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New UserBuddhism and reincarnation (self.Buddhism)

MaltEnge が 投稿

So i've been reading about buddhism for the past months and i've been wondering: "How can buddhists belive in reincarnation, when buddhism isn't a belief system?". It makes no sense to me. Is it just something you know as a buddhist or is there some other kind of meaning behind it? Or does it mean something else perhaps?

I've heard that buddhism is about accepting reality as it is. If thats true, then why would you believe in something you don't know is true?

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[–]Rks1157Theravāda / Saddhānusāri 8ポイント9ポイント  (0子コメント)

You already asked this question.

Buddhism is not about accepting reality as it is. It's about investigating reality for ourselves.

What the Buddha Taught is a short (<200 pages) book that will help you to understand what Buddhism is and isn't.

[–]reptilee 6ポイント7ポイント  (1子コメント)

The Buddha shows the causes and end of suffering only. Anything else is just a bonus. Re-birth is something you can either:

  1. Take his word for (because after-all, he was right about many other things that can be validated through your own experience).

  2. Ignore it, but continue to reap the other benefits of Buddhism & maybe eventually one day realize rebirth yourself.

A Sutta about skeptical doubt:

It's just as if a man were wounded with an arrow thickly smeared with poison. His friends & companions, kinsmen & relatives would provide him with a surgeon, and the man would say, 'I won't have this arrow removed until I know whether the man who wounded me was a noble warrior, a priest, a merchant, or a worker.' He would say, 'I won't have this arrow removed until I know the given name & clan name of the man who wounded me... until I know whether he was tall, medium, or short... until I know whether he was dark, ruddy-brown, or golden-colored... until I know his home village, town, or city... until I know whether the bow with which I was wounded was a long bow or a crossbow... until I know whether the bowstring with which I was wounded was fiber, bamboo threads, sinew, hemp, or bark... until I know whether the shaft with which I was wounded was wild or cultivated... until I know whether the feathers of the shaft with which I was wounded were those of a vulture, a stork, a hawk, a peacock, or another bird... until I know whether the shaft with which I was wounded was bound with the sinew of an ox, a water buffalo, a langur, or a monkey.' He would say, 'I won't have this arrow removed until I know whether the shaft with which I was wounded was that of a common arrow, a curved arrow, a barbed, a calf-toothed, or an oleander arrow.' The man would die and those things would still remain unknown to him.

TLDR: it doesn't matter if rebirth is real or not. Buddha is giving you a methodological antidote to suffering & that's what matters.

[–]Mayan_Fist 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

I don't know...Although the Buddha didn't really push for his followers to believe in rebirth, I think that it should at least be considered within the realm of possibility in order to provide a moral framework for his teachings.

[–]Dhammakayaram 3ポイント4ポイント  (2子コメント)

I accept the Buddha teaching about rebirth. So far no scientist has been able to persuade me that I am wrong or that the Buddha is wrong.

No, Buddhism doesn't accept reality as it is. This would be the theory of naïve realism which is only a theory -- not absolute truth.

[–]mguzmann 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

No, Buddhism doesn't accept reality as it is. This would be the theory of naïve realism which is only a theory -- not absolute truth.

What?

[–]mkpeacebkindbgentlefive khandas gone wild 5ポイント6ポイント  (1子コメント)

According to Buddhism rebirth is a verifiable fact. You're supposed to be able to remember your past lives after deep enough meditation.

[–]entropyvortexNyingma :) 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

"When the mind was thus concentrated, purified, bright, unblemished, rid of defilement, pliant, malleable, steady, & attained to imperturbability, I directed it to the knowledge of recollecting my past lives. I recollected my manifold past lives, i.e., one birth, two... five, ten... fifty, a hundred, a thousand, a hundred thousand, many eons of cosmic contraction, many eons of cosmic expansion, many eons of cosmic contraction & expansion: 'There I had such a name, belonged to such a clan, had such an appearance. Such was my food, such my experience of pleasure & pain, such the end of my life. Passing away from that state, I re-arose there. There too I had such a name, belonged to such a clan, had such an appearance. Such was my food, such my experience of pleasure & pain, such the end of my life. Passing away from that state, I re-arose here.' Thus I remembered my manifold past lives in their modes & details.

[–]The_Dead_See 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

Buddhism is a belief system.

[–]national_sanskritpure land 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

Buddhism is a belief system . It is a religion. Belief system we can test by practicing Buddhism and becoming enlightened. Or you can take Buddha's word on it. You can be sceptical and practice Buddhism but faith makes it much easier and is highly recommended.

[–]ordinarysuperlame 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

There's no self to reincarnate. Buddhists do not believe in reincarnation, only rebirth.

[–]entropyvortexNyingma :) 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Reincarnation is rebirth in "meat".

[–]greenquartzsecular 1ポイント2ポイント  (4子コメント)

I am a secular Buddhist, and I do not believe in reincarnation or any type of metaphysical karma.

To me, Buddhism isn't as much a belief system as it is a mode of spirituality.

[–]Marvinkmooneyoz 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

oR you could say that Buddhist spirituality has to do with the infinite modes

[–]greenquartzsecular 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Good point. I'll clarify what I meant.

To me, there are many modes of spirituality, like modern Paganism and the New Age. Buddhism is my personal mode.

[–]tykatozen 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

As a secular buddhist myself, I see reincarnation as true. But not in the way that most people want it to be, where you are reborn as e.g. an animal. This thought is just made to give you emotional stability. But as you pass down your DNA to your children, part of you (the information stored in your DNA) lives on. Then there are the atoms of your body when you decease. Those live on aswell.

[–]greenquartzsecular 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

That's a very uplifting thought.

[–]rathskellarunsure 2ポイント3ポイント  (8子コメント)

Everything in nature is cyclical. I shouldn't have to post any proof or evidence of this fact (I will if you demand it). It only makes sense that reincarnation is a way of "recycling" the energy.

This doesn't take into account the mountains of evidence to people having memories of a previous life. My own included. I only have one strong and very vivid memory of a "past life" from my childhood. When you're a child memories can be often confused with imagination (how can you scientifically confirm it is one or the other?) but I somehow "knew" I was alive in the late 1800s as a cowboy. It is my only "memory," but I was there. It's hard to describe if you've never had the experience. But there is much stronger evidence out there than my anecdotal experience.

[–]TibetanBookOfNappingnonsectarian 1ポイント2ポイント  (7子コメント)

Everything in nature is cyclical. I shouldn't have to post any proof or evidence of this fact (I will if you demand it). It only makes sense that reincarnation is a way of "recycling" the energy...there is much stronger evidence out there than my anecdotal experience.

Not OP, but I want to press the "I demand it button" because I'm curious to see what you'll come up with (that is, only if you feel like playing along--if not, don't worry about it).

Be forewarned though: I've got a physics degree and I'm not afraid to use it! ;)

[–]rathskellarunsure 1ポイント2ポイント  (6子コメント)

Sure thing. I'll start out by saying the definition of cyclical is "occurring in cycles; recurrent." So with that;

1) arguing the basic fibonnaci spiral which is recurrent in many physical life forms.

2) the spherical nature of objects...namely planets and stars, also bubbles holding their shape because it maintains the most efficiency.

3) the occurrence of climate, seasons and tidal effects on earth.

4) the orbit of planets around a celestial object.

5 ) the cycle of trees losing their leaves every season. It is energy efficient for trees to lose their leaves in the winter when having to save as much energy as possible and regrowing their leaves (common not only to trees but other plants as well) during the months they harvest energy. (Do you mourn the leaf fallen off a tree?)

6) the spiral shape of the milky way galaxy, hurricanes, tornadoes, dust devils, fire tornadoes, etc.

7) the rotation of bodies in space nearly everything, (if not all) celestial objects are spinning creating a revolution effect. This revolution is cyclical.

8) the supposed shape of our universe. Google 'shape of our universe' and you get a lot of images of a donut like shape which collapses in on itself and cycles back out.

I have plenty more examples if I put my mind to more work but I think that should suffice for now?

[–]TibetanBookOfNappingnonsectarian 0ポイント1ポイント  (5子コメント)

I see--it appears we were thinking about different things. I appreciate the effort you put into your post though!

[–]rathskellarunsure 0ポイント1ポイント  (4子コメント)

If you explain what you had been expecting I can try to conjure up some evidence to that.

A physics related cycle

[–]TibetanBookOfNappingnonsectarian 1ポイント2ポイント  (3子コメント)

That's okay. The reason I asked the question in the first place is that I thought you were taking about the theory of a "cyclical universe," something that has been ruled out by current evidence. This is a fairly recent discovery, and the article you sent refers to a book from 2006--at that point the "fate of the universe" question was still largely unresolved and a "Big Crunch" was still a viable theory.

Most cosmologists today recognize that this idea is probably not true, because according to our current understanding, the gravitational force of existing bodies is not strong enough to overcome the expansion of space: as a result, it appears that the future of our universe is something called "The Big Freeze," in which everything just sort of...stops. You may find this wiki entry interesting:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_of_an_expanding_universe

[–]rathskellarunsure 0ポイント1ポイント  (2子コメント)

Fair enough, I understand that. Thanks for pointing it out. I do however, have to argue that if everything gets so far away from itself and eventually all electrons get so far away from each other that nothing can exist, at what point does it collapse back in on itself, perhaps starting anew? Or does it stay that way for infinity? There's obviously no way to truly know...yet. But seeing the other cyclical patterns in nature, you can formulate that it will eventually begin again. Especially if the net energy of the universe is 0. Which...is also a circle haha.

[–]TibetanBookOfNappingnonsectarian 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

Well, according to our current evidence, our universe doesn't collapse back in on itself. This idea may be incorrect, but probably it isn't. It seems that most suggestions that it is incorrect is not supported by anything more than the human tendency to desire something other than impermanence, which Buddhism--and physics--tells us is a fundamental truth.

It is an uncomfortable truth, yes--but a truth nonetheless.

[–]rathskellarunsure 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Infinity can't end. Impermanence is a separate notion from eternity

[–]TibetanBookOfNappingnonsectarian 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Buddhism is not a traditional "belief system" in the way that (most) other religions are, but at the same time is it not not a belief system either. It's still a religion, there are still some aspects that we're asked to take on faith, at least at first.

For example, we're asked to take on faith that Buddhism works at all! Most people can accept the First and Second Truths fairly easily, be but the Third and Fourth Truths are not statements that can be verified easily, i.e. "that it is possible to actually end suffering, and here's how."

The point is that we should take ideas like the Four Truths and kamma and reincarnation as hypotheses and investigate them for ourselves. If you don't know that something is true, you can't believe in it. Belief isn't a choice. So don't worry about it.

Therefore, Ananda, be islands unto yourselves, refuges unto yourselves, seeking no external refuge; with the Dhamma as your island, the Dhamma as your refuge, seeking no other refuge...those bhikkhus of mine, Ananda, who now or after I am gone, abide as an island unto themselves, as a refuge unto themselves, seeking no other refuge; having the Dhamma as their island and refuge, seeking no other refuge: it is they who will become the highest, if they have the desire to learn.

[–]maxiaofeng 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

https://youtu.be/zS73WxpBd5k

[–]Xolanitibetan 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

What's not often enough spoken about is the importance of direct spiritual experience. Many people do have memories of past lives. Many people learn to remember them after deep meditation. And the only answer so-called skeptical minds like Dawkins can reply with is to merely dismiss it as hallucination. Part of perceiving reality as-is, in Buddhism, is learning one's own capacity for that kind of experience.

[–]bunker_manShijimist [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

Buddhism only "isn't a belief system" because its a practice. Part of the practice is meant to include realizing / discovering and realizing that reincarnation is true. So in other words it is more or less a a belief system. Its only "not" inasmuch as that it defines itself slightly differently.

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