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Creating Bridges: Spirituality & Philosophy:
Spirituality in Daily Life:
Science, Creation, and Rebirth -
Part 2 of 4
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by Bhikshuni Thubten Chodron |
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What is the mind?
Our mind is all of our emotional and cognitive experiences. It includes not only the consciousnesses that perceive sense objects -- colors and shapes, sounds, odors, tastes, and tactile objects -- but also the mental consciousness, which thinks and which has the capacity to directly perceive more subtle objects, such as emptiness. The word "mind" in a Buddhist sense also includes what in English is referred to as "heart," as in "he has a kind heart." To emphasize the continuity of consciousness, we also use the word "mindstream" to refer to our mind. Each person has a separate mind, or mindstream. The mind is formless, while the brain is part of the body. Our body and our mind are separate entities. While the mind is immaterial, the body is material, composed of atoms.
What is the relationship between the brain and the mind?
The brain is a physical organ and is atomic in nature. The mind is formless and is characterized by clarity and awareness. While we're alive, our brain and mind influence each other. The brain provides the physical support for our sense consciousnesses and gross mental consciousness. If the brain and central nervous system are damaged, the functioning of the mind is affected. Similarly, our mental state -- be it peaceful or agitated -- affects our physical health and our nervous system.
There are subtler levels of mind that, according to Buddhism, do not rely on the physical body as a support. The subtlest mind, which continues on to the next life, is an example. Thus, skilled practitioners can meditate with their subtlest consciousness even after they are brain-dead. Kyabje Ling Rinpoche, His Holiness the Dalai Lama's senior tutor, did this for thirteen days after his breath ceased. Scientists are very interested in studying this, and His Holiness the Dalai Lama has given his approval for them to measure great practitioners' brain functions at death and afterward. The problem is that scheduling this is difficult, because the scientists must be ready with their equipment in India when a great practitioner dies!
What is rebirth?
Rebirth refers to a person's mind taking one body after another under the power of ignorance and contaminated actions. While we are alive, our body and mind are linked, but at death they separate. Each has its own continuum. The body becomes a corpse, and the mind continues on to take another body.
This process of rebirth under the control of ignorance and contaminated actions is cyclic existence, the cycle of constantly recurring problems that we experience. In cyclic existence, sentient beings take rebirth in any of six types of life forms. Some of these life forms -- hellish ones, hungry ghosts, and animals -- experience more suffering than happiness. Other life forms -- humans, demi-gods, and gods -- are considered relatively happy births. Beings repeatedly take rebirth in all of these life forms until they free themselves from ignorance and attain liberation.
How did our mind begin? Who or what created it?
Each moment of mind is a continuation of the previous moment. Who we are and what we think and feel depends on who we were yesterday. Our present mind is a continuation of yesterday's mind. That is why we can remember what happened to us in the past. One moment of our mind was caused by the previous moment of mind. This continuity can be traced back to childhood and to being a fetus in our mother's womb. Even before the time of conception, our mindstream existed. Its previous moments were linked to another body.
Our mind has no beginning, and its continuity is infinite. This may be difficult to grasp initially, but if we use the example of a number line, it becomes easier. From the "0" position, looking left, there is no first negative number, and looking right, there is no last, highest number. One more can always be added. In the same way, our mindstream has no beginning and no end. We all have had an infinite number of past rebirths, and our mind will continue to exist infinitely.
In fact, it would be impossible for our mindstream to have a beginning. Because each moment of mind is caused by its previous moment, if a beginning existed, then either the first moment of mind had no cause or it was caused by something other than a previous moment of mind. Both of those alternatives are impossible, for mind can only be produced by a previous moment of mind in its own continuum. By purifying our mindstream, we can make our future existence better than our present one.
What connects one life with the next? Is there a soul, atman, self, or real personality that goes from one life to another?
Our mind has gross and subtle levels. The sense consciousnesses that see, hear, smell, taste, and feel tactile sensations, and the gross mental consciousness, which is busy thinking this and that, actively function while we are alive. At the time of death, they cease to function and absorb into the subtle, and finally the extremely subtle, mental consciousness. This extremely subtle mind bears the imprints of our actions (karma). After death, the continuity of the subtle mind, which is neither static nor an independent entity, leaves one body, enters the intermediate state, and then takes rebirth in another body. After the subtle mind joins with another body at the moment of conception, the gross sense consciousnesses and the gross mental consciousness reappear, and the person again sees, hears, thinks, and so forth. This extremely subtle mind, which goes from one life to the next, is a constantly changing, dependent phenomenon. For this reason, it is not considered to be a soul, atman, self, or real personality. Thus the Buddha taught the doctrine of selflessness -- that there is no solid, independent, findable thing that can be isolated as the person.
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Bhikshuni Thubten Chodron,
Buddhist Nun, Teacher, Author
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Thubten Chodron (Cherry Greene) graduated with a B.A. in History from UCLA in 1971. After traveling extensively in Europe, North Africa and Asia, she taught in the Los Angeles City School District did post-graduate work in Education at USC.
In l975, she attended a meditation course given by Ven. Lama Yeshe and Ven. Zopa Rinpoche, and subsequently went to their monastery in Nepal to explore Buddhism. In l977, she was ordained as a Buddhist nun.
Chodron studied and practiced Buddhism of the Tibetan tradition under the guidance of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and other Tibetan masters for many years in India and Nepal.
She was the spiritual program director at Lama Tzong Khapa Institute in Italy for nearly two years and studied three years at Dorje Pamo Monastery in France. For two years she was resident teacher at Amitabha Buddhist Centre in Singapore, and for ten years she was resident teacher and spiritual advisor at Dharma Friendship Foundation in Seattle.
She currently is co-founder of Sravasti Abbey at Liberation Park in USA. Ven. Chodron has taught Buddhist philosophy, psychology and meditation worldwide.
Her books include:
Open Heart, Clear Mind; Buddhism for Beginners; Working with Anger; Taming the Monkey Mind, and Blossoms of the Dharma: Living as a Buddhist Nun.
Active in interfaith dialogue, she also does prison work. Ven. Chodron emphasizes the practical application of Buddha's teachings in daily life and is especially skilled at explaining them in ways easily understood and practiced by Westerners.
www.thubtenchodron.
org
www.sravastiabbey.
org
www.dharmafriendship.
org
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