Awakening into Nirvana (The Buddha Speaks)

When I was a young person, at the beginning of my life, I looked at nature and saw that all things are subject to decay and death and thus to sorrow. The thought came to me that I myself was of such a nature. I was the same as all created things. I too would be subject to disease, decay, death, and sorrow. But what if I were to search for that which underlies all becoming, for the unsurpassed perfect security which is nirvana, the perfect freedom of the unconditioned state?

So, in the first flush of my independence, I went against my father’s wishes, shaved off my thick black hair, put on a saffron robe, and left my father’s house for a homeless life. I wandered a long time, searching for what is good, searching after an unsurpassed state of peace.

At last I came to a pleasant forest grove, next to a river of pure water and sat down beneath a big tree, sure that this was the right place for realization.

All the conditions of the world came into my mind, one after another, and as they came, they were penetrated and put down. In this way, finally, a knowledge and insight arose, and I knew that this was the changeless, the unconditioned. This was freedom.

The reality that came to me is profound and hard to see or understand because it is beyond the sphere of thinking. It is sublime and unequaled but subtle and only to be found by the dedicated.

Most people fail to see this reality, for they are attached to what they cling to, to pleasures and delights. Since all the world is attached to material things, it’s very difficult for people to grasp how everything originates in conditions and causes. It’s a hard job for them to see the meaning of the fact that everything, including ourselves, depends on everything else and has no permanent self-existence.

If I were to try to teach this truth, this reality, nobody would understand me, I thought. My labor and my trouble would be for nothing.

But then it came to me as an insight that I should teach this truth, for it is also happiness. There are people whose sight is only a little clouded, and they are suffering through not hearing the reality. They would become knowers of the truth.

It was in this way I went forth to teach:

For those who are ready, the door
To the deathless state is open.
You that have ears, give up
The conditions that bind you,
And enter in.

Majijhima Nikaya

All those who clearly understand the fact that enlightenment is everywhere come to the perfect wisdom with a marvelous insight that all objects and structures, just as they are in the present moment, are themselves enlightenment, both the way and the goal, being perfectly transparent to the ineffable. Those who experience the ineffable, known as Suchness, recognize that all structures are radiantly empty of self-existence.

Those who attain perfect wisdom are forever inspired by the conviction that the infinitely varied forms of this world, in all their relativity, far from being a hindrance and a dangerous distraction to the spiritual path, are really a healing medicine. Why? Because by the very fact that they are interdependent on each other and therefore have no separate self, they express the mystery and the energy of all-embracing love. Not just the illumined wise ones but every single being in the interconnected world is a dweller in the boundless infinity of love.

Prajnaparamita Sutra

Scriptures of the Buddha

Excerpted from The Buddha Speaks edited by Anne Bancroft 2000

[Samana]

The Prajnaparamita Sutra wasn't spoken by the Buddha, its a much later Mahayana add-on to the Buddha's teachings .


_/\_

Originally Posted by Samana

The Prajnaparamita Sutra wasn't spoken by the Buddha, its a much later Mahayana add-on to the Buddha's teachings .


_/\_

Ok? What is your point in saying this? Did you not agree with the teaching I presented?

[Samana]

Personally I prefer the Nikayas (Pali Canon) as being the nearest to the authentic teachings of the Buddha. Do you not agree with me expressing my preferences just as you are expressing yours ?


_/\_

Originally Posted by Samana

Personally I prefer the Nikayas (Pali Canon) as being the nearest to the authentic teachings of the Buddha. Do you not agree with me expressing my preferences just as you are expressing yours ?


_/\_

Not too concerned with what were Buddha's "authentic" teachings. A lot of people since have seen what he had to say. Their insights to me are more than welcomed.

[Gem]

Originally Posted by Mayflow

Not too concerned with what were Buddha's "authentic" teachings. A lot of people since have seen what he had to say. Their insights to me are more than welcomed.

Everyone says their own little trip is 'Buddahs authentic teaching' but there is no 'authentic' teaching, only Buddah's teaching.

I liked the OP, but liking it does not mean I call it 'Buddah's authentic'.

If a version is preferred so let it be preferred, it's a personal preference, and does not make one teaching authentic and another not.

People seem to think that because they prefer it, it somehow becomes authentic.

[Silver]

Good post, Gem.........btw, I like your sig!

[psychoslice]

I think any teaching can be a good pointer, authentic or not, when one has awakened to their true inner Being, the Buddha if you like, then the teaching or the pointers have served their purpose, they can now be dropped, you now are your own master, your own inner teachings appear, they are authentic to you, they can also be to others who are searching.

Originally Posted by Gem

Everyone says their own little trip is 'Buddahs authentic teaching' but there is no 'authentic' teaching, only Buddah's teaching.

I liked the OP, but liking it does not mean I call it 'Buddah's authentic'.

If a version is preferred so let it be preferred, it's a personal preference, and does not make one teaching authentic and another not.

People seem to think that because they prefer it, it somehow becomes authentic.

This is a problem for us sometimes, I think. I always want to be so free and like really free, and Buddha did seem to offer this to us all. "Authentic?" Hell I don't know, but freedom does ring a freedom's bell for me. And I don't care if it was Buddha or some guy or girl I don't even know yet who offers and shares this with me.

Originally Posted by psychoslice

I think any teaching can be a good pointer, authentic or not, when one has awakened to their true inner Being, the Buddha if you like, then the teaching or the pointers have served their purpose, they can now be dropped, you now are your own master, your own inner teachings appear, they are authentic to you, they can also be to others who are searching.

Once you kill the Buddha, you become the Buddha and then your freedom is real.
Then you are free! Killing the Buddha is not like hurting someone that can be hurt, it is just seeing concepts as concepts. You cannot hurt a real Buddha. That would be like hurting your soul and it can't be done.