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Dharma Magic
lobster
Crusty Veteran
in Philosophy
In other thread on fashion @how asks:
Is dharma magick a skilful means, a distraction for the terminally Zen, fun for all the family?
Expecto patronum
http://wisdomquarterly.blogspot.co.uk/2010/09/buddhist-magic-and-supernatural.html
This question has me ask what is magic, what isn't and how do either pertain to the Buddha's path?It is an important question for the magically, tantrically or 'rationalist uber alles' schools of thought. I like a little pixie dust to tickle my sitting bone. I regularly get possesed by imaginary archetypal farces . . . sorry forces . . . from the arisings of Never Never land. I like Lamas who make horrible noises with conches and human bones to scare away the hordes of bad thoughts, the Borg, the undead and the neurosis made manifest . . . Certainly they would frighten the neighbours dog . . .
Is dharma magick a skilful means, a distraction for the terminally Zen, fun for all the family?
Expecto patronum
http://wisdomquarterly.blogspot.co.uk/2010/09/buddhist-magic-and-supernatural.html
0
Comments
If you take it seriously, you may wind up having to extract yourself from some kind of weird beliefs later on. Why bother?
I guess there is a place for the material in the link. It doesn't interest me much. It is not really a teaching in my opinion. Might even do more harm than good.
I like this:
That is the real dharma magic!
Levitation... Eh, not so much.
If you thought that you needed to use magic to achieve some ends, surely you would have to believe in what you were doing?
Like trying to see past lives. How would you set out to do that if you didn't really believe that you had lived before?
Relentless rationality seems to work for some people, but I find it boring and uninspiring.
I understand that it's Dharma magic we are talking about. Here is another example from the link above:
"B. Celestial Hearing
Human ears hear at close range. We need amplifiers and microphones to help us hear sounds from afar. Those with celestial hearing can hear sounds clearly regardless of the distance. Maudgalyayana, the foremost in supernatural power among all the Buddha’s disciples, once tried to see how far the Buddha’s voice could travel. With magical power, he traveled to another Buddha world trillions of light years away. There he used his celestial hearing and he could still clearly hear the Buddha’s voice preaching.
We may know Chinese, but not English, Japanese, or other languages. People with linguistic talents may be able to speak multiple languages but still have limits in understanding other languages. Those with celestial hearing can understand all languages. Besides human languages, they also understand the singing of the birds and howling of animals."
There is a fair bit of baggage that goes along with accepting that this is an ability that one can achieve. Even the guy in the example had to use some nameless magical power to travel trillions of light years away.
I'm not saying that it's not possible. For me it will have to remain as an imponderable for now.
I take magick very seriously. For example I would not exorcise @betaboy from his demons even as a joke . . . Every raft is abandoned after all the bother of building, sailing and arriving on the far shore . . . It also might do more good than not bothering. Not guaranteed, dharma magick is not an exact 'science' after all . . .
I take magick very seriously. For example I would not exorcise @betaboy from his demons even as a joke . . . Every raft is abandoned after all the bother of building, sailing and arriving on the far shore . . . It also might do more good than not bothering. Not guaranteed, dharma magick is not an exact 'science' after all . . .
You have been joking about betaboy's demons all week. Of course, why would we want them excorsized? They are good fun.
Why take on extra baggage? I'm a keep it simple, stupid kind of guy. Stick with the basics.
I'll read the link you posted. Might see things differently.
That was a pretty interesting read.
At this point I'll say that while my mental jury is still out deciding on whether magical abilities are possible, I'm going to have to stick with my 'why bother' stance, for now.
I'm good with seeing our reality as magical and mysterious. I feel that that is the way I see my world.
The conclusion of the article sums things up nicely, as all good conclusions should.
Conclusion
It could be argued that the Mahayanist “higher magic of the Dharma” and Dogen’s Ch’an/Zen position of taking the reality of daily life and practice as the true magic, effectively demythologises or defines the notion of magic out of existence. Furthermore, one could argue that Dogen is expressing an extreme “ultimatist” position in which all that really matters in Buddhist is practice and enlightenment. But I would argue that this ignores the Dogen’s retention of his Hua Yen dharma analysis, inherited from his training as a T’ien T’ai (Tendai) monk in Japan. In this analysis, the mutual interconnectedness and interpenetration of dharmas seems to produce magical effects. Furthermore the elevation of the “drawing of water and gathering firewood” as the magical practice of meditative daily life, takes on the same quality of the earlier Indian Mahayana sense of Buddha-dharma as the higher magic. Declaring the Buddha-dharma or the reality of Buddhist practice as the true higher magic is not exactly the same as demythologising the notion of magic. Even Dogen does not deny the reality of lower order magic; he just doesn’t see the point of it. Having the powers and choosing not to use them is not the same as not believing in them even as a possibility. Despite the appeal of the ultimatist position to a rational, scientific mindset, or the appeal of a demythologised Buddhism to those of a modernist orientation; it is clear that traditional Buddhism clearly endorses notions of magic which are deeply embedded, and provide important material for teaching Dharma as well as aesthetic and rhetorical expression.
Possibly this is an example of the "middle way" we were talking about recently in another thread.
Still on the Tibetan stuff I got some good tips on Samatha from the Rinpoche who runs the course @lobster linked the other day.
Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche
What
Would
Happen if God leaned down
And gave you a full wet
Kiss?
Hafiz
Well first of all, Buddhism rejects the supernatural, it is a gross misrepresentation to describe their beliefs as such. They believe all is within the natural world, just that there are supernormal or supermundane qualities or powers or what-have-you, however this is NOT supernatural, as in beyond the natural world. This is a subtle but extremely important distinction to be made.
Beyond this, though some older Indian tantra involves magic, tantra in general isn't really tied into it, the rituals etc are about phenomenological transformation, purifying perception, they are soteriological, not necessarily magical.
The Buddha, as portrayed in the pali texts, does identify a few forms of magic and distinguishes them from what he calls "dharma magic", which he relates as some of the supernormal abilities.
However the real key is that the most important one he emphasized as truly miraculous was the capacity to teach.
Dharma magic is skillful means, but only for the most serious and dedicated of practitioners. Anyone else, like householders, really have no business practicing such things because they are so short on time that the Buddha would of surely scolded them for wasting precious moments that should be used to seek nirodha-dukkha/enlightenment/nirvana.
However though, if you are a full time tantric who is practicing in retreat for at least 8 hours a day, by all means use some of your free time to gain the supernormal abilities, there are texts which discuss which states help with the development of this or that.
For example, using a highly mastered first jhana, entering in and out of it, while placing the mind in very specific positions, is used to have cognition of past lives. While using a highly mastered realm of infinite space, while projecting images into the space and holding them with specific intentions, is used to increase or decrease the likelihood of various events occurring.