Quotes About Buddhism

Mah?y?na Buddhism arose in India around the first century C.E. It can be classified into three periods: early, or dynamic (1st century C.E. to 4th century C.E.), middle, or scholastic (4th–mid-7th century), and late, or esoteric (mid-7th–early 13th century).

Though we have translated deva as "god" and "deity," there is a vast difference between Indian gods and the modern Judeo-Christian idea of a deity. The Buddhist being that is closest to the Judeo-Christian notion of God is the Buddha. We cannot, though, in the narrowest sense of the word, call the Buddha a god.

We have seen how the Buddhist conception of the universe underwent numerous changes over time. If we view those shifts as changing responses to the problem of human suffering, we can see a steady progression in one direction: Buddhists gradually ceased to regard life as suffering.

Here we seem to have arrived at the terminus of Buddhist cosmology as a practical philosophy. It is a point all ancient views of the universe have finally reached. As knowledge is disseminated in ever-greater amounts, people have sought out the rational and overturned old dogmas.

Buddhism divides living beings into five types: gods ( deva ), human beings ( manusya ), animals ( tiryañc ), spirits of the dead ( pert ), and inhabitants of the hells ( naraka ). These states of existence, among which living beings transmigrate (are reborn) depending on their karma, are called the five or six paths (see figure 14).

It is a common pattern in Asian religions that hells below complement heavens above. In Buddhism, just as there are many hells, there are countless numbers of devas , and a multitude of heavens, summarized in figure 17.

Karma functions automatically, without the need of some kind of godlike arbitrator. Meritorious acts give rise to good results, and evil causes adverse results. This is a law analogous to natural law. Each person receives upon him- or herself that retribution or rewards for his or her own acts. That is why Buddhist texts do not say "to be punished" or "to be thrown into hell," as though a god were the agent, but rather "to receive retribution" and "to fall into hell.

The idea of transmigration hardly appears in the Hindu ?g Veda (12th–8th century B.C.E.), though by the time the new religious movements arose in the sixth to fifth centuries B.C.E., most of the important ones included a philosophy of transmigration, outstanding examples being Buddhism, Jainism, and the religion of the ?j?vikas. We also find the idea in Brahmanism in the new literature called the Upani?ads .

All phenomena are empty.

I believe in Buddhism. Not every aspect, but most of it. So I take bits and pieces.

Buddhism suits me 'cuz nobody's in charge. Nobody's decidin' for me if I'm good or bad, goin' to heaven or hell. It's just me workin' on my head, you workin' your head, the friggin' Dalai Lama workin' on his head.

The unspoken conspiracy of all religions—and the Buddhism of Zen Buddhism is not an exception—is their seemingly irresistable inclination to make metaphysical what is not so, and then to organize into complexity what is inherently simple.

I have been following Buddhism since 11 years now. I love the sound of chanting.

Ah-rah-han, the first Buddhist apostle of Burma, under the patronage of King Anan-ra-tha-men-zan, disseminated the doctrines of atheism and taught his disciples to pant after annihilation as the supreme good.

The coolness of Buddhism isn't indifference but the distance one gains on emotions, the quiet place from which to regard the turbulence. From far away you see the pattern, the connections, and the thing as whole, see all the islands and the routes between them. Up close it all dissolves into texture and incoherence and immersion, like a face going out of focus just before a kiss.

Buddhism takes change as a given and suffering as the inevitable consequence of attachment and then asks what you are going to do about it. Suffering, though, is not the most accurate translation of the Pali word dukkha. Dukkha means sky, ether, or hole, particularly an axle hole. Sukkha was a good axle hole for a wheel, while dukkha was a poor one, one that made the wheel wobble and bump, jolting the load. It could be translated as discord or disturbance, the antithesis of harmony or serenity.

The coolness of Buddhism isn't indifference but the distance one gains on emotions, the quiet place from which to regard the turbulence. From far away you see the pattern, the connections, and the thing as a whole, see all the islands and

And I shall not be concerned at all with other religions such as Buddhism or Confucianism. Indeed, there is something to be said for treating these not as religions at all but as ethical systems or philosophies of life.

Confucianism and Taoism were native to China, but its third religion, Buddhism, was an import from India.

The Buddha did not deny the gods, therefore, but believed that the ultimate Reality of nirvana was higher than the gods. When Buddhists experience bliss or a sense of transcendence in meditation, they do not believe that this results from contact with a supernatural being. Such states are natural to humanity; they can be attained by anybody who lives in the correct way and learns the techniques of Yoga. Instead of relying on a god, therefore, the Buddha urged his disciples to save themselves.

There are some Buddhist philosophers (a branch referred to as Zen) who say that sometimes a bad thing happens to prevent a worse thing happening

The Dalai Lama once said that 'If science proves some belief of Buddhism wrong, then Buddhism will have to change!' This is a great thought! And great thoughts belong to great men only!

I turned into a monk when my mother went to learn Buddhism in Burma. While she learnt at the monastery, I used to roam around with a begging bowl and ask for food.

I try to make sure that the Buddhism is more or less implicit in the music rather than explicit