Enlightenment=a shared responsability

Discussion in 'Off Topic Area' started by ninjaboj, Dec 2, 2011.

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  1. ninjaboj

    ninjaboj Banned Banned

    Hi. I appreciate that my last thread got bricked after only a couple of days, but there are still a couple of things i would like to raise on the issue and so I am going to try again here...

    Me saying that I am enlightened sure has seemed to hit some of you men hard. But I think you have misunderstood me and what I mean when I say this.

    I will refer back to one of my first posts on the religion's thread, when I said that enlightenment is not an individual experience but a shared one. What I mean by this is that we are not built as solitary beings, but in communities with friends and neighbours around us. As any good buddhist who is worth his salt will be able to tell you, sure the road to enlightenment is a rocky one (as most certainly the road to heaven, one which surely only ends when we die), but equally we cannot do it alone. Anyone who goes through life under the pretence that we exist as solitary individuals must live a very sad life indeed.

    Actually we exist with others, we were born with a close attachment to our parents (and our mother specifically), and I think we would to well to try and preserve these attachments through our waking lives. This means not just the protection and attachment to our families (which I accept are critically important), but also to all other sentient living beings. This is the Buddhist way.

    Thankyou for listening.
     
  2. CanuckMA

    CanuckMA Valued Member

    :bang:

    :hammer:



    :banana::banana::banana::banana::banana:
     
  3. m1k3jobs

    m1k3jobs Dudeist Priest

    What school of Buddhism teaches this?

    Attachment is one of the main causes of suffering. To be attached to a relationship is to try and control it, to have expectations and other desires. Relationships are not static or permanent. People change, people leave, people die, some day you will die. What of these attachments then? This is not living skillfully.
     
  4. ninjaboj

    ninjaboj Banned Banned

    I call my Buddhism Zen, but I suppose this is just a generic incarceration. Better then not to call it anything at all. I learnt about Buddhism from firstly Christmas Humpreys, Edward Conze and Julius Evolva. But I learnt how to love from my wife. And Love is the better half of God (Corinthians 1:13 the n testament).

    Attachment is one of the main causes of suffering. True. People die, true again. What of these attachments then? This is not living skillfully. I probably would have agreed with all of that before I went into hospital fifteen years ago with a broken neck for three months. But trust me after spending ten days in a coma with a close attachment to those around me, you kinda get a new perspective on things.

    You can push people away all you like, this is not living skilfully. Or you can try and build bridges and attachments, family and friends. sure they won't last with you til the grave. But no-one can expect to live forever, not even god not even buddha, certainly not you or me.

    So what then then? Do we just throw in our cards and call it a day? Or do we carry on living fighting, striving and working (if you are lucky enough to have a job)? Trying the best we can with the cards we have been dealt. Me in and out of hospital for the last six years have sat down and written three books. Sure they are riddled with mistakes, but you try writing from in hospital.

    I am not trying to dismiss your school of theology/Buddhism whichever it may be. Just defending myself and mine from this corner that's all.
     
  5. Simon

    Simon Administrator Admin Supporter MAP 2017 Koyo Award


    Which is it then? Seems like an arguement riddled with contradictions to me.

    You ca have very little in the way of material posessions and be more than happy.

    You can have millions of pounds worth of posessions and be miserable.

    Choose your own path and just be, for the desire to rid yourself of attachments is in itself an attachment.
     
  6. holyheadjch

    holyheadjch Valued Member

    Nothing you have said here or anywhere else indicates you have the slightest idea what Zen is, never mind that you practice any kind of variant of it. Zen is not a catch all term for hokey pseudo new age nonsense. Zen is not something you read about or think about or intellectualise.
     
  7. Blade96

    Blade96 shotokan karateka

    attachment in itself isnt bad, you just better be darn sure and particular about who you get attached to.
     
  8. ninjaboj

    ninjaboj Banned Banned

    I can't argue with you on this one for two simple reasons Simon.

    A Because anything i say you seem to have found quite an art to dismissing on its negative points without finding any credit to give it whatsover.

    And B I am already on my final warning. I am afraid that if I commit myself to any more heated debates that will be it for me on this forum. So I must regretfully refrain from this tit for tat way of going about things. What I will say is that you may find that it is in the words you neglect to respond to in my posts, that you will find your true answers!
     
  9. Simon

    Simon Administrator Admin Supporter MAP 2017 Koyo Award

    You cannot respond because you don't have the words to do so. It has nothing to do with being on a warning.

    If a fight is about to start the sentences stop and the words become monosyllabalistic, often resorting to swearing. This is the position you are in.
    You cannot formulate and arguement backing up your claims and feel the need to use aggressive words to shout your point across.

    Sorry, your excuse won't wash.
     
  10. ninjaboj

    ninjaboj Banned Banned

    Hi holyhead. Please don't claim to have any monopoly over Zen buddhism because you don't. What I have said to you doesn't reek of Zen huh? Well maybe that is because I am a self taught Buddhist, of the authors mentioned above, whom were in and as of themselves very important figures in western Buddhism in their time. If you have never heard of them please let me know, and equally if you have great then tell me.

    What I don't want you to do is sit on the fence and criticise me from an assumed position of authority. Because without commiting to a position we are fighting (or arguing) on a artificially false and alienated battlefield. Which is concurrent to cheating.

    So show your hand. I call you.
     
  11. m1k3jobs

    m1k3jobs Dudeist Priest

    A bit of an interesting exercise. One of the primary goals of any school of Buddhism is given up the illusion of control. Which things in your life do you feel you have control over?

    Sitting quietly, doing nothing.
    Spring comes and the grass grows by itself.

    Have fun.
     
  12. ninjaboj

    ninjaboj Banned Banned

    No Simon, infact I won't respond not because I can't so much as because I choose not to. Infact the answers to your questions are already evident in the self same points which you have attempted (but failed to take down).

    I suppose the main thing you should try and get from all of this is that one (ergo you Simon) cannot hope to successfully learn from a new religion/perspective/pov without a certain amount of engagement and self-belief/commitment. It is clear to me by the speed of your rebuttals, that you don't have this. And I dare say never will have.

    Is it out of order me saying that? So prove me wrong. And don't respond to this message with a rebuttal, but try and find some common ground in this approach. It is called a reversal philosophy style.

    But then a proud man never bows to his enemy huh?
     
  13. Blade96

    Blade96 shotokan karateka

    ninja didnt say that about attachment causing suffering. that was m13jobs. so ninja didnt contradict. The reason it looks like ninja said it - and i saw it - is because he didnt use quotes.
     
    Last edited: Dec 2, 2011
  14. holyheadjch

    holyheadjch Valued Member

    Nothing I've said in this thread would be considered controversial by anyone with the slightest knowledge of Zen tradition.

    If you practice Zen then tell us what your practice is? If you don't have a practice then you don't do Zen. It really is that simple.
     
  15. Simon

    Simon Administrator Admin Supporter MAP 2017 Koyo Award

    Good try at trying to create an arguement, but not good enough I'm afraid.

    Perhaps you could answer hollyheadjch's question.
     
  16. Rand86

    Rand86 likes to butt heads

    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Drkh0YLF8rI"]"I've Got A Bad Feeling About This!" - YouTube[/ame]
     
  17. m1k3jobs

    m1k3jobs Dudeist Priest

    He has told us his practice. He has read books.
     
  18. m1k3jobs

    m1k3jobs Dudeist Priest

    Ninjabooj said:
    Perhaps he has developed Borg Buddhism?

    "We are Borg. We are enlightened."
     
  19. ninjaboj

    ninjaboj Banned Banned

    OK I will pretend that I haven't already said this before and say it again.

    I learnt Buddhism from reading books. Nothing more nothing less. Firstly, Christmas Humphreys' Concentration and Meditation.

    [ame="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Humphreys-Christmas-Concentration-Meditation-Pelican/dp/0140212361/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1322856464&sr=8-1"]http://www.amazon.co.uk/Humphreys-Christmas-Concentration-Meditation-Pelican/dp/0140212361/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1322856464&sr=8-1[/ame]

    Secondly Edward Conze's Buddhist Scriptures.

    [ame="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Buddhist-Scriptures-Classics-Edward-Conze/dp/0140440887/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1322856604&sr=1-3"]http://www.amazon.co.uk/Buddhist-Scriptures-Classics-Edward-Conze/dp/0140440887/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1322856604&sr=1-3[/ame]

    Thirdly Julius Evola's meditations on the peaks.

    [ame="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Meditations-Peak-Julius-Evola/dp/0892816570/ref=sr_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1322856695&sr=1-7"]http://www.amazon.co.uk/Meditations-Peak-Julius-Evola/dp/0892816570/ref=sr_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1322856695&sr=1-7[/ame]

    And so to conclude, I am sorry if on examining this important collection of books you men still don't consider me to be an authentic Buddhist. True I combine my meditation with prayer, and if so by that you consider me a traitor then so be it.

    Nice one.
     
  20. holyheadjch

    holyheadjch Valued Member

    Zen isn't about reading books. It's about doing Zen. If all you do is read, then you are not doing Zen.

    Reading James Bond books doesn't make you a secret agent. Reading Buddhist books doesn't make you a Buddhist.

    Buddhism isn't like Christianity (or at least it shouldn't be) where you declare your membership and poof you're a Christian. Buddhism, and Zen in particular, is something you do, not something you talk about. Period. End of story. Good night.
     
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