When Siddhartha, then a Boddhisattva, awakened (became Buddha) he had this to say:
“The Dharma I have realized is deep, hard to see, hard to understand, peaceful and sublime, beyond mere reasoning, subtle, and intelligible to the wise. But this generation delights, revels, and rejoices in sensual pleasures. It is hard for such a generation to see this conditionality, this dependent arising. Hard too is it to see this calming of all conditioned things, the giving up of all substance of becoming, the extinction of craving, dispassion, cessation, Nibbâna. And if I were to teach the Dharma and others were not to understand me, that would be a weariness, a vexation for me” (Ariyapariyesana Sutta).
This Dharma the Bodhisattva realized comes by many names or epithets. They all point in some way to the transcendent: a world we don’t see, especially, those of us who are clinging to the conditioned world. These epithets include the unconditioned (asankhata), the end (anata), the truth (sacca), the other shore (pâra), the subtle (nipuna), the everlasting (dhuva), the invisible (anidassana), peace (santa), the immortal (amata), the blest (siva), purity (suddhi), freedom (mutti), the island (dipa), shelter (lena), the refuge (sarana), the beyond (parayana) and nirvana. Of these epithets (there are more such as the absolute, [kevala]) the unconditioned (asankhata) is one of the more important ones.
The unconditioned is in sharp contrast to our conditioned world including our thoughts and concepts by which we connect with conditioned things and various ideas of those things. This contrast is because the unconditioned is substance while the conditioned is mode. To begin to approach the unconditioned is to embark upon a path that minimizes the powerful influence of the conditioned. It is also about allowing ourselves to adapt to the unconditioned. The Buddha set a course for us to follow to the unconditioned. The first thing we must do is believe in the unconditioned enough to strive after it.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/11144442/First-hint-of-life-after-death-in-biggest-ever-scientific-study.html
Posted by: Kantairon | October 07, 2014 at 07:25 AM