How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Exploring Theravāda's connections to other paths - what can we learn from other traditions, religions and philosophies?
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Ben
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by Ben »

Nicely said, Nathan.
BTW, what is yo mama?

Ben
“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.”
- Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:
in mountain clefts and chasms,
loud gush the streamlets,
but great rivers flow silently.
- Sutta Nipata 3.725

Compassionate Hands Foundation (Buddhist aid in Myanmar) • Buddhist Global ReliefUNHCR

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nathan
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by nathan »

Ben wrote:Nicely said, Nathan.
BTW, what is yo mama?

Ben
About 71. She just had her birthday last week. Sent me some cookies in the mail. Then the folks 50somethingeth anniversary is coming up at the end of the month. Thanks for asking.

metta Ben
:anjali:
But whoever walking, standing, sitting, or lying down overcomes thought, delighting in the stilling of thought: he's capable, a monk like this, of touching superlative self-awakening. § 110. {Iti 4.11; Iti 115}
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zerotime
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by zerotime »

Santikaro wrote:
Self-censure as well as active censorship are other reasons for certain perspectives to not be recorded
dear Santikaro, maybe one day if you feel it's a right time, you can explain if there is some relation of these comments with the missed Chit-wang teaching. In the Jackson book there are comments of some Thai society members explaining his fears of a society in where lay people can be awakened to become more good and wise. I note the Jackson book is quite poor in other topics (like the chinese Chan explanation) then I don't know the exactitude of these news in explaining the under development of Chit-wang teaching. If you feel it's a right time, I insist.

best,
nathan
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by nathan »

Santikaro wrote:Living without a liver.
That must be tough, are you on a transplant list? :smile:
Seriously though, if, as I have, I've happened to have found the texts, literally true, in living experience, entirely; except of course those things presented as explicitly metaphorical. Do you suppose I should get myself treated for fundamentalism or schizophrenia because I'm commonly told to do both, usually by the same people. Usually the same people who have a fundamental religious devotion to the cult of the PhD.

Those options seem counterproductive as, also in living experience, these lead to much greater suffering for myself and for others whereas I do find the teachings are literally and precisely the medicine I actually need in all regards. Useful for such far flung things as dealing effectively with the kamma that arises now which was created in past lives. Dealing effectively with heavenly beings and ghosts in my neighborhood. Living in peace with all earthly beings, both alone in the wilderness with fearsome wild beasts and when walking amongst the hypnotized masses of humanity and all of their deadly machinery.

Would it be best to keep those facts to myself and simply 'play along with everyone'. Most particularly with those who delusively think that the extensive discourses by the Buddha regarding such things as other realms, an untraceable long prior existence in bondage to being and becoming or the ongoing and insurmountable difficulties in overcoming the downward momentum of a wholly degenerate age and of the horrors that yet await humanity in times to come are 'simply hindu fairy tales' that corrupt monastics stuffed into the cannon when no one was looking. Just because 'you have to play along to get along?' Because, that far out stuff matches up with the evening news very well actually. Does the daily underscoring of these facts in direct experience make me a 'fundie'? Should I feel inferior to someone because now they have come up with yet another label and feel at liberty to apply it to whoever they like? Is this the sort of thing I should be doing for the benefit of other people? Would that help someone, maybe help someone's book sales? To falsely present myself as completely out of touch with the visceral reality of the present moment so that it could fit this idealized notion of a religious wing nut to suit a handful of people who want to 'update the teachings' to match up with contemporary delusions of grandeur on the part of people who are our modern day 'best guessers'? I'm just curious to know where this whole line of reasoning is headed. Maybe I should make myself scarce so that I don't 'get in the way of progress'.
Last edited by nathan on Mon Jul 20, 2009 2:40 am, edited 1 time in total.
But whoever walking, standing, sitting, or lying down overcomes thought, delighting in the stilling of thought: he's capable, a monk like this, of touching superlative self-awakening. § 110. {Iti 4.11; Iti 115}
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tiltbillings
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by tiltbillings »

Santikaro wrote:Walking without a walker.
Breathing without a breather.
Living without a liver.
Not unlike Buddhaghosa in his discussion of paticcasamuppada when he stated:

"There is no doer of a deed
Or one who reaps the deed's result;
Phenomena alone flow on---
No other view than this is right." - Visuddhimagga XIX.20

And earlier in that text he stated:

"There is suffering, but none who suffers;
Doing exists although there is no doer;
Extinction is but no extinguished person;
Although there is a path, there is no goer” - XVI 90

One also needs to keep in mind that Buddhaghosa states that dhammas/dharmas themselves (the supposed ultimate categories) are the products of conditions.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
nathan
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by nathan »

tiltbillings wrote:One also needs to keep in mind that Buddhaghosa states that dhammas/dharmas themselves (the supposed ultimate categories) are the products of conditions.
A considered and considerate friend in the Dharma has eloquently expressed this as 'The Law of Receding Horizons". Which seems apt.
:anjali:
But whoever walking, standing, sitting, or lying down overcomes thought, delighting in the stilling of thought: he's capable, a monk like this, of touching superlative self-awakening. § 110. {Iti 4.11; Iti 115}
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Santikaro
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by Santikaro »

zerotime wrote:Santikaro wrote:
Self-censure as well as active censorship are other reasons for certain perspectives to not be recorded
dear Santikaro, maybe one day if you feel it's a right time, you can explain if there is some relation of these comments with the missed Chit-wang teaching. In the Jackson book there are comments of some Thai society members explaining his fears of a society in where lay people can be awakened to become more good and wise. I note the Jackson book is quite poor in other topics (like the chinese Chan explanation) then I don't know the exactitude of these news in explaining the under development of Chit-wang teaching. If you feel it's a right time, I insist.

best,
Apologies. I am not clear what you want explained.
Nothing is worth clinging to as me or mine.
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zerotime
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by zerotime »

Santikaro wrote:Apologies. I am not clear what you want explained.
1- if that self-censure included Chit-wang
2- if comments of the Jackson's book in this topic are exact
3- to know what is the reason for the actual under-development of Chit-wang. Today it is not explained in Suan Mokkh retreats, at least according my experience. However, in books we read how Buddhadasa seem to have seen in Chit-wang a teaching specially useful for the lay people.

best,
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Ngawang Drolma.
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by Ngawang Drolma. »

Nathan,

Your input is a pleasure. And I can relate.

Thanks muchly,
Drolma

:anjali:
nathan
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by nathan »

Ngawang Drolma wrote:Nathan,

Your input is a pleasure. And I can relate.

Thanks muchly,
Drolma

:anjali:
Thank you Drolma. It is a comfort to know that. I think I have begun to see a growing body of evidence that we are in fact many, largely resting in silent acknowledgment of the truth. It's likely simply that, overall we sort probably don't 'get out much' and associate with the like minded.

Mudita
:anjali:
metta & upekkha
nathan
But whoever walking, standing, sitting, or lying down overcomes thought, delighting in the stilling of thought: he's capable, a monk like this, of touching superlative self-awakening. § 110. {Iti 4.11; Iti 115}
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Ngawang Drolma.
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by Ngawang Drolma. »

Nathan,

That's why I bother sifting through the tedium, to find a post like what you wrote.
It makes me think I'm not as tragically alone on the path as it would seem.

Maybe I'm a fundie schizophrenic. Or maybe I've found a form of dharma that's legit and I'm just doing the work.
Either way I have to face tomorrow and I'm not going to change the way I do it.

With warm regards and mundita,
Drolma

:anjali:
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by jcsuperstar »

:offtopic: man this thing has gone waaay off topic, maybe some emoticon will get us back on track... :focus:
:heart: :group: :heart:
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Ngawang Drolma.
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by Ngawang Drolma. »

Sorry for my part in being off topic. I'm all for scholarship, it's really cool. Especially when people do it for altruistic reasons.
But sometimes it's nice to find a yummy post that speaks to the reality of the path. With the traditional teachings in mind.
Seeing the teachings unfold in the world around us, and our own inner world.

So, how are the views of Buddhadasa Bikkhu regarded?
I think since we have a living, breathing, and posting student of his among us, we ought to be picking his brain.
With respect.

Kindly,
Drolma
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Ben
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by Ben »

Well said, Drolma! Well said!
Metta

Ben
“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.”
- Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:
in mountain clefts and chasms,
loud gush the streamlets,
but great rivers flow silently.
- Sutta Nipata 3.725

Compassionate Hands Foundation (Buddhist aid in Myanmar) • Buddhist Global ReliefUNHCR

e: [email protected]..
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Ngawang Drolma.
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Re: How are the views of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu regarded?

Post by Ngawang Drolma. »

Ben wrote:Well said, Drolma! Well said!
Metta

Ben
:anjali:
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