Buddhism and the long winding path: No soul for me, please, and make that karma ‘lite’…
Salvation implies a soul to be saved. I’d prefer some enlightenment, in this lifetime. And that’s a fundamental tenet of Buddhism, of course, the lack of a permanent enduring soul to guide you through the ages, or even a solid existent self to call your own in this lifetime, the basis for egotism and possession, and all the misgivings of misplaced attachments. And if that seems like a significant deviation from the teachings of Christ, then it was even more of a deviation from the early Vedic-inspired teachings of India, including Jainism and what we now call Hinduism. For if the Vedantic Hindus want a Self to unite with a Cosmos, an Atman to unite with a Brahman, then the Jains want to find a soul in everything, every little thing, be it rock, insect or umbrella. It’s not just that everything is alive, but it’s permanent and enduring. The Buddha thought he saw something simpler than all these machinations of overwrought mentality, which are just linguistic conveniences standing up and asking to be counted, when in reality there is really nothing there, just ‘mental formations’ or something like that. After all, if everything has a soul, then what do we do to acknowledge that? The Jain answer was: not much. Just sit, sit, and sit some more. It’ll all go away sooner or later. Every action was possessed of karmas, plural. Now that may seem like a strange definition of karma, but they likely invented the concept, so that’s their right. Others saw it differently, for once the cat of karma was out of the bag, so to speak, then there is no end to it, the generation-jumping karma of retribution and the things we’ll do to avoid it. If religion craves certainty, then this became the Hindu leitmotif, past lives and reincarnation, which, like conspiracy theory, cannot be disproven, so it must be true. But don’t we need some semblance of free will, simply for the dictates of morality and ethics? So I prefer something simpler, ‘karma lite’ if you prefer: Do good and life is good. Do bad and life is bad. That’s karma, actions. You will be rewarded by them, not for them…
hardie karges, 
streaming consciousness... 
quantumpreceptor 7:08 am on October 27, 2019 Permalink |
Hardy, good job boiling things down and making them simple enough to live them.
QP
hardie karges 11:46 pm on October 27, 2019 Permalink |
thx
Passport Overused 8:01 am on October 27, 2019 Permalink |
Great post 😊
hardie karges 11:46 pm on October 27, 2019 Permalink |
thx
hardie karges 10:57 am on October 27, 2019 Permalink |
Thanks
Dave Kingsbury 4:41 pm on October 27, 2019 Permalink |
You will be rewarded by them, not for them… great insight here, the circle squared perhaps?
hardie karges 11:45 pm on October 27, 2019 Permalink |
Actually I may have modified a quote from the Dalai Lama there, so should give credit, not sure of his exact words. ‘Circle squared’, though: I like that…