Monday, March 13, 2006

The Independent Man

The whole Buddhism is about understanding yourself. ( Buddha once defined yourself as the “world”, mainly because all the complexities in the universe is also there.) According to lord Buddha, the things you have done ( good or bad ) carries with you.
The good or bad will naturally reacts on you as the time goes on.

Therefore you, yourself has to understand what is good an what is bad and try to avoid doing bad ( sinful ) activities.

It is NOT because you are afraid of someone, not because you will be punished / questioned / watched by someone, it is because you know the consequences. So, you should be afraid of performing sinful activities. The difference I see here is if you are afraid of doing evil things because some one is watching you, you feel you feel insecure and you may afraid to think of your own. ( because there is a person looking at you. ) You feel you are lacking of the privacy you need. This will lead you to a stressful situation, especially when your master taught you something you should do but you are not willing to do so. In that case you feel guilty about yourself.

Eg:- What will happen to the astronomy if Catholics thought that criticizing the bible is a sin so we are not going beyond gods words on this area. So, in that situation you are bound by the culture and religion.

What Buddha taught is

"Rely not on the teacher/person, but on the teaching. Rely not on the words of the teaching, but on the spirit of the words. Rely not on theory, but on experience.Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. Do not believe anything because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything because it is written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and the benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it."

(Published in All About Buddhism blog)