Stout,
OK...after smashing my head repeatedly against my keyboard while devoting just under two weeks to reading and trying to understand a thread here in R&P ( the Subjectivity and Science one ) I've decided that it's time to come to grips with, and try to develop a basic understanding of Buddhism.
The problems I've had so far have revolved around Buddhists talking in esoteric language that have me opening multiple tabs in my browser to search out the meanings of this language, and the result is m well, confusion.
And then there's the "personal interpretation" aspect that seems to accompany individual Buddhists. Take Karma for example. Is Karma something that we accrue in this life, or the next ?
Now I'm not a woo kind of guy, and so far, I've taken Buddhism to be strictly a philosophy with a religious, or spiritual component that western, practitioners are trying to downplay, so I'm not really all that interested in the whole idea of rebirth, reincarnation, etc, more in Buddhism as a workable philosophy to consider when making daily decisions.
So I guess my questions are more to do with the four noble truths, and the eightfold path from a modern, western perspective. For instance, someone's telling me that the first truth....All life is suffering...is an inaccurate translation of the word "dukka", that the Buddha wasn't talking about "suffering" as we think of the concept today.
I've pretty much given up the idea of doing my own research online, due to the reasons I cited above and I'm considering actually purchasing a book on the topic.
http://www.windhorsepublications.com/CartV2/Details.asp?ProductID=321
Has anyone else read this ? And if so, what is your take on it ? I'm drawn to the easy to read, can be understood by anyone sales pitch but if it's not a reliable reference to western Buddhism, I really don't want to waste my time with it.
There is a lot of information to cover here, but one thing that I always try to stress is that the Buddha's teachings are first and foremost a pragmatic path, that if sufficiently followed, will lead to a precise destination, i.e.,
nibbana. Essentially, whatever one's view of rebirth,
nibbana is first and foremost the cessation of [mental] stress and suffering. When asked, "What now is
nibbana?" by Jambukhadaka, Sariputta replied, "The destruction of lust, the destruction of hatred, the destruction of delusion: this, friend, is called
nibbana" (SN 38.1). It is also stated by the Buddha that
nibbana is "the highest bliss" (
Dhp. 204). Furthermore, this freedom from suffering is not contingent upon death. The Buddha himself realized
nibbana at the age of thirty-six, at which time he preceded to dedicate the remaining [forty-four] years of his life to teaching the path to the end of suffering. That being said, while there is room for skepticism in Buddhism, there is also a limit to that skepticism. In other words, there is a place for faith (yes, the dreaded word "faith") as well.
In the Pali Canon, the word
saddha can be translated as "confidence," "conviction," or "faith." More specifically, it is a type of confidence, conviction, or faith that is rooted in understanding as well as what we would conventionally refer to as faith in the West, i.e., confident belief in the truth, value, or trustworthiness of a person, idea, or thing. To give an example, for one to truly take refuge in the Buddha, one has to take his awakening on faith until they too have achieved that particular goal. Until then, they have no way of verifying the experience of awakening until they have experienced it for themselves. Therefore, while
saddha by itself is not a sufficient condition for arriving at the highest fruits of the Dhamma, there are elements of faith that are important to the practice.
As the Venerable Thanissaro writes in his essay
Faith in Awakening, "The Buddha never placed unconditional demands on anyone's faith... We read his famous instructions to the Kalamas, in which he advises testing things for oneself, and we see it as an invitation to believe, or not, whatever we like. Some people go so far as to say that faith has no place in the Buddhist tradition, that the proper Buddhist attitude is one of skepticism. But even though the Buddha recommends tolerance and a healthy skepticism toward matters of faith, he also makes a conditional request about faith: If you sincerely want to put an end to suffering — that's the condition — you should take certain things on faith, as working hypotheses, and then test them through following his path of practice."
Coming back to the path itself, the teachings on rebirth play an important role. Regardless if individual Buddhists, or people who simply adopt Buddhist practices, utilize the Pali Canon to selectively pick out teachings in order to construct a world view out of them, the Buddha himself made it clear that (i) these teachings and practices are designed to put an end to suffering, and that (ii) these teachings are like a raft to be used to cross a dangerous river—once that river has been crossed, the teachings have served their purpose (
MN 22). What this means is that these teachings in and of themselves are not to be used to construct a world view of concepts that act as a theoretical box that practitioners have to fit their experiences and insights into, regardless of what they are, but they are to be used for the specific purpose of leading the practitioner to a direct experience of an unconditional nature—an experience that will free the mind from its afflictions of greed, hatred, and delusion. Once that goal is reached, the raft of teachings can be left behind.
That being said, one does not have to fully subscribe to concepts such as rebith, especially if they are more interested in the purely practical applications of Buddhism such as the fourth Noble Truth, i.e., the Noble Eightfold path, which consists of right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration. For two excellent overviews of the Noble Eightfold Path as it is presented in the Pali Canon, please see
The Noble Eightfold Path: The Way to the End of Suffering and
this section of Wings to Awakening. In addition, for a detailed overview of the Four Noble Truths, I would suggest taking a look at the short essay
The Nobility of the Truths, as well as the lengthier anthology
The Four Noble Truths: A Study Guide.
In regard to the book by Sangharakshita, I must admit that I am not a very big fan of Sangharakshita in general. I feel that there are much better resources out there. If you are looking for something that "demystifies Buddhism and explains simply and plainly how its practice can enrich our lives," then I would suggest picking up a copy of Stephen Batchelor's
Buddhism without Beliefs. If, however, you are looking for recommendations regarding decent and reliable collections of Buddha's most important teachings from the Pali Canon, then I would suggest
In the Buddha's Words: An Anthology of Discourses from the Pali Canon,
The Life of the Buddha: According to the Pali Cannon, and
Wings to Awakening (Note:
Wings to Awakening is a little more heady reading than average).
Jason
