/lit/ - Literature

neither.

truthism.com

because both religion and science are bullshit,

buddhism has less ethnic constraints..so if you are a westerner then probably buddhism..

>>1527430

I doubt you know the truth, but thanks for trying.

>>1527430
that's it dude - prove 'em all wrong

Hinduism.

The answer is in this: Flight from reality.

>>1527445

Ethnic constraints? Do you mean I'll be looked down upon if I go to a temple or something to learn?

buddhism, of course

>>1527449

I'm not sure what reality is but I sure do love to fly.

>>1527450
hi, recently converted buddhist here.
buddhism is very different from hinduism. we don't worship any gods; we don't pray because we have nothing to pray too.

do some wiki reading on both. if you have any questions i'll be here.

>>1527457
>but you can't.

Buddhism, but Hinduism does have some veritably kick-ass literature. The beginning of the fucking battle scene in the Bhagavad Gita is astonishingly awesome.

>>1527462

>aeroplanes
>drugs

>>1527494
Somehow I don't think Buddhism prescribes to either.

Buddhism is derivative of Hindusim (at least originally), but most people now are okay with Buddhism because it's more of a blend of Shintoism and Taoism with a New Age spin in the western world.

Why not learn from both?

>>1527461

I know that Hinduism has a plethora of gods and goddesses, but I've also read that there is something called Atheistic Hinduism where I suppose the gods aren't taken as literal entities.

What confuses me is all the schools of both Hinduism and Buddhism. I was looking at Zen Buddhism before posting this, for instance, and wondering what the differences really are.

>>1527502
Someone actually knows something!

Yes. Hinduism is not a monolith. In fact there is no Hinduism per se.

>>1527502

Hinduism is the oldest religion, right? I had a really good discussion with a young Hindu before and it hasn't left my mind since. I have a copy of the Bhagavad-Gita waiting to be read (btw that is only an extract, right? Why is seperated from the other text?)

Shintoism and Taoism are schools of Buddhism aren't they?

>>1527506
There's also the approach where the Hindu pantheon is a collection of archetypal facets of Brahman, and Brahman = Atman.

>>1527521
I don't know a ton about Hinduism. Shinto and Tao are from Japan and China respectively. They are separate from Buddhism but both became infused with it later (in some degree or another). Wikipedia should be enough to get you started man.

>>1527521
Shintoism predates Buddhism.

>>1527530

Okay, thank you. I'll go and do some quick research and refresh my knowledge on all of this. I'd really appreciate it if you or any other Buddhist or Hindu anons would share your experiences here. I want to do the reading but I feel I should go out and experience it too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2VzLn6DMCE

>>1527573

That is pretty spiritual.

>>1527584

It was heavily influenced by Siddhartha.

>>1527592
>whose other name is Budhha.

>>1527599

You mean Gautama? I was talking about the book, btw.

>>1527603

Really? Wow, I never knew that, probably never would have guessed either. I love Radiohead, second only to The Beatles for me.

>>1527603
This is why titles are, you know, italicised or put in quotations.

Punctuation: It Clarifies Meaning.

>>1527624

That's basically never done on /lit/, and it's not my job to babysit you.

Buddhism, obviously. It doesn't have too many constraints and doesn't have you worship blue elephants, although I honestly am not too fond of either. Buddhism, from what I've seen, acts like not suffering is so important that you should give up all pleasure and desire to not suffer. I personally would be fine with suffering in order to have a happy life. Seems cowardly to me. But I'm no expert.

>>1527627
You're fat and lazy and your 4chan career is doomed to multi-posts in clarifying what you meant.

Tibetan Buddhism...

>>1527642
pls explain

>>1527642

I'm not that fat!

HEY BUDDHISTS

IF WE'RE ALL REINCARNATED, THEN WHY DOES THE POPULATION GROW? SHOULDN'T THERE BE LESS PEOPLE?

LOL
ATHEISTS - 1
BUDDHISTS - 0

>>1527681

>ATHEISTS - 1

Thats about right lol

>>1527681
there is actually a very complex explanation of this, which I could never hope to retell right here and now..

>>1527681

>Atheists
>Buddhists

>>1527634

Everyone wants to end suffering, even someone like you. You're just saying you're willing to suffer if it results in happiness, you still want the end of suffering.

Buddhism moves towards the goal of peace, eradicating good and evil and becoming one with everything.

>>1527681

As much as this is probably a troll, I would like to know this also.

Also, my mind was blown slightly when I found that Buddhism has a Hell (called Naraka, I believe.)

>>1527702

Point us to a source then, please?

>>1527681
Atheist here, Buddhists are cool. It's the religions like Christianity and Islam that have texts written by insane murder-loving assholes.

>>1527712
>As much as this is probably a troll, I would like to know this also.
>Also, my mind was blown slightly when I found that Buddhism has a Hell (called Naraka, I believe.)
Goddamn that's so corny.

>>1527681

There are trillions upon trillions of living creatures on Earth, and probably umpteenth more living on other planets.
Not to mention the beings incarnated in the other planes.

Also, Buddhism denies separate minds. We're really just one mind looking out from a million eyes. Imagine an ocean, and you have a bottle whose cap is open to the sea and filled with seawater. The notion of individuality is an illusion.

>>1527712

Naraka isn't permanent though. It's better compared with purgatory.

>>1527740

Yeah, I think I remember reading that the demons tear the sins (if that's how Buddhists see it) from your soul, then allow you to be reincarnated and throw you back into Sansara, or something like that?

>>1527736

If we are all one, how can an individual attain nirvana? Shouldn't it require us all to be enlightened? Surely we would still be incomplete upon enlightenment if the rest of the 'one' hasn't reached nirvana?

>>1527717
>>1527712

I am surely butchering this but I believe there are levels of reincarnation. So a person who lived a 'bad' life would come back as a bug while a person who lived a good life would come back as something more 'spiritual'. There is also reincarnation of the soul, in attempt to evolve and eventually reach a level of infinite that makes one a sage, over generations of people (sometimes several hundred indivdual lifetimes for a single soul)

Depends on your worldview:
Hinduism is essentially Deist
Buddhism is essentially atheist

>>1527764

and that's the most ignorant statement I've read all day

For me its Buddhism. I attend a local meditation group two times a week and meditate at home at least two hours a day. Don't really consider myself Buddhist, just follow the teachings.

>>1527770
why?

>>1527786

Not that guy, but most versions of Buddhism are not atheistic, and Hinduism would be theistic, not deistic.

>>1527758

Nirvana could be likened to realizing that one is the ocean. Seeing one's 'bottle' as mere transitory illusion.

Looking for a good introduction to Daoism and Shinto. Already read the Tao te ching, anything else?

>>1527764

There's a difference between theistic and deistic.

>>1527827

I haven't read it personally (it's on my list), but I've heard that Benjamin Hoff's The Tao of Pooh is a really good introduction.

I don't know how good of an introduction it is, and on what level it's written on, but it looks alright.

bump

Almost exactly the same thing aren't they?

TAOISM.
laughing chinese sages cultivating in longevity in simplicity >bitter Buddhists/Hinduists attempting an ambiguous enlightenment and/or nirvana

Have you considered the option of not choosing between them? You can have them all, in the spirit of non-dualism. Tao, Buddhist, Hindu, they all have something to say.

In the realm of Eastern philosophy, you don't have to draw lines in the sand and label yourself with a single association.

>>1527758
Everyone isn't one, everyone is none.

>>1529021
Sort of, yeah. Buddhism is a reform movement within Hinduism, similar to how Christianity is a reform movement within Judaism.

Be a Hermeticist.

>>1529041
no this is fucking stupid


they are more than just sects at this point


jesus, it's like none of you have ever taken a thing as basic as a world religions class

>>1529038

That doesn't sound right . . .

>>1529041
>idiot
No.

Shinto is a very nation-specific form of animism that says that the Japanese islands are favoured by the gods, that the imperial dynasty is divine and that the Japanese people are superior. If you're not Japanese, don't bother trying to convert to Shinto. Luckily for you, there's more to Japanese spirituality than just Shinto - there's Confucian, Daoist and Buddhist thought as well.

>>1529051
>>1529047
did buddhism not come out of hinduism?

Theos and Deus are synonyms.

Deism and Theism *should* be synonyms.

>>1529064

Pretty sure it did.

>>1529064
not really no

hinduism is to buddhism what islam is to native arabian idol worship

they do have a lot of similarities but really only a few core beleifs function the same

and buddhism didn't come out of hinduism, it was founded by the buddha and borrowed many motifs

>>1529067

Deism is the belief in creator gods that created and then abandoned, specifically. Theism is the belief in a creator god. I suppose Theism could replace deism, but deism could not be substituted for theism.

>>1529078
he's saying that they should be synonyms based on root alone

not that they are

everyone knows what theism and deism are

>>1529049
It's the Buddhist answer. We are a all intransient and the concept of our very existence as total being is an illusion.

Buddhism has a lot in common with Atheism. The difference imo is that Buddhism goes a step further and tries to figure out what would be best to do when we realize the reality of our situation.

>>1529072

The Buddha was a Hindu.

>>1529064
Not as a 'reform' in the usual sense.

'Hinduism' was never a religion. There was no identity beyond fraternity of Aryans. Hindu is not a title taken by Hindus. It is a given one (it comes from the word Sindhu). They did hold the Vedas as sacred though if any similarity to religion is to be sought.

Buddha (previously Siddhartha) realized the origin and solution to pain. He simply formed his own cult that practiced his teaching centered around certain Vedic ideas. There was no religion to reform.

>>1529082

If you had said everyone is one, I would have understood, but everyone is none? I don't understand how that works. Nothing? If you're saying it's an illusion it still something surely?

>>1529088
samefag. I don't agree with precepts of Buddhism. They are wrong as far as I see it.

>>1529084
But Buddhism does not elaborate or in any way embrace the tenants of Hinduism. The revelations of the Buddha could have come to a Christian, or a Confucian, or anyone else.

>>1529093
Not trollin. What would you replace them with?

>>1529100
Why would 'I' replace them???????

Taoism FTW

>>1529091
It's based on the concept of non-dualism, that there are things we call 'form' (existence) and 'emptiness' (non-existence), but both of those are not real and are only 'no-thing'. Not 'nothing', because that implies complete non-existence; the eastern languages the idea comes from has a word for it, but we don't. 'No-thing' exists as a concept, not as an existing thing itself.

I think.

>>1529102

Precepts of Buddhism. For your 'pleasure':
I undertake to abstain from causing harm and taking life (both human and non-human).

I undertake to abstain from taking what is not given (stealing).

I undertake to abstain from sexual activity.

I undertake to abstain from wrong speech: telling lies, deceiving others, manipulating others, using hurtful words.

I undertake to abstain from using intoxicating drinks and drugs, which lead to carelessness.

I undertake to abstain from eating at the wrong time (the right time is after sunrise, before noon).

I undertake to abstain from singing, dancing, playing music, attending entertainment performances, wearing perfume, and using cosmetics and garlands (decorative accessories).

I undertake to abstain from luxurious places for sitting or sleeping, and overindulging in sleep.

tl;dr: Live as if you are dead.

>>1529102
Because "Why is there pain in the world" is a question everyone had asked at some point in their life, and I am curious about how people answer that question.

Maybe I'm jumping to conclusions, but if you're in this thread I assume you have thought a little about the concept of complete truth.

>>1529112
Of course if these precepts do not lead to Nirvana they should immediately discarded.

>>1529119
"The Problem of Pain" by C.S. Lewis.

>>1529111
The word "Mu," by chance?

>>1529129
Yep, mu.

>>1529119
Fair enough.

The real question is what authority do have, other than my power of pursuation, to convince you.

So. There is pain because the world is not fair and/or we are not careful enough.

The solution: We can't do everything, as life is limited. So do your best and know that fruits of your labour may be lost. Your reward is the knowledge that you tried your best.

>>1529129
Which reminds me of a Zen koan:

a monk was asked if a dog has Buddha-nature, and he responded by saying, "mu."

>>1529137
samefag:

*do I have. Oh and I am a tripfag.

What is the sound of three pounds of flax?

>>1529140
i guess 'mu' is the sound dogs make in that country.

>>1529146
Bond, you seem pretty knowledgeable on this stuff, how did you learn what you know? From books? Off of a Monk? It's like in Blood Meridian when the Judge unexpectedly speaks Dutch, Tobin asks "Where'd you learn Dutch?" and the Judge answers "Off a Dutchman."

Hinduism, because Hindu mythology (probably not the best term, but whatever) is fucking insane. Fuck yeah Ramayana.

>>1529172
He is in fact a total idiot.

Buddhism took all the good parts of Hinduism and added more good parts

>>1529112
these are only for monks, not lay-Buddhists, who usually only follow 4/5 precepts

>>1529096
It did elaborate and embrace some, but not all, of the tentants of Hinduism, such as dukkha, samsara, and reincarnation.

Taoism.

Vajrayana > Theravada > Mahayana

>>1529520
Hm. This is true. I stand corrected.

>>1529576
check yo self before you wreck yo self

>>1529112
Worst precepts ever.

>>1529609
once again, this is only for monks and nuns, not common people

>>1529058

This, a thousand times this. Do not rope in Shinto with the other Eastern religions.