Sunday, December 6, 2009

All kinds of people in this imperfect world!




Question : (Unedited)
Hi,
Wisdom or transcendental intelligence is the sustaning principle of enlightenment.Without it,ignorance will have the chance to rise again.
My question is,
1)How can our wisdom be of permanent nature(as stated in Lankavatra Sutra,Chapter XII and countless more.).
~Personally,I just dont see how this is possible because:
1.)our memory is just undependable.eg.I understand some Math formula and after some time,I cant recall it anymore.If I can forget Math so easily,Why is Wisdom not forgettable like Math?

Thanks.

My comment:

Hi,

Thank you for asking me.

The sutra is from the Mahayana tradition. I follow the Theravada tradition. We can discuss the topic "wisdom" without referring to whatever text. You are right to say that we cannot have permanent wisdom. Whatever you may read, the Buddha advised us to analyze whether it is true or not. If not true or beneficial, then we don't have to follow. If we have permanent wisdom, it means we are enlightened. If we are not enlightened then we can try to be wiser by practising the teachings of the Buddha. The more we reduce our greed, hatred and delusion, the wiser we become. That's all.

Smile from justinchoo :-)

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Follow-up question by this "very angry person".

Question:(Unedited)

Hi again,
You have not answered my question at all.I ask Why wisdom is not forgetable like Math formula?That's all.I do not need you to tell me how to acquire it and why it is needed etc.Futhermore ,What I wanted is reason and not just mere statement that wisdom is permanent.I ask this question eventhough many sutra state that wisdom is permanent.I dont even trust sutra's statement,what do you think about your mere statement.I just want to reclarify that what i wanted is reason not statement.
Futhermore,your answer is very unconsistent.At first,you say that wisdom is not permanent ,then you said wisdom is permanent.Without any reason you said all this thing.How am I to digest your words regardless of it's validity.
I deeply appreciated your help very much and I am sorry for my very direct style of language.I just state about my opinion.
Thanks

My comment:
Hi again,

I have tried my best to provide my comments. I said I agreed with your comment that we (normal worldlings) cannot have permanent wisdom because if we have permanent wisdom we will have attained enlightenment.

Please don't get upset with my comments. You can always ask others and find better answers. I don't claim to be perfect and I don't guarantee complete satisfaction. Have peace.

3 comments:

stephen said...

Hi Justin, this is off topic, but this is to thank you for your reply to my question.
Can I then surmise that wealthy and successful people have collected more good than evil energy and thats why they are living better lives than people born to suffering? Why then are some of them corrupt and cruel?Haven't their past lives given them a more benevolent outlook towards reaching nirvana?
We keep seeing crooked well to do politicians and rich individuals almost everyday in our lives.

Justin Choo said...

Stephen,

Please ask this question as a "follow-up" question at Allexperts and I shall give you a more detailed answer.

Here I shall give a short reply. Kamma works in a very complicated way that we have no way to know when the good or the bad results will appear. This is the danger of existence; when things are good, we forget to behave ourselves because of our weakness to temptation and desires and greed. The rich and famous may have a good life for now, but their lives are not ended yet. It is just just like a book, we only know one of the chapters, the ending is yet to come.

A true Malaysian said...

Justin,

It is quite common for some people, Buddhist or not, to expect answers that they have in mind when asking question. If the answer is not what they expected, they can get very upset and .....

Buddhism is not like Abrahamic religions (where there are holy books which they regard as derived from their Gods), there are no absolute answer to many aspect of life, like rebirth and kamma. Even among monks,within or without traditions like Thevarada and Mahayana, their views can be very different. It's all depend on each individual's wisdom to accept Buddha's teachings, which over the years, subject to diverse interpretations to suit with their own egos.

That is the reason why, though the word "enlightenment" seems simple, but to achieve the state is not a simple matter.

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