Thread replies: 21
Thread images: 2
Thread images: 2
File: 97472088.jpg (116KB, 650x506px) Image search:
[Google]
116KB, 650x506px
What is the nature of desire in Buddhism?
I don’t even think that “desire” is the correct word to translate the concept:
1. “Dukkha, "incapable of satisfying,"[web 2] painful.[4][5] Life in this "mundane world,"[web 3] with its craving and clinging to impermanent states and things,[4] is dukkha,[3] unsatisfactory and painful;[web 2][4][5][6][18][web 3]
2. Samudaya, the origination or arising of dukkha. Dukkha, and repeated life in this world, arises with taṇhā, "thirst," craving for and clinging to these impermanent states and things. This craving and clinging produces karma which leads to renewed becoming, keeping us trapped in rebirth and renewed dissatisfaction;[note 4]
3. Nirodha, the cessation of dukkha. By stopping this craving and clinging nirvana is attained,[25] no more karma is produced, and rebirth and dissatisfaction will no longer arise again;[note 5]
4. Magga, the path to the cessation of, or liberation from dukkha. By following the Noble Eightfold Path, restraining oneself, cultivating discipline, and practicing mindfulness and meditation, craving and clinging will be stopped, and rebirth and dissatisfaction are ended.*
The word would be something like “thirst” then.
I ask this because it is inconceivable to me that Buddhism would really preach the extinction of all desires. You need to desire to achieve enlightenment; you need to desire the good of others; you need to desire to help others and make meaningful actions; you need to desire to better yourself as a person. You even need desire to move your body, to exercise, to do any day ordinary activity.
It seems to me that to work as physicist or mathematician or painter or writer can’t be seen as a bad life choice, as a choice that is filled with poisonous “desire”. As long as you don’t get attached to it, as long as you know that this too will fade away, as long as you do it for the sake of improving yourself, not simply to achieve fame and recognition, I don’t think that such professions are bad.
It seems to me that one can achieve enlightenment even by living an ordinary life, with a job, a wife, and living in an urban environment.
I would like to know the thoughts of people more learned in Buddhism about these questions.
*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Noble_Truths
>>
>>9346301
Read Bhikkhu Bodhi's The Noble Eightfold Path.
>>
File: sitting buddha high releif.jpg (91KB, 498x682px) Image search:
[Google]
91KB, 498x682px
>>9346312
thanks for the suggestion
>>
>>you need to desire the good of others;
>>you need to desire to help others and make meaningful actions
Wrong http://www.buddhasutra.com/files/ubhatobhaga_sutta.htm
>>
>>9346343
I want to know if this:
>>9346301
>It seems to me that to work as physicist or mathematician or painter or writer can’t be seen as a bad life choice, as a choice that is filled with poisonous “desire”. As long as you don’t get attached to it, as long as you know that this too will fade away, as long as you do it for the sake of improving yourself, not simply to achieve fame and recognition, I don’t think that such professions are bad.
>It seems to me that one can achieve enlightenment even by living an ordinary life, with a job, a wife, and living in an urban environment.
Is valid.
>>
>>9346343
>>Released both ways, released both ways,' it is said.
That's the point, to leave good AND evil
>>
Desire to become a writer or scientist stems from need to satisfy self, to self-actualize. Hence, it is a desire in "bad" meaning of the word and it is going to bring suffering anyway. MHO
>>
>>9346394
OP here.
That is what I fear.
>>
>>9346411
Yeah, they have built all the monasteries for a good reason
>>
>Tanha versus Chanda
Buddhism categorizes desires as either Tanha or Chanda.[22] Chanda literally means "impulse, excitement, will, desire for".[23]
Bahm states that Chanda is "desiring what, and no more than, will be attained", while Tanha is "desiring more than will be attained".[24] However, in early Buddhist texts, adds Bahm, the term Chanda includes anxieties and is ambiguous, wherein five kinds of Chanda are described, namely "to seek, to gain, to hoard, to spend and to enjoy".[25] In these early texts, the sense of the word Chanda is same as Tanha.[25]
Some writers such as Ajahn Sucitto explain Chanda as positive and non-pathological, asserting it to be distinct from negative and pathological Tanha.[26] Sucitto explains it with examples such as the desire to apply oneself to a positive action such as meditation.[26] In contrast, Rhys Davids and Stede state that Chanda, in Buddhist texts, has both positive and negative connotations; as a vice, for example, the Pali text associate Chanda with "lust, delight in the body" stating it to be a source of misery.[27]
Chanda, states Peter Harvey, can be either wholesome or unwholesome.[5]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ta%E1%B9%87h%C4%81
>>
>>9346301
Best Buddhism is Secular Buddhism:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secular_Buddhism
>>
Non-attachement does not mean that an individual should hole themselves up in a cave and crave nothing until they die.
Likewise Buddhism is not solely about the cessation of suffering through extinguishing desire. It is also about the dharma; the service to the entirety of creation. Look up the boddhisatva vow, the figure of Avalokistesvara, and compassion as a tenant in the religion.
Someone mentioned self-actualization as a manifestation of desire, and should thus be seen as an impediment on the path to liberation.
I don't think this is so. It is in the universe's best interest for sentient beings to realize themselves and actualize the best part of themselves, edifying the truth that engendered them, and from there exalt everything that lives.
Self-actualization is a necessary step on the path to enlightenment.
>>
>>9346587
>Someone mentioned self-actualization as a manifestation of desire, and should thus be seen as an impediment on the path to liberation.
>I don't think this is so. It is in the universe's best interest for sentient beings to realize themselves and actualize the best part of themselves, edifying the truth that engendered them, and from there exalt everything that lives.
>Self-actualization is a necessary step on the path to enlightenment.
amem, brother
>>
>>9346520
disgusting
>>
>>9346692
Why? The Buddha lived a long, long time ago. There is no reason to follow him or the lamas blindly. One needs to put the teachings to the test, and discard them if they fail. Karma and rebirth have zero evidence in their favor, so it is not wise to take them as fact.
>>
>>9346587
Mahayanafags pls go
>>
>>9346973
I don't know why someone would call themself a Buddhist if they don't think the Buddha was correct in his insight into reality. That's what makes him a buddha in the first place.
>>
>>9347220
Read the kalama sutra. He himself encouraged this kind of healthy questioning. There is a lot of things that are valuable for their own sake in buddhism without the old cultural credos of hinduism that were already old even before the time of the Buddha. He was a man of flesh and blood, like Socrates: you dont need to agree with everything he said as if he was divine.
>>
>>9347264
The point of 'testing for yourself' in the Kalama Sutta is so you can verify through your own experience that the Buddha was right in his analysis of existence. If you don't think his teachings on samsara were, in some sense, correct, why use his name to describe yourself?
>>
>>9347220
There is no buddhism. The ideal student of the Buddha would not call himself a buddhist.
>>
>>9346301
>This craving and clinging produces karma
No. All actions produce karma. Karma in Sanskrit means action. Even a single thought will produce karma and keep you bound in samsara. You think that you don't have countless lives worth of Karma waiting to be burnt?
Thread posts: 21
Thread images: 2
Thread images: 2