/lit/ - Literature

>>23046123
Nagarjuna

Should I read suttas before or after meditation?

Nagarjuna's mulamadhyamakakarika, Vigrahavyavartani and sunyatasaptati are closer to early Buddhist teachings eg atthakavagga or than any Theravada additions like that of Buddhaghosa or the Abhidhamma OR any mahayanist additions like dharmakaya or bodhisattva vows.

In fact you find the exact same tetralemma/catuskoti used in the Pali canon by the Buddha himself (agnivaccagotta sutta and malunkya sutta).

>But Nagarjuna is a mahayanist
There is literally only one Mahayana reference in his corpus which is a line praising amitabha Buddha at the end of the suhrlekha - I'd put actual money on this being a later addition.
>But Buddha wasn't a sceptic
Yes that's too blunt of a way of understanding it. read the atthakavagga and the kaccanagotta sutta.
The issue is not that we don't know if things exist or not, it's that we can see through analysis that they are actually indeterminate, therefore we see the limitations of conventional truth and how ultimate truth apparently surpasses intellect, understanding this, we don't take up conventional views with any seriousness

>But Sañjaya Belaṭṭhaputta the sceptic is said to be a numbskull
That's because he just says he doesn't know anything. This Is quite different to seeing that conventional truth is limited through negations.

Tl;Dr: all phenomena (dhammas) and entities (puggalas) are conditionally dependent (paticcasamupada) and therefore empty (sunnata) and this is the core of the Buddha's teaching on the nature of the world.

Take the middle path between theravadan abhidhamma/Buddhaghosan commentaries and Mahayana fan fiction Sutras

Read the Atthakavagga, the Kaccanagotta sutta and the Mulamadhyamakakarika.

Pali canon - Abhidhamma + Madhyamakakarikas. Simple as

Is Buddhism the original sigma grindset. Read this sutta from the Udana:

Saṅgāmaji had arrived in Sāvatthī to see the Blessed One. His former wife heard, "Master Saṅgāmaji, they say, has arrived in Sāvatthī." Taking her small child, she went to Jeta's Grove. On that occasion Ven. Saṅgāmaji was sitting at the root of a tree for the day's abiding. His former wife went to him and, on arrival, said to him, "Look after me, contemplative — (a woman) with a little son." When this was said, Ven. Saṅgāmaji remained silent. A second time... A third time, his former wife said to him, "Look after me, contemplative — (a woman) with a little son." A third time, Ven. Saṅgāmaji remained silent.

Then his former wife, taking the baby and leaving him in front of Ven. Saṅgāmaji, went away, saying, "That's your son, contemplative. Look after him."

Then Ven. Saṅgāmaji neither looked at the child nor spoke to him. His wife, after going not far away, was looking back and saw Ven. Saṅgāmaji neither looking at the child nor speaking to him. On seeing this, the thought occurred to her, "The contemplative doesn't even care about his son." Returning from there and taking the child, she left.

The Blessed One — with his divine eye, purified and surpassing the human — saw Ven. Saṅgāmaji's former wife misbehaving in that way.

Then, on realizing the significance of that, the Blessed One on that occasion exclaimed:


At her coming,
he didn't delight;
at her leaving,
he didn't grieve.
A victor in battle, freed from the tie:[1]
He's what I call
a brahman.

>>22394435
But there is no fundamental difference between Samsara and Nirvana.

Happy are those who have cast aside victory and loss.

Sadhu Sadhu Sadhu

Is there even a point of reading Buddhist scriptures as an layperson worldling?