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Thread: Dukkha is more than suffering.

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    Quote Originally Posted by anatta View Post
    gawd I love having you around with your knowledge of world empires and peoples. I knew little of this.

    Just like the old days when we chatted about "Wakistan"
    I assumed that you knew about it... Anyway, IMHO it makes that situation much more complex.
    "There is no question former President Trump bears moral responsibility. His supporters stormed the Capitol because of the unhinged falsehoods he shouted into the world’s largest megaphone," McConnell wrote. "His behavior during and after the chaos was also unconscionable, from attacking Vice President Mike Pence during the riot to praising the criminals after it ended."



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    Quote Originally Posted by Bill View Post
    I assumed that you knew about it... Anyway, IMHO it makes that situation much more complex.
    bits and pieces of it - but I'm not all that up on Myanmar -yes I can see it becomes more then just a religious conflict

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    Sid Kemp, Zen practioner since 1980, sharing Buddhist meditation since 1987.

    This is a distortion or mistranslation of the Buddha’s teaching. I’ve also heard it as all passion is suffering.
    Neither of these is true.

    The root of all suffering in Buddhism is tanha, which is properly translated as attachment or grasping.

    We see this because the Buddha teaches us how to cut off suffering, but he also teaches us to cultivate joy and peace, both of which are passions and emotions. But if we get attached to joy and peace and want it all the time, that, too, is suffering.

    When we become free of attachments, emotions flow. If a friend dies, we cry, but do not become weak. If we hear good news, we feel joy. If we learn the good news was not true, we let go, and are not disheartened.

    That is the true teaching of the Buddha. Emotions or passions are not suffering. Getting stuck in them is.

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    Once a Brahmin approached The Buddha and questioned him thus:

    Brahmin: “My Lord, your disciples claim that your Dharma (Teachings) is flawless and pristine and yet
    I see some of your disciples gone astray! How could this happen?”

    Buddha: “ My dear Brahmin, do you know the road from the capital of Magadha to the capital of Kosala?”
    (Two Kingdoms during the time of The Buddha)

    Brahmin: “ Oh Yes my Lord! Like the palm of my hand!”

    Buddha: “ My dear Brahmin, what if someone asked you directions to go from the capital of Magadha
    to the capital of Kosala and you gave him the directions accurately? Yet, you find that… that person had gone astray?”

    Brahmin: “ My Lord! While giving that person accurate directions, if that person had not listened to me attentively or while giving that person accurate directions he had listened to me attentively but not followed my instructions properly, am I to be blamed for that person going astray?”

    Buddha: “ Then my dear Brahmin, while I expounded this Dharma, if my disciples had not listened to me attentively
    or while I expounded this Dharma my disciples had listened to me attentively but not followed my instructions properly,
    am I to be blamed for my disciples going astray?”
    Last edited by anatta; 05-22-2019 at 02:49 AM.
    Kissinger: “demonization of Vladimir Putin is not a policy; it is an alibi for the absence of one.”
    ________

    Cold War 2.0 Russia hysteria is turning people’s brains into guacamole.
    We’ve got to find a way to snap out of the propaganda trance
    ________

    Buddha: "trust the person who seeks truth and mistrust the person who claims he has found it "
    1.2.3.4.5.6.7. All Good Children Go to Heaven

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    Guardian Naga Serpent
    mages or depictions of nagas are a common sight in Thailand, particularly at temples. The naga is a guardian figure which keeps away bad spirits and features in Hindu and Buddhist mythology. In one particular story, it is said that the King of Nagas protected the Buddha from a fierce storm by using its cobra hood as a shield


    Naga, (Sanskrit: “serpent”) in Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism, a member of a class of mythical semidivine beings, half human and half cobra. They are a strong, handsome species who can assume either wholly human or wholly serpentine form and are potentially dangerous but often beneficial to humans.
    Last edited by dukkha; 05-24-2019 at 09:36 AM.

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    The Buddha didn't say "life is suffering." He said "the five aggregates subject to clinging are dukkha".
    "Suffering" is just one of several ways the word "dukkha" can be translated. It has also been translated as "dissatisfaction" and "stress."

    According the the Buddha's teachings, we feel suffering or dissatisfaction because we cling to the five aggregates of form, sensation, perception, volition, and consciousness. By clinging less, and following the middle—equanimous—way, we mitigate our dukkha.

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    The Buddha never preached at anyone, but always led by example. He dealt with all things as they actually are.
    He did not invent anything and say it was true if there was no evidence to support such a claim.
    He taught that, if there were such beings as gods they needed enlightenment as much as any other sentient being.
    He taught that we can only live in this moment. Every moment is precious and should not be wasted.

    He taught that we are all born with original goodness and that life was all about seeking to maintain and develop this goodness. He also taught that all life is sacred, not just human life.
    He did not preach at people, but always led by example. Buddhism cannot be fazed by new discoveries.
    For instance, it has no problem in accepting the truth of evolution. The best parts in the Christian gospels have all been adapted from much earlier Buddhist scriptures such as the Dharmapada and the Lotus Sutra,
    The Buddhist scriptures are deeper, more helpful and longer than the scriptures of any other any other great religion.

    Parables were invented in India long before the time of the Buddha, who saw them as useful teaching tools.
    The originals of such parables as the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son can be found in earlier Buddhist Sutras. Buddhist teachers were present in Alexandria, Antioch and Athens during the time of Jesus and they travelled around quite a bit, which means that Jesus may well have picked up some of his teachings from them. Zen, also known as Dhyana and Ch’an, is the simplest and purist form of Buddhism and teaches serene reflection meditation.

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    A Look at the Kalama Sutta
    https://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/...-essay_09.html
    The passage that has been cited so often runs as follows: "Come, Kalamas. Do not go upon what has been acquired by repeated hearing, nor upon tradition, nor upon rumor, nor upon scripture, nor upon surmise, nor upon axiom, nor upon specious reasoning, nor upon bias toward a notion pondered over, nor upon another's seeming ability, nor upon the consideration 'The monk is our teacher.' When you yourselves know: 'These things are bad, blamable, censured by the wise; undertaken and observed, these things lead to harm and ill,' abandon them... When you yourselves know: 'These things are good, blameless, praised by the wise; undertaken and observed, these things lead to benefit and happiness,' enter on and abide in them."

    Now this passage, like everything else spoken by the Buddha, has been stated in a specific context
    — with a particular audience and situation in view — and thus must be understood in relation to that context. The Kalamas, citizens of the town of Kesaputta, had been visited by religious teachers of divergent views, each of whom would propound his own doctrines and tear down the doctrines of his predecessors. This left the Kalamas perplexed, and thus when "the recluse Gotama," reputed to be an Awakened One, arrived in their township, they approached him in the hope that he might be able to dispel their confusion. From the subsequent development of the sutta, it is clear that the issues that perplexed them were the reality of rebirth and kammic retribution for good and evil deeds.

    The Buddha begins by assuring the Kalamas that under such circumstances it is proper for them to doubt, an assurance which encourages free inquiry. He next speaks the passage quoted above, advising the Kalamas to abandon those things they know for themselves to be bad and to undertake those things they know for themselves to be good. This advice can be dangerous if given to those whose ethical sense is undeveloped, and we can thus assume that the Buddha regarded the Kalamas as people of refined moral sensitivity. In any case he did not leave them wholly to their own resources, but by questioning them led them to see that greed, hate and delusion, being conducive to harm and suffering for oneself and others, are to be abandoned, and their opposites, being beneficial to all, are to be developed.

    The Buddha next explains that a "noble disciple, devoid of covetousness and ill will, undeluded" dwells pervading the world with boundless loving-kindness, compassion, appreciative joy and equanimity.
    Thus purified of hate and malice, he enjoys here and now four "solaces": If there is an afterlife and kammic result, then he will undergo a pleasant rebirth, while if there is none he still lives happily here and now; if evil results befall an evil-doer, then no evil will befall him, and if evil results do not befall an evil-doer, then he is purified anyway. With this the Kalamas express their appreciation of the Buddha's discourse and go for refuge to the Triple Gem.

    Now does the Kalama Sutta suggest, as is often held, that a follower of the Buddhist path can dispense with all faith and doctrine, that he should make his own personal experience the criterion for judging the Buddha's utterances and for rejecting what cannot be squared with it? It is true the Buddha does not ask the Kalamas to accept anything he says out of confidence in himself, but let us note one important point: the Kalamas, at the start of the discourse, were not the Buddha's disciples. They approached him merely as a counselor who might help dispel their doubts, but they did not come to him as the Tathagata, the Truth-finder, who might show them the way to spiritual progress and to final liberation.

    Thus, because the Kalamas had not yet come to accept the Buddha in terms of his unique mission, as the discloser of the liberating truth, it would not have been in place for him to expound to them the Dhamma unique to his own Dispensation: such teachings as the Four Noble Truths, the three characteristics, and the methods of contemplation based upon them. These teachings are specifically intended for those who have accepted the Buddha as their guide to deliverance, and in the suttas he expounds them only to those who "have gained faith in the Tathagata" and who possess the perspective necessary to grasp them and apply them. The Kalamas, however, at the start of the discourse are not yet fertile soil for him to sow the seeds of his liberating message. Still confused by the conflicting claims to which they have been exposed, they are not yet clear even about the groundwork of morality.

    Nevertheless, after advising the Kalamas not to rely upon established tradition, abstract reasoning, and charismatic gurus, the Buddha proposes to them a teaching that is immediately verifiable and capable of laying a firm foundation for a life of moral discipline and mental purification. He shows that whether or not there be another life after death, a life of moral restraint and of love and compassion for all beings brings its own intrinsic rewards here and now, a happiness and sense of inward security far superior to the fragile pleasures that can be won by violating moral principles and indulging the mind's desires. For those who are not concerned to look further, who are not prepared to adopt any convictions about a future life and worlds beyond the present one, such a teaching will ensure their present welfare and their safe passage to a pleasant rebirth — provided they do not fall into the wrong view of denying an afterlife and kammic causation.

    However, for those whose vision is capable of widening to encompass the broader horizons of our existence, this teaching given to the Kalamas points beyond its immediate implications to the very core of the Dhamma. For the three states brought forth for examination by the Buddha — greed, hate and delusion — are not merely grounds of wrong conduct or moral stains upon the mind. Within his teaching's own framework they are the root defilements — the primary causes of all bondage and suffering — and the entire practice of the Dhamma can be viewed as the task of eradicating these evil roots by developing to perfection their antidotes — dispassion, kindness and wisdom.

    Thus the discourse to the Kalamas offers an acid test for gaining confidence in the Dhamma as a viable doctrine of deliverance. We begin with an immediately verifiable teaching whose validity can be attested by anyone with the moral integrity to follow it through to its conclusions, namely, that the defilements cause harm and suffering both personal and social, that their removal brings peace and happiness, and that the practices taught by the Buddha are effective means for achieving their removal. By putting this teaching to a personal test, with only a provisional trust in the Buddha as one's collateral, one eventually arrives at a firmer, experientially grounded confidence in the liberating and purifying power of the Dhamma. This increased confidence in the teaching brings along a deepened faith in the Buddha as teacher, and thus disposes one to accept on trust those principles he enunciates that are relevant to the quest for awakening, even when they lie beyond one's own capacity for verification. This, in fact, marks the acquisition of right view, in its preliminary role as the forerunner of the entire Noble Eightfold Path.

    Partly in reaction to dogmatic religion, partly in subservience to the reigning paradigm of objective scientific knowledge, it has become fashionable to hold, by appeal to the Kalama Sutta, that the Buddha's teaching dispenses with faith and formulated doctrine and asks us to accept only what we can personally verify. This interpretation of the sutta, however, forgets that the advice the Buddha gave the Kalamas was contingent upon the understanding that they were not yet prepared to place faith in him and his doctrine; it also forgets that the sutta omits, for that very reason, all mention of right view and of the entire perspective that opens up when right view is acquired. It offers instead the most reasonable counsel on wholesome living possible when the issue of ultimate beliefs has been put into brackets.

    What can be justly maintained is that those aspects of the Buddha's teaching that come within the purview of our ordinary experience can be personally confirmed within experience, and that this confirmation provides a sound basis for placing faith in those aspects of the teaching that necessarily transcend ordinary experience. Faith in the Buddha's teaching is never regarded as an end in itself nor as a sufficient guarantee of liberation, but only as the starting point for an evolving process of inner transformation that comes to fulfillment in personal insight. But in order for this insight to exercise a truly liberative function, it must unfold in the context of an accurate grasp of the essential truths concerning our situation in the world and the domain where deliverance is to be sought. These truths have been imparted to us by the Buddha out of his own profound comprehension of the human condition. To accept them in trust after careful consideration is to set foot on a journey which transforms faith into wisdom, confidence into certainty, and culminates in liberation from suffering.
    Last edited by anatta; 06-16-2019 at 02:09 AM.

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    Imagine you were a character in a computer game. The normal situation is to be in character, to experience the internals of that agent in a seemless way. You are the agent.

    Next imagine getting knocked out of the character to a position where you could observe its code.
    You are not the character. Now you can inspect and debug. You can reprogram the character in ways that were impossible before.
    You can delete old technical debt which slows things down and generates errors.
    You can clean up other areas to be more efficient and precise.
    New objectives can be set. Busy hung loops can be given an exit.

    You notice all the other characters run the same code. You can learn how to use your new understanding to help them clean up their errors and inefficiencies from inside the agent. You can help them also generate the faults that drop them out of character, so they can hack too.

    Buddha didn't gain anything, it's still all just code, but became awake to the program.

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    changing karma is a lot of work, but chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo is the way to go to make the impossible possible.

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    Fake Buddhist is hilarious. Supporting Trump, you will be reincarnated as a slug.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Phantasmal View Post
    Fake Buddhist is hilarious. Supporting Trump, you will be reincarnated as a slug.
    That's the kind of JPP Staff Moderator you'd expect when being escorted into Hell.

    So in the era of Fake-News we find EXPERTS assessing everything into two categories:
    a] Things we agree with.
    or
    b] Things we do not agree with.


    Yet the odd thing is that the EXPERTS don't know anything.

    Every war lord in History was actually trying to accomplish peace ---as they like it--- forcing everyone to be proud.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Phantasmal View Post
    Fake Buddhist is hilarious. Supporting Trump, you will be reincarnated as a slug.
    Buddhists do not reincarnate as a self. That's Hindu.

    my location "100% re-cycled karma" - means the un-perfected karma has to go some place
    ( conservation of energy theory) and it does go back into the pool which gives rebirth, but not as a new me

    anatta = "no self"

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    Quote Originally Posted by bhaktajan View Post
    That's the kind of JPP Staff Moderator you'd expect when being escorted into Hell.
    she's a nasty idiot.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Bill View Post
    Yes, I am familiar w/ that..

    From what I have read the root of the problem is they were brought there from British India as coolie laborers, the Burmese had no say in this decision.

    As you know there are many ethnic groups there that are formally recognized, & even some that are Muslim & originally from India that migrated long ago but the Rohingya have not, & have always been considered unwanted British plants, Not even Aung San Suu Kyi will come to their defense.
    She is powerless to do anything about it, the enmity towards the Rohingya goes back many decades, in the past we just never knew about it.

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