The God of Zen

[@mattlovesjiyu]

This is my understanding: God in Zen is the unconditioned void state in that which nothing arises or falls yet is full of everything. It’s like a perfectly luminous space that reflects all information, a clear light as the tibetans refer to it. When you let go of the the ego illusion you discover you are part of this. It’s like empty space, it is nothing yet contains everything all at once.

[@schonlingg.wunderbar2985]

Apples in indias are mangos. Sarcasm in my comment is just sarcasm. Equating totally different things is not productive.

[@peggyandjackieweltmanrasmu2854]

Holy crap i love that definition. The consistency with traditional Kabbalah is pretty remarkable. Bravo sir.

[@DavidFerguson62]

Norman Fischer said, at our zen center a couple of years ago that, "God is a three letter word in the English language".

[@Teller3448]

"Buddhism is not pantheistic in the sense that it identifies the universe with God. On the other hand, the Buddhist God is absolute and transcendent; this world, being merely its manifestation, is necessarily fragmentary and imperfect. To define more exactly the Buddhist notion of the highest being, it may be convenient to borrow the term very happily coined by a modern German scholar, "panentheism," according to which God is all and one, and more than the totality of existence." -Master Soyen Shaku (1860-1919)

[@HardcoreZen]

Good quotation. Thanks!

[@Teller3448]

@@HardcoreZen I just discovered Soyen Shaku, the first Rinzai monk to visit America at the Chicago Parliament of Religions (1893). One might get the impression that Dogen is a pantheist, but he occasionally sneaks in a panentheist statement...very similar to what we know from Vedanta.

[@froomite]

My experience of GOd is that he/she is this transcendent 'it' but also very personal and intimate at the same time

[@katblehm2119]

...makes perfect sense, Brad. My favorite book about “God” just happens to be your book! (There is no God and He is Always with You).

[@HardcoreZen]

Aw! Thank you!

[@Plutocat999]

Yes, great book - loved it. But my favourites are the ones that investigate Shobogenzo. Great stuff, keep it up Brad!

[@MikeD-kp2so]

Reminds me of the Vonnegut quote: "(The purpose of life is) to be the eyes and ears and conscience of the Creator of the universe."

[@HardcoreZen]

I forgot he said that. Is it from Cat's Cradle? I read all of Vonnegut's books in high school (the ones that had been published by then, anyway, I have read most of the later ones too by now).

[@w_ulf]

EXACTLY what you proposed @ 10:23, good sir. Among Asatruar, this is our ODIN, the Jungian Wotan Archetype, who ever seeks wisdom and becomes more.

[@gracefoster4861]

I appreciate your thoughts on this and also your book on the topic. The force thingy kind of makes sense to me too.

[@MarkMcGinn]

Wow, great video... The question of God in Zen has always been very interesting to me, although I find it difficult to explain this idea to others, especially when they already have their own working definition of God or refuse to discuss things that remind them of religion in the first place. I think this has something to do with the fact that "God," for most of Western history, has been conceived in personal terms as an entity that is "on our side" and concerned with human interests, and so usually the person I'm talking to either (a) already believes in a personal God and finds any other notion of God unacceptable or (b) will hear no talk of such silly things because (I suspect) their idea of God brings brings up all kinds of unpleasant associations with organized religion. Usually I conclude that it is probably better not to take conversations in that direction anymore, because it seems to invite misunderstanding more than anything else. Your video made me think of a passage from Nishitani's Religion and Nothingness where he discusses this notion of a personal God. I think it says a lot about why group (a) people find the notion of "God" a la immo somewhat disturbing (because "it" is neither personal nor impersonal). However, I still don't know how to deal with people in group (b) who don't have much patience for things like God (like I said, I usually just don't go there). At the risk of boring everyone, I will quote the passage in full: "Since ancient times calamities both natural and man-made have often been spoken of as the punishment of heaven, the wrath of God, or the like. For the prophets, the fall of Israel was like a lash from the whip of an angry God who people had turned against him. Both Christians and those of other faiths regarded the sack of Rome by Alaric and his troops as a divine punishment, each blaming the other. Such examples as these show that the order of nature and history had come to be viewed teleologically, as dependent on a divine personality, and that the relationship between God and man had come to be viewed mainly as a matter of human interests. But the laws of the natural world that rule over life and matter alike, that govern life as well as death, are in themselves indifferent to questions of our life and death, of the fortune and misfortune that comes our way, of the good and evil we do. Nature greets with indifference distinctions like these which belong to the concerns of man." The question this raises for me: What do we gain by speaking of immo in terms of "God" when this weighty term seems to elicit such unpleasant reactions? Is it perhaps not better to use more neutral language to discuss such a slippery topic? These questions are not challenges; I struggle with them myself.

[@TonAkveld1956]

God is a concept - John Lennon Pick up a stone, and you'll find me. Cleaf wood, and I'll be there - Jesus

[@WorldCrafterPrime]

I might be commenting 4 years late because I'm watching this whole channel in chronological order. It might also be true that you've heard what I'm about to say before and didn't address it because you were trying to make a point that you wanted to make in the video. It's also almost certainly true that nobody changes their mind or learns things from KZbin comments. But here I am, a KZbin commenter, doing what we do best. "God-given" Rights are also called Natural Rights. The philosophy of Natural Rights, while going back to Greek philosophers, was a subject written in detail by John Locke who died ~1700AD and greatly influenced the men who formed America. They are not ideas concocted by aforementioned philosophers, but observed in nature and documented by them, Locke specifically with the native American population. The "God" mentioned here isn't a National God as you try to attribute in this video, it's the general "creator" God from the Catholic/Christian tradition. You can tell because this philosophy has been created/forwarded by/built upon by people like Epicurious and Senca, to French theologian Jean Gerson, Austrian economists like Ludvig Mises, to the Englishmen John Lock and then to America's founding, Jefferson possibly most passionately. And many more. I understand that Buddhism is the point around here, and that's why I'm watching your channel, I want to learn about Zen not debate politics. But at the risk of sounding like Sam Harris, it is easy to knock down straw men. If you want to make a better argument politically, you need to at least know what your opposition is actually arguing. I don't see any evidence you do when it comes to guns, but I hope that you would care to. I am someone raised incredibly Christian (by parents who were church staff and there 3-4 nights a week EZ) who then deconverted into militant atheism, who then after much searching and learning landed on Zen because of Hardcore Zen. I don't believe in the Christian God, like yourself, but I still believe the theory of Natural Rights is correct, because the argument is good. The "Godless" version goes like this: All humans are created equal, with equal Rights and equal significance under the Law. These Rights include: The Right to Life, to Liberty and to Property (later revised to "the pursuit of Happiness" by Tommy Jefferson, some say in order to weaken the institution of slavery.) These are the rights that human beings have in nature, before governments and states or institutions. That is not to say that God protects these Rights or that it's natural for people to have these Rights. If tomorrow the world descended into lawless Anarchy, the only obvious Right would be Might, the strongest would rule due to violence. That is much more "natural". However, what you see in human society when the State or governments do not intervene, but you have a tribe or group working in cooperation, these Rights are always there. Much like how the Golden Rule is in all religions, all cooperative societies had these 3 things for other people in the "in-group", and these Rights would only be taken away if the society deemed the actions of an individual to be unlawful. These are the foundation of the Bill of Rights and most of the West's basic principles of law. Part of the Right to Life is the Right to Self-Defense. Repealing the 2nd Amendment directly impedes on the Right's of the citizens to Self-Defense, especially when one of the entities an individual might need to defend themselves from is a tyrannical government, who, even with a repeal of the 2nd Amendment, would not give up *their* guns, nor would the criminals or mentally unstable, who you also have a Right to defend yourself from. You say in another video that maybe before someone suggests a change to the Zen tradition that maybe they should sit Zazen for 30, 40, 50 years, as Buddhism is a 2500 year old practice that's been tested time and time again, with the implication that it's a bit arrogant to think that one would know better than those that came before them. I have a very hard time not thinking the same thing about people who sound like you when criticizing the American political and legal system, which directly goes back to Athens, ALSO 2500 years ago. If you walk through a field and see a fence, with no apparent reason for it's existence, do you tear it down or keep it up?

[@tobiaskyon5383]

It's always interesting to see how close top-notch christian theology and the ideas of Zen are. You're right, it's not about pantheism or something like that, neither is there a NRA-God. To understand what "God" is in the judeo-christian tradition, we've got to take a look at the bible first. Sure, God is often portrayed as some kind of tribal deity, but there are some completely different notions, namely the ones that portray "God" as "being itself". Aquinas called that "ipsum esse subsistens". To really understand what God meant for the people who wrote the bible it is important to know that the platonic body/soul-dualism wasn't common in the judaism of that era. Life was very physical back then. This physicality translated into the faith, that's why our modern idea of heaven (souls going up there and stuff) wouldn't ever have occurred to an ancient jew. But wouldn't that make God obsolete, if life just ends? No. Because God is (and now we're back to Aquinas again) the "non-contingent ground of the contingent universe". God is in everything because "he" is the ground, the reason for everything that is. That's not pantheism, that's looking at the world as "mirror". On a side-note, everything is at once, there is no past or future for God, everything there is is the present moment and every change is "written" into it (sounds familiar?). But what exactly is "God" now? The answer is simple: We don't know. God is the great secret everybody is searching for, in a way, even atheists. This search is ingrained in our nature, bc we try to attune to "God". Some do it by sitting, some do it by repeating "kyrie iesu christe, eleison" over and over again. Don't get me started on how Christ fits into all that (as manifestation of the immovable mover), that would take too long. The takeaway points of my somewhat incoherent rambling are those: First, most "religions" are on to the same thing, but most of the practitioners don't know that. Which isn't a bad thing, because you can be close to "God" without having a clue or explanation of it (that might be the only way, in fact). Second: The judeo-christian understanding of God isn't as crude as it seems to be at first sight. God is no describable entity that grants wishes or punishes people because some preacher say so, God is the greatest secret there is. And sometimes this secret becomes somewhat clear, especially if we're not trying to uncover it, but are just watching. Like, a wall or something.

[@MartinJutras]

That's a great video. ❤

[@Ope_itsadam]

What you say makes a lot of sense. I like it.

[@HardcoreZen]

Thanks!

[@zanejohnson4548]

This reminds me of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite: God is the "super-essential Darkness which is hidden by all the light in existent things."

[@danielremete4214]

It is confusing trying to grasp IT. But it so good to let pass IT. 🤘

[@w_ulf]

"Hi folks, let's talk about God." Priceless.

[@edgepixel8467]

Don Ricardo JR Underrated

[@sparrowsparrow4197]

Considering the disciple of Jesus said that he taught ," god is light and in God is no darkness at all" and that " god is love"........what does light, ONLY LIGHT, and LOVE, as distinct from evil, coldness, hate,by jesus, considered ultimate truth, ultimate reality, have to do with the Bodhi IT?............what's pure light and love got to do with it?

[@marilynfisher6350]

😅 What if “Inmo” is actually the creator God who has marked all of creation and creature with with Himself? If Zen recognizes that the body and mind appear in the universe and neither are our true selves; then if this is true we should all go to the Bible that “It/What/Inmo” which you call Him (The creator of Heaven and Earth) has left us all teaching us who we are and how to serve and worship Him and not fallen demons which you call tribal gods. Amen to Jesus be all glory and honor forever.

[@CrawlingAxle]

First, I want to thank you for pointing to Shobogenzo Inmo. I looked it up, and it's fascinating. That IS pretty much God of mystical western religions (Kabbalah, Sufism, Upanishads, Maester Eckard, etc.), if you want it to be. Second, with all due respect, I don't think you understood correctly what the NRA dude was referring to. I am not saying I agree with whatever his view was completely or that I take his side with the gun rights and that gun rights are a simple issue. But he is not invoking a tribal god (or God). When he says that bearing arms (owning weapons) is a God-given rights, he is invoking an 18th century (and earlier) idea of natural rights: that all sentient beings possess natural rights as a result of their nature as rational beings. (With the obvious exception of women, children, and slaves - the Founders were not consistent.) They are God-given because they are natural. One has a right to his body's integrity not because some government decided so, but because that's how it is: it's in the fabric of reality. If you want to translate that into a Buddhist language, you can say "It is so because it is Thus". Because whatever the nature of reality is (nature, evolution, God, Thusness, Tathagathagarba, Rigpa, Brahman, Mind), makes it right for a person to own his own body. And whoever violates that right acts wrongly. And from those basic rights other rights develop: for example, if a person has a right to his body, he has a right to his possessions, which are extensions of his bodily functions and investments. And if he has a right to his body and possessions, he has a right to acquire means to protect himself and his family and his possessions. Hence "God-given" gun rights. Now, I recognize that 1) the gun rights issue is not actually so one-sided (people in the public also have a right to safety), 2) republicans/conservatives are not 18th century Scottish Enlightenment; they are a different group of people with different ideals and views and politics. It's very likely that when the NRA dude says "God given rights", he actually believes Jesus decided white male Americans ought to own guns. But he is invoking an idea that's much more abstract and universal and older than current Christian/Republican politics.

[@MrMalcovic]

The force works for the bad guys, too! Those who have succumbed to the dark side...

[@fairytalejediftj7041]

Necro comment: I think the best correlation to what you were expressing is The One in Plotinus. For me, "not me, not mine" means no permanent self, specifically. Mindfulness of body, mindfulness of mind are important. These things exist, it's just they don't exist permanently. And why should an ape exist forever anyway? That seems silly to me.

[@williambigger1545]

I admittedly am more familiar with advaita and western philosophy than buddhism, but from my understanding, reality is infinite, and therefore there isn’t a “top level” in which a God resides. but reality, being infinite paradoxically entails a kind of God. and if it’s all mind? , then by God we are referring to the latent intelligence that exists across all levels.

[@rca8309]

I recently ran across "panpsychism" which I think gets closer to what many people mean when they say "pantheism" in the context you're talking about: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panpsychism

[@HardcoreZen]

I guess... I mean... OK. I just hate words like that. They seem to put a cap on things. Like, you learn the word and you're like, "OK! Got that!" and you're ready to move on to the next thing*. Only, in this case, there is literally NO next thing. *Not YOU specifically, I just mean "one learns the word..." etc. But that sounds pretentious.

[@rca8309]

Yeah, at the end of the day you’re forced to revert to using language to describe something that exists beyond language’s ability to describe. Seems to be the universal problem faced by mystics from all sorts of religious backgrounds. At least until we can install a Matrix-style plug into each other’s heads and directly experience someone else’s experience anyway (but even then it’d be a digital reproduction instead of the thing itself...).

[@jacobhoppen1964]

Very interesting! Went to look at picking up a copy of Buddha Is the Center of Gravity because I'd never heard of it. And your Joshu Sasaki book is worth $500

[@HardcoreZen]

I got it for $4.

[@jacobhoppen1964]

@@HardcoreZen Score!

[@alankuntz4406]

Yasutani was an advocate of emperor of Japan during World War II.

[@HardcoreZen]

He might have been. I've heard that too. I have no connection to Yasutani's lineage. I know almost nothing about him.

[@edgepixel8467]

Alan Kuntz As almost everybody was in Japan. Your point is?

[@wladddkn1517]

I deeply understand what you are talking about. But, communicating with my friends who are God-believers I found out that this kind of argumentation just doesn't work for them, because for a god-believer the very isea of God as "It" is unbelievable and even impossible. God is He! And He is (place the name you like).

[@HardcoreZen]

Yeah.... There are people like that. Sometimes you gotta just let things go, y'know?

[@wladddkn1517]

When I find myself in times of trouble Mother Mary comes to me Speaking words of wisdom, let it be.

[@garad123456]

Since it wasnt in my local library here in Finland, I had to google for the book. Found the whole book in pdf! Here is a link to the book by Sasaki Roshi, "Buddha is the center of gravity" terebess.hu/zen/mesterek/Joshu-Sasaki-Roshi-Buddha-is-the-Center-of-Gravity.pdf

[@garad123456]

On a related note, I borrowed Brad's book Zen wrapped in karma... from my library last summer and wanted to borrow it again. Now it seems to have vanished from the library and theres no trace of any brads book having been in the library system. I wonder what happened. Well, guess I have to support brad and buy one of his books online.

[@HardcoreZen]

THANKS! It seems like my books are often stolen from libraries. Also, thanks for the link to the PDF.

[@alankuntz6494]

From a nondual perspective it's all God.

[@edgepixel8467]

Lodrö Pharchin Siering Oooh. Thank Itness that we have such a wise individual among ourselves. Should we offer you a few bows for sharing a bit of your unbound fucking wisdom?

[@Jack-il3qv]

God is a Mystery. We are a small part of everything.

[@marknoble2030]

There was a time long ago when Hebrew law commanded stoning to death anyone who uttered the name of God. Let me be clear: I am not pro-stoning. But I do sense that the instant I start to talk about You-know-who I mislead myself and anyone listening.

[@cameronoconnor5364]

Agree

[@carlkellner1310]

I'm not sure that introducing the concept of God into Zen discourse is helpful. Perhaps it creates unnecessary confusion for some (knuckleheads like me). I'm not a Christian or a Jew or a Muslim, I don't believe in God but I practice zazen wholeheartedly (as far as I can) and try to follow Buddha's and Dogen's teachings. "Inmo" seems to be more of a quality, whereas the concept God implies some kind of permanent entity. As far as I know, the world seen through Buddha's eyes consists of no permanent things at all. And even if one focuses on negative theology, the word "God" still has implications of some creator deitiy or Eternal Being. The understanding that there is no such eternal God (or that gods are a matter of mere specualtion) is one of the fundamental things Buddha taught, as far as I know. So why try to express the Buddhist perspective using Christian language? Perhaps for Zen people who were raised Christians, this is an important issue. But any attempt to make theistic beliefs accord with Buddhism waters down at least one of the two. You can't be a Christian and a Buddhist at the same time without disregarding fundamental parts of at least one of the two. But I might be wrong. This is just confusing to me. Perhaps I'm simply too dumb to get it. I still appreciate your thoughts and books a lot.

[@wladddkn1517]

I agree that this "play with god" tends to be a confusing thing, especially if we keep in mind that for a god-beliver, be it Muslim or Christian, God is strongly "He" (not even "She"), and it can never be 'It" - it is just unbelivable for him or her to have god as "it". Well, it is a blasphemy, after all. So, all you say about God as True Reality or Absolute, or Great Nothingness or whatever.. it just doesn't work, since "God just can't be so, as you say" (kinda quote)

[@markbrad123]

Thinking it easier to encourage people to realize no self as a thing by noticing the impermanent variance of thought and leave them with some notion of a self as a varied set of traits, skills etc that arise and pass; otherwise, they get so defensive. Nissardgata had to hold back less the identify-ist delusional string him up when teaching in India.

[@Eric123456355]

"Saints and mystics throughout history have adorned their realizations with different names and given them different faces and interpretations, but what they are all fundamentally experiencing is the essential nature of the mind. Christians and Jews call it "God"; Hindus call it "the Self," "Shiva," "Brahman," and "Vishnu"; Sufi mystics name it "the Hidden Essence"; and Buddhists call it "buddha nature. When all is removed what is left is God . Nothingness doesn’t exist as well . Word God cannot be exactly linked with something that is why people struggling with it. Jesus emptied himself into God(Kenosis) .

[@markcaselius5993]

I believe that god and the devil, good and evil, exist because we say they do. This is one of the reasons I struggle mightily with the concept of "no self" If there is no self, who is experiencing this life?

[@alankuntz4406]

Well that guy who said its your god given right could have just said its his right according to the constitution.

[@SonofSethoitae]

Yeah, but the Constitution justifies its "inalienable rights" by saying they come from God.

[@gracefoster4861]

I know this isn't an original thought, but it seems to me that a big part of the problem, is the word god itself. Many cultures have a belief in God, with images, and ideas about their god rewarding them, punishing them, heaven, hell, etc., etc. Many others have tried to come up with names that express it like "ultimate reality, the universe," or some such. I think we sometimes experience this "reality" as children and then are taught all kinds of religious dogma to explain it. Oh, and taught why we should hate others who believe something else. If we are lucky (I think), we come to realize those are only stories/myths and let them go and experience what we experience and don't worry about explaining it to someone else. I find it very difficult without some name that others might "grok" so mostly I don't try, except now. LOL

[@HardcoreZen]

Yeah. I agree with all of that.

[@frisimota]

I found this video very similar to this article I read some time ago: brightwayzen.org/zen-version-god/ But I can´t help feeling that as long as I keep trying to bring back to life a sort of mystical experience I had long ago, or trying to confirm that the content of that experience was actually true and not some kind of self delusion by reading articles or watching videos, i will keep straying away from the true practice and meaning of zen. I keep thinking about the Zhuangzi story in which the old master starts talking about the Dao and the man who was listening to him didn´t even wait five minutes before falling asleep, and then the master starts praising his wisdom. Should i reach the point where i will no longer even care to listen to talks like this one, because the whole meaning of it all will be unfolded before me?

[@romainvicta9793]

I think it’s possible for Buddhists to believe in “a god” (not talking about devas, bodhisattvas or celestial buddhas - but a literal monotheistic god) so long as that god is in line with Buddhist views on reality. This god can not be permanent, must have no essence or self, and may even be subject to suffering and delusion (unless he is enlightened himself). Also, I feel like deification or worship is out of line with Buddhist practice. If we acknowledge that all things have no essence or self and are impermanent, why would we worship something that is subject to the same phenomena that we are?

[@SonofSethoitae]

Wouldn't that just be Mahabrahma?

[@DenverDeathrock]

You might contemplate the Ontological Argument for God. If you accept the rules of semantics and grammar, you arguably have to conclude that God exists, although not necesarily with any attributes people often ascribe to it. I think you're left with the conclusion that God is Being, which is probably or hopefully what Dogan was really getting at.

[@HardcoreZen]

It might be.

[@edgepixel8467]

Jason West But wouldn't a God who would understand the flaws of the ontological argument be even greater?

[@benhorner8430]

When you say there is something that everything is infused with, that it's present in everything, are you just using a softer (maybe easier for people to deal with) way of saying that everything _is it_ (as opposed to having a separate thing that everything is infused with)? I have some confusion about the mind / body division thing. I'm trying to keep an open mind, and not miss important ideas, but my natural tendency is to think of everything as matter and energy. I tend to think of my thoughts as a series of chemical reactions and electrical charges in my brain which is made up of matter. I definitely see all of matter, throughout time as a unit, and probably the ego as an evolved coping mechanism or something. You've said there is no soul per se (no reincarnation, no heaven etc), are you saying that there is something beyond matter and energy that infuses matter and energy? Are you saying that thing is conscious and/or guiding? (That would sound like a god type thing to me.)

[@HardcoreZen]

Not quite. The main thing I'm saying is that I don't know. But, I think one way of looking at what we call "consciousness" is to define it as a series of chemical reactions and electrical charges in the brain, which is made up of matter. I'm fine with that definition and don't see any need to introduce some outside force like God (as it's usually defined as a supernatural thing) or the Soul or something made of a substance other than matter. The caveat there is I also ask, "Do we really know what chemicals are? Do we really know what electricity is? Do we fully comprehend what matter is?" I happen to think these are very mysterious, even mystical forces and elements. They seem to be capable of something very much like magic. They are beyond our understanding. Maybe this very world we are living in is a place of tremendous wonder. Maybe the very mind that reads this sentence is the mind of God.

[@benhorner8430]

Sweet. I love "I don't know". :) When I took philosophy 101 or whatever, I thought Descartes went to far with "I think therefore I am", I could never get that far. I could only get to "I think therefore something is" (I might be a thought in god's mind). And as far as physics (chemistry), I think we will never get to the smallest particle. We can understand things in terms of their precise consistent behavior (and I believe that consistent behavior will continue), but I don't think we'll ever understand why it's consistent, or why the forces that control everything even exist. I have no better thing to call it than god. But god isn't a great conversationalist. Well... maybe that's not true, but it's not a traditional conversation.

[@gra6649]

I like this guy, but I feel that he blew it at the end. As soon as one says God like Zen is this or that one has missed the target.

[@HardcoreZen]

Oops! I missed!

[@gra6649]

Bullseye.@@HardcoreZen

[@AmericanShia786]

I said I wouldn't leave too many comments (and that's because I tend to comment on KZbin as if I know the maker of the video personally, when that is not the case, and then I comment too much), but this is the third comment in two days, so I really will shut up after this. (Smile) Your name looked familiar and so I went to Amazon.com and then I saw where I saw your name before: Hardcore Zen! I had thought about purchasing that previously and reading it. I think, though, that first I will read There Is No God and He is Always With you. I don't like the "mere tribal god" theology, either. I am a monotheist, for better or for worse, but I have a very idealist view of God as a perfectly Just. Benevolent Moral Governor. So, even though I'm sort of a Ron Paul Libertarian who will vote for True Progressive Liberals too, and so I believe law-abiding American Citizens have a constitutional right to own a weapon, I personally don't own one and have no intention to do so. It certainly is not a God-given right! So, hehehe, I got it from both sides because I refused to vote for either Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump. I believed both were too evil for me to vote for with a clear conscience. So, I vote for Gary "Aleppo" Johnson and told people if you think he's boring, vote for Jill Stein. I believe my personal understanding of who God is influenced my decision. I am a 12er Shia Muslim, but so much human tradition in Christianity and Islam that lead Christians and Muslims to act very differently than I believe Jesus or Muhammad did really is a turn off. I believe humans are good but finite so tend toward selfishness, some more than others, and some of us who can see selfish tendencies in ourselves and try do something about it, whether theists or not. That's sort of my take on the 4 noble truths of Buddhism. Zen seems to me to be the equivalent of, for example, Sufism (or Irfan for us Shias) or Carmelite Christian Spirituality for those who may not believe in one (or many) God(s). I read and consider Zen and Buddhist literature because bothered me when I first tried to read it in my early 30s (early 1990s) as a Bible School grad and an Elder in a local Wesleyan Holiness fellowship. Some might say it didn't help me because I eventually became a 12er Shia Muslim, though most people don't even know what that is. Still, how come I get along better with a lot of Buddhists and Zen practitioners (you problem would call yourself something else) than many Bible-Believing Christians, even though I should be getting along better with them as a Theist? Anyway, I promise no more introspective comments on your videos for a long time. Peace.

[@wayneconner2394]

This sounds kind of similar to Taoism and how you can't really explain or understand the Tao from a dualistic point of view. The only way to really know the Tao is to transcend the ordinary mind and embody it. This idea is expressed in the first few lines of "The Tao Te Ching": "The way that can be shown is not the eternal way; the name that can be named is not the eternal name. The nameless is the beginning of Heaven and Earth. The named is the mother of ten thousand things. There are parallels to this in Greek philosophy with the concept of Logos. Stoic philosophy, which I find very complementary to Buddhist practice, talks a lot about this concept. But overall, I find the concept of gods rather pointless and anachronistic. In most cases, they are quite obviously the personification of our ignorance and generally speaking, their associated practices are grossly out of touch with modern culture.

[@Eric123456355]

Stoicism is greek buddhism.(Pyrrho travelled to India)

[@chrislasagna]

First

[@davicarneiro84]

I don’t believe in God because I never saw him. If he wanted me to believe in him, Without a doubt he would come to talk with me And come in my door Telling me, Here I am! (Maybe this is ridiculous to the ears Of someone who, because they don’t know what it is to look at things, Doesn’t understand someone who talks about them With the way of speaking looking at them teaches.) But if God is the flowers and the trees And the hills and the sun and the moonlight, Then I believe in him, Then I believe in him all the time, And my whole life is an oration and a mass, And a communion with my eyes and through my ears. But if God is the trees and the flowers And the hills and the moonlight and the sun, Why should I call him God? I call him flowers and trees and hills and sun and moonlight; Because if he made himself for me to see As the sun and moonlight and flowers and trees and hills, If he appears to me as trees and hills And moonlight and sun and flowers, It’s because he wants me to know him As trees and hills and flowers and moonlight and sun. And that’s why I obey him, (What more do I know about God than God knows about himself?), I obey him by living, spontaneously, Like someone opening his eyes and seeing, And I call him moonlight and sun and flowers and trees and hills, And I love him without thinking about him, And I think him by seeing and hearing, And I walk with him all the time. VI Thinking about God is disobeying God Because God wants us not to know him, And so he doesn’t show himself to us... Let’s be simple and calm, Like brooks and trees, And God will love us by making Beautiful things like the trees and brooks for us, And give us greenness in his spring, And a river for us to go to when we end... excerpt poem by Aberto Caeiro

[@edgepixel8467]

Davi Carneiro And, a personal opinion?

[@jhhjyjkkkjgfjjk]

Zen caught in looping thinking and understanding. You say there is no God if you refer to god as creator. Then you make excuses that it can be called God if you refer to it as something greater (the innefable, the Void, etc.) Logic 1. Gautama Buddha never taught that there is a creator god. Logic 2. Gautama Buddha never taught there is no god. Logic 3. Gautama taught there ARE godS who live in the godly realm but still within samsara. Now, Zen masters and disciples, you may be in agreement with what Gautama taught based on Logic 1 and 2 but you miss out on Logic 3. If you call this "something greater" as god then it is not permanent based on logic 3. Meaning this innefable, void, etc. is still subject to impermanence since any god (whether creator god, Abrahamic god, Ahura Mazda, Allah, Hindu gods, inefetc.fable, void, something greater, etc.) fall under the godly realm being god/gods. If you think that way, then the innefable (which you classify as God aka the Divine) will also die and take rebirth as long as he/she/it is within the cycke of samsara being a god.

[@ΝικόλαςΜ-δ9μ]

I still don't see how the existance of this god is justified. Can someone explain?

[@HardcoreZen]

I practiced zazen for about an hour a day for about 15 to 20 years before I began to believe in God. A few more years after that I didn't doubt it anymore. If you want a string of words that will prove the existence of God, I don't think such a string of words will ever exist.

[@ΝικόλαςΜ-δ9μ]

Hardcore Zen I couldn't care less about words! The thing is that you try to explain what you experience during zazen by using the word god. Why do you go that far? Why not just say that this experience is a product of your brain? Also, I don't see why mention your years of practicing meditation? In my perspective, all this years of practice just make you good at zazen, in the same way that many years of climbing just make me good at climbing. You justify god or the "experience" of him / her / it in your mind by the hours spent meditating! That's a little bit weird, don't you think?

[@HardcoreZen]

God is the best way I can think of to express what I've encountered. I cannot give you a set of words that will make you understand why I don't think it's a product of my brain. I did write a whole book trying to explain both those things. It's called There Is No God And He Is Always With You. I really can't try to recreate that in the space of a KZbin comment. I don't think it would be convincing anyway. Besides that, I don't really feel a need to convince anyone else of what I encountered and what I continue to encounter.

[@ΝικόλαςΜ-δ9μ]

Hardcore Zen I will just say this: You experience something while meditating, you don't know what it is (you said is the best way you can think to express what you have encountered) and yet you decided to call it god, a word with meaning. Sounds to me like an argument from ignorance. It's the same argument all religions use. I didn't expect buddhism to be the same ...

[@HardcoreZen]

Sure. OK. Fine.

[@augurtroldettrold1698]

PanDheism?

[@bartfart3847]

10:02 "it " is a perfectly acceptable pronoun for god. You don't "have to use" (He) at all. You are better than that. Don't perpetuate the patriarchy. You can just as easily say IT to refer to god.

[@HardcoreZen]

I've tried. It doesn't work for me.

[@bartfart3847]

@@HardcoreZen Attachments are difficult. I understand.

[@osip7315]

caught red handed ! promoting "big mind" as it or bodhi ! 5:20