Some
Questions from and Answers to a Friend haunted by Doubt
(Vicikicchā):
Question:
>I usually
rely on myself to solve problems.
Answer:
Buddha would agree on that one, since he said.
“No one can purify another”
“Attā
hi attano nātho:
Let self be the helper of self.”
“For self is the master of self.
For self is the protector of self.
For self is the saviour of self.” Dhp 380
Question2:
> I often
suffer from low grade, long term depression
Answer2:
Do
daily Metta meditation on Universal Friendliness, which will elevate the
mind:
https://What-Buddha-Said.net/drops/V/Advantageous_is_Friendship.htm
Study the links.
This is the right tool and
medicine here, since it substitutes with the opposite state.
Metta Meditation As streaming audio and mp3 download:
https://soundcloud.com/bhikkhu-samahita/metta-meditation
Video on Mettā Meditation on Friendliness:
How to cure Depression?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yz0nE1wRWQY
Question3:
> I watch
my mind cave in and indulge in the object of those cravings.
Answer3:
Do daily Asubha meditation on Disgust,
which will cool down & avert the mind:
https://What-Buddha-Said.net/drops/V/Bluish_Victory.htm Study the
links.
This is the right tool and
medicine here, since it substitutes with the opposite state.
I scream, U Scream, We all Scream for Ice-Cream!
Down by
Law (Jim Jarmusch)
Question4:
> but I still am struggling
with other forms of abuse. I fail on the fifth precept.
Answer4:
If it is ganja/grass/marijuana, then know that it is mind searching for
a CALM
it has known before...! Often ganja-smokers have been meditators in prior
lives,
which make them addicted to a similar, yet now easy “Chemical Calm”
unfortunately
not without the side-effects of: Laziness, neglect, memory, ability and
learning loss etc.
If it is coke/ecstasy and other 'speedy' drugs: They are EXTREMELY
DANGEROUS,
not because of biological health hazard, but because of long-term
addiction to behaviour,
which results in subhuman often excessively painful rebirths... So Nix to
the Barbeque Fix!
Making a firm resolve and heavy doses of meditation (10 day retreat) is
the antidote to both.
Question5: >
Is the truth ultimately knowable by our human brain?
Answer5:
First: Absolute Truths can
only be known about some and not all objects!
Any material object e.g. a door cannot be known absolutely, since it is
basically not
a finite, but infinite object (both microscopically and
macroscopically)...
Since it is infinite,
then there will always remain unexplained aspects of the object...
Therefore can an explanation of a door and other material objects never
be absolute!
However, how to pass out of a given door CAN indeed be explained
absolutely!
Just imagine the closest door to you now. You can easily devise many
different
explanations, which all ALWAYS unambiguously lead to passing out of the
door,
and which therefore are absolute truths about that particular
PURPOSE!
So Purposes CAN be
explained absolutely. How to End Suffering => Noble 8-fold Way
is such an ABSOLUTELY TRUE EXPLANATION, which, if followed
ALWAYS succeeds.
Question6:
> What
constitutes Right View?
Answer6:
Know
there are 2 forms of right view. Mundane and supramundane. For Mundane
Right view see:
https://What-Buddha-Said.net/drops/What_is_Right_View.htm
Study the links.
The supramundane right view
of a Noble is not communicable to any non-noble ordinary person.
They would not be able to understand it and often find such radical
views absurd... Hehehe ;-)
Question7: > Whether or not the Buddha actually taught literal
re-birth
Answer7:
Many
times did the Buddha teach literal rebirth see e.g.:
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.135.than.html
The skillfulness of one's actions in life
determine one's destination after death:
Dhp 17,
Dhp 18,
Dhp 240
Causes of favorable or unfavorable
rebirth:
MN 135,
AN 3.65,
Dhp 310,
Dhp 316
How to gain rebirth as an elephant or a
horse:
AN 10.177
The laws of kamma and rebirth are as
inviolable as the law of gravity:
SN 42.6
What's so bad about being reborn?:
SN 5.6
Why not just settle for rebirth among the
devas?:
SN 5.7
The preciousness of our human birth:
SN 20.2,
SN 56.48
Rebirth witnessed by Buddha on the night
of his Awakening: See
Buddha's Awakening.
https://What-Buddha-Said.net/drops/Rebirth.htm
Question8: > I try not to get too hung up on the issue of
re-birth
Answer8:
Believing in Annihilation
is a fanatic religious view, which cannot be substantiated
experimentally,
since no-one can ever return from annihilation and deliver a direct
witness account of it...
Rebirth may IMHO (both as a medical doctor and as scientist) now be
regarded as scientifically
underpinned by 60 years of unfortunately largely ignored research mostly
by the late professor
Ian Stevenson of
University of
Virginia
U.S.A.:
http://www.healthsystem.virginia.edu/internet/personalitystudies/
The research was difficult
to publish, since it was not conferring to the conventional
paradigm of our quite ignorant, yet very proud times. This “Keeping Out”
is standard
for new discoveries and very unscientific, unfortunately also very
human...
Not so long ago people were decapitated for pointing out the earth was
not flat,
but in fact: round... Life is -in fact- not a single shot, but a
chain-reaction of rebirths...!
J
EXAMINE this crucial issue by WATCHING: Eg.
The Rutherford
Institute:
http://www.youtube.com/user/RutherfordInstitute#p/search/0/YLKT5UsKoqM
http://www.ial.goldthread.com/clips/tucker.wmv
http://www.ial.goldthread.com/interviews.html
The Information is there
USE & EXAMINE IT!
Answer9:
No not formulated as such.
Yet sentient life is just a CONSEQUENCE of a FORCE
pushing nature into this form. This force is
craving for sensations and
sensing...
Remember: Consciousness is a form of non-local wave energy which has
non-local 'material'
effects just like any other electro-magnetic-radio-wave form of energy
has effects!
(Which makes your mobile-phone work even far away from the speaker both
in time and space)
Yet on a deeper dhamma note:
Sentient life is a NOT an individual (entity), but a process
or activity of mere sensing!
The causality if this process of sensing new contacts proceeds
dynamically like this:
The condition of Ignorance
causes Mental Construction to arise.
The condition of Mental Construction causes Consciousness to arise.
The condition of Consciousness causes Name-&-Form to arise.
The condition of Name-&-Form causes The 6 Senses to arise.
The condition of The 6 Senses causes
Sentient Sense Contacts to
arise.
This is Dependent
Co-origination!
A chain of conditioned
effects that causes new events!
https://What-Buddha-Said.net/drops/Cohesive_Co-Origination.htm
Dig that!
