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Where does buddha's truth lie within the universal TRUTH?? It it ultimate truth?
zenmyste
Veteran
What i mean is;
What kind of truth is it????
Is it the Ultimate truth of the universe?
Or are there other things someone can learn anout life?
Did he find the ultimate answer to 'everything'
Or was his truth a truth based on 'something'
For example; did he just figure out why we suffer??
I hope you understand what i am asking? Lol
Cheers in advance!
What kind of truth is it????
Is it the Ultimate truth of the universe?
Or are there other things someone can learn anout life?
Did he find the ultimate answer to 'everything'
Or was his truth a truth based on 'something'
For example; did he just figure out why we suffer??
I hope you understand what i am asking? Lol
Cheers in advance!
0
Comments
I don't know that we really understand it until we're super advanced though.
he did not speak of the beginning or end of existence or any kind of " ultimate answer to everything". You can spend an eternity of lifetimes going mad thinking about these "imponderable" or "unconjecturable" things.
He was very pragmatic in that way.. he saw how people were born, grew old, grew sick, and died, and he wanted to find a way out of that... which he did.
what exactly IS "ultimate truth" anyways? maybe there is one out there but we can only know an "ultimate truth" through our 6 senses(the totality of all we know)... and that ultimate truth would be that all conditioned phenomena have the three characteristics of existence " Anicca, Dukkha, Anatta" or " impermenance, unsatisfactoriness, not-self.
But this is interesting... the Buddha didn't tell us everything about everything. He told us a little tiny bit, the relevant stuff. Other stuff he knew, but he didn't teach. http://www.buddhanet.net/4noble1.htm
That's why they are referred to as 'Noble'.
It indicates that they are indisputable, and cannot be argued against.
Other than that - it's up to you.
Now, come to think about it, most probably Buddha does not reveal the ultimate truth. If I am not mistaken, it had been written that what he preaches is just a leaf from a forest.
I am leaning more toward not believing that his wisdom answered all the great questions of life.
Thank you for this reference.
But the Buddha's truth is something we can all experience.
His truth was that of suffering. How it is "constructed" and how it is "deconstructed". He taught the vehicle of cause and effect.
This is a very profound statement.
In regards to anything other than suffering I am pretty sure the Buddha was silent. The immediate and most apparent problem is suffering. Any other question is the result of suffering lol.
For instance:
Is there a heaven? Hell? Is there a God? Is there an ultimate ground? Etc.
And just to be a little mean:
There is no ultimate truth and that is the ultimate truth. And that. And that. ETC for infinity.
But how many people can find comfort in that? LOL!!
Ultimate is the conceived limitation of linear thought.
Universal is it's cousin.
Truth has always been another spelling for hubris.
&
Buddha is awakening beyond the perceived and the perceiver.
What was he enlightened in ???
What truth does he know?
That there is suffering in the world?? Well we all know that dont we!
But to say someone is enlightened , surely they need to be enlightened about ALL things..?
Thats why i ask, where does his truth lie within the universe truth of reality??
Does he know how the world works as in how it began?
How we all got here?
What 'are' we doing here???
If he couldnt answer these questions then what was he enlightened in???
What catorgory would his "knowledge and wisdom" come under???
also.. who ever said enlightenment is the same as omnipotence?
Thank you.
What we are doing here in Buddhism is not answered with purpose. You would have to apply humanism, mysticism or another alternative.
So Buddhism does not complete or round the individual. It is a partial dharma . . . that most of us are partial to. It is a good place to start.
This seems to be a question that arises more for the devotionally inclined than the meditative.
What think u?
See here, he said it himself:
And that's fine, Jason. But that is not what is said almost all the time that this issue is raised. If they mean people will suffer from vexation, then it would be wise to use that term. If somebody said, "If you ponder the imponderables, you may become annoyed or frustrated", then I would say that's reasonable.
Being partial, particular, aggregated beings, we can connect, align and experience the everything running through us. Knowing everything in a sense but not in an infinite totality.
The Buddha made it clear he was not a 'god man', he was awake. Dreaming is for dreamers . . .
http://www.eaglespiritministry.com/teaching/buddha/stbawake.htm
here is the sutta translated by Thanissaro
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an04/an04.077.than.html
AN 4.77 PTS: A ii 80
Acintita Sutta: Unconjecturable
"There are these four unconjecturables that are not to be conjectured about, that would bring madness & vexation to anyone who conjectured about them. Which four?
"The Buddha-range of the Buddhas[1] is an unconjecturable that is not to be conjectured about, that would bring madness & vexation to anyone who conjectured about it.
"The jhana-range of a person in jhana...[2]
"The [precise working out of the] results of kamma...
"Conjecture about [the origin, etc., of] the world is an unconjecturable that is not to be conjectured about, that would bring madness & vexation to anyone who conjectured about it.
"These are the four unconjecturables that are not to be conjectured about, that would bring madness & vexation to anyone who conjectured about them."
Notes
1.
I.e., the range of powers a Buddha develops as a result of becoming a Buddha.
2.
I.e., the range of powers that one may obtain while absorbed in jhana.
*Fluxional
*Not an amorphous non-conceptual blob, rather a more precise vision than the conceptual
*Emotional, not dead (someone else might use different words, but in this usage everything is emotional).
*Neither manifest nor non-manifest
2nothing is needed to add to that
I like your question, and regret to say that I disgree with most answers given here.
Yes. The Buddha taught 'ultimate truth'. Primarily he teaches the end of suffering. The four noble truths are true because of the way the world is. That is, in order for his teachings to be true the world has to be a certain way, and he must have known the way it is in order to inform those teachings. He must have known that materialism is false, for one example, and theism for another. This is knowledge of metaphysical truths at least, and they might be called ultimate. Without a knowledge of ultimate truths it would be impossible for him to know whether his own teachings were true. Nagarjuna shows us how to interpret his teachings in a philosophically extended way if we wish, and speaks directly about conventional and ultimate truth. The Buddha was not concerned with such issues but much of what he leaves unsaid can be inferred.
The problem with the phrase 'ultimate truth' is that it is an epistemilogical phrase. A 'truth' requires a knower of the truth. But we are asked to look beyond this distinction to ontology and identity. Al-Halaj was crucified not for saying that he knew the truth, but for saying that he is the truth. Not at all the same thing, and this adds a complication. As the Upanishads ask, how can there be knowledge of truth when there is no distinction between knower and known?
But yes, of course the Buddha knew 'the ultimate truth', speaking loosely. In Buddhism there is much discussion of the nature of his omniscience. His soteriological teachings can only be true if certain fundamental truths relating to the nature of reality are true, and to suggest he did not know these deep truths yet still taught correctly is implausible and a rejection of the teachings as conjectural.
"At the heart of reality is a hidden truth which is reflected within each one of us but unrealized. To realize this truth takes courage, persistence, and training. It changes our world and ourselves eventually igniting the fire of vision, love, and creative power. This truth is not an affair of the intellect but a living presence that lays a demand for its fulfillment on the totality of our being. The quest for it having begun we can never give it up or rather it never gives us up."
hope this helps
I know yours is not an uncommon view but I cannot see how anyone could reach it. Of course we all come from different directions and will have our own revelations and intuitions, but ultimate truths are true for everybody and never change. If we think such truths cannot be known then we must think that the Buddha was making up a lot of what he said and had no right to be so unequivocal in his speech. The four noble truths are true for everyone at all times and places, and they cannot be true unless many other things are absolutely true.That is, in order to know that the 4NT are always true for everybody one would have to know many other things that are true for everybody, including certain fundamental truths about the the nature of reality.
My view would be that discovering ultimate truths is what the practice is all about. Otherwise our view will never be more than a theory.
Being that it is conceptual then as a symbol it points to a referent.
In Buddhism there are no freestanding referents. Everything is dependent upon everything else.
For instance emptiness is dependent upon designation and an object to negate. There is no freestanding emptiness. It is a medicine for a certain sickness, without establishing an ontological ground (non-affirming negation).
The truths in Buddhism are pointers to end the proliferation of giving inherent existence to self and phenomena. They themselves are not absolute truths for that would basically undermine the whole purpose of ending fabrication.
The dharma is traceless without establishing absolutes and relatives.
Taking this into account each individual has their own unique journey and path towards liberation. And in the Buddhist sense liberation only occurs when the mind apphrends the lack of inherent existence of self and other. But that non-affirming negation doesn't imply an ultimate truth, but it is the damn closest you'll get.
"If I had any thesis, that fault would apply to me. But I do not have any thesis, so there is indeed no fault for me."
-- Nagarjuna, Vigrahavyāvartanī, Verse 29
First, I didn't read anything where @Wisdom23 said any such things. He didn't suggest truth is relative to the person, or that truth changes all the time, and he didn't reduce the Dhamma to mere conjecture (as you put it). What he did do was define "universal truth".
But look what you have done. You have stated quite clearly that Buddhism is not a universal truth. Which I happen to agree with...at least that "all of Buddhist thought" is not a universal truth.
To me, the value in what @Wisdom23 wrote is that he focused down to one area where one aspect of Buddhism may be a universal truth.