Originally Posted by
NikolaiI
I chose the title because I thought it was inclusive enough to cover most topics... I used the word ontology but perhaps should have used theory and practice. There's an article called "The Range of Buddhist Ontology" by Kenneth Inada.. at
http://ccbs.ntu.edu.tw/FULLTEXT/JR-PHIL/inada4.htm, but it is kind of lengthy.
Buddhist logic is a little different from Western logic because it allows for the existence of paradox. Western logic generally has two possibilities; either something is, or it isn't. Buddhist logic has four: it is, it isn't, it is and is not, and it neither is, nor is not. In my life this comes second to things like practice, meditation, insight and so forth.
I've read the article although I don't think I understood it entirely. I think ontology is important because it justifies the practice. Why should one meditate the way a Buddhist does? What benefit does one obtain from doing this? Why is it effective?
There are many people who practice some form of meditation or mindfulness of the now, including Christians, Hindus, and a range of people who have no specific religious affiliation but could be called "spiritual", "intuitives", "mystics", or "psychics" among other things. They may each have a different ontology justifying their practices. Buddhists aren't the only ones who meditate.
Here are some questions:
1) Does Buddhism have a form of yoga, or physical discipline, associated with it? Meditation with the spine straight might be a kind of asana, but I suspect this physical practice is something peculiar to Hinduism. As the article says (page 264):
The same format is seen in the Vedaanta system. To wit, it postulated the empirical self (aatman) bound up in the changing world, but when its purity is uncovered by virtue of yogic discipline. the self can rise above the impurities to become the greater self (AAtman) and thereby identify itself within the total nature of things (Brahman). This approach certainly was a great spiritual insight; it captured the imagination of the Indians and has enabled the dominant Hindu philosophy to thrive so powerfully up to the present day.
I suspect yoga is irrelevant in Buddhist practice because of the denial of "the empirical self".
2) How does Buddhism view near-death experiences? This is from the linked text (page 265):
Even the Buddha denied life after death, the immortality of the soul, on the grounds that it would transgress and disregard the normal flow of existence. Thus, if immortality or permanence (eternality) is not to be experienced, then the concentration would have to be on the moment-to-moment existence. In this way, the great insight was not about permanent or eternal life, but on the microscopic behavior within momentary existence.
I've asked this in other threads, but reading Thich Nhat Hanh, he seems puzzled how one could love "nirvana", which he views as corresponding to the Christian "God" in Going Home. Those with a positive near-death experience tell of a sense of acceptance and love that does not seem to be part of the Buddhist tradition.
3) How does Buddhism view the origin of the universe? The article has the following quote from Buddhaghosa (page 273):
Becoming's wheel reveals no known beginning;
No maker, no experiencer there;
Void with a twelvefold voidness, and nowhere
It ever halts; for ever it is spinning.
Modern 21st century science has established that the universe originated out of nothing about 13.73 billion years ago. How does Buddhist ontology reconcile itself with this? I know one can say that this is not important and one should be concerned about removing suffering, but the ontology justifies the means used to remove the suffering.
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