//honeypot demagogic

 Forum DhammaCitta. Forum Diskusi Buddhis Indonesia

Show Posts

This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.


Topics - djoe

Pages: [1] 2
1
Mahayana / Death Oleh Master Sheng Yen
« on: 28 May 2015, 09:29:14 AM »

2
Diskusi Umum / MELESTARIKAN AJARAN DHAMMA ATAU MENGHANCURKAN
« on: 02 March 2013, 09:07:50 AM »
Terkait dengan beberapa thread yang tidak bermanfaat.
Tujuan dari forum ini adalah untuk melestarikan ajaran dhamma atau menghancurkan.
Ajaran saya yang benar, Ajaran kamu tidak benar maka dihancurkan

3
Chan atau Zen / Compassion
« on: 28 February 2013, 03:28:47 PM »
WHEN BANKEI HELD HIS SECLUSION-WEEKS OF MEDITATION, PUPILS FROM MANY PARTS OF JAPAN CAME TO ATTEND. DURING ONE OF THESE GATHERINGS A PUPIL WAS CAUGHT STEALING. THE MATTER WAS REPORTED TO BANKEI WITH THE REQUEST THAT THE
CULPRIT BE EXPELLED. BANKEI IGNORED THE CASE.

LATER THE PUPIL WAS CAUGHT IN A SIMILAR ACT, AND AGAIN BANKEI DISREGARDED THE MATTER. THIS ANGERED THE OTHER PUPILS, WHO DREW UP A PETITION ASKING FOR THE DISMISSAL OF THE THIEF, STATING THAT OTHERWISE THEY WOULD LEAVE IN A BODY.

WHEN BANKEI HAD READ THE PETITION HE CALLED EVERYONE BEFORE HIM. ’YOU ARE WISE BROTHERS,’ HE TOLD THEM. ’YOU KNOW WHAT IS RIGHT AND WHAT IS NOT RIGHT. YOU MAY GO SOMEWHERE ELSE TO STUDY IF YOU WISH, BUT THIS POOR BROTHER DOES NOT EVEN KNOW RIGHT FROM WRONG. WHO WILL TEACH HIM IF I DO NOT? I AM GOING TO KEEP HIM HERE EVEN IF ALL THE REST OF YOU LEAVE.’

A TORRENT OF TEARS CLEANSED THE FACE OF THE BROTHER WHO HAD STOLEN. ALL DESIRE TO STEAL HAD VANISHED.

Compassion is the ultimate flowering of consciousness. It is passion released of all darkness, it is passion freed from all bondage, it is passion purified of all poison. Passion becomes compassion. Passion is the seed, compassion is the flowering of it. But compassion is not kindness, kindness is not compassion. Kindness is an ego-attitude, it strengthens your ego. When you are kind to somebody, you feel the upper hand. When you are kind to somebody there is a deep insult – you are humiliating the other, you are feeling happy in his humiliation. That’s why kindness can never be forgiven. Whomsoever you have been kind to will remain somehow somewhere angry with you, is bound to take revenge. Because kindness is only on the surface as compassion, but deep in the depth it has nothing to do with compassion. It has other ulterior motives.

Compassion is unmotivated, it has not motive at all. It is simply because you have, you give – not that the other needs. The other is not a consideration at all in compassion. Because you have, you go on overflowing. Compassion is very spontaneous, natural, like breathing. Kindness is a cultivated
attitude. Kindness is a kind of cunningness; it is calculation, it is arithmetic. You have heard one of the most important sayings – it happens in almost all the scriptures of the world in one form or another: Do unto others as you would like to be done with you. This is a calculated attitude, this is not compassion. This has nothing to do with religion – it is a very lower kind of morality, a very worldly morality: Do unto others as you would like to be done with you. It is
very business-like, it is not religious at all. You are doing only because you would like exactly the same in return. It is selfish, it is self-centered, it is egoistic. You are not serving the other, you are not loving the other – in a roundabout way you are serving yourself. You are using the other.
It is very enlightened egoism, but it is egoism – very intelligent, but it is egoism. Compassion is a very uncalculated flowering, flowing. You simply go on giving because there is no other way to be.

So remember, the first thing: it is not kindness, in one sense – in the sense you use the word ’kindness’ it is not kindness. In another sense, compassion is the real kindness. You are not being kind to somebody, you are not bigger than the other, you are simply releasing the energy that you
are receiving from the whole. It comes from the whole, it goes to the whole – you don’t stand as an obstacle, that’s all.

When Alexander was coming to India he went to see one great mystic, Diogenes. And Diogenes was lying on a Riverbed, taking a sunbath. Alexander had always cherished the desire to see this man Diogenes, because he had heard that this man has nothing, yet there is no other man who is more rich than this man. He has something within him, he has a luminous being. He is a beggar, but he is really an emperor. So Alexander had become intrigued. While coming to India he heard that Diogenes was just nearby, so he went to see him.

Early morning, the sun is rising, Diogenes is Lying naked on the sand. Alexander says, ’I am happy to see you. Whatsoever I have heard seems to be true. I have never seen a happier man. Can I do something for you, sir?’ And Diogenes said, ’You just stand to the side – you are preventing the sun. And remember! never prevent the sun. You are dangerous, you can prevent the sun reaching many people. Just stand to the side.’

Compassion is not something that you give to others, it is simply not preventing the sun. See the point of it: It is simply not preventing God. It is becoming a vehicle of the divine, it is simply allowing the divine to flow through you. You become a hollow bamboo and God goes on flowing through you. You know? only the hollow bamboo can become a flute – because only a hollow bamboo is capable of allowing a song to flow through it.

Compassion is not from you, compassion is from ZEN; kindness is from you – the first thing to be understood. Kindness is something that you do, compassion is something that ZEN does. You simply don’t prevent, you don’t come in the way, you don’t stand in the way. You allow the sun to fall, to penetrate, to go wherever it wants. Kindness strengthens the ego – and compassion is possible only when the ego has disappeared utterly. So don’t be misguided I y your dictionaries, because in the dictionaries you will find compassion is synonymous with kindness. It is not so in the real dictionary of existence. And Zen has only one dictionary, the dictionary of the universe.

4
Chan atau Zen / Zen is paradoxical because Zen is not a philosophy
« on: 18 January 2013, 03:19:34 PM »
Osho - Zen is paradoxical because Zen is not a philosophy

Question - Why is Zen Paradoxical?
Osho - because life is paradoxical and Zen is a simple mirror-reflection of life. Zen is not a
philosophy. Philosophies are never paradoxical, philosophies are very logical -- because philosophies are mind-constructions. Man makes them. They are manufactured by man. They are manmade, tailored, logically arranged, comfortably arranged so that you can believe in them. All those parts which go against the construction have been dropped, rooted out, thrown away. Philosophies don't reflect life as such; they are chosen from life. They are not raw, they are cultured constructions.



Zen is paradoxical because Zen is not a philosophy. Zen is not concerned about what life is, Zen is concerned that whatsoever is should be reflected as it is. One should not choose, because the moment you choose it becomes untrue. Choice brings untruth. Don't choose, remain choiceless -- and you remain true.

But that's what you do: you fall in love with a woman and you start choosing. Soon you will be in trouble. You don't see the woman as she is, you only see that which is good and you overlook all which is not good. There are a thousand and one things in her -- a few are good, a few are bad, that's how people are made. God never makes goodie-goodies -- they would be very dull and dead, they wouldn't have any backbone, they would be bloodless. He makes alive people. And each person has something that you like and something that you don't like -- because he has not been tailored especially for you, he has not been made for you, he has not come out of an assembly line in a factory. He is unique. He is himself and she is herself.

When you fall in love with a woman, you start choosing. You overlook many things. Yes, sometimes you feel she gets angry but you overlook it, you don't take any notice of it. You just see the goddess, you don't see the witch. The witch is there. No goddess can exist without a witch otherwise the goddess would not be worth anything. She will be too good to be enjoyed, too good to be loved. And you don't want to worship a woman, you want to love a woman. You want a woman to be human not a goddess.

But that's what you do. You pretend, you don't see any negative factors. You start choosing. You create an image of the woman which is false, which is not true. Sooner or later you will start feeling frustrated because sooner or later the reality of the woman will go against the image that you have created. And then you start feeling as if you have been cheated and deceived, as if this woman has knowingly deceived you. Nobody has deceived you. You yourself are the writer of your whole drama. You have managed to deceive yourself because you started choosing. You did not see the woman as she was, in the way a mirror reflects her. Yes, there were beautiful things but there were ugly things too -- because beauty never exists without ugliness and ugliness never exists without beauty. They exist together. They are two aspects of the same coin.

Sometimes the woman was really sweet and sometimes she was really bitter. If you had looked at both it would have been difficult for you because this was paradoxical, this didn't fit in with your Aristotelian logic, this seemed illogical -- how could a woman be both? Sometimes she loved you and sometimes she hated you; in fact, the deeper her love is, the deeper her hate goes too. Sometimes she was ready to die for you and sometimes she was ready to kill you too. A woman is a ferocious energy, Just as man is.

But you make a fairy tale. You choose a few parts and you drop a few parts and you create an image. That image is not going to last. Once the honeymoon is over, reality will start asserting itself. Reality cannot be defeated by your imagination and by your
dreaming, reality has to be taken care of sooner or later. Yes, you can postpone it for the time being but not forever. And when the reality asserts itself....

It will assert itself in day-to-day life. When you meet a woman once a day on the beach she is totally a different animal. You are a different kind of animal too. Meeting for one hour, she is prepared for it, she is ready for it, she has rehearsed for it, she has been standing before the mirror for hours for it. You will not find the same woman if you start living with her twenty-four hours a day; it will be impossible for her to be so ready and rehearsed. By and by she will start forgetting about you. She will get ready only when you are going to the movie, otherwise she will not bother.

Then you will see something else which was never there before. Then small things of life, trivia, assert themselves. Over small things she starts arguing -- and you start arguing too. Over small things there is anger and nagging and fighting -- you never saw these things on the beach. On the beach you saw the full moon and the waves. On the beach the woman did not argue with you; whatever she said you said yes, whatsoever you said she said yes. You were so ready to say yes that no was not possible at that moment. But the no cannot wait forever, it will come up, it will surface. The moment no surfaces, y our image starts falling into fragments. Then you think that the woman has done some wrong to you.

This example is not only about man and woman, this has been the whole story of philosophy. Each philosophy does it. Each philosophy chooses a few things from reality and tries to remain oblivious of other things. Because of this, each philosophy has loopholes, each philosophy has leakages, each philosophy can be criticised -- and has to be criticised. Those who believe in it may pretend not to see the loopholes, but those who don't believe in it see only the loopholes -- they choose from the other end. Each philosophy has been criticised and the criticism has not been wrong. It is as true as the propounder's idea about it.

And it does not happen only in philosophy, it happens in science too. We create a certain theory and then there is the honeymoon with the theory. For a few years things go perfectly well. Then reality asserts itself. Reality brings up a few things and the theory gets into difficulty because we had excluded a few facts. Those facts will protest, they will sabotage your theory, they will assert themselves. In the eighteenth century science was absolutely certain, now it is certain no more. Now a new theory has come: the theory of uncertainty.

Just a hundred and fifty years ago Immanuel Kant came across this fact in Germany. He said that reason is very limited; it sees only a certain part of reality and starts believing 'that this is the whole. This has been the trouble. Sooner or later we discover further realities and the old whole is in conflict with the new vision. Immanuel Kant attempted to show that there were ineluctable limits to reason, that reason is very limited. But nobody seems to have heard, nobody has cared about Immanuel Kant. Nobody cares much about philosophers.

But science in this century has at last caught up with Kant. Now Heinsenberg, in physics, and Godel, in mathematics, have shown ineluctable limits to human reason. They open up to us a glimpse of a nature which is irrational and paradoxical to the very core. Whatsoever we have been saying about nature has all gone wrong. All principles go wrong because nature is not synonymous with reason, nature is bigger than reason. And Zen is not a philosophy; Zen is a mirror, it is a reflection of that which is. As it is, Zen says the same. It does not bring any man-made philosophy into it, it has no choice, it does not add, it does not delete. That's why Zen is paradoxical -- because life is paradoxical. You just see and you will understand.

You love a man and you hate the same man too. Now, our mind says this is not good, we should not do it. So you pretend that you don't do it. But it is not possible. If you really want to drop the hate part, you will have to drop the love part too -- but then both disappear and indifference arises. This paradoxicality is in the very nature itself -- day and night, summer and winter, God and Devil are together.

Zen says that if you say that God is good then a problem arises: then from where does the bad come, from where does the evil come? That's what religions have done -- Christianity, Islam, Judaism, have separated God and Devil. The evil comes from Devil and all good comes from God. God means the good. But from where does this Devil come? Then they are in trouble and then finally they have to concede that God created the Devil too -- but what is the point in going in such a roundabout way? If the Devil is also created by God then God remains the sole signature on existence, then God remains the sole author. So whatsoever is happening is happening through him -- and he is paradoxical. That's what Zen says. God is paradoxical, as paradoxical as existence itself. God is nothing but another name for existence, for the totality of existence.

Once you understand this paradoxicality, a great silence arises in you. Then there is no choice -- there is no point in it -- then things are together. You cannot become a saint because if you want to become a saint you will have to deny your devil; you will have to cut yourself into two parts. You will have to force your devil somewhere into your belly and the devil will remain there and will go on sabotaging your sainthood.

Zen brings great health to humanity. It says you are both. Accept both. Don't deny, don't choose; accept both. In that acceptance there is a transcendence, in that very acceptance you are neither a saint nor a devil. That is what a holy man is -- neither good nor bad, or both. And when a person is both, knowingly both, those opposites cancel each other. Just try to understand this; it is one of the most fundamental keys. When you accept both the good and the bad and you don't choose, the bad and good cancel out each other, the negative and the positive cancel out each other. Suddenly there is silence, there is neither good nor bad; there is only existence, with no judgement. Zen is non-judgemental, it is non-condemning, it is non-evaluating. It gives you utter freedom to be.

Source - Osho Book "Zen The Path of Paradox Vol 1"

5
Sutra Mahayana / A teaching on the Heart Sutra
« on: 04 January 2013, 02:36:47 PM »
 A teaching on the Heart Sutra

With the Mahayana there is this ideal that you begin to practice so that you can benefit others. And it's actually a very subtle, but profound, kind of shift. For instance, if you're in a profession where you do benefit others, it's so heartbreaking to realize that you get so irritated with people that you're trying to help, that they push all your buttons, that you actually get angry and don't like them, and all of these things. And so, you start to practice because you want to be able to stay, hang-in-there with them. And you know that only to the degree that you can hang-in-there with yourself are you going to be able to hang-in-there with anybody else.
The bodhisattva ideal is that you begin to practice not just for the cessation of your own suffering (which, of course, we all do practice for that reason), but realizing that to be there other people, we need to be there for ourselves. And to the degree that we can hang-in-there with our own suffering--and our lack of cessation of suffering, but the actual nitty-gritty of what it feels like to feel pain--the more we can hang-in-there with our own and not run away from ourselves, the more we can stay in the room with somebody who's provoking a lot of uncomfortable feelings in us.
Avalokitesvara is a super-bodhisattva. He's also known as Kanzeon and Chrenrezig-- and in female form, I think Kanzeon is female and Kuan-Yin. Avalokitesvara, in different countries comes sometimes in female, sometimes in male form, but always is the bodhisattva of compassion.

So, Shariputra starts asking him questions. And he says, "How should we (students, men and women) sons and daughters of the noble family of the Buddha train, who wish to practice the profound prajnaparamita?"
You notice that even in the very first stanza, or first paragraph, it says that "Avalokitesvara, the bodhisattva mahasattva, while practicing the profound prajnaparamita, saw in this way: he saw the five skandhas to be empty of nature."
And then, Shariputra asks him, "How should we practice?" This is actually a really important point. This sutra is instruction on how to practice. It's not like intellectual speculation. It's really instruction on how to practice.
And later, much further down in the sutra, it's says, "All the buddhas of the three times," abide by means of prajnaparamita. They practice the prajnaparamita, they abide by it. It's not like something they study. It's the difference between scholarly accumulation, the first of the Three Prajnas, studying and reading, this is more in the area of contemplation and meditation--like practicing the prajnaparamita, or abiding by prajnaparamita. That's what this Foundation-yana-Shariputra wants to know. He says, "How? How should I practice?"

What occurs in all versions of the Heart Sutra is Avalokitesvara's answer, which is: "Form is emptiness, emptiness is form. Emptiness is no other than form, form is no other than emptiness." That little paradoxical, enigmatic, difficult to understand answer.
This answer to how to practice the prajnaparamita is really probably the main thing that distinguishes the Hinayana from the Mahayana.
I'm going to go into it with some detail, but the overview of it is: Avalokitesvara says anything that you're clinging to, anything that you now currently believe to be so-- such as egolessness, or the Four Noble Truths, or the skandhas, as a description of no-self-- anything that you currently believe in, it's not that.
In other words, the Buddhist teachings are progressive stages in groundlessness.
Having taught groundlessness, now the Buddha teaches-- through Avalokitesvara-- the prajnaparamita, which says: even all of that, if you believe in it as a belief system, will block you from understanding the truth-- if you cling to anything, it will block your understanding the truth-- even clinging to the words of the Buddha, the teachings of the Buddha, will be a major obstacle if you hold on to them and make them something solid and use them as ground under your feet.
This is really what distinguishes the Mahayana, or why it's said to be like a next step, because basically it doesn't say that the first turning wasn't true. It just says, it is true, but you can't believe in it. All of that is very, very helpful, but actually the instruction on being and curious and inquisitive, that's more what we really have to stick with.
We don't throw out the teachings on the Three Marks of Existence-- egolessness and impermanence and suffering. But, we can't hold on to it, or it will block the true wisdom. That's the pith of it.
And what was said was that a lot of the arhats, which were the enlightened first turning students that actually had full realization (which is more than I can say for myself, or probably we can say, we don't know who's here tonight [laughter], but generally speaking, most of us don't have a full-blown experience of non-duality of egolessness or of impermanence for that matter. We very much solidify and concretize and think in terms of subject and object. Don't we?). But the arhats were the ones who had actually realized that.
Sometimes they say, when this teaching was given at Vulture Peak Mountain (this was a new teaching), that the arhats had heart attacks. [laughter] But, I love this, I heard a Tibetan teacher teaching once, he said, "Probably, really more the truth was, they got up and walked out." [laughter] Because they didn't want to hear this. And I think that's true.
You see, none of us are so invested in the Four Noble Truths that it's a big shock to find out that "no suffering, no origin of suffering, no cessation of suffering, no path"-- we're not going to get any heart attacks-- but, if you really believed in this. . . So, more, I think, you have to find something that you actually really believe in.
Well, in answer to some of the people's questions, "no cessation of suffering." You're saying, "I've been practicing three or four years, and there's no cessation of suffering." And this is saying, "That's right, no cessation of suffering." You've got to stop believing that there's a goal. Or believing in anything.
You have to come up with things, begin to find out where your real prejudices are. Where you say, "I believe in this," and actually you get hot under the collar and you dig in, "This is RIGHT!" [hits gong bluntly] [laughter] Which makes somebody else "WRONG!" who doesn't believe that.
That's probably true, they got up and walked out because they just didn't want to hear it. Basically, everything they believed in, it was saying, "NO."
He emphasized, at first, just the five skandhas. He just took that. He saw that these five skandhas were empty. And it starts with "form" and says there is no form, and then also it would be, no feeling, no perception, no concepts, and then no thoughts or emotions (consciousness). We certainly believe in thoughts and emotions.
It's pulling out the rug. Trungpa Rinpoche introduced this already by giving all these teachings on "disappointment" (you read two chapters on the subject of disappointment), which he said was "when you think something is going to be a certain way, and then you become disappointed." That's where the wisdom comes from, the disappointment-- things not being the way you think they are. And then "boredom," that was another one, he gave a lot of teachings on boredom.
In some sense, teachings on disappointment and boredom are a way of teaching on groundlessness, on shunyata. You think it's going to be a certain way, or you wouldn't be disappointed. You're waiting for something exciting to happen, or you wouldn't be bored. It's sort of like leveling everything out.
Suzuki-Roshi says (to sort of paraphrase) in Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, "I have found that it is absolutely necessary to believe in nothing," and then he says, "by which I don't mean voidness." And then he explains, beautifully, he says what he means is "a mind that is flexible, a mind that is ready and open." And he uses the word, that everything is "tentative," rather than things being solid and fixed-- everything is "tentative," just about to become something. He says, "it's not like it's nothing there, but it's tentative." It isn't like THIS. His definition of believing in nothing is: a mind that is flexible and ready to see what's there, and open. Rather than believing in nothing being a nihilistic statement, it's an affirmation.
Avalokitesvara says, "Form is emptiness; emptiness also is form. Emptiness is no other than form; form is no other than emptiness." So now I'm going to give a little teaching on this.
First, I'll teach it the way Trungpa Rinpoche does. He starts out with "form is emptiness". . .
For instance, when Thich Nhat Hanh teaches this in a wonderful little book on the Heart Sutra called The Heart of Understanding, he says, "But if Avalokitesvara says that's it's empty, we have to help him to be more clear and ask him, 'Empty of what, Mr. Avalokita?'" [laughter]
Trungpa Rinpoche says: empty of our preconceptions, empty of our fixed ideas. Empty of, we say, "It's like this." And so he talks about, if we say, "right/wrong," "good/bad," any of these pairs of opposites, we have to just erase all of those concepts and just look at everything free of our biases. Empty of bias. So he describes that in the chapter ["Shunyata"] that you'll be reading for this week.
There's a famous sutra [poem] by one of the early Zen patriarchs [the third] which begins with the line: "The great way is only difficult for those who pick and choose." This saying that "form is emptiness" is like saying: form is free of our picking and choosing. Form is just what it is without our picking and choosing, without our "for" and "against," without our "yes" and "know."
So then Rinpoche says that that leaves you feeling free, it's like a liberation-- liberated from all this caught-upness. And he says, therefore the Buddha didn't want anybody to get any ground under their feet with this statement, so he said, however, "emptiness also is form."
And the meaning here is, we erase all the preconceptions of right and wrong, the prejudices, but at the same time, things really are happening: people really are hurting, people really need our care; we really are hurting, we really need our own care, our own loving-kindness. Things are happening.
I'm sitting in the traffic jam, and I can be free of biases about the traffic jam, but still there are two thousand people who have all kinds of life stories about all the appointments they're missing, and the child's birthday party they're not getting home for, and who knows what's going on in those two thousand lives-- at least two thousand lives.
It's saying, you can't just say "form is emptiness" and let it go at that. It's called the "poison of shunyata." You can't just use the absolute truth as a way to dangle above the messiness of life.
All things are an expression of emptiness, everything manifests out of emptiness, but it does manifest. And we have to relate to it. Actually, this is the first inkling in the sutra of compassion, the need for compassion. (The other inkling of compassion in the sutra is that it's Avalokitesvara who's doing all the talking. The bodhisattva of compassion. Whose name in some languages means: he or she who hears the cries of the world.)
That's the point: form is emptiness, but nevertheless, there are the cries of the world, emptiness is form.And then, should you get any sort of ground out of that, then: "emptiness is no other than form" and "form is no other than emptiness." Which often is also translated as "form is just form" and "emptiness is just emptiness."
It's sort of like saying, Things are just what they are, and there are no escapes. Either being stuck in our prejudices about them and our concepts, or using the absolute truth to dangle above it. Somehow you have to be in the middle of it and not caught up in "right" and "wrong" thinking, at the same time.

One of the ways I often like to teach these four, though, is: You see the Buddha sitting under the Bodhi Tree, and here's your big chance, you're going to ask him about the meaning of life with the hope of getting some ground under your feet. Poor choice. [laughter] So you go up and he asks you, "What do you think about all of this that you perceive?" And you are being very honest and you say, "It is my experience that it all exists." And he says, "No." He could say that in the format of, "form is emptiness"-- this is all emptiness. But you say, "all of this exists," and he says, "No."
So, you go away and you think about it and you contemplate it -- you study, you contemplate, and you meditate-- and you come back. Actually, you haven't really had this understanding, but you think you know what the right answer is. So you say to him, "All of this does not exist," and you're very proud of yourself. And he says, "No." But he says it in the form, "emptiness is also form."
So you go home for another week or month, trying to get up your courage to go back. And you think, Well, I think there's only one other answer to this. So you back and you say, "I got it. All of this exists and doesn't exist at the same time." And he says, "No." That's sort of like saying that things exist and they don't exit, it's like two things. In your mind you're conceptualizing it, it does exist and it doesn't exist at the same time. And he answers that as, "emptiness is no other than form." In other words, they aren't two things, they're inseparable. Emptiness manifests as form.
So then you go home, and actually it's about a year before you come back. And you've thought of every possible answer, and you say, Ok, I've got it: "Things neither exist nor don't exist." That's a pretty emptiness, groundless answer. And he says, "No."
Where does that leave you? And that's kind of the point of the Heart Sutra, Where does that leave you? Whatever answer you can come up with, the answer is No. That's kind of the point of this. Pulling out the rug, more and more and more.


6
Mahayana / Adakah yang tidak berkondisi???
« on: 03 December 2012, 02:54:06 PM »
Something that is not dependently arisen,
Such a thing does not exist
Therefore a non-empty thing
Does not exit

Jadi adakah yang tidak berkondisi?

7
Diskusi Umum / Argumen Ego
« on: 22 November 2012, 10:23:34 AM »
Karena yang tingkat tinggi sudah tidak komentar, maka saya mau coba berikan pendapat tingkat rendah. Dalam pemahaman dasar, shunyata tidak berbeda antara pemahaman Theravada maupun Mahayana, yaitu berasal dari kanon Pali Culasuññatasutta yang menjelaskan bahwa segala fenomena adalah kosong dari diri.

Belakangan di satu hari yang indah, sekonyong-konyong ada yang merumuskan kitab dari Tavatimsa yang mengategorikan nibbana sebagai satu elemen yang terpisah, maka sekonyong-konyong pula ada yang ke alam naga sebagai tandingan dan menyatakan nibbana bukan elemen yang terpisah (nibbana=samsara; samsara=nibbana). Bagaimana kekosongan itu ada/tidak ada adalah sebab kita masih terkondisi dalam kekotoran bathin, maka pada hakekatnya, kekosongan tidak terpisahkan dari fenomena, hanya bagaimana kita memahami 'kekosongan vs fenomena' yang membedakan orang yang telah merealisasi dengan orang biasa.

Jadi dari sutra ini, sebetulnya kita diajak untuk tidak 'mencari' satu elemen pembebasan yang seperti 'eksis di luar samsara', namun dengan cara memahami samsara itu sendiri yang adalah shunya.

Argumen ego adalah argumen yang hanya untuk bertujuan untuk menang sendiri atas argumen orang lain yang menyatakan hal yang sama. Tetapi dikarenakan ego menutupi nya sehingga tidak melihat inti argumen dari orang lain dan melencengkan ke arah lain dengan membuat argumen asal asalan.

Dikarenakan ia hanya melihat apa yang ada di pikirannya

Karena ia tidak mengenalinya ketika yang dibold diungkapkan dalam bahasa yang berbeda disebabkan kemelekatan pada kata kata yang tertimbun dalam pikiran

Inilah yang dimaksud dengan argumen ego.

8
Kesehatan / Cara menjaga kesehatan ginjal
« on: 20 November 2012, 09:12:04 AM »
Bagaimana caranya menjaga kesehatan ginjal?

Kalau urine banyak buihnya apakah pertanda kesehatan ginjal tidak baik.

9
Segala sesuatu tidaklah kekal dan berubah terus menerus karena sifatnya yang tetap/kekal dalam perubahan dan tidak pernah berubah
Segala sesuatu kekal karena sifatnya yang berubah rubah terus menerus dan tidak pernah tetap

Tidak kekal karena kekal
Kekal karena tidak kekal

Karena itu segala sesuatu tidak bisa dikatakan kekal atau tidak kekal.

10
Katanya ada sebagian member senior disini galak galak, Tukang libas, Tukang meluruskan, Pintar berdebat
Saya yang bodoh ini  datang ke wdc dengan harapan bisa dilibas, diluruskan dan diajarkan mengalami kecewa berat
Yang saya lihat mereka adalah pengecut, beraninya keroyokan, Pintarnya mengejek, mengancam.

Dan statement mereka lebih banyak tidak bermutu daripada yang bisa diambil pelajarannya oleh saya yang bodoh ini

Tapi itu tak masalah bagi saya, biar di keroyok, satu persatu terpental, terlibas sendiri dengan pandangan mereka
Satu persatu pandangan mereka dibalikkan, dipatahkan dan diluruskan, satu persatu mundur
Saya melihat mereka hanyalah macan ompong yang perlu dilibas dan diluruskan

  :))  :))  :))  :))

Tetapi ini hanyalah pandangan saya.
Tetapi ini hanyalah pikiran saya.
Mungkin saya terjebak dengan pandangan dan pemikiran saya sendiri.
Mungkin saya berilusi.
Mungkin ini pandangan sesat dari orang yang bodoh dan arogan


Harap abaikan tulisan ini dari orang yang bodoh yang awalnya ingin dilibas dan diluruskan akhirnya malah melibas dan meluruskan.
Ini hanya khayalan saya




11
[SIZE="5"] Omnibus dubitandum , dubito ergo sum, cogito ergo sum
Segala sesuatu meragukan, aku meragu maka aku ada, aku berpikir maka aku ada. 
Rene Descartes <1596 - 1650>[/SIZE]
 
[SIZE="4"]Saya tidak memiliki latar belakang akademis filsafat.
Namun perjalanan hidup ini memapah saya ke dalam rimba pencarian kebenaran lewat filsafat barat dan timur disamping spiritualitas. 
Ada banyak filsuf akademis yang telah mengupas kalimat terkenal dari Descartes  ini. Namun bagi saya sisi praktisnya, kalimat Descartes bermakna bahwa : keberadaan hidup kita di bumi ini ditandai dengan kemauan kita untuk meragukan dan memikirkan langsung kebenaran dan hidup itu sendiri.
Bukan dari kata orang lain, bukan dari kata pendeta atau ulama atau biksu, bukan dari kitab-kitab yang katanya suci.
Namun langsung bertindak untuk menggunakan otak dan pengetahuan yang kita miliki, yang juga  terus kita tambahkan, untuk menganalisa, menilai, dan membuktikannya sendiri.
Dengan demikianlah hidup kita ini bermakna ada.
 
Ironisnya, sekalipun Rene Descartes di sebut Bapak Filsafat Modern, penyokong rasionalisme, ternyata kalimat yang sepadan dengan kalimat di atas justru sudah pernah dikatakan jauh-jauh hari sebelumnya oleh seorang pertapa dari India Utara 2000 tahun sebelumnya, yaitu oleh pertapa Sidharta  Gautama. 

Janganlah kamu percaya sesuatu sebagai kebenaran hanya karena hal itu didesas-desuskan orang banyak, dikatakan oleh gurumu yang kau anggap suci dan bijaksana, tertulis dalam kitab-kitab suci, diturunkan oleh budaya dari satu generasi ke generasi berikutnya, di dasari atas rasio belaka, atau bahkan karena itu dikatakan dari bibirku sendiri.
 
Hendaknya kamu meragukannya, menilai, mencoba memahaminya dengan penalaran dan pertimbangan akal budimu.
Apakah hal demikian memberi kebaikan dan bermanfaat bagi dirimu dan sesama. Dst 


Hemat saya, inilah kebijaksanaan seorang spiritualis kelas wahid, yaitu mendorong setiap orang untuk berani mengambil keputusan menilai, menakar, mempertimbangkan, menguji dan membuktikan sesuatu  sebagai kebenaran,
bukannya terus menerus mendakwahkan tentang ADA suatu tuhan yang mutlak, ADA seorang nabi yang sempurna, ADA suatu kitab yang sempurna dan terpelihara tanpa cacat dan cela, ADA suatu agama yang diriestui oleh tuhan yang mutlak itu, ADA seorang juru selamat penebus.
ADA, ADA dan ADA.
Padahal ketika dibedah oleh kritik historis, kritik bentuk, kritik sastra dan  sains ternyata semua fundamental ajaran tersebut pada hancur berantakan dan terbukti hanya jargon belaka.
 
Sayangnya rasionalitas dan skeptisisme pertapa Gautama tidak bisa dikejar oleh murid-murid dan umatnya.
Banyak pengikut ajaran Gautama sendiri sudah mabuk dogma dan lupa diri untuk menganalisa dan mengritik agamanya sendiri, yaitu agama Buddha –
‘pokoknya karena itu tertulis di kitab suci, dijamin pasti benar’.
‘karena Buddha bilang begini – begitu pastilah itu benar’.
Mereka ini lupa bahwa tripitaka, kitab-kitab yang darinya mereka mengenal tokoh Buddha itu, sejatinya ditulis oleh manusia juga, yaitu para biksu dan pertapa yang hidup ratusan tahun setelah Buddha wafat, sehingga sangat memungkinkan adanya pembiasan, pembelokan, pencatutan, pengecilan dan pembesar-besaran di sana-sini.

Begitu pula logika yang sama terjadi dalam penyusunan alkitab, dan penyusunan alquran serta kitab-kitab agama lainnya. 
Kisah-kisah dalam weda, tripitaka, alkitab dan alquran sebaiknya tidak dipercayai sebagai kisah sebenar-benarnya terjadi secara factual dan historis, melainkan kisah-kisah mitologis inspiratif dimana si penulis mencoba menyampaikan suatu pelajaran moral ataupun idea dengan cara menampilkannya lewat komunikasi para tokoh mitologis mistik seperti Krishna dan Arjuna, Buddha dan murid-muridnya, Yesus dan para rasul, dan Muhammad dengan para sahabatnya.
Itu semua adalah tokoh-tokoh bentukan dari para penulis sendiri yang digunakan untuk menjadi wadah dimana idea-idea yang sedang dipaparkan dibawakan secara lebih komunikatif.
 
Semua bangunan-bangunan keangkuhan agama memang musti dibongkar-bangkir, agar jelas apakah terbukti atau tidak kejumawaannya.
Mengapa ini perlu?
Karena fakta memperlihatkan bahwa semakin rasional suatu masyarakat, semakin sedikit tingkat esktrimitas dan kriminalitas agama.
Sebaliknya semakin kuat ekstrimisme dan fundamentalisme agama, semakin besar pula pelanggaran hak-hak asasi dan irrasionalitas serta kriminalitas yang dilakukan oleh piranti dan penguasa agama itu. 
 
Bukan berarti beragama itu dilarang, tetapi agama harus sadar bahwa ia tidak memiliki kuasa sebesar-sebesarnya untuk mendikte ini-itu terhadap masyarakat.
Ia harus masuk dalam ruang privat, menjadi pilihan pribadi, tidak boleh masuk dan petantang petenteng di ruang publik.

Semoga mengerti
Semoga semua makhluk berbahagia   
[/SIZE][/QUOTE]
 
sumber http://www.w****a.com/forum/topik-umum/10641-omnibus-dubitandum-dubito-ergo-sum-cogito-ergo-sum.html?pagenumber=

12
Buddhisme untuk Pemula / Sampah dan Pencerahan
« on: 03 June 2011, 10:13:07 AM »
Jika pikiran penuh dengan sampah/kekotoran batin, maka Kata - kata yang keluar dan terucap adalah sampah juga. Segalah hal yang dilihat adalah sampah. Segala sampah yang dilihat adalah emas. Ia tidak menyadari sedang mengkokmsumsi sampah dan tidak menyadari sedang membuang emas.

Jika seseorang mempunyai samadhi dan kebijaksanaan, maka kata - kata yang terdengar itu bukanlah sampah melainkan sumber daya yang dapat digunakan untuk melatih kebijaksanaan seseorang. Sampah tersbut tidak bisa mengotorinya. Karena walaupun ia exist diantara sampah, ia dan sampah terpisah jelas berada dalam hubungan yang harmoni dan saling mendukung satu sama lain. Seperti lumpur yang membuat bunga teratai menjadi indah, dan bunga teratai memperindah lingkungan lumpur tersebut.

Jika seseorang tidak mempunyai samadhi dan kebijaksanaan, maka ia akan mengkomsumsi sampah tersebut mentah - mentah, Ia akan terkontaminasi dengan sampah tersebut karena Ia tidak mendaurnya menjadi pupuk, Sehingga pikiran penuh dengan sampah dan yang keluar juga sampah yang akhirnya dikomsumsi kembali dalam siklus yang terus menerus seperti proses GIGO (Garbage IN Garbage Out)

Tetapi anda tidak usah khawatir jika pikiran anda penuh sampah. Karena umat Buddha sejati mengandalkan sampah untuk menjadi Buddha. Seperti bunga teratai yang hidup dalam kubangan lumpur, tetapi keindahannya tidak terpenuhi dengan kotoran tersebut. Bunga teratai bisa mendaur kotoran menjadi pupuk sehingga  bunga teratai tersebut tumbuh menjadi indah dan tidak terkontaminasi dengan lingkungannya. Itulah keindahan yang sejati ditengah - tengah kekotoran. Semakin kotor kubangan lumpur tersebut, maka bunga teratai akan semakin Indah. Sehingga keindahannya mampu membuat sekelilingnya tumbuh menjadi indah.

Tetapi anda tidak usah khawatir pikiran anda penuh dengan sampah dan kotoran,, karena Buddha mengajarkan kita cara mendaur sampah - sampah pikiran ini menjadi pupuk dengan demikian bibit tersebut bisa tumbuh dan berakar menjadi bunga teratai yang indah didalam kubangan lumpur.

Jangan menjadi seperti orang yang megkomsumsi sampah mentah mentah sehingga pikiran penuh dengan sampah, dan yang keluar dari pikiraan sampah semua seperti ini
Garbage In Garbage Out. Jangan terjebak dalam siklus tersebut. Ajaran Buddha mengajarkan kita menghentikan proses Garbage In Garbage Out.

Jika kita punya kebijaksanaan,  Ketika Garbage In, maka kita mampu mendaur sampah tersebut menjadi pupuk sehingga batin / benih teratai tersebut tumbuh dan berkembang. Pada saat itu sampah - sampah disekeliling anda  bukanlah sampah lagi tetapi merupakan sumber alam yang dapat anda gunakan untuk melatih kebijaksanaan. Pada saat anda mengkomsumsi sampah tersebut, dan tidak lagi mengalami penderitaan dari kekotoran sampah. Anda tidak lagi merasa kotor, karena anda mendaur sampah tersebut menjadi sesuatu yang berguna. Seperti bunga teratai yang hidup dikubangan lumpur. Lumpur dan Bunga teratai tersebut hidup berdampingan secara harmoni. Lumpur tidak mengotori dan bunga teratai memperindah lumpur tersebut dan menunjukkan bahwa lumpur tertersebut masih berguna. Ketika ada sampah, sampah tersebut membantu bunga teratai tersebut tumbuh menjadi sesuatu yang indah.

Pada saat itu sampah dan batin/bunga teratai adalah 2 hal yang terpisah. Walaupun hidup disekitar sampah, tetapi sampah dan bunga teratai tersebut adalah 2 hal yang berbeda. Terdapat perbedaan yang jelas antara sampah dan bunga teratai tersebut. Walaupun hidup disekitar sampah, sampah tersebut tidak bisa mempengaruhi keindahan bunga teratai tersebut.

Kita hendaknya seperti itu.
Jadilah seperti bunga teratai tersebut, bukan orang yang mengkomsumsi sampah mentah mentah dan menghasilkan sampah dan mengotori sekelilingnya.
 

13
Buddhisme untuk Pemula / Cara Membingbing orang awam
« on: 01 June 2011, 11:00:13 AM »
Rekan - rekan sekalian, Berikut artikel dibawah ini berisi tentang dharma talk oleh Ajahn Chah didalam membingbing umat awam. Menurut Ajahn Chah Didalam membingbing umat awam sebenarnya kita sedang membingbing kita sendiri. Kita sedang melatih kesabaran dan kebijaksanaan diri kita sendiri. Kita sedang mempraktekkan dharma. Bagaimana kita tetap penuh perhatian ke dalam batin dan pikiran kita didalam membingbing orang awam tersebut dan tidak melekat dan menjadi duka. Agar kita tidak melihat keburukan orang lain dan mengkritiknya. Tetapi kita dianjurkan agar tetap konsisten dengan usaha kita tanpa melihat hasilnya dan menjadi kecewa

   


   
A Dhammatalk by Ajahn Chah
Monastery of Confusion1

Staying or going is not important, but our thinking is. So all of you, please work together, cooperate and live in harmony. This should be the legacy you create here at Wat Pah Nanachat Bung Wai, the International Forest Monastery of Bung Wai District. Don't let it become Wat Pah Nanachat Woon Wai, the International Forest Monastery of Confusion and Trouble2. Whoever comes to stay here should be helping create this legacy.

The way I see it, the lay people are providing robes material, almsfood, the dwelling place, and medicines in appropriate measure. It's true that they are simple country folk, but they support you out of their faith as best they can. Don't get carried away with your ideas of how you think they should be, such as, "Oh, I try to teach these lay people, but they do make me upset. Today is the observance day, and they came to take precepts. Then tomorrow they'll go casting their fishing nets. They'll drink their whiskey. They do these things right out there where anyone can see. Then the next observance day, they'll come again. They'll take the precepts and listen to the Dharma talk again, and then they'll go to put out their nets again, kill animals again, and drink again."

You can get pretty upset thinking like this. You'll think that your activities[/color] with the lay people don't bring any benefit at all. Today they take the precepts, and tomorrow they go cast the fishing nets. A monk without much wisdom might get discouraged and feel he's failed, thinking his work bears no fruit. But it's not that his efforts have no result; it's those lay people who get no result. Of course there is some good result from making efforts at virtue. So when there is such a situation and we start to suffer over it, what should we do?

We contemplate within ourselves to recognize that our good intentions have brought some benefit and do have meaning. It's just that the spiritual faculties of those people aren't developed. They aren't strong yet. That's how it is for now, so we patiently continue to advise them. If we just give up on such people, they are likely to become worse than they are now. If we keep at it, they may come to maturity one day and recognize their unskillful actions. Then they will feel some remorse and start to be ashamed of doing such things.

Right now, they have the faith to support us with material offerings, giving us our requisites for living. I've considered this: it's quite a big deal. It's no small thing. Donating our food, our dwellings, the medicines to treat our illnesses, is not a small thing. We are practicing for the attainment of Nibbāna. If we don't have any food to eat, that will be pretty difficult. How would we sit in meditation? How would we be able to build this monastery?

We should recognize when people's spiritual faculties are not yet mature. So what should we do? We are like someone selling medicine. You've probably seen or heard them driving around with their loudspeakers touting the different medicines they have for different maladies. People who have bad headaches or poor digestion might come to buy3.

We can accept money from those who buy our medicine; we don't take money from someone who doesn't buy anything. We can feel glad about the people who do buy something. If others stay in their houses and don't come out to buy, we shouldn't get angry with them for that. We shouldn't criticize them.

If we teach people but they can't practice properly, we shouldn't be getting angry with them. Don't do that! Don't criticize them, but rather keep on instructing them and leading them along. Whenever their faculties have ripened sufficiently, then they will want to do it. Just like when we are selling medicine, we just keep on doing our business. When people have ailments that trouble them, they will buy. Those who don't see a need to buy medicine probably aren't suffering from any such conditions. So never mind.

Keeping at it with this attitude, these problems will be done with. There were such situations in the Buddha's time too.

We want to do it right, but somehow we can't get there yet; our own faculties are not sufficiently mature. Our pāramī (spiritual perfections) are not complete. It's like fruit that's still growing on the tree. You can't force it to be sweet - it's still unripe, it's small and sour, simply because it hasn't finished growing. You can't force it to be bigger, to be sweet, to be ripe - you have to let it ripen according to its nature. As time passes and things change, people may come to spiritual maturity. As time passes the fruit will grow, ripen and sweeten of its own accord. With such an attitude you can be at ease. But if you are impatient and dissatisfied, you keep asking, ''Why isn't this mango sweet yet? Why is it sour?'' It's still sour because it's not ripe. That's the nature of fruit.

The people in the world are like that. It makes me think of the Buddha's teaching about four kinds of lotus. Some are still in the mud, some have grown out of the mud but are under the water, some are at the surface of the water, and some have risen above the water and bloomed. The Buddha was able to give his teachings to so many various beings because he understood their different levels of spiritual development. We should think about this and not feel oppressed by what happens here. Just consider yourselves to be like someone selling medicine. Your responsibility is to advertise it and make it available. If someone gets sick they are likely to come and buy it. Likewise, if people's spiritual faculties mature sufficiently, one day they are likely to develop faith. It's not something we can force them to do. Seeing it in this way, we will be okay.

Living here in this monastery is certainly meaningful. It's not without benefit. All of you, please practice together harmoniously and amicably. When you experience obstacles and suffering, recollect the virtues of the Buddha. What was the knowledge the Buddha realized? What did the Buddha teach? What does the Dhamma point out? How does the Sangha practice? Constantly recollecting the qualities of the Three Jewels brings a lot of benefit.

Whether you are Thais or people from other countries is not important. It's important to maintain harmony and work together. People come from all over to visit this monastery. When folks come to Wat Pah Pong, I urge them to come here, to see the monastery, to practice here. It's a legacy you are creating. It seems that the populace have faith and are gladdened by it. So don't forget yourselves. You should be leading people rather than being led by them. Make your best efforts to practice well and establish yourselves firmly, and good results will come.

Are there any doubts about practice you need to resolve now?

Question: When the mind isn't thinking much, but is in a sort of dark and dull state, is there something we should do to brighten it? Or should we just sit with it?

Ajahn Chah: Is this all the time or when you are sitting in meditation? What exactly is this darkness like? Is it a lack of wisdom?

Question: When I sit to meditate, I don't get drowsy, but my mind feels dark, sort of dense or opaque.

Ajahn Chah: So you would like to make your mind wise, right? Change your posture, and do a lot of walking meditation. That's one thing to do. You can walk for three hours at a time, until you're really tired.

Question: I do walking meditation a couple of hours a day, and I usually have a lot of thinking when I do it. But what really concerns me is this dark state when I sit. Should I just try to be aware of it and let go, or is there some means I should use to counter it?

Ajahn Chah: I think maybe your postures aren't balanced. When you walk, you have a lot of thinking. So you should do a lot of discursive contemplation; then the mind can retreat from thinking. It won't stick there. But never mind. For now, increase the time you spend on walking meditation. Focus on that. Then if the mind is wandering, pull it out and do some contemplation, such as, for example, investigation of the body. Have you ever done that continuously rather than as an occasional reflection? When you experience this dark state, do you suffer over it?

Question: I feel frustrated because of my state of mind. I'm not developing samādhi or wisdom.

Ajahn Chah: When you have this condition of mind the suffering comes about because of not knowing. There is doubt as to why the mind is like this. The important principle in meditation is that whatever occurs, don't be in doubt over it. Doubt only adds to the suffering. If the mind is bright and awake, don't doubt that. It's a condition of mind. If it's dark and dull, don't doubt about that. Just continue to practice diligently without getting caught up in reactions to that state. Taking note and being aware of your state of mind, don't have doubts about it. It is just what it is. When you entertain doubts and start grasping at it and giving it meaning, then it is dark.


As you practice, these states are things you encounter as you progress along. You needn't have doubts about them. Notice them with awareness and keep letting go. How about sleepiness? Is your sitting more sleepy or awake?

(No reply)

Maybe it's hard to recall if you've been sleepy! If this happens meditate with your eyes open. Don't close them. Instead, you can focus your gaze on one point, such as the light of a candle. Don't close your eyes! This is one way to remove the hindrance of drowsiness.

When you're sitting you can close your eyes from time to time and if the mind is clear, without drowsiness, you can then continue to sit with your eyes closed. If it's dull and sleepy, open your eyes and focus on the one point. It's similar to kasina meditation. Doing this, you can make the mind awake and tranquil. The sleepy mind isn't tranquil; it's obscured by hindrance and it's in darkness.

We should talk about sleep also. You can't simply go without sleep. That's the nature of the body. If you're meditating and you get unbearably, utterly sleepy, then let yourself sleep. This is one way to quell the hindrance when it's overwhelming you. Otherwise you practice along, keeping the eyes open if you have this tendency to get drowsy. Close your eyes after a while and check your state of mind. If it's clear, you can practice with eyes closed. Then after some time you take a rest. Some people are always fighting against sleep. They force themselves not to sleep, and the result is that when they sit they are always drifting off to sleep and falling over themselves, sitting in an unaware state.

Question: Can we focus on the tip of the nose?

Ajahn Chah: That's fine. Whatever suits you, whatever you feel comfortable with and helps you fix your mind, focus on that.

It's like this: if we get attached to the ideals and take the guidelines that we are given in the instructions too literally, it can be difficult to understand. When doing a standard meditation such as mindfulness of breathing, first we should make the determination that right now we are going to do this practice, and we are going to make mindfulness of breathing our foundation. We only focus on the breath at three points, as it passes through the nostrils, the chest and the abdomen. When the air enters it first passes the nose, then through the chest, then to the end point of the abdomen. As it leaves the body, the beginning is the abdomen, the middle is the chest, and the end is the nose. We merely note it. This is a way to start controlling the mind, trying awareness to these points at the beginning, middle and end of the inhalations and exhalations.

Before we begin we should first sit and let the mind relax. It's similar to sewing robes on a treadle sewing machine. When we are learning to use the sewing machine, first we just sit in front of the machine to get familiar with it and feel comfortable. Here, we just sit and breathe. Not fixing awareness on anything, we merely take note that we are breathing. We take note of whether the breath is relaxed or not and how long or short it is. Having noticed this, then we begin focusing on the inhalation and exhalation at the three points.

We practice like this until we become skilled in it and it goes smoothly. The next stage is to focus awareness only on the sensation of the breath at the tip of the nose or the upper lip. At this point we aren't concerned with whether the breath is long or short, but only focus on the sensation of entering and exiting.

Different phenomena may contact the senses, or thoughts may arise. This is called initial thought (vitakka). The mind brings up some idea, be it about the nature of compounded phenomena (sankhārā), about the world, or whatever. Once the mind has brought it up, the mind will want to get involved and merge with it. If it's an object that is wholesome then let the mind take it up. If it is something unwholesome, stop it immediately. If it is something wholesome then let the mind contemplate it, and gladness, satisfaction and happiness will come about. The mind will be bright and clear; as the breath goes in and out and as the mind takes up these initial thoughts. Then it becomes discursive thought (vicāra). The mind develops familiarity with the object, exerting itself and merging with it. At this point, there is no sleepiness.

After an appropriate period of this, take your attention back to the breath. Then as you continue on there will be the initial thought and discursive thought, initial thought and discursive thought. If you are contemplating skillfully on an object such as the nature of sankhāra, then the mind will experience deeper tranquility and rapture is born. There is the vitakka and vicāra, and that leads to happiness of mind. At this time there won't be any dullness or drowsiness. The mind won't be dark if we practice like this. It will be gladdened and enraptured.

This rapture will start to diminish and disappear after a while, so you can take up the initial thought again. The mind will become firm and certain with it - undistracted. Then you go on to discursive thought again, the mind becoming one with it. When you are practicing a meditation that suits your temperament and doing it well, then whenever you take up the object, rapture will come about: the hairs of the body stand on end and the mind is enraptured and satiated.

When it's like this there can't be any dullness or drowsiness. You won't have any doubts. Back and forth between initial and discursive thought, initial and discursive thought, over and over again and rapture comes. Then there is sukha (bliss).

This takes place in sitting practice. After sitting for a while, you can get up and do walking meditation. The mind can be the same in the walking. Not sleepy, it has the vitakka and vicāra, vitakka and vicāra, then rapture. There won't be any of the nīvarana4, and the mind will be unstained. Whatever takes place, never mind; you don't need to doubt about any experiences you may have, be they of light, of bliss, or whatever. Don't entertain doubts about these conditions of mind. If the mind is dark, if the mind is illumined, don't fixate on these conditions, don't be attached to them. Let go, discard them. Keep walking, keep noting what is taking place without getting bound or infatuated. Don't suffer over these conditions of mind. Don't have doubts about them. They are just what they are, following the way of mental phenomena. Sometimes the mind will be joyful. Sometimes it will be sorrowful. There can be happiness or suffering; there can be obstruction. Rather than doubting, understand that conditions of mind are like this; whatever manifests is coming about due to causes ripening. At this moment this condition is manifesting; that's what you should recognize. Even if the mind is dark you don't need to be upset over that. If it becomes bright, don't be excessively gladdened by that. Don't have doubts about these conditions of mind, or about your reactions to them.


sumber :
http://www.ajahnchah.org/book/Monastery_Confusion1.php

14
Berikut link to pdf dhammatalks by Ajahn Chah. Wajib dibaca oleh praktisi dharma. Ada banyak petunjuk sederhana cara berlatih didalam pdf tersebut.

Penjelasannya mudah dicerna dan dipraktekkan. Semoga bisa mengambil manfaatnya.

http://www.ajahnchah.org/pdf/the_teachings_of_ajahn_chah_web.pdf

15
Zen is Pureland, Pureland is Zen
 Introduction


 All teachings in the Tripitaka (Buddhist Canon) are tools to induce sentient beings to sever attachment.
To those attached to Emptiness, Buddha Sakyamuni taught Existence to break that grasp.
To those attached to Existence, He taught Emptiness so as to loosen that grasp.
To those grasping at both Emptiness and Existence, He taught "neither Emptiness nor Existence" to break that grasp.
Lastly, to those grasping at "neither Emptiness nor Existence," He taught both Emptiness and Existence to break that attachment. (1)

In short, the purpose is to draw all sentient beings away from attachments. That is the Buddhist teaching of salvation. There is no other way to return to the source [the Mind], though there are many different expedient methods. We Buddhist students and practitioners should not become attached to these methods.

When thoughts arise in our mind discriminating between what method is right and what method is wrong, that is against the purpose of the Buddhas and is a deviation from the Buddhist path.

For example, when Buddha Sakyamuni taught the Dharma of Emptiness, His message was not that it was the opposite of Existence, but rather that it was Truth and Reality. What are Truth and Reality? Let me quote the T'ien T'ai Patriarch Chih I:

 When one dharma is empty, then all dharmas are empty; there is no separate Non-Emptiness. Without Non-Emptiness to contrast with Emptiness, Emptiness itself is unattainable [i.e., does not exist].

 Similarly, when Buddha Sakyamuni taught Existence, this was not the opposite of Emptiness, but was rather to say:

 When one dharma exists, then all dharmas exist; there is no separate Non-Existence. Without Non-Existence to contrast with Existence, Existence itself is unattainable.


 We should understand the true meaning of Emptiness and Existence. Nothing we say about Emptiness or Existence is attainable (i.e., truly valid). And since this is so, why are we still attached to them?

 The Great Master Han-Shan thoroughly understood the goal of the Buddhas. In tune with the minds of the Patriarchs, he spread the Dharma (teaching), grasping at neither Emptiness nor Existence, neither Non-Emptiness nor Non-Existence -- thereby manifesting the Middle Way. Thus, he promoted the cultivation of both Zen and Pure Land, pointing to the non-duality of Emptiness and Existence. That teaching is "Wonderful Enlightenment" (see Glossary).

 When practicing Zen, at the beginning of cultivation the expedient of Emptiness is used. But Zen does not mean Emptiness, nor does it mean Existence.
Pure Land uses the expedient of Existence at the start of practice, but Pure Land does not mean Existence nor does it mean Emptiness.

When Sakyamuni Buddha spoke of Emptiness and Existence, it was to reach human beings of different capacities.
The Dharma itself transcends Emptiness and Existence.

All methods taught by Buddha Sakyamuni are like prescriptions; since people suffer from different diseases, they need many kinds of prescriptions. It does not matter whether the medicine is expensive or cheap. As long as it is effective, it is a good medicine .

 Those who practice Zen or Pure Land should all understand this truth: "all Dharma methods are equal and none is superior or inferior." No one who really understands the deep meaning of the Dharma can have the kind of obstinate prejudice that sees inferiority and superiority between the various Buddhist methods. No one with that kind of obstinate prejudice can gain any real benefit from the Dharma.

 For example, the Zen school teaches meditation on a "hua-t'ou" (wato). Hua-t'ou means "before words," before a single thought rises up in one's mind. (2) What is there before a single thought rises up? It is No Thought. No thought is one's own Pure Mind, one's own Buddha Nature, one's own Original Face. Meditating on a hua-t'ou does not mean repeating it, because the repetition of a hua-t'ou is also a great false thought. Rather, to recognize one's own Original Face is the purpose of a hua-t'ou.

 The Pure Land school teaches Buddha Recitation -- the repetition of Amitabha Buddha's name. However, it does not teach merely to recite by mouth, like a parrot mindlessly squawking out words. Buddha Recitation centered on the mind is real Buddha Recitation. This is because Mind is Buddha, Buddha is Mind. As the sutras state: "The Mind, Buddhas and Sentient Beings are undifferentiated and equal." Outside of Mind, there is no Buddha, outside of Buddha, there is no Mind. Buddha is Mind, Mind is Buddha. If a practitioner recites the Buddha's name in this manner, he will gradually arrive at the stage where there is neither Mind as subject nor Buddha as object. And there is neither a subject reciting nor an object of recitation. This is the stage before the arising of a single thought. This is the hua-t'ou and this is one's own Original Face. If the practitioner can really understand the Dharma as transcending subject and object, what difference is there between Zen and Pure Land?

 Ever since Sakyamuni Buddha held up a flower and the Elder Mahakasyapa smiled, the method of Mind-to-Mind transmission, "without a word and outside the Teachings [of the Buddhist Canon]," has been the traditional way to pass the succession from patriarch to patriarch in the Zen school. (3) Since Bodhidharma came from the West (i.e., India), there has been continuous transmission, up to and including the Sixth Patriarch, Hui-Neng. In later generations, each Zen patriarch relied on his own techniques to train his students and followers. There are many methods, such as using Mind to seal Mind, meditating on a hua-t'ou, exploring one's Original Face, pondering "who is the one reciting the Buddha's name," or meditating on the single word "Wu" ("no") or on any of the other 1700 kung-ans (koans). However, the only purpose of all these teachings is to allow the practitioner to let go of everything, from body to mind, remove all false thought and rid himself of grasping and attachment. A practitioner who simply repeats a hua-t'ou or meditates on a kung-an without understanding its real purpose would be wasting his time and energy.

 The Dharma of Pure Land, taught by Sakyamuni Buddha without being requested, (4) expresses His great compassion. The magnificent realm and adornments of the Western Pure Land are described in detail in the Amitabha Sutra. The Pure Land Dharma is extolled by all Buddhas in the Ten Directions and cultivated by Bodhisattvas and Patriarchs. For example, the great Bodhisattvas Avalokitesvara (Kuan-Yin), Mahasthamaprapta (Ta Shih Chih), Manjusri, and Samantabhadra all advocated and followed Pure Land. In ancient India, the Patriarchs Asvaghosa, Nagarjuna and Vasubandhu, among others, all promoted Pure Land teachings. After the Dharma was transmitted to China, many Zen masters and great patriarchs promoted Pure Land. How perfect and lofty is the wonderful Dharma of Pure Land, taught by Sakyamuni Buddha and extolled by all Buddhas throughout the Ten Directions! We, on the other hand, are merely ordinary beings who have not yet broken away from ignorance and defilement. Yet, surprisingly, there are arrogant individuals who look down on this Pure Land Dharma.

 The Avatamsaka Sutra includes a well-known episode concerning the youth Sudhana who journeyed to visit fifty-three Virtuous Teachers. The first one he met, the monk Cloud of Virtue, introduced him to the very important teaching of Pure Land. From there, Sudhana continued his visits until he had covered all fifty-three Teachers, the last of whom was the great Bodhisattva Samantabhadra. The latter also taught him the wonderful Pure Land Dharma method. Thus, we should understand that Pure Land is crucial in this Dharma-Ending Age. As disciples of the Buddhas, we should begin practicing this Dharma as early as possible.

 In summary, Pure Land is Zen, Zen is Pure Land. In the past, all Buddhas throughout the Ten Directions relied on these two methods to practice and attain Buddhahood. All Buddhas in the present are likewise dependent on them to practice and attain Buddhahood. The same is true for all Buddhas in the future. These two Dharma methods are specially set forth in the Avatamsaka Sutra, the Lotus Sutra and the Surangama Sutra, along with many other sutras that exhort people to study and practice.


 Master Lok To
 New York: May 1993

Pages: [1] 2