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Nirvana = Heaven?

In my practice my aim is purely to be contented to live now and that would be my idea of Nirvana but reading around the vast subject that is Buddhism and I'm reading about different paths that treat it like the Christian Heaven. A place where believers would go upon their death, practices where if a certain name is chanted regularly they would go to certain realms.

Now for me happines is now, being with my partner and seeing my loved ones but excisting in an afterlife for eternity without them (none of them are Buddhists so wouldn't be going) this would be as far from Nirvana as it could possibly be.
SilouanEnriqueSpain

Comments

  • I think heaven is where devas live in Buddhism. The problem is that it is impermanent and it is too pleasurable to practice dharma. In the human realm there is always suffering to remind you. When a deva is dying and it's radiant raiment is fading and crumbling there can be terrible suffering because they did not practice and they do not know what karma will ripen at death.

    There is also a 'pureland' where all the karma to practice dharma sends you to a lifetime where it is ideal to practice dharma. For example you might be a natural at meditation and renunciation and find a qualified teacher.
  • SilouanSilouan Veteran
    edited March 2013
    Sounds like a description of the experience of heaven to me. Right here and now when time and eternity fall away.
  • federicafederica Seeker of the clear blue sky... Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubt Moderator

    In my practice my aim is purely to be contented to live now and that would be my idea of Nirvana but reading around the vast subject that is Buddhism and I'm reading about different paths that treat it like the Christian Heaven. A place where believers would go upon their death, practices where if a certain name is chanted regularly they would go to certain realms.

    Now for me happines is now, being with my partner and seeing my loved ones but excisting in an afterlife for eternity without them (none of them are Buddhists so wouldn't be going) this would be as far from Nirvana as it could possibly be.

    It's not a 'where', it's a 'what'.
    riverflow
  • TakuanTakuan Veteran

    A place where believers would go upon their death, practices where if a certain name is chanted regularly they would go to certain realms.

    I assume you're talking about Pure Land. If so, it should be made clear that the Pure Land people go to after death in the nianfo traditions is a buddha field, not Nirvana. Nirvana is still the goal of Pure Land practice, it just employs a different method.

    If you are making this statement about Pure Land, then I suggest reading up on the theory behind the practice. By this, I mean reading works by historical scholars like Shan-tao and Tan-luan. You might also want to consider reading a modern commentary, such as "River of Fire, River of Water" by Taitetsu Unno, to get a more up to date idea of the practice. Finally, I suggest reading the Contemplation/Amitayurdhyana Sutra which goes into great detail about the effects of a variety of Pure Land practices, including name recitation.




  • ZeroZero Veteran


    Now for me happines is now, being with my partner and seeing my loved ones but excisting in an afterlife for eternity without them (none of them are Buddhists so wouldn't be going) this would be as far from Nirvana as it could possibly be.

    That's transposing human values to a non-human state.

    For example, I am a collection of atoms say, some come and go - my consciousness doesnt acknowledge a sense of loss towards my atoms.

    I'm with you though that if happiness is dependant on an afterlife then this may be quite far from a nirvana.
  • misecmisc1misecmisc1 I am a Hindu India Veteran
    edited March 2013
    Nirvana is the cessation of all conditioned processes.
    chela
  • JeffreyJeffrey Veteran
    edited March 2013
    Even if there is no reincarnation it still doesn't hurt your practice, and may help it to believe. A Buddhist said 'my practice is as vast as the sky, but I respect karma like finely ground grains'. And seeing as there is no proof for or against it is win win as there very well may be continuation of your Mind.
  • DakiniDakini Veteran
    Nirvana doesn't necessarily imply rebirth. Nirvana/Enlightenment/Liberation is an individual achievement that's the result of what you make of this lifetime. Whether other lifetimes preceded that and contributed to the effort is a matter of belief/faith.
  • riverflowriverflow Veteran
    edited March 2013
    Barbara O'Brien on the difference between reincarnation and rebirth:
    Would you be surprised if I told you that reincarnation is not a Buddhist teaching? If so, be surprised -- it isn't.

    "Reincarnation" normally is understood to be the transmigration of a soul to another body after death. There is no such teaching in Buddhism. One of the most fundamental doctrines of Buddhism is anatta, or anatman -- no soul or no self. There is no permanent essence of an individual self that survives death.

    However, Buddhists often speak of "rebirth." If there is no soul or permanent self, what is it that is "reborn"?
    More HERE.
  • BhikkhuJayasaraBhikkhuJayasara Bhikkhu Veteran
    riverflow said:

    Barbara O'Brien on the difference between reincarnation and rebirth:

    Would you be surprised if I told you that reincarnation is not a Buddhist teaching? If so, be surprised -- it isn't.

    "Reincarnation" normally is understood to be the transmigration of a soul to another body after death. There is no such teaching in Buddhism. One of the most fundamental doctrines of Buddhism is anatta, or anatman -- no soul or no self. There is no permanent essence of an individual self that survives death.

    However, Buddhists often speak of "rebirth." If there is no soul or permanent self, what is it that is "reborn"?
    More HERE.

    the term used in the Pali translations and in Theravada is "becoming" or "re-becoming", not even rebirth. Thanks for posting this so more people understand.
    riverflowInvincible_summer
  • Meditation techniques are easy to practise because they have a form. Awareness is harder because it has no form. Buddhism

    Post from Buddhism now on facebook
  • The highest happiness is Nibbana [Nibbanam paramam sukham]. Venerable Sariputta, as recorded in the Anguttara Nikaya, says in one of his dialogues: “This nibbana is happiness” [sukham idam avuso nibbanam]. One of the listening monks then asked: “Friend Sariputta, what is then here the happiness that is not felt in this [nibbana]?” [kim pan avuso Sariputta sukham, yad natti vedayitam ti?"] Answering this question Sariputta said: “That very absence of feeling is happiness here.” [etad eva khv avuso sukham, yad ettha natthi vedayitam.]

    http://www.bhavanasociety.org/resource/buddhist_concept_of_happiness/
  • CinorjerCinorjer Veteran
    edited March 2013
    I suspect most Buddhists put as much thought into Nirvana as most Christians do Heaven. Perfect bodies but we don't need them anymore to eat or work, streets of gold in a place where gold is worthless, nothing to do but hang out with our loved ones (at least the ones who didn't end up in Hell) for eternity? Try to put yourself in that situation and it quickly becomes ludicrous, if not torture in its own right.

    In the same way, Nirvana both classically described and in popular thought is "nothingness" where you go to after death if you've graduated from the prison of karma and rebirth. There is no "self" to experience anything, just a big amorphous nothing. It's the same as being unconscious and might as well be simple extinction as far as we are concerned, and that's a good thing, because without the extinction of our conscious selves what's described is sensory deprivation and again would quickly become torture.

    Nirvana as a concept was dragged along into Buddhism, like the concept of karma and reincarnation or rebirth, from the religion of India where Buddhism originated and given a new twist in Buddha's dharma. Once you realize there is no "you" to be reincarnated or "you" to escape from being reincarnated, then Nirvana also stops being a goal out there.
    riverflowlobsterrobot
  • 'To eliminate the perception of nirvana is to liberate all beings.' ~ Surangama Sutra
  • Thank you for all your replies. As for the whole reincarnation business I consider it more along the atomic level. The atoms that we're made up were once part of dust in space, we bacame part of stars and planets, these atoms were then scattered throughout the universe. One day we will die and over thousands of years our bodies will decompose and the material we're made up from will will one day be re-used in other ways. Eventually this planet and our sun will be destroyed and those atoms will move on through the universe and so on.

    I'm just going though life trying to live my life in the right way, trying to make the best of now and understand things, if there's something else at the end of it I'll try and understand that and try to enjoy that version of now.
    lobster
  • DairyLamaDairyLama Veteran Veteran
    Cinorjer said:

    In the same way, Nirvana both classically described and in popular thought is "nothingness" where you go to after death if you've graduated from the prison of karma and rebirth. ....Nirvana as a concept was dragged along into Buddhism, like the concept of karma and reincarnation or rebirth, from the religion of India where Buddhism originated and given a new twist in Buddha's dharma.

    Nirvana is the goal of Buddhist practice and therefore central, not something "dragged along" into Buddhism. And classically Nirvana is described as a here-and-now liberation from suffering.
    Similarly karma and rebirth are central to Buddhist teaching, and the idea that they were "dragged in" is entirely speculative and not supported by the suttas.
    stavros388
  • DairyLamaDairyLama Veteran Veteran
    Dakini said:

    Nirvana doesn't necessarily imply rebirth.

    Though traditionally it means the end of rebirth.

  • DairyLamaDairyLama Veteran Veteran
    Jayantha said:

    the term used in the Pali translations and in Theravada is "becoming" or "re-becoming", not even rebirth.

    According to the teaching of dependent origination bhava ( the process of becoming in the 3 realms ) leads to jati ( physical birth ). Because it's a cyclical process people say "rebirth" as a shorthand.
  • Cinorjer said:

    In the same way, Nirvana both classically described and in popular thought is "nothingness" where you go to after death if you've graduated from the prison of karma and rebirth. ....Nirvana as a concept was dragged along into Buddhism, like the concept of karma and reincarnation or rebirth, from the religion of India where Buddhism originated and given a new twist in Buddha's dharma.

    Nirvana is the goal of Buddhist practice and therefore central, not something "dragged along" into Buddhism. And classically Nirvana is described as a here-and-now liberation from suffering.
    Similarly karma and rebirth are central to Buddhist teaching, and the idea that they were "dragged in" is entirely speculative and not supported by the suttas.
    That is the twist given to it by Buddhism, yes. As for my choice of words about "dragging in", Buddhism did not invent the term or concept of Nirvana, or karma, or invent reincarnation. The reason Nirvana is spoken of as a place or realm is that most people continue to think of it in that terms, no matter what fine philosophical distinction a Buddhist scholar may apply.

    I would say that Nirvana might be the stated goal of the monks in your temple, but it's certainly not the goal of other schools or the vast majority of lay Buddhists. If Nirvana is the end-all of Buddhism, then it's a poor religion because almost all of the Buddhists in the world are destined to fail. At least Christianity offers the surity of Heaven for all believers. How many Buddhists in your Sangha have achieved Nirvana lately? Why would I want to get involved in a religion where only the few dedicated monks at the top have a chance of getting the final reward?

    So for a lot of us, the goal is instead realizing our Buddha-nature or Clear Mind, and we don't use the term Nirvana. As described by the old monks, Nirvana is an altered and permanently elevated state of consciousness, a superhuman condition. I reject that picture. Buddha-nature is your ordinary mind. It is a clear mind seeing the correct situation.
    vinlynVastmind
  • misecmisc1misecmisc1 I am a Hindu India Veteran
    edited March 2013
    Cinorjer said:

    So for a lot of us, the goal is instead realizing our Buddha-nature or Clear Mind, and we don't use the term Nirvana. As described by the old monks, Nirvana is an altered and permanently elevated state of consciousness, a superhuman condition. I reject that picture. Buddha-nature is your ordinary mind. It is a clear mind seeing the correct situation.

    @Cinorjer: Nirvana is not a state of consciousness, as Buddha taught, Nirvana is the cessation of all suffering - in a way, the unconditioned - cessation of all conditioned processes.

    regarding Buddha-nature as far as i understand, as per Tibetian Buddhism, Buddha-nature is the inherent nature of our mind - but Buddha-nature is not ordinary mind. The ordinary mind is covered with avijja or avidya or ignorance. When this ignorance is removed with panna or pragya or wisdom, then the true nature of the mind comes shining forth, that is our Buddha-nature or our Buddhahood or our plain consciousness inside us(different words indicating the same thing).
    Jeffrey
  • vinlynvinlyn Colorado...for now Veteran
    Cinorjer said:

    Cinorjer said:

    In the same way, Nirvana both classically described and in popular thought is "nothingness" where you go to after death if you've graduated from the prison of karma and rebirth. ....Nirvana as a concept was dragged along into Buddhism, like the concept of karma and reincarnation or rebirth, from the religion of India where Buddhism originated and given a new twist in Buddha's dharma.

    Nirvana is the goal of Buddhist practice and therefore central, not something "dragged along" into Buddhism. And classically Nirvana is described as a here-and-now liberation from suffering.
    Similarly karma and rebirth are central to Buddhist teaching, and the idea that they were "dragged in" is entirely speculative and not supported by the suttas.
    That is the twist given to it by Buddhism, yes. As for my choice of words about "dragging in", Buddhism did not invent the term or concept of Nirvana, or karma, or invent reincarnation. The reason Nirvana is spoken of as a place or realm is that most people continue to think of it in that terms, no matter what fine philosophical distinction a Buddhist scholar may apply.

    I would say that Nirvana might be the stated goal of the monks in your temple, but it's certainly not the goal of other schools or the vast majority of lay Buddhists. If Nirvana is the end-all of Buddhism, then it's a poor religion because almost all of the Buddhists in the world are destined to fail. At least Christianity offers the surity of Heaven for all believers. How many Buddhists in your Sangha have achieved Nirvana lately? Why would I want to get involved in a religion where only the few dedicated monks at the top have a chance of getting the final reward?

    So for a lot of us, the goal is instead realizing our Buddha-nature or Clear Mind, and we don't use the term Nirvana. As described by the old monks, Nirvana is an altered and permanently elevated state of consciousness, a superhuman condition. I reject that picture. Buddha-nature is your ordinary mind. It is a clear mind seeing the correct situation.
    Excellent post, and a way of looking at "Buddhist thought" that I really hadn't considered before.

    Now I'm going to say something, and I want to SHOUT OUT from the beginning that no one should assume I'm talking about them or any specific person here. I think there are a number of people in our forum who talk a good game, but who don't remotely lead the life they espouse on here, because if they did they'd be a monk living alone in some forest over in Southeast Asia, or in a hut in the Himalayas. I'm not saying they're bad people at all, although they may be a bit deluded about the life they actually live, and they may take themselves a little too seriously.

  • Cinorjer said:

    So for a lot of us, the goal is instead realizing our Buddha-nature or Clear Mind, and we don't use the term Nirvana. As described by the old monks, Nirvana is an altered and permanently elevated state of consciousness, a superhuman condition. I reject that picture. Buddha-nature is your ordinary mind. It is a clear mind seeing the correct situation.

    @Cinorjer: Nirvana is not a state of consciousness, as Buddha taught, Nirvana is the cessation of all suffering - in a way, the unconditioned - cessation of all conditioned processes.

    regarding Buddha-nature as far as i understand, as per Tibetian Buddhism, Buddha-nature is the inherent nature of our mind - but Buddha-nature is not ordinary mind. The ordinary mind is covered with avijja or avidya or ignorance. When this ignorance is removed with panna or pragya or wisdom, then the true nature of the mind comes shining forth, that is our Buddha-nature or our Buddhahood or our plain consciousness inside us(different words indicating the same thing).
    You've done an excellent job helping me define the two viewpoints that have arisen in Buddhism regarding the concept of Nirvana or Buddha-Nature or Enlightenment, whatever we want to call "it" for our own practice. It's a debate Buddhists have been happily engaged in for many generations.

    It's like you're holding the trunk of the white elephant, I'm holding the tail, and we're trying to describe different ends of the same animal. Funny, that.
  • DairyLamaDairyLama Veteran Veteran
    edited March 2013
    I would say that Nirvana might be the stated goal of the monks in your temple, but it's certainly not the goal of other schools or the vast majority of lay Buddhists. So for a lot of us, the goal is instead realizing our Buddha-nature or Clear Mind, and we don't use the term Nirvana.
    So which schools specifically talk about realising Buddha nature instead of attaining enlightenment, and how exactly is that different from the enlightenment described in the suttas?
  • chelachela Veteran
    As I understand it through my reading, Nibbana is the cessation of all conditioned thoughts/responses (as many others have said here), including any notions or ideas. When I think about this, it reminds me of when I look into a 4 month old baby's face. The baby hasn't learned language and concepts yet. When you look into a baby's face of this age, and make eye contact, you often get a huge, bright smile. I think this may be some kind of instinctual reaction (physiological), but you can see why the Chinese liken the idea of Buddha-nature to a happy baby. It's almost like the old adage "ignorance is bliss".

    @riverflow thanks for posting that link. What is exciting to me is that idea of energy, atoms, molecules living on after you die is something I started to think about some years ago. I didn't know that Buddhism's "reincarnation" (as I understood that to be correct at that time) was actually in line with my thinking. This just further illustrates to me that I have found my home in Buddhism. I am printing it out for the future when some of my Catholic in-laws corner me about my "beliefs"...
  • CinorjerCinorjer Veteran
    edited March 2013

    I would say that Nirvana might be the stated goal of the monks in your temple, but it's certainly not the goal of other schools or the vast majority of lay Buddhists. So for a lot of us, the goal is instead realizing our Buddha-nature or Clear Mind, and we don't use the term Nirvana.
    So which schools specifically talk about realising Buddha nature instead of attaining enlightenment, and how exactly is that different from the enlightenment described in the suttas?

    Oh, the "Ordinary Mind" teaching is pretty much what distinguishes the entire Chan and later Zen schools of practice. You will find lots of talk about enlightenment and Buddha Nature, but due to the equally stressed teaching about emptiness, these teachings are wrapped up into what's refered to as "Ordinary Mind" teaching.

    To my limited scholarship it first appeared as an expressed teaching in the Platform Sutra, notably in the story of Huineng and the dueling poems.

    The story is familiar to anyone who practices Zen so bear with me if you've heard this too many times before. The sutra tells how there was an anonymous poetry contest in the temple where Huineng worked as a common laborer, being denied full monk status because of his common roots (It was a feudal society, monks at that time came from higher class families and Huineng could not even read or write). The poems were supposed to reflect the monk's understanding of the Dharma.

    Anyway, the star pupil of the temple and assumed successor of the head monk wrote this and posted it on the wall:

    The body is a Bodhi tree,
    The mind a mirror bright
    Time and again brush it clean,
    And let no dust alight.

    This is pretty much the picture of Enlightenment as Nirvana, as the mind wiped clean of the defilements and desires and pollutions of the world. Monks were supposed to skillfully perfect the Self through meditation and study of the Dharma until the perfection of Nirvana shines through.

    When it was read to Huineng, he asked the person to write on the wall another poem of Huineng's invention:

    There is no Bodhi tree,
    No mirror standing bright.
    If everything is void;
    Where can dust alight?

    And thus the great debate was summarized in two conflicting visions of the Self. If the Self is illusion, then so is both perfection and defilement. There is only mind, only Buddha Nature, and it's our insisting on confusing relative with absolute reality that gets in the way of realizing that.

    lobster
  • robotrobot Veteran
    @Cinorjer
    Thanks for clearing that up. I got what Huineng's point was, but I didn't get the significance of the monks poem.
  • robotrobot Veteran
    riverflow said:

    @chela - karma and re-birth (or as @Jayantha points out, 're-becoming') was something I had a hard time swallowing, though that probably isn't unusual. My way of understanding it is that 'I' am not some sort of essentialised entity, a noun--in fact, everything is a process--the universe is actually one vast verb. Heraclitus was one western philosopher who had some insight into the impermanence of all things, saying 'You cannot step into the same river twice,' and that 'everything flows' (this is actually the reason for my screen name). In spite of everything being in flux (including ourselves), we attach concepts to everything with words, superimposing abstractions on this ever changing reality. We place dotted lines around things. These abstractions are static and so they conceal the everyday impermanence around us and within ourselves. Those abstractions are a way of clinging.

    This isn't to say that language is bad (nor is it the sole culprit). But when we have faith in language as the be-all and end-all of understanding reality we run into brick walls of delusion and we keep running into those walls in a very painful way. We don't want things to change, because either there is something we really like right now or there's something we don't like that is approaching. So we're perpetually pushing and pulling and chasing after things that aren't even real, making ourselves miserable. That is samsara.

    But if we are actually verbs, and everything we do are verbs, every thought, word spoken, and action ripples outward interacting not only with those around out immediate vicinity right now, but ever outward rippling through one person or place or thing to another--even long after the ego has gone and that specific person is long forgotten or unknown. The ego is what is not reborn, but all the actions that ripple outward coalesce into a new being. In that sense I can talk about past lives or future lives but not MY past lives or MY future lives in the sense of an ego, but rather only in the sense that those lives led to or lead from this current life that I am living right here and now. And that includes even within what we conventionally call 'my life.' There is no 'I' i the sense of an essentialised and reified ego that is unchanging-- we just call it that. We aren't separate from time, as if time were some added process mixed in with the myriad entities of the universe-- rather we *are* time itself-- everything unfolds here and now. THIS. Nirvana is right under our noses, but we are always resisting it.

    But I know this is all just talk talk talk. But it is my best way of understanding it.


    Excellent! It seems like a profound realization very well described.
  • JasonJason God Emperor Arrakis Moderator

    In my practice my aim is purely to be contented to live now and that would be my idea of Nirvana but reading around the vast subject that is Buddhism and I'm reading about different paths that treat it like the Christian Heaven. A place where believers would go upon their death, practices where if a certain name is chanted regularly they would go to certain realms.

    Now for me happines is now, being with my partner and seeing my loved ones but excisting in an afterlife for eternity without them (none of them are Buddhists so wouldn't be going) this would be as far from Nirvana as it could possibly be.

    As far as the teachings of the Buddha that are recorded in the Pali Canon go, nibbana is never descibed as being a place akin to an eternal paradise where we all go when we die. As others have already mentioned, something of that nature sounds more like the Pure Land tradition's buddha-field (buddhaksetra) or even one of the heavenly deva realms (devaloka) than nibbana. In the Suttas, nibbana is defined as the end of dukkha (suffering); the extinction of craving (AN 10.60); the extinguishing of greed, hatred and delusion (SN 38.1). Beyond that, it's open to interpretation.

    Personally, I think it's much better to think about phenomena in Buddhism as activities, events or processes rather than things or places. The way it's presented in Theravada, samsara, literally 'wandering on,' is the potential for the arising of human [mental] suffering, while nibbana, literally 'extinguishing,' is the cessation of that potential. As Thanissaro Bhikkhu puts it, "Samsara is a process of creating places, even whole worlds, (this is called becoming) and then wandering through them (this is called birth). Nirvana is the end of this process (emphasis mine)." Nirvana is "realized only when the mind stops defining itself in terms of place ... it's realized through unestablished consciousness."

    This may be a bit of nonsense, but in one of the ways I like to look at it, the teachings from the 'conventional viewpoint' (vohara-desana) explains things through subject, verb, and object whereas the teachings from the 'ultimate viewpoint' (paramattha desana) primarily explain things through verb alone, i.e., from the perspective of activities and processes.

    This, I think, is incredibly difficult to see, but perhaps what happens here is that once self-identity view (sakkaya-ditthi) is removed, the duality of subject and object is also removed, thereby revealing the level of mere conditional phenomena, i.e., dependent co-arising in action. This mental process is 'seen,' ignorance [of the four noble truths] is replaced by 'knowledge and vision of things as they are' (yatha-bhuta-nana-dassana), and nibbana, then, would be the 'letting go' of what isn't self through the dispassion (viraga) invoked in seeing the inconstant (anicca) and stressful (dukkha) nature of clinging to false refuges that are neither fixed nor stable (anatta).

    Nibbana isn't the unconditioned, such as a place we go, but the unconditioned (i.e., freed from greed, hatred, and delusion; freed from grasping and suffering; etc. in this very life).
    riverflowSabbyJeffrey
  • riverflow said:

    Barbara O'Brien on the difference between reincarnation and rebirth:

    Would you be surprised if I told you that reincarnation is not a Buddhist teaching? If so, be surprised -- it isn't.

    "Reincarnation" normally is understood to be the transmigration of a soul to another body after death. There is no such teaching in Buddhism. One of the most fundamental doctrines of Buddhism is anatta, or anatman -- no soul or no self. There is no permanent essence of an individual self that survives death.

    However, Buddhists often speak of "rebirth." If there is no soul or permanent self, what is it that is "reborn"?
    More HERE.

    Actually, the doctrine of "no soul or no self" is considered by the Buddha to be an extreme view, part of the tangle of views alongside "I have a Self". The Buddhist doctrine is one of not-Self.
    Jeffrey
  • riverflow said:


    But if we are actually verbs, and everything we do are verbs, every thought, word spoken, and action ripples outward interacting not only with those around out immediate vicinity right now, but ever outward rippling through one person or place or thing to another--even long after the ego has gone and that specific person is long forgotten or unknown. The ego is what is not reborn, but all the actions that ripple outward coalesce into a new being. In that sense I can talk about past lives or future lives but not MY past lives or MY future lives in the sense of an ego, but rather only in the sense that those lives led to or lead from this current life that I am living right here and now. And that includes even within what we conventionally call 'my life.' There is no 'I' i the sense of an essentialised and reified ego that is unchanging-- we just call it that. We aren't separate from time, as if time were some added process mixed in with the myriad entities of the universe-- rather we *are* time itself-- everything unfolds here and now. THIS. Nirvana is right under our noses, but we are always resisting it.

    Even verbs ie. labels applied to an action does not fully describe the action. Eg. What is walking but a sequence of smaller actions of lifting, placing, swinging, balancing the feet. When does walking becomes running? Same thing is applied to eating - biting, chewing, swallowing etc. Even actions don't inherently exist but are dependent on the sum of its parts.

    Things are no-things, actions are no-actions.

    riverflow
  • "The story is familiar to anyone who practices Zen so bear with me if you've heard this too many times before. The sutra tells how there was an anonymous poetry contest in the temple where Huineng worked as a common laborer, being denied full monk status because of his common roots (It was a feudal society, monks at that time came from higher class families and Huineng could not even read or write). The poems were supposed to reflect the monk's understanding of the Dharma.

    Anyway, the star pupil of the temple and assumed successor of the head monk wrote this and posted it on the wall:

    The body is a Bodhi tree,
    The mind a mirror bright
    Time and again brush it clean,
    And let no dust alight.

    This is pretty much the picture of Enlightenment as Nirvana, as the mind wiped clean of the defilements and desires and pollutions of the world. Monks were supposed to skillfully perfect the Self through meditation and study of the Dharma until the perfection of Nirvana shines through.

    When it was read to Huineng, he asked the person to write on the wall another poem of Huineng's invention:

    There is no Bodhi tree,
    No mirror standing bright.
    If everything is void;
    Where can dust alight?

    And thus the great debate was summarized in two conflicting visions of the Self. If the Self is illusion, then so is both perfection and defilement. There is only mind, only Buddha Nature, and it's our insisting on confusing relative with absolute reality that gets in the way of realizing that."

    ______________

    Are these two conflicting visions of the Self? Or are they two levels of realisation? I would say it's the latter and see no conflict.
    Sabby
  • CinorjerCinorjer Veteran
    edited March 2013
    Florian said:

    "The story is familiar to anyone who practices Zen so bear with me if you've heard this too many times before. The sutra tells how there was an anonymous poetry contest in the temple where Huineng worked as a common laborer, being denied full monk status because of his common roots (It was a feudal society, monks at that time came from higher class families and Huineng could not even read or write). The poems were supposed to reflect the monk's understanding of the Dharma.

    Anyway, the star pupil of the temple and assumed successor of the head monk wrote this and posted it on the wall:

    The body is a Bodhi tree,
    The mind a mirror bright
    Time and again brush it clean,
    And let no dust alight.

    This is pretty much the picture of Enlightenment as Nirvana, as the mind wiped clean of the defilements and desires and pollutions of the world. Monks were supposed to skillfully perfect the Self through meditation and study of the Dharma until the perfection of Nirvana shines through.

    When it was read to Huineng, he asked the person to write on the wall another poem of Huineng's invention:

    There is no Bodhi tree,
    No mirror standing bright.
    If everything is void;
    Where can dust alight?

    And thus the great debate was summarized in two conflicting visions of the Self. If the Self is illusion, then so is both perfection and defilement. There is only mind, only Buddha Nature, and it's our insisting on confusing relative with absolute reality that gets in the way of realizing that."

    ______________

    Are these two conflicting visions of the Self? Or are they two levels of realisation? I would say it's the latter and see no conflict.

    I suppose I'd say it's both, although since the sutra is written from a Zen perspective that's the official take in the story. To those who stand on the No-Self side, the first poem is a simple matter of incomplete realization. Why? Because it fails to comprehend the emptiness of the Self.

    But for those who point out that Buddha taught perfection of the Self and reincarnation in the Suttas so obviously there is a self to be perfected, and consider No-Self to be tacking something onto the Dharma, saying their realization is incomplete is denigrating their practice. They would say you're misinterpreting what Buddha did say about emptiness (see the post above about No-self being addressed by Buddha as wrong view).

    Back to the story, the author of the first poem, Shen Hsiu, went on to found and become the Patriarch of the Northern school of Chan. Huineng went on to found the Southern school of Chan. Shen Hsiu stuck to the more traditional "gradual enlightenment" practice while the Southern school focused on the sudden awakening or Satori-like realization of the Dharma that its founder experienced. So this story is the Southern Chan's version of the beginning of the debate between the two viewpoints. By the way, the Northern Chan also heavily influenced Tibetan Buddhism.

    By an accident of geopolitical conflict, the Northern School was pretty much wiped out by the Chinese authorities eventually, while the Southern School escaped the court intrigue so became the Chan that made it to Japan.
  • FlorianFlorian Veteran
    edited March 2013
    Cinorjer said:



    I suppose I'd say it's both, although since the sutra is written from a Zen perspective that's the official take in the story. To those who stand on the No-Self side, the first poem is a simple matter of incomplete realization. Why? Because it fails to comprehend the emptiness of the Self.

    But for those who point out that Buddha taught perfection of the Self and reincarnation in the Suttas so obviously there is a self to be perfected, and consider No-Self to be tacking something onto the Dharma, saying their realization is incomplete is denigrating their practice. They would say you're misinterpreting what Buddha did say about emptiness (see the post above about No-self being addressed by Buddha as wrong view).

    Interesting. I think I see what you're saying. But I see no need for taking the story to denigrate anybody's realisation, or that it presents a particularly Zen perspective. The second poem is a step more profound, or closer to an ultimate view, so Huineng won the prize. But I don't think it follows that anybody's realisation was incomplete, although it may have been, just that their expression of it was not as profound as it might have been. The first poem for all its insight is a reification of Bodhi trees, dust and mirrors, the second makes it clear that these are void phenomena.

    I'm not sure myself as to whether it is correct to say that Buddha taught the perfection of Self (as a task) or reincarnation. My cautious suggestion and current tentative opinion would be that Self/No-self is yet another dualism to be abandoned for the middle way view. I don't read Huineng's poem as suggesting otherwise, while the first poem does seem to suggest otherwise.

    Not that it would be 'wrong'. I'd see the first poem as great practice advice and the second as an expression of the truth to which such a practice will lead us. Not right and wrong, but not equally profound.

    All imho of course. I can only look forward to being able to write such a profound poem as the first one, and the second will probably have to wait a few lifetimes.
  • The second poem is a step more profound
    The first poem is technique, the second realisation.
    The expression and transmission of the ineffable is fraught with doubts and uncertainties, until we develop confidence in our technique. All being well our experience of the void happens before we turn to dust . . .
    pegembara
  • " The first poem is technique, the second realisation. "

    In a nutshell...



  • I like that also. This sutra and the story of the dueling poems was written during a period when the North and South Chan schools of Buddhism were in a protracted, bitter, and to our eyes petty fight over which founder had the valid Dharma Transmission. Where we're comfortable with multiple schools of Zen and Buddhism and each is valid for their own practice, for those monks there could be only one correct Master and lineage was everything.

    Since the North school was pretty much wiped out later, what we have left to us is the Southern Chan's account of their founder. This includes an account of the writer of the first poem, Shen Hsiu, being secretly told by his Master that his realization wasn't complete while publically praised. This detail is considered by scholars to be almost certainly a complete fabrication on the part of the Southern Chan school to bolster their claim to the true lineage. If it was a secret meeting, how did the Southern Chan school come to know about it?

    All this history, when you dig into it, helps make our Sangha come alive. Turns out those great people were just human like you and me. When it comes to questions about "What does (blank) mean in Buddhism?" it's comforting to me, knowing even the monks who passed the Dharma down to us through the centuries had the same problem giving a definitive answer and were just as prone to argue about it.
    Sabby
  • Cinorjer said:

    Cinorjer said:

    In the same way, Nirvana both classically described and in popular thought is "nothingness" where you go to after death if you've graduated from the prison of karma and rebirth. ....Nirvana as a concept was dragged along into Buddhism, like the concept of karma and reincarnation or rebirth, from the religion of India where Buddhism originated and given a new twist in Buddha's dharma.

    Nirvana is the goal of Buddhist practice and therefore central, not something "dragged along" into Buddhism. And classically Nirvana is described as a here-and-now liberation from suffering.
    Similarly karma and rebirth are central to Buddhist teaching, and the idea that they were "dragged in" is entirely speculative and not supported by the suttas.
    That is the twist given to it by Buddhism, yes. As for my choice of words about "dragging in", Buddhism did not invent the term or concept of Nirvana, or karma, or invent reincarnation. The reason Nirvana is spoken of as a place or realm is that most people continue to think of it in that terms, no matter what fine philosophical distinction a Buddhist scholar may apply.

    I would say that Nirvana might be the stated goal of the monks in your temple, but it's certainly not the goal of other schools or the vast majority of lay Buddhists. If Nirvana is the end-all of Buddhism, then it's a poor religion because almost all of the Buddhists in the world are destined to fail. At least Christianity offers the surity of Heaven for all believers. How many Buddhists in your Sangha have achieved Nirvana lately? Why would I want to get involved in a religion where only the few dedicated monks at the top have a chance of getting the final reward?

    So for a lot of us, the goal is instead realizing our Buddha-nature or Clear Mind, and we don't use the term Nirvana. As described by the old monks, Nirvana is an altered and permanently elevated state of consciousness, a superhuman condition. I reject that picture. Buddha-nature is your ordinary mind. It is a clear mind seeing the correct situation.
    Upon becoming a bodhisattva you can see directly that all beings can become Buddha. This is according to my teacher. If we have more than one lifetime then that becomes apparent. If you pick and choose there are going to be confusion such as saying Nirvana is non-existent. Buddhism then becomes 'self help',
  • JeffreyJeffrey Veteran
    edited March 2013
    vinlyn said:

    Cinorjer said:

    Cinorjer said:

    In the same way, Nirvana both classically described and in popular thought is "nothingness" where you go to after death if you've graduated from the prison of karma and rebirth. ....Nirvana as a concept was dragged along into Buddhism, like the concept of karma and reincarnation or rebirth, from the religion of India where Buddhism originated and given a new twist in Buddha's dharma.

    Nirvana is the goal of Buddhist practice and therefore central, not something "dragged along" into Buddhism. And classically Nirvana is described as a here-and-now liberation from suffering.
    Similarly karma and rebirth are central to Buddhist teaching, and the idea that they were "dragged in" is entirely speculative and not supported by the suttas.
    That is the twist given to it by Buddhism, yes. As for my choice of words about "dragging in", Buddhism did not invent the term or concept of Nirvana, or karma, or invent reincarnation. The reason Nirvana is spoken of as a place or realm is that most people continue to think of it in that terms, no matter what fine philosophical distinction a Buddhist scholar may apply.

    I would say that Nirvana might be the stated goal of the monks in your temple, but it's certainly not the goal of other schools or the vast majority of lay Buddhists. If Nirvana is the end-all of Buddhism, then it's a poor religion because almost all of the Buddhists in the world are destined to fail. At least Christianity offers the surity of Heaven for all believers. How many Buddhists in your Sangha have achieved Nirvana lately? Why would I want to get involved in a religion where only the few dedicated monks at the top have a chance of getting the final reward?

    So for a lot of us, the goal is instead realizing our Buddha-nature or Clear Mind, and we don't use the term Nirvana. As described by the old monks, Nirvana is an altered and permanently elevated state of consciousness, a superhuman condition. I reject that picture. Buddha-nature is your ordinary mind. It is a clear mind seeing the correct situation.
    Excellent post, and a way of looking at "Buddhist thought" that I really hadn't considered before.

    Now I'm going to say something, and I want to SHOUT OUT from the beginning that no one should assume I'm talking about them or any specific person here. I think there are a number of people in our forum who talk a good game, but who don't remotely lead the life they espouse on here, because if they did they'd be a monk living alone in some forest over in Southeast Asia, or in a hut in the Himalayas. I'm not saying they're bad people at all, although they may be a bit deluded about the life they actually live, and they may take themselves a little too seriously.

    How can you know what type of life people lead? Did Buddha say lay people could not practice? Notice I didn't say become enlightened I said practice.
  • I find some of this rather confusing.

    It is not necessary, as far as I know, to become a monk in order to be able to talk the talk or to walk the walk. And it seems to me that it may be impossible to take oneself even a little too seriously. And I do not believe that most Buddhists are destined to fail. The idea would mean dismissing what the Buddha says about this.

    "Why would I want to get involved in a religion where only the few dedicated monks at the top have a chance of getting the final reward? "

    Why indeed. Luckily Buddhism is not such a religion.

    I'll happily admit to being better at talking than walking, but we cannot make this judgement of others here except by their words since we have no idea how we each live and practice. Still, words can tell us much, as they do for the two poems we've been discussing. We can see the different levels of realisation that they express without having any idea of how the two poets lived.

    As for Nirvana, if we do not know of Nirvana then we do not have to believe in it. But it is worth noting that the Abidhamma pitaka describes and defines Nirvana as a phenomenon, not the elevated state of some other phenomenon.

    I see no reason for Huineng and the head monk to argue about anything. One seems to have been just a little further down the path than the other. Nor do I see the need for any secret meeting between the head monk and his abbot to be held or fabrictated by the southern Chan school. The poems speak for themselves. Huineng won the prize and it is no secret that this was because his words describe a deeper realisation.

    Definitive answers are difficult because often language is inadequate to the task. So I don't think we should see a failure to provide one as a sign of ignorance or uncertainty.

  • Awakening said:

    Actually, the doctrine of "no soul or no self" is considered by the Buddha to be an extreme view, part of the tangle of views alongside "I have a Self". The Buddhist doctrine is one of not-Self.

    Is you shure of this? Buddha teaching the sunnata, he saying: "Empty of self". Where Buddha doctrine include no-self in tangle of views? Can you have the kindness to sharing the scripture?

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