Namaste Francis king,
thank you for the post.
hmm.. so.. you dislike the method for teaching a being how to generate equaniminity, i.e. viewing all sentient beings as their mothers?
personally, i do not have a difficult time with the generation of compassion so these teachings are not all that useful to me whereas the generation of wisdom is quite difficult. that said, for other beings the opposite is true and so i find the teachings on generation of equaniminity useful.
nor did i say that you did and i did not intimate such from your post.
i could not tell since you simply referenced "Mahayana" as an overarching term.... perhaps you meant to be indicating a specific school of philosophy or practice within the Mahayana?
yes, i'm aware of the idea
so.. what is an "enjoyment body" of a Buddha?
this statment seems to indicatethat all things are products yet does not seem to acknowledge that causes are, equally, impermanent. phenomena, whether cause or product are impermenant and i'm unaware of any philsophical school within Buddhism that does not uphold this teaching. as you probably know, the Zen/Ch'an school (perhaps being the most popular in the West) starts each day with a recitation of the Heart Sutra wherein it is explicitly mentioned that "all forms are emptiness and emtpiness is form".
just seems like a strange statement to make to my mind.
Buddha is a title not a being, per se. when asked how a being should classify a Tathagata (Thus gone or Thus come) the Buddha Shakyamuni explained that there is no method by which a Buddha can be classified as they no longer depend upon external supports by which such classifications can be made and to speak of such is to miss the, as the Chinese say, eye of the work.
but it is more than simply suffering as well.. that is taking only a negative view towards it.. dukkha is also feelings of love and happiness, plesasure and exhiliration.. in short, dukkha is the entire range of emotive responses that are products of the unawakened mind.
generally speaking Tanha is tranlisterated as "craving" which indicates a deeper enmeshing than attachment may.. in any event, i wouldn't disagree with this notion.
really? the Suttas do not really indicate that as such.. well.. perhaps that is the natural inference but it doesn't seem to be warranted. the Sutras state that a Bodhisattva is a being that has vowed to help others attain Nirvana and to forestall their entry into Nirvana without remainder.
interesting.. i would parse the terms somewhat differently and conclude that the term means "a being which is awake"
agreed.
correct. Awakening does not mean that one has set down the fetters nor, for that matter, does attainment of Arhatship. according to the Suttas, only a being that enters Nibbana without remainder can be said to have set down the fetters and will no longer take rebirth in any realm.
no, indeed you are not alone in this thought. yet, the Buddha describes Nirvana in both positive and negative terms as the "stillness which proceeds stillness" and as the "activity which proceeds activity" as when Arhants and Bodhisattvas engage in activities for the befit of sentient beings.
you can find it in the Chinese and Tibetan canons, iirc.
the Buddha Shakyamuni described his own previous arising as a Bodhisattva in the Suttas so this is well within what we'd expect to see. further, there are two main experiences of Nibbana which the Buddha describes, with and without remainder and, it seems, that this is a rather fine point within Buddhist philosophical thought.
that is what the Suttas relate though to think of one as superior seems to be, in my mind, rather missing the point.. it seems more organic to me than that.. like the state of a solid, gas or liquid wherein they are all different forms of the same substance.
Nirvana can be peace whilst there are remainders which the Suttas seem to be quite clear upon:
"Monks, there are these two forms of the Unbinding property. Which two? The Unbinding property with fuel remaining, & the Unbinding property with no fuel remaining.
And what is the Unbinding property with fuel remaining? There is the case where a monk is an arahant whose fermentations have ended, who has reached fulfillment, finished the task, laid down the burden, attained the true goal, destroyed the fetter of becoming, and is released through right gnosis. His five sense faculties still remain and, owing to their being intact, he is cognizant of the pleasant & the unpleasant, and is sensitive to pleasure & pain. His ending of passion, aversion, & delusion is termed the Unbinding property with fuel remaining.
And what is the Unbinding property with no fuel remaining? There is the case where a monk is an arahant whose fermentations have ended, who has reached fulfillment, finished the task, laid down the burden, attained the true goal, destroyed the fetter of becoming, and is released through right gnosis. For him, all that is sensed, being unrelished, will grow cold right here. This is termed the Unbinding property with no fuel remaining."
These two proclaimed by the one with vision,
Unbinding properties
the one independent,
the one who is Such:
one property, here in this life
with fuel remaining
from the destruction of craving,
the guide to becoming,
and that with no fuel remaining,
after this life, in which all becoming
totally ceases.
Those who know
this state uncompounded,
their minds released
through the destruction of craving,
the guide to becoming,
they, attaining the Teaching's core,
delighting in ending,
have abandoned all becoming:
they, the Such.
Iti 28-49
metta,
~v
