Did Dogen teach literal rebirth and karma?

https://www.facebook.com/groups/SotoZenGlobal/posts/10160528895910692/

 

See my replies (by Soh Wei Yu):


    Elliot Miller

     eonSprsodt4g54cul72m4a3uc028i87c0h9f0i1c2htf2a61a215540491h2 
    I don't mean to be quarrelsome here at all but I do have a concern with the bodhisattva path. The Buddha taught that enlightenment ended rebirth. The stream enterer has at the most 7 lives before parinirvana. The Buddha himself entered nirvana at the end of his life. So how can a bodhisattva who is aiming at enlightenment remain in samsara until it is empty if she gets enlightened and cuts off rebirth. Seems like a big problem.

    15 comments


    • Cynthia Wooten Wolfenbarger
    The Buddha didn't teach that.


    Into the Stream: A Study Guide on the First Stage of Awakening
    ACCESSTOINSIGHT.ORG
    Into the Stream: A Study Guide on the First Stage of Awakening
    Into the Stream: A Study Guide on the First Stage of Awakening


    • Elliot Miller
    Author
    Cynthia Wooten Wolfenbarger "The Pali Canon recognizes four levels of Awakening, the first of which is called stream entry. This gains its name from the fact that a person who has attained this level has entered the "stream" flowing inevitably to nibbana. He/she is guaranteed to achieve full awakening within seven lifetimes at most, and in the interim will not be reborn in any of the lower realms." - Thanissaro Bhikkhu


    Cynthia Wooten Wolfenbarger
    Elliot Miller this is not specifically taught in Soto Zen Buddhism, and in fact there is no belief in reincarnation that is required. We are already enlightened, we just need to realize that. And it can be a continual, iterative process. The Bodhisattva intentionally remains until all sentient beings are free. That is the intent, anyway.

    • Reply
    • 1h
    • Edited

    • Soh Wei Yu
    Cynthia Wooten Wolfenbarger Many Soto Zen Buddhists nowadays do not believe in rebirth as they are influenced by modern materialist views, however it is clear that Dogen took rebirth and karma quite literally.


    • Soh Wei Yu
    Astus shared:
    Dogen talks directly and indirectly about karma and rebirth. Some examples:
    In the Shobogenzo (tr. Nishijima-Cross, Numata edition):
    vol 1
    ch9, Keisei-sanshiki (p. 118), on the power of confession cleansing past karma
    ch10, Shoaku-makusa, the entire chapter about retribution and precepts
    ch12, Kesa-kudoku (p. 159), on the power of kesa/kashaya cleansing karma
    ch14, Sansuigyo (p. 221), different beings see in different ways
    vol 4
    ch90, Shizen-biku (p. 272), criticises Kongzi and Laozi for their ignorance of past lives
    ch84, Sanji-no-go, the whole chapter is about the karma in three times
    In the Eihei Koroku (tr. Leighton-Okumura):
    4.275 (p264); 5.383 (p340) fruit of past lives
    5.386 (p344) "If people who study Buddha Dharma have no genuine faith or true mindfulness, they will certainly dispense with and ignore [the law of] causality."
    6.437 (p392) denying karma is wrong view, zazen with wrong view is useless
    7.485 (p430); 7.517 (p460) 3 kinds of karma
    7.504 (p450) "Tathagatas never go beyond clarifying cause and effect"
    7.510 (p454) "Students of the way cannot dismiss cause and effect. If you discard cause and effect, you will ultimately deviate from practice-realization."
    7.524 (p466) rebirth of relatives by the merit of one's leaving home

  • ---------------------
     
    Shobogenzo:

    Venerable Kumaralabdha, the Nineteenth Ancestor in India, said:

    "We see both wholesome and unwholesome results in the three periods. Ordinary folks deny cause and effect when they see kind, fair-minded people suffer and die young, while violent and unjust people prosper into old age. Such ordinary folks say that neither crimes nor beneficial acts bring consequences. They do not realize that the consequences of our actions follow us for one hundred, one thousand, or ten thousand eons."
     
    We clearly know from this that Kumaralabdha does not deny cause and effect. But students today do not understand this. They do not revere or follow the ancient way. Calling themselves teachers of humans and devas, they are robbers of humans and devas—enemies of practitioners. Followers of the ancestral teaching should not instruct later generations to deny causation, because that is a crooked view, not the dharma of buddha ancestors. People fall into this crooked view because their studies are shallow.

    Nowadays, monks in China say, “Those of us who have received human bodies and encountered buddha dharma don’t remember even one or two past lives, but the wild fox on Mount Baizhang remembered as many as five hundred past lives. He did not become a fox because of past actions. Stopped at the entrance door by a golden chain [trapped by a limited view of enlightenment], he was transmigrating only in the animal realm.” Many who are regarded as great teachers talk like this, but such a view is not acceptable among buddha ancestors.

    In the realms of humans, foxes, and others, some may be born with the capacity to see past lives. Such a capacity may be the result of unwholesome action and not necessarily a seed of enlightenment. The World-Honored One has cautioned us in detail about such a point. Not to understand it reflects a lack of study. Regrettably, to know as many as one thousand or ten thousand lifetimes is not necessarily to understand buddha dharma. There are those outside the way who remember eighty thousand eons, but do not understand buddha dharma. Compared with such capacities, this fox who could recall five hundred lifetimes is not significant.

    The most serious mistake made by those who study Zen in China is to believe that a person who practices completely does not fall into cause and effect. What a pity! There have been an increasing number of those who deny cause and effect, even though they witness the Tathagata’s true dharma being transmitted from ancestor to ancestor. So, those who study the way should urgently clarify this teaching. The point of Baizhang’s words Do not ignore cause and effect is that we should not be ignorant of causation.

    Thus, the significance of practicing cause and realizing effect is clear. This is the way of buddhas and ancestors. Those who themselves have not yet clarified buddha dharma should not superficially explain it to humans and devas.

    Ancestor Nagarjuna said, “If you deny cause and effect in the worldly realm, as some people outside the way do, you negate this present life as well as future lives. If you deny cause and effect in the realm of practice, you reject the three treasures, the four noble truths, and the four fruits of shravakas.”

    Clearly know that those who deny cause and effect are outside the way, whether they are living a worldly or a renunciate life. They say that the present life is unreal and that their transient body is in this world, but that their true nature abides in enlightenment. They believe that their true nature is mind, and that mind and body are separate.

    There are also those who say that people return to the ocean of true nature when they die. Without having studied buddha dharma, they say that transmigration through birth and death ends and there are no future births after they return to the ocean of enlightenment. Those who hold this view of annihilation are outside the way. They are not buddha’s disciples even if they look like monks. They are indeed outside the buddha dharma. Because they deny cause and effect, they deny present and future lives. They deny causation because they have not studied with true teachers. Those who have studied deeply with true teachers should abandon mistaken views which deny causation. Have faith in and pay respect to the compassionate teaching of Ancestor Nagarjuna.


    • Cynthia Wooten Wolfenbarger
    Soh Wei Yu rebirth doesn't necessarily mean the same thing as reincarnation. It doesn't necessarily mean a direct one to one preservation of an individual personality or soul. Especially since Buddhism teaches no soul. Again, Zen Buddhism doesn't require you to believe anything.


    • Soh Wei Yu
    Cynthia Wooten Wolfenbarger Yes no learnt Buddhist in any of the three traditions (Theravada, Mahayana, Vajrayana) believe that a soul is reincarnated. But also, all three traditions do take rebirth and karma without soul quite literally. There is, conventionally speaking, past lives and karma. To reject these would constitute what Buddha calls "wrong view".
    It does not require a soul or agent however.
    “Empty phenomena ~ Nagarjuna
    All beings consist of causes and effects,
    In which there is no ‘sentient being’ at all.
    From phenomena which are exclusively empty,
    There arise only empty phenomena.
    All things are devoid of any ‘I’ or ‘mine’.
    Like a recitation, a candle, a mirror, a seal,
    A magnifying glass, a seed, sourness, or a sound,
    So also with the continuation of the aggregates —
    The wise should know they are not transferred.
    Nagarjuna
    The Heart of Dependent Origination, verse 4 & 5”
    Buddhaghosha:
    "Mere suffering is, not any sufferer is found
    The deeds exist, but no performer of the deeds:
    Nibbana is, but not the man that enters it,
    The path is, but no wanderer is to be seen."
    No doer of the deeds is found,
    No one who ever reaps their fruits,
    Empty phenomena roll on,
    This view alone is right and true.
    No god, no Brahma, may be called,
    The maker of this wheel of life,
    Empty phenomena roll on,
    Dependent on conditions all." Visuddhimagga XIX.


    • Soh Wei Yu
    In the ultimate sense, there do not even exist such things as
    mental states, i.e. stationary things. Feeling, perception,
    consciousness, etc., are in reality mere passing processes of feeling,
    perceiving, becoming conscious, etc., within which and outside of
    which no separate or permanent entity lies hidden.
    Thus a real understanding of the Buddha's doctrine of kamma and
    rebirth is possible only to one who has caught a glimpse of the
    egoless nature, or //anattata//, and of the conditionality, or
    //idappaccayata//, of all phenomena of existence. Therefore it is said
    in the //Visuddhimagga// (Chap. XIX):
    Everywhere, in all the realms of existence, the noble disciple
    sees only mental and corporeal phenomena kept going through the
    concatenation of causes and effects. No producer of the
    volitional act or kamma does he see apart from the kamma, no
    recipient of the kamma-result apart from the result. And he is
    well aware that wise men are using merely conventional language,
    when, with regard to a kammical act, they speak of a doer, or
    with regard to a kamma-result, they speak of the recipient of the
    result.
    No doer of the deeds is found,
    No one who ever reaps their fruits;
    Empty phenomena roll on:
    This only is the correct view.
    And while the deeds and their results
    Roll on and on, conditioned all,
    There is no first beginning found,
    Just as it is with seed and tree. ...
    No god, no Brahma, can be called
    The maker of this wheel of life:
    Empty phenomena roll on,
    Dependent on conditions all.
    In the //Milindapanha// the King asks Nagasena:
    "What is it, Venerable Sir, that will be reborn?"
    "A psycho-physical combination (//nama-rupa//), O King."
    "But how, Venerable Sir? Is it the same psycho-physical
    combination as this present one?"
    "No, O King. But the present psycho-physical combination produces
    kammically wholesome and unwholesome volitional activities, and
    through such kamma a new psycho-physical combination will be
    born."
    FUNDAMENTALS OF BUDDHISM
    ANGELFIRE.COM
    FUNDAMENTALS OF BUDDHISM
    FUNDAMENTALS OF BUDDHISM

    • Reply
    • Remove Preview
    • 45m

    • Cynthia Wooten Wolfenbarger
    Soh Wei Yu okay, so how does all of this relate to the original question about the Bodhisattva vow not making sense?


    • Soh Wei Yu
    Cynthia Wooten Wolfenbarger His question presumes that full enlightenment leads to the cessation of mindstream in parinirvana, so one cannot continue the Bodhisattva vow of helping beings after passing away from this life.
    I answered his query below.
    "In Mahayana sutras, Buddhas eventually rouse sravaka arahants from cessation to continue their path to Buddhahood, and Buddhas appear to enter parinirvana but actually continue to emanate and help suffering sentient beings as long as there is a single sentient being left in the universe. Their mindstreams do not actually cease, only delusions and afflictions cease.
    1st Bhumi [Mahayana stream entry] bodhisattvas do cut off the cause for rebirth in the lower realms and self-views like the sravaka stream entrant, and an 8th Bhumi bodhisattvas who has overcome all mental afflictions like a sravaka arahant do cut off uncontrolled cyclic rebirths, but it is not the same as the cessation of mindstream.
    It is a different understanding from Theravada which relies only on Pali canon suttas and the Sravakayana commentaries."














    • Adam Schwartz
    Who’s problem is it?


    • Dominick Fontana
    I've had the same thought. 🤔 I take, Buddha's, words to heart when he says, (roughly paraphrasing) "don't believe what I say, until, you've experienced it yourself".


    • Soh Wei Yu
    In Mahayana sutras, Buddhas eventually rouse sravaka arahants from cessation to continue their path to Buddhahood, and Buddhas appear to enter parinirvana but actually continue to emanate and help suffering sentient beings as long as there is a single sentient being left in the universe. Their mindstreams do not actually cease, only delusions and afflictions cease.
    1st Bhumi [Mahayana stream entry] bodhisattvas do cut off the cause for rebirth in the lower realms and self-views like the sravaka stream entrant, and an 8th Bhumi bodhisattvas who has overcome all mental afflictions like a sravaka arahant do cut off uncontrolled cyclic rebirths, but it is not the same as the cessation of mindstream.
    It is a different understanding from Theravada which relies only on Pali canon suttas and the Sravakayana commentaries.

  • Reply
  • 1h
  • Edited

Labels: , 0 comments | | edit post