What do Buddhists believe about God and the afterlife?

What is dust? There is organic dust, there is geological dust, primarily minerals....we know eventually we return to dust. What's the problem there? Max, you aren't going to raise any doubts in my mind and I'm not even sure that's what you want to do. When I find something that seems to be hard to understand....I put it on the shelf until it is revealed to me. Eventually , that still small voice spoken to my spirit or through another person of faith makes it apparent. That is where I put my trust. There are, I realize many atheist and agnostic blogs out there. That is the wisdom of this world and I don't bother going there.

 

@The Amazing Sam's Ego

I read now a little what's written in the Lotus Sutra and I was astonished to find a little mistake there. They say in this Sutra women have to be reincarnated as man to be able to find enlightenment. This is wrong. I remember I read some years ago the Shakyamuni Siddhartha Gautama (the historical Buddha), was once very clear when he was asked about the enlightenment of women. Women are on the same level as men. They are able to find directly enlightenment.

So you should perhaps take care to find a good teacher, if you have the feeling it is important for you to go this way. And I doubt about that the internet is a good place to try to let grow spiritual roots. And do not forget: The world is full of liars and very trickery. Alcohol, drugs, LSD and so on are for example not compatible with Buddhism. A Buddhist follows for sure the pañca-sīla :

• (1) abstaining from killing any living being,

• (2) from stealing,

• (3) from unlawful sexual intercourse,

• (4) from lying,

• (5) from the use of intoxicants

Oh … and by the way: Gods are not able to find enlightenment. Why? Gods are not able to suffer. So gods have to be reborn as human beings first, if they like to find spiritual enlightenment.

 

My intent is to find out your beliefs. The Bible can be interpreted in a wide variety of manners so I was curious about your interpretation.

 

Buddhists are not ascetics. Buddhism points out that life is full of suffering and that some suffering is from "want".


http://www.rickhanson.net/four-noble-truths-noble-truth-suffering/
The Noble Truth of Suffering
The first Noble Truth is that life contains inevitable, unavoidable suffering. (Some translators use the word, “stress,” to convey the broad meaning of the original word used by the Buddha in the Pali language: dukkha.)

This suffering encompasses the gross forms of pain, illness, and trauma we can all imagine, such as a broken leg, stomach flu, grappling with the devastation of a hurricane or the violent death of a loved one — or getting the diagnosis of a terminal disease.
It also includes milder but common forms of discomfort and distress, like long hours of work, feeling let down by partner, a headache, feeling frustrated, disappointed, hurt, inadequate, depressed, upset, etc.

And it includes the subtlest qualities of tension in the mind, restlessness, sense of contraction, preoccupation, unease, boredom, blahness, ennui, sense of being an isolated self, something missing in life, something just not fulfilling, etc.

What People Do with the Fact of Suffering
Because suffering is uncomfortable, we may suppress or minimize it in our own lives. And because it is unpleasant – and sometimes guilt-provoking – to see it in others, we sometimes turn away from it there, too.

We also live in a culture that tends to cast a veil over the everyday suffering of poverty, chronic illness, draining work conditions, aging, and dying while – oddly – pushing intense imagery of violence in everything from the evening news to
children’s TV. Simultaneously, our media present an endless parade of promises that you can avoid suffering through looking younger, upgrading your internet connection, drinking Bud Lite, getting Viagra, losing 10 pounds, etc.

It can almost make you feel like a failure for suffering!

 

"Buddhism itself says nothing about god." Precisely.

"Among the founders of religions the Buddha (if we are permitted to call him the founder of a religion in the popular sense of the term) was the only teacher who did not claim to be other than a human being, pure and simple. Other teachers were either God, or his incarnations in different forms, or inspired by him. The Buddha was not only a human being; he claimed no inspiration from any god or external power either. He attributed all his realization, attainments and achievements to human endeavour and human intelligence. A man and only a man can become a Buddha." short quote from What the Buddha Taught, p. 1, Walpola Rahula.

 

I heard there are different ideas of God in the different schools of Buddhism.

Schools of Buddhism are the various institutional and doctrinal divisions of Buddhism that have existed from ancient times up to the present. The classification and nature of various doctrinal, philosophical or cultural facets or schools of Buddhism is vague and has been interpreted in many different ways, often due to the sheer number (perhaps thousands) of different sects, subsects, movements, etc. that have made up or currently make up the whole of Buddhist traditions. The sectarian and conceptual divisions of Buddhist thought are part of the modern framework of Buddhist studies, as well as comparative religion in Asia.

From a largely English language standpoint, and to some extent in most of Western academia, Buddhism is separated into two groups at its foundation: Theravāda, literally "the Teaching of the Elders" or "the Ancient Teaching," and Mahāyāna, literally the "Great Vehicle." The most common classification among scholars is threefold, with Mahāyāna itself split between the traditional Mahāyāna teachings, and theVajrayāna teachings which emphasize esotericism.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schools_of_Buddhism


The Indo-Iranian group whose members composed the Zoroastrian scriptures, the Avesta, and the Hindu scriptures such as the Vedas, called themselves Aryans (Airya/Airyan in the Avesta and Arya/Aryan in the Vedas).

The Zoroastrian and Hindu scriptures are the only known ancient texts that contain references to Aryans. Of these two sources, the Avesta contains the preponderance of references to being Aryan, a concept central to the Avesta and Zoroastrian heritage.

The next contemporaneous references are in the inscriptions of the Achaemenian Persians (see Achaemenian History as well as our page on Naqsh-e Rustam), and classical Greek texts such as those of Herodotus and Strabo [Aria, Arioi, Ariane etc.], where the the references are exclusively regarding the Medes' and Persians'ancestry and their Central Asian connections.

https://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/aryans/index.htm


White Aryan Resistance (WAR) is a white supremacist neo-Nazi organization in the United States founded and led by former Ku Klux Klan Grand Dragon Tom Metzger. It is based in Warsaw, Indiana, and is incorporated as a business.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Aryan_Resistance


What a White Supremacist Told Me After Donald Trump Was Elected


https://www.newyorker.com/news/news...macist-told-me-after-donald-trump-was-elected


We find the prehistory of the Aryans recorded in the Zoroastrian scriptures, the Avesta (in particular the Zamyad Yasht 19), in Middle Persian texts, in the poet Ferdowsi's epic, the Shahnameh or Book of Kings, and in the Hindu Scriptures, the Vedas.

https://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/aryans/prehistory.htm



Solomon also called Jedidiah (Hebrew יְדִידְיָהּ‬ Yədidya), was, according to the Hebrew Bible,[3] Quran, Hadith and Hidden Words,[4] a [fabulously wealthy] and wise king of Israel who succeeded his father, King David.[5]The conventional dates of Solomon's reign are circa 970 to 931 BCE, normally given in alignment with the dates of David's reign. He is described as the third king of the United Monarchy, which would break apart into the northern Kingdom of Israel and the southern Kingdom of Judah shortly after his death. Following the split, his patrilineal descendants ruled over Judah alone.

According to the Talmud, Solomon is one of the 48 prophets.[6] In the Quran, he is considered a major prophet, and Muslimsgenerally refer to him by the Arabic variant Sulayman, son of David.

The Hebrew Bible credits him as the builder of the First Temple in Jerusalem,[5] beginning in the fourth year of his reign, using the vast wealth he had accumulated. He dedicated the temple to Yahweh, the God of Israel.[7] He is portrayed as great inwisdom, wealth and power beyond either of the previous kings of the country, but also as a king who sinned. His sins includedidolatry, marrying foreign women and, ultimately, turning away from Yahweh, and they led to the kingdom's being torn in two during the reign of his son Rehoboam.[8]

Solomon is the subject of many other later references and legends, most notably in the 1st-century apocryphal work known as the Testament of Solomon. In the New Testament, he is portrayed as a teacher of wisdom excelled by Jesus,[9] and as arrayed in glory, but excelled by "the lilies of the field".[10] In later years, in mostly non-biblical circles, Solomon also came to be known as amagician and an exorcist, with numerous amulets and medallion seals dating from the Hellenistic period invoking his name.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solomon


Is Shahnameh, Shah (meaning Ruler), King Solomon, son of King David? Or which could also mean, Solomon, illegitimate son to Bathsheba? Which would mean that Bathsheba was of the Persian side. Bathsheba, if she was of the Persian side, would have been from the line of Shem, son of Noah, more so than from the lines of Japheth or Ham, the sons of Noah.


Hosea:
4:17
"Ephraim is joined to idols: let him alone.
4:18
Their drink is sour: they have committed whoredom continually: her rulers with shame do love, Give ye.
4:19
The wind hath bound her up in her wings, and they shall be ashamed because of their sacrifices.
5:1
Hear ye this, O priests; and hearken, ye house of Israel; and give ye ear, O house of the king; for judgment is toward you, because ye have been a snare on Mizpah, and a net spread upon Tabor.
5:2
And the revolters are profound to make slaughter, though Ihave been a rebuker of them all.
5:3
I know Ephraim, and Israel is not hid from me: for now, O Ephraim, thou committest whoredom, and Israel is defiled.
5:4
They will not frame their doings to turn unto their God: for the spirit of whoredoms is in the midst of them, and they have not known the LORD.
5:5
And the pride of Israel doth testify to his face: therefore shall Israel and Ephraim fall in their iniquity; Judah also shall fall with them.
5:6
They shall go with their flocks and with their herds to seek the LORD; but they shall not find him; he hath withdrawn himself from them.
5:7
They have dealt treacherously against the LORD: for they have begotten strange children: now shall a month devour them with their portions.
5:8
Blow ye the cornet in Gibeah, and the trumpet in Ramah: cry aloud at Bethaven, after thee, O Benjamin.
5:9
Ephraim shall be desolate in the day of rebuke: among the tribes of Israel have I made known that which shall surely be.
5:10
The princes of Judah were like them that remove the bound:therefore I will pour out my wrath upon them like water.
5:11
Ephraim is oppressed and broken in judgment, because he willingly walked after the commandment.
5:12
Therefore will I be unto Ephraim as a moth, and to the house of Judah as rottenness.
5:13
When Ephraim saw his sickness, and Judah saw his wound, then went Ephraim to the Assyrian, and sent to king Jareb: yet could he not heal you, nor cure you of your wound.
5:14
For I will be unto Ephraim as a lion, and as a young lion to the house of Judah: I, even I, will tear and go away; I will take away, and none shall rescue him.
5:15
I will go and return to my place, till they acknowledge their offence, and seek my face: in their affliction they will seek me early.
6:1
Come, and let us return unto the LORD: for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up."



-


5:8-9;11
Blow ye the cornet in Gibeah, and the trumpet in Ramah: cry aloud at Bethaven, after thee, O Benjamin.
Ephraim shall be desolate in the day of rebuke: among the tribes of Israel have I made known that which shall surely be.
Ephraim is oppressed and broken in judgment, because he willingly walked after the commandment.

5:14-15
For I will be unto Ephraim as a lion, and as a young lion to the house of Judah: I, even I, will tear and go away; I will take away, and none shall rescue him.
I will go and return to my place, till they acknowledge their offence, and seek my face: in their affliction they will seek me early.

6:1
Come, and let us return unto the LORD: for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up."


- Where is the help to Ephraim? The Lion of Judah - Revelation 5:5 "And one of the elders saith unto me, Weep not: behold, the Lion of the tribe of Juda, the Root of David, hath prevailed to open the book, and to loose the seven seals thereof."

desires that Ephraim be saved.

5:14-6:1
For I will be unto Ephraim as a lion, and as a young lion to the house of Judah: I, even I, will tear and go away; I will take away, and none shall rescue him.
I will go and return to my place, till they acknowledge their offence, and seek my face: in their affliction they will seek me early.
Come, and let us return unto the LORD: for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up."


Acknowledge your offence and seek His face. And let us help them return unto the LORD: for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up.

 

I would be willing to share my interpretation and also to stand corrected by other Believers that know more than I. The Bible does say "scripture is not of a private interpretation". I believe as Jesus said, "the Holy Spirit will guide us in all truth."

 

Actually, you just formed your own interpretation by altering the quote.

"no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation". Quite a bit different.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2+Peter+1:19-21&version=KJV

 

You know Max.....in the particular home Bible Study I have participated in for years I think there are maybe two or three that have the same Bible. I do not have any problem with your interpretation but you seem to want to split hairs.I do not normally speak in King James English, but I have memorized scripture from that version. Sometimes it seems inconvenient when someone reads and you try to follow along, but I have found I am able to do it without too much trouble.NIV is what I most generally use. Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic are often more expansive languages than English. Most versions were painstakenly translated with honest intent. Their are other versions such as "the New World Translation" that vary significantly in key areas intentionally and to divert the truth. The idea is to glean the spirit behind the Word.

I have no problem with your addition of "no prophecy" from Timothy and I do not see how that offers any difference to the interpretation. In fact, I think the entire Word of God is of a Prophetic nature as it is spoken by God through men and women. I believe it is interesting just to study the Word "Word". Jesus is the Word. There is so much there to know. Usually I don't go to one of my many Bible sources to post a scripture. My feeling is if I haven't received a "rema" or (word embedded in my heart) I don't feel worthy of bringing it up. Perhaps if I have received something in King James, I quote it as though I would speak it to a neighbor or friend. I believe the spirit in the word is most important. Unless you are a lawyer, I think you would agree our Constitution should be viewed that way as well. If we get too "legalistic" we become like lawyers or the money changers that Jesus cleared from the Temple.

 

Dude, I didn't interpret it, I quoted it verbatim and included a link. You're the one that altered by meaning by carving up the sentence.

The link allows you to select different translations of the Bible. Which version were you quoting?

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2+Peter+1:20&version=NIV
Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet’s own interpretation of things.


https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2+Peter+1:20&version=TLB
For no prophecy recorded in Scripture was ever thought up by the prophet himself. It was the Holy Spirit within these godly men who gave them true messages from God.

 

You lost me at Dude.
2 Peter 1:20 New International Version (NIV)
20 Above all, you must understandA)" data-cr="#cen-NIV-30500A" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; vertical-align: top; top: 0px;"> that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet’s own interpretation of things.
I can cut and paste too. Your interpretation is no different. It's not the prophets interpretation, it's not your interpretation. Interpretation belongs to the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit and it is revealed to those that seek Him in Spirit and in Truth. I have not altered any meaning....it's you and legalism that wants to split hairs. I don't see the pro-noun "dude" as a sign of respect except maybe to a surfer who is looking for some "tasty waves". So I'll chalk this discussion off as "dishonest intent" on your part.

 

It's wrong what your wrote here. Only a hu"man" being is able to become a Buddha - but not only a "man". Also a woman (=human being) is able to become a Buddha. And it's also wrong that a Buddha needs no one else. The Shakyamuni asked an external authority, who was not he himself, whether he should start to teach what he found out. He asked with a bowl, which swam against the stream: this answer meant "yes".

 

Buddhists are seeking the way between all extremes. In the western world lots of people seek this way extremely.

Is it?

Suffering exists. To accept this is nearly impossible. That's why Siddhartha became Buddha. So the first of the four noble truths is not trivial. What do you do here in the internet if you will bring suddenly someone to the realization that this is not only an empty phrase? You are not even able to call an ambulance car here.

 

No worries. I'm sure anyone who cares can see the difference between quoting the full sentence and a snippet of it.

A dishonest person is one who obscures the truth. An honest person reveals it. On forums such as these it is always a challenge to determine if a person is dishonest or has some form of mental disorder which prevents them from seeing the truth. Dishonesty is a choice, but mental issues are not.

 

Yes, it is. But note that some suffering is from "want", not all. Disease, calamity and war can cause suffering.

You keep mentioning the First Noble truth, but neglect to mention the Second through Fourth? Why?

https://www.school-for-champions.com/religion/buddhism_four_noble_truths.htm
The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism are stated in simple terms as:

1. Suffering exists
2. Suffering arises from attachment to desires
3. Suffering ceases when attachment to desire ceases
4. Freedom from suffering is possible by practicing the Eightfold Path

 

you may be both.

 

Sane, honest and true Christians now it's a sin to bear false witness against others. Not only is it against the Ten Commandments and Christ's two commandments, but they know that many did the same against Jesus himself:

http://biblehub.com/mark/14-56.htm
Many testified falsely against him, but their statements did not agree.

http://biblehub.com/matthew/26-59.htm
The chief priests and the whole Sanhedrin were looking for false evidence against Jesus so that they could put him to death.

 

I always make the consideration that a word for "man" in the original language may be akin to the Greek "anthropos," and could be translated as mankind, including any and all human beings.

 

If this word in the original language, which we do not know, means "man" and not "human being" then this would change nothing too. I made this example only to make clear, where the mistake of the word "man" is in the English language. You often use the word "man" instead of the word "human being". The German and the Yiddish language use the word "Mensch" (spoken "mansh") in case of 'human being'.

 

I don't think that has very much bearing on my argument. My point is that there are people who will combine it with Christianity. I'm not arguing that that is a correct interpretation of Christianity (indeed, I believe Christianity is false altogether, so I don't really have a strong concept of a correct Christianity), just that such interpretations exist and that that gives some insight to the breadth of Buddhism.

 

You implied something about me and I turned it back that you may be guilty of the same. You know Max.....I know an awful lot of true believers and none of them cut and paste scripture, and use it as a club like you do. Please, I no longer feel like discussing with you. It is too "Pharisitic".