In the Soka Gakkai Dictionary of Buddhist terms it states:
“In the “Life Span” chapter, Shakyamuni revealed his attainment of Buddhahood numberless major world system dust particle kalpas in the past. No matter how far in the past, however, it occurred at a fixed point in time and therefore is not eternal.”
Uh, no, that’s not “fixed”. That’s “infinite” and just one of the meanings of “numberless”. But “fixed” is not one of them.
“Moreover, he did not clarify the Law or cause that enabled him to attain enlightenment at that time.”
Then what is the ceremony in the air, a keg party?
But what I’m really asking everyone to help me with is TIME. Why the delay from his teaching to what is commonly referred to as the Latter Day Of The Law? I know everyone always points to “the time wasn’t right”.
Well, why not? Why three time periods and wait over two millennium?
Some people respond that it’s because of the capacity of the people. (They couldn’t handle the truth.) But even Nichiren says that though people had the capacity, the TIME wasn’t right and even sages have a hard time judging time. (Who says medieval Japanese prophets don’t have a sense of humor.) And spare me “the cherry blossom blooms when the time is right” metaphors. That is a biological function based upon evolution and not a Nostradamus type prediction like this is.
So, …bring it.
- Comments (40)
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#1 | Written by Magnolia about 6 years ago.Joe,
I am so glad that you brought this discussion to the table because I would love to get some insight into this as well. Time seems to be a huge important component of Buddhism-and I wonder how to think about Buddhism in the context of how time is- linear or spiral shaped or circular in nature and structure? I feel limited by my lack of understanding of time.
I’m no scholar and I am still learning alot of basics in Buddhism so don’t laugh but- maybe is it that religions/spiritual traditions can get calcified and eroded over long periods of time? I was always told that because we live in this age of major evil compared to times when things weren’t so bad in comparison ( sure there was evil but was it as bad as now?) that the mystic law as we practice NMHRK was like an embedded salvation time capsule release thing brought forth when things were goin down in flames. Could it be that even though the teachings remain still viable and worthy over long years- that its possible that we need something to refresh the teaching- to wake it back up in the minds and hearts of folks? What happens after 10,000 years of the mystic law? Will there be another Buddha that manefests with a understanding profound meaning of the law. Is buddhism a constant evolution?Is there some secret sutra scroll buried in a cave with the answers to this and more? Thanks for your writing your humour your thoughts Joe.
Magnolia -
#2 | Written by Ryuei about 6 years ago.Hi Joe,
Great issue to bring up. This has long perplexed me as well. I am still not sure I have “the” solution to the problem, but since I first read the “Selection of the Time” by Nichiren back in the 80s I’ve learned a lot more about the Buddhist attitude to time.
First though:
If you really want to see how sophisticated Buddhist thinking about time can get read Dogen’s essay “Being-Time” (in Japanese it is called “Uji”).
If you want to know how Shakyamuni Buddha used increasing scopes of time to evaluate different philosophies and religious points of view based on the paucity or grandeur of their perspective then read the Brahmajala Sutta, the first discourse in the Digha-Nikaya. Nichiren used the same method in Kaimoku Sho (Opening of the Eyes).
But when it comes to the three times, and the right time, and selecting the right time, I think some of the gosho in the WND Vol. II answer the question but I can’t remember which ones and all my notes are at home (and would take at least an hour to go through anyway). But here is what I remember:
Every Buddha gets a dispensation that will consist of three ages of the Dharma. In fact, if you review the predictions of Buddhahood for the arhat-disciples in chapter 3-9 of the Lotus Sutra you will see that the Buddha also predicts the ages of the true Dharma for each of them and in some cases the length of the age of the formal or counterfeit Dharma. This idea of dispensations with three (or even up to five periods) actually traces back to the Pali Canon and has a lot to do with the cyclical nature of Buddhist cosmology (a carryover from the Brahmanistic cosmology).
So if being is time and time is being, and in Buddhism being is actually becoming, then what is the becoming that characterizes each age?
In the age of the true Dharma the becoming is characterized by those with good roots who are able to meet with the Buddha and even though they may not be very bright (like Chulapanthaka) or very virtuous (like Angulimala) they are able to immediately benefit from learning the Dharma and attain freedom from the six lower worlds and/or to generate bodhicitta and become bodhisattvas.
In the age of the counterfeit or formal Dharma people good roots are less, which is why they were not born in the earlier age and/or in the presence of the Buddha or his direct disciples. Due to these good roots and regardless of intellectual or moral capacity, people can make some progress, but usually to attain freedome or generate bodhicitta they must be reborn in the pure lands after doing what they can in this world.
In the final age of the Dharma, people are born who have no good roots. This is also partly because all those with good roots were already born in the previous ages and escaped (except of course for the bodhisattvas who appear again but usually incognito). Those in the final age may be smart, may be virtuous, may even have the relative good karma to be reborn in the heavenly realms - but they don’t have good roots in relation to the four higher worlds. These must be planted anew.
Now Nichiren argues that in the true and counterfeit ages, teaching the Dharma step by step will work for those with good roots and for those with the capacity to follow the reasoning and make use of the methods even if they are receiving the seed of Dharma for the first time. But in the latter age, people have no good roots and even if they have the capacity to understand they don’t have the inclination or patience for it. Their unwholesome roots are too strong. So teaching the Dharma step by step - even to those who are smart or virtuous but have no good roots - will either lead to those people slandering it (like the Confucians who rejected any kind of Buddhism) or to clinging to provisional teachings (like Ryokan of the Shingon-Ritsu school). So it is better - in the long run - to plant the seed of the highest teaching, the Lotus Sutra, even if the short-term reaction is to reject it. This seems to be Nichiren’s reasoning.
To reiterate - capacity seems to be about whether people have the intelligence and self-discipline to accept, understand, and put the Dharma into practice. But the age is also about evolution or devolution of people based on the deeper good roots that can connect someone to the highest Dharma teaching. It is one thing to be smart and virtuous and potentially able to understand the Dharma. It is another to actually have the inclination and will to do so. So the age or time question is addressing that deeper aspect of good roots - the affinity for the Wonderful Dharma that transcends considerations of intellect and virtue.
Also, though Nichiren did not say this, it may also be a matter of allowing enough time for a teaching to sink in - both in terms of individuals and cultures. And perhaps allowing for the time it takes to work through preliminary matters to get to the essential point.
This is my current understanding at any rate.
It is why I teach everyone to chant Namu Myoho Renge Kyo right off the bat at Faithful Fools. So all will be exposed to Namu Myoho Renge Kyo, even if they reject it at first, or even if they are unable or unwilling to pursue any further study or practice as Nichiren recommended. This is in accord with the time in the sense of the evlolution or devolution of the good roots pertaining to liberation.
Namu Myoho Renge Kyo,
Ryuei -
#3 | Written by joe about 6 years ago.Ryuei,
That’s pretty good for off the cuff. Damn. And it parallels what Nichiren said in the Object of Devotion For Observing The Mind SGI Vol.1 page 374 or same letter in the Doctrine 2 volume of Tanabe/Hori issue page 160. It’s about the sickos in the later day. But that’s still a capacity issue and the question remains the same in light of dependent origination especially in terms of what you said “what is the becoming that characterizes each age?”: what is the cause for the five five hundred time periods? -
#4 | Written by Engyo Mike Barrett about 6 years ago.Hi, Joe -
It’s way too long to post here, but there is a commentary by Saicho (Dengyo Daishi) called the Candle of the Latter Dharma, written somewhere around 800 CE. It is posted in its entirety at E-Sangha, here:
http://www.lioncity.net/buddhism/index.php?showtopic=17259
Namaste, Engyo Mike Barrett -
#5 | Written by joe about 6 years ago.
Mike,
That was pretty cool. Thanks for that. It certainly shows why he had an influence on his time and Nichiren. And it sounds like Nichiren. But it is still a justification for a time period by an explanation of how to recognize it properly.
It doesn’t speak towards the causality behind it.
But it does reiterate that capacity is secondary to the age.
“But this is simply the destiny of the age; it is not due to the people.”
And that harkens back to Magnolia’s question of are times more “evil” now? Well, the atomic “age” has been likened to the most threatening as in ending life as we know it pretty swiftly. But the Vikings were thought of that way too; it’s the end of “our” way of life as we know it. Genocide. (They had cool games too, like throw the baby up in the air and catch it on your sword.) Every age has had it’s epoch of what they considered the penultimate evil. Until the next one; The war to end all wars, WWI. Until WWII came along with it’s versions of genocides. -
#6 | Written by Bruce Maltz about 6 years ago.the Eternal Buddha asked the Bodhisattva from the Earth to come to earth during the later day of the law, and as Ryei says they are crum-bums but they have also been taught by the Eternal Buddha and have been transfered his merits, so there is no need for them to practice any dharma, but if you carefully read the stories in the Lotus Sutra, they lead to the climax of the Ceremony in Space.
I think in our human body, we can only spread the truth of the sutra, we can’t practice anything, that is what I have been saying, and when we spread the sutra we remember our Bodhisatva life, maybe the Ceremony in the air, and maybe the great merits we inherit from the Buddha. The Buddha already had us practice everything an gave us his merits knowing the current day situation. And being against Religion, I don’t think he would like his sutra being spread as a religion.
Remember, the Ceremony in Space is Eternal, everyone goes back to 1260 because of Nichiren, but we can think of Buddha sending Bodhisattva’s here in 3000 or 6000 and I don’t think people will be going to meetings and chanting, and thinking of religion in the same way. Holding on to the static on old ways of thinking is holding back progressive ways of approaching the truth inside the Sutra.
Dogen seems to have really touched a nerve about time, and why not try to remember being at the Ceremony in the Air, with the Eternal Buddha?
There is absolutely nothing you can do here on earth that will make a dramatic difference to a person or to the world, of so, it would have been done. There would have been a change.
Now you have my Readers Digest Version
Maltz -
#7 | Written by Ryuei about 6 years ago.
Hi Joe,
I really do need to do some more reading to refresh my memory on what exactly “capacity” is supposed to refer to.
I balk at the idea that “time” is some abstraction apart from the people, places, and events that a time is. This is exactly Dogen’s point - that time is nothing other than the particulars and their changes and vice versa. As soon as you abstact some concept of time other than for the sake of convenience in making an observation you have set up a false entity - a dharma to cling to.
But the question you ask: what is the causality behind the times is exactly what I have wondered about. What are the causal particulars that make a time the time that it is? In regard to the three times of a Buddhist dispensation I think it is like this - you start off with a certain grouping of beings at a particular location (a world system say) and some of them have talent and ambition and they all are fortunate enough to find the one person in that location who can tutor them and point the way out of that location. They do so, and in leaving try to help some others leave to. Over time, the only ones left in that location are the ones with no talen, no ambition, and who made no effort or had no opportunity to meet either the teacher or his students while they were still around. So as “time goes by” the location gets that much worse as the overall character of the remaining population changes.
The monkey wrench in all this are the original disciples of that tutor who were waiting outside all along to come in and help out the truly hard cases after all the teacher and all his best and brightest students had been long gone. These are not crumb-bums (and I never said they were) but are each on par with the original teacher and furthermore know that all of the people left behind have the potential to be on a par as well.
But as I said, I need to find those other gosho references to clarify this, or at least to clarify what Nichiren may have meant by it.
Namu Myoho Renge Kyo,
Ryuei -
#8 | Written by Bruce Maltz about 6 years ago.
Michael, it has to do with the length of time that the HUMAN Buddha has been away from Earth. Remember, when Buddha told Ananda he would have lived longer if Ananda had only asked, and yes, I said crum-bums, because the mappoites are crum-bums, the dregs of the earth. Scientology calls us WOGS.
About your last paragraph.. how do you know they are waiting to HELP? maybe we just wake each other up. After all, count how many Bodhisattvas there were. Just a thought. I elbow you and say wake up, you throw water on me and say wake up, we help each other but we stop sending each other to hell. We can see the Buddha realm here, if we see the Ceremony in the Air here.
Don’t throw too much water on me.
Bruce -
#9 | Written by joe about 6 years ago.
Bruce,
You are definitely the personification of what you aren’t preaching. Thank for your words that don’t make a difference here on earth.
Ryuei,
“Time” is not an abstract because it only exists through change, which is a relative issue. What is “eternal” is an abstract for those of us who live with change because time is irrelevant to it. Our efforts are to realize that which is eternal within ourselves without it remaining an abstract. But what this thread is about is not time itself, but the reasons for the parameters placed around it which can be termed an “age”. Specifically, in this case, a prediction. -
#10 | Written by Bruce Maltz about 6 years ago.
Joe, Preaching? I guess you just don’t read the Lotus Sutra because I don’t waver from the Sutra.
As always, I think it is important to consider what is in the Sutra, the spirit, the meaning, and not go off on HUMAN practice or HUMAN views.
The Human Shakyamuni could not teach the law to PEOPLE, because only a Buddha and a Buddha can understand the Law of the Buddha. (read the sutra, and Michael will tell you even Dogen was fond of that knowledge) so, I am telling you that Buddha was not teaching PERMANENCE here on earth, if so, I dare you to find a trace of the teaching. We are not here on Earth forever, time is something people mentally masturbate about. You are Eternal at the Ceremony in the Air, those words are in the Lotus Sutra.
Actually I thought you were serious about a discussion, time here is time wasted. If I am wrong about you, I apologize, but the ball is in your court or quart.
Bruce -
#11 | Written by joe about 6 years ago.
Bruce,
No need to apologize. You’re human. What’s that like? -
#12 | Written by Andy Hanlen about 6 years ago.David,
In my opinion, all these time delineations are arbitrary, and better understood as metaphors or similes (I get those mixed up). 500 years isn’t necessarily 500 years, if you catch my drift. And it’s different for different people, and peoples. You’re ready when you’re ready.
I have spoken. Hope this helps.
Cheers!
Andy -
#13 | Written by Mark Rogow about 6 years ago.There are several reasons that things have played out as the Buddha predicts. Entropy, ego, greed, and playing the game of telephone rather than systematically studying the sutras themselves.
Mark -
#14 | Written by clown hidden about 6 years ago.Robin’s suggestion is a good one. Dogen’s lecture on Being-Time has had a lot written about it. You may find this interesting,
http://www.dogensangha.org.uk/Talks/11-Uji%20Interpretation.pdf
http://tinyurl.com/3jg2gw
It has a commentary by Michael Eido Luetchford who is the teacher at Dogen Sangha Buddhist Centre in Bristol England. -
#15 | Written by Bruce Maltz about 6 years ago.
Joe,
You mean you don’t know how it feels to be human?
Feels like Ichinen Sanzen,
looking for something to stop the ichi at the drug store.
Bruce -
#16 | Written by joe about 6 years ago.
People bothered by that embarrassing itching use Cortizone-10.
People bothered by that embarrassing I Ching use Coarticulation-10.
People bothered by that embarrassing Ichi-non-sans-them use T’ien T’ai 3000. -
#17 | Written by Bruce Maltz about 6 years ago.
I am looking for Buy one, get one free..
I saw those but they are not on sale,
T’ai T’ien 2999 is on sale, but not in my state, the state of joy , even comes in a box made of Suede by the environment.
Maltz -
#18 | Written by joe about 6 years ago.
Andy,
Sorry, but metaphors or similes need not apply unless you can translate that into something practical. But saying 500 doesn’t REALLY mean 500 is bullshit for why use a number at all? But what you ARE talking about is non-linear time, which has possibilities but not as a prediction, and is very close to what CH pointed me towards with that Zen link. That’s all very Billy Pilgrim, who comes loose in time and exists in the future just as he does in the present or the past. But the aliens who capture him in the future are trapped by destiny and are incapable of changing it, just as Billy and everyone else in Vonnegut’s story. It’s a metaphor (story line wise) for what he felt about what happened to him in WWII. Billy does have a quality that is very similar to the bodhisattva in that he deals with his destiny amicably, but he is unable to affect change either for himself or others, only deal with it. But nowhere in Vonnegut’s story is there the notion of changing destiny. Whereas in Nabakov’s “Invitation To A Beheading” in the action of his hero’s refusing to dance with his executioner, not only does he change his destiny by seeing his world for what it is, it vanishes because it was an illusion. Destiny does not necessarily have to be linear. But a prediction is. And if the language of the Lotus Sutra is a dream like metaphor, then the prediction contained within it is also. In that case, Andy is correct, and 500 isn’t really 500, but neither is the prediction and it shouldn’t be used as linear doctrine on a time line. (That’s redundant)
Chirp in. -
#19 | Written by Andy Hanlen about 6 years ago.
” In that case, Andy is correct, and 500 isn’t really 500, but neither is the prediction and it shouldn’t be used as linear doctrine on a time line. (That’s redundant)”
Yes, it is, but it’s correct. That’s what I’m saying (I think).
Cheers!
Andy -
#20 | Written by Mak Rogow about 6 years ago.
Radiocarbon dating is based on the radioactive decay of Carbon 14 and it is precise, the rate of decay. I propose that it is rather precise the rate of spiritual decay of a society and that is how the Buddha came up with the five, five hundred year periods.
Mark -
#21 | Written by JC about 6 years ago.
This entry in the Soka dictionary is part of the reductionist logic that came up with the bizarre doctrine of Nichiren as “True Buddha” (Sakyamuni as “Provisional”) , further reduced to the declaration of exclusivity by NS/Gakkai as the only practitioners of “True Buddhism”; a doctrinal prestidigitation worthy of the Bush Justice Department. This only works if one becomes trapped by circular logic in the linguistic and conceptual cul-de-sac commonly called the time/space continuum. Closer examination of the “Life Span” (more correctly “Duration”) chapter, the Buddha proceeds to fry the mental circuits of his audience with an incomprehensible description of the moment of his enlightenment. Once they are sufficiently awed, he doubles up his bet.
Termite minds snap out of the revery and say, “Aha, a fixed point in time, therefor . . .” but, by accepting the deliberateness of the Buddha and his thinking one can apprehend there is no constant of time. Self-existent time is as foreign to Buddhist thought as is a creator god.
Is it possible to comprehend all phenomena in a pragmatic way without resorting to the metric of time or its corollary delineated space? Modern physics does since the advent of relativity. Many non-western societies do. We know this because most of their languages (including Sanskrit, the mother tongue of Buddhism) contain no conceptual framework corresponding to time/space. Instead of past, present & future, Hopi language and cosmology, for example, speak of manifest and manifesting phenomena. (Joe, I know there’s a joke in here somewhere!) Manifest includes the objective, visible world and history, all that is and ever has been accessible to the senses. Un-manifest, or manifesting correspond to the subjective (thoughts, plans, dreams, emotions, memory). I am really over-simplifying this in a feeble attempt at brevity. What we would consider mystical, spiritual, even para-normal are seamlessly interwoven with Hopi daily life. Occurrences like what the Buddha describes are so distant in memory and place they assume the aspect of myth blurring the distinction between manifest and un-manifest. The most fascinating aspect (for me anyway) is how the realms of manifest and un-manifest interplay; a sort of conjunction, a bright shimmering membrane of consciousness between worlds that in the mundane sense is conveyed by transitive verbs; waking up, eating, getting loaded. This conveys the sense of mystery Einstein alluded to when compelled to conclude that energy emerges from a vacuum. This would be the Ku of Ke, Ku, Chu fame in Buddhism.
But I digress.
Joe, I think you’ve got something there with your “biological function based upon evolution” analysis. Buddhism, like all living beings, evolves; consider the Maka Chikan and Nichiren’s mantra and mandala practice as evolutionary extensions of the Lotus Sutra. Buddhism appears in relation to the capacity of the people who are a product of their cultural epoch. Moreover, enlightenment is an original state of being rather than an arrival point, a way of living to be cultivated as a garden. I’m not sure what’s gonna grow in the Mappo garden with its irradiated and chemical laden muck under a blurred sun in the acid rain. Bitter melon, I suppose, imported from China. I hate bitter melon. -
#22 | Written by Bruce Maltz about 6 years ago.
“…Buddhism appears in relation to the capacity of the people…”
It does not appear and disappear. Does the Sun appear and disappear? Buddhism is not a thing like a box of soap or plant.
Ichinen Sanzen is the heart of the Lotus Sutra, the lifespan of the Buddha, that is what the secret is. When the Eternal Buddha transfered all his merits to the Bodhisattvas of the Earth, and sends them to Earth in the Latter Day, we see Ichinen Sanzen.
If you have an SGI or Shoshu background or even a Nichiren Shu way of thinking, you will balk at the pure nonpolitical thinking and accepting the Lotus Sutra at face value. There is a desire to say, he really meant this or that, this really means this and that really means this, but that is not my problem.
Accepting the pure teaching of the Lotus Sutra as truth, non religious, non biblical, non fantasy, not anti-anything not even anti-pasta, if you even begin to change a dot or sentence of the Sutra and put in your own commentary you have now become somewhat an enemy of all those Bodhisattva of the Earth that want to spread the Lotus Sutra.
The Bodhisattvas of the Earth, in their state in the Ceremony in the Air, are eternal.
Maltz -
#23 | Written by joe about 6 years ago.
“Joe, I think you’ve got something there with your “biological function based upon evolution” analysis. Buddhism, like all living beings, evolves; consider the Maka Chikan and Nichiren’s mantra and mandala practice as evolutionary extensions of the Lotus Sutra. Buddhism appears in relation to the capacity of the people who are a product of their cultural epoch.”
Sorry, but that’s a misread on your part and the complete opposite of what I said. -
#24 | Written by JC about 6 years ago.
I realize you’re trying to find a “Nostradamus type prediction”, but there is none. The Buddha appears to be observing the true nature of the evolution of society and its relationship to Buddhism. So, i think your throw away line, “spare me . . .”, is closer to the truth.
I stand by my assertion that Buddhism evolves and grows to maturity unless you try and abstract it and separate it from the people. You can say that an acorn is a tree, but what you hold in your palm is a “potential” tree. Sakyamuni’s first sutra after waking up under the bodhi tree was second only to the Lotus Sutra in profundity. He then started from the basics like the “don’t pee upstream from your drinking water” sutra. Buddhism according to the capacity of the people. Even when he taught the LS, people weren’t ready for it.
By the way, I don’t think “the Buddha” was one person, but then again, for some people the sun never sets. -
#25 | Written by joe about 6 years ago.
“I realize you’re trying to find a “Nostradamus type prediction”, but there is none”
Not me. It’s been presented “to” me: three time periods and 5th 500th. And I’ll reiterate that Saicho and Nichiren both put more emphasis on “time” than “capacity”. I’m just looking for cause.
But I am enjoying myself in this effort and I’d like to thank everyone for engaging.
Okay, time for a break. This is from my friend Phil Proctor:
Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia is the fear of long words. -
#26 | Written by JC about 6 years ago.
Bill Clinton wanted to define the meaning of “is”. I want to know Nichiren’s understanding of “time”.
-
#27 | Written by KatRama Brooks about 6 years ago.
The “Ceremony in the Air”metaphorically
took place in a parallel Universe,
the eons and kaons of time that Buddhism refers to
are all but parallel universes existing simultaneously.
Ichinen Sanzen too states the simultaneity of the 10 worlds in a momentary state of existence.
Therefore I ask is “time” an illusion we made up, became addictied to, as we languish on the karmic ferris wheel ?
KatRama -
#28 | Written by mark Rogow about 6 years ago.
Time is a series of events according to Nichiren, great events, great earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, comets like the Shumacher-Levi, great floods, pandemics, world wars, purges like Joseph Stalin’s, famines like Mao’s starvation of the peasants, all great omens, all falling into this category. I think it was the Great Collection Sutra and the Maya Sutra that delineates the time periods and that which was, is and is to be.
Mark -
#29 | Written by Bruce Maltz about 6 years ago.
Kat-Rama says: “The “Ceremony in the Air”metaphorically took place in a parallel Universe,”
Hi, and Stephanie says Hi.
That conclusion is from Human Theory, Nichiren in his Kanjin Honzon Sho, says we find the Original Buddha in our mind, we can see and hear with our mind, we can use our mind in ways beyond described in the World Tribune (joke). Think of a sour lemon, your lips pucker, the lemon, nor the taste make you pucker, it was your mind. Think of the Ceremony in the Air, think of the Original Buddha, you react, you don’t pucker, but compassion, mercy, love will start to react.
The whole Nichiren Religion is upside-down, if we think of inheriting our merits from the Original Buddha (chapter 22) they are in our mind, we can unite the Bodhisattvas of the Earth, and spread the compassion for peace.
Insanity is to continue to do over and over the same thing, and expect a different result. The old religious ways, are not working, never has, never will. Buddha was against religion so why would he say, spread the Sutra by a Religion, have everyone chant, pray to me, pray to Nichiren, have priest, shave their heads, build Temples, etc.. etc…
See, you got me worked up..
Later,
Bruce -
#30 | Written by KatRama Brooks about 6 years ago.
Thank you Mark, for that clarification.
I am somewhat of the non-traditional school, way out of the league of fundamentalists
or believing that “this is the way it is” or “this is the way it was”
because Nichiren or the Buddha said so. not discounting that they may be accurate in what they state.
Looking back into the “history” we have created and been part of.
I am not denying “great events, great earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, comets like the Shumacher-Levi, great floods, pandemics, world wars, purges like Joseph Stalin’s, famines like Mao’s starvation of the peasants, all great omens”
I’m measuring time differently, being curious and inquisitive about other people’s take on “Time”
This inspires and stimulates me, as I always learn something new which expands my world view.
I have time travelled in both past and future.
The “past” experiencing horrendous barbaric practices, wars, famines etc. etc.
My travels into the “future”, lead me to great tidal waves, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, more wars, more suffering finally leading to a world at peace.
When I relive the past and future, I experience them simultaneously in a “Now” present moment, taking me to a sense of awe.
Perhaps I relate that to our “dream time” where we too travel into parallel realities as we sleep in a here and now reality.
Then I read Nichiren’s
“The Unanimous Declaration by the Buddhas of the
Three Existences regarding the Classifcation
of the Teachings and which Are to Be Abondoned
and Which Upheld”
(Pg 835 The Writings of Nichiren Daishonin Volume II)
It is a profound essay on expedient means, provisional teachings, Dreams, being awake in the dream.
boggling to the psyche.
Thank you for allowing me to indulge in my mental machinations.
KatRama -
#31 | Written by KatRama Brooks about 6 years ago.
Aloha Bruce and Hi to (Stephanie)
Hey Bruce, I agree, the mind is one hell of an instrument.
It can defy the laws of gravity and put to shame the beliefs and conditioning many a mind has bought into.
I’ll get into deep waters (for me) here.
According to quantum physics, its been proven the mind as it observes an object can change it’s molecular and atomic structure of its matrix and when the observer stops observing the object returns to its unobserved structure. And there is much more on this subject
But you know all that.
I like your take on the “mind” and “Religion”
KatRama -
#32 | Written by joe about 6 years ago.
“The “Ceremony in the Air”metaphorically
took place in a parallel Universe,
the eons and kaons of time that Buddhism refers to
are all but parallel universes existing simultaneously.
Ichinen Sanzen too states the simultaneity of the 10 worlds in a momentary state of existence.”
The universe as we know it exists in constant change because of time. The “Ceremony”, if it is eternal, exists without time. Time only exits in the form of change. So if something is eternal it does not change. If a universe is parallel does it have time or is it eternal?
“The Unanimous Declaration by the Buddhas of the
Three Existences regarding the Classifcation
of the Teachings and which Are to Be Abondoned
and Which Upheld”
(Pg 835 The Writings of Nichiren Daishonin Volume II)
This is the new (well, not really new but new to the West) hot letter I first discovered in Anesaki’s book. But everyone that reads it seems to love it and thinks it is a major including myself.
“I’ll get into deep waters (for me) here.
According to quantum physics, its been proven the mind as it observes an object can change it’s molecular and atomic structure of its matrix and when the observer stops observing the object returns to its unobserved structure.”
Oh yeah! Based on who’s hypothesis? Lucy, you got some splaining to do! -
#33 | Written by Bruce Maltz about 6 years ago.
In the Surangama Sutra, it teaches that it is achievable, because of “intrinsic hearing” for us to step, even if just momentarily, outside the material world in perception, while we are sill in an embodied human being body.
The Sutra says, “Even in dreams when all thinking has become quiescent, the hearing nature is alert.”
So, we can transcend ordinary distinctions between body and mind, and hear in one place, dream someplace else, I see no reason why we cannot see and feel on earth, and remember and think in the Ceremony in the Air, or remember, or interchange.
Point is, everyone has been sold a pile of religious hogwash by Temple Used Car Salesmen, Buddha had a dislike for religion, and no doubt would abolish all Nichiren Sects at once, in a heart beat, and have every prayer book destroyed.
There is no mention of practice in the Sutra, it is spread the sutra, not practice the sutra, save people, not practice the sutra. Nichiren really blew it by not throwing off his robe and denouncing the priesthood.
I think I will take a nap, and SEE what I HEAR.
Bruce -
#34 | Written by KatRama Brooks about 6 years ago.
Everything is plausible, all we need to do is “Make it up”
isn’t everything made up?
Scientists make up an experiment and and prove that their
theory works experiment worked voilå.
Our vast infinite brilliant minds can create unbelievable plausibe events.
Would anyone in NIchiren’s era conceive of creating an atom bomb or traveling to the Moon in a man made space ship.
or building a space probe traveling to Mars manipulated by men on their computers 35 million miles away?
What time is it?
It’s the right time . . . n’est pas?
A couple of quotes on the matter of “time” from 2 well known physicists not that they are necessarily true yet interesting.
I am certain there are more.
“Time is not at all what it seems. It does not flow in only one direction, and the future exists simultaneously with the past”
Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
and
“Time is what prevents everything from happening at once”
John Wheeler (1911 - )
Time serves as a standard of measure as change occurs.
One of the great truths about Buddhist teachings:
“impermanence” . . . . perhaps that is how time may also be measured. -
#35 | Written by joe about 6 years ago.
KatRama,
Science is observation and experiment through the systematic study of the physical and natural world. Theories are possible independent explanations of something. The Big Bang is the theory to explain observable phenomena; background microwave noise, which is light waves elongated into sound waves left over from that event, which could not be observed itself, only it’s effect. And all the great thinkers of today, scientist and blogger, are sitting on the shoulders of those who came before.
I could not imagine three more appropriate, thought provoking, and lyrical approaches to time as the ones you presented. Thank you. -
#36 | Written by Mark Rogow about 6 years ago.
Scientific Faith is akin to Buddhist faith. No one has ever seen a quark or measured a quark but without taking quarks into account we can neither understand the fundemental nature of matter nor apply the principles of physics in a most advantageous manner. Without faith that quarks exist, there is no advancement of science.
No one has ever seen or measured the ancient Buddha Shakyamuni in our mind(the ancient Buddha has a name as does the quark)but without taking into account the ancient Buddha Shakyamuni we can neither understand the fundemental nature of life no apply the Buddhist principles in a most advantageous manner. Without faith that the Eternal Buddha Sakyamuni exists, there is no Buddhahood.
Mark -
#37 | Written by joe about 6 years ago.
“Scientific Faith” is an oxymoron used by the post-oxy’s who can’t differentiate between an assumption and a presumption.
-
#38 | Written by JC about 6 years ago.
oh that’s so Dennis Miller, post-NFL even.
why can’t there be scientific faith? don’t some people have complete confidence in science? faith is a noun, therefor it must be qualified to be understood. presuming that faith is only about god spoils an otherwise useful word. then again, the god crowd is not generally big on understanding.
let’s get this straightened out before the Assumption in August.
excuse me, but i need a hearty bowl of Post Oxys for breakfast before i do battle for the Faith. -
#39 | Written by clown hidden about 6 years ago.
People may have faith in science but it is not scientific to do so. Science is a method for arriving at conclusions that hold up in the real time world or prove true mathematically not a body of knowledge which represents itself as the truth of the way things are.
-
#40 | Written by JC about 6 years ago.
science is also “a body of knowledge which represents itself as the truth of the way things are” the scientific method has proven to be an excellent application for arriving at reliable replicable conclusions and some people have “faith” in many of those conclusions. nothing wrong here. i’m a big fan of selective faith whether in Buddhism or science which makes me technically a heretic. science is a human creation (as is religion and god) thus its proponents are subject to foibles, foolishness and intransigence as are all humans. one difference between science and religious faith is science’ inclusion of evolution especially that of science itself. i think Buddhism evolves as well. any system of thought or belief that does not evolve breaks down. the rigors of scientific inquiry are what drives science and i think rigorous skepticism is also healthy for Buddhism.
cool website, by the way, clown hidden.