Re: I disrobed and returned to "normal" life
Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2017 1:16 am
Then all of Sri Lanka is wrong, because Sri lankans call all monks Bhante, even when I was a Samanera I was being called Bhante. The Buddha set down before his death that any monastic who is senior to you you call Bhante, not just a very senior monastic.
Life taught me that lesson well before I was even a Buddhist my friend. As for my preceptor, he is fully aware of everything I do online, as I show him and he is also online to see. He has always been a visionary when it comes to technologies ability to share the dhamma, The internet was very important to my own Buddhist spiritual practice, and likewise for many others.Bhikkhu_Jayasara wrote: ↑Sun Dec 03, 2017 6:15 pm life itself has taught me that anytime I thought I had everything figured out, it laughed and flipped everything around on me.
I could have informed you of that because you were the 1st social-media novice I ever saw although I see others like you now, which is disconcerting in respect to your preceptors. I personally find it bizzare to see Westerners showing their novicing & ordaining on social media. It reminds me of the Christian & Islamic videos about people converting to their religions.
are you trying to say that someone who follows the noble eightfold path has already become free of sensuality.. because thats downright silly, the noble eightfold path IS the path leading to the sessaion of dukkha, and craving, the path is FOR that purpose and everyone who starts down that path is not someone who has become dispassionate towards sensuality, and also there are levels of such dispassion, it is a gradual process.Bhikkhu_Jayasara wrote: ↑Sun Dec 03, 2017 6:15 pmRegardless if you are a monastic or a lay person, there is still the noble eightfold path...
Sounds like you are proselytizing that same proselytizing that captured you. The noble eightfold path is something free from sensuality. I would imagine a person would already be dispassionate towards sensuality before ordaining.
my preceptor, Bhante G, has had most of the people he ordained disrobe as well. In a very austere dhamayut thai forest place near me, I watched a person jump from anagarika to full bhikkhu ( when I first met him he was anagarika and I was samanera, then 7 months later he was Bhikkhu and I was still samanera) and then months later I found out he disrobed and left. I would be careful before rushing to judgment.Bhikkhu_Jayasara wrote: ↑Sun Dec 03, 2017 6:15 pm I hold nothing against anyone who decides to disrobe...
Either do I however I have my concerns about those senior monks like Ajahn Brahm & Sujato recruiting unsuitable applicants with their shiny advertising of jhanas & brahma realms. It was ethically disconcerting for me to see Ajahn Jag promoting/advertising the urgency in raising $2.5M to build a new monastery and then hear of him disrobing.