Beginning of Life indicates the Wheel of Life

By Sona Kanti Barua

Wheel of Life

The wheel of life as portrayed in Tibetan art and Japanese art in the circle, the hog represents ignorance (Moha), the cock represents desire (raga) and snake represents aversion (dosa). Despite this recent progress, I think it exaggeration to say that Buddha’s Dependent Origination (Paticca Samuppada) theory of cause and effect and the Middle Way are still applicant to moral development of mankind and the very best universal theory.  It seems the comparison of the wheel of life with scientific outlook. Buddhism teaches that all compounded things come into being, presently exist and ceases dependent on conditions and causes.

Newsweek of May 7, 2001 published a cover story on “Science & the Spirit”. In this essay there are comments on Buddhism, ”Scientists are using brain imaging to pinpoint the circuits that are active when Tibetan Buddhists mediate.”…10

            According to Buddhism ignorance is the ultimate beginning of life.

This question so frequently put is ignorance manifest. To speak of a beginning where there is no entity is a sheer impossibility. A process can have to no beginning but as it is beginning constantly, have no end, but is ceasing constantly. Not to understand this is ignorance, and dependent on ignorance and raised karma-formations, which through processes of conscious grasping lead to rebirth in which is suffering.

Time and space are subject to change in Buddhism.

           

Time and Space according to Buddhist Rebirth perspective

There is a close relation between Buddhism and psychology. The subject is the impact of spiritual tradition on current psychological thought. The Buddhist systems or ideas explained about self, identity, personality and how these go beyond or can be interpreted in terms of current psychological concepts. Secondly, they look at the practical application such as research on Buddhist meditation, the value of contemporary therapeutic techniques and question of spiritual development and personal development.

            It is also remarkable that Radmila Moacanin explained concerning self and etc. in his book entitled “Jungian Psychology and Buddhism.”  11The approaches of Jung and the teachings of Buddhism have often been looked at together. The writer (R. Moacanin) examines archetypes, collective unconscious, the self, Jung’s  famous mandala experiences and the teachings of Buddha’s Eightfold (Middle ) Path and Tantric Buddhism. 

Buddhism asked what is self?  

Dr. Leonard C.D.C. Priestley professor, edited and wrote a book entitled “The Reality of the Indeterminate Self or Pudgalava Buddhism.” He explained in the page 54,”The pudgala, then, is a self which is indeterminate in the sense that it is neither the same as the dharmas by which it is identified nor separated from them.” 12

            The reality of self may be likened to asking how high is the mercury in a thermometer? There is a reply it depends upon temperature and where the thermometer is viewed. Nolan Pliny Jacobson clarifies the philosophy as he seeks to eliminate the confusion concerning the Buddhist view of what is concrete and ultimately real in the world.

            Jacobson explains the fundamental teaching of Buddhism : that life’s mysteries lie within the creative passing of momentary nows and that human suffering is caused by compulsive clinging to each moment as it passes. As part of this explanation, Jacobson explores the theory of no – theory held by Nagarjuna, the great exemplar of the second century’s one of the most remarkable scholar of Buddhist expression of Life.

            Focusing on the inner conflict between spontaneous and the abstract constructions of culture, he (Jacobson) demonstrates that Buddhism and Western process of Philosophy have developed a form of reason truer to authentic experience than the rationality traditionally dominant in Western philosophy. After discussion of Buddhism’s relationship to both: Western science and theology.13 (Tharpa Publicacations.p.30)

            The Heart Sutra is one of the most popular and well – known of Mahayana Buddhist scriptures. Belonging to the great part of the Perfection of Wisdom Sutras, it contains a very essence of heart of the Buddha’s teachings on emptiness (shunyata) the ultimate nature of reality and the methods to develop the wisdom that understands this ultimate nature. There is a detailed explanation of how to gain an initial understanding of emptiness, and how such an understanding can be used in conjunction with the sutra to overcome obstacles to both temporary and ultimate happiness.

             What we are is dependent upon conditions – the conditions which constitute our self. Description itself is not always reliable. Neither the revolutionists nor the Buddhists don’t recognize that God created world.

The Heart of Buddhist Wisdom:  Human life is made of 5 aggregates.

5 Aggregates in Buddhism

We live in the period of which is dominated by the amazing achievement in the field of science and technology. Every aspect of our daily life is permeated by science and what is today called the Scientific Method it was used over 2600 years ago by Lord Buddha. Human life is made of five aggregates. The Buddha explained five aggregates (1) Form or body is like a foam (2) feeling is like a water –bubble  (3) Perception or discriminate mentality is like a mirage (4) conditionings are like a banana tree and (5) Consciousness like a magic or illusion. There are several discourses of the Buddha on the five aggregates of attachment.16

What the Buddha taught is: (1) all things (life, time and space) are impermanent or in a flux (2) what is changing, it creates sufferings or feelings of discontent and (3) non – entity (Anatta): The teaching of Buddha does not proclaim that there is no individuality, no –self, but only that there is no permanent individuality, no unchanging self. So this individuality has no permanent existence, like a wave in ocean where is existent of self as a process, and in rolling on makes self and destroys self.17

 Conclusion:

To conclude, I see the task before us as one of identifying strategies of action to ensure to understand Buddhism and Science. In this effort, our attention should first be directed to the doctrinal base and historical experiences with Buddhism and Science have to bring about the attitudinal change in the minds of people.

I am grateful to Mr.Capra for his great book entitled the Tao of physics.  There are many interesting points in this book. I write this essay in following the book. How ever, writings of words and essay writing system are inter-related facts. Everything exists only the in fundamental dependence on everything else. That is why if we finally understand true nature ofourselves, we at the same time understands the true nature of everything. The great works of Japanese Buddhist scholars including Dogen, Kukai, Nichren, Shinran, Professor D. T. Suzuki, and Professor Hajime Nakamura indicated us how the perilous trend can be slowed down, if not reinvent the human at the species level altogether. Relating to reinvent the human nature should we suggest the Buddha’s enlightenment process to realize great compassion lies in humanistic transcendence.   “There is a question of how do we escape from our greed and corporate greed?”3

Science without religious morality spells destruction. Science plus religion like Buddhism without dogma can save the world. The Buddha appears here as the great teacher of the Middle Path (Buddhism). Mental developments illustrate the wisdom of the Buddha in insisting on sound ethical basis against an exclusive on mystic experience. 

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10 Newsweek,  May 7, 2001, p. 53.

11 Radmila Moacanin, Jungian Psychology and Buddhism, p. 123

12 Priestley, C.D.C. The Reality of the Indeterminate Self (Pudgalavada Buddhism),p.

13 Geshe Kelsang, Gyatso, The Heart Sutra, p.23

16 The Path Freedom, p. 258

17 Nyanatiloka, Buddhist Dictionary, p. 96

3 Berry, Thomas, The Great Works, p. 114