4-“Explain the Buddhist attitude to the Indian Ideals.” (not yet).doc

8/10/2019 4-Explain the Buddhist attitude to the Indian Ideals. (not yet).doc

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Explain the Buddhist attitude to the Indian Ideals.

The Indian word for ideal ispurua artha(human ideals). There are four idealsthat Indian

people were trying to follow: Dharma(virtue),Artha(wealth),Kma(sense pleasure), andMoka

(liberation). There is another ideal called Praj (wisdom). These ideals are understood and

explained in different ways by the different religions.

Dharma(Virtue) as understood in Brahmanism is not meant by ainism and Buddhism. It

is meant by Brahmanism that the virtuous person who offers sacrifices. That is the true nature of

Brhmaa: to accept the Vedicreligion and to please !od by offering the sacrifices. It is the dharma.

But, according to Buddhism, it is totally against the virtuous person. Buddhism does not believe in

the existence of the !od creator, universal soul, and the value of sacrifice. ainism also has different

understanding of dharma. "ccording to ainism, you must be free from violating human life. #hile

preaching non$violence, it cannot accept the value of sacrifice. Buddhism also teaches not to harm

other%s life& so it also cannot accept the value of sacrifice. Thus, what is dharmain Brahmanism is

adharmain both ainism and Buddhism.

Artha (wealth) is praised in Siglovda Sutta. 'ou have to divide what you earned into

four: consume one portion& two portions should be invested for your future enterprise& and the

fourth portion is to be saved for the difficult times. The Indian aterialists emphasied only two

values& arthaand kma. 'ou must earn the wealth to en*oy your life. They did not give much praise

to dharma. They did not believe in future birth. +ife comes to the end with death. ince we are only

in this life, we should en*oy life. But, other religious teachers believed in the existence of future

life.

Kma(sense pleasure)has place in ainism and Buddhism. "s long as Buddhism accepts

the existence of the laity, it does not re*ect the value of kma. The laity as husband and wife needssense pleasure. The Buddha blessed the birth of infants. -e did not condemn kmabut not valued it

as much as rva/as did. "mong the five precepts, the third one is kmesu micchcr. The sexual

misconduct was re*ected. But, you can en*oy life. ome people came to the Buddha said, 0I have

en*oyed my life very well. 1lease preach a 2octrine for me to be happy in this life and be better in

the next life.3 The Buddha did not re*ect their re4uest. Therefore, there is a place for sense pleasure

in Buddhism but not to the same extent as Indian aterialists taught. The sexual misconduct was

discouraged and condemned. ainism was also similar to Buddhism regarding kma. #ithout the

laity, there cannot be any religion. "s Siglovda Suttarevealed, one of the duties of the lay is to

loo/ after mon/s and nuns. The religious teachers depended on the support of lay people. In the

DasadhammSutta (AN), there are ten points that the mon/s and nuns are expected to rememberalways. 5ne of them is thus: 0y living is dependent on others.3

Buddhism did not accept the Indian ideals as understood by other religions. Buddhism had

a different interpretation. You have to show how Buddhism differsand why Buddhism differs

from other religions. Buddhism had its own philosophy. It does not accept the creator and the

existence of the soul& it accepts the future birth and the value of virtues. Therefore, while there are

four or five ideals, Buddhism has its own interpretation.

Moka(lieration)fromsasrais understood by Indian aterialism as death. 2eath itself

is liberation because they did not accept the existence of future life whereas most of the religions

accepted the existence of the future life. But, each religion differs from each other to explain howthe process goes on and what leads to the future birth. 'ou can read the 6arada%s boo/ (The

Buddha and is Teachings) to see the explanation of Buddhism. ainism has a different

interpretation of how the rebirth ta/es place. It believes in the existence of soul that will be reborn.


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Buddhism has the path /nown as the threefold training (Tisikkh) to attain liberation:sla! samdhi,

and"a. It is under thesamdhiand"athat you get all forms of meditation. 7irstly, you should

be virtuous. Then you follow the certain types of meditation to purify your mind. But, the

purification of the mind is not completed unless you see the reality of the world. Then, under

vi"assan or "a, you have to /now three things: everything is impermanent and changing

(anicca)& everything is sub*ected to suffering (dukkha)& and there is no soul (anatta). The last one isthe most important Buddhist teaching which other religions have not taught. 8nder Brahmanism,

ainism, and *iva/ism, it is believed that there is a soul. But, Buddhism says that there is no soul in

this world or in the other world& there is no soul even in ni##na. 8ndersamdhiyou cannot have

full understanding of this important teaching (anatta). 5nly by vi"assanmeditation you can fully

understand the reality.

"ccording to Buddhism,pa (wisdom)would be the understanding of vi"assan. In the

Brahmanism, it is to /now the nature of soul. 7or the Indian aterialism, it would be a re*ection of

all religions.

#ith this introduction you may give me a tutorial (lesser than four pages). 'ou must read

my notes and referential boo/s. If you read the 6arada%s boo/ several times, you can get lots of

information for the tutorial. 'ou can also get information from the internet but you must be careful

that some internet sites do *ust copy without understanding the contents. #hen you write the

tutorial, do not copy from others without understanding. 9verybody must have one%s own writing

style.

!rom old note "##"

Indian values

$uman ideals

The Brahmana introduced a system of ideals in term of the caste system and the theory of four

stages. The advantages of these depended on one%s caste. There were other teachers /nown as

aramanas who developed different theory of ideal /nown as urusaartha$human ideal. These

human ideals differed from the Brahmanical ideals on many methods. They are:

;. 2harma$ virtues


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virtues among different thin/ers. These different lists were based on different concepts of religions.

ome religions believed the most important thing a man could do was to offer sacrifice, to please

the creator !od. There were some religions according to them the world was not created. It gust

happened the most important thing a man could do was to live according to nature because it is the

nature that brought the human beings into this world. 6aturally these two religions one believing in

!od, the other believing in nature had two different list of virtues. In the same way, ainism andBuddhism also have two different list of virtues. 5n some matter there is similarity. But on some

other matter there is different. These two lists are based on different religious ground. Therefore,

they may preach the same things for different reasons. In the same way materialism is also against

the performance of sacrifice. Buddhism, ainism and aterialism condemned sacrifice for different

reasons.

'rth& wealth

#ealth is the second ideal Indian thin/er thoughts. It was very much emphasied by materialist

thin/ers. 7or materialism out of four ideals only two were important. They are wealth and pleasure.

7or them pleasure could be en*oined if one has wealth. Therefore, they encourage their followers tobecome wealthy. India at that time was clanging its symbol economy and people were gathering

wealth as much as they could get. ome Indian writers devoted their time to produce on wealth. "

well$/nown boo/ that was been discovered recently on this sub*ect is "rthasastra$economy, written

by ana/ya or >autilya. This >autilya is very important since he laid the foundation for the

emergence of a new 9mpire, which later produced 9mpire "so/a. ana/ya in his boo/ mentioned

several teachers who had written on the sub*ect. This boo/ had been lost. This shows the ideal had

become popular. @arious thin/ers expressed their views regarding the significance of wealth.

ramana thin/ers, while excepting the value of wealth, they tried to show that there was an evil of

incoming. ost of the ainism followers were merchants. "nd they engaged in trade and

commerce. Buddhism also understands poverty as a form of suffering and also spea/s earning

wealth by righteous means. There are several uttas which instruct man to devote their time and

energy and earn wealth.

ama& pleasure

"ccording to these thin/ers, who introduced the four ideals, there are different interpretations. 7or

the materialists pleasure is the more important ideal. ome materialists maintained that as long as

we are living we must en*oy life. They advocated that for the sa/e of en*oyment even borrowing is

advisable. There is well /nown word which says that one may run into death even to buy ghee. "nd

when the body is cremated there is no coming bac/. But these materialists accepted social values

and maintained that people should have good relation to each other. o that they can live happily.5ther aramana teachers taught pleasure can be en*oy within a certain limit. 7or instance

Buddhism and ainism taught self$control. In the case of Buddhism there is list of ila$precepts for

a follower to observe. 7or a aina follower there is list of vows. If the follower observes these, his

life will be controlled and governed properly. o that he may be able to practice his own religion.

7or instance for the layman Buddhism has the well /nown five precepts. That is the basic code of

ethics a Buddhist can start to practice of Buddhism. If one wants to go higher and higher there are

more virtues that he is expected to observe. ome other teachers went to the other extreme of

advocating the renunciation of pleasure. They believed by the practice of austerity or torturing of

the body one can attain happiness. They thought with the body there are certain defilements what

one has to do is to remove the defilements is to torture the body. There was another group of

thin/ers who maintained that inside the body there is a soul. The soul is infested with defilements.To remove the defilements from the soul one has to torture the body. o there were so many

practices aimed at purify the body and soul. 2uring hot season they used to sit under the sun with

fire$lit around the person. 2uring the winter they remained with nec/ed and bathed several times.

Thus they tortured the body. #hen we reach the biographical account of the Buddha during the


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period of six years we can /now the practices he followed. 2uring that period he followed the

practices followed by those ascetics.

o*sa& lieration

8sually liberation was taught by those thin/ers who taught that present life is not satisfactory. "s itis not satisfactory they wanted to escape from this life. any methods were taught. 5ne method

that ainism taught is the practice of self$mortification based on non$violence. They believed there

are souls everywhere and these souls should not harvested. o they practised or observed non$

violence. Buddhism teaches the noble eight$fold path for the attainment of liberation. In the every

first discourse Buddha said the two extremes have to be avoided. 5ne is self$mortification taught

by those thin/ers who advocated severe ascetics practices. The other is self$indulgence taught by

extreme materialists. "ccording to Buddhism these noble eight$fold path is the middle path, which

avoids these two extremes. ome materialists who did not accept future life maintained that life

comes to an end will with death. Therefore, their view was liberation could be attained if one is

desirous of such a thing with death of this life. This account shows with regard to four ideals there

is no agreement among Indian thin/ers. "ll these thin/ers interpreted these according to thephilosophy of life they accepted. +ater we find even Brahmanism was influent by these ideals. That

is why later they extended the stages of life by adding two more. In the beginning they had two that

is student and householder. Because of the influence of armana thin/ers they added the forest

dwellers and the renunciated or ascetics. Brahmanism as a religion, which advocated sacrifice has

to change and accept liberation also as an ideal. These show though Brahmanism was relevant

among the high caste people the ideals of aramana thin/ers were able to reach larger number of

followers. o much so not only high caste people but ordinary people also followed those ideals.

+ead

"riyapariyesana sutta of .6

asacca sutta

utta sutta

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4-“Explain the Buddhist attitude to the Indian Ideals.” (not yet).doc