[Buddha-l] Being unable to imagine dying [confused]

[lemmett at talk21.com]

Hello. I guess I thought it wasn't relevant as long as the list was open to non academics. I only have an undergrad degree in philosophy. I was interested in death being inconceivable for a long time but have only started reading Buddhism in the last 6 months or year, since finishing university. They didn't talk about death much; I did read some Heidegger while there but it wasn't helpful.
So yes it is just something that I have a personal interest in, for whatever reason.

--- On Sun, 6/6/10, JKirkpatrick <jkirk at spro.net> wrote:

From: JKirkpatrick <jkirk at spro.net>
Subject: Re: [Buddha-l] Being unable to imagine dying [confused]
To: "'Buddhist discussion forum'" <buddha-l at mailman.swcp.com>
Date: Sunday, 6 June, 2010, 2:35

 
Dear Mr No-fold Lemma,

Richard wrote: "It may be worth looking into why you have made
the choices you have made in giving various [or, certain] things
significance." Amen to that.

Why don't you tell us what you have assiduously left out so far:
what is your training, or study, in whatever path you are on???
Or, since you were in college, did you take up this existential
(there, Herman!) problem on your own,------ or?

"No condition can possibly be so bad that reading Derrida would
be worth undertaking to find relief. Buddhist dogma may be a cure
for a disease no one has, but Derrida is a disease for a cure
that no one has found."       Ya Allah!

JK
____________________________________


On Jun 5, 2010, at 1:47 PM, lemmett at talk21.com wrote:

> What I'm asking is if I were to take seriously the authority
behind the fourfold negation of the Buddha's existence after
death, apply that doctrine of his final death to my own upcoming
one and then add the argument for one's own non existence being
inconceivable: then should I conclude anything about the
possibility of death being a positive nothingness ("slipping into
the night").

I'm afraid the fourfold negation is purely an intellectual
exercise that has no bearing whatsoever on anything as practical
as the question you are asking. About the only thing you can
conclude from the fourfold negation is that there is no self that
will either endure or perish. But so what? 

> Or if "black velvet" remains very unlikely, does death take on
a different significance according to these motivations I have
adumbrated just now.

Death, like life, has no significance whatsoever in itself.
Insofar as it has any significance at all, it has the
significance you have chosen to give to it. It may be worth
looking into why you have made the choices you have made in
giving various things significance.

> Also I might add that, I think, that there is certainly
something or other to Buddhist contemplation in that there is a
sense in which a self cannot be found inhering in phenomena.

The non-self doctrine seems to me like an answer to a question
that no one is asking, or a cure to a disease that no one
actually has. 

> I haven't unpacked that analytically but then I can't do so at
all easily to the belief of death's inconceivability either. At
least without reading Derrida anyway.

No condition can possible be so bad that reading Derrida would be
worth undertaking to find relief. Buddhist dogma may be a cure
for a disease no one has, but Derrida is a disease for a cure
that no one has found.

But ignore me. I'm old, prejudiced and happy to be both.

Richard


_______________________________________________
buddha-l mailing list
buddha-l at mailman.swcp.com
http://mailman.swcp.com/mailman/listinfo/buddha-l

_______________________________________________
buddha-l mailing list
buddha-l at mailman.swcp.com
http://mailman.swcp.com/mailman/listinfo/buddha-l