Where Is Your ‘Hereafter’?

by Shen Shi'an, The Buddhist Channel, Jan 24, 2010

Singapore -- ‘Hereafter’ proposes something ‘simple’ yet mysterious. It speaks of the great possibility of existence hereafter, which seems certain to exist, yet being beyond the scope of our clear understanding.

Even the protagonist psychic featured, who is masterful in communicating with the deceased is unsure of where they go to after ‘hanging around’ for a while. In the Buddhist teachings, ‘hereafter’ can be many places indeed, for there are 31 planes of existence, which are more broadly classified into 6 main realms. And there is no fixed hereafter in the ‘forever and ever’ sense, due to the cycles of rebirth and dynamic changes in karma. This is why it takes more than an ordinary psychic to be able to discern the whereabouts of long deceased ones.

While the nihilistically ‘pragmatic’ might feel that the question of what lies hereafter to be the most irrelevant existential question of all, a sound answer does however gives us crucial spiritual bearings. As uttered in the film, ‘a life about death is no life at all’. True, but to really live life is to be concerned with death too, for it puts this short and vulnerable life in perspective. 

The Buddha spoke against the erroneous romanticism of the hereafter as eternal nothingness (that’s nihilism), and as eternal heaven or hell (that’s eternalism). Well, the subtle life force that is the consciousness is too powerful to be simply snubbed out at the end of this physical life, and what natural or supernatural justice is there to deserve everlasting pleasure or pain due to limited good and evil done?

The hereafter depicted in the film is one that is supposedly experienced by many – of blurred silhouettes against bright white light. In the Buddhist context, these figures can be other denizens of the in-between, of the weightless bardo state (when the consciousness stripped free from the body), or even the (de)forming manifestations of personal demons and guardians. With many coloured lights representative of various spiritual tendencies, a precarious state this is, as described in great detail in the Bardo Thodol (‘The Tibetan Book of the Dead’). When one follows the lights or beings one is attached to, one would be reborn accordingly. In the Mahayana teachings, the safest way out is to be mindful of Amituofo (Amitabha Buddha) by reciting his name with utmost sincerity, to which he will manifest and lead one to his Pure Land, where enlightenment is guaranteed.

Dying is not universally blissful, as often relayed by those with Near-death Experiences (NDE). If death is always nice, there would be no encounters with woeful wandering spirits! Though there are many culturally conditioned NDE accounts due to collective perceptions, there are many other different ones too. Those with unpleasant experiences seldom return to share them. This is due to the intensity of their negative karma, that barred them from second chances at the expired lives. Perhaps accidentally, the film might promote the use of psychic services to communicate with the deceased. While this can be comforting as a means to relay final messages, it can be dangerous if attachment and regret on both sides of the living and dead is reinforced, which might prevent the deceased from taking a good rebirth. And yes, as the story warns, beware of false prophets, fake mediums and pseudo psychic scientists!

On the science of the afterlife, the recently deceased Dr. Ian Stevenson of Virginia University had meticulously documented more than 3,000 cases of those with recollections of their past lives. Many children were discovered with such detailed memories, which upon rigorous investigation, correspond to persons who lived before they were born. In over 40 cases, there were discoveries of unusual birthmarks and birth defects, which matched post-mortem records of those the children claimed to have been. They even displayed familiar habits towards their previous surviving family members. While playing, many would also incorporate elements of their claimed past professions! Tellingly, they also had phillias and phobias linked to their manner of death.

Curiously, the director Clint Eastwood featured a scene where a boy shook his head upon hearing a preacher say there is nothing to fear about death if one believes in Christ. Perhaps he is open-minded enough to explore the possibility of making his next movie based on the phenomenon of rebirth? Still skeptical of the existence of any hereafter (and the worth of doing good)? Here is a sound fourfold way of reasoning to solve this problem, as advised by the Buddha in the Kalama Sutta. Firstly, if there is afterlife, and if there is the law of karma, you will have a good rebirth if you do good. Secondly, if there is no afterlife, and if there is no karma, you will live happily now, as you are free of ill will (since you do good). Thirdly, if evil befalls the evil, it will not affect you as you do no evil. Fourthly, if evil does not befall the evil, as you do no evil and do good instead, you are pure both ways. There you have it, the very assuring Four Assurances!

Original article here.

Music in Buddhism

The Bangkok Post, Nov 26, 2010

Bangkok, Thailand -- The first impression the general public may have of Buddhism is how it turns its back away from worldly pleasure. While that might be true, there is a role for music, one of life's worldly and heavenly pleasures, in Buddhism.

For example, when Prince Siddhattha left his worldly life behind and became an ascetic, he first studied under many respected gurus of the time and found no effective way to reach the end of all physical and mental sufferings. That was when he decided to embark on his own path and tried different experiments.

During his time, there were two major schools of thought regarding how to reach the end of sufferings. The first school taught that, in order to conquer all your mental defilements and thus reach the end of sufferings, you have to follow your heart's every desire. Their reasoning is that, once you have fed your desires to one point, you will feel bored of it all and would not have any more desires and become Enlightened.

But Prince Siddhattha was a crown prince who has had it all and still felt that he is nowhere near Enlightenment. Therefore, it was natural for him to choose the second school of thought, which is to deprive yourself of all worldly pleasures and to torture yourself to the extreme. This school of thought believed that, when you have deprived yourself of everything, your desires will become weak and eventually disappear.

Being a very determined man, the Prince took to his task seriously. It could be said that he took all the extreme measures of torturing and went even further. At one point, he went as far as not eating more than one single pea a day in order to starve his body and hopefully to kill his desires.

 

Again, as we now know, that extreme measure did not work. In fact, Prince Siddhattha was on the verge of dying as he collapsed one day. The Devas, heavenly sentient beings, saw what happened and thought they had to give the Prince some clues. So, one Deva disguised himself as a young man travelling on a boat along the river, passing by where the Prince was collapsing.

And what did the Deva-cum-young man do? He played a harp. At first, he tuned the strings of his harp too tight and the sound did not come out right. The second time, he tuned the strings too loose. Naturally, the sound was also awful. It was only the third time, when the young man tuned his strings just right _ not too tight and not too loose _ that the music came out perfect.

Upon hearing what happened, Prince Siddhattha , with his innate wisdom, knew instinctively what to do. He realised that neither the harshest way nor the most lax would yield the best result. It's got to be the Middle Path _ not too harsh, yet not too lax. That was when he decided to eat again, but moderately, and tried cultivating his mind along the same idea, meaning not getting too deep into the samadhi, or concentration, but merely observing things as they are in the present moment. The latter practice is vipassana meditation and is also the heart of Zen practice.

After the Prince changed to the Middle Path, it did not take long for him to become Enlightened. And since the harp playing helped trigger his wisdom, it can be said that music also held a great role in the Enlightenment of the Prince who would then be known as Lord Buddha.

Centuries afterwards in Japan, music also had a role in the spread of Buddhism. Around the 12th century, travelling monks would recite The Tale of the Heike, a war chronicle teaching the Buddhist Law of Impermanence, to the accompaniment of the biwa, a musical instrument similar to the lute.

Then, between the 13th to 19th centuries, there was this practice called suizen where Fuke monks would play the shakuhachi bamboo flute as a form of meditation in order to attain self-realisation. Fuke monks would play the shakuhachi while wearing a large woven basket hat that covered their entire head as they went on pilgrimage. The idea was perhaps to shield their eyes from the worldly pleasures and helped them concentrate better on their musical meditation.

However, the sect started to see its demise during the Tokugawa Period (1608-1868). Totally oriented to retaining their dictatorship, the Tokugawa government imposed a travel ban on the citizens. They could not travel to other provinces freely and needed difficult-to-obtain travelling documents. The exception, however, was given to the Fuke monks, since they were considered pilgrims. This way, the Tokugawa government disguised many masterless samurai, the ronin, as monks so they could travel across the country as spies.

After the demise of the sect with the modernisation of Japan, Fuke Zen has seen a slow recovery today. If the monks can play flutes as a form of meditation, so can we. Do you play any kind of musical instrument? If so, have you ever considered using it to cultivate your mind and develop your wisdom so that you might attain self-realisation and thus Enlightenment one day?

If you are interested in how music and the power of being here and now can turn your life around, you may want to consider going to a mindfulness meditation retreat first to learn the ropes of what it is like to practice vipassana or Zen meditation.

From there, you can easily apply the idea to your musical pastime. Hey, you never know - Enlightenment might just be around the next few notes!

Gulliver's Travels Vs Moggallana's Journey

by Shen Shi'an, The Buddhist Channel, Jan 7, 2010

Singapore -- The movie tagline of the 2010 take on 'Gulliver's Travels' says, 'A magical land. A comedy of epic proportions.' The protagonist's encounter with Lilliput, though fantastical, shares real lessons too.

That's what makes fantasy stories truly magical - when they are creatively practical! Comedic as this version is, it does tell of a common tragedy too, of faulty habitual perceptions, of how we tend to judge one another by appearances. 

Literally 'huge' discrimination by size is featured in the film! Big guys are not always beasts or monsters; they can be gentle or funny giants too. (Oh yes, you won't miss the 'giant' product placement of a mega-sized iPhone as seen by Lilliputians!)

Gulliver the office mailman is used to belittling himself, calling himself one of the 'little people', who should preferably not even be seen or heard while he does his work. When he reaches the land of the tiny, he is forced to be the inverse, the big star, the centre of attraction. And hey, he starts to enjoy his status after being customarily demonised for a while at first. The ordinary guy became extraordinary in an extraordinary environment, simply by virtue of his relative size? He does have a genuine virtues too - a good heart, which is given the chance to shine.

A small nobody can indeed become a big somebody - but only if one's heart is big enough. Size does matter to some extent, but physical size does not matter as much as the size of the heart! This is another way of looking at 'mind over matter'! 

 

His was a case of reversal of fortune... which reverses to its extreme opposite when he later stumbles into a land of giants. This reminds me of Moggallana, the Buddha's disciple foremost in supernormal powers, who travelled to a distant world system, where he 'came' to be worm-sized, humbled in the mind-blowing presence of giant humans... with a giant Buddha! Buddhism is in tune with the reality of relativity - in terms of cosmic dimensions too. 

And any size is ultimately 'empty' of any inherent significance unless there is relative comparison!

Original article here.