Rebirth? Reincarnation?

[kahljorn]

Classical debate between Classical buddhists who are so classy their class outclasses the class of the classy sirs with kaviar. I would tend to say rebirth, because most Buddhist "Philosophies" would tend to agree upon my tending. However, this tension is often resolved upon reading a certain parcel, call this parcel Golden Eggshell #1.
You see, it essentially says Sir Criesalot(Adavenianda or something) shall be reborn as a buddhist in another life. Why? I don't know. What crazy crazyness thought by the crazy regressed hypno potimus.
As for the rest, it seems to be outlined in general science, toaism and "Christianity". Rebirth is just the idea that things must die and go the fuck away for another to come and say, "Hi my name is joe". This would tend to outline my general marmaliads, small compilations of many, as though the galaxy were reborn all into the earths Cellular fibrosis, oft described as humanity, though considered by me to be nothing more than a cancer. A necessary cancer, for progressional regression marks energies wigity wam, sam.
So basically, does the individual soul and all it's "Karma" carry on to the next life? Or when we die, is it over, and our pieces are left behind to haunt the flow with such a devious passion those echoing our "Legacy" would be declared individual and loved, while merely passing on our conceptual embers. Is that form of rebirth the true form of Reincarnation, merely our conceptual path carved slowly through stony brains leeking their unsaturated energies of our words?
There is also a scripture about rebirth, stating life and death is like taking a lit candle, and lighting another candle. Even as the earlier lit candles burn out, new candles are being lit, and some are still burning. That is a conjecture on beheart of a half, could it be the flame. The flame, the flickering martyr of the flame?

[Helm]

The population of the planet has increased. Is this to say that the majority of people around are new souls? If we're all bound to the circle of karma then a new soul is just starting. Isn't the it possible if there's a start to the circle that there's also an end? Maybe some souls die.


As far as I'm concerned the flames will eat my soul along with my charred flesh. It will be released in a scream that will see me standing carving my own path in death, well after I have stopped being alive.

[kellychaos]

The population of the planet has increased. Is this to say that the majority of people around are new souls? If we're all bound to the circle of karma then a new soul is just starting. Isn't the it possible if there's a start to the circle that there's also an end? Maybe some souls die.



Doesn't that assume merely one planet, nay, one dimension? While I can see the wisdom of pragmatically believing what you can only see empirically, but I'd like to believe there's more "out there" than this. Who's to say that while our population is increasing that there isn't some other planet and/or dimension suffering some catastophic, violent end thus freeing up more souls?

[punkgrrrlie10]

Buddhists actually do think it ends eventually when your body is no longer connected to the material possessions which ties souls to the earth. That reincarnation is actually not a good thing b/c it means that you have yet to release all your desires and such which are earthly and that souls that life is torturous until you are able to release what is unnecessary and become enlightened. Those that are truly enlightened are no longer tortured and their souls are not reincarnated.

[kellychaos]

That sounds a lot more fair than the "one shot, you screw up, you'll burn in hell" deal Christians get. Seriously, though. Do you think that you've ever met anyone that has even come close to meeting that lofty status in your life?

[Perndog]

I say tie me to the earth as tightly as possible, let me enjoy my life and not deny myself one ounce of earthly pleasure. And if I get reincarnated afterward, so much the better, because then I'll be able to do it all again.

Buddhism places such an emphasis on detachment because it originated in a poor part of the world where life was just a matter of subsistence and suffering (as viewed in the eyes of Siddharta Gautama). Therefore, people didn't want to keep living the lives they had there, and would rather not exist. Buddhism should have no place in the mind of a person who is able to enjoy his life.

[ScruU2wice]

Seriously, If you can't remember something that happened in your past life (hypothetically), how can your conciencness exist? thats one of the reasons i believe in the after life, i mean when does you concienceness and memories end? What difference would it make if its not you memories your personality affecting the decisions mad in the past. its kinda hard to put what im asking in words.

ps. i can't spell concience :(

[Perndog]

Consciousness.

I always wondered about that, too. In the same line of thinking, if you get hit in the head and lose your memory, it would be as if your old consciousness died and you now have a new one. Was it really you that was alive then, if you don't even remember it?

[ScruU2wice]

Kinda like that but you have the able to recover your memory...
with reincarnation you have to start from scratch and learn everything over again which could alter your personality.
Moslty i just wonder that if my consciousness ever ended when i died then what exactly would my consciousness be? I kinda think that consciousness is the ability to know of my existence and make decisions now. When the consciouness ends you can't remember anything, and your consciousness doesn't matter.

[Big Papa Goat]

Buddhism places such an emphasis on detachment because it originated in a poor part of the world where life was just a matter of subsistence and suffering (as viewed in the eyes of Siddharta Gautama). Therefore, people didn't want to keep living the lives they had there, and would rather not exist. Buddhism should have no place in the mind of a person who is able to enjoy his life.
All ancient religions are like this, since all ancient soceities were very poor (I suppose Greek and especially Roman religions weren't but Greece and Rome were rich). India and China and that area were in pretty good shape compared to the rest of the world at the time Buddhism originated.

[FS]

Seriously, If you can't remember something that happened in your past life (hypothetically), how can your conciencness exist? thats one of the reasons i believe in the after life, i mean when does you concienceness and memories end? What difference would it make if its not you memories your personality affecting the decisions mad in the past. its kinda hard to put what im asking in words.

ps. i can't spell concience :(

That's only a valid question if you believe that everything about the brain being the seat of the mind is claptrap. When you're born, you start out with virtually nothing other than instinct. I say if the soul does exist, it's limited to a few basic personality traits and maybe even less than that.

[VinceZeb]

Most if not all religions focus on living more for the family/God than it does for material wealth. In Christanity's case, it is becuase God is the ultimate being in the existance of the universe and we should not let material man-made items/ideas interfear with our worship of Him.

On a side note, being a Buddhist has always struck me as being a part of the ultimate liberal religion. I mean, a rich guy goes out, sees a poor person, freaks out, runs to the mountains and then comes back "enlightened" with no proof whatsoever, spouts off some stuff to movitate more poor people not to do anything about being poor but to just wait till you die so you can get another shot at it. Seems kinda wussy to me. Except for the kung-fu guys, of course.

Edit: Forgive me. Buddha went into a forest and climbed a tree and sat.

[The One and Only...]

Nevermind.

[Ninjavenom]

Ah, karma. If it weren't for karma, i think i'd be a lot more cynical.

[kahljorn]

Most people misunderstand Karma from most of the things I've read about it. They think it's like some crazy force that goes around punishing your soul when it's evil. Everything I've come to understand about it, it's just "Cause and effect".

[Perndog]

Most if not all religions focus on living more for the family/God than it does for material wealth. In Christanity's case, it is becuase God is the ultimate being in the existance of the universe and we should not let material man-made items/ideas interfear with our worship of Him.

Or, in actuality, because the priests/rulers (if they weren't the same people, they at least shared a bed) wanted to keep all the money and power to themselves so they made it very easy for their followers to part with their money and to keep looking to the priests for guidance.

[kahljorn]

Those Mary Magdolin Motherfuckers.

[VinceZeb]

Yeah, Perndog, because Jesus Christ and the Apostles were walking around with king's robes on and staying at the finest inns. It was all because of the leaders that people were poor. You are 100% correct.

Take your piss-ass idiotic Satanist views and suck a tailpipe, you worthless piece of pig shit.

[Perndog]

Vinth, will you have my babies? :love

I'd argue, but this thread is about reincarnation, and I don't want to get too far off topic.

[punkgrrrlie10]

Yeah, Perndog, because Jesus Christ and the Apostles were walking around with king's robes on and staying at the finest inns. It was all because of the leaders that people were poor. You are 100% correct.

Take your piss-ass idiotic Satanist views and suck a tailpipe, you worthless piece of pig shit.

I think you are ignoring the entire reason for Martin Luther for tagging his grievances to the Catholic Church. People "buying" forgiveness from priests and the churches having all the power and money in Europe.

[Skulhedface]

Yeah, Perndog, because Jesus Christ and the Apostles were walking around with king's robes on and staying at the finest inns. It was all because of the leaders that people were poor. You are 100% correct.



So I want you to scream that, and VERY LOUDLY, the next time the collection plate gets passed around. I can even remember something I'd heard (I REFUSE to call it LEARNED) in Sunday School:

The poor man that only had $2 and gave it to church had a better chance of going to Heaven than the rich man who gave $2.

There is a clear cut case of "Give more money if you have it, and if you give it ALL, you go to Heaven!"

[kahljorn]

And with that note, I believe it is time for a little sing-a-long-tunes:

Back there when I was in seminary school, there was a person there who put forth the proposition, that you could petition the lord, with prayer. Petition the lord, with prayer. Petition the lord... with prayer. YOU CANNOT PETITION THE LORD, WITH PRAYER. Can you give me sanctuuuary, I must find a place to hide, a place for me to hide. Can you find me softer silo I can't make it, anymore, the man is at the door. Peppermint patties are chocolate candy, shampy and sax and a girl named sandy. There's only four ways to get unraveled, one is to sleep and the other is travel. One is a man up in the hill, one is to love your neighbor bill. His wife gets home. Catacombs, nursery bones, winter women throwing stones, carrying babies to the river. Streets and shoes, avenues, letter writers selling news. The monk bought lunch.

[Big Papa Goat]

Most if not all religions focus on living more for the family/God than it does for material wealth. In Christanity's case, it is becuase God is the ultimate being in the existance of the universe and we should not let material man-made items/ideas interfear with our worship of Him.

On a side note, being a Buddhist has always struck me as being a part of the ultimate liberal religion. I mean, a rich guy goes out, sees a poor person, freaks out, runs to the mountains and then comes back "enlightened" with no proof whatsoever, spouts off some stuff to movitate more poor people not to do anything about being poor but to just wait till you die so you can get another shot at it. Seems kinda wussy to me. Except for the kung-fu guys, of course.

Edit: Forgive me. Buddha went into a forest and climbed a tree and sat.
No proof of being enlightened? What proof do you want him to offer? And the thing about spouting things off to motivate the poor to not do anything about being poor but just wait to die, that is EXACTLY what the catholic church told peasents in medieval times. And since when are buddhists, paticularly the buddhist monkdom (I don't know if its called monkdom, but the guys in the orange robes anyway) rich?

[kahljorn]

They aren't rich at all, in fact most of them embrace begging as an actual profession. It's honorable and shit. I think the Dalia Lama has some goodies though.

THe thing about "Enlightenment" is now a days everyone is such a moron they say, "An enlightened person would not say they were enlightened because they are beyond physical bindings", while in just about every Sutta the buddha either SAID or DID SOMETHING(or whoever scribed that shit overexagerated hella lots) that was really pretentious and arrogant. I mean shit, he was known as the "World-reknowned one". :/

[Immortal Goat]

Ok, Vinth? I hope you are listening to this. You had said sarcastically that Jesus and the apostles wore the finest clothing to prove a point that the religious leaders of his day were NOT rich. Am I right?

Vinth: Yes, that is correct, you fucking liberal satan worshiper!

Ok, but in Jesus' day, he was NOT considered the typical "religious leader" for that very reason. MOST of the religious leaders DID have all the money and wealth. And in the MIddle Ages, it was WORSE!!! The bishops were the most corrupt people in the world at the time. It was either be poor and never argue and spend you money to buy your way out of Purgatory (which was just invented to get money anyway) or go to Hell (which was just invented to scare people into staying poor and obedient).

[Perndog]

I love how making a remark you know will upset the forum's biggest troll incites everyone that agrees with you to speak up. :)

EDIT: This isn't worth a whole new post for itself, but anyway: I tend to use "troll" to label anyone online who's outright antagonistic, not just someone looking to stir up trouble. That's what I meant; I know Vinth means what he says.

EDIT 2: Oh, and I don't just bait people either; if I wanted to do that, I could think of far more offensive things to say. ;)

[The_Rorschach]

Vince is an easy target, whether you're the first or the last of many, it takes little effort of intellegence to contest him.

In any case, I believe you're mistaken in calling him a troll. Regardless of his obvious hostility and belligerance, he seems to be wholely sincere.

[The_Rorschach]

Double post :(

[Brandon]

Nietzsche makes an interesing contrast of Buddhism and Christianity in The Antichrist. Even though he has disdain for all "religions of decadence," he nevertheless flatters Buddhist doctrine for it's positivistic, realistic nature:

"Buddhism does not promise but fulfills; Christianity promises everything but fulfills nothing."

[VinceZeb]

Yeah, you just got me back to talk to you, Pern. Man, you made me look bad.


I saw something stupid that you said, which is par for the course from you. I gave my piece and that is about all that needs to be said about it. I also wouldn't call me a troll... because I have seen a lot of the pictures that this message board posts of themselves and I haven't seen anyone that doesn't look like a McDonald's worker or a janitor on this board. I can see why you all spend so much time on it.

[Spectre X]

I also wouldn't call me a troll...

Of course you wouldn't you idiot, you're oblivious to the outside world.

Now, you go back to your little happy dream world where the Catholic Samurai roam the world free and beat the crap out of all those filthy rich buddhists :rolleyes

[VinceZeb]

Are you blabbing incoherently again, Spectre?

[pjalne]

I'm sorry about going off-topic on thi sone, but there are a couple of things I'd like to point out. First of all, Vince admitted he was wrong about something, which as far as I know is a first.

Edit: Forgive me. Buddha went into a forest and climbed a tree and sat.

Let's see if he can do it again:

I saw something stupid that you said, which is par for the course from you. I gave my piece and that is about all that needs to be said about it. I also wouldn't call me a troll... because I have seen a lot of the pictures that this message board posts of themselves and I haven't seen anyone that doesn't look like a McDonald's worker or a janitor on this board. I can see why you all spend so much time on it.

It amazes me that after we devoted an entire thread to defining what an internet troll is and using Vince, who joined in the discussion, as an example, he still doesn't know what a troll is.

[Spectre X]

Are you blabbing incoherently again, Spectre?

while to you it might sound incoherent, seeing as your, well, abominably weak mind can't handle grown-up talk. But, let me assure you, the vast majority of people who go to these forums are in fact able to read what I type, perfectly.

[pjalne]

On a serious note, I don't see what the point in reincarnation would be. If we are reborn, we don't remember it. It's obvious our personalities are shaped from genetics and our environment, so none of that is transferred into the new body either. What's left except some vague 'life force'?

[Vibecrewangel]

This thread made me giggle

Doesn't that assume merely one planet, nay, one dimension? While I can see the wisdom of pragmatically believing what you can only see empirically, but I'd like to believe there's more "out there" than this. Who's to say that while our population is increasing that there isn't some other planet and/or dimension suffering some catastophic, violent end thus freeing up more souls?

This is why I likes you so much!

Those that are truly enlightened are no longer tortured and their souls are not reincarnated.

But they can choose to come back and teach others to achive the same state.

Therefore, people didn't want to keep living the lives they had there, and would rather not exist. Buddhism should have no place in the mind of a person who is able to enjoy his life.

I disagree. I completely enjoy this life. I want to learn and take in all I can from it. When I am ready I will let go and will have the opportunity to come back and learn more from a different point of view. If I am lucky enough to become enlightened I will definately choose to come back and teach others. (This DOES NOT mean as a human teacher either) Just as I am sure many have taught me.

Seriously, If you can't remember something that happened in your past life (hypothetically), how can your conciencness exist?

You need to get past the view that conciousness is "human"

"enlightened" with no proof whatsoever
And proof of God? It's all faith. Don't knock others when you yourself follow the same type of concept.

"Buddhism does not promise but fulfills; Christianity promises everything but fulfills nothing."

I think that what Christ taught would also fulfill. Chirst, Mohamed, Buddha, (insert many others here)....all great men with great wisdom to impart. Sadly....it is those that come after that tend to corrupt what these people gave to the world.

[kahljorn]

Reincarnation is entirely "theoritical", so to speak, you know with "Theories" you are allowed to speculate and make outrageous variables with details so rich and deep they seem to make sense in some fashion. I could do that now. Instead, a psalm, of non-biclical proprtions:

One, two and everything
My first and last are nothing
For it to be one
It must be everything,
All must be individual
My karma is mine, as yours is yours
My rebirth is all of mine and mine befores
Multiple possession of a single moment
Possession and mine, that's not part of the line
As if my only anchor is made of Gold
Unswaying in the coarsest weather

Everything is Individual
What does this demonstrate
That epic universe, this pulsing existence
Words to define what no man can Divine
My chronology is everywhere, an inconstant fiber
Everything as one, destroying everything I've done
That's for another place, later and before
One and everything equals two
A co-existence of opposites?
A means to achieve?
Is this the enlightenment our soul seeks
Suicide of my regrowth, it's mine
Insert clots here
Could you imagine these colors
no more strive to live, just time to die.
Chronology all over again
the unchanged changed
The unmentionable stretched beyond mentions
Filing cabinets locked away
Oceans drowning under it's own weight
Now our final confusion will commence:

The everything, the one of everything
If he truly were the such
And his words were true and truer
and yet false and falsest
for the greater good, the greatest good
Mass illusion contours, an irony there
Perhaps a trick of words, a small corruption.
Then death of old conceptions rebirthing into new
The conception flowing with it's newest form
Flirting with destiny, collisions reinforced
A universal invention for man-kind
Everything being one, itself
No need for redundancy
The tide pulls me to mention
That the wind has stalled
but the scent still drifts
perhaps attempting to understand the ocean
so he could inherit the way of a fish

The Two, of course, is interchangable
It shares factors, and eats cheetahs
Just as one and everything
Can still hold hands in the depraved mind of eyes
Mostly I would tend to mention
That ignorant breath before you exhale
Inhale with control, but don't you ever understand
Just let it flow, stand still and watch
But destroy your intuitions
And forget your inspirations
Still in that first one of everything
But someday you will succeed to another one
Only the enlightened can know, only they can save?
A flash of nirvana, a man takes a bullet for his fellow man
Ungrateful liars of time; with cactus arms
Destroying material incarnation for all your love
But only the enlightened can know
Although all are to be free(as to me they appear to be)
Hide from your growth, stay in the shade
You may still be in that parade
Apart from the unwise, the one's who eternally bleed.



It's crappy but it stemmed from a conversation like this one...

[Perndog]

I've started to wonder..what do pagans think of all this? Of the few I know personally, it never occurred to me to ask them about their religion (because they don't seem to make as big a deal of it as Christians and Jews, except for holidays), so I never got their views on what happens after death. Anyone know?

[kahljorn]

Half of the pagans are morons, just like half the satanists are. They just want to fit into a religion. Other than that I believe pagan is just a way to say, "People outside of the Christian Church". Check the dictionary :) We had a brief encounter over this word not too long back

[Perndog]

So I'll clarify myself by including only those who are genuinely into their religion and that belong to various Neo-Pagan nature loving religions (generally, when someone who is not a fundie says pagan these days, it's understood to mean a member of one of these groups), otherwise known as white light mystics, Wiccans, druids, etc. etc.

You're right though - it's so hip and New Age to dabble in witchcraft, paganism, and Satanism. Fucking yuppie posers. >:

[Brandon]

I think that what Christ taught would also fulfill. Chirst, Mohamed, Buddha, (insert many others here)....all great men with great wisdom to impart. Sadly....it is those that come after that tend to corrupt what these people gave to the world.

Buddhism, for the most part, has stayed true to what the Buddha taught. Christianity, however, has been perverted beyond belief by the church founders. Quotes attributed to Jesus in the New Testament are vastly different in their philosophy than the sort of "Christianity" Paul propogated.

To quote Nietzsche again: "There was only one Christian, and he died on the cross."

[Vibecrewangel]

ArtificalB -

I agree, but since I am for lack of a better term a Buddhist, I try not to let that color my judgement when thinking of how teachings have been changed or misinterpeted or badly translated.
And I have unfortunately met several people who claim to be Buddhist but have no understanding of the philosophy past karma, reincarnation and enlightemnment.

[Skulhedface]

The most interesting secular theory I've heard on the subject is this:

Indirectly, we all come from the Earth. As time passes, your mother and father take the Earth into themselves by eating, absorbing the Earth. Then, after time passes, a baby comes into this world, from the Earth, but with your parents as the "middlemen", so to speak.

When you die, you get buried, cremated, whatever, but you do not disappear. Your consciousness ceases, but your body, nutrient ripe as it is, is absorbed back into the Earth, to continue to fertilize the land, sprouting food or feeding livestock, whatever the case...

It's one of the most farfetched theories I've heard, but oddly enough, I find it more believable and natural than stories about a spooky man in the sky with an attention whore complex.

Regarding the Bible in that respect... I won't rattle on about proof, after all, I agree, a little faith is good if you need it or if your life is lacking otherwise, more power to you. But doesn't anyone else find it quite odd that with all the AMAZING SUPERHERO TYPE STUFF that happened in the past, according to the Bible (rivers turning into blood, fire from the sky, etc.) that we don't see any of that shit nowadays? Or that, in the last documented 500 or 1,000 years, not one bush has SPONTANEOUSLY COMBUSTED?

Food for thought. But I'm still curious as to why God suddenly decided to give up around the turn of the first millenium. And moreover, why God suddenly had a massive change of heart between the OT and the NT. Did God create Prozac at that point?

[Perndog]

Plenty of people have witnessed miracles since Biblical times. The problem is, the Church grew up and started labeling people heretics when they said God talked to them. So anyone who was confronted by a burning bush after the time of the apostles got burned himself or went off to found his own religion (Islam being the only one that has flourished to this day).

[Brandon]

Food for thought. But I'm still curious as to why God suddenly decided to give up around the turn of the first millenium. And moreover, why God suddenly had a massive change of heart between the OT and the NT. Did God create Prozac at that point?

More interesting is how God's role so easily shifted from being merely a tribal deity to the supreme creator and god of all mankind. Smells like pure public relations to me.

[Jeanette X]

Brandon is back! :party WOOHOO! I thought you had vanished off the face of the earth.

[Skulhedface]

Plenty of people have witnessed miracles since Biblical times. The problem is, the Church grew up and started labeling people heretics when they said God talked to them. So anyone who was confronted by a burning bush after the time of the apostles got burned himself or went off to found his own religion (Islam being the only one that has flourished to this day).

People still hear voices and claim to talk to God. These people are called schizophrenics, or they're suffering from delusions of grandeur. Nice to see the 20th Century has ways of explaining it.

More interesting is how God's role so easily shifted from being merely a tribal deity to the supreme creator and god of all mankind. Smells like pure public relations to me.

:lol

[kahljorn]

I watched a documentary about how God/Angels were really Aliens, it explained a great many of the wonderous miracles.

WALKING ON WATER? Let's see, in the middle of a fucking desert, shiny sand surrounding you, suns out, what happens when the sun hits it? Flambingo, mirage.

MOSES PARTS THE SEAS OF CHEESE? THat was said to be like, anti-gravity thrusters gigantic thrusters on a ship blaring down or some shit.

HALOS AND BRIGHT LIGHTS SHINING UPON ALL TILL HOS ARE BLIIINDED? Put your head in between the person you're talking to and the sun. Contrary to popular belief, the sun hurts your eyes. I just saved so many poor abused eyeballs.

I can't think of anymore :\ There were alot of them, it was interesting to see. There was even some more scriptural things, even beyond the obvious(they came from the Heeeavens).
And you guys have an addiction with Christianity, it's funny to watch your attachments. hardy har, my name is yar.

[kellychaos]

Energy never disappears, it just takes another form. Comments?

[Helm]

Yeah, fuck you.

[kahljorn]

"Energy never disappears, it just takes another form. Comments?"

..Nebulas? Ra-diation?

[kellychaos]

Yeah, fuck you.

This lil guy is just soooo CUTE! :love