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Buddha Quote Explanation?
Jayjay
Veteran
in Meditation
He who loves 50 people has 50 woes; he who loves no one has no woes.
Just found this quote that was supposedly by the Buddha
Any thoughts? Explanations? Can there be a conversation about this?
I'm trying to find its meaning and how it can relate to me. Thank you!(:
Just found this quote that was supposedly by the Buddha
Any thoughts? Explanations? Can there be a conversation about this?
I'm trying to find its meaning and how it can relate to me. Thank you!(:
0
Comments
As for any meaning it may have it sounds like the laments of someone with a broken heart. Not loving anyone certainly is a woe unto itself.
Not being attached and clinging to the things that are Mine. But cultivating a feeling of love/metta towards everything.
"Consider the trees which allow the birds to perch and fly away without either inviting them to stay or desiring them never to depart.
If your heart can be like this, you will be near to the way"
THANK YOU. That pretty much puts it all in place for me, very very helpful.
@Che
GREAT quote, I'm with JamestheGiant, who said that?
wei wu wei(:
Yes, it's attachment to people that is the problem.
It sounds pretty much like this:
(or should I probably say, this sentiment echoes the original)
"Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they? Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature? And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these."
Matthew 6:26-29
As some one who is at least fifty people, it is the non being that loves and I loves the most. As a mahayanist heretic I love practically everyone.
Woe is me . . . I am happy to say!
Its further proof imo that we can't just take the words of someone that lived 2500 years ago in a culture absolutely alien to ours, where the highest honour was given to those who became mendicants and cut themselves off from family and society, and think that we can apply them to our lives..
We have to be discriminating in what we take and what we leave.
instead of trying to beat around the bush to try and mold this quote through our own insecurities, let us attempt to entertain the quote(from the suttas given by James, not the OP) directly, if only as a mental exercise.
"Visākhā, those who have a hundred dear ones have a hundred sufferings. Those who have ninety dear ones have ninety sufferings. Those who have eighty... seventy... sixty... fifty... forty... thirty... twenty... ten... nine... eight... seven... six... five... four... three... two... Those who have one dear one have one suffering. Those who have no dear ones have no sufferings. They are free from sorrow, free from stain, free from lamentation, I tell you."
Straight off the bat, if you have a family, or even a self, you have some sort of dukkha(remember lets use the ACTUAL word and all its connotations, not just the translation suffering). The less dear ones you have(including yourself don't forget!), the less you will experience dukkha, it's simple math.
it equates nicely with Ajahn Chah's quote.. because well he was basically paraphrasing the buddha : If you let go a little you a will have a little peace; if you let go a lot you will have a lot of peace; if you let go completely you will have complete peace. ”
― Ajahn Chah
for those interested here is a discourse regarding detachment in early buddhism:
accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/harris/bl141.html
I'm not necessarily posting this because it 100% fits my thread, but it is a good read for the topic in general.
Metta is considered the only love which is free of dukkha, where as eros(romantic/marital love) and filial(family) love are rife with them. A rightly practicing monk lives unattached to the world, but of course the Buddha did not say everyone should be a monk and detach from their family, that is not the essence of the thread.
However is it possible to move past an eros or filial love attachment of beings you once attached to as "family", "spouse", "dear one" and into a mind state of metta with them as well as all beings? yes I believe you can because I've started to see it in my own practice ever so slightly. I am of course still attached to my family,(and probably still at finer levels even to my deceased wife) but nowhere near as much as I use to me. If I were I would not be renouncing because at one time there was nothing more important to me then family, now there is.
I have also noticed how I view "my wife".. I use to say "my wife" , I noticed after some time of practice how I was "owning" that connection, that attachment, years after her death, long after the attachment was severed. It is amazing how when I think back now I do not really have romantic(eros) feelings/love for her anymore, but she is a being stuck in samsara like myself who is born to experience dukkha, until she releases herself from it. Even with my own mother, it was a frightening/weird experience the first time I thought of her truly not as "my mother", but as a fellow being in samsara, I actually called her a being in my mind, totally out of the blue and had a mental double take.
It is an amazing feeling when you start to detach your mind from the different strata of love and hate, and move closer, inch by small inch, towards abiding in boundless friendliness(metta) with all beings. I cannot imagine how it must be for those fully awakened.
@Jayantha sorry, more proof ( imo ) that we cannot and should not try to live in a way which is totally at odds with our times and culture.
Neither is it necessary for us to do so.
The most realised people I have met..including Dudjom Rinpoche and Chogyal Namkhai Norbu have been ordinary family men with loving families.
It is a matter of mindset, not modelling our behaviour on that of ancient hermits.
We should be attached to our families.
We should also be prepared to take the pain that comes with that attachment.
It has nothing to do with being Awake.
We can awaken in any situation if we have the right teaching and the support of Sangha.
....But when you awaken, the pain is no longer there.
Just because Dudjom Rinpoche and Chogyal Namkhai Norbu had loving families, doesn't mean they did not practise what the Buddha taught.....
I'm afraid i'm siding with the Buddha here; I think this teaching is as relevant today as it was when he gave it.
It's not a question of attachment and the pain it brings; it's a question of HEALTHY attachment and the pain we need not feel.
I think the real issue at hand pertains to the selectivity of our love, not the math of our love.
A fostering of love of some and not others, manifests as dukkha, whereas a fostering of love of everyone's innate Buddhanature removes the selectivity and the sufferings cause.
Tough to do...Yes... but I've yet to find something better to practice with?
It directly addresses the differences between a love that maintains our identity and a love that doesn't. The difference between a conditional and an unconditional love.
I have no doubt that Dudjom Rinpoche and Chogyal Namkhai Norbu side with the Buddha too.
With the essence of his teachings... which apply to renunciates and family men alike.
Pain is unavoidable...the Buddha was described as suffering great physical pain.
When the son of the great yogi Marpa Lotsawa teacher of Milarepa died, Marpa was bereft.
But his Realisation remained unbroken.
Realisation is not some anaesthetic.
Non duality means oneness with all that arises. Not just the things we prefer.
'The Great Way is without difficulty, save it avoids picking and choosing '.
This is the heart of the difference between non dual traditions like Dzogchen and Mahamudra on the one hand and Sutric traditions on the other.
The real difference is not cultural or linguistic, its that the non dual traditions do not see the aim of Dharma as adding or removing anything.
They see Awakening as not two. As non-different to all that arises.
' Samsara IS Nirvana.' ( Nagarjuna ).
@Citta, I think statements like Samsara is Nirvana need the right context or they can be misleading.
All attempts to give them context are based in duality Jeffrey..or so it seems to me.
hmmm not sure what I was saying, Citta. My concern was people who already believe they are enlightened because they read that you don't have to do anything. While that may be true they don't realize how easily we screw up that simple suggestion. It actually is a great accomplishment as in the heart sutra to realize there is no attainment.
So I am saying that there is a path even though there isn't one.
Possibly...but Nagarjuna still says 'Samsara IS Nirvana '...
He does not make provision for misunderstanding.
How can the conditioned be the unconditioned??
Shunyata.
What is meant by shunyata as an answer to my question?
The conditioned has no actual reality.
It is a linguistic convention.
I used the analogy yesterday of a 'fist '. A fist is a temporary state which does not need undoing..we just need to open our hand.
We need to stop doing something. i.e. in this case we need to stop making a fist.
We don't need to perfect making a fist and then move on to opening our hand.
In the same way seeing Shunyata does not require us to perfect our seeing the conditioned.
We need to stop doing something.
Specifically we need to stop identification with what we are not.