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Re-Incarnation-Previous Lives?
Xrayman
Veteran
Hi all,
Do any of you posess knowledge of your own previous life/lives? :-/
My interpretation of Impermanence encompasses all things, including the spirit/soul/self/ whatever, so maybe the spirit etc. actually looks like this a few weeks after burial:zombie: , Just like the physical.
What do ya reckon?
I know this is a long-shot, but you never know, there might be someone like me out there, who has come to your planet to understand how you humans function.
Nano nano.:poke:
:rockon:
Xrayman
Do any of you posess knowledge of your own previous life/lives? :-/
My interpretation of Impermanence encompasses all things, including the spirit/soul/self/ whatever, so maybe the spirit etc. actually looks like this a few weeks after burial:zombie: , Just like the physical.
What do ya reckon?
I know this is a long-shot, but you never know, there might be someone like me out there, who has come to your planet to understand how you humans function.
Nano nano.:poke:
:rockon:
Xrayman
0
Comments
On one level memory has no substance. On another, it is a form of attachment...things that need to be addressed...karma playing out.
The interviewer was somewhat taken aback... he (or she... I don't know....) seemed to be under the mistaken notion that one so great and elevated would naturally have some kind of spiritual or 'supernatural' access to such "information"...
The DL asked in return....
"Do you remember what you were doing on <INSERT RANDOM DATE HERE> by any chance....?"
The Interviewer replied,
"No, I don't...."
"Neither do I !!" Exclaimed the DL gleefully.
"And," he continued, "if I don't remember this lifetime, how can I possibly be expected to remember a past lifetime?? The important is Now......"
And to give something else I have heard elsewhere....
"If you wish to know what you were in a past life, look at how your Life is today. if you wish to know what you will be in a future Life, look at how your MIND is today."
-bf
............No comment.
LOL!!!
-bf
I, however, have not yet mastered right speech...... and right silence
Sas
Buddhism doesn't talk about reincarnation per se...
it speaks of re-birth. Which is a fact.
Can someone explain what exactly is meant by re-birth and how it 'is fact' as I cant get my head round how it could be.
See also:
The Buddha's Teaching As It Is
Does Rebirth Make Sense?
Dhamma Without Rebirth?
Kamma & Rebirth
Jason
Reminds me of the four solaces of the kalama sutta: http://www.ship.edu/~cgboeree/buddhawise.html
While I generally believe in rebirth, I find this belief to be secondary to actual practice (though it does encourage me to practice a little harder).
take care & be well
_/\_
metta
Not1not2.... While you "generally' believe...."? Could you explain? Surely in such a case, you either do or you don't...? I'm puzzled by the term.... However, I completely agree with you regarding it as of secondary importance to practice... absolutely, spot on.
Umm... perhaps I shouldn't have used the word 'generally'. Maybe it means I am not well versed enough on the topic to 'specifically' believe in it. :P I think that is actually pretty close to what I meant. I don't really understand how it works, but i lean more towards believing in re-birth than I lean towards not believing. I guess it comes down to the fact that I don't really know, but I don't have a whole lot of skepticism surrounding the idea.
Now that I'm on the subject though, my whole thought surrounding this process is like this-
The mind has a tendency to create patterns out of our experience by linking similar things together. In this manner the mind sees the moment-by-moment interplay of the five skandhas and relates them together. The cognitive mind also gives a mental designation to objects which fit certain characteristics. This is the basis of the 'I-making' process. Mind identifies the moment to moment progression of the mind/body and suggests a continuity, known as 'I' or 'self'. Anyway, as the mind becomes engrossed in this designation, it begins to filter out other information and disregard it. This strengthens the sense of an individual/independent self, as well as the sense of other objects being isolated and independent from one another. Additionally, the mind is ignorant at this point of what it is doing, and assumes that the self is a real entity along with other objects.
Now, to the rebirth part. Have you ever smelled something or heard a song which awakened memories from years upon years ago? Well, to me it seems the mind sort of connects all experiences together based on commonalities. In this case it would be the smell or the song. From this we can infer that upon attaining a deep enough state of awareness, we may begin to have memories which share a commonality with a past life. However, these memories are not normally triggered in the more gross states of consciousness which are closely associated with this current nama-rupa continuity. Meditation can open up these pathways which allow us to recall past life experiences which share commonalities which correlate to certain meditative states.
Combining these two points, we can see how mind imputes a real subject, known as 'I' or 'self' based on a continuity of events, which had previous causes before this current succession of body/mind moments which can be regarded as past lives as a sentient being.
... I guess I do have a fairly developed opinion on the subject. However, this is all purely theoretical, but it does seem to fit my understanding of how things work, and I still have doubt on this subject. Also, I still do not fully understand the way karma functions from life to life, or precisely how the previous life causes the next life. I guess this will all become clearer to me as my studies and practice deepen.
Anyway, I probably should have said that I can see 'rebirth' as highly feasible, though I'm not sure I fully 'believe'. Basically, 'generally' just indicated a level of uncertainty or doubt as a qualifier to my 'belief in rebirth.'
does that clear things up?
_/\_
metta
Thank you N1N2... pleasure speaking with you....
Look at it this way - the you that is reading this now is not the same you that will wake up tomorrow morning. On even the simplest level - some of the cells in your body will have died and others will have come into being, you will have different memories than you do now and so on - you're not the same person and yet not totally different. Just as no solid thing has passed over from now to tomorrow morning, so no solid thing is needed to explain rebirth from life to life. We tend to get stuck in the idea that it's 'me' being reborn when in fact there's no such thing in an absolute sense.
Love ya all,
Bobby
"In the same way, when a monk has developed and pursued the five-factored noble right concentration in this way, then whichever of the six higher knowledges he turns his mind to know and realize, he can witness them for himself whenever there is an opening....
If he wants, he recollects his manifold past lives,3 i.e., one birth, two births, three births, four, five, ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, one hundred, one thousand, one hundred thousand, many aeons of cosmic contraction, many aeons of cosmic expansion, many aeons of cosmic contraction and expansion, [recollecting], 'There I had such a name, belonged to such a clan, had such an appearance. Such was my food, such my experience of pleasure and pain, such the end of my life. Passing away from that state, I re-arose there. There too I had such a name, belonged to such a clan, had such an appearance. Such was my food, such my experience of pleasure and pain, such the end of my life. Passing away from that state, I re-arose here.' Thus he remembers his manifold past lives in their modes and details. He can witness this for himself whenever there is an opening."--AN V.28
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/canon/sutta/anguttara/an05-028.html