Buddhism flashcards world rel

Grindon - General origins 1

Origins → India (Ganges Valley), from Siddhartha Gautama/Historical Buddha/Shakyamuni (Shak - clan name, muni - sage) and Sramana movement (6-4th BCE)

“Buddhism” → (Western word from western scholarship, 19th C.) Goal to overcome suffering and cycle of rebirth (samsara) → Thru meditation, virtues, moral precepts/rules

• Transcending in individual self but differing in paths

• Not always mutual recognition of others practicing the same religion, vast in geography, texts, practices

-Comes out of Indian worldview

Grindon - 3 Jewels

“Taking refuge” (seeking protecting from suffering of life, death, rebirth) in “3 Jewels”:

1. Buddha (enlightened one, goal to wake up and become a buddha)

2. Dharma/Dhamma (from Hinduism; but def different → Buddhist Dharma as teachings of the Buddha)

• Pali Canon (Languages: Pali, Sanskrit, Chinese, Tibetan, Japanese)

3. Sangha (Community of Buddhist practitioners, monks; like Xian “church”)

Grindon medical analogy (3 jewels)

Buddha - Doctor

Dharma - Medicine prescribed by doctor

Sangha - Nurse

Grindon - Jakata Tales

Jakata tales → Folklore of past lives of Buddha, on the path to enlightenment (Moral teachings and fun stories

Bodhisattva → Buddha to be, on path → Siddhartha as final lifetime, karma all used up (many others before him who have achieved enlightenment)

Grindon - Budai

Budai/Hotei (Chinese) → In Chinese folklore, monk living in Japan; wears a sack of goods like santa!

• Budai as a bodhisattva (one lifetime of) → Maitreya, next Buddha, in future

Not related to Historical Buddha, but folklore incorporated within Hinduism

Grindon - Siddhartha Gautama Birth

Miraculous Birth → Oral tradition hundreds of years after his life

-Indian ascetic and teacher, around 500 BCE

-Comes out of mother’s side (c-section), mother dreamt of white elephant jumping inside of her

-Destined to either be world-renouncer or universal-king → Life of luxury and shelter (Not allowed to be outside of palace until 24)

Grindon - Gautama’s 4 Passing Sights

Four Passing Sights, chariot driver explaining human suffering to Siddhartha

-Seeing old man (1), sick person (2), corpse (3); learning about death

-Seeing monk/renouncer (4) → “I’ll have what he’s having!”

“A fetter (chain) has arisen” → Family holding him back from spiritual freedom; leaving them for the sake of the whole world

• Rahula (son) = “fetter”

Grindon - The Great Going Forth

-Gautama (at 24) leaving family at night in secret, leaping over locked gate for freedom

-Seen as v emotional

Grindon - Severe Asceticism

-Spending 6 years studying with spiritual masters, but unsatisfied

-Joining 5 other Sramana movement renouncers in dehydration, starvation → Severe bodily disciplines

Grindon - Middle Way, Siddhartha’s name origins

“Siddhartha” (from archery) → “One who hits the mark”

Addiction to extremes (indulgences of sense-pleasures, but also indulgences to self-mortification)

Meditating under Bodhi tree to solve suffering

Grindon - Mara’s Attacks (all failed!)

If Siddhartha suceeds, powers of evil/death/suffering doomed

Mara - Personification of evil; demon tempter of death and desire

1. Attacking with storms (fire/hail/wind), flinging hot coals and mud to Siddhartha

• Siddhartha turning storms into flower petals, remaining serene and compassionate

2. Luring Siddhartha with ugly (disguised as beautiful women) daughters - Lust, Thirst, Discontent

• Siddhartha notices but lets them pass

3. Accuses Buddha’s spot under Bodhi tree as his (Mara’s)

• Siddhartha touches earth, calling upon spirit to justify his spot (confirmed thru earthquake) - “Calling the earth to witness”

  • Previous life as Thai prince, earth rewarding him from before

Grindon - Awakening

Siddhartha becoming “Buddha” (an awakened one) in 3 stages/watches, suffering extinguished

“Sees” and '“touches” nirvana

1. Vision of all his past lives, gains insight into deep personal identity shaped by all lives/karmas (sees way it works)

2. Gains insight into mechanism of karma → Understanding universal law of cause and effect (pple succeeding / failing based on actions)

3. Sees one instantaneous present, his atman / self as mere projection; atman proved to be fiction → (only the) chain of causation

Neither him nor world has essence → WAKES UP!!!!; Nature of self = There isn’t one (relief of suffering)

Very radical view, very different from Hinduism

Grindon - Tumbleweed

No self under chain of causation → All desires, fears, gone

Clinging to self/soul as samsara

Self as a tumbleweed → Bundle, no essence

• Investigating the self, but finding out there is no such thing as a tumbleweed (bc a tumbleweed is just a collection of things) (soul/self)

Grindon - Interconnected Multiplicity

Buddhism as not monistic, not monotheistic but as interconnected multiplicity

Interconnected multiplicity - Various phenomena of all different tumbleweeds (bundles, such as the bhavachakra, gods etc) (transcendent reality/state)

Grindon - Gautama’s Enlightenment → Teaching

-Hindu god Brahma asks Buddha to teach → Everybody, including gods, need Gautama’s wisdom

-Buddha reluctant, initially refuses → Out of compassion, he agrees

Grindon - The Sermon at the Deer Park: Turning the Wheel of Dharma

Bhava-cakra → Wheel of samsara, wheel of becoming; cyclical movement of nature of life in world

-Comes back to 5 medicants and starts preaching; “Thus come (gone) one / I am the come/gone one” → Preaching turns the wheel of samsara the other way!!!!!!

-Deer as symbol of Buddha’s message for all

-1st sermon → Buddhist scripture starting w/ “Thus have I heard..”

• “Elucidate” (make known to life), sermon long and repetitive for oral memorization and rhythm

Analogy w/ poison arrow = Buddha’s teaching that religious life does not depend on dogma, things unelucidated will not bring to nirvana, but what have I done? I have elucidated the origin of dukkha and how to eradicate it! (Refuses to answer what Nirvana is like, more as cessation of suffering)

Grindon - Parinirvana

Parinirvana = “Full/entering” nirvana

“Seeing nirvana” → All causes for future rebirth destroyed vs.

“Entering nirvana" (paranirvana) → Karma of present life is spent

Buddha entering nirvana at 80, peacefully resting on right side surrounded by gods, nature, etc

Grindon - Summary of Historical Buddha’s life

-Miraculous birth, destined to either be world conqueror or prophet → As a prince, completely sheltered until 24 and noticing the 4 Passing Sights on a chariot ride (old age, disease, death, asceticism)

-Renounces family and material life, running away to join ascetics but feeling unsatisfied until with 5 others practicing extreme bodily discipline, almost dying

-Sitting under bodhi tree for meditation, Mara testing him 3 times but Buddha remaining calm → Seeing nirvana and becoming enlightened!

-Initially not teaching anybody for too complications, then teaching 5 ascetics out of passion and then those becoming monks

-At 80 → Reaching parinirvana and dying peacefully, surrounded by gods, nature and etc

Grindon - Distribution of relics, stupas

-Historical Buddha’s cremated remains divided into 8 parts (as physical memory)

-Subdivided etc and put into stupas! (mound w/remains inside - pilgrimages to them, circumambulation)

Grindon - Buddhist Writings / Tripitika

-Earliest Buddhist teachings were oral ; 400-500 yrs post Buddha death → Collected, written down in Pali

Tripitika / Pali Canon → Name of collection of writings from Early Buddhism; “The Three Baskets”

1. Original teachings

2. Monastic rules for Sangha

3. Synthesized teaching (commentary)

-Tripitaka Koreana → Crafted in 2 versions (one destroyed by Mongols), v. complete

Grindon - Dukkha (4 Noble Truths)

Aka 4 truths for those on the path to enlightenment

1. The diagnosis: Dukkha (suffering/unsatisfactoriness in all realms, not just present life; “happiness” marked by Dukkha)

• Physical and mental “pain,” frustration of not getting what you want / not measuring up to expectations / dissatisfaction with impermanence of everything

Grindon - Bhavachakra

Depicting wheel of samsara, Mara holding the wheel; human realm best place to be → noticing suffering (but not overwhelming)

Each realm (gods, demigods, pitied hungry ghosts, one of many he double hockey sticks, animal realm, human realm) - clockwise - marked by subtle and particular suffering, impermanence and uncertainty → No peace

(Anicca existing; dependent origination)

Grindon - Tanha (4 Noble Truths)

2. The etiology (cause): Tanha

All suffering = Result of past action (most imp. mental action) by person suffering

• Cycle of suffering driven by tanha (“grasping/craving/clinging/attachment”)

What we cling to is impermanent and empty → Clinging = Karma ↑

3 interlocking “afflictions/poisons,” core making up tanha (deep cause of suffering)

1. Bird - Greed / out of control desire

2. Boar - Ignorance (about noble truths and 3 marks), clinging to hatred and narrow point of view

3. Snake - Hatred, dissatisfaction

Grindon - 4 Noble Truths

Dukkha (diagnosis), tanha (cause), cessation/nirvana (prognosis-outcome of disease), eightfold path (therapy)