What kind of craving do you think a secularist who are agnostic regarding rebirth and kamma could not annihilate?

[Green]

@Donabedian

The problem is that we have other seekers who claimed to see things, and each professed that what they saw was the truth. What they each saw, their opponents would deem views, whilst they would deem authentic (direct) knowledge.

Yes, i see your point. I belief this is because people are not sincere, not truthful, deceiving themselves and others, influenced by craving. Sorry for the judgements but i belief this is true. I will try to explain.

Is there really someone who can claim to have direct knowledge of an eternal being, a creator? How would one know this? Does one see directly that this being is eternal? How? Really how?
That is impossible. Does that being say it is eternal? And is it therefor true (Maha Brahma) No…there is no reason to belief one can have direct knowledge of an eternal being, eternal soul or eternal Atman. Eternal is just a category of thought . I belief it cannot be an object of direct knowledge.

The same with all those views as: the world is eternal, not eternal, it is limitless, limited, the tathatagata exist after death etc. There is no direct knowledge of it. It are only thoughts, opinions, conclusions, only based on reasoning. The Buddha taught this is not conducive to attend to.

Regarding the existence of heaven and hells, all religions, i belief, advance some kind of afterlife. I think this can be established in direct knowlegde with the heavenly eye.

The real problem of delusion is, i find, that people start claiming knowledge they do not really have. That causes many problems, many conflicts because only craving leads them. It is all craving-and conceit driven and not by truthfulness. I feel that is the main message of Buddha about views. This is all self and other deception. Claiming to be a knowledge master while one is just a philospher.

Many people literally translate what they experience according their wishes. Example: one has an experience of overwhelming love. And because one is a Christian, this experience becomes a personal meeting with God. Now one knows God. That kind of translations. It is not really truthful because what one has really experienced becomes something else.

[Adutiya]

@Alaray

so what kind of craving do you think it is ?

@NgXinZhao

A stream winner would have total faith in the Buddha, so if their view of sutta is correct, then they should acknowledge rebirth exist already.

@NgXinZhao

It’s clear from both sutta and rebirth evidences that rebirth exist and is taught by the Buddha.

Since the Buddha’s goal was to put an end to dukkha and samsara, he purified his mind to the point where he was able to see what had been hidden: the extent of kamma and rebirth and the extension of samsara over many lifetimes. This was a lynchpin to seeing the entire chain of dependent origination and the end of ignorance.

If a person doesn’t believe the Buddha in this regard, perhaps they crave a good life without dukkha, existence on the sensual level.

taṇhā
Craving—for sensuality, for rebirth, or for annihilation (see bhava). See also lobha (greed; passion)

bhava
Existence, life, or rebirth. States of existence that develop first in the mind and can then be experienced as internal worlds and/or as worlds on an external level. There are three levels of existence: on the sensual level, the level of form, and the level of formlessness.

[josephzizys]

Hi @Alaray I just wanted to chip in m y 2 cents worth, firstly, I think your point is right, if it is possible to utterly uproot craving without a belief in rebirth then it is possible to achieve awakening without that belief, and after all, the Buddha does say that even the teaching is like a raft and is to be let go of once the journey is completed.

I think this is complicated by some things I see being said by “secular” buddhists though, for example the idea that one can achieve enlightenment simply by putting quotation marks around terms like “self”, or that enlightenment simply is overcoming constructs of self. These sorts of ideas are facile and ridiculous, imagine if a bandit kidnapped you and decided to saw off your limbs with a hacksaw, do you think frantically repeating to yourself “this isn’t “me”, this isn’t happening to “my” “self” etc” would prevent you from suffering? of course not, personality view is the lowest fetter, not the highest achievement, and the idea that the buddha was simply teaching a self help method or a psychology is just not borne out by the suttas.

So one craving I think that is apparent in a lot of those who promote secular buddhism is a craving to already be at the end of the path, to sort of say, “hey look! modern science already teaches us that the immortal soul is an illusion and things are just swirling atoms, so all I have to do is remind myself that i have no self and i will be enlightened!”.

Meanwhile, just like the rest of us, these people are pining for true love, daydreaming about their next delicious meal, weeping inconsolably at the death of a loved one, flying into a rage on receiving their tax audit notice and so on.

Craving is difficult to even see let alone uproot, it underwrites every thought that passes through our heads, every kilo of our body, every feature of our built environment, it is the sinew that holds this world together, and it runs deep.

A view of buddhism that makes it into a kind of cognitive behavioral therapy may be enough for some, but it is the tragedy of the death of the innocent, the pain and starvation of children, the spectre of nuclear war, the six million slaughtered in the holocaust that is the suffering I have the question about, that I need to reconcile or somehow transcend, and buddhism as CBT does not get anywhere near that.

With all that said, I certainly don’t think secular buddhism is alone in promoting views that obscure, delude and comfort, Therevada has it’s obsessive tendencies, in fact all the sects, from A to Zen have their share of charlatans and and delusions, how could it be otherwise?

Why not just call yourself a Buddhist and leave it at that?

[Nimal]

When someone for example says “I do not believe in rebirth but I can still reach Nibbana” that itself is the craving. This is because such statements are products of grasping the five aggregates which is craving. These people go on and on forever making such statements and unfortunately they do not realize that every such utterance binds them to Samsara.
With Metta

[Alaray]

which among the 5 aggregates do you think the secularists crave ?

[Nimal]

All five them. It is not possible to be selective when it comes to grasping.
With Metta

[Punna]

@Alaray

which among the 5 aggregates do you think the secularists crave ?

I have only met one secularist so far. I’m not sure if he has changed in the sense that he’s no longer a secularist but has conviction in rebirth now, but from my conversations with him months and years back, he praised science. He didn’t talk about consciousness arises from the physical body, but it’s apparent that he upheld science as true/high. Attachment to sanna that science is the ultimate truth seemed to be the problem for him.

Because science has peer review system, why don’t rebirth deniers, instead of taking the words of scientists to be true, take matters into their own hands, do peer review themselves, be their own scientists to find out whether rebirth is true or not.

Self peer review here can refer to meditate deep enough to see one’s own past life.

~
Attachment to status is also attachment to sanna. What sanna? Perception that one is right or in a respected position. One may have the status of a reputable scientist doesn’t want to admit he’s wrong before.

Attachment to sanna “I’m a modernist”