists (and especially monks and nuns) have historically avoided getting too involved in politics, but that’s more for pragmatic reasons than anything else. In imperial China, for example, the monastic establishment would usually try not to get too close to or too dependent on particular rulers for fear of ending up on the wrong side of a power struggle. At the same time, there are cases of monks setting themselves on fire to protest things like state-imposed limitations on the number of permitted ordinations. Just because they didn’t get too involved in capital-p Politics doesn’t mean they ignored social realities and their implications for the dharma.
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Aug 10, 2021 04:13
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The Japanese Buddhist sects were strongly involved in politics, and there was always a period afterwards which could be summarized as "anti-Buddhist persecution," so, ups and downs to every approach. I think the theory of, "if people are in better material conditions it will help them to realize the four noble truths, take refuge, and practice" is a good one and it has seemed to be executed by a lot of temples and monasteries, for reasons broadly similar to churches in the West encouraging people to learn how to read for the sake of being able to read Scripture themselves. In an unrelated topic, I had a rather uncomfortable moment in a train station earlier today and I am not sure if I acted righteously or not. A person who seemed hungry as well as in bad circumstances asked me for food... which startled me very badly as I had realized they had been following me (and perhaps I had not heard earlier requests for help), as well as them having one hand concealed. I had just gotten a sandwich and had not even opened the wrapper, so I handed it to them and immediately got out of the food court. I feel like I erred here, but I cannot quantify why exactly. I suppose it felt like I was in a bad and negative mental state regarding this person asking me for help, even if the actual request was satisfied.
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Aug 10, 2021 05:49
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did you act perfectly? probably not, i'm sure there was something to be done better. maybe you were stereotyping along some dimension. maybe it was just your sketchometer picking up a sketchy situation. maybe you should have really figured out that they wanted money and given that. maybe they wanted a conversation and wanted to talk. maybe they really just wanted to have something to eat and not have to talk for a little, so your actions (ignoring your mental state for a bit) were precisely what would help them most. don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. it's next to impossible to act perfectly without first achieving enlightenment. look back at what you did (only you were there in the first person, so only you have the requisite access to do this) and learn from the bits that were imperfect, but also don't throw out a partially- or mostly-right act because it was only 95% or whatever. the main thing here is that someone asked for food and got it.
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Aug 10, 2021 06:15
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Nessus posted:The Japanese Buddhist sects were strongly involved in politics, and there was always a period afterwards which could be summarized as "anti-Buddhist persecution," so, ups and downs to every approach. The same thing happened in China at various points, so I don’t know that that’s necessarily a consequence of being too involved in politics. I would guess it’s more likely tied to the fact that both countries have competing but non-exclusive religious systems in the form of Shinto and Daoism. It’s easier for a large percentage of the populace to turn against Buddhism when they have a clear alternative available. It seems like a very different situation than in Europe or the Middle East, where religious divisions tend to coincide with ethnic ones. The anti-Buddhist persecutions I’m aware of seem to have been directed more towards monks, whereas anti-Muslim or anti-Christian persecutions usually end up being directed at ethnic minority populations.
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Aug 11, 2021 01:14
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Speaking of AI and Buddhism, the reason I started learning about Buddhism is the first place was the second short film in Doomsday Book, a Korean anthology movie. (I hope that's the right link, I'm on mobile and it doesn't work for me.) The story is about robot who works in a monestary who comes to believe it is enlightened.
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Aug 11, 2021 01:34
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It’s interesting how “Buddhist robot” has slowly become a recognizable pop culture trope, e.g. Zenyatta from Overwatch or that one actual chanting robot in the Japanese temple.
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Aug 11, 2021 20:01
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Laocius posted:It’s interesting how “Buddhist robot” has slowly become a recognizable pop culture trope, e.g. Zenyatta from Overwatch or that one actual chanting robot in the Japanese temple. I would wonder if a machine intelligence could reach liberation faster or more easily than we could, but it seems like it is a big fat "depends how it works, and we dunno how it would work." Their experience of life would be very different from ours I am sure, and that might disguise the roots of suffering.
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Aug 12, 2021 17:27
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NikkolasKing posted:So I had a very annoying argument on Discord. few thoughts going in largely the opposite direction of what other people have said to you 1) yeah material conditions do not particularly matter to realization. They don't not matter either, but a condition of privation or hardship doesn't make someone incapable of realization either (outside of maybe in the most extreme cases). Generally the better your position in life and the more luxuries you enjoy, the more distractions and attachments you're carrying around with you everywhere. 2) worth noting that the noble truths come/came out of, specifically, suffering and exposure to suffering. buddha had to leave his sheltered, comfortable existence to gain even minimal insight into the world. To be clear, this is emphatically at odds with the (some branches of) christian concept that suffering brings you closer to god. And indeed it largely goes in the opposite direction: it's widely acknowledged that a certain amount of stability in life is a pre-requisite to stable, sustainable practice. That said, wealth or luxury or power beyond that point of simply having enough probably hinders more than it helps. Other issues like the lead poisoning hypothetical likely are more impactful on capacity for beneficial activity than capacity for the necessary amount of realization. Like the important thing is that one lives decently via the eightfold path, not that one understands the entire reasoning for it. It's good for it to be understood as well, but that's secondary to simply living it. And in the inverse case: understanding it means basically nothing if you don't live it. Anyways fluffy's answer above is v good.
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Aug 15, 2021 13:01
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I thought of a joke. Please tell me if it is funny. What city is Mara from? Buddhapest.
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Aug 19, 2021 01:44
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Yorkshire Pudding posted:I thought of a joke. Please tell me if it is funny. 
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Aug 19, 2021 01:55
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And then I said that’s no self that’s an lllusion causing my suffering!
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Aug 19, 2021 01:58
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I got a giant tattoo of the Buddha sitting under a bodhi tree on my back. When I showed my mother, she was apoplectic. She said "Are you crazy? What have you done? Don't you know those things are permanent!?" I said "But mom, permanence is an illusion!"
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Aug 19, 2021 14:49
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Yorkshire Pudding posted:I thought of a joke. Please tell me if it is funny.
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Aug 19, 2021 16:21
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Nessus posted:It makes perfect sense to me. After all, Shakyamuni had been sitting under that tree for a while. He was probably getting pretty hungary
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Aug 19, 2021 17:17
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New Pali canon being written right here on the SomethingAwful forums.
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Aug 19, 2021 19:01
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Here’s one of mine I posted in the old thread: Have you heard about the Sutra that denies the existence of Avalokiteshvara? It’s considered by most Buddhists to be non-Kannon-ical.
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Aug 19, 2021 20:32
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https://youtu.be/xlIrI80og8c
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Aug 19, 2021 20:39
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Did y'all hear about the Buddhist medical director who got fired? He kept writing "birth" under "cause of death."
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Aug 20, 2021 00:22
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These jokes are proof of the First Noble Truth.
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Aug 20, 2021 02:51
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Yorkshire Pudding posted:New Pali canon being written right here on the SomethingAwful forums. we think it's a pali cannon but really it's a jataka tale
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Aug 20, 2021 06:10
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Cephas posted:These jokes are proof of the First Noble Truth. you must accept these jokes as they are not as you wish them to be. this is the second and third noble truths.
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Aug 20, 2021 06:27
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I have been having an issue with trying to be mindful lately. It is not exactly about life, work, and the greater world, although that is bad enough. But the events themselves I can take in stride. What frustrates me and causes me anger and a general loss of equilibrium is observing the reactions of others to these realities; what seems, to me, like learned helplessness or a focus on trying to encourage other people to share their specific current emotional state, rather than addressing either the problem under consideration, or their own situation in relation to that problem, or even trying to comfort them personally. It is very challenging even when trying to help others, because it feels as though the most ardently desired outcome is: "Share my emotional state, which is usually very distressed." I don't really know what to do about it, other than the obvious solution of retreat into a monastery 
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Aug 26, 2021 18:43
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I sincerely recommend letting go of social media.
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Aug 26, 2021 18:48
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Siivola posted:I sincerely recommend letting go of social media. Some of this is probably the forcing of everything into online venues causing changes in general behavior in everyone, of course...
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Aug 26, 2021 19:20
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May be worth reading Thich Nhat Hanh, whose country was literally being set on fire around him, for perspective on how to practice when surrounded by mass cruelty and death.
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Aug 26, 2021 19:32
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Maybe not the best transition, but does anyone here have any Buddhist discords they recommend? Looking to find a group I can chat with.
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Aug 26, 2021 21:09
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I'd ask the same thing. I've been studying for some time, enough to have confidence in my knowledge of the basics, and started looking into how to connect with others. There is a Thai forest monastery nearby that normally gives weekly Dharma talks, but COVID has put the kibosh on that indefinitely. And online, there appear to be innumerable options even once you filter out the obviously fishy or unsuitable ones, which is easily overwhelming. As much as I'd just like to cloister up, it's not called the double jewels, and I'm interested about learning all sorts of perspectives from other people.
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Aug 27, 2021 21:39
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I may have become a Buddhist today. Jesus Christ is good and all, but SOMETHING IS SERIOUSALY WRONG with the poor guy/religion. How long is Hell in Buddhism? Because I feel like I'm going there.
Spacegrass fucked around with this message at 13:57 on Aug 31, 2021 |
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Aug 31, 2021 13:35
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Spacegrass posted:I may have become a Buddhist today. Jesus Christ is good and all, but SOMETHING IS SERIOUSALY WRONG with the poor guy/religion. How long is Hell in Buddhism? Because I feel like I'm going there. Hell lasts as long as it takes for all negative karma you’ve accumulated to be used up. You can be there for as little as a minute or as long as several trillion years depending on whether you were a jaywalker or literally Hitler. Humans can dedicate their good karma to specific loved ones in hell or all sentient beings and in doing so shorten the amount of time others spend in hell. There is also similar to evangelical Christianity, a Buddha known as Amitabha, who takes all beings who ask to a pure land where you’re taught the dharma directly by a Buddha without the distractions/bad influences that are inevitable in Samsara and can become Buddha in as little as two months. L
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Aug 31, 2021 15:00
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You also have multiple forms of Hell, we had a good discussion about the hell where the sinners are forced to swallow the balls earlier. One of the things that made this easier to swallow for me (the concept of some kind of punishment realm, that is, not the balls) was the mixture of 'it is not an infinite sentence' and 'the hells appear to arise naturally from the structure of the universe, rather than having been created explicitly by a moral authority'
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Aug 31, 2021 15:41
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Do we have a thread for Taosim, is Taosim allowed here? For my personal path I'm finding Taoism to be more beneficial than Buddhism, and it contains even less of the trappings of religion. Someone who objects to the Christian ideas of hell and damnation might find a lot of value in Taosim.
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Aug 31, 2021 16:36
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eSporks posted:Do we have a thread for Taosim, is Taosim allowed here? Dude someone in the general religion thread was literally just asking about Taoists so they could ask Taoism questions
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Aug 31, 2021 16:46
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eSporks posted:Do we have a thread for Taosim, is Taosim allowed here? taoism with the magic, or nah? i don't know much about it either way - just curious
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Aug 31, 2021 16:55
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BIG FLUFFY DOG posted:Dude someone in the general religion thread was literally just asking about Taoists so they could ask Taoism questions Achmed Jones posted:taoism with the magic, or nah? i don't know much about it either way - just curious I'm not aware of any magic associated with Taoism. As far as I understand it, it was a sort of precursor to Buddhism, and the main teaching is "Doing not doing," action through in action. Accepting that the past and future are illusions and trusting the present. As well as coming to understand the underlying oneness and unity of all things. It's resonated with me a lot more than Buddhism, and it feels more personal than some of the Buddhist structures. One way to describe it is that instead of having to learn anything, Taoism just showed me things that I knew were true but had forgotten. I don't want to hijack the thread unless people are ok with it though. Buddhists are good people I have nothing against.
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Aug 31, 2021 17:58
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Achmed Jones posted:taoism with the magic, or nah? i don't know much about it either way - just curious 
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Aug 31, 2021 18:07
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eSporks posted:I'm not aware of any magic associated with Taoism. Based on what I’ve encountered, Taoism is chock full of magic. It’s like vajrayana but even more.
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Aug 31, 2021 20:28
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Laocius posted:Based on what I’ve encountered, Taoism is chock full of magic. It’s like vajrayana but even more. I'm really only familiar with the Tao te Ching and some of Zhuangzi, and nothing in there is anything I would call magic. There isn't even practice or ritual, the closet thing amounting to magic is that by letting go of outcomes and desire, you create conditions for desirable outcomes to happen; a less magical form of "the secret" as I see it. I briefly looked up Vajrayana, and while tantric sex yoga sounds cool, I don't see a commonality to Taoism. Its possible some sects of Taosim take it to strange places, and also possible that I am just ignorant. The things I read about Vajrayana would go heavily against the idea of doing not doing. eSporks fucked around with this message at 21:53 on Aug 31, 2021 |
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Aug 31, 2021 21:50
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