XPost: talk.religion.buddhism, alt.zen, alt.philosophy.zen   
   XPost: alt.buddha.short.fat.guy   
   From: kimmerian@fastmail.fm   
      
   Catawumpus :   
      
   >>      According to the scriptures, the Buddha preached the truth   
   >> of _dukkha_ after his awakening.  Nothing in the   
   >> Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta suggests he was just kidding, Rob's   
   >> wishes notwithstanding.   
      
   halfawake :   
      
   > I never said that.   
      
        I said that, you big dummy, and it's true:  the Four Noble   
   Truths date, scripturally speaking, from after the Buddha's   
   enlightenment, and nothing in the sutta suggests he was kidding   
   when he described life as suffering and put the root of the   
   problem in "the craving that leads to rebirth," a very critical   
   view of worldly existence.   
      
   > I said they were preached, correctly, to the   
   > unenlightened, which is most of us, but still only relevant to those who   
   > are still trapped in delusion.   
      
        You said the "Buddha's message was tailored to the   
   understanding of those in his audience," but all you showed was   
   a desire to tailor his message to your taste.  And you   
   explained what kind of taste that is by admitting you're "still   
   a clinger to the life-experience."   
      
   > Suffering and pain are not synonymous in Buddhism.   
      
        I never claimed they were.  I argued that according to the   
   Sakalika Sutta (or at least the Bhikkhu translation), the   
   Buddha _endured_ severe pain.  Again, I don't want to place too   
   much weight on a single word in the English, but the sutta   
   doesn't say that he escaped or transcended his painful feelings.   
   Instead it says he _endured_ them, directly implying he   
   suffered, since otherwise there would have been nothing for him   
   to be enduring.  So in that account he suffers after his   
   awakening, contradicting your notion "the enlightened have gone   
   beyond suffering."   
      
   > I have not denied Buddha's statement about withdrawal from sensuality   
      
        And therefore I haven't denied that you haven't denied the   
   Buddha's statement about withrdrawal from sensuality.  With   
   that little diversion out of the way, let's return to the topic.   
      
        You like to offer the jhanas as proof of "pleasant abiding   
   in the here and now."  But every time you do, you somehow   
   neglect to mention that in the sutta you're quoting, the Buddha   
   is discussing a monk "quite withdrawn from sensuality" and   
   "rapture and pleasure born from withdrawal."  The very opposite   
   of your life-clinging attitude.   
      
        More:  the Buddha is in the middle of teaching against the   
   "five strings of sensuality," i.e., things pleasing and   
   agreeable to the five senses, which tie people up and make them   
   into Mara's prey.  Conversely, monks who have abandoned   
   sensuality can become "invisible to the Evil One" and enter the   
   first jhana:  already one step away from the world.  From   
   there the Buddha goes on to talk about the "complete   
   transcending of perceptions of form" and "complete transcending   
   of the dimension of the infinitude of space," destroying   
   Mara's vision and making here-and-now into a meaningless notion.   
      
   -- Catawumpus   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)