Apech

We have a family of Ukrainian Russian speakers in the village. Everyday I try to say something in Russian to them ( cos they don’t speak the local lingo). Privet, kak dela? Is getting bit old now- so what are some easy phrases/ normal pleasantries one might say in Russian. oh and please transliterate from Cyrillic cos I can’t read that 😎 thanks

They say what sounds like zharka for hot … is that a regional accent?

Fake science.

Hello and welcome.

Bodhi-cheating The art work of early Buddhism shows what early Buddhism and the Buddha was like. He is not depicted but represented by a pair and sandals, or an empty cushion and so on. He is surrounded by dancing and singing, by nature spirits including voluptuous female nature spirits, and naga serpents. This is a shamanistic scene. Buddha was a shaman who imparted knowledge. A few centuries after his death the great king/emperor Ashoka appropriated Buddhism because it gave a chance of a way out of the otherwise inevitable consequences of the wide-scale slaughter he had perpetrated as part of his empire building. He felt sorry for this - sorry for himself in fact and wanted to save himself from the hell realms. The state subsidised Buddhism he introduced was, unlike the original Buddhism both scholastic and monastic. Early Buddhism had no written texts but under the new Buddhism the collections of texts became everything - where liberation came from listening to the text being read, thinking about them, meditating on them and so on. State funding institutionalised Buddhism into monasteries and universities - much as Constantine did to Christianity - and created a new form of Buddhism which emphasised intellectual learning and religious hierarchies. Early Buddhist monks wandered in groups no larger than three, lived and worshipped in close connection with the local communities on whom they depended for food and supplied services such as healing and spells for good harvests and so on. But for the monastics the text became everything in a kind of 'sola scriptora' approach. Attempts by modern Buddhists to re-find 'early Buddhism' fall into the trap of trying to abstract ideas from the texts and end up with a kind of desiccated secular mental exercise. Oddly to us moderns the closest thing to early Buddhism would be vajrayana even though it has much later historical roots. And it is the main criticism of vajrayana that it introduces magical, yogic and deity practices which places it much closer to what the Buddha was actually like.

Welcome bobelroz - tell us a bit about yourself.

Every time a Daobum stops remembering an Apech dies.

TM has no manager!

I think there’s a remember me button you have to click.

Welcome Daoman.

It would tear us apart again.

Something called Hun Dun primordial chaos still exists but is hidden and not in use! The odd thing about DaoBums is that nothing ever actually ceases to exist but is simply hidden from view. I am sure there is something deeply symbolic about this.

OMG! I thought I was talking to highbrow people

I can answer from the point of view of Vajrayana which I practice. If you have followed proper procedure, observed your teacher for about 12 years before deciding he/she is learned in the dharma, has realisation and follows proper ethical conduct ... and then with growing confidence have received empowerments from them which include samaya vows, have practiced guru-yoga in which one views the teacher as a perfect Buddha and so on. You are effectively bound by the vows you have taken. This is a serious matter and goes well beyond any normal human to human interaction. Then, unfortunately for you, your teacher is found to have committed sexual misconduct etc. then you are within the framework of guru-yoga required (since you have samaya vows) to regard his/her behaviour as a kind of test ... that the perfect Buddha is teaching you something profound. This does not mean though that if asked by them, you have to engage in such acts, since the dharma teachings on this point say you should refuse to do so saying such things are undharmic. It does not mean you should brush said behaviours under the carpet, you should if appropriate report such things to the police for instance (with the awareness that this too is part of the teaching and while holding on to the bond with your teacher). They remain as far as you are concerned a spiritual master. I know this is hard to understand but it illustrates that the vajrayana is a difficult path and that you should stick to the other yanas if you think this would be too difficult to stomach. Do their behaviours demonstrate spiritual mastery? No but yes but maybe. On the one hand they are unacceptable and should be addressed as I said above. But if you read the lives of the mahasiddhas you will find that did all kinds of things which would make you gasp. What Tilopa did to Naropa for instance. Now ok these were already very advanced practitioners but again if they did it today they would certainly be in prison (not that they would give a damn about that) - and justly so. Having said this, we don't live in the extraordinary times of great yogis - so generally you can be sure that the acts you hear about or observe are not spiritual mastery. How does it colour our view of their teachings? It gives us a big, big problem which is a teaching in itself. In one sense these things are clearly undharmic. We can say to ourselves clearly why that might be. Not just shock horror at the thought of it - but clearly and rationally what is it that breaks the vows and so on. From this we can learn a lot. But on another level the shock to ourselves might be the teaching. It could be quite ego smashing to go through this kind of thing - if you yourself are committed practitioner. As it says in Lo Jong 'turn everything on to the path'. When you sign up to the bodhisattva way it is not for a safe and gentle ride. It might be a series of shocks. From the other point of view it is quite possible for someone who is quite off the path to deliver a talk which perfectly follows the dharma. If so would you throw those teaching away if you found he was sleeping with his students? The last point to make - which may sound a little trite but is necessarily true - is that the teacher, the lama or guru is simply an external focal point for you to get to know your own buddha-nature. It is this that you are relating to fundamentally. Provided this is what you are doing the rest doesn't matter.

I like the way you slipped the T word in there. This is a bit like sending drones in to soak up the Iron Dome before hitting it with hypersonics. Moderators sleep ... but with one eye open

what is The Curb? I’m not sure what you mean.

It is part of the board where moderators can discuss things. You have to be a moderator to access it. It dates back to a stage when different parts of the board had ‘stewards’ who had semi- moderation role. I can’t remember when this was as the role was abandoned while the name of the section remained. I posted there so that confidential information like TMs email could be shared without divulging it to the whole of the board. So in effect you were right.

Maybe, maybe not. What after all is certain in this life?

I saw Bill Oddie in a hotel near Newcastle - he had a big backpack and was waiting for the lift. Nothing really happened but given the dullness of my existence it was a bit of a high point to see someone famous. I can’t remember what year it was. I have also seen Morrisey of the Smiths and the lead singer of New Order in a theater. I saw the Queen once but she didn’t know who I was I guess or she would have said something.

She emailed to say she’s back in.

See my message in Stward lounge- Another Day thread.

Congrats on doing that for years - what results did you get? If you are able to share.

Yes indeed though Hathor has the cow aspect which more benign - her name means 'house of horus' or at least that is how it is usually translated. The word for 'house' which is 'hwt' actually means the enclosure of a temple ... thus sacred ground. She is a very ancient goddess and probably originally the sky consort of Horus (who himself was a sky god). This probably older than the Heliopolitan sun cult of Ra which by the 4/5th dynasties had become prominent. Sometimes Horus and Ra are conflated or become composite gods such as Ra-Horakhty etc sometimes the 'eye' or consort is One of a number of goddeses including even Isis depending on the locality of the tradition quoted.

She is usually associated with the Eye of Ra. Ra the sun God had an energetic component called "sekhem" (often addressed as exalted sekhem). The 't' ending to words means female. So Sekhemet or Sekhmet means she is the female embodiment of solar energy. She has a wrathful aspect in this respect

Thank you Luke for asking a difficult question to which as far as I can see there is no clear answer 😀 Personal practice is generally self moderated and while the purpose is to record your thoughts arising from your practice - if those thoughts included some political musings then I guess that would be up to you. Except to say our dear leader’s edict of no right wing bullshit would still apply (as that is his wish to expunge all right wing thought from the board). So I guess that within bounds it might be ok. Despite what people may believe the general purpose of moderation is to make DBs a pleasant and ‘safe’ place for all to post. Experience has shown that political debate on here is often quite angry and unharmonious giving rise to lots of reports and antagonism. It also seems to suck energy from the main purpose of the board to discuss Daoism etc. I think it is fair to say that we have done our best to try to strike a balance on this. But maybe there’s a strong feeling amongst members that they want to ‘have at it’ with political debate(?). I don’t know the perfect answer to this and I think any positive suggestions would be welcome 🙏