Exploring the depth of Buddhism : four noble truths, Karma, Nirvana

Exploring the depth of Buddhism : four noble truths, Karma, Nirvana The Buddhism is the fourth-largest religion in the world, being a very influential religion worldwide. The Buddhism was first originated in India, therefore, being classified as an Indian religion. Although Buddhism originated in India, it rapidly spread around Asia, now being one of the most dominating and influential religion in Asia. The Buddhism is immensely associated with the state of being awakened about the human nature. This process is obtained and trained mostly through meditation, which is a distinct feature about Buddhism compared to other religions. The Buddhism is rather a self-mentoring and self-recognizing about the nature of human lives and the surroundings. The Buddhism encompasses the teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, known as the Buddha, which means the awakened one. In addition, the Buddha was recognized by his followers as an awakened teacher who was fully aware of, what is known as the Buddhists philosophy or beliefs, a cycle of suffering and rebirth. In other words, the Buddhism greatly elaborates on the belief about nothingness, death and afterlife. There are various branches in Buddhism but there are two main branches; Theravada, meaning the school of elders, and Mahayana, meaning the great vehicle. Moreover, there are four very important features about Buddhism; the four noble truth, karma, nirvana and Mahayana. The purpose of this paper is to explore the Buddhism in depth, about its origins and various beliefs. In particular, it will be based on the four noble truths, karma, nirvana and Mahayana, the major branches in Buddhism. The most fundamental thoughts and beliefs in Buddhism are greatly based on the four noble truths. Especially in the Mahayana Buddhism, the fourth truths are the essential concepts to the path. The four noble truths are the formulation of his understanding of the nature of suffering. Since his beliefs and teachings were mostly about suffering and nirvana, it was the most advanced and fundamental principle in Buddhism. The significance of his belief is that he did not view negatively about suffering but acknowledged it. The followings are the four noble truths. 1. Life means suffering 2. The origin of suffering is attachment 3. The cessation of suffering is attainable 4. The path to the cessation of suffering. As the Buddha puts an emphasis on the understanding of suffering, it is very important to recognize the importance of these noble truths. The first truth is basically about the human nature being painful for their entire lifetime. The beginning of life, birth, is the start of suffering as the pregnancy is extremely painful. As we live along, we age and get older, which is also suffering. Moreover, humans are very vulnerable to all kinds of diseases and illness, which is also suffering. However, on top of all these sufferings, the most painful and long-lasting suffer is probably death. The death of the parents, friends, lovers and even children lead people to great pain for a long time. Therefore, the first noble truth that the life is suffering describes well about the human nature. The second truth suggests that the suffering is caused by attachment. In Buddhist point of attachment is mostly greed, egotism and unnecessary desire. According to this truth, the desire for attachment would only result in misery and suffer. Moreover, this truth also gives the idea that everything is impermanent, meaning that in any realm of human nature they cannot possess eternal happiness. Everything changes, death exists and desire will only lead to misery and suffer. The third truth is related to the second truth. Since the suffering is caused by attachment, the cure for suffering is to vanish the attachments. This is simply to abolish the cause of suffering, abolishing the source of pain. In other words, by being free from all worries, troubles and greediness, the cessation of suffering can be attained. This state of mind is called nirvana, which will be dealt in more detail later on this essay. The nirvana will only be comprehensible to those who have attained it. The fourth truth is the extended thought about third truth, which talks about the path to end the suffering, a gradual path of self-improvement. There are two extremes, indulgence and asceticism, which the two ends lead to the end of a cycle, rebirth. Therefore, the main point of this truth is to avoid the extremes in favor of a life of moderation, nonviolence and compassion. Therefore, Buddhism is the middle way. Another important feature about Buddhism is karma, any kind of intentional action whether mental, verbal, or physical. The karma is every volitional action of individuals, whether those are good or bad. The exception made in their case is because they are delivered from both good and evil; they have eradicated ignorance and craving, the roots of Karma. Buddha says All living beings have actions as their own, their inheritance, their congenital cause, their kinsman, their refuge. It is Karma that differentiates beings into low and high states (deBary, p417). This is the main idea of karma, that the will makes the difference between good and bad. In each life, a soul is punished or rewarded based on its past actions, or karma, from the current life as well as earlier lives. Karma isnt due to gods judgment over a persons behavior. The way Buddhist accepts is somewhat different from the way the ordinary people perceive. The Buddhists understand good and evil in terms of how selfless and pure the person is, rather than simply caring for other people or being nice. Buddhists believe that the greatest achievement is selflessness(deBary, p493), showing how Buddhists perceive goodness. In addition, since karma is not a god or a supernatural force, it can be controlled by strong will. This state of mind, karma, can be cured by meditation, as the greateset mediation is a mind that lets go(deBary, p495). Another important fact is that Karma is not only believed in Buddhism, but also in Hinduism, Sikhism, Jainism and many other religious groups. Because Karma is categorized as being the chain of cause and effect, Buddhists perceive karma as motives behind an action. Therefore, in order to make a difference between good and bad action, you will still need to have a pure intention, which can only be obtained in the empty state. In Buddhism, there is a state that the Buddhists desire to acquire, perhaps their ultimate goal in their lives. When karma is a willful action of individuals, nirvana is the state that Buddhists desire to acquire. Nirvana is the state of being free from all the suffering and sadness. It is a central concept in Buddhism, a spiritual state of having no sorrow and anger. Buddha says that Nirvana is the highest happiness(deBary, p494) , extinguishing ignorance, hatred and suffering. The Buddha also referred Nirvana as the state of deathlessness having an increasing control over the generation of karma. Since Buddha had overcome all these complexes and sufferings through meditation and achieved nirvana, his mental health was perfect. Also, that he was very much aware of appreciating the pureness, in which people are initially born with and try to obtain. Therefore, the Buddhists refer to this state as enlightenment. In order to achieve this peace, individuals practice and meditate endlessly to empty their minds as much as possible. Also, this highest spiritual state is derived from the cessation of the desires and greed. Once the state of Nirvana is achieved, you can fully escape the cycle of karma and achieve parinirvana, nirvana in the afterlife. Parinirvana is the final nirvana that you eventually obtain endless peace in your life for the rest of your cycle of life. The Buddhism relates lots of their religious beliefs to afterlife. For example, they believe that when you commit lots of malevolent actions that you will have to pay off for those actions, perhaps in afterlife. Also, when you are constantly experiencing misfortune, Buddhists will say that you are paying off what you have committed in the past life. Moreover, another famous belief that Buddhists have is that in order to have a relationship with a person, you need have an extremely strong bond with that person from the past life. Meaning that past life and after life is somehow related, in terms of relationships. The Mahayana is one of the two main existing branches of Buddhism, which was believed to be first founded in India. It is generally believed in the East Asia, including Korea, Mongolia, China and Japan. The Mahayana is majorly taught in Buddhists schools. People who strongly believe in Mahayana usually think that the state of nirvana can be achieved in a single lifetime, and it can be accomplished even by a layperson. The Mahayanists puts an emphasis on the individual enlightenment. In a different point view, they strive to liberate from the cycle of birth and death, the ultimate source of suffering. Once Buddhists are set free from all the pain, suffering and troubles, they eventually reach the bliss of Nirvana. Another important feature about Mahayana is that they believe in universalism, which is the belief that everyone can become a Buddha (deBary, p502). This is an abstract belief but the theory is that at some point, you will become a Buddha as you obtain more and more selflessness. Moreover, the Mahayanists also believe that compassion to help sentient beings reach enlightenment: become a bodhisattva, both human and seemingly godlike, yourself. We can see that the Mahayanists generally believed in ordinary people, perhaps Buddhists, could eventually reach a state of mind that can become Buddha, which can be governed by compassion and individual enlightenment. Once you recognize the sentient beings, you will be drawn closer to the Nirvana, the ideal and ultimate peace in Buddhism. Therefore, the Mahayanists also believe in reaching a state where they could extinguish their own individual existence in Nirvana. In conclusion, we have explored the Buddhism, its various supporting beliefs and the origin of those branches of Buddhism. It seemed that Buddhists majorly desire to achieve the peaceful and empty state of mind, regardless of what branch they strongly believed. For example, there were extremely keen to acquire the Nirvana, the ultimate peace in life, no longer being entangled in suffering and pain. Most of the suffering comes from the cycle of death and attachment. However, the cessation of those attachments is the way to overcome the pain and achieve nirvana. This controlling of mind is also associated with Karma, which is the willful action. Therefore, the Karma differentiates the state of mind, which will cause the individuals life to branch in different directions. The Mahayana is a powerful branch in Buddhism, which emphasizes individual enlightenment. In a nut shell, the ultimate motto of Buddhism is to achieve the state of nothingness, understanding the cycle of suffering, the karmic cycle and the cycle of rebirth and death. By exploring the Buddhism, I figured that Buddhism is more associated with individuals attainment, rather than simply worshiping the supernatural beings or gods.

Evaluate Research on Conformity Making Reference to 2 Studies Essay

Conformity is the tendency to adjust one’s thoughts, feelings or behaviour in ways that are in agreement with those of a particular individual or group, or with accepted standards about how a person should behave in specific situations (social norms). It is also the key ways that a society or culture passes down its values or behaviours to its peers through an indirect form of social influence. Deusch and Gerald (1995) first presented that the reasons of people conforming is due to two factors that are information social influence and normative social influences. Information social influence is based on the ways people cognitively process information about specific situations. Normative social influence is based on our nature as social animals, and our need to be accepted and to ‘belong’ in society. Individuals often conform to avoid rejection and gain social approval within society. Festinger (1954) also agreed that people evaluate their own opinions and judgement through social comparisons, which is when the individual compares themselves to the peers around them When one realizes that others are not behaving in the same way, or think differently, it leads to anxiety, which is known as cognitive dissonance. In order to test for conformity, Asch carried a test where the subject was given a simple task of matching a length of line to one of three other comparison lines. The control subjects (who were able to take the test alone without any confederates) that served as the comparison to the variable (the individual who was tested for conformity) made almost no errors. In the experimental condition, one individual was tested but were surrounded by seven other confederates of the experimenter, who were told to give wrong estimates almost 70% of the trials. The subject was also second to last giving their answers, so that they were faced either giving their own opinion or conforming to the group. The average rate of conformity was 32%. 74% conformed at least once and 26% never conformed. In order to identity factors influencing conformity, Asch conducted variations to his experiment. Asch found out that with only one confederate, only 3% of the participant conformed, and with two confederates the rate rose to 14% and with three confederates, it rose to 32%. Larger groups did not increase the rate of conformity. Unanimity was an another factor, where conformity was more prominent when all the confederates agreed. If one of the confederates disagreed, the participant was less likely to conform. The difficulty of the task also increased conformity. Also when the participant was given the choice to write down their response, conformity decreased. Confidence and self-esteem was another significant role in influencing the participants, as people with high confidence strongly believed in their opinion, and were less likely to conform. However, even the participants that did not conform still felt strong social pressure. Although these results were quite reliable to a certain extent, there were multiple criticism towards the experiment. The experiment was considered ‘artificial’ with low ecological validity. There were also ‘demanding characteristics,’ where the participant may have changed their behaviour in order to please researchers. Also there was a lack in cultural diversity as the experiment may only represent the US in 1940-1950s. Because the individuals were placed in deception and anxiety, it also resulted in ethic concerns. Also, there were ethic concerns as the individuals were placed in deception and anxiety. Berry (1967) suggested that conformity is required by their respective survival level economics. Low food receiving societies tend to produce self-reliant independent individuals, while high food producing societies are group reliant and dependent. He also proved his theory by using a variation of Asch’s experiment through using samples of the Temne Sierra Leone and the Inuit people of Canada. Hunting and fishing in Eskimos show great tolerance in disciplining children, therefore resulting in independent and risk taking individuals. Rich farming Temne people apply strict disciplinary measures, resulting in more dependent and group reliant individuals. Therefore the experiment resulted that the Temne people of Sierra Leone conformed significantly more than the Inuit people of Canada, probably because of the economic differences. The Temne people usually had to survive on a single crop that is harvested by all the people in the society, therefore requiring each other’s trust and coordination of effort. . The culture also mainly focuses on agreement and harmony. Consensus is less present in Inuit culture as their economy is based on continual hunting and gathering on a relatively individual basis. However sometimes, there have been several examples of minority commitment to a view not held by the majority throughout the 20th century. This includes women’s right’s to vote in civil rights movement, environmental movement etc. Also research proved that minority opinions are significant in a group’s decision-making process. Groupthink happens when someone in a group suggest an idea, and everyone accepts the idea without considering other possible opinions It represents the group members having concordant opinions in an issue, resulting in not seeking alternative or disagreeing opinions, often because optimism prevents their decisions from becoming successful.

Les Fetes - 643 Words

Brianna Jackson Period 3 12/15/15 Les Fà ªtes Christmas is one of the most important festivals. It is celebrated ever year on 25th December. It was on this day that Lord Jesus Christ was born. Christians wear new clothes and attend special prayers in the church on Christmas. The churches are lit up on the Christmas eve, an evening before Christmas. On Christmas, Christians sing carols and pray together in the church. All the family members decorate Christmas trees with toys, decorative lights, balloons and candles. Children believe that it is Santa Claus who brings gifts for them. Christmas is a festival of joy and peace. But Christmas is celebrated differently in many countries. Variations during this time include different meals,†¦show more content†¦In America there is no set way of celebrating Christmas. Because the united states is a melting pot of all cultures you can see many different views on the holidays. In the U.S though we do have some basic traditions. In the U.S many families decorate their houses with co lorful lights and decorations such as garland. During December many cities and towns in the U.S put up large Christmas trees and through festivals that feature ice skating and sledding. Many households have Christmas trees of their own that they decorate with lights and ornaments as well. On Christmas eve families customarily leave out cookies and milk for Santa Claus. Children leaving stocking hanging on the fireplace for Santa to fill and then he also leaves their one Christmas wish under the tree. In the U.S Santa is believed to have 12 reindeer that fly his slay around the world. On Christmas day families’ open gifts and then share a meal. The traditional meal for the U.S Christmas is turkey or ham with cranberry sauce and assorted sides. In the evening on Christmas is when most religious families attend a special church service to remember the birth of Christ. Although all countries celebrate Christmas differently they all share the same want for peace on earth. This was proven during World War 1 Christmas cease fire of 1914. When French, British, and German troops stopped fighting to celebrate Christmas. This event proves that all men no matter the circumstance can come together and canShow MoreRelatedThe Built Environment At The Gardens Of Versailles1594 Words   |  7 Pagesgrand Vaux-le-Vicomte which was suspected to have been built using embezzled crown funds1, in 1661 Louis XIV began his epic project of the gardens designed almost entirely as an expression of his absolute power. Andres Le Nà ´tre, Versailles’ leading landscape architect, believed in the basic conception that landscape should be more impressive than the buildings it comprehends2. With over 800 hectares of gardens, the size of Versailles alone is quite daunting. 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Computers Course Works

Abstract Computer choice during the time of acquisition is a very important factor that should never be ignored. Many stores are flooded with advertisements and offers that may seem to be a wonderful deal and pocket friendly but in the long run they turn out to be a howler. Care should therefore be taken during the time of acquisition and ensure that you get the best deal for your money. List of Abbreviations: GHz – Gigahertz MHz – Megahertz RAM – Random Access Memory MB – Megabytes GB – Gigabytes TB – Terabytes Introduction A computer is a magnificent tool for making work easier but can sometimes turn out to be a nuisance if not properly chosen during the time of acquisition. If one decides to buy a computer without carrying out a thorough market survey, then he/she is likely to end up with a sub-standard machine. Care should therefore be taken when choosing a computer so as to suit your purpose. Some of the factors that should be considered when buying a computer include: the computer speed (measured in GHz or MHz), RAM size (measured in MB or GB), the hard disc capacity (measured in GB or TB) and also the brand of the computer. The last specification has been ignored by many but has in the recent years proved to be vital. This study takes into account a market survey and tries to find out which computers are best suited for an organization. The study takes a close look at HP touchSmart 600 desktop computer. This type of computer has a touch screen and is fun to use. The computer looks beautiful and has several features that make it one of the best computers to use. It has an Intel core Duo P7450 64bit processor running at 2.13GHz. This makes this computer very fast. It also has a 4GB system memory which makes the speed of program execution superb! On top of that, the computer is fitted with a 1TB hard disc. This makes it have a very good   (large) storage capacity. The TFT monitor that comes with the system is fitted with a card reader (supporting six formats), built in camera and a volume control knob. This makes it an all-in-one PC. Retrieved from http://www.reghardware.com/2010/01/22/review_desktop_pc_hp_touchsmart_600/ Some of the features that should be improved in this particular design include: fitting it with a higher quality camera with a higher resolution. The camera should also be detachable so as to give a better view when taking photos. The computer should also incorporate the use of Wi-fi technology which enables wireless interconnection of devices. The computer has a combo CD/DVD writer tucked behind the right-hand bezel which is capable of playing Blue-ray discs. It however takes long to start playing. The drive is also a little bit difficult to recognize. The drive also makes one to force a disc into it which often caused scraping. Retrieved from http://www.reghardware.com/2010/01/22/review_desktop_pc_hp_touchsmart_600/page2.html References http://www.reghardware.com/2010/01/22/review_desktop_pc_hp_touchsmart_600/page1.html http://www.reghardware.com/2010/01/22/review_desktop_pc_hp_touchsmart_600/page2.html