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| Gwen and Blake would rather wait than have wedding "be a COVID situation" (today.com) |
Blake Shelton: "Come Back as a Country Boy"
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| I like drama: Gwen. I like both: Gav' |
DISCLAIMER: If any producer or label has an issue with this song or picture, please contact Iconic Sound to have it deleted. This is a new song just out today.
Why do Buddhists say "rebirth" if Hindus say "reincarnation"?
Dhr. Seven, Ashley Wells (ed.), Wisdom Quarterly
Recently, on Ask a Stupid Question Day, we invited any and all questions about life, the universe, and everything. One question we often get is, Why or how does rebrith differ from reincarnation? They're both about coming back. And that's true. But who or what comes back and why differ.Re-incarnation presupposes a previous "incarnation," an "into the flesh" (Latin and Spanish carne). We are not reincarnated. The steady but impersonal (empty) process of rebirth rolls on without an unchanging "soul" or spirit (gandhabba).
There is not someone who incarnates and no one who reincarnated. Why? It is the unique teaching of buddhas that all existence exhibits three characteristics or marks of existence: All "things" are unsatisfactory, impermanent, and impersonal. What is a "thing"? It is any conditionally-arisen phenomenon. There are therefore two categories in the world, the conditioned and the unconditioned. In the condition group are all things. In the unconditioned, there is only one element, nirvana, which is also known as the "unconditioned element," the "deathless," and has other synonyms like bliss, peace, and so on. For everything else we find the three universal marks of existence.
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| Anthropomorphic representation of the Buddha |
It is incapable of fulfilling, of satisfying, of giving one what is sought after. This is how it is with sensual pursuits (kama tanha), as well as those aspirations to become (bhava tanha) or cease to become (vibhava tanha). If there, ultimately speaking, is no being -- then there is no continuation of being nor any annihilation of being. All that comes into existence is ignorance and unsatisfactoriness, which with enlightenment are replaced by wisdom and liberation.
2. What does it mean to say that something is impermanent?
It is hurtling toward destruction, flashing, vibrating, pulsing, never still for two consecutive submoments. Things are composed of multiple factors or conditions and do not exist without them, but they are not those factors or conditions and do not exist without them. Therefore, all things are radically impermanent, going through three phases or submoments of arising, turning, and passing away. These three comprise one moment. Now if a person is this way, too, it is not reasonable to speak of the same person in the future or past. There is only this moment, but even in this moment, the submoments exhibit change and motion -- turning. After each thing passes away it is generally replaced by something quite like but not identical to it. (This is generally spoken of in terms of mind and body or, more correctly, cittas and kalapas, thought-moments and particles-of-perception, a stream of psychological or cognitive moments and particles or constituents and characteristics of materiality). All of these are impermanent.
3. What does it mean to say that something is impersonal?
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In the ultimate sense (not to be confused with the conventional ways in which we generally speak or think), everything is not-self, anatta, egoless, without essence, empty, which is to say, impersonal. We take it as personal (I mean, for goodness sakes, we say "we" or "I" and constantly make reference to "self" and others) and experience it as such. With enlightenment or spiritual-awakening (bodhi), what is seen, what is revealed is that this was not self, not permanent, not ever able to satisfy cravings for sensuality or any fulfillment, becoming, or nonbeing. While this may be impossible to accept. It's mindboggling and would never be arrived at by mere reasoning, it is the key to the first stage of enlightenment, stream entry. See the "Heart Sutra." Without it, there can be no perfection of wisdom, no ultimate liberation, no complete freedom from further suffering.
Hindus and nearly everyone else believes in a self, a soul (atman or atta), an ego, a persisting personality, a person, a being, an unchanging conscious entity, consciousness itself as "self." But while this seems to be the case, it is not ultimately true. What is true in the highest sense is an-atman, an-atta, "not-self," "not-soul," "not-ego." It is not a soul or consciousness or a personality again and again being reincarnated (coming into flesh). It is an impersonal process of becoming, constant change, a dynamic manifestation and working out of karma. Though it does not have a single identity, ignorance identifies it as first this then that and what it may be in the future or had been in the past. But these are all unrealities that constitute this illusion (maya), this existence marked by the characteristics of unsatisfactoriness, impermanence, and emptiness (being impersonal).
This is so heady that it can be no wonder that people prefer country music. We all live conventional lives and only very rarely hear anything about ultimate truths leading to liberation from all further rebirth/suffering.
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