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Belief in rebirth necessary to practice 8-fold path?
DairyLama
Veteran Veteran
Is a belief in rebirth necessary to fully and effectively practice the 8-fold path? From a practical point of view I don't see that it is, but I'd be interested in your thoughts on this.
Please note the question is about our own beliefs on this issue and how they relate to our practice, not about what the Buddha taught which is a separate issue and the subject of another thread here.
P
Please note the question is about our own beliefs on this issue and how they relate to our practice, not about what the Buddha taught which is a separate issue and the subject of another thread here.
P
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Comments
The Buddha's primary objective was to teach us about the origin and cessation of suffering.
Thinking excessively on such matters ultimately simply adds to it.
I can't make my mind up completely, but I'm not really all that worried.
I think it's better for me to focus on what's going on here and now, rather than to waste time wondering 'what if'....
Palzang
There's nothing wrong with having either of these views, or believing in both views. If both views did not exist, many people would not associate themselves with Buddhism, and the Dharma's transmission and impact would be greatly lessened. When one awakens to reality, which is called stream-entry in Buddhism, one gains a new solid foundation to replace their beliefs, and rebirth can then be re-examined and understood with a more developed 'Right View'.
Always consider the bigger picture. I hope this has been helpful.
Namaste
After that I do not know. It is said that the Buddha saw past and future lifes right before enlightenment. Maybe it becomes important then.
Also many see it as a motivational factor to cultivate buddhism to belive in rebirth.
/Victor
Susima Sutta.
Thanks a lot!!! Why did you not quote this sutta to me earlier? Well I must have read it because I love SN but not really remembered this sutta.
Really enlightening. Got a friend (rebirth agnostic) who is going to be thrilled about it too.
Well I still believe in rebirth (difficult for me not to) and I am not going to change my cultivation due to this but (rebirth belief never really figured in there anyway) it is really satisfying to be able so say that seeing past and future lives is not at all necessary to reach the goal.
Thank you.
/Victor
I'm currently agnostic and now thinking it's better to just focus on my daily practice, keep an open mind and live with the uncertainties and possibilities...
P
Reference please? Futher explanation would also be welcome. Obviously I have only read the "wrong" translation...
/Victor
Regarding the eightfold path, he prefaces the Short Section on Morality (paragraph prior to that link) with This makes it clear that moral practice is an ancillary result of his awakening, not the path which took him there.
Regarding the necessity of rebirth, see three paragraphs prior this link: Wrong views 35-50 are also relevant.
The Sila are a part of the eigthfold path and I can agree that it is a base part of it but the eightfold path also contains Pranja and Samadhi. And I can not see that he discusses Samadhi here and besides seems to say that Pranja is the advanced path...?
"There are, monks, other matters, profound, hard to see, hard to understand, peaceful, excellent, beyond mere thought, subtle, to be experienced by the wise, which the Tathágata, having realized them by his own super-knowledge, proclaims, and about which those who would truthfully praise the Tathágata would rightly speak. And what are these matters?..."
Besides just because something is basic does not mean they can be disregarded in the whole. They do not teach plus minus in advanced calculus...
Is he not talking about wrong views of the self here? As eternal, infinite etc. Not per see the fact that there is rebirth or its role in practise?
/Victor
Thanks, Guy. I just see such questions going round and round and never ending up anywhere (as happened further down the thread). BTW, I really like the quote you have in your signature. I've used it several times!
Palzang
So my take on it is that rebirth is not of immediate concern. You can go a long way without even considering the question of rebirth. Practice according to the eightfold path can be developed naturally and even quite expansively without touching upon philosophical and metaphysical issues.
However, at some point in the development of samadhi, practitioners will enter what science calls alternate states of consciousness. Knowing these alternate states might lead to an improved understanding of common states of consciousness. This in turn leads to an improved understanding of the types of illusions that are present in everyday consciousness.
What I am saying is that rebirth will look a lot less whacky at this point, because it becomes clear that the mind's power is unlimited and that it can give instantaneous birth to almost everything. Furthermore, it becomes clear that the dichotomy between nonphysical and physical existence itself is mind-made. With this insight an intuitive understanding of rebirth develops.
Cheers, Thomas
I need something to practice!
P
I think ethical behaviour can be seen as both a foundation and a result of practice, but either way I don't think it's something we should ignore.
P
The Story of Fire
Is a matter of changing clothing while the body remain beautifully in place.
Wow. I think every single aspect of the above quote contradicts at least one of the major tenets of Buddhism AND fails to answer the question. :crazy:
That 'there is no death' is for sure. Given that, do you still think Disney's post contradicts any tenets of Buddhism?
Namaste
Namaste
Nothing new is created, there are only things changing constantly. Life is change. Cells changing, coming together and forming new structures, food changing into energy to nourish, etc.; nothing stands alone. After death the body, which existed only as sustained by food/energy, becomes food/energy for other beings.
I'm not sure that I'm putting this quite well. But, if we understand that obviously there was no 'me', no 'I' before the egg and sperm came together, why are we so afraid to die? What were we before we existed? Fear of such things is dukkha, born of our self-centered and delusional way of looking at 'life'.
Namaste
In biology, we can identify a phenotype that appears to transmigrate between successive generations of organisms. It retains certain traits over time, but ultimately -due to mutation and other genetic/epigenetic mechanisms- the phenotype is subject to change. The transmigration of a permanent entity is therefore an illusion. There is no such entity, there is just as a cyclic process of (re-) birth and genetic transmission.
I find that the nonphysical aspects of existence, some would say "spiritual aspects", can be described in a similar way. The empirical self that we conceptualise in an autobiographical manner comes to an end at physical death of the body. However, certain traits of this empirical self appear to transmigrate in successive rebirths. But this is an illusion, because there is no real entity, since not even the transpersonal self is real. There is just a cyclic process of (re-) birth and karmic transmission.
Cheers, Thomas
The mainstream one.
I.e. not Buddhadhasas.
/Victor
No it does not contradict but support the necessity of understanding the Dhamma.
/Victor
Are you saying that there can be no life without death? You belive in literal rebirth then? Because it seems to be the implication.:skeptical
/Victor
The only belief that is necessary for the 8 fold path is a "belief" (confidence) in your own capacity to follow it.
The Buddha taught there is no death? That life is suffering and we must escape it? :hrm:
Ignorance is the first link
Mental Formations
Consciousness
Name and Form
6 senses (including mind sense)
contact
feeling
craving
grasping
existence
birth
Death is the last
By undoing the first link with wisdom of emptiness the last link is also undone in a chain reaction. Because if the self is empty then what dies? Its obviously not realized just so obviously and trightly as we experience all the bodily and mental suffering here and now. Wisdom of emptiness is quite a remarkable thing and it is always fused with great compassion.
The heart sutra also states that there is no birth and no death. As a consequence of emptiness of self.
No the Buddha did not teach it. But if everybody had the perfect and ultimate view on the self (if everybody was born arahants) then Buddhism would not be necessary.
/Victor
What lives?
:eek2:
Why?
I can see your point. This (the opposite acctually) was a very hard thing to do myself, to understand the view of somebody holding Buddhadhasas view on birth. Let me get back to you on that one.
Lets look at this one concerning why rebirth is not covered under the wrong views you quoted.
"They declare that the self after death is healthy and conscious and (1) material, (2) immaterial, (3) both material and immaterial, (4) neither material nor immaterial, (5) finite, (6) infinite, (7) both, (8) neither, (9) of uniform perception, (10) of varied perception, (l1) of limited perception, (12) of unlimited perception, (13) wholly happy, (14) wholly miserable, (15) both, (16) neither."
The wrong view here is that anybody would hold a belief in a self period. IMO of course.
/Victor
The web of illusions...;).
:crazy:
P
There is nothing in the Eightfold Path that I have ever found, that would imply such a direction.
We are advised as to Right View and Right Intention, but neither alludes to matters we should take as read, or verbatim in such a belief or acceptance.
Right view / samma ditthi.
Everything starts from right view and everything ends in right view. The entire path is a continuous refinement of one's understanding. As someone who has turned from agnostic/disbeliever with regard to rebirth to acceptance, I have to say this change of mind had a profound impact on my understanding of the dhamma. It became clear to me that this isn't just something they make up, something metaphorical, but it is exactly as described, very real indeed. It puts the dhamma into a larger and deeper perspective, at least for me.
Cheers, Thomas