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Your example of blindness is excellent. When an element is missing from life then life is not whole. When that element is restored to life then life becomes whole.
This is an OT aside, and I don't want to cause offence but my mother is blind and her life is not incomplete or not whole. We all have things we can't do so well, we're all imperfect, so in that sense you could also say we're all incomplete. But please don't assume blind people have an awful life!
IMO the only thing which needs and has proof is that something ineffable marvelous and huge exists. I think that's true.
Carl Sagan ?
Benefit of finding god? No ultimate benefit because there's no suitable referent connected to the word "god." You can't find a ___"D#h*W+|"___ because you don't know and can't possibly know what it refers to! It certainly can't be communicated even if it could be found which it can't. lol :nyah:
That's what I was thinking, but I sort of needed opinion from both parties (believers and non-believers ).
Benefit of convincing people god (whatever THAT is) has been found? You can prey on people's irrational fears to your own advantage.
That's what I see daily in my country.
The other one cent comes from this: meditate and you will probably find the ineffable marvelous and huge that exists
Roger, you seem very focussed on god/gods, something which the dhamma is not. A number of times in the suttas the Buddha says that all he ever taught was suffering, cause of suffering, cessation of suffering and the noble eightfold path to perfection. Buddhists need not concern themselves with anything else as that does not lead to cessation of suffering.
So, on that basis, I'm going to give one more stab at putting the god thing into perspective, give you some advice if you want to follow that path and finally fall silent on this subject (for now).
Gods, or devas and I am going to call them from now on, are impermanent beings. They come into existence and they cease. They love very, very long lives. In this respect, they are no different to us or any other "living" beings. In our travels in this round of samsara, we have been devas. You have been a deva. We have also been animals and even hell beings. We have spent eons arising and ceasing into differnt lives both heavenly and hellish. Nice to be born into heavenly realms. But when travelling around in this samsara, if we haven't attained the first stage of awakening as a minimum, we can also be reborn into the hell realms. They can also last a very long time and a excruciatingly painful. So, my strong advice, work on the path that leads to cessation of suffering.
Now that I have put things into perspective as best I can on a forum, let me tell you how you can be reborn into the heavenly realms. You need to find out about the brahmaviharas and practice those. Practice them day and night every day, every second for the rest of your human life. Then, if you have done this correctly, on the dissolution of the human body, you will be reborn in one of the heavenly realms. For home study, you can start with metta meditation, of which Venerable Mahinda is known to be a great exponent of. You can find his guided metta meditation audio here: http://www.justbegood.net/Downloads/Other talks/Metta Meditation.mp3
Don't practice it just in sitting, practice loving-kindness to all beings no matter where you are and what you are doing.
Roger, you seem very focussed on god/gods, something which the dhamma is not.
{EDITED... . For space savings}
Enjoy the journey,
Vangelis
Beautifully put V. Thank you. Will check out the link you gave me.
May I collapse that joyous bubble and say my focus on the god issue is to separate Buddhism from a religion. I do not want religion associated with what I'm up to. It's a social thing in my little world; people around me think they know GOD! I have to practice resisting that. I'm enthralled with how HUGE things are and how small we are and how inadequate and deceptive our language is. Buddha nature within ourselves is what's important. Getting there is accomplished by actions according to the Dharma. Dzogchen Khenpo Choga Rinpoche hasn't even started us on meditation yet. I hesitate to mention him because I haven't taken refuge yet. All this is to say my plate is full (trying to do good things) and whenever the God issue is raised I think it's preposterous but I must get in there and add my two cents to eliminate preposterous-osity. Geez, thanks for showing me I'm getting off track! Okay. This is very interesting! Makes me a little bit happy, so that's good.
My journey lead from being raised in a non-religious family, to becoming a Quaker, where we practised silent meditation, intended to help us find God (the "Still, small voice of calm" as the hymn called it). Then I got lead into extreme, fundamentalist Christianity when at college and wrote off the Quakers as heretics, but that's another story.
Some years later, I began to lose my faith and was rejected by the church, so I tried to find my faith again by returning to the Quakers. Ironically, it was at a Quaker meeting I met my first 'out' Buddhist. He told me that, according to his beliefs, it wasn't God we were sensing in meetings, but the universal connection between all things.
In other words, this sensation we were calling "God" was in fact our true selves.
I didn't believe him right away, but now it seems obvious to me that what we sensed in silent Quaker meetings, or in the quiet between hymns in the Evangelical church, or walking in the mountains alone, was not God but what the Tibetans call "dharmakya", the Ultimate Reality, the Nirvanna within us.
The Quakers say "When I enter into the silent assembly of God's people, I feel the evil fall within me and the good rise up"
That is exactly my experience with Buddhist meditation.
Comments
Thank you. /end public information announcement
That's what I see daily in my country.
I have 'found' it, and not quite....
So, on that basis, I'm going to give one more stab at putting the god thing into perspective, give you some advice if you want to follow that path and finally fall silent on this subject (for now).
Gods, or devas and I am going to call them from now on, are impermanent beings. They come into existence and they cease. They love very, very long lives. In this respect, they are no different to us or any other "living" beings. In our travels in this round of samsara, we have been devas. You have been a deva. We have also been animals and even hell beings. We have spent eons arising and ceasing into differnt lives both heavenly and hellish. Nice to be born into heavenly realms. But when travelling around in this samsara, if we haven't attained the first stage of awakening as a minimum, we can also be reborn into the hell realms. They can also last a very long time and a excruciatingly painful. So, my strong advice, work on the path that leads to cessation of suffering.
Now that I have put things into perspective as best I can on a forum, let me tell you how you can be reborn into the heavenly realms. You need to find out about the brahmaviharas and practice those. Practice them day and night every day, every second for the rest of your human life. Then, if you have done this correctly, on the dissolution of the human body, you will be reborn in one of the heavenly realms. For home study, you can start with metta meditation, of which Venerable Mahinda is known to be a great exponent of. You can find his guided metta meditation audio here: http://www.justbegood.net/Downloads/Other talks/Metta Meditation.mp3
Don't practice it just in sitting, practice loving-kindness to all beings no matter where you are and what you are doing.
Enjoy the journey,
Vangelis
May I collapse that joyous bubble and say my focus on the god issue is to separate Buddhism from a religion. I do not want religion associated with what I'm up to. It's a social thing in my little world; people around me think they know GOD! I have to practice resisting that. I'm enthralled with how HUGE things are and how small we are and how inadequate and deceptive our language is. Buddha nature within ourselves is what's important. Getting there is accomplished by actions according to the Dharma. Dzogchen Khenpo Choga Rinpoche hasn't even started us on meditation yet. I hesitate to mention him because I haven't taken refuge yet. All this is to say my plate is full (trying to do good things) and whenever the God issue is raised I think it's preposterous but I must get in there and add my two cents to eliminate preposterous-osity. Geez, thanks for showing me I'm getting off track! Okay. This is very interesting! Makes me a little bit happy, so that's good.
Some years later, I began to lose my faith and was rejected by the church, so I tried to find my faith again by returning to the Quakers. Ironically, it was at a Quaker meeting I met my first 'out' Buddhist. He told me that, according to his beliefs, it wasn't God we were sensing in meetings, but the universal connection between all things.
In other words, this sensation we were calling "God" was in fact our true selves.
I didn't believe him right away, but now it seems obvious to me that what we sensed in silent Quaker meetings, or in the quiet between hymns in the Evangelical church, or walking in the mountains alone, was not God but what the Tibetans call "dharmakya", the Ultimate Reality, the Nirvanna within us.
The Quakers say "When I enter into the silent assembly of God's people, I feel the evil fall within me and the good rise up"
That is exactly my experience with Buddhist meditation.