Unveiling "Skillful Means" in Buddhism: Early Developments
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- Опубликовано: 10 июл 2024
- What is "skillful means" in Buddhism, particularly in early Buddhism? We'll look at its usage in the early texts, in particular in one odd text where it seems the Buddha recommends a practice of sense desire, and then turn to its more famous usage in the Mahayana Lotus Sutra.
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✅ Video mentioned:
The Parable of the Raft in Early Buddhism: Right View and Non-clinging - • The Parable of the Raf...
✅ Books referenced:
Donald Lopez and Jacqueline Stone, Two Buddhas Seated Side by Side: A Guide to the Lotus Sūtra - amzn.to/4bCUI6H
Tsugunari Kubo and Akira Yuyama (trans.), The Lotus Sutra (Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research, 2007). amzn.to/4bQo1To
Robert Buswell (ed.), Encyclopedia of Buddhism, pp. 871-2 amzn.to/3wy78N6
✅ Paper referenced:
Bhikkhu Anālayo, “Skill in Means and Mindfulness.” Mindfulness (2021) - www.researchgate.net/publicat...
✅ Suttas mentioned:
suttacentral.net/an6.79/en/su...
suttacentral.net/dn33/en/sujato
suttacentral.net/snp2.8/en/su...
suttacentral.net/thag2.19/en/...
suttacentral.net/ud3.2/en/sujato
suttacentral.net/mn22/en/sujato
suttacentral.net/mn38/en/sujato
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00:00 Intro
00:20 Skillful means in early Buddhism
01:42 Parable of the raft
03:53 Use of the phrase “skillful means” in early Buddhism
05:17 Nanda’s strange story
11:19 Skillful means in the Mahāyāna
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I think, another teacher put it quite well. " Be in the world, but not of the world"
Interesting ...
The way I see it, it’s like a golden carriage. A beautiful vehicle. Thanks Doug for another useful video. Much appreciated!
My pleasure!
Thanks!
🙏🙏
I love embracing weird/unusual moments in various faith traditions.
This was interesting, thanks for sharing. I was unaware of this story but it gives food for thought, especially regarding the trickster archetype.
Two things: Skillful means, upayakausalya, is, even in non-Tantric Mahayana, always seen as needing to combine or wed with the perfection of wisdom, prajnaparamita, the two usually abbreviated as the union of upaya with prajna. They are also portrayed as compassion and emptiness (karuna and sunyata) -- and I always thought reflected the fact that you can pursue the eightfold path to the ends of the earth but unless emptiness/wisdom arises, you don't complete what you are trying to do.
The other thing is that in Tantra, I'm not sure the "passion" one needs to be freed from (raga) is the same as the "passion" or more closely, "bliss" (sukha) that frees. Even if sukha is taken to be the term for both, Yogini Cinta, e.g., distinguishes between mahasukha (great bliss) and pravrtti sukha (the bliss of daily life) -- the former leads to the union of upaya and prajna, the latter leads, quite explicitly in her text, to pregnancy and childbirth continuing the wheel of samsara.
Thanks for your thoughts! Yes, for sure in order for the means to be skillful, they must be imbued with wisdom. As for the issue about Tantra, IIRC Anālayo doesn't go into a lot of detail in it in his paper, but it might be interesting to hear more of his thoughts on that.
I have heard that martial arts in the context of Buddhism are also seen as Upaya which is used to justify their practice despite the fact that it seems contradicting that a religion of peace espouses the use of violent combat methods. Though not all Schools of Buddhism encourage the practice of martial arts contrary to the misconception attributed by pop culture.
Yes good point, would be interesting to know more about the history of martial arts. My next video will touch indirectly on such ideas.
Hi! I am learning about Buddhist teachings. Can you please share on which suttas teaches in detail about the four noble truths and the noble eightfold path? Thanks!
Check out my videos on the Four Noble Truths. There are links to suttas in the information boxes. ruclips.net/p/PL0akoU_OszRguYdCWSckAaVbhZxdb8Ia_
off topic, but I would like to ask since you havent made a video on the topic,
did the Buddha ever advise the practice of mantra? if yes, did he talk of the benefits?
To my knowledge he did not. Mention of mantras is very limited in early Buddhism; that practice came later.
I was walking with a group through a haunted house. It was said that in one room there was a very beautiful ghost woman, but it was tricky and risky to find the way into that room because that section of the house was off limits.
I tried to imagine what the beautiful ghost woman looked like. Then I thought she may not be as beautiful as a celestial maiden, and I imagined a celestial maiden waiting for me outside. I decided to just head out, and I was fine. The party that went into forbidden section of the haunted house ended up in the dungeon for a time, and I got to go out and eat my favorite ice cream and watch Netflix instead.
Doug had decided “ teaching skillful means would be tiresome for me “
StevePutra said : ahhh the DougDharma has decided not to
teach .. all is lost
RUclips appeared and , lowering its algorithm to right of its shoulder
StevePura circles Doug to right and says
There are RUclips watchers with little dust in eyes , and some with much
Doug emitted a white light , from the tuft of his forehead, illuminating the 10 directions RUclips universe
“Very well , I shall speak the Dhama using skillfull means
various illustrations ❤
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Namyohorengekyo
Namyohorengekyo
Namyohorengekyo
Dear Doug - Please make more videos outside amidst the trees 🌳 - I'm sure your likes and views will increase - Your words are so kind and wise - but the background you've chosen is always claustrophobically clinical and artificially blue these days - I for one would watch many more of your videos if you were surrounded by nature like your older videos - Please try - Thanks !
I hear you, it's nicer to record outside. But it will be very infrequent I'm afraid, since weather and noise makes it very difficult to do on a regular basis.
so he became enlightened through peer pressure?
How do you mean?
Surely the point of skillful means is trying to move you away from theorising and towards practice?
That can be one aspect of skillful means. It can also be skillful to get the theory right so our practice is well grounded.
Brahman really threw me off in reading early works. Hard to figure out from our culture.
500 nymphs sounds ok, but can you afford all the shoes and handbags? 😁🙏
Very interesting, very well told and explained. But to be frank, a bit disappointing that the Buddha might have proposed such "muslim" tactics to his disciple taking him to a " heaven" and showing him and then promising beautiful women. Nothing justifies such base and vulgar story. Shocking.
Thanks!
🙏🙏