Let’s get one thing straight though. Before you can attempt this, you must first be able to actually subsist from day to day to day. And that means, among other things, getting all the bills paid. And, for most of us, there is not a whole lot of “spirituality” involved in accomplishing this.
So there is still the part where the religious narrative has to be in sync with one of another political narrative.
After all, there are few things the ruling class and those who own and operate the global economy want to sustain more than folks who are eager to expend considerable chunks of their time in the pursuit of religious enlightenment.
Rather than, say, organizing politically to change things.
My post assumed all the basic needs are of no issue.
Buddhism-proper is not about chasing the typically understood “enlightenment.”
Buddhism is about achieving optimality and progress with equanimity and interacting in all aspects of life.
Regardless of whether one is a politician, professional, businessperson, actor/actress, sportsperson, etc. one is a human being with an inherent unavoidable existential issues. Buddhism-proper address those existential issues specifically.
yup, and that’s code for: be a passive wuss and don’t fight back. and because there are so many people involved in mundane, day-to-day struggles that create for them a sense of existential anomie, there’s a thriving market for designer spiritualities like buddhism. it’s an opium almost as strong as christianity. private biggs has noted this:
“there are few things the ruling class and those who own and operate the global economy want to sustain more than folks who are eager to expend considerable chunks of their time in the pursuit of religious enlightenment. Rather than, say, organizing politically to change things.”
the irony is, organizing politically might very well eliminate the circumstances that have led these people to search for religious enlightenment… an activity which is, as marx once called it, ‘the sigh of the oppressed creature.’
folks need to prioritize their respective struggles, man. you get the material struggle whooped before you go on your spiritual quest for enlightenment. if you don’t, that spiritual quest will amount to nothing more than a temporary anesthetic.
Wait a minute. You are accepting Iambiguous’ criticism of Buddhism as anti-political, but his position is that one can never know what is good. That people on all sides of the debate - whatever the issue is at hand - are objectivists. He is saying we cannot know if we are free, we cannot know if our opinions are just based on dasien, we cannot find an I - which apart from being rather Buddhist is hardly encouraging people to change the world for the better.
And organizing things for the better is one of those things he thinks we cannot know how to do, since we cannot know what is better.
Buddhism actually encourages compassion - as I am sure Iambiguous would also, on a personal level, but his philosophy throws up its hands that even this is not something we can know is good.
Now I agree with him about the part that there are no objective morals. But the two of you cannot attack Buddhism, in the context of his philosophy, without rather ironic self-contradiction. He is even more nihilistic than Buddhism and even more anti-political, even more undermining engagement - Buddhists have in many cases been extremely politically active against oppression - and beyond this is philosophy anti- meaning, anti-drawing conclusions. His is an ‘as far as I know there is no reason to get out of bed in the morning philosophy and I can’t even tell if ‘I’ want to or ‘I’ exist’ or how one could start to make the right choices or draw the right conclusions about this’. There will be no revolution or reform movement televised or otherwise coming from him and his philosophy. It would have to be based on arguments that would convince every rational person. That would be step one. How could any organizing for things to get better - whatever that would be - come from a philosophy that demands that one must first explain why we should do something such that every rational person would be compelled to agree. At least a Buddhist monk might have meditated, perhaps blessed a new patio and shown compassion to a songbird, without having had to convince everyone on earth these were rational things to do. And heck, they might even have protested against Chinese oppression in Tibet.
Okay, fair enough. But sooner or latter all religious movements of any consequence, get around to the part where, as one Major Dude advised, you “render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s; and unto God the things that are God’s.”
In fact, some religious movements are all about making Caesar as inconsequential as they can. But, historically, only to the extent that any particular Caesar permits this.
There’s just no getting around subsistence though. One way or another that’s got to be a top priority. Though, sure, in the First World where most of us reside, millions upon millions just take that for granted. Well, barring, say, the next Wall Street bubble. Or Great Recession.
Or trump’s civil war.
From my own experience, however, that sort of explanation is what we often hear from any religious denomination. But: only insofar as words to that effect are encompassed in a general description of human interactions. However, when the focus shifts to actual contexts in which words like progress and justice and virtue and freedom are thought [optimally] to be very different things, God and religion often become very different things in turn.
In other words, always and ever the relationship between our day to day interactions here and now that, through a particular understanding of spirituality/enlightenment/God etc., segues into a yearning about the there and the then. Stretching into all of eternity.
Then let’s be more specific. If there are any Buddhists here, let’s explore the relationship [in your own lfe] between spiritual enlightenment as that impacts on your interacxtions with others in which moral narratives and political agendas come into conflict. Which of course reflects my own particular interest in all of this.
I’m not arguing that Buddhists are necessarily anti-political, only that to the extent they choose to live their lives among the rest of us, their spiritual journeys are almost certainly going to come into contact with conflicting goods out in the political realm. Then they have to ask themselves their own rendition of, “what would – what should – a proper Buddhist do?”
Just as do those of all the other religious/spiritual communities. And all the secular equivalents for that matter.
And I certainly don’t argue that one can never know what is good. I’m only suggesting instead that what any one particular individual thinks they know and/or believe about the “good life” in their head is construed by me to be largely an existential contraption rooted in dasein. And thus ever open to change given new experiences and access to new ideas.
They are objectivists [to me] only to the extent they argue that all rational and virtuous people are obligated to think as they do.
And my own dilemma here is that, on the one hand, I seem to be criticizing spiritual quests that neglect politics. While at the same time arguing that all political agendas are but existential contraptions rooted in a world that sans God is awash in conflicting goods.
But that is just my own fractured and fragmented “I” down in the hole that I’m in here. And without a clue as to how to yank myself up out of it. That’s the irony. I have chosen to pursue philosophy. But, philosophically, I have now managed to think myself – sink myself – into an antinomy I am unable to think myself out of.
Buddhism is just one more wholistic narrative that doesn’t work for me.
But: to the extent that “for all practical purposes” it does work for others that’s all that need be the case. Sure, go to the grave with it if you can.
Of course a description of Buddhism can’t get more general than this.
Suppose, however, a Buddhist who calls herself a left wing liberal befriends a Buddhist who calls himself a right wing conservative.
Wouldn’t it be interesting to follow them about from day to day and listen in on their discussions of things like abortion or immigration or the role of government? How would the spiritual “I” and the political “I” communicate so as to sustain a harmonious relationship?
Especially in a context where the stakes were particularly high for one or both of them.
Sorry I haven’t been active in this thread… I’ve sorta lost interest. But I did want to poke my head in and say: I don’t really believe anyone who says they know what Buddhism is all about. The only one who really knows is Siddhartha Gautama himself and everyone after him was talking about what he experienced and the means by which he got there. What we have today are writings of this. All we can do with them is interpret them, and I don’t invest a lot of credence into interpretations.
True, there may be authoritative institutions whose interpretations are considered canon by many followers, and this may count as what Buddhism is officially “about”, but I’m interested only in the so-called “awakening” that Gautama experienced–what was it?–and what he did to get it.
I’m also curious about other so-called “awakenings” that others have claimed to have undergone, and I wonder how much of a right we (or they) have to say it was the same thing as what Gautama underwent. In fact, out of all the writings I could find describing the Buddha’s original awakening, it only says he meditated under the bodhi tree for 49 days until he realized the 4 noble truth, or the true state of the world, which might only mean something as mundane as: he had an insight. ← Was it really just a glorified “eurika” moment that got blown out of proportion by scholars and story tellers in the years after?
Previous posts deleted! Go disrespect some other Nation, by demeaning their intrinsic nature of a spiritual concept, and go find your own… if you care about the matter that much.
This thread brings me back to a really excellent book review in Philosophy Now magazine…
The Monk and the Philosopher by Jean-François Revel & Matthieu Ricard
Lachlan Dale explores some of the philosophical implications of Tibetan Buddhism.
There’s no getting around this for any particular individuals. If their pursuit of Buddhism allows them to attain and then to sustain benefits of this sort, then, well, this in and of itself makes it all worthwhile.
This is the part that intrigues me. Why? Because to the extent Buddhism does allow someone to “grasp the fundamental nature of reality” is the extent which my own interests in reality – identity, value judgments, political economy, free will, ontology, teleology – are argued to be within the grasp of a mere mortal.
In particular, the “self”. From my perspective, [b]I[/b] am composed of objective, factual truths that seem to be anything but illusions. But intertwined in that is the part where “I” embody subjective/subjunctive reactions to the world around me that generate value judgments that are seen by me to be, if not entirely illusory, certainly anything but objective.
All I can come back to here is this: What on Earth does that mean? What might it be like to be inside the head of someone who has accomplished this? How would he or she react to the components of my own philosophy? What might an exchange consist of in regard to the distinction I make between the either/or world and the is/ought world.
Not up in the clouds of abstraction but embedded down in actual human contexts in which the Buddhist makes particular choices given his or her understanding of human reality.
I totally agree with Gib in his holding to the aspect of organized belief, that subscribes to levels of attaining realization of desired states of conaciousness, as preferential.
And at the same time I am in tune with iambig’s assertion of trying to describe some objective Nirvana type experience on the basis is personal experience, must have absolute validity.
Buddhists are very protective and careful with partially realized assumptions , without reference to absolute states. The reasons are fairly credible , the first is that such an exception may undercut their authority and procedural forms of education. The the second has merit:
It has reference to a conversation between a novice monk with a Master The young monk related the conviction that he has been enlightened, whereupon the Master declares that whoever says he is enlightened is not.
Further conversation between them is terminated by the Master.
Between a description based on succeeding levels of knowledge, say reading all that has been written on the Vedanta , (which I do not believe could be achieved by any individual in any one life time) , or, being instantly enlightened , there may at some point offer very little difference .
Neither do I believe that a symbolic passing of the guard between masters
could be the only way such mastery can exclusively gain such description.
We can fill in that it is persuasive TO YOU. You can say no one knows, but for some reason you feel persuaded. So, the answer to why would be in you.
You state the question, but have already stated others do not know. You seem to not know. That really leaves a couple of options. Try the practices and see if this draws you in more.
I love how Buddha centers Himself with the oneness of all things, to see the interconnections of the rainbow, to try to build the bridge to the higher through faith, and to shine the light of hope through noble deeds and transcendent karma. To see things from a higher plane, to will the Soul to avoid material gains, to be holistic and evolved to a more legendary state, and to awaken the mind to all conscious perspectives of the multidimensional relativistic reality truly sharpens the Soul for mastery and dominance over any torrent or tempest.
The persuasiveness of Buddhism comes from seeing the effects it has on people–particularly Buddhist monks and other practitioners such as Doshin Roshi–not from how its doctrines are interpreted. And if I’m going to be perfectly truthful, any credence I give to one or another interpretation of Buddhism, I give it equally to any other interpretation of any other religious doctrine, and this is simply a default reaction of my brain, which I don’t think is unique to me (we tend to believe what we read/hear as an initial knee jerk reaction before it’s filtered by our more critical thinking).
I’m know. I’m being a winy little fence sitter.
I’ve tried the practice before, multiple times. I never could get into it. It brought me some degree of peace and relaxation but also itching boredom. I could never see how anything like what they describe enlightenment to be like could come out of it. I was never devoted to the practice, as devoted as it seems one has to be to reach a point where some kind of spiritual awakening might occur, and that’s due to my own laziness.
So “don’t” seems to be the option for me–the option I’ve already chosen.
So the question now is: do I just shut up and quit wining, or do I continue to with this thread under the pretense that it still makes for some interesting philosophy (I was hoping to bring up some of the more philosophical questions–for example, how can the self not exist?).
The main thing I am pressing is that experience is the teacher of most important things. That gives you no answer, now, and unfortunately that’s where we are. This is true for many rather mundane things also. Maybe therapy won’t help. Maybe golf lessons won’t. Maybe approaching that lovely woman is going to end up breaking my heart or boring me to tears.
Unfortunately and maybe also fortunately, we gotta make our best guesses and see what experience and longer team learning bring us. One can always, take a pause, reevaluate and either drop out or continue.
It’s easier in the presence of others.
That’s certainly a philosophical discussion. But what it means in Buddhism is, again, something experienced, a long way down the line. I’m not judging you here particularly. I hate that we can’t have some simple scoring system. Like we do something right (for us or in general) and we see plus points on a board. We do something no good for us and the points drop. And we get estimates of results, like projections in business when we, say, start meditating for fifteen minutes. Man, I would love that. Then, we’d know. We’d know. I wish.
But here we are in a universe where there are competing experts with competing stories and practices and, well, we are left to our intuition for many decisions and, heck, some good processes can make us feel worse for a while. Think about relationships. Telling one’s spouse or ________friend that we are pissed off about something may very well make things worse for a while. It might be more painful and this might last for a while. But not doing this ends up in relationships that such in a gray way or have explosions and more pain. think of this as the equivalent of meditation or therapy. A good process might make things feel worse for a while, maybe a long while. So, how the heck do we decide.
I think we have to decide by intuition, desire and to some degree our values, in those situations where it may take a long term committment with no guarantees.
So what does your gut feeling tell you about Buddhism?
And you could make a decision based on that and check back in 6 months later.
My gut tells me that years of practicing meditation probably has a consciousness altering effect on the brain that can be described as a feeling of “one-ness with the universe”, “dissolution of self”, or “awakening”… but the same can be said of psychedelic drugs, and people call that “hallucinations” or “delusions”… still, sounds like a pretty nice delusion to have.
A person can experience a sense of “one-ness with the universe” as an altered state of consciousness through many ways via drugs, meditations, stress, mentally ill [schizo, epileptic, etc.] and even brain damage [note Jill Bolte - a neuroscientist].
What is critical to the above experience is how one can apply to optimize one’s well being. The 4NT-8FP life problem-solving technique provide one the path to such an optimization.
Buddhism has the principle of the Middle-Path to ensure one do not get stuck in one extreme, thus via the Two-Truths principles holds there is oneness with the universe [non-duality] in one perspective while in another perspective one is independent within the universe [duality].
There is this neo-advaita movement [of madness]; Neo-Advaita, also called the Satsang-movement[1] and Nondualism, is a New Religious Movement, emphasizing the direct recognition of the non-existence of the “I” or “ego,” without the need of preparatory practice. - Wiki
who keep preaching and telling the world there is no-you, no-me, no-self and all sort of one-sided extreme thus the call to abandon what we would term as the ordinary real world.
In normal everyday life, a Buddhist will acknowledge the independent external world. However where the impulses of the existential crisis is active, the Buddhist adopt the oneness with the universe, i.e. there is no independent God to offer salvation to the independent individual.
Since in this perspective of oneness, there is no independent soul to be lost and need to be saved, thus avoiding the sufferings from any “imagined” threat of loss upon mortality.
To be in state of holding to two extremes at the same time but not in the same perspective require one to cultivate the necessary skills supported by the effective algorithm within one’s brain/mind via proper meditations [a requisite of Buddhism] and reflections.
In general most of those who experienced an altered states of consciousness of one-ness via other means [drugs, etc.] do not convert their experiences to the practicals of life.
In the case of Buddhism, the ordinary believer do not start with an expectation of an experience of one-ness but rather such an experience of oneness spontaneously emerged after some time in the course of practicing Buddhism and reflections on its doctrine.
The problem with the above is at present there are so many schools and sects of Buddhism promoting a range of confusing and opposing interpretations of Buddhism-proper.
Thus there is a need to get to what is Buddhism-proper which can be extracted from the teachings of the Buddha in alignment with universal philosophy-proper.
