Lacking that unborn supreme security

In the aryan (P., ariya) quest described in the Ariyapariyesana Sutta the Buddha-to-be sees the unborn supreme security from bondage which is nirvana; which is deathless and transcendent.  Here, bondage refers to the temporal world which is subject to decay and death.  But few these days take up the aryan search in a serious way.  They prefer the unaryan quest which never fails to end in decay and death.  They manage to find all kinds of excuses such as religious ones, for example, that when I die I will go to heaven.  They even find non-religious excuses, that when I die, that’s it.  Then there are all kinds of distractions from pleasure seeking to just surviving, day to day, not knowing if I am going to die tomorrow.

The modern, cultural narrative will have nothing to do with an aryan quest.  The narrative only reinforces the unaryan.  I would argue that those who maintain this narrative not only fear such a quest but this fear subconsciously drives the narrative—it’s its fuel.  The narrative they favor is the quick fix or a religion that guarantees instant salvation if you just join its ranks and obey its rules.  But this is just a sophisticated con game, one in which we are putting our Buddha-nature, that is, our potential to become enlightened in jeopardy by following various paths that are intended to delude us spiritually.

This brings up the question of evil (excess) which is latent in everyone; which if given oxygen, so to speak, will turn an individual into a self-destructive monster or worse, become a destroyer of others.  We certainly see this today in people who lack self-control being too weak to manage their own day to day life; who end up bringing themselves to ruin as a result, not to mention their families.  We also see this in the true believer, in the example of the devout Muslim, who lives for jihad; who also has no problem killing gays.  A rather dark note on this, without being committed to the aryan quest, even partially, the world for each of us will grow darker, not lighter.  Collectively, trying to escape from it, we will only plunge ourselves into a new dark age.

Comments

[Mr.Nobody]

While it is true that things may seem grave, remember this, it only takes one person awakening to this truth and then to share this awakening with others (Complete and Unexcelled Awakening, I mean); this is all it takes for a difference to be made. When we look at the many we can become overwhelmed but if we start with ourselves and then work outwards from the security of the unborn (having realized it), then our options become many as we are able to help others in a variety of skillful ways.

[David Brainerd]

Sadly if there was a spiritual ultrasound that could show the unborn supreme security of Nirvana, the athiest culture of scientism would establish a corporation called Planned Buddhahood to abort it.