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A Dhamma-inspired community in the heart of Petaling Jaya |
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What Is Buddhism?
Buddhism is a religion which originated in India over 2,500 years ago with the enlightenment of Siddhattha under the Bodhi Tree. Henceforth he was known as the Buddha. His enlightenment consisted of the most profound and all embracing insight into the meaning of life, the very nature of mind and universe. This enlightenment was not a revelation from some divine being, but a discovery made by himself and based on the deepest level of meditation and the clearest experience of mind. It meant that he was no longer subject to craving, anger and delusion, and that he had attained the complete ending of all forms of personal suffering. Having realized Perfect Enlightenment himself, the Buddha spent the next 45 years teaching a Path which, when followed, will take anyone, man or woman, to that same Enlightenment. The Teachings about this Path are called the Dhamma. In essence, the Dhamma consists of the Four Noble Truths; The Noble Truth of SUFFERING, the CAUSE of this suffering, the END of this suffering and the WAY leading to the complete ending of suffering. The Dhamma, the Teachings of the Buddha, extends to many, many volumes. The Buddhist way is a gradual training in virtue, meditation (calmness of mind), wisdom and compassion. Belief has a place, but only at the beginning and it is always to be questioned, challenged and investigated until this makeshift and uncertain belief becomes transformed into a Truth directly seen in one's own immediate experience. Questioning and clear thinking, study and practice, and honest reflection on one's personal experience are thus all encouraged in Buddhism. From such intelligent use of the mind, a Buddhist develops virtue. For most Buddhists, this virtue consists of practicing generosity and compassion and keeping the five moral precepts; refraining from killing, stealing, adultery, lying and the use of intoxicants such as alcohol or illegal drugs. Based on this virtue, one develops the mind in silence, mindfulness, clarity and purity - which is the practice of Buddhist meditation. Then from such pure, clear and powerful states of mind, clear insight arises, a great wisdom which brings with it the ultimate peace and unlimited compassion. This then is the origin, the way, and the goal of Buddhism.What is Theravada? Theravada, the "Doctrine of the Elders," is the school of Buddhism that draws its scriptural inspiration from the texts of the Pali Canon, or Tipitaka, which scholars generally accept as containing the oldest surviving record of the Buddha's teachings. For many centuries, Theravada has been the predominant religion of Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Thailand; today Theravada Buddhists number over 100 million worldwide. In recent decades Theravada has begun to take root in the West. The Buddha called the religion he founded Dhamma-vinaya, "the doctrine and discipline". To provide a social structure supportive of the full-time practice of Dhamma, and to preserve these teachings for posterity, the Buddha established the order of bhikkhus (monks) and bhikkhunis (nuns) -- the Sangha -- who continue to this day to pass his teachings on to subsequent generations. Two centuries after the Buddha's passing, as the Dhamma spread across much of India, several different interpretations of some of the Buddha's original teachings arose, leading to the emergence of as many as eighteen distinct sects of Buddhism. One of these sects (the Mahasanghika) eventually gave rise to a reform movement that called itself Mahayana (the "Greater Vehicle).What we call Theravada today is the sole surviving school of those early non-Mahayana schools.Pali: The Language of Theravada Buddhism The language of the Theravada canonical texts is known as Pali , which is based on a dialect of Middle Indo-Aryan that was probably spoken in central India during the Buddha's time. Most of the sermons (suttas) the Buddha delivered were memorized by Ven. Ananda, the Buddha's cousin and close personal attendant; those sermons at which Ananda was not present are said to have been repeated to him later on. Shortly after the Buddha's death (ca. 480 BCE), five hundred of the most senior monks -- including Ananda -- convened to recite and verify all the sermons they had heard during the Buddha's forty-five year teaching career. Most of these sermons therefore begin with the disclaimer, Evam me sutam -- "Thus have I heard." The teachings were passed down orally within the monastic community, in keeping with an oral tradition that long predated the Buddha. By 250 BCE the Buddha's teachings had been systematically arranged and organized into three basic divisions: the Vinaya Pitaka (the "basket of discipline"; the texts concerning the rules and customs of the Sangha), the Sutta Pitaka (the "basket of discourses"; the sermons and utterances by the Buddha and his close disciples), and the Abhidhamma Pitaka (the "basket of higher [or special] doctrine"; a detailed philosophical and psychological analysis of the Dhamma). Taken together these three are known as the Tipitaka -- the "three baskets". In the third century BCE Sri Lankan monks began compiling a series of detailed commentaries to the Tipitaka that were finally translated into Pali in the fifth century CE. The Tipitaka and the commentaries together constitute the complete body of classical Theravada texts. Since Pali is an oral language, it has no alphabet of its own. It wasn't until about 100 BCE that the Tipitaka was first fixed in writing, by Sri Lankan scribe-monks writing the Pali phonetically in their own Sinhalese alphabet. Since then the Tipitaka has been transliterated into many different scripts (Devanagari, Thai, Burmese, and Roman, to name a few). Although translations of the most popular Tipitaka texts abound, many students of Theravada find that learning the Pali language -- even just a little bit here and there -- greatly deepens their understanding and appreciation of the of the Buddha's teachings. Of course, no one can prove that the Tipitaka contains any of the actual words uttered by the historical Buddha. But practicing Buddhists have never found this problematic. Unlike the scriptures of many of the world's other great religions, the Tipitaka is not meant to be taken as gospel, containing unassailable statements of divine truth, revealed by a prophet, to be accepted purely on faith. Instead, its teachings are meant to be assessed firsthand, to be put into practice in one's life so that one can find out for oneself if they do, in fact, yield the promised results. It is the truth towards which the words in the Tipitaka point that ultimately matters, not the words themselves. Although scholars will undoubtedly continue to speculate about the authorship of passages from the Tipitaka for years to come (and thus miss the point of these teachings entirely), the Tipitaka will quietly continue to serve -- as it has for centuries -- as an indispensable guide for millions of followers in their quest for Awakening.
For more information on Buddhism visit the following web-sites:
Great range of books, images, music, craftwork at Sukhihotu. 11A, First Floor, Jalan SS24/8, Taman Megah, 47300 Petaling Jaya, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia. Tel: 6 03 7806 2833 Fax: 6 03 7806 2733 email:sukhihotu at maxis.net.my What is Buddhism to you? If there is any religion that would cope with modern scientific needs, it would be Buddhism.... Albert Einstein.
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