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Old 03-24-2011, 03:32 PM   #24
AlexanderDrew

Join Date
Oct 2005
Posts
609
Senior Member
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So your saying that one could only obtain right view if they learn it and practice it entirely from the Dharma? Sounds robotic and superficial to just do as you are told without experiential discernment.
Simply that the Right View the Dhamma describes, whether discerned as a Buddhist, derived from Buddhism generally, or arrived at through other channels, is the Right View for the ending of greed, hatred, and delusion. It isn't doing as one's told, however:

Sanditthika Sutta:
"...the Dhamma is visible in the here-&-now, timeless, inviting verification, pertinent, to be realized by the wise for themselves."

It's to be seen by the wise for themselves - experiential discernment, precisely as you say.

The Dharma is designed to show a way of life to which one is likely to obtain personal liberation, first through mental development and ethical conduct and then, through wisdom. The Dharma, for you and I, is the best way to build a foundation for proper conduct but, it is not the only way. To assume that it is such is to construct a limitation. In doing this, you create an other mental state to which one must overcome in personal liberation.
It may in fact be the only way, but in either case it is the most direct, as it is without speculative metaphysics, unexperienced beliefs, or mere fealty to authority. It also isn't likely, but assured, given one attains the Noble Path - sotapanna and so on.

One takes refuge in the Buddha, Dhamma, and Noble Sangha, not in one among many Buddhisms. The Dhamma I referred to is that Dhamma, not this or that tradition.
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