There was once a Zen master who was asked by a samurai warrior to teach him the meaning of hell and heaven. When the master answered, I will never teach anything to anyone as violent and idiotic as you, the samurai became very angry, raised hid sword, and was about to stab the master. The master said to him, That is hell. Immediately, the samurai understood, threw down his sword in recognition, and bowed to the master with faith. Then the master said, That is heaven.Buddhist believe that there is hell and heaven unless they purify their dualistic negative habit into positive habit through practicing, and go from positive habit to no habit, which is fully enlightened, stainless Buddha-hood. Hell is created by the habit of negative conception and its projection, and heaven is created by positive phenomena. If one plants a bean, the result is not going to be a rice plant; if the seed is rice, the result must be rice. So, until dualistic minds habit is exhausted into fully enlightened Buddha-hood, Buddhists try not to be cause the sediment of habits which create hell, and try to develop and increase virtue in order to attain fully enlightened Buddha-hood. All are from mind. That is why Shantideva, the Indian Buddhist scholar of ancient times, said: The phenomena of hell are caused by sin (Negative karma) . Other than that, there is no hell that exists independently. Whenever ones own dualistic negative habit of sin is purified, there is no personal phenomena of hell. - From the book- Welcoming Flowers From The Cleansed Threshold Of Hope An answer to the popes criticism of Buddhism by Thinlay Norbu
Posted on: Sat, 22 Nov 2014 07:42:00 +0000
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