buddhism is ÎÞÉñÂÛ
i hope u can read the 3 words.
Yes I can read after changing my IE encoding. Wu Shen Lun... not
sure if u mean atheist? Buddhism is not atheist (it is a little
extreme) but more like agnostic. Meaning whether God exist or not
isnt something important in Buddhism; it is not even a Religion if
your definition is that as a religion we must worship a supreme
being or deities/gods. However... we believe that heavenly beings
exists (devas)... but we do not worship them. Also Buddha did not
accept the view of a Creator God. Buddha himself has already
refuted claims by the Mahabrahma, king of the 1st Jhana Brahmic
world where even devas below this heavens treat him as all-knowing
Creator. Information about this could be found here:
http://buddhism.sgforums.com/?action=thread_display&thread_id=98028&page=2
hmm. WHO? WHO's the one who judge anyone, everyone? If im not
wrong. If one attains enlightenment, he/she finally becomes buddha.
Yes, and who is the one to judge if you attains enlightenment?
There must be someone who judge. Yeah? It's all human thinking i
would say. WHO JUDGE Buddha? if you say that he's the one who
judge. how can he judge? And Buddha is not the creator of all
living things, he cant be the one who judge.
Enlightened people will surely know they are enlightened (well,
because they're enlightened)! 
So how
is enlightenment likened? It is likened to a person walking in a
dark room (symbolising ignorance) and finally turning on the light
(wisdom). Everything just comes clear to him. A wise person will
know, an ignorant person would not know. Since Buddha has awakened
his Prajna liberation wisdom, he will know. This enlightenment is
undoubtable - it is stated a lot of times, and also said by people
who have experienced themselves, because it is Real beyond Real.
Even attaining the first stage of Sainthood, Sotapanna
(Stream-enterer), one of the 10 fetters, "Doubt", is already
permanently removed and that person is destined to be liberated, as
he has truly experienced the essence of No-self. After Buddha
defeated the Maras (devils) who tried to obstruct his
enlightenment, he was asked, "Who is your witness that you have
attained these realizations?" He put his hand to the earth and
said, The earth is my witness. At which time, there was an
earthquake.
Are there anyone with such enlightening experience in the
modern world? Well, I can tell you from what I
know, there are a lot of such people. (But they have not attained
complete Buddhahood - that would take a much longer time and
effort. But ultimately we practise to reach Buddhahood). Even in
this forum, there are some people who have reached certain degrees
of realisation. Longchen who posted in this forum, for example,
have experienced the state of "Pure Awareness". A pure state of
awareness can be experienced directly in deep meditation, where
mental faculty becomes silented and what is left is only Pure
Awareness, your true nature (instead of a false egoic 'self'). In a
way, he has reached certain degrees of enlightenment (although he
has still a long way to go.). But not only in this forum - there
are many other enlightened persons that I know - in the whole
Singapore, in the whole World, and even much more whom I did not
know. Don't think that there is nobody whose mind is completely
pure. There are! Such persons are not ordinary people, they are
liberated saints and Bodhisattvas (pu2 sa1).
But even though we have not reached this level of realisations yet
, Buddhists all practise and sharpen 'Awareness'. Awareness of
Mind, Speech, Action. If our minds arose a bad thought, if we are
Aware, then there will not be any more room for this bad thought to
continue... like a chain, like waves. It ceases upon the awakening
of Awareness. Like for example.... if you can focus well onto the
teacher teaching in the class, then you wont be daydreaming of
other things. So Similarly, if you are Mindful of your Mind,
Speech, Actions, sentient thoughts would not arise. You also will
not scold bad words or unskillful words. You will also not do bad
conducts that harm yourself and others. Your mind will be at
peace.
If we can constantly stay focus in the Now moment, (instead of
dwelling in the false illusive past or future), being Aware,
practises meditation, then one day you will experience the state of
"Pure Presence", a state of Unified Oneness.
As I have mentioned above, Albert Einstein said these:
"A human being is a part of a
whole, called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He
experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something
separated from the rest... a kind of optical delusion of his
consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us,
restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few
persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this
prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living
creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty."
In this state of Pure Presence, one goes beyond the optical
delusion of his consciousness to see himself seperate from the rest
of the universe. There is simply pure luminous Oneness. In this
state Time no longer exist... such an experience is
beyond time and space, beyond the impermanence of
arisen forms in the universe. In pure Oneness, there is no Enemies,
no Discriminations, there is no Greed, Hatred, Ignorance. There is
definitely no more "Evil", as this is the pure state of mind. There
is selfless Compassion that fills the entire universe. As being
gone beyond the consciousness delusion, this is called Reality.
Your true nature.
In fact there are other religions that have similar experience of
"Pure Awareness", a state of Oneness (where the Subject and Object
cease; where you and the universe Unifies into ONE whole). It is
mentioned in Buddhism, Taoism, Hinduism, and many Christian Mystics
and other religions. But Buddhism puts emphasize on No-self and
Conditioned Arisings as it is required for one to attain complete
liberation (even beyond merely the state of oneness where a subtle
'I' still exist, attaining genuine realisation of No-self). I will
not elaborate on this as I have yet to attain such states, neither
do you. Until then, we should cultivate hard. I usually never talk
about such things to someone who is still new to the understanding
of Buddhism... but thought might as well explain a bit to ans ur
question. Sorry for being the most unskillful dharma speaker
But seriously it'll be great if you read the basics of Buddhism as
it will help you in understanding further. http://www.buddhanet.net/e-learning/basic-guide.htm
well. If i dont suicide. ok. i lead a gd life. i do not kill,
nor hurt anything. i am not a buddhist. i die of old age. WHAT
becomes of me? there is no consequences and there's no difference
between believing or not. u see.
Like I said above in the article,
The majority of us have
the concept that all religions are the same: they all teach us to
be good. Indeed, most religions teach to avoid all evils and do all
that are good. However, apart from practising virtuous deeds and
avoiding unvirtuous and evil conducts which is very important,
purifying ones mind is the underlying tenet of Buddhism. We
recognise that the Mind is the source of it all - bliss,
sufferings, Greed, Hatred, Ignorance, they are all caused by the
Mind.
So even if you are the best among the world - You donate
generously, you take part in all kinds of virtuous deeds in
relieving poverty of the world, what you are attaining is at most
the virtue to be reborned in a Heaven realm - until you have
completely liberated from the Samsaric cycle. Under delusion the
Maha Brahma, the Brahma who claimed to be Creator, believed himself
to be permanent, with no Death. But the Buddha sees beyond his
delusion - that even this realm of Brahma is impermanent - and can
exist only for billions of years in which later will be destroyed
together with the universe.
Because of this even some of the Devas (heavenly beings) like a
human rebirth.
What's your point?
I'm trying to point out that a human birth is so precious, that
even the heavely beings would like to have the opportunity to be
borned as a human to cultivate the path of liberation.
Buddha was a teacher of Liberation - that is to remove all
sufferings from our Minds through Enlightenment and Liberation. In
summary, a liberated mind no longer holds to the view of "Self",
thinking "I am this... I am that...", "This is MINE...", etc etc...
all the miseries are caused by the "I"... that also leads to the 3
poisons of Greed, Hatred, Ignorance.
I would say, as long as you're a human being. You will surely have
these 3 characteristics. I dont believe there's a perfect person
once that person believes in Buddha.
Like I said, Buddhism is not merely a belief-system. It is not
like any ordinary religions. It does not demand that you blindly
follow him - blindly put your dogmatism and faith into it.
To attain freedom from the false egoic 'self', and the 3 poisons,
one has to cultivate well. Liberation is truly possible, there has
been no lack of liberated persons since Buddha's times. (the number
of liberated persons, Arhants, are far more common in Buddha's days
than today as recorded in the scriptures. but there are still such
saints)
An Eternal Now - A fully liberated person's mind is completely
calm, at peace, in equanimity, abiding in Nirvana where craving and
clinging/attachment has ceased. Such a person abides in the Highest
Bliss, of Nirvana. This is also the permanent way of removing
sufferings - not by Indulgence in other things, or silly actions
like committing suicide.
How? i dont think there's one extremely dedicated buddhist can
forever, be calm and at peace.
One does not need to be "dedicated" in the sense that he chants
all day, meditates all day, preach all day, just to be liberated.
There are many many liberated persons. You may be amazed by some of
their tranquility if you have the opportunity to meet such persons.
I was.
