Buddhism, guessworks, discoveries, inventions in.

[yrreg]

I just made an edit or revision at the start of the Wikipedia article on Faith in Buddhism. It now stands thus:

Saddha
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from Faith in Buddhism)

Faith (saddhā / śraddhā) is an important constituent element of the teachings of the Buddha - both in the Theravada tradition and especially in the Mahayana. It betokens faith in the reliability of the Buddha as a truly Awakened guide and confident trust in the truth of the Buddha's teachings (his Dharma). It can be inspired in part by the charisma of the Buddha himself. Buddhists claim that it is certainly not "blind faith" in just anyone and anything; but in fact ultimately it is blind faith.

In the Kalama Sutta the Buddha himself argues against "blind faith" based simply on authority, tradition or specious reasoning; but Gautama, the Buddha himself, and his Buddhism are exempted by Buddhists from this prohibition: for even though one's own experience is emphasized in accepting Buddha and Buddhism, the counsel of the wise (implicitly meaning a Buddha, ultimately Gautama himself, or a Buddhist master well versed in Dharma) should always be depended upon -- whence there remains a requirement for a degree of trusting confidence in Buddhism, essentially in the authority of Gautama as the ultimate Buddha, based on his spiritual attainment and salvational knowledge.

Faith in Buddhism centres on the authority of Gautama as a supremely Awakened being, by assenting to his unexcelled role as teacher of both humans and gods, to the truth of his Dharma (spiritual Doctrine), and in accepting the Sangha (community of spiritually developed followers). Faith in Buddhism can be said to functions as a form of motor, which propels the Buddhist practitioner towards the goal of Awakening (bodhi) and Nirvana.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faith_in_Buddhism



My contribution consists in saying that faith in Buddhism is not supposed to be blind faith but in fact it is blind faith.

Faith is an invention of Gautama consisting in taking the teachings of Gautama which are essentially guessworks on the ultimate destiny of man and the universe.


Yrreg

[Marquis de Carabas]

I was just thinking last night the place was overdue for an yrreg Buddhist thread.

[prewitt81]

I just made an edit or revision at the start of the Wikipedia article on Faith in Buddhism. It now stands thus:

My contribution consists in saying that faith in Buddhism is not supposed to be blind faith but in fact it is blind faith.

Faith is an invention of Gautama consisting in taking the teachings of Gautama which are essentially guessworks on the ultimate destiny of man and the universe.


Yrreg


Nope.

[username]

Please refrain from forcing those who know what they are talking about having to tediously edit your ramblings.

It is fine you frequently post here revealing your complete disinterest in learning about that which you speak, but why ruin something like Wikipedia with your delusions?

As the Wiki article notes: the Buddha himself argues against "blind faith" based simply on authority, tradition or specious reasoning.

That's all there is to it.

No blind faith.

Examine everything.

The 4 noble truths and the 8 fold path make sense or they do not.

Anyone advocating faith beyond 'no blind faith' is simply not being true to what the Buddha is recorded as saying. Most of us here, if not all of us, are completely unimpressed by the attempts to take the words attributed to the Buddha and contradict or go beyond them.

No blind faith works quite well for me. I do not understand any Buddhism which requires checking one's brain at the door. I have no use for it.

[sesshin]

you are the LAST person who should be editing the wikipedia on Buddhism.

[Marquis de Carabas]

you are the LAST person who should be editing the wikipedia on Buddhism.
No, no, no. We definitely want someone else editing it after him.

[lupus_in_fabula]

Buddha’s teachings and Buddhism is not necessarily the same thing. Dogmatism is perhaps a necessary evil when making distinctions and comparisons, but some of the message appears to become lost in the process (as with many other –isms).

[yrreg]

The most important hallmark of the Wikipedia is its fundamental feature of being founded on neutral points of views.

Anyone can edit any article there on condition that he is doing a NPOV contribution to a topic.

=================================

First Buddha or Gautama the founder of Buddhism had blind faith in himself and in his ideas, borrowed or original or rehashed; but he did not know about himself being a victim of his own blind faith. That is typical of people overly and uncritically in love with themselves and their ideas.

Then by the force of his blind self-love he preached himself and his blind ideas.

Now, if you try the same thing yourself and you are already in some situation of advantages like being a prince to whom people had been conditioned to defer to you, then you will also succeed: to get people to follow you and your ideas also on blind faith in you, holding you to know better and with complete certainty than themselves.


Faith has been studied by people who have faith in a leader and his ideas, and they come to all kinds of attempts to show that their faith is not blind faith in a person and his ideas, but justifiably founded on solid grounds.

How to connect their faith in a person and his ideas to solid grounds? that is the problem that is still not solved by people with faith who do honestly try to establish solid grounds for their faith.

What about the Buddhists in this forum, how do they bridge their faith in Gautama the Buddha to solid grounds?

Try this approach: how does a people with a judiciary system topped off by a supreme court have faith in the supreme court as the last determinant effectively of facts and ideas and laws?

Good Buddhists here, work on that problem, and we will know better what is faith and whether it is not essentially blind though stubborn.


Yrreg

[Glen.Nogami]

The most important hallmark of the Wikipedia is its fundamental feature of being founded on neutral points of views.

Anyone can edit any article there on condition that he is doing a NPOV contribution to a topic.

Did you read what you wrote? It's not neutral at all. Saying "it is in fact blind faith" is inflammatory language at best.

[lupus_in_fabula]

Advocating one’s beliefs… dialogue attempted… blank stare… continue advocating one’s beliefs unaffected. Not a very fruitful process for a discussion forum!

However, I would assume many Buddhists don’t ground their “faith” in Gautama nor in the exact words people tell he’s supposed to have said, but in the actual experience, produced by contemplation of his words, in themselves.

For of course the true meaning of a term is to be found by observing what a man does with it, not by what he says about it --- P. W. Bridgman

[Dancing David]

Yrreg, this is great! Now you can have a non-discussion on the wiki, you can post your definitions and others will post thiers, Should be cool, way to go. I don't think people will find your lack of response to specific points as frustrationg there.

What a great place to engage in defining things.

:cool:

[yrreg]

[.....]

Anyone advocating faith beyond 'no blind faith' is simply not being true to what the Buddha is recorded as saying. Most of us here, if not all of us, are completely unimpressed by the attempts to take the words attributed to the Buddha and contradict or go beyond them.

No blind faith works quite well for me. I do not understand any Buddhism which requires checking one's brain at the door. I have no use for it.

...simply not being true to what the Buddha is recorded as saying.

I keep on searching for the earliest written evidence of Gautama's words, but so far I have not found anything earlier than fragments of manuscripts recovered from somewhere near ancient Gandhara in northwest Pakistan, written on birch bark, dated to as late as the second century C.E.

I will appreciate most liberally Buddhists here who can bring me to written evidence of Gautama the Buddha and his teachings dating closer and closer to his lifetime, and best of all authentic as coming from his pen.


Yrreg

[yrreg]

[......]

However, I would assume many Buddhists don’t ground their “faith” in Gautama nor in the exact words people tell he’s supposed to have said, but in the actual experience, produced by contemplation of his words, in themselves.

[.....]

...I would assume many Buddhists don’t ground their “faith” in Gautama nor in the exact words people tell he’s supposed to have said, but in the actual experience, produced by contemplation of his words, in themselves.


In other words, to be copiously clear, lupus means:
...I would assume many Buddhists don’t ground their “faith” in Gautama nor in the exact words people tell he’s supposed to have said, but in the actual experience, produced by contemplation of his words, in themselves -- but again not "in the exact words people tell he’s supposed to have said."


That is why it's not blind faith but faith in one's own experience. See?


Yrreg

[yrreg]

Unlike many animals which have to fend totally and exclusively for themselves once they get born or out of their eggs, man must completely and exclusively depend on his mother to keep alive, and develop into eventually and hopefully a self-dependent and self-reliant and self determining person one day.

But the instinct of complete dependency remains and in many people stays active in search of a mother surrogate.

In religion like Buddhism that instinct comes to play in the form of blind faith in a religious leader as regards a world-view, in particular on the question of what to do with life beyond biology and how to do it.


And that's all there is of adherence to Buddhism, blind faith in Gautama just like the instinct of blind faith in one's mother; except that Gautama is no biological mother but some kind of a Buddha, a self-recognized enlightened being whom people opt to take for exceptionally enlightened and therefore deserving of their credal obedience.


Yrreg

[username]

And that's all there is of adherence to Buddhism, blind faith in Gautama just like the instinct of blind faith in one's mother;

Yrreg

What about folks like me and many other 'western' Buddhists who have no use for The Buddha? What about folks like me and many other westerners who really don't know (or care) whether the historical Buddha said the things attributed to him?

What about folks like me and many others who simply read the 4 noble truths and 8 fold path and say 'hey, this makes sense to me and best of all every claim is testable and falsifiable so I think I will look into it.'?

Where is our blind faith in Gautama? How do we fit into your view? Are we just an aberration?

Is the blind faith of religions which insist we believe absurdities without reasons under penalty of death really the same as a religion that says 'hey, here ya go. Here is what we have come up with on the issue of happiness and suffering. Consider it, test it, see if it is true for yourself.'?

May I humbly suggest that if you wish to wage a verbal war on a blind faith religion that you may serve humanity better by focusing on Islam, the religion which insists on killing infidels? If you wish to be more mundane you could focus on Christianity and the role Christian fundamentalists are playing in American government today and the ways in which it is strikingly similar to the unreason of Muslims.

Why do you insist in erecting a caricature of Buddhism (which I admit does seem to accurately reflect some people in predominately Buddhist cultures) and attack it when your audience here more or less has told you repeatedly that we aren't into the blind faith thing or the hero worship thing.

On this board we are mostly secularists with absolutely no taste for blind faith, hero worship, dogma or anything else which requires us to check our brains at the door. We may be wrong about a great many things including our appreciation for Buddhism, but accusing us of blind faith is absurd in light of what we have repeatedly stated to you.

[Mojo]

Yrreg, this is great! Now you can have a non-discussion on the wiki, you can post your definitions and others will post thiers, Should be cool, way to go. I don't think people will find your lack of response to specific points as frustrationg there.

What a great place to engage in defining things.I don't know how tolerant they're likely to be (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Internet_Infidels) of Yrreg's other foibles: Wikipedia is not a sounding board for a beef you have with another website, nor is it for your reviews of said site. It looks like you're using this discussion page to talk against the Internet Infidels since you can no longer do so there, having been banned and all.

[Mojo]

Unlike many animals which have to fend totally and exclusively for themselves once they get born or out of their eggs, man must completely and exclusively depend on his mother to keep alive, and develop into eventually and hopefully a self-dependent and self-reliant and self determining person one day.

But the instinct of complete dependency remains and in many people stays active in search of a mother surrogate.

In religion like Buddhism Christianity that instinct comes to play in the form of blind faith in a religious leader book as regards a world-view, in particular on the question of what to do with life beyond biology and how to do it.


And that's all there is of adherence to Buddhism Christianity, blind faith in Gautama the Bible just like the instinct of blind faith in one's mother; except that Gautama the Bible is no biological mother but some kind of a Buddha work of literature, a self-recognized enlightened being authority whom people opt to take for exceptionally enlightened and therefore deserving of their credal obedience.Fixed it for you.

[Dancing David]

...simply not being true to what the Buddha is recorded as saying.

I keep on searching for the earliest written evidence of Gautama's words, but so far I have not found anything earlier than fragments of manuscripts recovered from somewhere near ancient Gandhara in northwest Pakistan, written on birch bark, dated to as late as the second century C.E.

I will appreciate most liberally Buddhists here who can bring me to written evidence of Gautama the Buddha and his teachings dating closer and closer to his lifetime, and best of all authentic as coming from his pen.


Yrreg

None , zilcho, nada, niente, empty set. Most of the teachings of the buddha are an oral tradition recorded four hundred years later.

[Dancing David]

Unlike many animals which have to fend totally and exclusively for themselves once they get born or out of their eggs, man must completely and exclusively depend on his mother to keep alive, and develop into eventually and hopefully a self-dependent and self-reliant and self determining person one day.

But the instinct of complete dependency remains and in many people stays active in search of a mother surrogate.

In religion like Buddhism that instinct comes to play in the form of blind faith in a religious leader as regards a world-view, in particular on the question of what to do with life beyond biology and how to do it.


And that's all there is of adherence to Buddhism, blind faith in Gautama just like the instinct of blind faith in one's mother; except that Gautama is no biological mother but some kind of a Buddha, a self-recognized enlightened being whom people opt to take for exceptionally enlightened and therefore deserving of their credal obedience.


Yrreg

Neo Freudian, OOOK?

There are many mental forms of dependance, they come in very many varieties and species. To link back to some vauge Freudian thinking shows a lack of imagination, try social theory instead. That will make your argument stringer, neotany is a real thing, especialy for humans. However most human behaviors is determined through social upbringing, dependance upon others is a learned and conditioned set of behaviors, effected by personal family , society and culture.

In the US for example many (not all) question all things constantly, they are very different from other cultures where society encourages adherance to authority. take martial arts for example , it is not uncommon to have US practioners of aikido pooh-pooh concepts such as 'ki' and 'extension of ki', this would be totaly unthinkable to many practioners in Nippon.

You have a good argument here but it needs refining, avoid vauge Fruedian concepts.

[Dancing David]

I don't know how tolerant they're likely to be (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Internet_Infidels) of Yrreg's other foibles:


I think he is capable of learning and well aware of the line to cross and where he choses to cross it.

[Beerina]

you are the LAST person who should be editing the wikipedia on Buddhism.No, no, no. We definitely want someone else editing it after him.

:)

[yrreg]

[......]

What about folks like me and many others who simply read the 4 noble truths and 8 fold path and say 'hey, this makes sense to me and best of all every claim is testable and falsifiable so I think I will look into it.'?

[......]

You have a good project in front of you: determine which materials in the Four Noble Truths and in the Noble Eightfold Path are guessworks, which are discoveries, and which inventions.

But if you want to engage in a more challenging search, find out how the Four Noble Truths evolved and also the Noble Eightfold Path; this requires that you go into text history and text criticism: looking for the earliest manuscripts or manuscript fragments of these materials, and determining among various succeeding historical texts what sources earlier to Buddhism are incorporated in them.

Also try to describe the kind of people who in a way codified what you believe or accept to be useful doctrines and observances, useful on their own intrinsic merits even without attribution to an enlightened person like Gautama the acclaimed Buddha of traditional Buddhist societies, although you cannot name specific persons, like for example, not Gautama the traditional Buddha par none.

And most important at this point of your Buddhist research career, organize a group of people like yourself, who find intrinsic worth in the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path, intrinsic worth even without the authority of an enlightened person like Gautama the traditional Buddha; this will be a study group like yourself, not beholden to the enlightenment of Gautama, but purely dedicated to the collection of doctrines and practices in the vast database of Buddhism which in your assessment can pass the test of being useful to mankind, of course according to your own criteria of usefulness to mankind.

You can start here by contacting every Buddhist in this forum to ask for the doctrines and practices which they believe to have intrinsic worth even should Gautama never in fact existed in history.


Yrreg

[yrreg]

Dear username, I like to invite you to tell me how you judge something to be of intrinsic worth to mankind.

Yrreg2, the guy who looks back at me when I look at myself in the mirror, tells me that food is an example of intrinsic worth to mankind.

I asked him to explain, and here is his explanation:

There were three skeptics he knew in a land always bordering on famine, one is a diamond merchant, one a Buddhist, and one a food trader, each one claiming to be a skeptic. All three are into hoarding: the diamond merchant keeps buying diamonds from people starving, the Buddhist keeps putting in more hours on meditation to get to enlightenment and thus to attain Nirvana which is the complete liberation from suffering or dukkha and samsara or as one wit puts it, que sera sera, and the food trader stored up on food. Tell me which skeptic is storing the stuff with intrinsic worth?

That is Yrreg2's idea of intrinsic worth to mankind. What is your concept of intrinsic worth to mankind? and give an example.

If whatever you believe in of Buddhism is of intrinsic worth to yourself according to your own concept of intrinsic worth, then you can go forth in life without having to be in any way and to any least measure annoyed with one Yrreg always probing into the rational basis if any of Buddhism.


So, I must congratulate the Buddhists here who are not annoyed and don't have to feel the need and do accordingly, namely, to disabuse me of my wrong thoughts that they for being Buddhists are into blind faith; you see, these guys don't read my postings on Buddhism and don't react to them except to join in the fun, like one Marquis.


Yrreg

[username]

You have a good project in front of you: determine which materials in the Four Noble Truths and in the Noble Eightfold Path are guessworks, which are discoveries, and which inventions.

Why can't I just read them as they are and judge them accordingly?

But if you want to engage in a more challenging search, find out how the Four Noble Truths evolved and also the Noble Eightfold Path; this requires that you go into text history and text criticism: looking for the earliest manuscripts or manuscript fragments of these materials, and determining among various succeeding historical texts what sources earlier to Buddhism are incorporated in them.

Why should I care about this?

Also try to describe the kind of people who in a way codified what you believe or accept to be useful doctrines and observances, useful on their own intrinsic merits even without attribution to an enlightened person like Gautama the acclaimed Buddha of traditional Buddhist societies, although you cannot name specific persons, like for example, not Gautama the traditional Buddha par none.

Why?

And most important at this point of your Buddhist research career, organize a group of people like yourself, who find intrinsic worth in the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path, intrinsic worth even without the authority of an enlightened person like Gautama the traditional Buddha; this will be a study group like yourself, not beholden to the enlightenment of Gautama, but purely dedicated to the collection of doctrines and practices in the vast database of Buddhism which in your assessment can pass the test of being useful to mankind, of course according to your own criteria of usefulness to mankind.

I am more interested in the practical than mental masturbation.

You can start here by contacting every Buddhist in this forum to ask for the doctrines and practices which they believe to have intrinsic worth even should Gautama never in fact existed in history.
Yrreg

What's the point? Many people say they are Buddhists when they don't even know what the 4 noble truths are. These would be cultural Buddhists roughly comparable to cultural christians who have never read a page of their bible. Am I to judge the value in the bible or lack thereof by the millions who call themselves christian, but have never read the first page of the bible?

Why should I care what anyone else thinks?

I read the 4 noble truths and the 8 fold path and find it worthy of my time and attention. Worthy of my examination, critical thought and practice.

I find many others, including authors with teaching authority granted them by eastern masters who say much the same thing. Examine it yourself. Discard anything you can't prove true or valuable for yourself.

There is no blind faith or dogma that must be swallowed whole.

You seem to wish their was, but there isn't. That is why skeptics generally give Buddhism a free pass. Buddhism doesn't tell skeptics they have to swallow anything without proper evidence.

[username]

Dear username, I like to invite you to tell me how you judge something to be of intrinsic worth to mankind.


I don't. I evaluate something's worth to me. I don't care how the rest of you do it as long as you don't oppress me.

So, I must congratulate the Buddhists here who are not annoyed and don't have to feel the need and do accordingly, namely, to disabuse me of my wrong thoughts that they for being Buddhists are into blind faith; you see, these guys don't read my postings on Buddhism and don't react to them except to join in the fun, like one Marquis.

You have been tolerated too long. It has been at least one year, maybe longer, since you started your attack on that which you do not understand. You have avoiding dealing with anyone's specific responses in an honest answer. You persist in your misrepresentations as if nobody has ever attempted to correct them.

You have been banned from multiple forums for your behavior which resembles that of a troll.

Still, you persist as if you live in a vacuum and the external world is unable to penetrate your microcosm.

I have engaged you in the hope you were capable of hearing, but you appear not to be.

For me to engage you further would subject me to potentially taking sport in ridiculing you and I do not wish to be guilty of debasing myself this way.

Have a nice life.

[yrreg]

I am always looking for common beliefs and practices of skeptic Buddhists or Buddhist skeptics in this here JREF forum.

Here is a statement of common acceptance on beliefs and observances by Buddhists in the West; see if any Buddhist here can and will point out what he believes in and practices and what not; then they can for their own benefit and to the information of people outside put up their own common statement of beliefs and observances.


The Buddhist Inter-traditions
Consensus on Commitment and Practice


[Visit the link for the progressive accumulation of statements on common beliefs and observances. I only reproduce here the latest ones, so far.]
http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma/consensus.html


Buddhist Sangha Council Convention on Buddhism Across Cultures, 1997

The one-day convention on Buddhism Across Cultures, convened by the
Buddhist Sangha Council and the American Buddhist Congress, with the
active support of Ven. Dr. Havanpola Ratanasara, Ven. Yin Hai Shih,
Ven. Geshe Gyeltsen, Ven. U Nyanavara, Ven. Dr. Yifa, Rev. Bishop
Noriaki Ito, Ven. Do Ahn Kim, Ven. Walpola Piyananda, Ven. Sumanatissa
Barua, Ven. Dr. Karuna Dharma, Ven. Thich Vien-Ly, Rev. Tenzin Khacho,
and Dr. Ananda W.P. Guruge, at the Hsi Lai Temple in Hacienda Heights
on March 15, 1997, expressed its agreement in principle with the
fourteen point Common Piatform of Col. Henry Steele Olcott, the twelve
principles of Christmas Humphries and the statement from the Ann Arbor
Conference, entrusted a discussion group to prepare the substantive
contents of a comprehensive statement to reflect the needs and challenges
of modem times. We agree in principle with the major points drafted by
both Col. Olcott and Mr. Humphries, and especially with the paper of the
Ann Arbor conference.

1. We recognize Sakyamuni Gautama Buddha as the historical source for
the transmission of Buddha Dharma of our time and venerate him for his
compassionate service to humanity

2. We recognize the multiplicity of the Buddhas of the past, the present
and the future, as well as Pacceka (pratyeka) Buddhas, Arahants and
Bodhisattvas. .

3. We take refuge in the Triple Gem consisting of the Buddha, his
teachings (the Dharma) and the community of monks, nuns, and ministers (the Sangha).

4. We aspire to the fruits of enlightenment and liberation from dukkha
(suffering) for ourselves and others in a spirit of compassion to all beings.




More commone beliefs and observances of Western Buddhists, tomorrow.

=========================

1. We recognize Sakyamuni Gautama Buddha as the historical source for the transmission of Buddha Dharma of our time and venerate him for his compassionate service to humanity

Isn't that blind faith to take Gautama as the historical source of Buddhism? What about venerating him for his compassionate service to humanity? Isn't that a behavior founded on blind faith?


Yrreg

[Ryokan]

1. We recognize Sakyamuni Gautama Buddha as the historical source for the transmission of Buddha Dharma of our time and venerate him for his
compassionate service to humanity

I don't know if the Pali Canon is the true teachings of the original Gautama Buddha, but that doesn't matter. Even if it was proved that Gautama Buddha never existed, I still like, and follow, the teachings attributed to him.

2. We recognize the multiplicity of the Buddhas of the past, the present and the future, as well as Pacceka (pratyeka) Buddhas, Arahants and
Bodhisattvas. .

No. Not at all. There's no evidence of 'past Buddhas' and although I like the Bodhisattva ideal, I don't believe there is such a thing. The title and idea of arhant has gathered a lot of crap in the last millenia, but I believe in the original meaning, someone who has completely understood the four noble truths.

3. We take refuge in the Triple Gem consisting of the Buddha, his
teachings (the Dharma) and the community of monks, nuns, and ministers (the Sangha).

Yes.

4. We aspire to the fruits of enlightenment and liberation from dukkha
(suffering) for ourselves and others in a spirit of compassion to all beings.

Yes.

Hope that answered what this 'western' Buddhist believes, Yrreg. I can't speak for other Buddhists.

[Soapy Sam]

Some sit under a tree and find the secrets of the universe.
Some sit under a tree and discover enlightenment.
Some sit under a tree and get bat droppings on their head.

Sometimes the tree is important, sometimes the person, sometimes the bat.

"Three facts, perceived in the light of dawn while attending a dull meeting". By Soapy Sam.

[Taffer]

I am more interested in the practical than mental masturbation.

:D

Oh, and:

* Taffer sighs at this thread.

[Chunol]

My contribution consists in saying that faith in Buddhism is not supposed to be blind faith but in fact it is blind faith.

Faith is an invention of Gautama consisting in taking the teachings of Gautama which are essentially guessworks on the ultimate destiny of man and the universe.


Yrreg[/QUOTE]


Hi Yrreg,
Here is my take on this.

Buddhism, as far as I can tell, is a method not a religion in the sense that modern Christianity, Judaism, or Islam are considered religions.

The method is a dialogue.
A dialogue is a discussion between 2 people.
The first person has a problem and brings it to the second person for help.
The second person will then attempt to help the first in trying to understand the truth of the problem/suffering, the cause of the problem/suffering and the cessation of the problem/suffering.
So, the dialogue is about suffering, pain, confusion, or any kind of problem.

So far the only belief involved is the first person’s belief that he/she has a problem and they think that the second person may be able to help them.

If you do not have a problem you don’t need to become involved in the dialogue (Buddhism).
If you have a problem and the dialogue fixes it, why would you want to hang around for the rest of your life? If your problem is fixed, go live your life.

If you enter the dialogue and cannot seem to understand the truth of your suffering, the cause of your suffering or the way to the cessation of your suffering, yet you feel that the dialogue is helpful to you, then while you are still trying to understand, at least try to follow the N8F Path to your best ability.

The Nobel Eightfold Path (the 4th Nobel Truth), as presented to those still trying to understand, are suggestions. They describe the kind of life that someone who understands the truth of suffering, the cause of suffering and the cessation of suffering would live.
So, for those who are still trying to understand, if they follow the 8F Path, they will at least be good neighbors and friends, decent human beings while they are going about looking for their answer/understanding.

The problem is that they are still looking for something and it is possible for them to start to think that following the 8F Path will lead them to their goal. If they make this mistake than following the 8F Path becomes their goal.
What started out as an investigation into suffering has been replaced by an adherence to a set of guidelines.

On the other hand, those who do understand, those who “got it” act the way they do out of a deep seated conviction of their understanding of their relationship to themselves, others and the rest of the cosmos. They have no choice but to act the way they do. If they had never heard of the N8F Path they would still act the same way.


Charlie

[Dancing David]

I don't know if the Pali Canon is the true teachings of the original Gautama Buddha, but that doesn't matter. Even if it was proved that Gautama Buddha never existed, I still like, and follow, the teachings attributed to him.



No. Not at all. There's no evidence of 'past Buddhas' and although I like the Bodhisattva ideal, I don't believe there is such a thing. The title and idea of arhant has gathered a lot of crap in the last millenia, but I believe in the original meaning, someone who has completely understood the four noble truths.



Yes.



Yes.

Hope that answered what this 'western' Buddhist believes, Yrreg. I can't speak for other Buddhists.


Seconded! Shall someone suggest a vote? ;)

[Dancing David]

Some sit under a tree and find the secrets of the universe.
Some sit under a tree and discover enlightenment.
Some sit under a tree and get bat droppings on their head.

Sometimes the tree is important, sometimes the person, sometimes the bat.

"Three facts, perceived in the light of dawn while attending a dull meeting". By Soapy Sam.

Or as allegedly happened to the buddha:

'While he sat in meditation under the bo-tree the sun shone down upon his head. The Snail King knowing that the buddha had come to free them from the suffering of thier shells decided to shade his head. And so he ordered the Snail Horde to the slime thier way up to the top of the buddha's head to sheild him from the sun. This is the source of the right turning knobs upon the buddha's head in iconography."

[Dancing David]

But if you want to engage in a more challenging search, find out how the Four Noble Truths evolved and also the Noble Eightfold Path; this requires that you go into text history and text criticism: looking for the earliest manuscripts or manuscript fragments of these materials, and determining among various succeeding historical texts what sources earlier to Buddhism are incorporated in them.

Also try to describe the kind of people who in a way codified what you believe or accept to be useful doctrines and observances, useful on their own intrinsic merits even without attribution to an enlightened person like Gautama the acclaimed Buddha of traditional Buddhist societies, although you cannot name specific persons, like for example, not Gautama the traditional Buddha par none.


As has been discussed before with you, there is an oral tradition that became codified four hundred years after the life of the buddha. So like Lao Tzu, Jain, Christ, Moshesh and Omeru there are only the tradition passed down through an oral history and codified at a later date. Thems the facts. Unlike Muhammed and Confucius there are no extant wrintings from the time period of those people.

Many buddhist web sites discuss this an lenth and even discuss the editing of the Pali Canon, and the same is true of most of the buddhists text. The text itself may contain various erratta and myth insterted in at the time of the origination or later (such as the birth of buddha from his mother's side after the inception by the white elephant, christ's virgin birth, lao tzu living 900 years) yet their is earnest discussion of this in many places.

[yrreg]

Thanks everyone for your participation.

As I said time and again, I am doing this posting activity here and also elsewhere in other forums for amusement, mental pastime, and a hobby of research, enriching to my mind and heart.

Now on your part, those who are Buddhists here or Buddhism sympathizers here I presume are telling me what they know and understand of Buddhism, the kind that they hold to and practice. Those of you who are not Buddhists or not Buddhism sympathizers I guess are like myself, into amusement, mental pastime, and a hobby of reading something interesting and enriching to your mind and heart.

My conclusions so far after my own readings outside forums and from messages of forum members here and elsewhere are the following:

1. Buddhism is an interesting system of thought and feeling and behavior consequent upon the thought and feeling.

2. It is useful to people who claim to have derived benefits from Buddhism.

3. I personally don't find in it anything useful and of benefit which I might want to avail myself of, which I do not find outside Buddhism and find it better, quicker, and easier, and more to my tastes as a critical thinker and prober of anything and everything I come across in life.

4. I continue to engage in this amusement of reading and investigating Buddhism for a mental pastime and a hobby of research, because it is good entertainment and most enjoyable at the same time safe and thrifty in terms of time and effort and cost.

------------------------------

I like to hear from Buddhists and Buddhism sympathizers that a lot of the most proprietary thoughts in Buddhism are a-rational, meaning immune to rational analysis as to exhibit logic, if not irrational altogether, but they profess these thoughts in verbal utterances just the same, and harbor feelings which they maintain to be consequential from these thoughts, and also comport themselves in life with the intention of supposedly putting into action those thoughts and those feelings.

And that is also why I find them so interesting and amusing and a good object of my hobby of research, the thoughts, the feelings, and the acts of Buddhists qua Buddhists and their verbal utterances in defense, proof, and explanation of all their thoughts, feelings, and acts in pursuit of Buddhism.

So, if Buddhists here can laugh with me out of sheer amusement and mental enjoyment and amazement from my viewing of Buddhism as in a circus, then I will know that they have their feet on solid earth notwithstanding their Buddhism.

=================

I experience some qualms of conscience for acting uncharitably on a tinge of anger against Buddhism the system and also against Buddhists, for which the founders and power figures in E-Sangha claimed that I am disparaging Buddha, Buddhism, and Buddhists -- and banned me [sorry for the self-commiseration, one example of suffering in Buddhism I dare say, correctly?]

And I am mildly disturbed that the peccadillo will come back to me by way of karma. But when I examine why I am angry at Buddhism and Buddhists, I realize that for the first because it is such a depressing system of a life philosophy and world-view, for the second because I am flabbergasted how people can do this to themselves, taking up with Buddhism. Well, I guess I have to rue my anger when karma gets to me.


I used to laugh a lot at this point, like hahahahaaaaaaaaaaaaaa, specially in one forum dedicated to immortality on earth, also with a good number of Buddhists; but perhaps contacts with Buddhism and Buddhists have changed my habit of laughing.

Two days earlier I came across someone in the SciForums also laughing like myself in his thread on the self in science and in philosophy, must be some clone of Yrreg. Yes, I signed up for SciForums and hope to get feedbacks from the scientifically minded folks there about Buddhism, with my first thread there on "Scientific materials in Buddhism”in that board of Science and Society. No, no one has called me troll, at least not yet.


Yrreg

[yrreg]

Allow me to present to everyone a guest posting from one Yrreg2, he's the guy who looks back at me when I look at myself in the mirror.

Title of Thread Buddhism for earthworms (http://www.skepticforum.com/viewtopic.php?p=94263&sid=c6e419ddd02a53e3987ce9bb31db847e#94263)

Posted: Sat Mar 03, 2007 5:10 am Download Post (http://www.skepticforum.com/viewtopic.php?download=92439&t=6576) Post subject: Let's go back to the earthworms.

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One thing good about Buddhism is its notice of animals; and some Buddhists don't eat animals but limit themselves to vegetables not for health reasons but for reverence to fellow humans who happen to be animals in their actual rebirths.

I once had a talk with a Buddhist convert, I mean a guy who did not know nothing about Buddhism but had contacts with Buddhists and got converted to Buddhism, of the school or group that do not eat animals, which I seem to have the impression that it is the biggest group.

This guy was an accountant and got a good college education where he knew about the phenomenon of life and its diversity and its origin, and the distinction between inanimate things and animate things of which life things are all representatives.

He told me that Buddhists do not eat animals out of reverence to life, for the animals you eat are humans who happen to be animals in their present rebirths. "That makes sense," I told him.

I asked him surely he knows that plants which Buddhists his kind of use for food are also life forms, they do everything humans do, even sex. He said yes. Now listen to this, he explained to me why they could and should eat plants:

"...because all sentient life must eat to live or stay alive while working for enlightenment to get to Nirvana; now, plant life forms are not sentient life, besides they don't mind being used by humans for food, in addition they consider it an honor to be used for food by humans."

With that answer from him about food, I decided to change the subject of our conversation out of courtesy to him, for I did not want to cause any dismay to him should I persist in my inquiry on Buddhist food discipline.

But in my mind I wanted to bring up to the surface of his conscious self erh nonself two points: (1) How can he be sure that plants being life forms are not sentient life? (2) Who is he or Buddhists to presume that plants welcome their recipiency of the honor given to them in being eaten for food by Buddhist sentient beings.


I once joined the Esangha Buddhist Forum but got banned after one of their founders noticed that I was consistently disputing the Buddha and Buddhist beliefs and observances, and according to him disparaging them. He wanted me to stop my disputation and to him disparagement of Buddhism, in a private mail. I told him I was doing criticism of Buddhism and he should be glad that I was doing him and Buddhists in general the service of criticism, so that they could work out better explanations for their world-view.

No, he was not convinced that Buddhists could use my service, and I was not deterred by his warning to cease and desist from criticizing, or according to him disparaging Buddhism. So with my next posting in the similar critical vein, he banned me and cautioned me against trying to register again in another name, because they knew where I was posting from. [No, I didn't try to register again, not because they knew where I was posting from, but because I respect their right not be have to read my critical posts on Buddhism.]

The whole point of this rumination is that Buddhists and all religious people should know that religion is a matter of the heart and not a matter of the mind, like being in love; and like being in love one must be ready to be told that one is behaving not only blindly but also deafly in terms of one's faculty of reason and logic.

And one must be disposed to assure oneself and the critic that nonetheless for being blind and deaf one feels swell, and that is the whole thing with religion, the swell feeling; and one must be able and enjoy it too, to laugh with the critic.


So, if Buddhists there be here who are really convinced about your Buddhism, then you should be able to read all kinds of critical observations of Buddhism and laugh with the critic. You can have the last laugh, that for not being Buddhists or not having any religion critics are not enjoying the swell feeling of religion.


About the earthworms, I think they are in de facto Nirvana: they live in so congested quarters but they don't end up eating each other or killing each other for food and space -- correct me if I am wrong.




Hope you guys are entertained, including the Buddhists and Buddhism sympathizers here.


Yrreg

[Dancing David]

3. I personally don't find in it anything useful and of benefit which I might want to avail myself of, which I do not find outside Buddhism and find it better, quicker, and easier, and more to my tastes as a critical thinker and prober of anything and everything I come across in life.



Now this is amusing!

How can you say that you haven't found anything of use in buddhism, when you aren't even aware of what constitutes the eight fold path? You have been on this board for at least a year if not much longer discussing your views of buddhism, and then just two weeks ago in a discussion with username, you admitted that you weren't even aware of what 'right/correct/healthy speech' was! So I would argue that you demonstrated you had not even looked into what the eightfold path entails.

So how can you say the above statement #3?

Secondly, you have never stated where you have found anything that you use that would replace the tenants of buddhism as enumerated in EFP. You have engaged in some vauge hand waving and some very misinformed comments about how you think it would work.

So here is an idea, why not look at the EFP, and then show us where you have found something specific to use in each of the eight paths that is 'better' than the EFP?

You are just fighting the straw bogey man that you construct everyday.

In the discussion with username you demonstrated that you didn't actualy know what the EFP is. And that is the heart of the buddha's teaching.

Hmmm?

Then your statement number three would make more sense. BTW your claim that each of the paths of the eight fold path were preceded in buddhism by other cultures and systems still hasn't be substantiated by you.(You made that claim very early on, so it is very apparent that you just make assertions and bold proclamations without any data or evidence. That makes you a demagoge not a sceptic.)

[Hawk one]

The most important hallmark of the Wikipedia is its fundamental feature of being founded on neutral points of views.

Anyone can edit any article there on condition that he is doing a NPOV contribution to a topic.

And that is why Wikipedia is so damn unreliable. Because what it should have had as a fundamental feature would be the foundation to always get the facts as straight as possible.

And facts are only "neutral" in that it doesn't care. But there are many facts out there that will nevertheless make people go nuts. Especially the pages about psychics suffer from this, because too many people won't realise that, say, Sylvia Browne -is- a fraud, and that's a fact. Therefore, they'll try to make the Wiki entry look "neutral", which is of course only making it less so.

And that's pretty much why nobody in their right minds will use Wiki as a source except for purely trivial matter, such as movies and video games and whatnot. It tends to usually be pretty good for that kind of stuff.

And it looks pretty much that you're doing this with your attempts to spread false and not the least uninformed opinions of buddhism, ignorant of even the most basic consepts, such as what the 8-fold path actually is.

[Joe Random]

...
And that's pretty much why nobody in their right minds will use Wiki as a source except for purely trivial matter, such as movies and video games and whatnot. It tends to usually be pretty good for that kind of stuff.
...

<derail>
Although it was interesting to see Stephen Colbert indirectly mess up the ecology of Middle Earth as reported by Wikipedia : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:M%C3%BBmak#Population
</derail>

We now return you to yrreg's escape from reality, already in progress ...

[Loss Leader]

Yrreg2, the guy who looks back at me when I look at myself in the mirror, tells me that food is an example of intrinsic worth to mankind.

I asked him to explain, and here is his explanation:

Sigh. I can take almost anything but that talking about himself in the third person has to be the most annoying quirk I have ever encountered. And then I really lose it when he compliments himself about how gracious and perceptive he is.

Maybe I should take up Buddhism and learn to just accept that some people are loons.