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rebus_minus
Registered: 05/15/09
Posts: 667
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Re: the Buddha - Quotes from the Pali Canon [Re: rebus_minus]
#11976933 - 02/06/10 05:37 PM (14 years, 12 days ago) |
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On stream entry:
[Ananda:] "What is the noble liberation?"
[The Buddha:] "There is the case, Ananda, where a disciple of the noble ones considers this: 'Sensuality here & now; sensuality in lives to come; sensual perceptions here & now; sensual perceptions in lives to come; forms here & now; forms in lives to come; form-perceptions here & now; form-perceptions in lives to come; perceptions of the imperturbable; perceptions of the dimension of nothingness; perceptions of the dimension of neither perception nor non-perception: that is an identity, to the extent that there is an identity. This is deathless: the liberation of the mind through lack of clinging/sustenance.'"
— MN 106
In the following passage, Khemaka — a monk who has attained the level of non-returner, and so has cut the first five fetters — indicates how self-identity views may be cut even though the mind has yet to cut the conceit, "I am," which ends only at the level of full awakening.
[Khemaka:] "Friends, it's not that I say 'I am form,' nor do I say 'I am something other than form.' It's not that I say, 'I am feeling... perception... fabrications... consciousness,' nor do I say, 'I am something other than consciousness.' With regard to these five clinging-aggregates, 'I am' has not been overcome, although I don't assume that 'I am this.'
"It's just like the scent of a blue, red, or white lotus: If someone were to call it the scent of a petal or the scent of the color or the scent of a filament, would he be speaking correctly?"
"No, friend."
"Then how would he describe it if he were describing it correctly?"
"As the scent of the flower: That's how he would describe it if he were describing it correctly."
"In the same way, friends, it's not that I say 'I am form,' nor do I say 'I am other than form.' It's not that I say, 'I am feeling... perception... fabrications... consciousness,' nor do I say, 'I am something other than consciousness.' With regard to these five clinging-aggregates, 'I am' has not been overcome, although I don't assume that 'I am this.'"
— SN 22.89
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rebus_minus
Registered: 05/15/09
Posts: 667
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Re: the Buddha - Quotes from the Pali Canon [Re: rebus_minus]
#11977044 - 02/06/10 05:58 PM (14 years, 12 days ago) |
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On right view:
One of the first stumbling blocks that Westerners often encounter when they learn about Buddhism is the teaching on anatta, often translated as no-self. This teaching is a stumbling block for two reasons. First, the idea of there being no self doesn't fit well with other Buddhist teachings, such as the doctrine of kamma and rebirth: If there's no self, what experiences the results of kamma and takes rebirth? Second, it doesn't fit well with our own Judeo-Christian background, which assumes the existence of an eternal soul or self as a basic presupposition: If there's no self, what's the purpose of a spiritual life? Many books try to answer these questions, but if you look at the Pali canon — the earliest extant record of the Buddha's teachings — you won't find them addressed at all. In fact, the one place where the Buddha was asked point-blank whether or not there was a self, he refused to answer. When later asked why, he said that to hold either that there is a self or that there is no self is to fall into extreme forms of wrong view that make the path of Buddhist practice impossible.
[...]Instead of answering "no" to the question of whether or not there is a self — interconnected or separate, eternal or not — the Buddha felt that the question was misguided to begin with. Why? No matter how you define the line between "self" and "other," the notion of self involves an element of self-identification and clinging, and thus suffering and stress. This holds as much for an interconnected self, which recognizes no "other," as it does for a separate self.
Ajaan Thanissaro Bhikku
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Chronic7
Registered: 05/08/04
Posts: 13,679
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Re: the Buddha - Quotes from the Pali Canon [Re: rebus_minus]
#11980178 - 02/07/10 05:59 AM (14 years, 12 days ago) |
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Quote:
rebus_minus said: If you don't mind. It sounds like you sometimes discard the whole eight-fold path as unnecessary striving and as if doing practices somehow implied being without peace or in suffering and denial of the moment.
Do you consider yourself awakened? Do you consider yourself a teacher?
edit to add:
if you say yes, i would very much like to meet you. i will return to work some months in europe in april and can come to london for a weekend in may or june
Cool, come for sure, sounds fun!  Im not gonna claim anything though sorry
Lovely quotes, i hadn't read the Culavedalla Sutta (MN44) for ages, what a gem!
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rebus_minus
Registered: 05/15/09
Posts: 667
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Re: the Buddha - Quotes from the Pali Canon [Re: Chronic7]
#11980595 - 02/07/10 09:26 AM (14 years, 11 days ago) |
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I will send you a pm when the time comes then.
Another quote, to stay on topic:
Do not pursue the past. Do not lose yourself in the future. The past no longer is. The future has not yet come. Looking deeply at life as it is, in the very here and now, the practitioner dwells in stability and freedom. We must be diligent today. To wait until tomorrow is too late. Death comes unexpectedly. How can we bargain with it? The sage calls a person who knows how to dwell in mindfulness night and day, 'one who knows the better way to live alone'.
Bhaddekaratta Sutta
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deff
just love everyone



Registered: 05/01/04
Posts: 9,411
Loc: clarity
Last seen: 4 hours, 21 minutes
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Re: the Buddha - Quotes from the Pali Canon [Re: rebus_minus]
#11980815 - 02/07/10 10:25 AM (14 years, 11 days ago) |
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are you still planning on moving to Vancouver, chronic? I think I'll be moving there in a few months
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Chronic7
Registered: 05/08/04
Posts: 13,679
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Re: the Buddha - Quotes from the Pali Canon [Re: deff]
#11981000 - 02/07/10 10:58 AM (14 years, 11 days ago) |
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Im definitely going to have go on holiday & see what comes of it, you'll have to let me know when the best time is to come out there
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