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Originally Posted by Scott R. Brown
Saying is easy,
even those who has seen their buddha nature cannot do it effectively until they attain higher then the eight ground boddhisatva level.
and thus, they still have to rely on the technic of reciting Amitaba Buddha or Mantra to dissolve the issue.
Have you become a strict vegitarian yet? if not why not? can you do it? simple stuffs isnt it?
Last edited by Hendrik; 05-09-2010 at 06:01 PM.
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Those questions are not for you right?
Could you let the owner of the answer answer his own question?
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You know this very well from experience, do you not?
I have for a time, at times. I found it very easy! But the belief that being a vegetarian is necessary belongs to the realm of attachment to distinctions. Being a vegetarian is unnecessary to obtaining an unobstructed mind. In fact, if one is preoccupied with the necessity of vegetarianism, that attachment will bind them to samsara!
Yet you have asked them from me in the past as well, have you not?
Your question is a reflection of your attachment to the need for a teacher!
How does my answering prevent him from answering? He will answer or not according to his own inclinations, separate from whether I answer or not!
羅王宗
You don't get Zen by following rules. Zen represents Supreme Wisdom, which in itself is the most natural goal. It unites all religions, philosophies and sciences in this respect.
There is no purpose in forcing rules on oneself. For example during periods of long meditation you will find that meat feels heavy when you eat it, you will find the concept of killing the animal for it is distasteful and naturally you will move away from it. There is no point denying yourself it deliberately. Eventually you naturally won't want it. As for sex, it will stop crossing your mind, it will become less important. There is no need to deliberately forcing yourself to be celibate. Just to practice more and naturally that will happen. By denying yourself Vices they control you. You should simply and naturally not want them. But that takes time and cannot be forced.
EXAMPLE: I observe that Monks wear robes and have shaved heads. So I shave my head and wear a robe....DOes that make me a monk? No. The robes and the head are a CONSEQUENCE of becoming a monk, they are not the CAUSE. Similarly the written texts of buddhism are a CONSEQUENCE of wisdom, they are not the CAUSE.
Buddha himself can not give you Zen. A teacher may help you on to the right path, but they will not walk with you.
meteor
this could use some clarification scott. not quite there yet my brother.
meteor
that's pathetic!
Itinerant practitioner
you don't need to see your buddha nature for it to be there. same like you don't need to see air to breath it and need it.
8 ground boddhisattva would make a huge hamburger, but it would be bad to eat it.
recitation is not necessary, mantra is a rope to hang onto so you don't fall
Vegetable matter is alive as well. Consider that. It has no face, but it is as alive as anything else.
Kung Fu is good for you.
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very simple. who are you?
"bodhisattva this.. zen teacher that.. eighth ground this.. vegetarian that.."
that's all your buddhist identity. you read that somewhere, or someone told you about that. that's someone else's idea, someone else's speech. what is your true speech?
who.. are.. you?!
i didn't answer that question because i asked you; "why do you make zen so difficult", and you answered with a thinking question in return, challenging my understanding through the authenticity of my master's instruction.
so i said; "thank you for that very clear answer".
with your thinking you make zen difficult. but zen is very simple. who.. are.. you?
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Does spiritual alchemy come into the equation with the Zen tradition?
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Hi Richard,
Thought is a manifestation of mind. Without mind there is no thought. When mind moves, that is has thoughts, action occurs!
One day Hui-neng was walking along and came upon two Buddhist monks observing a pennant blowing in the wind. The two monks were arguing amongst themselves attempting to determine whether it was the wind moving the pennant or whether the pennant was moving independently of the wind. (It may seem like a stupid discussion, but it is more of a discussion about perspective, not physics.) Overhearing the conversation Hui-neg commented it was neither the flag nor the wind moving, but their minds!
All perception occurs within the mind. Without mind to perceive it there is nothing to occur. This leads Buddhist to conclude that mind creates events. Events do not occur separate from mind and then mind perceives them, they occur because mind creates them from the first. Action is Mind perceiving itself. The Action we perceive around us is thought moving/creating.
Think of life as a first person computer game with full sensory immersion. Without the sensory immersion we may observe the game without directly experiencing events, it is like a movie, we are separate from the action. But once we include a sophisticate sensory system, we become PART of the action directly because we have a greater investment, pleasure and pain, in what occurs.
It does make sense if we think it through completely. Something is hot because we have sensation telling us it is hot. That sensation is a nerve impulse from the hot substance to our brain wherein it is "interpreted" as hot by the mind. If one did not have sensors within their body to perceive hot, they could touch a hot substance and it would NOT be hot. Or one could choose not to interpret their nerve impulse as hot, which is a mental action, and they would not feel the heat, as when someone is hypnotized or has supreme mental control.
That does not mean that the body would not burn in a fire though. The body is a tool of the mind in order to have full immersion within the game and is subject to the laws of physics.
One might say, “There are events going on far out in other galaxies and there is no mind to perceive them, but when we investigate we see they have still occurred!” This is true, however we know they occurred because we have a mind that perceives them. If there was no mind to perceive them, they did not occur.
Buddhism teaches that all individual “minds” are artificial distinctions of ONE-MIND and it is this MIND that creates all things out of itself.
We KNOW because of Mind! We THINK because of Mind! We PERCEIVE because of Mind! We IMAGINE because of Mind. All these are qualities, functions, of Mind.
Without Mind, "that which perceives", nothing can be demonstrated to happen at all!
Hi kfson,
Spiritual Alchemy is a metaphorical process, so to speak, at least according to Liu I-ming a noted Contemplative Taoist.
There are certainly some methods that use alchemical metaphors. From the Zen perspective, an "expedient means" is an "expedient means", which means to each his own path according to his inclinations, purpose and needs. But a method is still a method regardless of whether it has ideal intentions or more modest intentions.
Zen views all methods as subject to leading one to attachment and as taking the long way around. Zen would ask, “Why go round-a-bout when one could take the direct path?”
My personal view is that, since time is relative and we are all already Buddha, it only matters how long it takes if one is attached to “getting there”. “Getting there” is only important if one has attachments. Life simply IS, enjoy it. If one wants to follow this path or that path, good for them. As long as they get something out of it then that is fine for them. It isn’t about paths or no-paths it is about attachments and understanding. If one has no attachment to a particular method they are following there is no harm done. If one has attachments to following “no-path”, they are just as confused as one who is attached to any other method.
For, Zen’s, "Path of no-Path" can still be made into a fixed method in which attachment becomes a problem. The intention within Zen is not to think about a “path” at all, but to practice it. It is like thinking about the taste of an orange and discussing it with others, but never actually eating it! The talking is NOT the eating; the discussion of the taste is NOT the taste. The taste is in the eating!
Resigned
all of this stuff's you speak is nothing more than prismatic-scintillating, 108-ft. tall Robot Godzilla, "you-spin-me-round-round-baby-rite-round-like-a-record-baby-rite-round-round-round" mind
if knew r3al C'h'a'n, you wud manifest Buddha nature like this:
(*^_^*)
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Only a true Mongolian Qigong Master would recognize that!
Resigned
and only a man sitting across the street with a high-powered scope would recognize one when he sees one...
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scott,
you're right. everything you said is summed up very clearly in the one simple and direct line found in buddhist scripture:
"everything is created by mind alone."
Resigned
why do u make such complex simplicity out of simple complexity? the foot-prints left by your towering 888-foot tall Voltron-Transformer mind-construct / ego-complex fill up with the karmic tears of samsara to make giant pools into which field mice and baby starlings fall and drown themselves; so much better if you sat home alone, disturbing only the neighbors and local goats with your diarrhetic word-flatulence
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