supernormal powers

A discussion on all aspects of Theravāda Buddhism
SarathW
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Re: supernormal powers

Post by SarathW »

He said that he had always had this power, and as a child thought it was the norm. On reaching adulthood he had to discipline himself so as not to take advantage of people by misusing this power, and said that it could be switched on and off.
Yes I can relate to this.
As you said this is an indication of the power you can developed by higher training.
Great scientist who discover things are the result of higher concentration.
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SarathW
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Re: supernormal powers

Post by SarathW »

It is important to not that the term supernormal powers is a wrong term.
They are just normal but for run off the mill person it appears super normal.
The technology we use today may considered as supernormal about two hundred years ago.
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form
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Re: supernormal powers

Post by form »

santa100 wrote:
Aloka wrote:I think its worth noting that regarding levitation 'powers', Bhikkhu Analayo writes in the conclusion of "Levitation in Early Buddhist Discourse'' that a comparative study of reports of levitation and so on, appear to indicate that "a mind-made body" was imagined, rather than being an act of literal levitation with the physical body.
I remembered from a chat with Ven. Bodhi at his Chuang Yen temple in Carmel NY and somebody brought up this same topic and the ven. said there's no evidence in the suttas that support Ven. Analayo's suggestion that only the mind-made body can levitate but not the physical body. The supernormal powers were mentioned frequently throughout the Nikayas and were quite explicit so there's no reason to rule out anything. The thing is once someone's able to attain such power, that means their mind's already been at quite some level of concentration and purity and so they'd tend to not even bothered wih such frivolous activity like showing off their power to others.
The Taoist meditation books have some ancient pics of from one it becomes many. It has some pics with a man made body coming out from the third eye area.

I suspect the physical type of ability are due to mental ability to alter the rupas. That will change density of the form.

Other stuff like telepathy could involved tuning in to the mental frequency of another. This sometime happened on a smaller scale when a psychologist is having very close communication with a patient.
SarathW
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Re: supernormal powers

Post by SarathW »

Bikkhu Bodhi explain this with his usual infectious laugh. (Counter 29.00)


https://youtu.be/DRfFYQZSzH0?t=1750
Last edited by SarathW on Sun Mar 05, 2017 8:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: supernormal powers

Post by DNS »

Bhikkhu Pesala wrote: (video of monk apparently levitating)
Not saying if that was true or not, but it is a fairly easy trick to do with the right equipment. All you need is to tell the camera crew to stay back so that your concentration can be strong (which the monk did) and then you need some curtains or fence or flexible barrier behind you (which he also has).

Here is how it is done (if it is illusion / magic):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxi0cREROew
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Re: supernormal powers

Post by Bhikkhu Pesala »

David N. Snyder wrote:
Bhikkhu Pesala wrote: (video of monk apparently levitating)
Not saying if that was true or not, but it is a fairly easy trick to do with the right equipment.
I didn't say it was true or not either, because it's hard to prove or disprove, and not conducive to liberation.

The Buddha only praised one kind of miracle and made a Vinaya rule to proscribe the exhibiting of mystic powers.
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Re: supernormal powers

Post by Bhikkhu Pesala »

SarathW wrote:Bikkhu Bodhi explain this with his usual infectious laugh. (Counter 29.00)
:idea: When sharing videos, one can copy the URL including the starting time like this:

Code: Select all

https://youtu.be/DRfFYQZSzH0?t=29m28s
It makes it a lot easier for anyone to view the relevant point in the Video without the trouble of scrolling or loading the entire video.
Sharing Videos.png
Sharing Videos.png (30.34 KiB) Viewed 3259 times
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Thisperson
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Re: supernormal powers

Post by Thisperson »

Story of Ajahn Chah and supernormal ability (told by Ajahn Nyanadhammo).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIpT7QnGBQw
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Re: supernormal powers

Post by Dhammanando »

SarathW wrote:It is important to not that the term supernormal powers is a wrong term.
They are just normal but for run off the mill person it appears super normal.
In a Buddhist context the wrong term would be "supernatural", for iddhis, abhiññās and vijjās are conceived as the natural products of certain kinds of mind-development, as opposed to, say, divine gifts.

As for "supernormal", this would be the right term to use in a Buddhist context, for the normal average person does not have these cognitive capacities. Hence the description of them as uttarimanussadhammā, "dhammas exceeding the [merely] human".

See the discussion in chapter IX of Jayatilleke’s Early Buddhist Theory of Knowledge.
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SarathW
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Re: supernormal powers

Post by SarathW »

Dhammanando wrote:
SarathW wrote:It is important to not that the term supernormal powers is a wrong term.
They are just normal but for run off the mill person it appears super normal.
In a Buddhist context the wrong term would be "supernatural", for iddhis, abhiññās and vijjās are conceived as the natural products of certain kinds of mind-development, as opposed to, say, divine gifts.

As for "supernormal", this would be the right term to use in a Buddhist context, for the normal average person does not have these cognitive capacities. Hence the description of them as uttarimanussadhammā, "dhammas exceeding the [merely] human".

See the discussion in chapter IX of Jayatilleke’s Early Buddhist Theory of Knowledge.
Yes, thanks for the correction.
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Re: supernormal powers

Post by form »

SarathW wrote:I remember is I had the ability to read others mind when I was about 11 years old.
Once I read someone's mind and my mother warn me not to do so.
In another occasion I was in a gambling place with my uncle and I was predicting how the dice going to fall and my uncle warn me not do so.
He said it was a dangerous place. He was latter killed by stabbing in a gambling place.
Have u ever wonder why u lose that ability?
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Re: supernormal powers

Post by No_Mind »

form wrote:
SarathW wrote:Yes.
When you can read your own mind you have super normal powers. :D
In the more modern times, I have read only about two people with such abilities. Zen monk xu yun and Burmese Dipama.
Hate to nitpick but Dipa Ma was a Bengali, Indian not Burmese (Myanmarese)

I wrote somewhere before .. copy pasting it here,

Dipa Ma, was born in 1911 in Chittagong, Bangladesh (at that time a part of India). Her actual name was Nani Bala Barua. Dipa Ma is actually Dipar Ma, Bengali for Dipa's Mother (Ma is Bengali for mother and Dipar Ma was mispronounced by her American disciples as Dipa Ma). After marriage she moved to Rangoon (modern Yangon) in Burma.

She went through a period of great loss and bereavement .. death of two of her three children and husband between 1935 - 57. This resulted in depression and chronic illness. Someone suggested she begin to meditate and she attended the school where Venerable Mahasi Sayadaw (a great Buddhist meditation master) taught. She had rare ability at meditation. In the first or second session itself she went into such deep state that she did not notice a dog had bitten her!!

In early 1960s, Anagarika Munindra, another great meditation teacher and student of Mahasi Sayadaw, became her guide. In 1967, she moved to Calcutta where she began to informally teach meditation. Her reputation as a master of eight jhanas (and considerable siddhi powers of walking through walls, bilocation etc) reached US. Her American students included Sylvia Boorstein, Joseph Goldstein, Jack Kornfield, Jack Engler, Michelle Levey, Sharon Salzberg (veritable who's who of American Vipassana movement).

Dipa Ma never became a full time ascetic. She insisted that we should be able to reach jhana while doing what we are doing .. but it is clear that she had rare inborn ability to reach deeper states and she had a great teacher.

One story tells that she insisted her maid Malati would be able to reach jhanas while nursing her newborn .. that any act can be turned into an act of mindfulness and lead to higher states.

For greater details read

article on Dipa Ma by Amy Schmidt

article on Dipa Ma by Sharon Salzberg

Dipa Ma wikipedia

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Re: supernormal powers

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form wrote:This regularly appears in the nikaya. Has anyone seen any in real life?
There are 8 siddhis (iddhi in Pali)

8 Siddhis (Supernatural powers) are:

Aṇimā: Ability to reduce one's size
Mahima: Ability to increase one's size
Garima: Ability to increase one's weight infinitely
Laghima: Ability to become lighter than the lightest
Prāpti: Ability to Obtain anything
Prākāmya: Ability to acquire anything desired
Iṣiṭva: Lordship over creation
Vaśitva: Having control over things

Some Buddhist meditators must attain them since some Hindu meditators claim they do. But it is strictly not for public viewing. I doubt they can become the Ant-Man or Incredible Hulk though.

Most stories are about astral projection and remote viewing of some type.

Only and only if you are close to the guru .. one day by accident you may see his power or he may show something to you (from many miles away or the past or the future) .. what your wife is doing in Fresno while you are with your guru in Himachal Pradesh.

I try not to believe in supernatural powers but there are so many recorded accounts .. I am little confused.

On the other hand very possible they are extremely adept at hypnotism and can make a person believe they saw the guru doing something supernatural like levitating (easier to hypnotise a person to believe you are levitating than levitating).

One scene I remember very well was from BBC (or Discovery) a couple of years back. A Britisher was making a documentary about Rishikesh the so called "yoga capital if the world" (a town in upper reaches of Ganges which is home to many gurukuls .. ashrams is the less grand word ..) .. he was filming a famous guru and the guru invited him into a room .. a while later he came out and all he could say was "I can see, I can see." probably the guru sent him into a jhana by touching his chakras?

Yet to understand what it means (if anything) but shot in broad daylight by a foreign crew in 720p .. cannot entirely dismiss it either.

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Re: supernormal powers

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No_Mind wrote:
8 Siddhis (Supernatural powers) are:

Aṇimā: Ability to reduce one's size
Mahima: Ability to increase one's size
Garima: Ability to increase one's weight infinitely
Laghima: Ability to become lighter than the lightest
Prāpti: Ability to Obtain anything
Prākāmya: Ability to acquire anything desired
Iṣiṭva: Lordship over creation
Vaśitva: Having control over things

Some Buddhist meditators must attain them since some Hindu meditators claim they do.
Some might attain them, but we can't say they must do on the basis you have given here. The Hindu claims might be false; and they might moreover be doing different things. One person's or group's attainment does not guarantee that of another.
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Re: supernormal powers

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Sam Vara wrote: Some might attain them, but we can't say they must do on the basis you have given here. The Hindu claims might be false; and they might moreover be doing different things. One person's or group's attainment does not guarantee that of another.
I said as much .. that Hindu claims might be false. I believe I expressed sufficient scepticism.

As far as I have seen Hindu and Buddhist meditation differs in same way as a Russian and American fighter differs .. different machines but same rules of aerodynamics apply.

I was surprised to find accounts of hesychasm online (contemplative prayer practice of Eastern Orthodox Church) that are almost same as some of the meditation techniques used by Buddhist teachers and err Hindu teachers. If one deleted certain words and read the article it would seem to be recounting of experience at a Buddhist retreat.

The list of rddhi powers in Buddhism are on the whole same as far as I see with siddhi in Hinduism (but then the super normal powers in comics are also the same .. so I guess by super normal powers people all over the world wish for the same capabilities)

rddhi

siddhi

:namaste:

Edit Add - Ah I see now .. must and might .. wrong use of modal verbs. Thank you for pointing out the error :bow:
"The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.”― Albert Camus
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