Expert: Bodhicitta - 5/23/2006

Question
I read your response about God to a former Catholic Nun, but I am     
still a little confused.  Maybe I am asking an impossible question,     
since I am trying to seek some truth about life and death.  Each     
religion or belief will argue their teachings are the correct  path,     
atleast for them, but none can really prove anything.  I guess that is     
why religion is a  belief .  Everyone believes what they feel is right     
for them from whatthey have read or been told. Whereas Christians     
take their Bible as the teachings (or message) of a God or creator to     
follow, it seems Buddhists do not address a beginning, just a     
spiritual continuation from one life form to another.  Is this correct?    
Getting older can be frustrating as one sees one s self grow

Answer
Dear Bill,
Thank you for your question.

If I am correct you are referring to a previous question/answer session on the role of prayer in Buddhism. The catholic nun asked how Buddhists could pray if they didn't affirm the existence of a God to pray to?

The essence of the Buddhist doctrine in terms of belief is
best summed up by one of the Buddha's sermons - when he told his disciples to not believe anything he said just because he was the Buddha. But instead that they had to find out by themselves what is true through experience.

Buddhism is a path of direct experience. It uses meditation
as a tool to gain direct experience of the truth about the mind and the world. There are no arbitrary beliefs within Buddhism. Obviously there are people who are following a Buddhist approach who believe various things. But if they
are true to the Buddhist  path they will test everything
they believe through experience.

In terms of your question on a beginning. This again is
really something that you could investigate through direct
experience. There are meditations that explore the nature
of time, of beginnings and end.

You bring up the question of continuation from life to life. It would seem that to follow any spiritual path
including Buddhism some belief or intuition that there is something beyond death is inherent. There would be little point in following any spiritual path if you were 100% convinced that death was the end.

The problem of beginning is an interesting one. There are
various discussions of this question within some schools of Buddhism. Other schools maintain that it is an unanswerable question until you are awakened.


Hope this helps?
Bodhicitta
http://www.bodhicitta.co.uk