Buddhism And Women

[rockyysdt]

I did not say that karma can be wiped out in general. But my teacher has had many many examples of how one who practices vipassana, dedicated the merit to their enemies (beings they harmed in the past), and those enemies then forgive them, which causes that particular negative karma to be cancelled out and they do not have to suffer for it anymore in the future.

The karma is not actually wiped away....... it is used up..... because when practicing Vipassana the meditator starts to get strong suffering as a result of their past actions. If they are patient and do not give up, ut continue to practice, they eventually reach a crisis point where the suffering is so intense that they can hardly stand it anymore....it is then that they must make the vow not to give up but to continue ...even if it kills them....and this is often followed by a great relief and all the suffering goes away. This means that the enemy has decided to forgive them and that particular karma has been destroyed.

Sorry to see you subjected to vigorous buffeting by forum members.

I commend you for your unshakable devotion to practice.

Many can be skeptical when it comes to equality, particularly when it's race or gender based.

Could the answer be that women & kateoys aren't inferior at all, but re born in such form subjects them to prejudices we're all familiar with, thus subjecting them to karmic fruit and suffering?

I have met many women who live wretched lives.

For example, being born black in itself is not an issue, but being born black in eighteenth century America would definitely yield karmic fruit.

Out of interest, have you personally experienced suffering during your practice?

How many hours of sitting meditation are you able to devote these days as a monk?

Edited August 1, 2010 by rockyysdt

[fabianfred]

Thanks. Not as many hours as I would like....but more than when I was a layman and much more inclined to distract myself. meditating whilst walking the alms round is a favourite of mine. I am not in a forest temple so I have various duties teaching....and also am still the dhamma teacher for the MonkforaMonth project.

never personally experienced any suffering apart from the usual aching legs and back. My teacher Luang Phor Jaran says that "When there is no Mara trying to distract us by tormenting us then there is little progress made.." So we have to try and keep to the time we proposed we were going to meditate for, and not give up just because it is getting hard. We have to beat mara and not allow him to beat us. Just as the Buddha did before his enlightenment....he vowed to sit under the tree until he reached his goal and never get up...virtually saying he would die in the process.

Edited August 1, 2010 by fabianfred

[rockyysdt]

Thanks. Not as many hours as I would like....but more than when I was a layman and much more inclined to distract myself. meditating whilst walking the alms round is a favourite of mine. I am not in a forest temple so I have various duties teaching....and also am still the dhamma teacher for the MonkforaMonth project.

never personally experienced any suffering apart from the usual aching legs and back. My teacher Luang Phor Jaran says that "When there is no Mara trying to distract us by tormenting us then there is little progress made.." So we have to try and keep to the time we proposed we were going to meditate for, and not give up just because it is getting hard. We have to beat mara and not allow him to beat us. Just as the Buddha did before his enlightenment....he vowed to sit under the tree until he reached his goal and never get up...virtually saying he would die in the process.

good luck with your endeavors.

Perhaps in the future you'll move on to a forest setting where you can devote more time.

In the mean time assisting others makes much merit.

Mara must be influencing many.

I find looking at things with different eyes often yields answers.

Can l ask, are monks allowed to wear underpants?

Edited August 1, 2010 by rockyysdt

[christiaan]

I would emphasise there is no attacking of any person overhere, I also do not and did not see someone is telling someone is doing so.

This is a kind of conversation, a dialogue. To me it makes clear the way people think and handle out of their thinking.

Some people do continue to ask questions, sometimes, not always becos they are sceptical, sometimes also just for gaining more information.

I am sceptical in my way and for this I need and like to have more information about any phenomenon I meet in life.

With all respect , so no personal attack, but merely the outcome an observation, I would not choose fabianfred to be my teacher, he probably would stay on the level of a sincere companion to talk with about what it means to be a munk, I sure do and would value his experiences and thoughts whatsoever since I am sure it would help us to get more insight.

The same would be for fabianfreds teacher, that is more difficult since I know just little about him.

I would not choose to have him as my teacher out of my own level of knowledge.

As far as I know any karmic event in life can be understand and comprehend by healthy thinking.

The Karmic laws itself and the works of Karma itself are not easy to dis-cover for people, it needs the development of our spiritual senses, but once discovered it can be understand and comprehend by all healthy thinking people.

I am absolutely sure there is not any punishment in being a Katoey or a female in your life, I would say it is a blessing to be who you are and what you are and I am sure there are not much katoey or female that will be katoey or female many many lifes in a row.

There is just in fact not much of punishment on earth going on.

About all personal 'suffering' in life is a personal choice and an act of balancing out unbalanced happenings in the life(s) before ,

Since these choices for balancing out are made in the spiritual world when we are a complete spiritual being living with other spirits, those choices are made to benefit at the end the movement of evolution into the future.

[christiaan]

so I would say , it could be possible that valueing an existence as a Katoey or a female as a punishment, would not be helpfull to solve the problems Thailand is facing. In fact they will more prevent the solution of the problems since a big part of the population is not valued as a serious valuable factor in a religious and democratic proces. It does explain a lot when the way the teacher of fabianfred is thinking is the way many munks and lay people are thinking, probably even the Katoey and woman think the same way. What a disaster.

[Xangsamhua]

Too many Westerners get mixed up about his teaching, the kalama sutta. They like to say that he taught to disbelieve everything until it is proven. But he never taught that, he said how to judge a teacher, by carefully testing out their teaching. So all the skeptics like to misquote him and say its OK to not believe anything unproven.

Indeed, my reading of the Kalama-Sutta would agree with yours to the extent that he Buddha advised the Kalamas to test all teachings in regard to whether they lead to harm and suffering or not.

The Buddha (in the Kalama-Sutta) asks the Kalamas to consider whether any teaching that leads to killing, stealing, adultery, false speech and encouraging others to do likewise should not be taken on and pursued, regardless of whether the teaching is given in the name of authority, scripture, reason, logic, reflection on analytical thought, the appearance of the teacher or the fact that some ascetic is your teacher. One can discern whether a teaching will lead to harm and suffering from one's own experience, especially if one is free of affliction, hostility and defilement (so there is a moral basis to Buddhist epistemology).

However, teaching regarding matters that lead to neither suffering nor harm or their opposites may not be accessible to our experience or intuition. The existence or otherwise of hel_l-beings, devas, paradises, etc is really of no consequence to whether one does harm or good in the Buddha's metaphysics, unless one believes it's salutary to threaten people with hel_l, for example. If one teaches that the eightfold path brings its own reward, regardless of what happens to consciousness at death, are one's students going to be led to suffering and harm as a result? Indeed the Buddha is far from dogmatic in the Sutta about the existence of other worlds, and argues for nobility of mind and action regardless of whether there is another world ("a happy realm, a heaven world").

The after-life consequences of karma are unknown to us, in my view, and those who say they are are either fantasists or I'm wrong. However, right or wrong, the grounds for believing someone who says he/she knows the karmic cause and effects of events across lives, in the Buddha's view, must be based on whether these claims lead to suffering and harm or their opposites.

(I've been citing the Oxford World Classics version of the Kalama-Sutta, translated by Rupert Gethin, 2008: 251-256.)

[fabianfred]

Can l ask, are monks allowed to wear underpants?

I believe most do.. but I personally stopped using them about 15 years ago...when I used to ride a chopper on long trips around Thailand...they get scrunched up and sweaty..... Hang Free!

[rockyysdt]

Can l ask, are monks allowed to wear underpants?

I believe most do.. but I personally stopped using them about 15 years ago...when I used to ride a chopper on long trips around Thailand...they get scrunched up and sweaty..... Hang Free!

An American thing?

Thankfully, for those who favor their use, a precept is not being broken.

[rockyysdt]

Too many Westerners get mixed up about his teaching, the kalama sutta. They like to say that he taught to disbelieve everything until it is proven. But he never taught that, he said how to judge a teacher, by carefully testing out their teaching. So all the skeptics like to misquote him and say its OK to not believe anything unproven.

Indeed, my reading of the Kalama-Sutta would agree with yours to the extent that he Buddha advised the Kalamas to test all teachings in regard to whether they lead to harm and suffering or not.

The Buddha (in the Kalama-Sutta) asks the Kalamas to consider whether any teaching that leads to killing, stealing, adultery, false speech and encouraging others to do likewise should not be taken on and pursued, regardless of whether the teaching is given in the name of authority, scripture, reason, logic, reflection on analytical thought, the appearance of the teacher or the fact that some ascetic is your teacher. One can discern whether a teaching will lead to harm and suffering from one's own experience, especially if one is free of affliction, hostility and defilement (so there is a moral basis to Buddhist epistemology).

However, teaching regarding matters that lead to neither suffering nor harm or their opposites may not be accessible to our experience or intuition. The existence or otherwise of hel_l-beings, devas, paradises, etc is really of no consequence to whether one does harm or good in the Buddha's metaphysics, unless one believes it's salutary to threaten people with hel_l, for example. If one teaches that the eightfold path brings its own reward, regardless of what happens to consciousness at death, are one's students going to be led to suffering and harm as a result? Indeed the Buddha is far from dogmatic in the Sutta about the existence of other worlds, and argues for nobility of mind and action regardless of whether there is another world ("a happy realm, a heaven world").

The after-life consequences of karma are unknown to us, in my view, and those who say they are are either fantasists or I'm wrong. However, right or wrong, the grounds for believing someone who says he/she knows the karmic cause and effects of events across lives, in the Buddha's view, must be based on whether these claims lead to suffering and harm or their opposites.

(I've been citing the Oxford World Classics version of the Kalama-Sutta, translated by Rupert Gethin, 2008: 251-256.)

This is why l enjoy discussions in this forum.

Although l have a loose knowing of Buddhism, it's posts like yours which help me develop my knowledge over time.

Thanks X.

Edited August 1, 2010 by rockyysdt

[Xangsamhua]

Too many Westerners get mixed up about his teaching, the kalama sutta. They like to say that he taught to disbelieve everything until it is proven. But he never taught that, he said how to judge a teacher, by carefully testing out their teaching. So all the skeptics like to misquote him and say its OK to not believe anything unproven.

Indeed, my reading of the Kalama-Sutta would agree with yours to the extent that he Buddha advised the Kalamas to test all teachings in regard to whether they lead to harm and suffering or not.

The Buddha (in the Kalama-Sutta) asks the Kalamas to consider whether any teaching that leads to killing, stealing, adultery, false speech and encouraging others to do likewise should not be taken on and pursued, regardless of whether the teaching is given in the name of authority, scripture, reason, logic, reflection on analytical thought, the appearance of the teacher or the fact that some ascetic is your teacher. One can discern whether a teaching will lead to harm and suffering from one's own experience, especially if one is free of affliction, hostility and defilement (so there is a moral basis to Buddhist epistemology).

However, teaching regarding matters that lead to neither suffering nor harm or their opposites may not be accessible to our experience or intuition. The existence or otherwise of hel_l-beings, devas, paradises, etc is really of no consequence to whether one does harm or good in the Buddha's metaphysics, unless one believes it's salutary to threaten people with hel_l, for example. If one teaches that the eightfold path brings its own reward, regardless of what happens to consciousness at death, are one's students going to be led to suffering and harm as a result? Indeed the Buddha is far from dogmatic in the Sutta about the existence of other worlds, and argues for nobility of mind and action regardless of whether there is another world ("a happy realm, a heaven world").

The after-life consequences of karma are unknown to us, in my view, and those who say they are are either fantasists or I'm wrong. However, right or wrong, the grounds for believing someone who says he/she knows the karmic cause and effects of events across lives, in the Buddha's view, must be based on whether these claims lead to suffering and harm or their opposites.

(I've been citing the Oxford World Classics version of the Kalama-Sutta, translated by Rupert Gethin, 2008: 251-256.)

This is why l enjoy discussions in this forum.

Although l have a loose knowing of Buddhism, it's posts like yours which help me develop my knowledge over time.

Thanks X.

You're welcome. I hope I don't have it all wrong!

[phetaroi]

Yet, fred and others like him want to bring in the invisible and unobservable (animal heavens and hells, for example), and try to say that there is proof of all this mumbo jumbo.

I have not seen my past lives.....But the Buddha teaches about other realms and rebirth and recalls his own past lives. I have confidence in my teacher the Buddha and do not believe he would lie to us. I therefore accept what he taught as fact. If you choose to disbelieve him then you are hardly a follower of his.

Too many Westerners get mixed up about his teaching, the kalama sutta. They like to say that he taught to disbelieve everything until it is proven. But he never taught that, he said how to judge a teacher, by carefully testing out their teaching. So all the skeptics like to misquote him and say its OK to not believe anything unproven.

Once, back a while, in another thread, you asked me not to misquote you. Okay. Fair enough. Now I demand the same courtesy. I did not say in this thread anything at all about the kalama sutta. I simply said that you clearly believe many things that you have never experienced. Since you are responding to me, and mention skeptics, I will admit to being skeptical of the mystical and magical aspects of traditional Buddhism, but I prefer a degree of skepticism while remaining open-minded over being gullible and all-accepting. There's a healthy place somewhere in between.

[sabaijai]

The after-life consequences of karma are unknown to us, in my view, and those who say they are are either fantasists or I'm wrong.

I agree, and when someone claims to know them, and the way in which they claim clearly diverges from discourses of the Buddha, I am sceptical. I've never heard this view that karma can be 'used up' in meditation. Vipaka (kamma result) can come during any posture or state, and is not said to be hastened or intensified by any particular activity, such as sitting or walking meditation. To say that it can be cultivated or spent during meditation is a somewhat different theory, to say the least.

When it comes to Thai views on kamma in particular, I'm inclined to trust the teachings of P A Payuttho, Phra W Vajiramethi, Khun Sujin, and others who have made this a special focus of their studies and who stress that the first step towards stream entry is sammaditthi, right view. Different teachers are better for different topics than for others.

Different teachers obviously teach completely different things, often divergent from the Tipitaka. We follow what we are compelled to follow, and cannot say which set of teachings is right unless we study dhamma ourselves, through reading and considering the suttas, until sati is strong enough that the end of the path appears. Meditation alone won't do it, according to the basic teachings contained in, for example, expositions on the Eightfold Path.

Ajahn Jaran is considered a great monk; I don't mean this as a criticism of the venerable, but perhaps the message has become somewhat garbled along the way.

[fabianfred]

If we consider that past negative karma, suffering caused to another being, is like a bill which has to be paid, then the practice of Vipassana, which is the strongest form of merit, is the best path to Nirvana. Reaching nirvana we escape rebirth, therfore any remaining karma, good or bad, loses its chance to get the bills paid. Enemies who were wronged by us and want revenge, seeing us practice Vipassana, may try to get their bill paid before the chance is lost.

Karma waiting for the chance to give an effect might not bother us much now, but cause us to fall to the lower realms upon death to get repaid. But seeing that we are getting away, so to speak, whilst practicing vipassana, might rush to start causing us to suffer and get the bill paid.

I do notknow if those other teachers are Arahants, but I am certain that LP jaran is.

Perhaps his message isn't garbled, perhaps we cling to our own views and refuse to accept a teaching we are uncomfortable with.

[christiaan]

Allthough we are in some way leaving the original topic I like to answer. But, when the moment is right -for me - I would like to start a topic about Karma and the teachings concerning this.

I do not look upon Karma as a bill that has to be repaid. I look upon Karma as a chosen 'road' to balance out all those imperfect actions out of my former life.

I have become aware of the - bad - consequences of my former life in the spiritual world , so after I died. And in this same world I made my plans how to outbalance my actions of before.

So the Karma in my next life is not an everlasting punishment but a 'plan' to outbalance.

I do not do this to save myself from rebirth, because living again gives me the possibillity to outbalance, it also gives me - and other humans - the chance to further personal spiritual development for the sake of the whole humanity and the spiritual world itself

Fabianfred you write : Enemies who were wronged by us and want revenge, seeing us practice Vipassana, may try to get their bill paid before the chance is lost.

How can someone be aware he is your enemy and how can you be aware you are someones 'enemy' when having no awareness of former live(s)?

It is another Topic so I would suggest top open one about it, but I wonder - becos still not explained - how to test a teacher and investigate if the teacher realy is an Aharant , or even more? By what means can someone test this or confirm this.

No offence here, - just to get more insight - How come I continue to think Buddhisme seems to be a way of Wise Selfishness, spiritual selfeshness. It is consequently humans who 'choose' to follow the way to personal (?) enlightment. Allthough the majority of Buddhists are just born to it.

Is this the opposite way to material selfishness as we see everywhere in the 'modern' world?

In Buddhisme it seems persons can be spiritual selfish, with a kind of religious flavour, pardonned by the wisdom to be found in the teachings of Buddha -and its interpretations.

Buddha brought "the world of spiritual wisdom" to the material world because of his awareness and his abbility to speak out this awareness in words.

Everytime I read about this teachings and become more aware I am impressed by it. In the history of humanity this is outstanding.

Snce 2500 years to have the chance to know about, to become aware of this.

But where is the love, where is "the world of love?"

Not the love for a life in nibbana, but the love for our brothers and sisters in the world, in physical life?

I do not see it in Thailand, in contrary. (But it is also hard to find in other countries)

(But also these remarks maybe could better be in another topic allthough everything is connected to eachother)

[sabaijai]

[T]he practice of Vipassana, which is the strongest form of merit, is the best path to Nirvana.

Source? I've heard this said before, mainly by Westerners but it doesn't seem to be what the Buddha taught, in terms of what is in the Tipitaka or the commentaries. Meditation is one step in the Eightfold Path, but not the whole package.

At any rate there are certainly many Buddhist teachers who would take issue with the notion, including the great forest master Ajahn Cha, who once commented that 'chickens can roost a very long time,' as well as others in the Aj Cha lineage. Certainly Abhdhammists such as Khun Sujin (whom many consider an arahant, ditto P A Payuttho) would question that notion, asserting that sammaditthi is the most crucial rung in the Eightfold Path. But all are necessary and sufficient for nibbana.

I do notknow if those other teachers are Arahants, but I am certain that LP jaran is.

Perhaps his message isn't garbled, perhaps we cling to our own views and refuse to accept a teaching we are uncomfortable with.

Logically speaking there are more options than just those two LP Jaran could or could not be an arahant (only another arahant can know for sure); the message could have been misunderstood at the source or at any intermediate person in between (unless you speak fluent Thai, and even then we all misunderstand what we are taught at times), and so forth.

Divergent views on dhamma don't make me uncomfortable. They're an excellent opportunity for each of us to consider dhamma point by point. I've changed my own views on dhamma countless times during the course of dhamma study and practice, through association with a number of dhamma teachers throughout Thailand (and a few outside).

[fabianfred]

Fabianfred you write : Enemies who were wronged by us and want revenge, seeing us practice Vipassana, may try to get their bill paid before the chance is lost.

How can someone be aware he is your enemy and how can you be aware you are someones 'enemy' when having no awareness of former live(s)?

There is also a linking aspect to karma. If I cause suffering to a being we are karmicly linked until that karma is paid off....but often when paying the bill we start a new one by hatred and revenge.

It is like a feud which goes on over many existences. i kill him....he dies hating me... eventually in a nother life we meet again and he kills me.....and all this after I spent time in hel_l...and after a long time when I get back to the human realm. Memory of the original events is not requred...when karma bears fruit it gives a result...the whole process of the law of karma is automatic. It is a law of nature, which works whether we believe in it or not, understand it or not.

[fabianfred]

[T]he practice of Vipassana, which is the strongest form of merit, is the best path to Nirvana.

Source? I've heard this said before, mainly by Westerners but it doesn't seem to be what the Buddha taught, in terms of what is in the Tipitaka or the commentaries. Meditation is one step in the Eightfold Path, but not the whole package.

sorry all the writings by LP Jaran are in Thai (which i speak and read fluently)

[rockyysdt]

Allthough we are in some way leaving the original topic I like to answer. But, when the moment is right -for me - I would like to start a topic about Karma and the teachings concerning this.

I do not look upon Karma as a bill that has to be repaid. I look upon Karma as a chosen 'road' to balance out all those imperfect actions out of my former life.

I have become aware of the - bad - consequences of my former life in the spiritual world , so after I died. And in this same world I made my plans how to outbalance my actions of before.

So the Karma in my next life is not an everlasting punishment but a 'plan' to outbalance.

I do not do this to save myself from rebirth, because living again gives me the possibillity to outbalance, it also gives me - and other humans - the chance to further personal spiritual development for the sake of the whole humanity and the spiritual world itself

No offence here, - just to get more insight - How come I continue to think Buddhisme seems to be a way of Wise Selfishness, spiritual selfeshness. It is consequently humans who 'choose' to follow the way to personal (?) enlightment. Allthough the majority of Buddhists are just born to it.

Is this the opposite way to material selfishness as we see everywhere in the 'modern' world?

In Buddhisme it seems persons can be spiritual selfish, with a kind of religious flavour, pardonned by the wisdom to be found in the teachings of Buddha -and its interpretations.

Buddha brought "the world of spiritual wisdom" to the material world because of his awareness and his abbility to speak out this awareness in words.

Everytime I read about this teachings and become more aware I am impressed by it. In the history of humanity this is outstanding.

Snce 2500 years to have the chance to know about, to become aware of this.

But where is the love, where is "the world of love?"

Not the love for a life in nibbana, but the love for our brothers and sisters in the world, in physical life?

I do not see it in Thailand, in contrary. (But it is also hard to find in other countries)

I don't claim, to be an expert on Buddhism but from what I've learned, Nirvana or Enlightenment is way above a spiritual realm, if it exists.

Others have said there are several realms including the one we live in, spiritual realms & hel_l.

Unless you are enlightened appearing in a spiritual realm remains limited in comparison.

When you die your spirit doesn't have a dialogue & decide what life to be re born into to balance karma or learn.

The Buddha refrained from describing Nirvana other than to say it is an unconditioned & permanent state.

The I which we call Rocky & Christian are conditioned & impermanent.

Unless we are enlightened most of our experiences are learned.

If there is a common stream of consciousness which is re born (until enlightenment breaks the cycle) it is not the I we call Rocky or Christian.

In the last phases of practice I understand that we must let go of the "l" or ego to achieve enlightenment. This means letting go of Rocky or Christian.

Whenever one speaks with I's, then one remains associated with ego.

Ego obstructs enlightenment.

To become truly aware of what lies within, one must forget about theory & words and practice awareness without attachment or preconceived ideas.

There is true loving kindness which is associated with our inner nature vs conditioned love associated with our character & conditioning.

If you feel connected with your spirit the Buddha would say to view this without attachment.

Edited August 3, 2010 by rockyysdt

[khaowong1]

Thanks. Not as many hours as I would like....but more than when I was a layman and much more inclined to distract myself. meditating whilst walking the alms round is a favourite of mine. I am not in a forest temple so I have various duties teaching....and also am still the dhamma teacher for the MonkforaMonth project.

never personally experienced any suffering apart from the usual aching legs and back. My teacher Luang Phor Jaran says that "When there is no Mara trying to distract us by tormenting us then there is little progress made.." So we have to try and keep to the time we proposed we were going to meditate for, and not give up just because it is getting hard. We have to beat mara and not allow him to beat us. Just as the Buddha did before his enlightenment....he vowed to sit under the tree until he reached his goal and never get up...virtually saying he would die in the process.

thanks FR, I like that phrase and will use it more in my practice...

[khaowong1]

[T]he practice of Vipassana, which is the strongest form of merit, is the best path to Nirvana.

Source? I've heard this said before, mainly by Westerners but it doesn't seem to be what the Buddha taught, in terms of what is in the Tipitaka or the commentaries. Meditation is one step in the Eightfold Path, but not the whole package.

sorry all the writings by LP Jaran are in Thai (which i speak and read fluently)

I used to have all his books written in English.. I believe there were 9 of them.. I would like to have them again, they were really interesting readings. by the by... I was at his temple back in 2006 on his birthday, and of course wished him a Happy Birthday.. I was the only farang there out of about 500 people.

[christiaan]

fabianfred, I am sorry, but at my question: How can someone be aware he is your enemy and how can you be aware you are someones 'enemy' when having no awareness of former live(s)? following your remark : Enemies who were wronged by us and want revenge, seeing us practice Vipassana, may try to get their bill paid before the chance is lost. I see no answer. Your answer is information about Karma but my question is about: Enemies ....seeing us practice .... I consider this 'seeing' as - becoming aware - of us practive Vipassana.

In fact in the mentioned text you tell" Ennemies seeing (becoming aware) us practice and in the next contribution #46 you tell not even memory is not requ(i)red. (?????)

As you tell in investigating teachers and teachings I notice this looks very inconsistent and I notice you in fact do not realy answer the question.

No offence to this, I just point to it as something I notice.

But maybe 'seeing' has some other meaning in the way you use it here as it has for me.

[christiaan]

The Vipassana, the clear seeing seems to be very much directed to getting awareness of the inner personal life. It is a confirmation for me this is a technic within, as I will hypothetically and carefully describe, the Spiritual preoccupation with the Self.

What, for instance, Buddhist practice give people awareness and insight in the embryology of mammals? Where did Buddhisme or has a Buddhist told - out of Vipassana practice - that the embryo of an ape continues to develope as an embryo after it reached about the simmilarity of the embryo of a human, to show the ape is in fact a degeneration in the evolution of humans opposite to: humans did develope out of apes?

I also could ask: When Vipassana leads to a (broad?) clear insight , how come in modern times the most awareness in relation to material live , and then I am talking about discoveries as we see in, for instance , dentistry, all the materials and technics involved, but also communication with all their technics, is not coming from Buddhisme?

[christiaan]

rockyssdt

Nirvana means : without suffering, being away of the path from rebirth, to be without the five agregates and so on. Nirvana is described as a perfect peace of state of mind (?) free from craving, anger and so on.

It is described as the 'end of the world' , no identities left, no bounderies for the mind.

Since it is material I would say it is spiritual, and I am not aware it is somewhere described to be anything else as spiritual.

When you die, you have to face and relive in a special way in spirit all your actions of before in the material world, there is no dialogue but here is law, spiritual law, out of this law the plan develops how to outbalance your Karma. It is no dialogue no free plan, but spiritual law.

Nirvana is the world of wisdom, a world of wisdom laws, a wisdom like we find them permanent in the Pythagorium theorem. Peacefull, unconditioned, without suffering, without birth, without stress, without agregates, without need to sacrifice.

This Nirvana was the state of the spiritual world as it still was remembered at the time of Buddha 2500 years ago .

This was the world without selfawareness because there was no self, no ego at all.

This was the world nobody wished to be born out of, but still it happened.

It happened when the stream of consciousness was not self aware and still the unaware minds (streams of unaware consciousness) where charged for their unawareness and brought to material existence on earth, the only place where a human can have an ego and be selfaware. ?????

It is only after we, as humans, came to existence on earth that ego and selfawereness started to develop and it is only short time in history we came to Self awareness. Self awareness can only develop at the moment we as a spirit are enclosed in a single human body on earth, because only then, in a state of being apart in a single body and mind, we can become aware of the other - people, things, phenomenons - outside us

This is what in the Bible is called " the Original Sin" we left the world of wisdom, (Garden of Eden) the world of shared awareness, where we had no selfawareness, to enter a world where we will be oneley, where we have to come to Self awareness.

Traditional Buddhisme is the repetition of the high awareness of Buddha, the memory of this world of laws of wisdom, and the resistance to be born into the material world. Traditional Budhisme is not engaged to the world as it is today and so it is not the way to solve problems in Thai society. By its characteristics it is at least conserving the problems in Thailand and some other Asian countries.

The I of human is not Rocky & Christian (becos of the language barrier I am not familiar with this expression )

the I of human is to say just plain spirit. The I is different from the ego since the ego is the conditioned self and I am talking about the unconditioned Self, the Self that can bring people to the desire to free the world from anger, selfishness, greed and so on, the Self that can feel the desire to purify.

Yes, unless we are realy enlightened, means living in the actual moment and state of Truth, we will be ruled by the past, the things we 'learned' (to keep) ....by experience.

The I is the common stream and this I is the selfawareness telling: sacrifice your ego, let your ego go, blow away (vana)

For what would otherwise tell to let the ego go? The mind? well, another name for I ? a stream of consciousness, another name for I ?

When one speaks with " I " one speaks with the higher Spirit that can tell to make choices and to let the ego go, that can tell to sacrifice your self to save a child from drowning, that can tell to see the interest of a country to be more important as your political ambition to become the obvious man in power, and so on.

I can agree in what you tell about becoming aware but in Buddhist terms I have the impression it first is important to become aware of the teachings, the traditions , the rules, and the munks in charge of spiritual wisdom, before nearing what lies within. This is however not special to Buddhisme, it is part of most of the institutionalized religions in this world, certainly also to the Christian 'churches' and Islam.

There is true loving kindness in Buddhisme but is it 'working'? Why then is traditional Buddhisme so overwhelmingly present in societies where is so much wrong and where many things could be so much better when people not only would talk about and out of wisdom but also would start to act out of love?

I can tell you I have experienced some flabbergasting acts of selfishness in Thailand that to me looked almost alien.

To be selfish in the way I have learned to know in and about Thailand makes me realy wonder if those people acting the way they do are in state of mental disorder, We all could whitness this in the beginning of this year. There is one aspect that seems to be similar in many cases, the one acting selfish for a shorttime result is not only destroying peoples future around him or her, but almost always his or her own future.

All these things one can view without attachment and it is the spiritual world that can inaspire to do so, ....out of your Self.

[christiaan]

How on earth, could 'good' develop without 'bad' ?

In my work I have to encourage people many times, and I do by asking them: what are your most intensive learning moments?

And often I have to help them by telling: everytime you became aware you made a mistake.

And they always agree.

Looking back I can say many things I learned in life by making mistakes and becoming aware of them.

When you do not detach from life you have the chance to make mistakes, to become aware and transform your Self and by this the world.

[fabianfred]

Thanks. Not as many hours as I would like....but more than when I was a layman and much more inclined to distract myself. meditating whilst walking the alms round is a favourite of mine. I am not in a forest temple so I have various duties teaching....and also am still the dhamma teacher for the MonkforaMonth project.

never personally experienced any suffering apart from the usual aching legs and back. My teacher Luang Phor Jaran says that "When there is no Mara trying to distract us by tormenting us then there is little progress made.." So we have to try and keep to the time we proposed we were going to meditate for, and not give up just because it is getting hard. We have to beat mara and not allow him to beat us. Just as the Buddha did before his enlightenment....he vowed to sit under the tree until he reached his goal and never get up...virtually saying he would die in the process.

thanks FR, I like that phrase and will use it more in my practice...

In Thai it is 'Marn (mara) mai mii, baramii (paramii) mai gerd'

[fabianfred]

[T]he practice of Vipassana, which is the strongest form of merit, is the best path to Nirvana.

Source? I've heard this said before, mainly by Westerners but it doesn't seem to be what the Buddha taught, in terms of what is in the Tipitaka or the commentaries. Meditation is one step in the Eightfold Path, but not the whole package.

sorry all the writings by LP Jaran are in Thai (which i speak and read fluently)

I used to have all his books written in English.. I believe there were 9 of them.. I would like to have them again, they were really interesting readings. by the by... I was at his temple back in 2006 on his birthday, and of course wished him a Happy Birthday.. I was the only farang there out of about 500 people.

I have only seen four of the English translations of his 'Law of Karma' series...in thai they go to about 30 volumes. I haven't been to his temple for 12 years, so i don't know where they are for sale.

[sabaijai]

[T]he practice of Vipassana, which is the strongest form of merit, is the best path to Nirvana.

Source? I've heard this said before, mainly by Westerners but it doesn't seem to be what the Buddha taught, in terms of what is in the Tipitaka or the commentaries. Meditation is one step in the Eightfold Path, but not the whole package.

sorry all the writings by LP Jaran are in Thai (which i speak and read fluently)

So it's a novel, and perhaps idiosyncratic, interpretation. Interesting.