Buddhism is generally known as a religion, as the other religions like Christianity, Hinduism and Islam. (Buddhism is not a religion)
Is Buddhism really a religion like any other religion?
To answer this question, it is better to analyze the common characteristics of any religion and compare them with Buddhism.
Common characteristics of any religion
1. There are some commandments or rules for people to follow
2. Followers must go to the church or temple to worship regularly as per the regulations
3. There is a belief on some invisible driving force (or some more beliefs) for the followers to believe, without any argument
1. In Buddhism, are there any commandments or rules for people to follow? No.
2. Dose Buddhism force people to go to a temple regularly? No.
3. Does Buddhism have any belief for people to believe without arguing? No.
Load Buddha’s words,
“You shall believe my words not because they are my words unless you have analyzed them, studied them, practically experienced them, and found to be the truth.You have the freedom to argue against them. Finally, believe them only if they are found to be true and believable by every mean, without any doubt”.
If so, how can Buddhism be a Religion?·
Yes. The truth is ‘Buddhism is not a religion’.Since Buddhism is not a religion,any person following any religion is free to read this.
So, what is it?
Buddhism is the teaching, taught by Load Buddha.
Regarding what?
Buddhism is not a religion but is regarding the pain and sorrow all living beings suffer in this universe.
What is the basic meaning, the objective or the content of his teachings?
Buddhism is the path to Nibbana, the eternal happiness which is totally free of any pain and sorrow.
Is Buddhism useful only for those who have any pain or sorrow?
Exactly yes. But, every living been who lives in entire universe is suffering from pain and sorrow. So it is useful to everybody.
Do you mean that there is none in the universe is happy? Even the richest man in the world?
In fact, no one. Not a single living being is happy. They all have pain and sorrow.
How can I believe this?
See this carefully.·
Are you really living without any pain, sadness or sorrow? No you have all these sufferings. We all are suffering from some kind of a pain, physically and/or mentally. Aren’t we?· Just see,
how painful a childbirth is?
how many painful or sad situations you experience per day, per hour or per minute or second in your life?
can you be happy having a wealthy life in luxury house in a comfortable bed?
If so, why don’t you stay there forever?
won’t this comfort be changed into a pain within a short period?
And,
how painful the death will be?· So, can you really find any happiness in the entire life?
So why do we live? And why shouldn’t we die?
The death cannot stop your continuity. Once you die from the current life, your soul will reincarnate in a new body for the next life term. So again and again you get a life which is full of same kinds of pains and sorrows.
How can I believe that there is a reincarnation? Isn’t Buddhism also a belief like any other religion has?
Yes, today you may see this as just a belief, because you cannot see facts and evidence to understand that there is a reincarnation. Today, your mind doesn’t show you the places you lived in your past lives. It has all these memories well saved in it which you cannot simply see. But, if you develop and improve the capability of your mind, you would be able to send your mind back to the past to open those past memories and to read them. This was what Load Buddha did at the beginning.What do you mean by ‘developing the mind”?· Our mind is something like a very busy air port terminal. In one second, how many people are coming there? How many are staying there? How many are leaving. For how many reasons people are coming there? How many activities they are doing there? Your mind is also like that. It is very much busier than the world busiest air port terminal. In a fraction of a second, how many thoughts are flowing in and out? How many of them can you remember just after even a second? Sometimes, you cannot remember where you have kept your pen or the pair of spectacles, and you take hours to relocate it. This is how your mind works. If you want to recall something forgotten, what you should do is letting your mind to go back to the past to re-open the saved memory files and read them. To do that, you need to have some sort of control over the mind.· Your mind has a very strong memory which has a very big capacity.It has two sections1. conscious mind and2. subconscious mindThe conscious mind is the one who is always open with you. It stays on the surface of the mind to keep your consciousness for all your thinking activities. It can keep some memory records in it, about the things you do consciously. But sometimes you may feel that it is little to recall some of those memories from it. It works only when you are awake.The subconscious mind stays on the back of your mind. It is more efficient than the conscious mind. It can memorize every single movement you pass accurately. It can keep not only the memories of this current life term, but of all the life terms you have ever had, also, in it. It works even when you are sleeping and even when you are unconscious. This is the one which goes body to body you get life term to life term.So, developing your mind means culturing, controlling, managing, training and organizing your conscious mind in the way you want, and/or, not letting it to culture, control, manage, train and organize you, in the way it wants. Once you develop the mind, you will be able to send it to the past and see the whole story. Once you see everything, you will be able to understand that the reincarnation is there. That means, you will be able to open your subconscious mind recall all its memories running down to millions of years back.
Are there any specific techniques to develop our minds?
You need to give a lot of trainings to the mind.Your mind should be free form all other unwanted thoughts. Can you simply remove all those thoughts from your mind and maintain a blank mind?Once you remove one thing, another 100 thoughts will come in without your control.So, you must find out the roots for those unwanted thoughts.Those roots may be your family, your friends, your health, your enemies, your properties, your employers or employees, your business, your past secrets, your money, your favorites or any other thing bond to your mind.You can realize that almost all root causes are starting with the word ‘Your’. That means something belongs to you or related to you. If you have no belongings and no relationships, you can make your mind free from any unwanted thoughts.To do this, our Load Buddha left, his crown and the wealth as a king, his beautiful young wife, his one day old son, his kingdom, and everything he belongs and related to, behind, and just walked into the jungle with empty hand. He had no worries about his yesterday, his today or about his tomorrow. He had given up everything. Then he could make his mind free of unwanted thoughts. So he could drive his mind to where he wanted to achieve the enlightenment.So, you need to train your mind to give up all your belongings and relationships. Load Buddha had done this training during a very long time, during an uncountable number of past life terms.
To do this kind of sacrifice, you need to have a determination and a will to win or achieve your objective.
If there is a will, there is a way!!!
