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Did the Buddha warn about false teachings?
Inc88
Explorer
An acquaintance of mine told me there was a quote or saying from the Buddha the basically said "beware of false teachings/dhamma" and then explained that when Buddhism separated into the different types we see today that those other branches were the false dhammas. When i asked him to explain a little bit more he even said in Theravada Buddhism some of their practices like constructing statues and worshiping the Buddha were activities the Buddha would speak against but if you wanted to practice any specific type of Buddhism Theravada was the best choice.
So basically im asking if there is such a quote or saying warning about other types of buddhism and what others opinions are on traditions that go against some of the precepts/ideals the buddha spoke of e.g. monks having families, having extra possessions, performing rituals, ect
So basically im asking if there is such a quote or saying warning about other types of buddhism and what others opinions are on traditions that go against some of the precepts/ideals the buddha spoke of e.g. monks having families, having extra possessions, performing rituals, ect
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Comments
That's only my humble personal opinion.
I think that if the Buddha were here today, he would think that whatever works for people is what is important. All areas of Buddhism specify the 4NT and N8FP, which is really what Buddhism is all about. If you are practicing that but are a Tibetan or Zen buddhist, I'm not sure Buddha would have had a problem. And it's not as if he is God, looking down on us for what we are doing and looking to punish us for practicing the right kind of Buddhism.
If Buddhism does produce awakening(ed) beings well then they can add to the party and open up 84,000 dharma gates. 21000 for alleviation of anger. 21000 for alleviation of greed. 21000 for alleviation of delusion and 21000 for mixtures.
All of humanity was diverse thus Buddha's sangha was also diverse. There were yoga practitioners and former craftsman and former farmers. Thus Buddha is talking to one person he teaches them in a unique manner.
In my humble opinion a canon is done by a council. Some things are not included. For example not every word of Buddha was recorded in his 80 years. Possibly some things change as when the Bible is translated differently to suit some subgroup more. For example the King James Bible has the energy of the renaissance from when it was written.
Do you take this man at his word? Do you want to make up your own mind?
The world is mysterious and we may not be sure if the Buddhas intervene in our life, but it is believed in Tibetan Buddism that for example asking for Padmasambavas blessing can remove obstacles. Ingenious people have devised mantras and pranidhanas (clearing your mind as to how to align with the path of the heart). For example the last section of the Avatamska sutra consists of a pranhidhana.
That and a practice that truely embodies the four Noble Truths/ The 8 Fold Path & Dependant Origination is all I think you need to watch for.
If you want to know about Therevada Buddhism:
http://www.buddhanet.net/
And the Buddha did not just teach the 4 noble truth and 8fold Venerable Path. He also taught dependent origination, 6 paramitas, emptiness, etc etc. You can also look into Mahayana Buddhism for more information.
Many Mahayana teachings (such as Buddha-nature) were added centuries later.
But does it matter? The Buddha is alive in every moment, not a dead fossil.
Of course, anything can be taken too far.
Through insight some notable new awakening karma is added to the store. The theravadins were one of several original sangha that has prevailed. Are all their monks awake? Are all the monks of other denominations awake? Do sangha still asleep, teach?
What is the test of a true dharma?
Awakening . . . :clap:
The emphasis was on the teaching.
For hundreds of years after the Buddhas time there were no Buddha Rupas ( statues ).
The Buddha was represented usually by a footprint with a chakra ( wheel ) in the sole of the foot.
Incidentally although it might appear the Theravada is older than the Mahayana, things are more complex than that. The Theravada is in fact a relatively recent form of one of the now obsolete earlier schools.
"Do not simply believe what you hear just because you have heard it for a long time.
Believe nothing on the faith of traditions, even though they have been held in honor for many generations and in diverse places.
Do not believe a thing because many people speak of it.
Do not confirm anything just because it agrees with your scriptures.
Do not be fooled by outward appearances.
Do not believe what you yourself have imagined, persuading yourself that a god inspires you.
Do not accept as fact anything that you yourself find to be logical.
Believe nothing on the sole authority of your masters and priests.
But whatever, after due examination and analysis, you find to be kind, conducive to the good, the benefit, the welfare of all beings - that doctrine believe and cling to, and take it as your guide."
The Buddha included himself in this. On another occasion, he told his monks to not believe what he says simply because they revere him. It is always necessary to test. This is one of the purposes of meditation. Buddhism is a very scientific spiritual path.
Secular Buddhism?
The age will be characterised by the " Five Disappearances "
The disappearance of Attainments...
Fewer and fewer people will reach the insights that follow proper practice of Vipassana and Samatha etc.A teaching of false samadhis will prevail.
The disappearance of the Methods which result in the attainments.
The disappearance of the Learning which underpins those methods and the substitution of whimsical activities which bolster the self sense.
The disappearance of a true understanding of the Symbols which encapsulate that learning..
And the disappearance of the Relics associated with Shakyamuni Buddha..
Following this comes the End of the Kalpa... this particular World Era.
This is closely parallelled in the Mahayana by the teachings concerning The Kaliyuga. The age of iron..and the triumph of Materialism
Which many Vajra teachers consider we have already entered...
NB. This has nothing to do with spurious "Mayan " prophesies.
Fact is, not one of the schools of Buddhism today practice the way Buddha did. The great strength of the Sangha is its ability to translate the Dharma into what is, for that time, the "modern world".
We are not free ( if we value our integrity ) to simply make stuff up at whim.
This requires some hard work in unpacking the source material..
Wolf in sheep clothing.
I used to hear this at church with my Nana.
Just sayin.
But of course its much cooler to dismiss that fact. Particularly if we have problems with the idea of authority.
and the buddha said yes, beware of false teachings.
in fact, buddha predicted that his teachings will last for 500 yrs only.
how do we know the authenticity of a teaching?
as a rule of thumb, you refer to the sutta and vinaya.
So my question is; what is a false teaching?
Is a teaching false if it contradicts what the Buddha taught or is it false if it contradicts the facts?
Apparently the Buddha was very capable of being wrong on the basic facts of life.
Was he, perhaps, capable of being wrong on facts, but right on principles?
It is this profound and starling skepticism that is the starting point of the path of Dharma.
That included a flat earth, a great mountain at the centre of the universe, and earthquakes caused by tremors in the water that the earth floats in...
But as the DL pointed out the Buddha was not making an ontological statement about the world...
And his central truths of the Three Signs of Being remain unaffected by being delivered against a backdrop of ancient Indian cosmology.
From what I can tell, we are not doomed to darkness for the lack of light as a whole. I would wager there are more and more of us waking up every day in this, the age of information.
I don't think Buddha taught to beware of false teachings so much as he taught to recognize the "right" ones.
The summary for the first council in fact glosses over some of the infighting already going on over Ananda, in particular. The acknowledged favorite was pushed aside immediately after Buddha's death, with claims that the one man who understood Buddha more than anyone somehow was not worthy to lead the Sangha, being only a "stream-winner" while the others who wanted the role had already achieved Arahant status. However, Ananda remained popular with most monks even if he wasn't the slickest politician in the group or was unwilling to do what was needed to wrest control from the others, so the monk who was jockying for the leadership position, Mahakassapa, made sure Ananda was announced to have coincidentally achieved Arahant status just before the council debate, making him equal to the other senior monks and so this popular monk's voice and vote would be given the weight needed for his side to win.
Now granted the official line does a bit of whitewashing, but anyone who has sat on even a church board understands the political posturing and backdoor dealing going on. The second and third councils were even worse. And these were fights over doctrine between monks who had all spent their lives studying the words of Buddha almost first hand.
What chance do we have, of finding that one true Dharma?
Yes, This was what I was taught.
(Quote)
What chance do we have, of finding that one true Dharma?
The best answer for me was one interpretation of the closing of the Pranjnaparimita.
which was...
Going, going, always going on, always becoming Buddha.
Another is that as it did not affect his central message, he was quite happy to deal in the cosmological currency of his age..
Another is the fact that the ancients did not distinguish between the ontological and the mythological as we would,
I suppose there is also the possibility that there actually IS a giant mountain in the centre of the universe..lol.
In all and any case what is starkly true is that sentient life is characterised by dukkha, anicca and anatta...the urgent question is what we do about that.
Whatever the case, one of the things I like about the Thai Forest Tradition, besides their focus on practicing, is their belief that awakening is still a possibility and open to all. There was a time not that long ago in Theravada when it was generally believed that it's no longer possible to become an arahant — that we're living in a 'degenerate age' — therefore monks usually spent most of their time studying the texts in order to preserve what's left of the 'true Dhamma' and try to become at least stream-enterers by intellectually understanding concepts such as not-self. Both monastics and non-monastics alike thought it was better to study the texts and to make merit than to practice meditation, hoping to eventually be reborn in a better time and place where the Dhamma and the ability to attain awakening will be restored by the next Buddha, Mettaya (hence the popularity of the Anagatavamsa). But thanks to monks like Ajahn Sao and Ajahn Mun in Thailand, as well as other contemporaries like Mingun Jetavana Sayadaw in Burma, who decided to start putting the Buddha's teachings on meditation back into practice and strive for liberation, that's changed.
The one thing each new decade shares with every other is that oh so common specialness by which our ego's view it.
Hubris!
There is just the work of being open and present in this very moment which we take on or not. Each moment, another manifestation of buddhahood or not, totally in our hearts, with no worldly conditions to excuse.
I think that's called spiritual adulthood.
Ananda's great sin was to convince Buddha to ordain nuns, something the old Braham Mahakassapa always objected to. In fact, the old monk refused to allow the Arahant nuns to attend his council. Ananda was charged with using his influence on the Buddha to get women admitted. He was also charged with allowing nuns who had showed up soon after Buddha's death to view the body first, instead of making them wait until the men had the honor of viewing the body like the second class citizens the old monk considered them to be. There were a few other charges, but those were picky like accidentally stepping on the Buddha's robe one time while mending it.
Ananda according to the record pleaded guilty but with the mitigating circumstance that he didn't know any of this was a crime. He accepted the authority of the congress to punish as it saw fit. Curiously, it doesn't say what that punishment was. However, soon after this first council the order of nuns began its long decline under the sometimes overt hostility of the male monks.
This is what I mean by whitewash. The information is there, but you have to dig through a lot of scholarly papers to find out just how petty and vindictive even the honored founders of our religion could be. The monks who we honor deserve that honor for passing the Dharma down through the centuries to us. Without them, we would not have the Noble Truths. But they were just people, not elevated, transcendent superhumans.
Just ordinary humans can become awakened?
The Buddha was just human?
We may become awakened in this very life?
It is all so . . . so . . . ordinary . . .
I feel a spurt of reverence coming on . . .
Hail Buddha, Full of Grace, the awakened are with thee; blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy sangha, Ananda.
Holy Tara, Mother of Buddhas, prostrate for us sleepers, now and at the hour of our awakening. OM MANI PEME HUM
Based on Hello Mary
Better now. :wave: