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  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 12:24 pm on June 7, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: #BlackLivesMatter, , Buddhism, curfew, injustice, lock-down, ,   

    Buddhism and Other People’s Crises: Lockdown and Curfew, Monasteries in the Making… #BlackLivesMatter 

    Maybe sometimes entire societies should go on extended retreat, shut down temporarily, and contemplate their existence. So societal lock-down doesn’t have to be so bad, whether for pandemic or riot-inspired curfew, not if you take advantage of the opportunities implicit therein.

    After all, monasteries are essentially locked down all the time, and the only people complaining are those who never really wanted to be there in the first place. The ones who are there by choice are not complaining about the poverty implicit in such a situation, either.

    In fact, any true monk takes a vow of poverty just for the privilege of being in lock-down. Implicit in the monastery deal is that there will be a community of supporters to take up the slack, of course, at least in Buddhism, and that is the sore spot for any Western culture, which tend to avoid class distinctions, even, or especially, when the class involved is a priestly one.

    I suppose this system works best, then, in SE Asia, where people are accustomed to such a system, and who find much value in it. I personally would probably prefer to grow my own food, if given the chance, even as a monk, and that is what many Buddhist monks in Japan do, if I’m not mistaken. I’m not sure about China or Taiwan, but I’ve never seen monks doing the morning alms walk in either, of that I am sure, ditto Korea, especially the north, haha.

    And for those who are in lock-down, but not by choice, maybe you should consider that as an attractive option, if only temporarily, for many non-monks also pay for the privilege of extended retreats. And while it is tempting to march in the streets right now in the name of rights and justice, that may not be the wisest option, and I’m not sure how much good it does, anyway, especially when some people of lesser ideals are obviously taking advantage of the uncertainties implicit, thus making the idealists complicit.

    In desperate political situations, aren’t the best remedies economic, i.e. boycott and/or divestment, or at least disinvestment? Isn’t that what changed the government in South Africa (if not the economy)? Isn’t that what drove the British out of India? People ask what is the Buddhist response to injustice…

    The Buddhist response to injustice is to provide a refuge to make you a better person, so that you will make good decisions. Nothing is gained by hate or anger or violence, and that includes language. Now is the time to create a new society, calmly and soberly and without prejudice. Reject the drama. Embrace the dharma.

     
    • kathleen chapman's avatar

      kathleen chapman 7:44 pm on June 7, 2020 Permalink | Reply

      is there a buddhist organization I can ask for help finding refuge? ideas are great but I am about finding solutions. any ideas for solutions? There are a whole lot of us elder folks barely existing thru this lockdown. We have no resources since the pandemic was not part of our plans. thanks

      • hardie karges's avatar

        hardie karges 7:35 am on June 8, 2020 Permalink | Reply

        I would imagine that there are Buddhist organizations in your neighborhood, but you’d have to google that for details. There are many Buddhist groups on Facebook, one of which I administer, but which is more oriented to quiet study than riotous debate. Others range from the devotional to the discursive. Many books on Buddhism are available from libraries, all of which now have online ‘overdrive’, where I’ve checked out at least a hundred in the last year or two. I sent you an invite to the FB group I administer. Feel free to check it out…

  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 12:11 pm on May 31, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism, , , , , ,   

    Because, that’s why: Buddhism, Descartes, Castaneda and the urge to merge in meditation… 

    Words can cut like knives or heal like bandages, so be careful what you think, and even more careful of what you say.

    The fact that we think in languages is the starting point for many a fine thesis and many a sleepless night, because in one sense Descartes was right when he said ‘cogito ergo sum,’ i.e. I think therefore I am.

    And if that is usually taken as a badge of pride for the West, and a flag of caution for the East, in fact I think it is neither. It is simply a status update for the human condition.

    Because we can debate endlessly over whether human beings are indeed the homo sapiens, wise men, that we claim, but we can certainly agree that they do think, whether or not they are some arrogant s-o-b’s to label themselves as ‘wise’, at the expense of all others, which at that point in history was largely limited to the white ‘race.’

    And so it is with thinking, which we assume as our birthright, and limited to us, and only us. But all animals think. They just don’t all do it with language.

    And that is why we meditate, many of us, whether you categorize it into one of the two original Buddhist classifications or one of the four now in vogue, complete with the obligatory ‘mindfulness,’ as guided by your local ‘dharma teacher,’ namaste.

    When really all you need to do is sit down and STFU, and don’t move a muscle, or scratch an itch, or swat a fly for at least a good quarter hour for starters, and quadruple that for peer professionalism, without moving a muscle, I repeat.

    Because I don’t know what’s going on in your head inside, but I know it’s directly related to what’s going on with your body outside, and this is easily measured by perturbations in the visual field.

    If you’re twitching, I think we can assume that you have yet to achieve any of the four dhyana states, or was it five? I lost count.

    Because all that really matters is to stop the internal dialogue, if only for a moment, and that’s almost the only thing I took away from Carlos Castaneda and his avatar Don Juan and all his tales of Ya(n)qui power in the deserts of our own mind-fields, as they leapt off cliffs with intent and little else.

    And that is what the brain researchers who wanted to scan my brain in and out of meditation alluded to, also, and asked if I understood what they’re talking about. Huh? Doesn’t everyone?

    Now I don’t know if they read Castaneda, but of course I understood. I just don’t know why Buddhists don’t say it that way, or at least not in so many words.

    Because that is why meditation exists, for me, to return to basics, proto-consciousness, or paleo-consciousness, if you will, i.e. thought without language, just like the old days, just like the animals do, before all the new frontiers, and all the limits of language.

    Curiously many Buddhists think that is an injunction to not think, but I don’t think that is correct. Once we have language, then the choice is ours what to do with it. Because the Buddha never said not to think. He said to think rightly, and quite rightly…

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 11:21 am on May 10, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism, , , , ,   

    Buddhism, Nature, and the Middle Path between Religions… 

    Nature is not something to be conquered. It is something to be revered. This is the basis for most feminine religions, without sword and without a book, just the smooth rounded edges of nature’s leaves and branches, hardened by brute experience with that same Nature’s lightning and thunder.

    Eventually that religion typically may evolve into a form of devotion, ‘bhakti’ for Hinduism, or one of the later sects for Buddhism, because few of us are really made for the rigors of metaphysics, when it’s easier just to bow the head and utter some formulas, or simply swear allegiance to mother Maria.

    And many Buddhists would gladly turn Descartes on his head and proclaim ‘non cogito ergo sum’, ‘I don’t think, therefore I am’, as many a devoted Theravadin truly believes, but which I take exception to. I’m just not that kind of Buddhist, I guess, for better or worse, confused or whatever, and I don’t for one minute think that Buddhism is better than all the others, simply that Buddhism is what is right for these times.

    That’s because I don’t see Buddhism as something established by some transcendental Buddha to which the earthly blokes are mere manifestations, any more than I see Jesus as a Christian version of the same thing, the Platonic ideal of love and forgiveness, Buddha that of compassion and forbearance. Because they were both just blokes, however enlightened, but with differences that have defined East and West at least since Homer’s recall, and likely before.

    So I see Christianity as the active aggressive alternative, dominated mostly by men of Aryan provenance, and despite their brutality, to see what could be accomplished in the state of Nature was a Noble (hint hint) quest, free enterprise, laissez-faire and all that rap, late nights with bright lights a reasonable relax.

    The Jains were, and are, just the opposite, of course, in which the less you do the better, to the point that death by self-starvation (ever heard of inanition?) seems only logical in the quest to do no harm. Just do nothing at all. The Buddhists have tried to walk the middle path to relative success, but still there are those who lapse into the do-it-all or do-nothing extremes.

    Bottom line: the Christian Capitalists have definitively gone too far, to the extent that we are killing ourselves knowing and willingly, grinning like Cheshire cats while going over the cliff, just like the Jains in spirit, if not letter, blindly proceeding with disaster. I revert to the demands of Nature. There is always a path to (re)conciliation, and that is THE path, I would say…

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 11:59 am on May 3, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism, , female, male, ,   

    Religion and Philosophy, Male and Female, Christianity and Buddhism… 

    Most people don’t want the truth. They want false hopes and fantasy, pie in the sky, with whipped cream and a cherry on top. And this is the basis for much, if not most, religion, the deferred gratification, since the rewards on this flat earth were so few and far between, and best found in something hard and sharp like the point of a knife or gun than in something round and soft like you-know-what.

    And that passed for cultural evolution at the time, that big men could lord it all over the rest of us, especially women, with their long pointy things and their never-ending greed for things they shouldn’t have, like gold and guns, while the rest of us made do with gardens and guilds, the society of friends and the abundance of greens, ripe for the taking in manicured rows, fruits to come later with buttons and bows.

    The goddesses ruled for such a short time, only long enough to populate this earth, before the seeds rebelled against the mother and the pistols attacked the pistils, stamens with limited stamina jealous of the good-natured receptionist who is open to all comers, irrespective of race or religion, and no need of too-flowery introductions, just a future of forgiveness with the calling card of compassion.

    But that’s not good enough for weekend warriors and wicked messengers, looking to spread their hatred with their seed and steed, incubating hatred with each thrust of a sword and each word of a book, forcing the forlorn to bow to such rude entreaties, when a simple request might easily suffice.

    But most men instinctively know that they are not needed, though they’d never admit it, just one or two for breeding purposes should be plenty, and the rest are best kept as mute slaves or blind poets, philosophers and freedmen by application and approval only. Religion goes bad in the hands of warriors, like milk goes bad when allowed too long outside.

    There have been countless wars of religion, therefore, and no wars of philosophy ever, not even one, but who’s counting? Because the world is round now, not flat or square, like stupas, not steeples, Buddhist not Vedic, or God forbid Christian.

    That religion is male, the sword and the book, but philosophy is female, the reconciliation of opposites, with words stroked not stoked. Philosophy is based on freedom, within limits, of biology and psychology. Religion is based on fear.

     
    • supranaturalone's avatar

      Yetzer Hara 1:15 pm on May 3, 2020 Permalink | Reply

      I’ll say that Judaism and Islam are Torah Observant, Hebraic religions. Christianity however is an effeminate religion that emasculates the Godhead and is Hellenic in nature and origin. In fact the Roman Church elevates the Virgin above the Godhead making the Goddess superior.

      • hardie karges's avatar

        hardie karges 1:20 pm on May 3, 2020 Permalink | Reply

        Christianity is also Hebraic, same God, same history, even if Roman Catholicism may indeed have its feminine side with the Virgin Mary. Protestantism definitely goes back to the original masculine orientation…

        • supranaturalone's avatar

          Yetzer Hara 1:26 pm on May 3, 2020 Permalink

          Rome after conquering a nation incorporated the religion of that nation into the Imperial Roman cult. The invention of Paul of Tarsus, the bastardization of the Torah with the Septuagint, formed Christianity, a Greek/Hellenic religion, not a Hebraic religion. There is no confusion between the two modes of thought!

  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 12:50 pm on April 26, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , Buddhism, , ,   

    Religion Up for Grabs: Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism… 

    The wise person knows his limits. The foolish person assumes there are none. And this is fundamental, the limits at least as much as the freedoms, to which we are so attached as Westerners, raised on revolution, and carrying flags to prove it, standing our ground, even when that ground is shifting constantly.

    We are attracted to belief systems that reinforce our prejudices, rather than the ones that would teach us something new and different and broaden our horizons beyond that line that separates us from the rest of humanity who we spend our lives dismissing as worthless.

    We are taught to exert ourselves, as if our prejudice must be correct, rather than to embrace something other, which may or may not be, all for the privilege of feeling those same old emotions which always evoke such a rapture of righteousness, when captured within a context of confusion, truth and honesty measured by emotional resonance rather than the logical placement order of propositions.

    But the best religions teach us what we need to know, and practice, not what we know and do already, often to an absurd extent, to the point that it does only harm, no good. Thus future Christians were taught love as remedy for their previous existence as steppes warriors, in the hope that they (we) would cease the racist violence in the hope of a better future.

    And future Muslims were taught to surrender, to God, in the hope that they would lose that chip on the shoulder and be less obsessed with futile victory, and maybe even cease the sexist subjugation, if only the women would hide behind veils.

    And Asians were taught Buddhist non-possession and non-grasping in the hopes that they would quit counting money and start counting time, better spent in contemplation than the great poker game of life. And how is that working out for us all? Has anybody really learned anything? We have to learn that which is hardest, not that which is easiest. I hope that I am wrong about the future of this world. I like being wrong sometimes. When you see a path with heart, you take it. The next revolution will be internal, a revolution of thought…

     
    • Dave Kingsbury's avatar

      Dave Kingsbury 4:03 pm on May 1, 2020 Permalink | Reply

      I don’t think you are wrong about the future of the world, Hardie, but there is surely some compensation in knowing why it’s not going well. I think much of the grasping is for a security blanket, something unhappy people seem to need from early on …

      • hardie karges's avatar

        hardie karges 4:36 pm on May 1, 2020 Permalink | Reply

        Yes, that sounds about right. Thanks for your comments, Dave…

        • Dave Kingsbury's avatar

          Dave Kingsbury 4:46 pm on May 1, 2020 Permalink

          Should have said, your post gives the reasons it’s not going well, I just added a psychological observation. 🙂

  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 9:31 am on April 19, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism, , , ,   

    Buddhism During a Crisis, Coronavirus Redux… 

    Nothing better illustrates the Buddhist First Truth of suffering than the Coronavirus, proclaimed as novel, but I’m not so sure. Because nothing is truly novel in the realm of suffering, especially when delivered by the sneaky intercessions of a virus. Somebody once said that pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional, though it wasn’t Buddha who said that, however congruent with his teachings it may or may not be. No, the Buddha was pretty clear about the inevitability of suffering, and the Eight-Step program to its mitigation, and hopefully cure. Now if there’s a difference in meaning between pain and suffering, then it’s the difference between looking and seeing, listening and hearing, touching and feeling, in that one verb is transitive, affecting objects, while the other is intransitive, something felt, so more than simple observation of another.

    But my point is that Buddhism can help, in times like these, by simply acknowledging the normalcy of suffering, if nothing else. I suspect that many Westerners accustomed to amusement parks and weekend larks will have a much harder time of it than some Orientals accustomed to struggle. After all, you don’t see Asians serenading each other in captivity, now, do you? And if the Western commitment to ‘never change our way of life’ is charming, in a way, then in another way, it’s rather discouraging. This IS a good time for paradigm shifts, I’d say. Because mostly this is a psychological shock, more than medical, economic, or even ecological. Most Westerners are accustomed, even taught, to control Nature, reign her in, to do our bidding, and the idea that She is there as something to be awed and revered, is rather secondary. I mean sure, we go visit national parks and snap our pics, but as often as not we’re snapping pics of each other, and God knows, our selfies.

    Most of all, though, we’ve just never been taught to look inward, and those introverts among us tend to be categorized as ‘losers’ by the type-A bullies who think that aggression comes first, then questions come later, if ever. So I don’t see the Coronavirus as a death sentence, but just the opposite, in fact, an opportunity to make some necessary changes socially and ecologically, perhaps first and most important, but also personally, mostly within the theme of ‘less is more’, simple pleasures, and a shift away from consumption toward contemplation. For now, though, the bottom line is all about control, self-control, preferably. Because I don’t think it’s any accident that the countries hardest hit are those that are the most freedom-obsessive, and the countries doing best are those most controlled. But I prefer the self-control of the Buddhist countries over the government control of the ex-Communist countries of East Europe and elsewhere. So for us it’s a bittersweet victory, but for Nature it’s jubilant. Global Warming lost a battle this year…

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 12:18 pm on April 12, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism, maitri, , Mithra, , ,   

    Buddhism and the Personal Peace Initiative… 

    Don’t take the bait. Let the other guy have the last word. Someone has to be the adult in the room in this world or there’ll be none, adults that is, since I think that we can assume that there is a room, by prior agreement, and our common consensus that the material world exists to at least an extent that we can talk about it, even if those illusions of solidity quickly vanish with increased scrutiny. Because the infinite divisibility of matter is as inscrutable as the infinite extension of the universe, and as unlikely as true love, in the sense of ultimate compatibility, beyond all causes and conditions, not to be confused with lovingkindness, simple friendship or universal brotherhood, however you want to define the Sanskrit or Pali terms ‘metta’ and ‘maitri’, notwithstanding all the mutations and peregrinations that the Iranian god Mithra made in transforming himself from a god of light into a Roman god of war, thus the very opposite of the Buddhist intent. And such is the world, fidgeting and finagling, hungering and thirsting for something more, if not always something other, the family familiar usually preferred to the altogether other, for reasons of convenience, if not comfort, and seldom better. For the world grows smaller to the same degree that it grows more violent, the need for living room in conflict with the need for living rooms, possession and aggression up against compassion and dispassion, so we gather up our rocks and put them in hard places, all ready for battle, rather than find peace within ourselves, and then extend it to others. There is a way out, and a way forward, but the answer is too simple for many men to accept: lay down your arms and rest your legs. Mind your tongues and mind your manners. For a war with guns is never really won, and a war of words is no better. Choose peace, and quiet, and reconciliation…

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 11:35 am on March 29, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism, Corona, , , , ,   

    Buddhism in Viral Times, Reflections from Coronas… 

    Live every moment as if it might be your last, in quiet peaceful reflection, like water. And if this virus has anything to teach us, which I believe it does, then this is certainly one of them, that panic is counter-productive, just as superficial excitement is ephemeral and fleeting, transient by nature. That concept gets a bum rap from social conventions, of course, in Buddha’s time, as well as our own, that anything temporary is by definition flawed and conducive to suffering. The implication, quite naturally, is that permanence is the desired state and condition of nature, and by extension—matter. Extensions fall flat, though, because that would be something like a false equivalency, when the truth lies in the very nature of our medium of discourse. Communication by language does not create castles in the countryside, but only in the sand. Everything is subject to its limits. Just as the painted picture creates fine lines and eye candy, and song produces sweet sounds and ear candy, language is limited to just that, great thoughts and mind candy, but not reality. We can create our reality to some extent, true, especially if that reality is kindness and compassion, but we can’t create the universal laws of physics, except in that they are a representation of nature, as universally perceived. And it is our task to find our place in that nature, but not to control it, for our own selfish benefits. Because this is false permanence, the permanence of possession and ownership, when that is beyond our capabilities, as transient tenants upon this semi-solid rock in motion around a flaming solar orb, ten thousand light-years from home, and another ten from our destination. In order to get the right answers to the questions of our lives, then we must ask the right questions. Religion should not be a matter of blind faith and fear. It should be a matter of knowledge, freedom and self-control…

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 12:29 pm on March 22, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: adjectives, adverbs, Buddhism, , , , nouns, , verbs   

    Buddhism 202: Mahayana or Theravada? Decisions decisions… 

    First I save myself, then I save the world. This is my reconciliation of the old Theravada vs. Mahayana debate, small wheel vs. large, respectively, on the question of whether to devote one’s time and energies to the salvation of oneself or the salvation of the world, notwithstanding the issue of whether the concept of salvation is just an import of Christian values on to a Buddhist nexus, or not, and just what there would be to save anyway, if so, given the fact that Buddhism places no belief in self or souls, per se, in the case of the individual, or what would be there in its stead, in the case of society, or the world, as if that might have an internal essence, or something such, when it almost certainly doesn’t, just more of those non-self selves all collecting and coagulating together, they both but aggregations of views aspects factors and circumstances probably best described by verbs nouns adjectives and adverbs, as if that were capable of somehow describing reality, when it almost certainly isn’t, so we add prepositions conjunctions subjunctive moods and imperfect tenses, when all we really need to do is sit down and shut up, eat the next meal and then enjoy the view, with scarce language needed to describe it but even less to defile it, the vibrations resolved into various frequencies sufficient to excite sensations, with or without the need of mechanical waves capable of transporting objects from place to place, the definition of our existence best left to the prime movers and heavy lifters and various mechanisms for the transformation of noble metals, when all that is really necessary for spiritual existence is the light of intelligence given in a flash from above, still we default to language like an addict to his pipe, for lack of more convenient options and the desire for familiar landscapes, words sentenced to paragraphs like prisoners to cages, so that it’s almost an afterthought that almost anything that can be said can also be negated, and only then can a further synthesis result, hopefully higher…

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 12:11 pm on March 15, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , Buddhism, , , ,   

    More on Meditation and Language, and the Prison of our Own Minds… 

    Meditation is the best medicine; twice a day keeps the doctor away. And I think that is accurate, even though the causes and effects may be debated endlessly, at least partly owing to differences in definition to begin with. Is it ‘concentration’, probably the most common translation of the Sanskrit word that is usually transcribed into the Roman alphabet as ‘samadhi’ (give or take a few palatal and labial signs for consonants, and long and short vowels for the adepts)? And then there are other Sanskrit-based words, such as ‘dhyana’, maybe implying something closer to ‘trance’ than ‘concentration’, not to mention ‘bhavana’, referring to something like ‘development’, or ‘patipatti’, the ‘practice’, of whatever it is you’re supposed to be doing. And that is the precisely the question, is it not, of just exactly what it is we’re supposed to be doing, as we sit cross-legged on the floor, as so brilliantly evoked in the band Chicago’s classic ’25 or 6 to 4′ (please don’t ask me what that means)? Well, I think the Buddha and others pretty much had it figured out way back when, but when the Americans and New Agers got hold of it, now all of a sudden you need an ‘app’ and you need someone’s soothing words to guide you through the beauty of it all, and pseudo/sorta/secular Buddhists explain that skateboarding is just another form of meditation, when what you really need to do is just sit down and STFU, in my humble opinion. Because language is the problem, not the solution, in this case, that quantum leap of linguistic consciousness 50,000 years ago that doomed the Neanderthals and Denisovans and a couple other smaller homos to oblivion now embedded in our minds as the preferred method of thinking, rational and syllogistic, such that other forms of thinking, visual or intuitive, are relegated to second-class status. And while this may be perfect for the strategic advantage necessary for the conquest and ultimate extinction of those pesky other hominids, it wraps us individually in feedback loops of language, and may ultimately be the inspiration for that kind of karma that we can never really shake. To ‘stop the internal dialogue’ was the lasting gist for me of Castaneda’s tales of Yanqui (:-) power as well as the goal of more than one neurologist measuring the motions of mind on an MRI scan. Because this is what meditation can do for you, if only for a moment, if only for an hour. It can allow the mind, whatever that is, to function without language, i.e. paleo-consciousness, pre-verbal, non-consonantal. It certainly beats argument. And if that makes me a cheater, dodging a fight rather than ‘standing my ground’, then so be it. Most fights have no winners, only losers. Because people say mean nasty ugly words sometimes, and seem to enjoy it, for some reason. I don’t know why, but at least now I know how to shut it off, and shut it out…

     

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