Understanding the Essence of Buddhism
Uploaded by spootyhead on Mar 05, 2007
Understanding the Essence of Buddhism
How can we begin to understand such a diverse and ancient religion? The width of Buddhism is immense. It is a religion without any written rules. Buddhism is based on self-discovery. Buddhists are born with the quest to find their true form. They believe that they are prisoners of the physical plain until they reach nirvana. Nirvana is the ultimate goal for a Buddhist. It is the state that saves them from all suffering and evil. They believe that only nirvana can remove them from the never-ending circle of life. The same circle that puts them back in a world of suffering and pain. The very thing they want to escape from.
Buddhists must conquer the mind before they could ever reach nirvana. The mind is full of lust and greed. A Buddhist eradicates temptations like greed and lust by rejecting the source of evil. They live independently from most of the luxuries required by westerners. They rely mainly on the basic necessities of life. By removing temptation, they gain more control of the mind.
Buddhists are very spiritual about their surroundings. They cherish all living things. They would remove all living organism with such care before an area is used for construction. Reducing the suffering of others provides a meaning to their lives. They believe that all things have the right to live. By doing good things they ease the mind from all the suffering around them. We cannot remove suffering. We can only reduce it. By controlling the mind, we control most of the suffering we create ourselves. We are neurotic beings that strive on suffering. Most people do not control their suffering. The suffering controls them.
Most religions believe in different dogmas. A dogma is an informed idea of what the gods look like. We can never be absolutely sure what God really looks like. Still, we believe in it so strongly that we would start wars over the different dogmas. The Buddhist outsmarted the rest of the crowd by being the individual. They do not believe a god. A major misconception is where people think they worship Buddha. They only believe that the ideas of the first Buddha would lead them to nirvana. The first known Buddha was Gautama Siddharta. He was the first one to teach others the way of a Buddhist. Unfortunately his...