Secular Buddhist remembers past life
DairyLama
Veteran Veteran
The UK secular Buddhist community has been thrown into confusion following a public claim of past-life memories by one of it's leading lights. Frank Skeptic, a retired science teacher from Surrey, posted a detailed account of his past-life memories on an internet blog some weeks ago. Frank had become well known in Buddhist circles for his radical new interpretation of dependent origination, which blends the evolutionary principle with gestalt theory ( or something ).
Frank has described detailed memories of a former life as a chimney sweep in Victorian London, and fragments of a previous existence as an undertaker in France. His chimney sweep memories have sparked a lot of interest from historians specialising in the Victorian era. As one of them commented: "There are only three people in the country who could have described things in such accurate detail, and Mr. Skeptic certainly isn't one of them. We gather he used to be a teacher, but he certainly isn't an academic - he'd need far more letters after his name to be one of us."
Friends and family have been astounded not only by Franks revelations, but also by the drastic change in his personality since his epiphany. Inexplicably it seems that Frank has taken on the character of his the chimney-sweep he claims to have been in a past-life. His wife Cecilia was bewildered and frustrated: "It's simply not the Frank I know at all. He's started smoking roll-up cigarettes and now talks with this dreadful cockney accent. One simply doesn't know what to do. And he drinks tea continuously."
Frank, though, seems very matter-of-fact about his experience: "There I was, lyin' in me barf, and suddenly it all came flooding back. I can remember right back to being a nipper, being shoved up them bleedin' chimneys wiv all that soot gettin' in me eyes, and the guvnor making very un'elpful suggestions from darn below. I can remember like yesterday getting me own set of brushes and feeling like a real man. Then I fell in love with that governess Mary, but that's a whole nuvver story."
Frank has now joined an SGI group, much to the consternation of his secular Buddhist colleagues. But Frank is unrepentant: "At least you know where you are with them," he exlained, "No ifs or bleedin' buts, no messing abart with the sutras. I feel so bleedin' embarrassed, all the times I slagged off them rebirth believers - now I know it's all true! My secular mates ain't been round, they fink I need a check-up from the neck-up. But I ain't barmy, It's all true, so help me!"
"I do wish he'd see a doctor" said his wife with a deep sigh. "And I do wish he'd stop cleaning the chimneys, I'm forever cleaning up after him."
Frank has started to write a book about his past-life as a chimney sweep in Victorian times, and is also planning a tour of French undertakers in the hope of identifying another previous life.
So is there really something to Frank's past-life memories, or is he just delusional? It's an intriguing question, but he does seem irrepressibly chirpy.
"Now, as the ladder of life 'as been strung
You might think a sweep's on the bottommost rung
Though I spends me time in the ashes and smoke
In this 'ole wide world there's no 'appier bloke"
Comments
I'd love to hear his memories as a French Undertaker. As if the French aren't sufficiently morose, being an undertaker would have put him high on the "Je vais me top meself je suis so bleedin' depressed" list.....
Perhaps there will be further instalments....
"Ou est le bleedin' entrepreneur de pompes funebres?"
Cor blimey gov, it's the god honest truth and no mistake
. . . looking forward to the French Undertaker . . . might that be Leon, Nikita or one of the other undertaker aides that seem to be in so many depictions of the French . . .
Well spotted!
"Frank Skeptic", really?
I toyed with the name "Arthur Doubt" for a while.
@SpinyNorman Oh you wrote that? Good on you! The first name "Frank" doubles as an adjective, making it both a name and a descriptor. It's better than Arthur Doubt, so you made the right call.
I initially thought this was a spoof article from The Onion.
I suppose the next instalment could be Frank's tour of French undertakers. Trying to write a cockney doing school-boy French would be a bit of a challenge though.
No... I've known some...
"Bonjoor, mon-soor common alley vue? mwah je swee an ramenoor, ay je swee very bloody filthy...."
"Frank Skeptic"?! I'm sure that's not his real name. :wtf: .
:hrm: .
Ooooh, you're such a doubting Thomas, you.....
.
It's a good name for a Dick Tracy type character.
Brilliant! (used this word in the British way, I hope you know). High quality for sure, you had me looking for a link until about two thirds the way down the post lol!
Brilliant has a "British" way?
Well, of course it does.... D'uh!! :rolleyes: .
Brilliant means 'excellent' or 'very very cool' in British slang. Don't ask me how I found out the hard way about the word 'knob' in British versus US use.
That's usually how I use the word, unless I'm specifically referring to someone's intelligence. Guess it's American-English slang too!
Without contex 'knob' is a veiled pejorative, 0therwise it's got something to do with a door.
I like the word "knob", it has a sort of harmless offensiveness to it.
Knob on Google.
I once called an (American) fellow poster on another forum, an ass . The comment was in any case humorous, but he took great offence, until I cleared up that I mean in the assinine sense, not the rear-end, sense.
In the UK, we generally refer to 'ass' (the butt-end) as an 'arse'.
When we say, "I can't be arsed". we mean, we care a lot less about something than one normally might. In fact, we can't even be bothered to not be bothered....
@SpinyNorman
It appears certain parts of the anatomy are imbued with both the sacred and profane. Nipples can be a bit of a grey area depending on context and may, or may not lead to cognitive dissonance.