OT: Question on Buddhism

[red5angel]

I have a quick off topic question. I am studying buddhism, and am trying to figure out who the rotund buddha like figure is that is so popular in asia. I see images of him all over the place but have as of yet to hear an explanation on who he is. Is there more than one guy or is it the same guy I see, stting down, walking with a stick and bag over his shoulder, hands stretched up over his head, etc.....

[David Jamieson]

These representations are symbolic in nature.

The fleshy or "fat" buddha is not the physical representation of guatama but rather , fits the cultural paradigm of contenment.

To be well fed and happy is interpreted through the sculpture as an outward symbol of inner contentment.

The various postures are also symbolic. When the buddha is holding his hands up over his head it is symbolic that with enlightenment and inner recognition of the buddha nature it is possible to "hold up the world" other postures have other symbolic meaning.

The true physical representations of the buddha Guatama and other buddhas before him and after him also contain symbolism while remaining a little more true to the actual form of the person.

peace

[Bak Mei]

Some would say it is Bohdidarma, the one who came from the west to the Shaolin monastray, the founder of Chan Buddism.

[Crimson Phoenix]

Yes, some Chinese even say it's not a buddha, but "the protector of houses" (a kind of less famous boddhisattva)...But I'm convinced it really is a buddha

[prana]

Walking around with a stick sounds like Bodhidharma.
His disciple is one without the arm :D great story behind this.

But if has a biggish stomach, laffing, it is Buddha Maitreya (Mei Lai Fut) he is the future Buddha that will bring forth the next round of enlightened beings. He shall defeat the great war, misery that lasts 150 years and change the ways of a very evil king (or leader).

Maitreya is a Buddha, who promised to return when he saw the suffering that will become of humans approx)2500 years after the death of Gautama (Shakyamuni Buddha)...

Maitreya returns to as a Bodhisattva :D

[prana]

in case you are talking about Maitreya...
This is taken from Lama Thubten Yeshe website

http://www.fpmt-osel.org/gallery/images/maitreya.jpg
Although in this thangka, he is not rounded or laughing...

Countless aeons ago, Maitreya, while making many offerings, took the bodhisattva vows from the Tathagata Great Power (Tub chen) in the presence of many other Buddhas. From that moment on, he has guided countless sentient beings along the path of the three higher trainings (discipline, concentration and wisdom) thereby leading them through the three vehicles (shravaka, pratyekabuddha and bodhisattva) to enlightenment.
While practising as a bodhisattva, he specialized in the meditation on great love. He not only taught this path to others, but meditated on it continuously himself. He would often station himself at the gates of a city and contemplate on loving kindness. So powerful was his meditation that people coming and going through the gates, if they would pass close enough to touch his feet, would themselves receive the realisation of great love. This greatly pleased all the exalted beings of the ten directions. The Tathagatas rejoiced in his actions and predicted that in his future lives, as a Bodhisattva and as a Buddha, he would be known by the name "Love" (Maitreya; Jhampa). This is how he received his name.

In one lifetime he was born as one of the thousand sons of a great king. This king wanted to know in what order his sons would become enlightened, so he put all their names into a bowl, then drew the names out of the bowl one by one. Maitreya's name was fifth and the Buddha of that age, the Tathagata Limitless Knowledge (Yon ten pa ye) predicted that he would be the fifth Buddha of the present era, Shakyamuni being the fourth.

Eventually, Maitreya advanced through all the levels of spiritual development. He achieved the tenth and highest stage of a bodhisattva and afterwards a fully enlightened Buddha. Having reached this level of utmost perfection, he manifested in many different aspects in countless Buddha fields, and at present his particular abode is the Pure Land of Tu****a. There he imparts mahayana teachings to many countless advanced bodhisattva disciples, and it was in Tu****a that he taught his five famous texts to the great arya being Asanga. Maitreya also gives many other teachings in accordance with the needs of different disciples. Throughout the ten directions of space he appears as countless spiritual masters, thereby leading innumerable beings along the path to full awakening.

Eventually the time will come for Maitreya to appear as the fifth universal Buddha of this world age and turn the wheel of dharma for the benefit of all. This will come about in the following manner. In the future, because of the growth of delusion, the beings living in this world will degenerate. Their lifespan will decrease and be filled with much suffering. When the human life expectancy has shortened to only ten years, Maitreya will mnanifest in the form of a great spiritual leader and demonstrate the path of virtue. He will particularly spread the teachings on loving kindness and, as a result, the fortune of the beings in this world will begin to change. As they gradually give up their deluded attitudes and harmful behaviour, their lifespan will increase. After a great many ages the life expectancy of humans will grow enormously and then slowly decrease again until the human lifespan is about a hundred years. According to the prophesies of all the Buddhas and his own promise, this will be the time when Maitreya Buddha will appear in this world as a universal teacher.

His father will be called The Great Compassion Brahmin (Tramze Tsang rab) and his mother The Youthful-lookinig One (Tsang Denma). Maitreya will be born from her side as she stands in a forest garden, and the great celestial kin INdra will receive the new born buddha with great deviotion. Immediately the baby Maitreya will take seven steps in each of the four directions, and on each spot that he places his feet, a treasure of lotuses wil bloom. Then he will declare, "I am the unsurpassed saviour of the world and have come to liberate all beings from their suffering. This will be my last rebirth; there will be no further reincarnations for me." Upon hearing this, all the exalted beings and spirits of the world will rejoice, performing many acts of purification and presenting magnificent offerings to him. His proud father will then take him around the city so that the citizens can also rejoice at their new treasure. Beautiful goddesses will offer him flowers and the great sages will predict that in that very life he will become a fully enlightened Buddha.

Thereafter he will follow the life of a royal prince. When the time comes for him to be educated, Maitreya will be the foremost of four thousand and eighty students and when it is time to marry, Maitreya will have many wives with whom he will live for many years. Then a great religious festival of Brahmins will take place in his kingdom. During this festival, Maitreya will demonstrate that he has come to realise the impermanent nature of phenomena and, seeing the examples of ascetic monks, will declare his renunciation of cyclic existence and his intention to leave his royal surroundings and follow the religious way of life. This decision will so greatly shock those around him that the whole palace and all his wives will fly up into space.

Thereafter, having made his decison to abandon the royal way of life, Maitreya will depart into the forest. All the celestial beings and saints will rejoice at his resolve and will offer prayers for his success, protecting and caring for him as he meditates. Following his example, many of his wives and one thousand and forty members of his retinue together with numerous city dwellers will follow after him in great devotion and also take ordination as religious practitioners.

For seven days, Maitreya will follow the ascetic way of life, refraining from all food and drink. Then upon arising from a state of deep meditative concentration, Maitreya will receive a bowl of milk from his wife Da way Tong chen. Refreshed by this, he will assume the diamond hard cross-legged posture and make the firm determination not to rise from meditationi until enligthenment has been achieved. That evening he will defeat all demonic interferences and negative forces (mara) and in the middle of the night will enter a state of profound absorption. Finally, with the rising sun the following morning, Maitreya, who in fact has achieved full enlightenment many ages before, will demonstrate for the sake of his fortunate disciples the attainment of complete and perfect Buddhahood. Then, in the same manner as all Buddhas of the past, present and future, Maitreya will lead countless beings out of their suffering and along the path to spiritual awakening.

For seven days after his demonstration of enlightenment, Maitraya will remain in silence, observing his future disciples. Then Indra, the king of the celestial beings, will present him with a golden wheel and the universally beautiful objects of the five senses, requesting him to turn the wheel of dharma for the benefit of all. In response to this request, Maitreya will teach the four truths of the noble ones and thereby lead many millions of disciples to liberation.

During his long teaching career, Maitreya will turn the wheel of great teachings three times and each time countless multitudes of disciples will come to listen. These teachings will be enormous events attracting not merely human, earth-born disciples, but many celestial beings, dakas, dakinis and beings from other realms as well. Many of those gathered to receive these teachings will immediately become arhats, bodhisattvas and even fully enlightened Buddhas. By the power of his holy body, speech and mind, Maitreya will lead and satisfy all those gathered according to their individual needs and capacities. To some he will give hinayana instructions, to others he will give mahayana. In this way, he will lead countless disciples through the three vehicles to liberation and enlightenment.

[prana]

And another...

The Maitreyavyankarna or "The Prophecy Concerning Maitreya"

translated by Edward Conze in his Buddhist Scriptures (Penguin Books, 1959), pages 238-242.

Sariputra, the great general of the doctrine, most wise and resplendent, from compassion for the world asked the Lord: 'Some time ago you have spoken to us of the future Buddha, who will lead the world at a future period, and who will bear the name of Maitreya. I would now wish to hear more about his powers and miraculous gifts. Tell me, O best of men, about them!'

The Lord replied: 'At that time, the ocean will lose much of its water, and there will be much less of it than now. In consequence a world-ruler will have no difficulties in passing across it. India, this island of Jambu, will be quite flat everywhere, it will measure ten thousand leagues, and all men will have the privilege of living on it. It will have innumerable inhabitants, who will commit no crimes or evil deeds, but will take pleasure in doing good. The soil will then be free from thorns, even, and covered with a fresh green growth of grass; when one jumps on it, it gives way, and becomes soft like the leaves of the cotton tree. It has a delicious scent, and tasty rice grows on it, without any work. Rich silken, and other fabrics of various colours shoot forth from the trees. The trees will bear
leaves, flowers and fruits simultaneously; they are as high as the voice can reach and they last for eight myriads of years. Human beings are then without any blemishes, moral offences are unknown among them, and they are full of zest and joy. Their bodies are very large and their skin has a fine hue. Their strength is quite extraordinary. Three kinds of illness only are known -- people must relieve their bowels, they must eat, they must get old. Only when five hundred years old do the women marry.

The city of Ketumati will at that time be the capital. In it will reside the world-ruler, Shankha by name, who will rule over the earth up to the confines of the ocean; and he will make the Dharma prevail. He will be a great hero, raised to his station by the force of hundreds of meritorious deeds. His spiritual advisor will be a Brahmin, Subrahmana by name, a very learned man, well versed in the four Vedas, and steeped in all the lore of the Brahmins. And that Brahmin will have a wife, called Brahmavati, beautiful, attractive, handsome, and renowned.

Maitreya, the best of men, will then leave the Tu****a heavens, and go for his last rebirth into the womb of that woman. For ten whole months she will carry about his radiant body. Then she will go to a grove full of beautiful flowers, and there, neither seated nor lying down, but standing up, holding on to the branch of a tree, she will give birth to Maitreya. He, supreme among men, will emerge from her right side, as the sun shines forth when it has prevailed over a bank of clouds. No more polluted by the impurities of the womb than a lotus by drops of water, he will fill this entire Triple world with his splendour. As soon as he is born he will walk seven steps forward, and where he puts down his feet a jewel or a lotus will spring up. He will raise his eyes to the ten directions, and will speak these words: "This is my last birth. There will be no more rebirth after this one. Never will I come back here, but, all pure, I shall win Nirvana!"

And when his father sees that his son has the thirty-two Marks of a Superman, and considers their implications in the light of the holy mantras, he will be filled with joy, for he will know that, as the mantras show, two ways are open to his son: he will either be a universal monarch, or a supreme Buddha. But as Maitreya grows up, the Dharma will increasingly take possession of him, and he will reflect that all that lives is bound to suffer. He will have a heavenly voice which reaches far; his skin will have a golden hue, a great splendour will radiate from his body, his chest will be broad, his limbs well developed, and his eyes will be like lotus petals. His body is eighty cubits high, and twenty cubits broad. He will have a retinue of 84,000 persons, whom he will instruct in the mantras. With this retinue he will one day go forth into the homeless life. A Dragon tree will then be the tree under which he will win enlightenment; its branches rise up to fifty leagues, and its foliage spreads far and wide over six Kos. Underneath it Maitreya, the best of men, will attain supreme enlightenment, there can be no doubt on that. And he will win his enlightenment the very same day that he has gone forth into the homeless state.

And then, a supreme sage, he will with a perfect voice preach the true dharma, which is auspicious and removes all ill, i.e. the fact of ill, the origination of ill, the transcending of ill, and the holy eightfold path which brings security and leads to Nirvana. He will explain the four Truths, because he has seen that generation, in faith, ready for them, and those who have listened to his Dharma will thereupon make progress in the religion. They will be assembled in a park full of beautiful flowers, and his assembly will extend over a hundred leagues. Under Maitreya's guidance, hundreds of thousands of living beings shall enter upon a religious life.

And thereupon Maitreya, the compassionate teacher, surveys those who have gathered around him, and speaks to them as follows: "Shakyamuni has seen all of you, he, the best of sages, the saviour, the world's true protector, the repository of the true Dharma. It was he who has set you on the path to deliverance, but before you could finally win it you have had to wait for my teaching. It is because you have worshipped Shakyamuni with parasols, banners, flags, perfumes, garlands, and unguents that you have arrived here to hear my teaching. It is because you have offered to the shrines of Shakyamuni unguents of sandalwood, or powdered saffron, that you have arrived here to hear my teaching. It is because you have always gone for refuge to the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha, that you have arrived here to hear my teaching. It is because, in Shakyamuni's dispensation, you have undertaken to observe the moral precepts, and have actually done so, that you have arrived here to hear my teaching. It is because you have given gifts to the monks -- robes, drink, food, and many kinds of medicines -- that you have arrived here to hear my teaching. It is because you have always observed the sabbath days that you have arrived here to hear my teaching.

And Shakra, the thousand-eyed, the replendent king of the gods, rejoiced greatly, saluted the leader of the world, and praised him as follows: "Homage to you, O noblest of men! Homage to you, the best of all men! Have pity on the multitude, O Lord!" And also Mara, the greatly powerful, will be there, and he also will salute the leader of the world, and praise him. And, surrounded by his retinue of gods, Brahma also will proclaim the true Dharma with his heavenly voice. And the entire world shall be crowded with Arhats, whose outflows have dried up, who have got rid of their faults, who have shaken off all the bonds which tie them to becoming. Joyously the gods, men, Gandharvas, Yakshas, and Rakshasas worship the teacher, and so do the mighty Dragons. They also will lose their doubts, and the torrent of their cravings will be cut off: free from all misery they will manage to cross the ocean of becoming; and, as a result of Maitreya's teaching, they will lead a holy life. No longer will they regard anything as their own, they will have no possessions, no gold or silver, no home, no relatives! But they will lead a holy life of chastity under Maitreya's guidance. They will have torn the net of the passions, they will manage to enter into the trances, and theirs will be an abundance of joy and happiness; for they will lead a holy life under Maitreya's guidance.

For 60,000 years Maitreya, the best of men, will preach the true Dharma, which is compassionate toward all living beings, and when he has disciplined in his true Dharma hundreds and thousands of millions of living beings, then that leader will at last enter Nirvana. And after the great sage has entered Nirvana, his true Dharma still endures for another ten thousand years.

Raise therefore your thoughts in faith to Shakyamuni, the Conqueror! For then you shall see Maitreya, the perfect Buddha, the best of men! Whose soul could be so dark that it would not be lit up with a serene faith when he hears these wonderful things, so potent for future good! Those therefore who long for spiritual greatness, let them show respect to the true Dharma, let them be mindful of the religion of the Buddhas!

I think this may be the image you are referring to....
http://web.singnet.com.sg/~alankhoo/Maitreya2.jpg

[David Jamieson]

prana, in all the sculpture i have seen of the future buddha, I have not seen the "fat" one. hahahaha.

Always, the matreiya is seated or standing, wearing the crown of the west and actually is represented as a rather average person.

The Bodhisattva state is where bodhicitta is acheived and the end goal is to become a buddha and to bring others into the state of being/mind that is bodhicitta that opens the gate to becoming a bodhisattva, or supremely merciful being who will endure all manner of tortures and evil to bring peace and harmony and to protect those who need protection.

the buddha guatama prescribed the pursuit of the bodhisattva state for humanity to 5000 years. Halfway along this timeline the buddha Matreiya was "prophecied" to be born amongst us and to bring us through the "dark" ages of evil that we are now living in.

when the 5000 years is up, we should have transcended our dualistic ways, become one with the Tagathata womb(buddha nature) that exists in all of us and moved on to the next level in our own evolution as a creature on planet earth and in the universe itself.

at least, that's how i've been led to understand the nature and purpose of buddhism :)

much peace at this time of year and happy solstice to you pagans, merry christmas to you christians, happy chanukah to all our jewish friends, Ramadan is over so all our muslim friends feel free to enjoy a festive meal in the daylight hours and finally a good tet to you all.

peace

[Daredevil]

Oh, Maitrea is often depicted as a fat guy. :)

There's lots of big, fat guys in Buddhist lore that look like the Buddha (Siddharta Gautama), but which really are not.

At least two spring to mind. I don't remember either's name, but one was Buddha's disciple. He had a unique problem. He was very handsome and the ladies would not leave him alone, so his practise was endangered. He asked the Buddha what to do, and he said he should make himself fat and unattractive. He followed this advice, but did not succeed, as a fat person was considered to be well off and wealthy, so he only encouraged the women. What a cruel life. :) He is depicted usually sitting and always holding his big stomach with his hands.

The second one .. I can't recall the story behind him, but he's usually laughing and carrying a sack.

So, what may look like a Buddha, may not be one.

Just some insights,

-dd-

[prana]

Kung Lek

hehehe,fat, ahhhhhh a very long journey for me instead. But hey, I never knew about the 5000 years before the attainment of tathagata, but it is good to know yourself, and all the suffering beings of the world, would one day become a Bodhisattva :)

Actually, I am so greatful of the thousands and thousands of Himalayans (and others) who are turning the wheel of the 6 syllable mantra constantly, and practising countless prostrations, to forever spread their loving kindness for us beings all over the rest of the word, who are in turn constantly creating more poisons.

And to those who have given their lifes to those tasks for OUR good, Namo Sangha.

[Repulsive Monkey]

I have only quickly glimpsed thru your response so im not sure whether or not you mentioned the most important bit about Maitreya? That he'll be doing it all from his chair (so befitting to the 21st century ideas of comfort!!!) hence all the pictures usually denote Maitreya sitting on a bench.
Hope you appreciate my ironis tone here.

[prana]

Repulsive Monkey

That is funny and yes, I myself have been wondering why he is seated so 'modernly' :D

One of my outcomes is that, as you say, he is powerful from the copmfort of his chair, and the other is that, his seated position is a means of 'rising' into binding with his heart center. In our practise, we practise Amitabha seated in that position with his right toe on the thousand petalled lotus.

GoOd StuFf ;)