--- In [email protected], "coulsong2001" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
> --- In [email protected], TurquoiseB <no_reply@>
> wrote:
> >
> > While what you say below about the "indeterminable questions"
> > is true, Geoff, I have a very different theory as to why
> > the Buddha chose to fit certain things into that category.
> > It has nothing whatsoever to do with "category errors."
> > It's because thinking about them is a total waste of time.
> > Nothing would be gained from knowing the answer. :-)
>
> Except that your argument seems to be that something would
> indeed be gained from knowing the answer - that it would tend
> towards a world view that avoided some of the negative aspects
> of the Hindu world view as you see them and supported some of
> the positive aspects of the Buddhist world view as you see them. :-
That is not inconsistent with such things being
a total waste of time. :-)
> > That said, you are welcome to your opinion as to what the
> > Buddha said about whether the universe was ever created
> > or not (which is the main point I'm homing in on, *not*
> > whether it is eternal in the sense of lasting forever into
> > the future).
>
> ('Eternal' in this context means that the universe will
> last forever into the future AND that there never was a
> start to it.)
>
> > I base my belief on what I have been told by
> > real, live teachers of Buddhism from several different
> > sects -- Japanese, Tibetan, and Chinese. All were agreed
> > on a cosmology in which there was never a start to creation.
> > That's the thing that I think most distinguishes the mythos
> > of Buddhism from almost any other philosophy or study. It
> > creates a very, very different set of assumptions than
> > believing that there *was* a start to creation and that
> > creation has flowed linearly since that start.
> >
> > Your mileage may vary...sounds as if it has. Believe
> > whatever you want.
>
> Thanks!
>
> > I tend to believe the real-life teachers
> > I've met and worked with. If you have heard differently from
> > the real-life teachers with whom you have personally studied
> > Buddhism, I'd love to hear who they were and what they thought
> > about this matter.
>
> I got interested in this initially on a course I did (actually I
> just sat in on the lectures :-)) at Columbia University, New York,
> that was run by a prominent Buddhist called Robert Thurman. As I
> remember it (I could be wrong though as it was a few years back)
> he took the category error view.
That is his right. I tend towards the pragmatic view.
> > If, on the other hand, you're just looking
> > for a pissing contest based on something you read on a website
> > somewhere, look elsewhere. :-)
>
> I was looking for a discussion on the nature of the
> indeterminate questions rather than on the specific
> questions themselves. As you say, your view is that
> thinking about them is a total waste of time (this,
> apparently, is indeed a common view in Buddhist traditions).
Yup. And the "waste of time" part is primarily in
terms of, "Would knowing the answer to this question
reduce suffering in myself or in others?" It's purely
pragmatic. There are, obviously, various schools of
thought as to why Buddha avoided dealing with certain
questions. Another possibility is that he just didn't
have a clue. :-)
> And yet you have obviously thought about this one at
> least and come to a specific conclusion. :-)
I've come to a hypothesis I *like*. I don't know any
more than anyone else whether there was actually a start
to creation. Intuitively, the idea that there was *not*
one seems to resonate better with me than the idea
that there was. What I *like* about having heard, from
a number of Buddhist sources, that they *didn't* have
any particular creation myth because they didn't think
there actually *was* a creation, was how *liberating*
such a notion was, and how many linearity hangups were
avoided as a result.
It's *all* hypothetical, and thus the opposite of
pragmatic, but I just loved finding a philosophy that
deals with the age-old questions of How Things Started
and Who/What Started Them by taking one step back and
asking, "Who said it ever started?" :-)
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