Shakyamuni Buddha and Buddhism

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appearances of pleasure and happiness. For instance, we usually think of increased popularity and fame or the accumulation of material wealth as sources of happiness. The Buddha pointed out that these aspects of the relative phenomenal world are perpetually subject to change, deceptiveness, and impermanence. As a result, while it is possible to be temporarily entertained or distracted, we constantly meet with obstacles and limitations in our pursuit of transitory pleasures. This is due to our failure to direct our efforts toward the unraveling of our own confusion and bewilderment. Most of our confusion is caused by our assumption that the causes of liberation must come from somewhere or something outside of ourselves. We assume that only by accumulating this or that, or only through associating with someone or something else, can we gain the cause of happiness. Our preoccupation with external concerns causes a tremendous sense of impoverishment, as though we were devoid of the slightest possibility of Enlightened intelligence. Our bewilderment derives from our failure to turn inward and really examine the workings of our own minds. It is only when we begin working with our minds through meditation practice that we become practical as far as the search for Enlightenment is concerned. It is very important that we have some understanding of our potential to awaken, that we understand the workability of our situation and the richness of our resources. And once we have some understanding of this, it is important that we begin the practice of the path. Formal meditation practice is important because our minds are constantly involved with any number of preoccupations, misconceptions and fixations. There is a sense of having spread ourselves too thin. But through the practice of meditation we can begin to experience a sense of groundedness and simplicity. We can begin to have some idea of who we are and what it is we are doing. Fundamental issues, which were previously sources of confusion for us, can begin to take on clarity and certainty. When we practice meditation, we think and analyze more clearly and effectively. Formal practice is made more effective through a proper application of discipline and conduct. Proper discipline in this sense means the constant practice of mind-fulness; while proper conduct means the practice of generosity, proper motivation and so forth. These two can greatly increase the effectiveness of meditation practice. If we consider how impermanent things are, then we must face the fact that we can die at any moment. If we were to die right now, what credentials, wealth or friends could we take with us? No matter what our plans for the future might have been, all of them will be meaningless at the time of death. The only thing that will matter is how much we understand ourselves and our own mental attitudes. How much we are able to unravel the bewilderment of our habitual patterns alone will be meaningful. Some of you are already doing these practices. Some of you, however, may only be just beginning to show a sincere interest. This is very exciting. It is as if the sun were just beginning to appear from behind the clouds for you. Through your sincere interest you are for the first time beginning to appreciate how rich and resourceful your lives are. This is quite an historic event. This is also a very realistic and sensible interest. I am hopeful that you will find these words that I have spoken to be worthwhile to ponder. It is my deepest wish also that once you have thought about these matters, you will be able to take a sane and healthy direction for your own good as well as for the good of others. (H.H. Goshir Gyaltsab Rinpoche)

WHEN SHAKYAMUNI BUDDHA EXPOUNDED his wisdom to people to show them the noble and profound ways they could conduct their lives, his intention was not to impress them with how much he knew or how well he could express himself. It was because of his infinitely compassionate concern for the benefit and liberation of all beings without exception, that he revealed the way of liberation from all suffering. Like the love of a mother who cherishes her only child, this was the loving- kindness of the Buddha's teaching. In his infinite wisdom the Buddha Shakyamuni recognized that although beings may be bewildered and struggling with the results of their bewilderment, their situation is not hopeless. As he saw the workability of the human condition, the Buddha's compassion became overwhelming. Had the plight of beings been hopeless, if there was nothing that could have been done, the situ ation would have been entirely different. The Buddha had the insight to recognize that in essence all beings have the same potential to become equally realized, and to become fully awakened Buddhas. The Buddha saw that the potential of sentient beings is like a treasure hidden from sight. Unfortunately, we continually fail to recognize this potential, or Buddha-nature as it is called, buried within each of us. Because of our habitual patterns and bewilderment, we find ourselves constantly involved with and entertained by the superficial

Theraveda Buddhism... The Theravada Buddhists believe that they practice the original form of Buddhism as it was handed down to them by Buddha. Theravada Buddhism dominates the culture of Sri Lanka, but is also very prominent in Thailand and Burma. While Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha, spent several decades teaching, none of his teachings were written down until several hundred years later. In the third century, Asoka, the great Mauryan emperor, converted to Buddhism and began to sponsor several monasteries throughout the country. He even sent missionaries out to various countries both east and west. During his reign, the teachings of Buddha spread all across India and Sri Lanka. Disturbed by the prolific growth of Buddhist heresies, a council of Buddhist monks was convened at the Mauryan capital of Patna during the third century BC to purify the doctrine. What arose from that council, more or less, were the definitive teachings of Theravada Buddhism; from this point onwards, Theravada Buddhism undergoes little if any change. When the teachings of Buddha were finally written into a canon, they were written not in Sanskrit, but in a language derived from Sanskrit, called Pali. This language was spoken in the western regions of the Indian peninsula, but from Sri Lanka (which is off the eastern coast of India) to Burma, the Pali scriptures would become the definitive canon. We can't determine precisely when they were written down, but tradition records that the canon was first written down somewhere between 89 and 77 BC, that is, over four hundred years after the death of Buddha. This canon is called the Tripitaka, or "Three Baskets," for it is divided into three parts, the Vinaya , or "Conduct," the Sutta , or "Discourses," and the Abhidhamma , or "Supplementary Doctrines." The second part, the "Discourses," are the most important in Buddhism. These are discourses by the Buddha and contain the whole of Buddhist philosophy and morality. The basic doctrines of Theravada Buddhism correspond fairly exactly with the teachings of Buddha. Theravada Buddhism is based on the Four Noble Truths and the idea that all of physical reality is a chain of causation; this includes the cycle of birth and rebirth. Through the practice of the Eightfold Noble Path and the Four Cardinal Virtues, an individual can eventually attain Nirvana . Theravada Buddhism, however, focussed primarily on meditation and concentration, the eighth of the Eightfold Noble Path; as a result, it emphasized a monastic life removed from the hustle and bustle of society and required an extreme expenditure of time in meditating. This left little room for the bulk of humanity to join in; Theravada Buddhism was, by and large, an esoteric religion. A new schism then erupted within the ranks of Buddhism, one that would attempt to reformulate the teachings of Buddha to accomodate a greater number of people: the "Greater Vehicle," or Mahayana Buddhism.
Belief in Deity - The concept of a supreme Creator God is rejected or at least considered irrelevant to Theravada Buddhism. Buddha, "the Awakened One," is revered above all - not as "God" but as supreme sage, model of a fully Enlightened person. •Incarnations - Buddha was a human, a fully Enlightened spiritual teacher and inspiration. As there is no belief in or relevant God, there are no incarnations of God worshipped. •Origin of Universe and Life - Buddhists consider it the job of scientists to explain origins of the universe and life. There is no contradiction with scientific discovery, however many maintain that the world creates and recreates itself millions of times every fraction of a second. •After Death -There is no transmigration of individual souls, but through the law of karma, one's wholesome or unwholesome intentions become imprinted in the mind. Negative mental states persist through continual rebirth until one's intentions become wholesome. Once fully Enlightened, one is liberated from rebirths, reaching a state of absolute selflessness resulting in ultimate bliss called Nirvana - the "Deathless State." One becomes Buddha (or one with Buddha). Some Buddhists, especially modern Western, don't emphasize or believe in literal rebirth. •Why Evil? People have free will to commit wrongs or rights. Evil doings may result when egoism, cravings, attachments, and ignorance are expressed as greed, hatred, and violence, which, if unmitigated, is perpetuated through rebirth. •Salvation - Enlightenment is an individual journey to Nirvana (complete bliss) - liberation from suffering and cycles of rebirth - acheived by following the Four Noble Truths and Eightfold Path. To eliminate karma, which causes rebirth, one must extinguish the belief in a separate self that gives rise to cravings, desires, and attachments. The path to Enlightenment includes loving-kindness and compassion, moral conduct, charity, wisdom, and meditation. •Undeserved Suffering - Unenlightened life is suffering, and the cessation of this suffering is the primary goal of Buddhism - to reach Nirvana, to end cycles of rebirth. Suffering is a result of past-life greed, hatred, and ignorance, which return as suffering (karma), while compassion toward others who suffer reduces the effects of karma.

the first Noble Truth is to be comprehended; the second is to be abandoned; the third is to be realized; the fourth is to be developed. The full realization of the third Noble Truth paves the way for the direct penetration of Nibbana (Sanskrit: Nirvana), the transcendent freedom that stands as the final goal of all the Buddha's teachings. The last of the Noble Truths - the Noble Eightfold Path - contains a prescription for the relief of our unhappiness and for our eventual release, once and for all, from the painful and wearisome cycle of birth and death (samsara) to which - through our own ignorance (avijja) of the Four Noble Truths - we have been bound for countless aeons. The Noble Eightfold Path offers a comprehensive practical guide to the development of those wholesome qualities and skills in the human heart that must be cultivated in order to bring the practitioner to the final goal, the supreme freedom and happiness of Nibbana. In practice, the Buddha taught the Noble Eightfold Path to his followers according to a "gradual" system of training, beginning with the development of sila, or virtue (right speech, right action, and right livelihood, which are summarized in practical form by the five precepts), followed by the development of samadhi, or concentration and mental cultivation (right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration), culminating in the full development of pañña, or wisdom (right view and right resolve). The practice of dana (generosity) serves as a support at every step along the path, as it can help erode the heart's habitual tendencies towards craving and as it can teach valuable lessons about the causes and results of one's actions (kamma). Progress along the path does not follow a simple linear trajectory. Rather, development of each aspect of the Noble Eightfold Path encourages the refinement and strengthening of the others, leading the practitioner ever forward in an upward spiral of spiritual maturity that culminates in Awakening. Seen from another point of view, the long journey on the path to Awakening begins in earnest with the first tentative stirrings of right view, the first flickerings of wisdom by which one recognizes both the validity of the first Noble Truth and the inevitability of the law of kamma (Sanskrit: karma), the universal law of cause and effect. Once one begins to see that harmful actions inevitably bring about harmful results, and wholesome actions ultimately bring about wholesome results, the desire naturally grows to live a skillful, morally upright life, to take seriously the practice of sila. The confidence built from this preliminary understanding inclines the follower to place an even greater trust in the teachings. The follower becomes a "Buddhist" upon expressing an inner resolve to "take refuge" in the Triple Gem: the Buddha (both the historical Buddha and one's own innate potential for Awakening), the Dhamma (both the teachings of the historical Buddha and the ultimate Truth towards which they point), and the Sangha (both the monastic community that has protected the teachings and put them into practice since the Buddha's day, and all those who have achieved at least some degree of Awakening). With one's feet thus firmly planted on the ground by taking refuge, and with the help of an admirable friend (kalyanamitta) to help show the way, one can set out along the Path, confident that one is indeed following in the footsteps left by the Buddha himself. Buddhism is sometimes naïvely criticized as a "negative" or "pessimistic" religion and philosophy. After all (so the argument goes) life is not all misery and disappointment: it offers many kinds of joy and happiness. Why then this pessimistic Buddhist obsession with unsatisfactoriness and suffering? The Buddha based his teachings on a frank assessment of our plight as humans: there is unsatisfactoriness and suffering in the world. No one can argue this fact. Were the Buddha's teachings to stop there, we might indeed regard them as pessimistic and life as utterly hopeless. But, like a doctor who prescribes a remedy for an illness, the Buddha offers hope (the third Noble Truth) and a cure (the fourth). The Buddha's teachings thus give cause for an extraordinary degree of optimism in a complex, confusing, and difficult world. One modern teacher summed it up well: "Buddhism is the serious pursuit of happiness." The Buddha claimed that the Awakening he re-discovered is accessible to anyone willing to put forth the effort and commitment required to pursue the Noble Eightfold Path to its end. It is up to each of us individually to put that claim to the test. (edited from an essay by John Bullitt)

What is Theravada Buddhism? The "Doctrine of the Elders" Theravada (Pali: thera "elders" + vada "word, doctrine"), the "Doctrine of the Elders," is the name for the school of Buddhism that draws its scriptural inspiration from the Pali Canon, or Tipitaka, which scholars generally accept as the oldest record of the Buddha's teachings. For many centuries, Theravada has been the predominant religion of Sri Lanka, Burma, and Thailand; today Theravada Buddhists number over 100 million worldwide. In recent decades, Theravada has begun to take root in the West - primarily in Western Europe and North America. What follows is a brief synopsis of some of the key teachings of Theravada Buddhism... Shortly after his Awakening, the Buddha ("the Awakened One") delivered his first sermon, in which he laid out the essential framework upon which all his later teachings were based. This framework consists of the Four Noble Truths, four fundamental principles of nature (Dhamma) that emerged from the Buddha's honest and penetrating assessment of the human condition and that serve to define the entire scope of Buddhist practice. These truths are not statements of belief. Rather, they are categories by which we can frame our direct experience in a way that is conducive to Awakening: Life Contains Suffering, Suffering is Caused by desire ( Particularly selfish desire), There is an end to suffering, The end is the Eightfold Noble Path To each of these Noble Truths the Buddha assigned a specific task which the practitioner is to carry out:

And the Buddha speaks: "For one's own sake, monks, vigilant mindfulness should be made the mind's guard and this for four reasons:
'May my mind not harbor lust for anything inducing lust!' - for this reason vigilant mindfulness should be made the mind's guard, for one's own sake.
'May my mind not harbor hate toward anything inducing hate!' - for this reason vigilant mindfulness should be made the mind's guard, for one's own sake.
'May my mind not harbor delusion concerning anything inducing delusion!' -- for this reason vigilant mindfulness should be made the mind's guard, for one's own sake.
'May my mind not be infatuated by anything inducing infatuation!' - for this reason vigilant mindfulness should be made the mind's guard, for one's own sake.
When now, monks, a monk's mind does not harbor lust for lust-inducing things, because he is free from lust; when his mind does not harbor hate toward hate-inducing things, because he is free from hate; when his mind does not harbor delusion concerning anything inducing delusion, because he is free from delusion; when his mind is not infatuated by anything inducing infatuation, because he is free from infatuation - then such a monk will not waver, shake or tremble, he will not succumb to fear, nor will he adopt the views of other recluses."
"If, monks, a man were to throw a heavy stone ball into a heap of wet clay, what do you think monks, will not that heavy ball of stone find entry into that heap of wet clay, will it not obtain a hold in it?" "Certainly, Lord." "Similarly monks, whosoever has not cultivated, not regularly practiced Mindfulness of the Body, in him Mara (this term refers to the forces of ignorance that hinder progress on the path of Enlightenment) will find entry, will obtain a hold. But, whosoever, monks, has cultivated and regularly practiced Mindfulness of the Body, in him Mara will not find entry, will not obtain a hold. Whosoever, monks, has cultivated and regularly practiced Mindfulness of the Body, included in it are for him all beneficial things conducive to wisdom. Mindfulness, I declare, O monks, is helpful everywhere! If the body is not mastered (by meditation), the mind cannot be mastered. If the body is mastered, mind is mastered. There is one thing, monks, that, cultivated and regularly practiced, leads to a deep sense of urgency - to the Supreme Peace - to mindfulness and clear comprehension - to the attainment of right vision and knowledge - to happiness here and now - to realizing deliverance by wisdom and the fruition of Holiness: it is mindfulness of the body."

the end to the shores of the Blessed Land. The inner nature of man aspires to quietude, contentment, peace, and serenity of spirit. We all prefer to live constructively, but against this natural inclination is arrayed an army of pressures and negative associations. To meet the confusion that arises, we now have recourse to a variety of escape mechanisms. We try to avoid the impact of truth by refusing to acknowledge it, or by giving our attention to lesser matters. Actually, we realize the destructiveness of the confusion that we endure and even increase by our attitudes, and we look forward to some time in the future when we can reaffirm the more benevolent aspects of our innate humanity. In the meantime, we may turn to psychoanalysis or to sedatives (medication) in the hope of finding some degree of relief from psychic stress. Buddhism takes the position that when man becomes aware that he is living badly, it is his moral obligation to rectify his character, and if he does not do so, he must reap the harvest of his mistakes. It is utterly impossible for any human being to break the rules of his species and escape suffering. He must therefore determine how much suffering he is willing to endure, how long he is content to be unhappy and insecure as the result of his own ignorance or lack of courage. The truth of the matter is that the solution is far less painful than the ailment, and can be applied at any time the individual resolves to change his ways. He cannot do this, however, until he realizes the need and wholeheartedly accepts the challenge. Weak attempts, not supported by adequate convictions, seldom achieve much. We must first realize that it is possible to control every thought, every emotion, and every action originating from within ourselves. The person who does not believe that he is stronger than his own disposition is ignorant, regardless of how much knowledge he may posses on other subjects.

Love - There are two kinds of love - selfish and unselfish. If selfish emotions dominate our relationships with others, we doom our lives to disillusionment and pain. The more personal our emotions, the more desperately we cling to others for happiness and understanding, the closer we come to mental and emotional illness. Buddha fully realized that human love is the most valuable and also the most dangerous of emotions. He revealed to his disciples the mystery of compassion, which is affection purified of all self-interest. Compassion is not the end of loving, but the beginning of TRUE love. A mother does not love her child less because she has experienced compassion for all the children of the world. To love the sky, the symbol of all the Buddhas; the earth, full of growing life; the stranger, who may be in need of sympathy; and the enemy, who must abide with his own sorrows - these are among the works of compassion. To love the eternal laws that guide our destinies; to bless the troubles that come our way; to accept with warm gratitude the wonders of new things, never questioning the benevolence of Providence, is to dwell forever in Blessedness. Compassion is a radiant child of infinite love. By our acts of mercy, we fashion the ship of salvation that carries us safely across the sea of illusion and brings us in

Those who look down upon the world, will surely take hold and try to change things. But this is a plan I've seen fail again and again. The world is the Way's own vessel. It is Perfection manifest. It cannot be changed. It cannot be improved. For those who go on tampering, it's ruined. For those who try to grasp, it's gone. Allow your life to unfold naturally. Know that it too is a vessel of perfection. Just as you breathe in and breathe out, so, sometimes you're ahead and other times behind. Sometimes you're strong and other times weak. Sometimes you're joined and other times alone. To the Sage, all of life is but a movement toward perfection. So what need has he for the excessive, the extravagant, or the extreme? Nothing in this world is as soft and yielding as water. Yet for attacking the hard and strong, none can triumph so easily. It is weak, yet none can equal it. It is soft, yet none can damage it. It is yielding, yet none can wear it away. Everyone knows that the soft overcomes the hard and the yielding triumphs over the rigid. Why then so little faith? Why can no one practice it? So the Sages say - "fulfill even the lowest position, love even the weakest creature." Then you will be called "Lord of every offering," "King of all below Heaven."
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