Monday, February 3, 2014

Buddhism and Time Travel (sutra)

Dhr. Seven, Amber Dorrian, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly (SPECULATION)
A Buddha figure encased in one of many inexplicable bell-shaped stupas, Borobudur, Indonesia, the largest Buddhist site in world (Wisdom Quarterly)
 
We know of no sutra directly bearing on the subject of time travel, although space travel to the akasha deva loka ("space world of shining ones") is frequently met with in both directions, Sakka to Earth and the Buddha and monastics to many "celestial" worlds [like the Buddha, Maha Moggallana, and other disciples going into near Earth orbit and battling a reptilian or naga named Nandopananda). But there is one oddity we never stop pointing out: 
 
During WW II the Germans developed a time travel "bell" (Die Glocke), which just happens to look exactly like the strange hollow stupas, reliquary mounds or "bells" housing Buddha figures at the largest Buddhist site in the world -- Borobudur, Central Java, Indonesia -- with its massive, pyramid-like platforms. The structure is the size of a mountain in what is now an Islamic.
 
What was the purpose of this mega structure?
So marvelous and inexplicable to the Muslims was this site that they tried to destroy it but could not. Nor could they build anything to rival it; they simply did not have the technology. Instead, they buried it in a massive pile of mud. More than a century later, when the British archeologists were surveying the site, one realized that there was no way there could be a "mountain" there. He had his workers dig, and he is credited with rediscovering a Buddhist temple complex larger than the massive pieces in Bamiyan, Afghanistan (although the unexcavated Mes Aynak site may rival Borobudur, but if Chinese mining interests have their way, it will be destroyed first) and Angkor Wat, Cambodia.

Hitler out for a propaganda photo op
The Germans were given off-planet instructions on how to construct a transporter, which they dubbed "The Bell" (Die Glocke), and tested it. They sent it into the future and retrieved, weather beaten a short time later. What else they did is kept top secret by the OSI, CIA, NASA, and other American organizations which inherited and protected German scientists after the war, such as Robert Oppenheimer and Nazi Wernher von Braun.

Chortans (AlexSaurel/flickr)
It is interesting that from Central Asia (Afghanistan, to India (Ajanta, Ellora, Sanchi) to Sri Lanka to Western China (Yulin, Kizil, Mogao, Dunhuang in Gansu, Bingling), Buddhism is characterized by temples and monastic cave complexes built into solid rock and cliff sides with a technology we do not understand to this day. It can be credited to visitors from space (akasha devas), much in the way that those advanced humanoid beings erected super-antiquated monolithic sites all over the world: Egypt, Stonehenge, Avebury, Petra (Jordan), Adam's Calendar (Africa), Antarctica, Sumer (Babylon), and mounds all across the USA as well as the mystery Egyptian caverns/Buddhist temples of the Grand Canyon.
The Light Being in Space
Wisdom Quarterly translation based on Ven. Thanissaro (Rohitassa Sutta, AN 4.45; SN 2.26) 

Space or akasha deva loka (Wiki)
Once the Blessed One [the Buddha, who was known as the Teacher of Devas and Humans] was staying near Savatthi, in Jeta's Grove, at Anathapindika's monastery. Then the male deva Rohitassa, late at night, with his splendid radiance lighting up the entire grove, went to the Blessed One, bowed, respectfully stood to one side, and asked:

"Venerable sir, is it possible by traveling to know or see or reach the far end of the universe where one does not undergo rebirth, aging, dying, passing away, or reappearing?"
 
"I tell you, friend, that it is not possible by traveling to know or see or reach the far end of the universe where one does not undergo rebirth, aging, dying, passing away, or reappearing."
 
Future Buddha, Ladakh (Sahil Vohra/flickr)
"It is amazing, venerable sir, it is awe-inspiring, how well this has been said by the Blessed One! ...Once I was a seer (Indian rishi, yogi) named Rohitassa, a disciple of [the Guru] Bhoja, a powerful sky-walker. My speed was as fast as that of a strong archer -- well-trained, a practiced hand, a practiced sharp-shooter -- shooting a light arrow across the shadow of a palm tree. [This is a common idiom to illustrate extreme speed in ancient India, the time it would take a shot arrow to pass the shadow of a tree.] My stride stretched as far as the East Sea is from the West [the width of India]. To me, endowed with such speed, such a stride, there arose the desire: 'I will go traveling to the end of the universe.'

"I with a 100 year life, a 100 year span spent 100 years traveling. And apart from the time spent eating, drinking, savoring, urinating, defecating, and sleeping to ward off weariness. But without reaching the end of the universe, I died along the way. So it is amazing, venerable sir, it is awesome, how well this has been said by the Blessed One!"
 
Golden Buddhist altar (BuddhistTrainTour)
[The Buddha replied:] "I tell you, friend, that it is not possible by traveling to know or see or reach the far end of the universe... But at the same time, I tell you that there is no making an end of disappointment and suffering without reaching the end of the universe (world). It is just within this fathom-long body, with its perception and intellect, that I declare that:
  1. there is the universe (world), 
  2. the origination of the universe,
  3. the cessation of the universe, and
  4. the path of practice leading to the cessation of the universe." [This is another wording of the ennobling Four Noble Truths.]
"It is not to be reached by traveling [in space]. AND it is not without reaching the end of the universe that there is release from disappointment and suffering. 
 
"So truly the wise one, an expert with regard to the cosmos, a knower of the end of the cosmos, having fulfilled the holy life, calmed, knowing the cosmos' end, doesn't long for this cosmos or for any other." (See also AN 9.38).
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