Did The Buddha Challenge The Atman = Brahman Thesis Of Earlier Hindus

[Joseph Maynor]

I know some of you around here read the classics.

Edited July 3, 2017 by Joseph Maynor

[Prabhaker]

@Joseph Maynor

Buddha said that there is no God (Brahman) . If there is God, you cannot be totally empty. You may not be there but the God will be there, the Divine will be there. And your mind can deceive you, because your Divine may be just your mind playing tricks. Buddha said that there is no soul, because if there is any soul, ATMA, you can hide your ego behind it. Your ego will be difficult to leave if you feel that there is some self within you. Then you cannot be totally empty because you will be there.

Just to prepare the ground for these techniques of emptiness, Buddha denied everything. He was not an atheist but he appeared to be an atheist because he said that there is no God, he said there is no soul, he said there is nothing substantial in existence – existence is empty. But this was just to prepare the ground for these techniques. Once you enter emptiness you have entered all – you may call it the Divine, you may call it God, or ATMA, soul, whatsoever you like – but you can enter the truth only when you are totally empty. Nothing should be left of you.

Hindus thought that Buddha was destroying religion, that he was teaching irreligion. And people who heard him, even they couldn’t follow, because whenever you go somewhere, you go to seek something – you never go to seek emptiness. So those who went to hear him were seeking something – nirvana, moksha, the other world, heaven, truth – but they were seeking something. They had come to gratify their ultimate desire: to find the truth. That is the last desire. And unless you are completely desireless, you cannot know the truth; the very condition of knowing is to be totally desireless.

So one thing is certain, you cannot desire truth. If you desire it, the very desire will become the barrier. There were masters before Buddha who were teaching, ”Don’t desire, be desireless.” But they were talking about God, about the kingdom of God, heaven, paradise, moksha, the ultimate freedom and liberation – and they were saying, ”Be desireless.” Buddha felt that you cannot be desireless if there is something to be attained. You may pretend that you are desireless, but this pretension, desirelessness, is also from some desire to be fulfilled. It is false. The masters say that you cannot attain to ultimate bliss with desire, and you want to attain ultimate bliss – so you start being desireless, you try to be desireless, so that you can attain the ultimate bliss. But the desire is there.You are trying to be desireless just because of the desire. So Buddha said that there is no God to be attained. Even if you desire, there is no one to be attained... so be desireless. There is no moksha somewhere, there is no goal. Life is meaningless and goal-less.

His emphasis is beautiful and wonderful – no one has tried that way. He destroyed all the goals just to help you to be desireless. If the goals are there, how can you be desireless? And if you are not desireless, you will not attain to the goal – this is the paradox. He destroyed all the goals – not that those goals are not there, they are there and they can be attained – but if you want to attain them, if you desire to attain them, it becomes impossible. The very basic condition is you must be desireless– then the ultimate happens to you. So Buddha says there is nothing to be desired, desires are futile. Drop all desires and when there is no desire you will be empty.

Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, Vol 2 ~ Osho

Before Buddha , Jainas denied God, but they do not denied soul. There were schools of Hinduism which denied spirituality, they were materialists, atheist , a Hindu can  be a atheist too, a Hindu can be monotheist, polytheist too. 

Edited July 3, 2017 by Prabhaker

[Loreena]

@Joseph Maynor Buddha challenged Hinduism and then began his new movement of Buddhism.

Buddha taught a way of life not a religion 

[Prabhaker]

1 hour ago, Loreena said:

Buddha challenged Hinduism and then began his new movement of Buddhism.

Buddha taught a way of life not a religion 

Hinduism is not a religion in the sense you know about religions. There is no founder, no single book, there are many enlightened masters, there followers practice religion in a different way. Hinduism is way of life, it is the Buddhism which is more like a religion. Buddha born and died as a Hindu. There are many masters in Hinduism which refuted unnecessary practices in Hinduism. Buddhism is popular only because it was spreaded outside India by some of his followers. A Hindu can be atheist, monotheist or polytheist. 

Edited July 3, 2017 by Prabhaker
spelling mistake

[Prabhaker]

@Joseph Maynor  There were many Hindus who challenged Atman, Brahman.

Charvaka , originally known as Lokāyata and Bṛhaspatya, is the ancient school of Indian materialism. Charvaka holds direct perception, empiricism, and conditional inference as proper sources of knowledge, embraces philosophical skepticism and rejects Vedas, Vedic ritualism, and supernaturalism.

Ajita Kesakambali is credited as the forerunner of the Charvakas, while Brihaspati is usually referred to as the founder of Charvaka or Lokāyata philosophy. Much of the primary literature of Charvaka, the Barhaspatya sutras (ca. 600 BCE), are missing or lost. Its teachings have been compiled from historic secondary literature such as those found in the shastras, sutras, and the Indian epic poetryas well as in the dialogues of Gautama Buddha and from Jain literature.

One of the widely studied principles of Charvaka philosophy was its rejection of inference as a means to establish valid, universal knowledge, and metaphysical truths. In other words, the Charvaka epistemology states that whenever one infers a truth from a set of observations or truths, one must acknowledge doubt; inferred knowledge is conditional.

Charvaka is categorized as a heterodox school of Indian philosophy. It is considered an example of atheistic schools in the Hindu tradition.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charvaka

If you watch the Indian mind, it IS materialistic. And it is not that it is materialistic only today -- it has always been, because twenty-five centuries ago Buddha was telling people not to be materialists, and he was talking to the Indians. And even before Buddha, almost twenty-five centuries before Buddha, Parshvanath was telling Indians not to be materialists.

India has given the greatest materialist philosophy to the world: the philosophy of the Charvakas. The Greek philosopy of Epicurus is nothing compared to the philosophy the Charvakas have given to the world. The word CHARVAKA is significant; it comes from CHARUVAK. Charuvak means sweet message, beautiful message. Another name of the philosophy of the Charvakas is LOKAYAT. Lokayat means popular; in which the majority of the people believe.

The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha, Vol. 4 ~ Osho