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Rebirth/rebeing.
Think I might be right, but I would appreciate those of you who are experienced in this to correct me if wrong. Thank you.
Just got done reading a few articles on re-birth from a Buddhist prospective. Obviously I would be wrong to assume, as many people do that the idea of transmigration is correct, as the the articles pointed out that there is no "self", for someone like myself, coming from a fundamental christian background, this would mean soul, correct? As such, no "soul", what is reborn? The impressions that we had in the previous life? The 6 realms of existence though seems to say to me, that our kamma is what determines our realm of birth. This also then is the impressions of the mind? To allow for higher births, our bad kamma must be extinguished, although it didn't explian how it was extinguished, I would assume that simply suffering through the realm and doing so knowing that this is like a purgatory type of exsistance(I really have no other terminology to use except western christian) thus allowing us to move forward.
Thank you for your concideration of this matter.
Charles.
Just got done reading a few articles on re-birth from a Buddhist prospective. Obviously I would be wrong to assume, as many people do that the idea of transmigration is correct, as the the articles pointed out that there is no "self", for someone like myself, coming from a fundamental christian background, this would mean soul, correct? As such, no "soul", what is reborn? The impressions that we had in the previous life? The 6 realms of existence though seems to say to me, that our kamma is what determines our realm of birth. This also then is the impressions of the mind? To allow for higher births, our bad kamma must be extinguished, although it didn't explian how it was extinguished, I would assume that simply suffering through the realm and doing so knowing that this is like a purgatory type of exsistance(I really have no other terminology to use except western christian) thus allowing us to move forward.
Thank you for your concideration of this matter.
Charles.
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Comments
Must admit... I'm not yet "experienced" in the dhamma... hope you don't mind my posting...
As a beginner, I straight away wanted to know what sort of rebirth I will take in the next life if I practiced diligently and accumulated much merit. This is something that held me be back for many months. Now it seems quite silly to me as to why I spent so much time worrying about the next life... when I have a 'life' right now to take care of.
Now I know what is to be done -
(1) Practice generosity (dana) - loving-kindness and compassion.
(2) Cultivate morality (sila) - in my speech, action, and livelihood.
(3) Mental cultivation (bhavana) - acquire wisdom (panna) through meditation and mindful living.
Practice without craving for any goals... you'll acquire peace in this very lifetime.
This is just my opinion. May someone with more experience guide you.
For example, one of the reasons I do not believe in God is because of that very reason, if I had a different father, I would not be who I am now (genes), also if I grew up in India with ther same parents I would not be who I am now (enviroment), I would be a completly different person. But I do believe that there has to be some kind of force that allows me to aware of my own existance. This has to be conciesness.
The Tibetan book of living and dying gives a brilliant and scientific explanation on how conciesness and rebirth is real. I mean everything in some way can be traced back to a previous existance, I could be traced to you some how, and could continue to be traced back all the way to space particles. As stated in the book, ecologists have scientifically proved that a tree burning in the rain forest will in some way effect the air being breathed by someone in paris.
That last fact offers an example of the way everything is inter-related, and an example of cause and effect (kamma).
I hope that helped and wasnt too wordy, Im not brilliant at explaining complicated things through writing. But I would really recomend the tibetan book of living and dying, its great for Westerners as he realised the need that we need everything proved to us. Feel free to PM me.
The Buddha generally taught rebirth to those who already believed in it and taught 'not-self' to those pursuing the higher teachings that end suffering.
Blessings. Charles.
I'm not buddhist or christian, but here's my 2 cents:
Try not to think of rebirth as another life. Instead try to understand that the world is in a constant state of flux and that existence is ever-changing. We are constantly experiencing things and experiences are constantly changing us.
Maybe you are reborn everyday when you wake up; you aren't the person you were yesterday, right? Maybe you are reborn every time you blink; you aren't the person you were two seconds ago, right? If you keep going with this idea, you see that we are always changing, and there can't be a permanent "self" if it is always changing.
We can never be completely sure of the past, and we can't be sure of the future. All we have is now. right now. The past, the future, tomorrow, the next life, are all heat hazes.
The problem with the world is NOT ignorance. The problem is pre-conceived knowledge. It's NOT about learning something, but rather un-learning things.
But please, Charles, don't worry about this, or anything for that matter. You already have all the answers inside yourself. They've been right in front of you the whole time, and eventually you will you'll notice them. You'll notice they've always been there, and it'll be like seeing the world's biggest joke.
Just relax. Right now, relax.
Palzang
Blessings Charles.
If you're interested, you can find some of my longer posts (read "expositions") on rebirth here and here.
The teachings on rebirth can be interpreted both literally and metaphorically. Metaphorically speaking, the five realms of existence correspond to various pleasant and unpleasant mental states based upon skillful or unskillful kamma, while literalists equate them with either external realms of existence where rebirth is possible or experiences with no external location — i.e., mentally fabricated realities — based upon skillful or unskillful kamma.
The Buddha defined kamma as intentional actions of body, speech and mind (AN 6.63), and he taught that intentional actions have the potential to produce certain results, which, in turn, have the potential to produce pleasant, painful or neutral feelings (AN 4.235). Intention actions rooted in greed, hatred or delusion produce painful feelings, while intentional actions rooted in non-greed, non-hatred and non-delusion produce the opposite. By bringing kamma to an end, however, the mind becomes free and undisturbed. And this teaching applies to both the literal and metaphorical interpretations of rebirth.
As for your question, we don't have to exhaust our unskillful kamma by letting it run its course in order to be reborn into a "higher realm." That's essentially the doctrine of the Jains. Theoretically, if we take the teachings on rebirth literally, it'd be statistically impossible to exhaust all of our unskillful kamma due to the fact that a beginning point to samsara (literally "wandering on"), the cycle of birth and death, isn't evident (SN 15.3). The same holds true for our skillful kamma as well.
Additionally, it should be remembered that some actions can ripen almost immediately, while others will ripen far into the future (MN 136). So rebirth in certain realm of existence, whether literally or metaphorically, can be due to skillful or unskillful actions done in the present (immediately preceding life or mental moment) or to actions done in the past (past lives or mental moments).
The concept of attaching to a self causes suffering there is no argument in that. That doesn't mean there is no re-birth concept in Buddhism. If we cease to exist after this lifetime there is not much credibility in the concept of kamma or practice at all. Why bother? There won't be much difference in us and the thief out there who makes a comfortable living from stealing because after 50 + something years we both just cease to exist and that is it. The reason for practice has something to do with kamma and rebirth too and it is not deniable.
Holy shmit, I wish I'd had your insight when I was 19......
Great post, my little toast topping!
Welcome to the site. It's lovely to meet you.
You've already received some great responses so I'll only add my two cents regarding the part of your original post that I quoted here.
As you know, it's very common for people coming to Buddhism from a Western Christian perspective to still have ideas about things like purgatory and redemptive suffering. When it comes to kamma I like to think of it in terms of a lake. (I read the analogy somewhere a long time ago so please excuse the lack of a reference.) The water in the lake is our kamma and our intentional actions are drops of water that fall into the lake. We want the lake to be filled with as much positive kamma water as possible so that when a few negative kamma droplets fall into it they don't overwhelm the lake.
Know what I mean, Jellybean?
Again, welcome to the forum and I hope you like it here as much I do.
P.S. If anyone knows the reference to the lake analogy and can clean it up for me I'd be most obliged.
Couldn't find the lake analogy, but I found this....
Thanks!
Haha thanks! :smilec:
...but if you think about it, it should be easier for me because I haven't had as much time to create/solidify schemata about the nature of reality.
Sukhita, that's a great analogy!
Nice to know... This concept of "ahosi kamma" will surely motivate a lot of us to perform more wholesome actions... so that our "bad" kamma becomes "past" or "cancelled" or "expired" or "spent" ... and thus will bear no further fruit.
Buddhism DOES NOT deny the existance of supernatural things, but it simply states that nothing is permanent, even one's "soul" (as it is constantly in flux), so yes, there is a subtle mind that passes from body to body. Call it a "soul", or what not, but that's what passes on after death according to buddhism. I guess the fear of saying people have souls was that people would identify with that, when the whole point was that we don't have an inherent "self". Its all interconnected and what not.