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David McGavock

Buddhism in a Nutshell: The Four Seals of Dharma - 0 views

www.lionsroar.com/ism-nutshell-four-seals-dharma

Buddhism meditation mindfulness seals

shared by David McGavock on 04 Mar 16 - No Cached
  • So what is the particular view that Buddhists try to get used to? Buddhism is distinguished by four characteristics, or “seals.” Actually, if all these four seals are found in a path or a philosophy, it doesn’t matter whether you call it Buddhist or not.
  • Therefore, these four characteristics are called “the Four Seals of Dharma.” They are: All compounded things are impermanent. All emotions are painful. This is something that only Buddhists would talk about. Many religions worship things like love with celebration and songs. Buddhists think, “This is all suffering.” All phenomena are empty; they are without inherent existence. This is actually the ultimate view of Buddhism; the other three are grounded on this third seal. The fourth seal is that nirvana is beyond extremes.
  • The First Seal: All Compounded Things are Impermanent
  • ...19 more annotations...
  • Delusion arises when we don’t acknowledge that all compounded things are impermanent.
  • realize this truth, deep down and not just intellectually
  • The Second Seal: All Emotions are Painful The Tibetan word for emotion in this context is zagche, which means “contaminated” or “stained,” in the sense of being permeated by confusion or duality.
  • how are we to understand duality?
  • It is subject and object: ourselves on the one hand and our experience on the other.
  • The dualistic mind creates a lot of expectations—a lot of hope, a lot of fear.
  • Another Buddhist way of explaining this is to say that when a big pain becomes smaller, we call it pleasure.
  • This is why Buddhists conclude that all emotions are painful. It is because they are impermanent and dualistic that they are uncertain and always accompanied by hopes and fears.
  • The Fourth Seal: Nirvana is Beyond Extremes
  • To hold that an object is something external is ignorance
  • Put very simply, when we talk about emptiness, we mean that the way things appear is not the way they actually are.
  • The Three Turnings of the Wheel
  • can be summed up in a single phrase: “Mind; there is no mind; mind is luminosity.”
  • A correct understanding of emptiness leads us to see how things are related, and how we are responsible for our world.
  • When I’m talking about emptiness, everything that I’m saying has to do with this “image” emptiness. I can’t show you real emptiness but I can tell you why things don’t exist inherently.
  • Buddhists define a phenomenon as something with characteristics, and as an object that is conceived by a subject.
  • In many philosophies or religions, the final goal is something that you can hold on to and keep. The final goal is the only thing that truly exists. But nirvana is not fabricated, so it is not something to be held on to. It is referred to as “beyond extremes.”
  • If, when you try to abandon or transform attachment to your own experiences, you don’t understand these four seals, you end up regarding the contents of your mind as the manifestations of something evil, diabolical and bad.
  • When you have a clear understanding of these four seals as the ground of your practice, you will feel comfortable no matter what happens to you. As long as you have these four as your view, nothing can go wrong. Whoever holds these four, in their heart, or in their head, and contemplates them, is a Buddhist. There is no need for such a person even to be called a Buddhist. He or she is by definition a follower of the Buddha.
  • David McGavock on 04 Mar 16
     
    ""Buddhism is distinguished by four characteristics, or 'seals.' If all these four seals are found in a path or a philosophy, it can be considered the path of the Buddha.""
Jass Brown

A science related view of rebirth within Buddhist philosophy - 1 views

The ray of light that never lands: non-supernatural views of rebirth. http://www.metta-physics.com/2011/06/the-ray-of-light-that-never-lands-non-supernatural-views-of-rebirth/

Buddhism Death Nordic Philosophy Rebirth

started by Jass Brown on 23 Jun 11 no follow-up yet
avivajazz jazzaviva

An Information Integration Theory of Consciousness - 3 views

www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi

consciousness mindfulness mind philosophy psychology psychiatry awareness

shared by avivajazz jazzaviva on 16 Sep 09 - Cached
  • avivajazz jazzaviva on 16 Sep 09
     
    An Information Integration Theory of Consciousness
David McGavock

Buddha's Four Noble Truths - Lion's Roar - 0 views

www.lionsroar.com/buddhas-four-noble-truths

shared by David McGavock on 10 Mar 16 - No Cached
  • He gave this teaching to his first five monk-disciples at the Deer Park, now known as Saranath, near Varanasi in India.
  • In the Uttaratantra, an important Mahayana text on buddhanature, it is said: As it is necessary to diagnose the sickness, to abandon its causes, to attain the happiness of good health and to apply medicine for it;The suffering and its cause as well as its cessation and the path of (cessation)Should be recognized, abandoned, attained, and applied.
  • The Character of the World: The Noble Truth of Suffering
  • ...38 more annotations...
  • For us, deep down in our mind, there is a habit that keeps us from seeing, let alone accepting, our own true character: the suffering, changing, impermanent and dying character of our life.
  • Buddhism first asks us not only to see the momentary and suffering character of the world, but also to have tolerance in accepting suffering as natural and not negative.
  • However, Buddhism also believes that, while the true character of the samsaric world is suffering, how the suffering character of phenomena affects us depends on our way of perceiving and feeling it.
  • three root sufferings of living beings: ordinary suffering, suffering produced by change, and the pervasive suffering of conditioning.
  • According to Buddhism, there are eight major sufferings
  • four major experiences of suffering of human life: the suffering in the process of taking birth, of old age, of sickness, and of dying and death.
  • accompanied by four secondary sufferings of human life: the sufferings of worry about facing harsh situations, about separation from loved ones and desirable things, about not achieving what one wishes, and about encountering unwanted situations.
  • Karma and Emotional Afflictions: The Noble Truth of the Cause of Suffering
  • What is the noble truth of the source of suffering? It is craving [which produces] re-existence [as a being in samsara], and which is accompanied by passionate desire, and which is total delight with [or attachment to] this and that. —The Buddha
  • Every action we perform with our mind, or with body or speech inspired by mind, formulates and produces a commensurate effect on our future.
  • Tilopa instructs his disciple Naropa: Appearances [of phenomena] do not bind you [to samsara] but attachment [to them] does. So, Naropa, cut off attachment.
  • Buddhahood: The Noble Truth of the Cessation of Suffering
  • What is the noble truth of the cessation of suffering? It is the total abandonment, renunciation, purification and exhaustion of the craving [which produces] the re-existence, and which is accompanied by passionate desire, and which is total delight in this and that. It is the complete freedom from, cessation of, pacification of and termination of desire. —The Buddha
  • f nirvana is described in affirming or positive terms, since we are using conventional words connected with certain conceptual views, we will probably grasp a concept associated with them and reaffirm our usual conceptualization, and that will be wrong. If we describe nirvana in such terms as uncompounded and the cessation of passion, which are beyond the ordinary norm, there will be less danger of misleading people, and they might pause and think more.
  • According to Mahayanists, pursuing various trainings for realizing buddhahood, the true nature of our own mind, is the path.
  • Through this path we reach the perfection of training, which is the realization of the ultimate nature and the cessation of the cycle of samsara. It is not that we are achieving something new or that we are returning to a previous state. It is awakening or realizing what actually we have always been by uncovering the layer of conceptual and emotional traces.
  • The Noble Truth of the Path to the Cessation of Suffering
  • What is the path that leads to the cessation of suffering? It is the Noble Eightfold Path, which consists of right view, right thought, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness and right contemplation. —The Buddha
  • In Buddhism there are hundreds of different paths of training to reach the fully enlightened state, buddhahood. But whatever technique of training is given in the teachings, it has to be based on the view of the “four emblems” of Buddhism. If the teaching is based on and propagates these principles, whatever techniques are presented, it is the teaching of Buddhism.
  • The view of the “four emblems” of Buddhism is: all compounded phenomena are impermanent; all contaminated things are miserable; all phenomena are selfless (voidness); and nirvana, the goal, is peace.
  • The Theravada Path
  • This vehicle relies on the three divisions of scripture known as “the three baskets.”
  • vinaya, the code of moral discipline for the monks, nuns and lay devotees;
  • sutra, the discourses on various spiritual trainings; and abhidharma, the scriptures on wisdom, philosophy and psychology
  • One of the main emphases of Theravadins is on physical discipline, such as living in solitude and leading a celibate life in order to avoid the circumstances that cause emotional afflictions and evil deeds to arise in one’s mind.
  • The Mahayana Path
  • emphasis on developing great compassion—the aspiration and dedication to take responsibility for others’ happiness and to lead all beings to the attainment of buddhahood without the slightest self-interest.
  • their main emphasis is on the training of the mind. By training the pilot-like mind on the right path, they bring the vehicle-like speech and body onto the right path.
  • They do not try to avoid the sources of emotional afflictions but destroy them by using antidotes such as compassion for anger, knowledge of the impermanent character of phenomena for attachment, and the wisdom of realizing the nature of phenomena as the union of voidness and interdependent arising for ignorance.
  • the two ways of developing the enlightened mind.
  • develop the “aspiring enlightened mind.” In this training one generates love, compassion, joy and equanimity toward all beings by seeing and understanding them as one’s mother.
  • The second training is to put the “enlightened mind into practice” by following the six perfections (Skt. paramitas).
  • The Tantric Path
  • The unique character of the training of tantric Buddhism is pure perception. In it one sees and actualizes all as the buddha-realms. One sees, believes and experiences that all appearances are the Buddhas and their pure land, all sounds are the pure sound or speech of the Buddhas, and all thoughts are the wisdom mind of the Buddhas.
  • At the beginning of the tantric path, when the disciple is ready, the master initiates him or her into the training. At the time of initiation, the disciples experience the true nature, or at least glimpse the wisdom of their mind and the wisdom energies of their consciousnesses, mental events and physical elements.
  • After that the disciple goes through the training of the “two stages.”
  • development stage, one sees, visualizes and actualizes the universe as the Buddhas and their pure lands.
  • the perfection stage, by using the powers of the channels, energies and essence of one’s vajra-body, one attains and perfects the union of great bliss and voidness.
  • David McGavock on 10 Mar 16
     
    "Tulku Thondup on the four simple and practical statements that encompass the entire Buddhist path, the Buddha's Four Noble Truths."
Michael Tebbano

Essentials of Buddhism - core concepts - 12 views

www.buddhaweb.org

buddhism zen philosophy meditation Spiritual

shared by Michael Tebbano on 28 Sep 09 - Cached
patrickzeis liked it
  • dhruvthukral on 11 Jun 14
     
    Keep on sharing about buddhism... wanna hear more..thanq http://lifeofnichiren.com
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