LIFE and death—a phenomenon puzzling mortals and laities
Xuefeng
August 16, 2002
This earth sees the birth and death of a huge amount of animals and plants every day and every moment. Life and death is a universal phenomenon in nature. Everyone has embarked upon the journey to death since the moment of his birth.
The happiness of LIFE and the sadness of death are the basic emotions of mortals and laities.
A family will be bursting with happiness at the birth of a baby and a family suffering loss of a relative will be overwhelmed with extreme sadness and grief. With the exception of the Jesus and Buddha Sakyamuni, who are so transcendental and free from vulgarity and have such great wisdom, few can escape from this enigmatic circle and understand the real signification of life and death.
The tragedy of life lies in the lack of enlightenment and in the inability to escape from the transmigration of life and death.
For thousands of years, people have been seeking the way to immortality. Modern medicine and science are also probing into the secrets of longevity. I wonder why people are so happy about life but so grieved at death.
Seeking life entails endless troubles and seeking death brings infinite benefits.
What would the world look like if none of the plants and animals on the earth dies, and if our great great great grandparents survive till today and each family has a thriving population?
Some will think, “It would be best if all of them die and all of us survive.”
Well, suppose they all die and we all survive, see if we are better off. It would be OK as long aswe can distinguish who “they” are and who “we” are. We must know at the same time that every one wishes the same as you and me. Then in the end who are to die and who are to survive?
Is it so good to live and so bad to be dead?
Take a look at human history, pay a visit to your neighbors, and ponder over the question of what good there is to live and what harm there is to die.
Let’s forget about the time immemorial and talk about the time from Sakyamuni till present. How many people have lived a good life and how many have died a bad death.
Let’s take the examples in Chinese society. Antenatal training has been provided even before a baby is born. Abandoning the music of nature, the Greatest Creator, God, and Buddha, people spare no efforts to inoculate the fetus with the imperfect music of mankind. Immediately after birth, adults try every means to provide the little babies with toys and cartoons instead of having them got in touch with flowers, birds, insects, and fish in nature. Before the age of schooling, the children have begun their preschool education, learning piano, painting, kong fu, and dancing. They have no opportunity to bring their own instinct into play nor have fun in nature. When the children have just begun to know about the world around them, they will be burdened with heavy and formless pressures. In addition to the heavy schoolbags and the endless homework, adults spare no efforts to add extra education for them. Moreover, endlessly lecturing began to pout on to children:
“You must be someone, you have to get full marks in exams, otherwise you’ll be lagging behind others!”
“Child, I am doing all this only for your good! You must work hard and strive to become an excellent student. You must enter key middle school and then qualify yourself for study at prestigious university. Otherwise, you will have no foothold in this society!”
“Why are you so fond of playing, my kid? Look at Xiao Ming, she is so diligent and so promising. You must learn from her.”
These and many more lecturing have left children at a loss.
The hundred-meter dash begins with middle school. Students are preoccupied with study and examinations day and night, teachers and parents are carefully supervising and urging, and the society is imprudently promoting the atmosphere of elites. As a result the splendor of human nature is inundated in the endless darkness.
Will their college life be relaxing?
The answer is no. The comparison between classmates for superiority in terms of food, clothes, residence, and transportation is only a small matter if compared with the authoritative indoctrination in ideological field and the blind and unlimited pursuit of knowledge. College should be a place to cultivate noble moral sentiments, but the majority of colleges are fostering the lively and natural men but the robots that have lost onself.
“We must bring honor to our ancestors, we must win glory for the motherland, and we must win credits for our nation!” The colleges have been fostering the narrow minded notions.
What’s worse, some colleges and organizations are teaching students how to make their first fortune, how to rise in the world, and how to attract handsome men and beautiful women to themselves.
This is a worrisome era!
The real distress begins with the graduation from the universities. There are a bewildering number of roads ahead. Which one shall I take? The unbridgeable gap between dreams and reality, the intangible conflicts between ethics and interest, the marriage, the houses, the cars, and the expected splendid success—all these have put universitystudents at loose ends, which has fragmented the entirety of their spiritual nature to an unbearable scene..
If unverisity graduates are like this, then those with no university education must have experienced even greater conflicts and misery in mind.
Marriage and having of a family does not secure one a harbor to shelter the storm. Heart-rending matters occur frequently, and it is only normal human feelings to support aged people and bring up children. What people cannot bear is the friction and “battles” between husband and wife. Birth, death, illness, and old age, departure, resentment, failure to accomplish one’s desire, and transience—all the beauties of life have been ruined completely.
We see people on the streets, each of them looking vigorous and elegant. But once we get to know their inner world, we will find every one of them emaciated and fatigued.
Many people in my neighborhood are rich businessmen. They all have villas, servants, andlimousines. Then they should be happy and satisfied, right?
The answer is no. When I chatted with them one day, one of them said, “Actually if I have a million Yuan (RMB), I will be doing well in China.”
Another person, as if he has heard the talking of an alien, taunted, “A million? What can you do with it? It is barely enough to buy and decorate an apartment.”
Another said to me, “I heard you are writing a book, right? You are a little old-fashioned. Don’t you know that in today's time you are everything if you have money and you are nothing if you don’t? Make haste to earn money!”
Yet another person (a woman) preached, “Nowadays money is God. How many copper coins is conscience worth?”
I was overwhelmed, I shuddered. No wonder they grudge every second and every penny and regard money above everything else.
I see the world is ruled by goblins, devils, and monsters? Am I wrong? Or am I the real devil? OrI don’t fit in with this world at all? I feel that life is suffering and human life is rightly a sea of suffering.
“The sea of suffering is borderless, please return and repent for salvation!”
Return? What is “return”?
Returning is death!
Why die? For living is worse than death.
How to die? Nirvana.
How can nirvana be carried out?
Self-improve and self-refine.
How does one self-improve and self-refine?
Raise consciousness and increase wisdom.
What is wisdom?
Wisdom is the supreme and complete understanding of life and death.
How can one acquire supreme and complete enlightenment?
By understanding what is life and what is death.
Then what is life and what is death?
That one is inexplicably brought into the world as a result of Karma is called birth and life; thatone rushes about blindly and departs the world unjustifiably is called death.
Birth is accidental, is death inevitable?
Both birth and death are inevitable.
Since both death and birth are inevitable and individuals have no choice and cannot resist,then why do we have to understand life and death?
By understanding death and life, one can cast off life and death.
How can one get rid of life and death?
One can do so by reaching the realm of no birth no death.
What is the realm of no birth no death?
Elysium World is the realms of no birth no death.
What is “Elysium World”？
“Elysium World" is one of the 36-dimension spaces, namely the world described by Jesus and Sakyamuni.
Is there really such a world? Or is it only a tale?
Yes, there is, I am telling the truth.
Then please demonstrate it to me.
I can not, because it is another time-space, which is invisible to naked eyes. The mirages that occur occasionally are part of “Elysium World”.
Then there is no way to see it?
Yes, there is.
What way?
By the spiritual sense.
What is spiritual sense?
A man has six sense organs of eyes, ears, nose, tongue, bodyand mind, which are respectively responsible for the six senses: vision, hearing, olfaction, taste, touch, and spiritual sense.Spiritual sense is the perception in everybody’s consciousness and a spiritual apperception.
Why cannot my spiritual sense have such a capability?
Because your spiritual sense is too dull.
Why is my spiritual sense dull?
Because it has been polluted.
What has polluted my spiritual sense?
Your spiritual sense has been polluted by images in nature and the values of human society and your prejudices.
Then how can I restore my spiritual sense?
By awakening to truth.
What is awakening to truth?
Awakening to truth means getting to the bottom of a phenomenon.
What is phenomenon?
Phenomenon can be anything that we see through vision, anything that we hear through hearing, anything that we smell through olfaction, anything that we can know through our taste, and anything that we acquire through our sense of touch.
According to you, there are too many phenomena.
Yes, Buddhism talks about 84,000 Dharma Paryayas, but actually Dharma Paryayas are unlimited.
What is Dharma Paryaya?
Dharma Paryaya is a means to grasp a phenomenon and find out the ultimate essence of thephenomenona‘s essence
What is essence?
Essence is something concealed, which causes the occurrence of certain phenomenon.
Then what is the ultimate essence of essence?
The substrate causing the essence is the ultimate essence.
That is to say the Greatest Creator is the ultimate essence?
Yes.
How do we get to know the Greatest Creator?
This book of mine can enlighten you on the understanding of the Greatest Creator.
Oh, I see.
What do you see?
The birth of man is like falling into the sea of suffering and so it is something lamentable. The death of man, however, is like being severed from the sea of suffering and so it is something delightful.
Yes, but not entirely so.
Why?
Because death is not the final resting place.
Why is death not the final resting place? Didn’t you say that man will enter the Elysium World after death?
Death is only a surface phenomenon. Behind death is the transmigration of life. Some people will return to the human world after death, some will becomeanimals after death, some will enter the thousand-year world, and some will go to the ten-thousand-year world. Only a very limited number of people will go to the Elysium World after death. So how can we feel happy if some people are even worse and are more miserable than in the human world after death?
Yourpreaching about preexistence, next world, and transmigration of life is too inscrutable and incredible. How can we believe in something that cannot be proved by science?
Science is materialism. Science can not prove what is beyond the material world. But the universe is composed of material and nonmaterial. Science can only prove half of the universe not the other half. Take my consciousness for example. How big is it? What color is it? How heavy is it? What shape does it have? Science cannot provide answers to these and many other questions. Therefore you cannot completely negate what cannot be proved by science.
Then can you prove that man has preexistence and next world?
Yes. One is the records about preexistence in history, which can be found in the literatures of many nationalities; another is the record of facts by International Near-death Research Institute; and the third is the descriptions by the sages and saints like Jesus and Sakyamuni.
These are only legends, hearsays, or religious doctrines, and thus are not convincing. Can you come up with something new?
Yes, homosexuality is an example. The rule for the biological world is that like sexes repel each other and unlike sexes attract each other. So why is there homosexuality? And why the homesexual love can be so dear to risk one’s life?
This involves the gender of his (her) preexistence. If a woman has apreexistence as a man, the inertia of biology will continue to play its role and will incline her to instinctively like a womaninstead of a man, although she has become a woman in this life. When she meets a woman with the same preexistence, they will chime in easily and fall in love with each other. In the same way, if a man has his preexistence as a woman, then he will still like man in this life.
Instead of morbidity, homosexuality is a spontaneous instinct, which may fade away with the passage of time.
In addition, there is a saying that “Rivers and mountains may be changed but it's hard to alter a man's nature.”. What is true nature? And why it is unchangeable?
Nature is the innate characteristic. When does nature come into being? From primary school? From the time of while in mother’s arms? Since the time of an embryo in the mother’s body?Since the time of existence in the womb? Or since the combination of the sperm and ovum?
If nature starts from the time mentioned above, there is no question of “hard to alter a man's nature”.
Then we can conclude that nature has started centuries before which is something deep-rooted, unlikely to change in a relatively short period of time.
We can observe people around us or study on some special people. Then compare with the habits of some animals, we can easily figure out that certain people possess original nature of certain animals. Thus we can conclude that such people may have been certain animals in their preexistence.
For another example, for thousands of years philosophers and thinkers have raised the question “Who am I?”, but failed to answer.
Who am I?
Am I my family? No, because I am still me even without my family.
Am I my clothes? No, because I am still me after I have undressed myself.
Am I my teeth? No, because I am still me after I have lost all my teeth.
Am I my hair? No, because I am still me even if I have become bald.
Am I my eyes? No, because I am still me even if I have become blind.
Am I my legs? No, because I am still me even if I am amputated.
Am I my heart? No, because I am still me after organ transplantation.
Am I my blood? No, because I am still me even after I have blood transfusion.
Neither this nor that, then who on earth am I?
Well, I am Tathagata.
What is Tathagata?
Tathagata is the essential origin, the consciousness (soul) that already exists beyond the flesh and is enduring hardships in the world by living in this "home” of my flesh. When this “home” of my flesh ceases to exist, I am still there. All that I have to do is only to find another “home”. This is just like crossing a river. I borrowed a boat, but I would give up the boat and go onshore afterI have got crossed.
Buddhism preaches that “An enlightened heart gives rise to insight into nature, and an insight into nature secures Buddhahood”. If we have understood this principle, we are already Tathagata Buddha. We will go directly to “Elysium World” after death and don’t have to come to the human world to continue the hard time.
Well, also much for the simple introduction of life and death. My purpose is not to consider something as it stands, but rather to make it clear that the irreversible question of life and death is determined by the Greatest Creator and that life and death has its purpose and meaning.Without the Greatest Creator there would be no life, let alone the question of life and death.
http://lifechanyuan.org/bbs/forum.php?mod=viewthread&tid=7123&extra=page%3D1
newoasisforlife.org
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