7 Issues the Buddha By no means Stated

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The historic Buddha stated many issues in his lengthy lifetime of instructing. However have you ever ever heard a supposed Buddha quote and puzzled, Did he actually say that? Monk Thanissaro Bhikkhu, a educated translator of the Buddha’s phrases, actually has. Right here he reveals seven of many he’s discovered. See for those who’re not stunned.

Buddha eyes.

Picture by David Gabriel Fischer.

1. “Life is struggling.”

This is without doubt one of the Huge Lies of Buddhism—a declare assumed to be true just because it’s repeated so typically—each in common books and tutorial books. The phrase “Life is struggling” is meant to be a abstract of the Buddha’s first noble fact, however the first noble fact merely lists the issues in life that represent struggling: “Start is tense, growing older is tense, demise is tense; sorrow, lamentation, ache, misery, & despair are tense; affiliation with the unbeloved is tense, separation from the beloved is tense, not getting what is needed is tense. In brief, the 5 clinging-aggregates are tense.” (Citation from Samyutta Nikaya, The Grouped Discourses of the Buddha, 56.11)

Life, you’ll discover, isn’t on the record.

The opposite noble truths go on to point out that there’s extra to life than simply struggling: There’s the origination of struggling, the cessation of struggling, and the trail of follow resulting in the cessation of struggling as nicely.

2. “Previous love is however a reminiscence. Future love is however a dream. Real love is within the right here and now.”

I noticed this on a card connected to the mirror within the lavatory of a house the place I used to be instructing as soon as. It’s so unrelated to something the Buddha stated that I do not know of what the unique inspiration may need been.

3. “There isn’t any self.”

That is the opposite Huge Lie. The one time the Buddha was requested point-blank if there may be or isn’t a self, he refused to reply (Samyutta Nikaya 44.10). In Majjhima Nikaya (the “Center-Size Discourses” of the Buddha) 2 he acknowledged that the views “I’ve a self” and “I’ve no self” are each a thicket of views that depart you caught in struggling. When the Buddha taught not-self (anatta) — versus no self — he was recommending a method for overcoming attachment, a means of slicing by the thoughts’s tendency to cling to issues by claiming them as “me” or “mine.”

The Buddha by no means stated that “There isn’t any separate self” both. He declined to get entangled within the problem of whether or not any form of self exists or doesn’t exist.

4. “All the things is impermanent.”
5. “Struggling comes from resisting change.”

These two misquotes are inclined to go collectively. If the whole lot adjustments, then the one means you can escape from struggling can be to simply accept that every one happiness is impermanent and cease attempting for something extra lasting than that. A reasonably depressing message.

Thankfully, the Buddha stated merely that every one fabricated issues are impermanent. Something perceived by the six senses is fabricated, within the sense that it’s formed by circumstances, each exterior and inner.

Nonetheless, there’s something unfabricated that you would be able to expertise, and that’s nirvana. (See the Majjhima Nikaya the “Center-Size Discourses” of the Buddha, 49, and the Samyutta Nikaya, the “Grouped Discourses of the Buddha,”43, for extra.)

Because the Buddha stated, nirvana is the final word happiness (Dhammapada 203)—free from change, free from demise, free from all limitations. That’s why he taught the trail: so that folks can discover an unconditioned happiness. If his message had been, “Hey, there’s no lasting happiness, so hand over serious about it,” it wouldn’t have lasted all these years.

As for the second misquote, the Buddha really stated that folks endure as a result of they determine with issues that change. When the thoughts is powerful sufficient that it doesn’t have to determine with something, that’s when there’s no extra struggling. On this level, see Samyutta Nikaya 22:1.

6. “If you wish to see an individual’s previous actions, have a look at his current situation. If you wish to see an individual’s future situation, have a look at his current actions.”

This concept turns karma into one thing very simplistic and deterministic. It’s what I name the “one karmic checking account” concept—the concept that your current situation exhibits the operating stability in your karmic account: the sum complete of all of your good actions, minus the sum complete of your dangerous actions, equals what you’re experiencing proper now.

As an alternative of a single checking account, the Buddha in contrast your previous karma to a discipline of seeds: Some seeds have already sprouted, some should not but able to sprout, and as for those which are able to sprout, those who get probably the most water with one of the best probability of flourishing. Which means, regardless that you possibly can’t return and alter the seeds you’ve already planted, you do have some management over which seeds you’re going to water. In different phrases, your current situation exhibits solely a sliver of your previous actions; your current actions affect the extent to which you’re going to endure over that sliver or not.

7. “A thousand candles will be lit by a single candle and but not diminish the primary candle’s gentle. Happiness isn’t diminished by being shared.”

This quote is common amongst individuals who write fund-raising brochures—regardless that they need your cash, and don’t essentially care about your happiness. It’s a pleasant sentiment, however there’s no report of it among the many Buddha’s phrases. The closest he will get to a sentiment like that is in Anguttara Nikaya (“The Numerical Discourses of the Buddha”) 10:177, the place he says that once you make benefit and dedicate it to your useless kinfolk, then even when these specific kinfolk should not in a spot — the realm of the hungry ghosts –- the place they’ll obtain that benefit, the benefit isn’t misplaced. Others amongst your useless kinfolk who’re in that state will partake of it—and you may be assured that no less than somebody amongst your kinfolk is there.

Not an appropriate quote for fund-raising brochures, however one thing price maintaining in thoughts.

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