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cause and effect
greetings. :-)
buddhists talk a lot about cause and effect; karma is afaiu based on it.
but karma is a phenomenon of unenlightened beings still trapped in samsara (again, afaik).
so per buddhist understanding, is cause/effect ultimately just another samsaric illusion ... like self/other or any other form of duality?
buddhists talk a lot about cause and effect; karma is afaiu based on it.
but karma is a phenomenon of unenlightened beings still trapped in samsara (again, afaik).
so per buddhist understanding, is cause/effect ultimately just another samsaric illusion ... like self/other or any other form of duality?
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Comments
We should define "karma". Are you defining it as volitional action, or as the fruits of that action? Sounds like the latter. Even enlightened beings engage in volitional action. So we need to clarify our terms.
As far as I know, not a single member here
is even close to enlightenment.
For an unenlightened answer, what will happen if I slap you?
yes: the latter. though i'm not trying to define karma; i don't presume to understand it well enough to attempt to do that. i'm just using it as an example of cause/effect in action. hopefully i know enough about it to have gotten that right; if not, someone who knows better please let me know! :-)
cause n effect.
But Buddhist 'scholars' on this forum insist that it means action.
More importantly intention.
So, do everything with good intention, and you will be ok.
Treat people n animals the way you would like to be treated.
with kindness, generosity, blah....
But, thats not enough, you need to meditate.
what does the buddha say about cause and effect? that it is a "law" of the universe? or a phenomenon that emerges from the maya of the relative dualistic world? (implying that when maya is gone, so is cause/effect.)
I can appreciate the qualities you're wrestling with here. If karma is something that is only for the unenlightened, then how is it more than illusion? Is it more than duality? Different people give different answers to this, and it does largely depend on how you look at the term.
The way I was taught it, karma is simply the actual law of cause and effect. You plant a seed, you get a fruit. You plant a weed, you get a weed. You touch a hot stove, you burn your hand. This is not what is escaped, this is how nature works.
What we escape is suffering... or in other words our dissatisfaction, confusion, and mental agitation. What we do with karma is simply realize it's pattern. Fruit doesn't spontaneously generate. If there is no seed, there is no fruit. If we are eating a fruit, we planted a seed. There is an empowering continuum, as nature is not random. Or said differently, our minds are not random.
Buddha didn't stop karma, rather he had no more fruits of suffering. He stopped the habit of eating fruit, planting the seed, harvesting the fruit, eating the fruit on and on. When it is related he "stopped his cycle of karma", it doesn't really refer to the cycle itself. He stopped planting seeds of suffering, and so had no confusion or agitation.
Sometimes its referred to as the cumulative burden of all of those fruits, such as "we work through our karma"... though perhaps you can see why this can be misleading.
With warmth,
Matt
Quote:
And thus Ven. Angulimala became another one of the arahants.
Then Ven. Angulimala, early in the morning, having put on his robes and carrying his outer robe & bowl, went into Savatthi for alms. Now at that time a clod thrown by one person hit Ven. Angulimala on the body, a stone thrown by another person hit him on the body, and a potsherd thrown by still another person hit him on the body. So Ven. Angulimala — his head broken open and dripping with blood, his bowl broken, and his outer robe ripped to shreds — went to the Blessed One. The Blessed One saw him coming from afar and on seeing him said to him: "Bear with it, brahman! Bear with it! The fruit of the kamma that would have burned you in hell for many years, many hundreds of years, many thousands of years, you are now experiencing in the here-&-now!"
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.086.than.html
Regards
"So is kamma something you have to believe in to be a Buddhist ? I've heard Buddhists say that to be a Buddhist you have to believe in the law of kamma and rebirth. But I've never felt that that was ever an expectation.
The thing that attracted me to Buddhism was that you didn't have to believe in anything. You didn't need to take positions. But these are terms that are used. So what is kamma now, rebirth now? Always bringing attention to the here and now rather than deciding whether you believe in the concepts or not. The concepts are just conditions, words."
(The Sound of Silence)
.
But Buddha is incapable of actions that result in
negative karma.
aMatt, i wasn't prompted by thoughts about karma when i started this thread. i just used karma as an example of buddhist cause/effect. the thing that did prompt me was trying to move one more step towards understanding Brahman (Absolute Truth).
per Sankara, Brahman is "Absolute Being divested of all qualities, attributes, limiting adjuncts." thus there is no space, time, duality, form, etc. at the level of Brahman. no cause/effect either.
what i'm trying to find out is what Buddha had to say on the subject.
The Concept of Cause and Effect, or Causality, is a key concept in Theravada, and indeed, in Buddhism as a whole. This concept is expressed in several ways, including the Four Noble Truths, Panca-Niyāma Dhamma and most importantly, the Paticca-Samuppāda.
Abhidhamma in Theravada canon differentiate between a root cause (Hetu) and facilitating cause (pacca). By the combined interaction of both these, an effect is brought about. On top of this view, a logic is built and elaborated whose most supple form can be seen in the Paticca Samuppāda.
This concept is then used to question the nature of suffering and to elucidate the way out of suffering, as expressed in the Four Noble Truths. It is also employed in several suttas to refute several philosophies including creationism."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theravada#Cause_and_Effect
I also found what appeared to be a Mahayana Sutra referred to as the "Sutra of Cause and Effect", but since the objective seems to be knowing what the Buddha said about cause and effect I stuck with Theravada.
as i was reading through them i realized that what i'm actually doing here is inquiring into the nature of Absolute Truth (Brahman), and that this is not the same as inquiring into the nature of human enlightenment. please correct me if i'm wrong, but (living) enlightened human beings still have "one foot in the relative world": have to breathe, eat, defecate, and when they get slapped in the face it hurts.
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I will divulge that I was the student in question!
A student asks:
"When I think of a good feeling when my heart is really alive I wonder how this could be."
Lama Shenpen:
Yes! That is what we should really be wondering about.
Why should that be indeed? There is such deep significance in this fact.
Student:
"I have read numerous times that any good feeling I am having now is because of virtuous actions in the past. But is this true?
It seems like it should also be something to do with opening into space. That when I truly open into space and let my heart be unblocked it is only natural that the spontaneous heart nature is quite wonderful."
Lama Shenpen:
You are right. So why is it said that happiness is the result of positive karmic actions?
It is important to think about why that might be. I think the answer is that the happiness is actually non-conceptual intuitive awareness, unborn and unceasing.
The teaching about karma belongs to samvrtisatya - it is apparently true - it is how things appear to work - like the sun seems to rise in the east. Actually it is stationary and the earth is moving.
Student:
"I mean even if I felt fear or confusion or something, if I were letting go and not conceptualizing on top of that it would have the alive quality 'that certain something' (elusive)."
Lama Shenpen:
Yes - though you could think of the letting go as a volition and so a karmic action with an immediate effect couldn't you?
This is both apparently true and maybe also simply the way the uncontrived mind is � its ultimate truth in a way - although ultimately there is nothing letting go of anything and so letting go doesn't mean anything.
But then, of course, intuitively it does. It transforms the whole world.
http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com/2007/03/thusnesss-six-stages-of-experience.html
As far as I know lama shenpen is a buddhist. She is of the Karma Kagyu lineage.
When that element is removed, rebirth ceases and general merriment ensues.
Namaste
perhaps in terms of formal dogma; i wouldn't know. but when my Tibetan teacher speaks of rigpa (pure primordial awareness = emptiness) it sure sounds like Brahman to me.
> I suggest more research.
perhaps ... though i'm quite content to rest in un-knowing.
I should remember to put name tags with my comments.
I don't know about therevadan buddhism but a pretty basic teaching on the nature of reality in Tibetan buddhism is 'the two truths' with ultimate reality as one. See I didn't explain that I just said further research. I probably should have given a link now that I look back on it. Well if they want a link I'll dig one up.
by the way, what is Brahman?
(ha! jus' kiddin' ... that one i already know! though it would be kinda fun to get some different personal takes on it.)
"The goal of the Buddhist spiritual life is not the merging of oneself with an unchanging, all-embracing, Unconditioned Absolute -- however that may be characterised. The goal of the Buddhist spiritual life is rather the insight into the true nature of the Conditioned itself. To borrow an expression from Krishnamurti: 'The unconditional acceptance of the Conditioned is the Unconditioned.'"
truth be told, i'm far more attracted to merging with The Absolute than to understanding the nature of conditioning. yet i can see the danger of pursuing the former without being grounded in the latter: one can end up living in a fairy tale. (which is what all of us do, isn't it? only some work to remain aware of their fairy tales while others just embrace them.)
"And how is a person of integrity a person of integrity in the views he holds? There is the case where a person of integrity is one who holds a view like this: 'There is what is given, what is offered, what is sacrificed. There are fruits & results of good & bad actions. There is this world & the next world. There is mother & father. There are spontaneously reborn beings; there are priests & contemplatives who, faring rightly & practicing rightly, proclaim this world & the next after having directly known & realized it for themselves.' This is how a person of integrity is a person of integrity in the views he holds."
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.110.than.html
Of course this also is true for enlightened persons. They picked the fruits of their good actions.
It is important to first realize the luminosity of mind otherwise the understanding of emptiness remains theoretical. That is why even the advaita sort of realization is quite impt. But to realize luminosity is not the same as realizing emptiness and most get stuck on perceiving an eternalistic Self
Its all well and good to have humility with respect to ones self, but if you are putting others down, even if it is true, does this not seem contrary to the dharma to you?
Daniel has admitted that his definition of fourth path is equivalent to sotapanna by the fetter model.
With metta,
Sabre