/lit/ - Literature

Suffering is inextricably bound up with conditioned existence. Impermanence leads one to suffer; identifying as a ‘self’ leads one to suffer (especially in combination with impermanence) and make others suffer. Suffering exists at every level of existence. There is no ‘God’ that created the world nor willed the suffering. Conditioned existence simply occurs, through Karma, and by cultivating the conditions for further existence you are prolonging your rebirths in a realm permeated by suffering. We don’t have to justify and learn to live with suffering, we can escape it, here and now.
Come home, Indo-aryan man!

I'm looking for recommendations for any and all books available in hardcopy or paperback that deal with criticisms of or refutations of Buddhism, made from any perspective such as from other religions or by modern non-religious writers. I would like to make a chart for it. Some parts of Buddhism I find interesting and genuinely appealing, but there are so many schools with varying positions on consciousness and the nature of existence, Nirvana etc, I find that certain of the schools I disagree with, and I find reading criticisms of Buddhism interesting, both to see if I agree with it as a critique of the schools I don't agree with, and also to challenge my own thinking when its critiquing a Buddhist school that I do like and agree with.

Here is what I have so far.

Buddhist Illogic - Avi Sion
A hindu critique of buddhist epistemology - John Taber
Why I Am Not A Buddhist - Evan Thompson
An Evaluation of the Vedantic Critique of Buddhism - Gregory Darling
the various Brahma Sutra commentaries that refute Buddhism by Shankara, Ramanuja, Madhva etc
Emptiness Appraised - David Burton
Relation as Real : A Critique of Dharmakirti - Raghunath Ghosh
Bulssi Japbyeon (Buddha's Nonsense) - Jeong Dojeon

I know the Taoists wrote certain texts refuting Buddhism and have seen them mentioned in other books, have any of these been translated in full to English?

Modern philosophical schools of Buddhism are all more or less influenced by a spirit of sophistic nihilism. They deal with Nirvāṇa as they deal with every other dogma, with heaven and hell: they deny its objective reality, placing it altogether in the abstract. They dissolve every proposition into a thesis and its anti-thesis and deny both. Thus they say Nirvāṇa is no annihilation, but they also deny its positive objective reality. According to them the soul enjoys in Nirvāṇa neither existence nor non-existence, it is neither eternal nor non-eternal, neither annihilated nor non-annihilated. Nirvāṇa is to them a state of which nothing can be said, to which no attributes can be given; it is altogether an abstract, devoid alike of all positive and negative qualities.

What shall we say of such empty useless speculations, such sickly, dead words, whose fruitless sophistry offers to that natural yearning of the human heart after an eternal rest nothing better than a philosophical myth? It is but natural that a religion which started with moral and intellectual bankruptcy should end in moral and intellectual suicide.

- Ernest John Eitel

>>15008817
Agree. Not a fan of that style of art.

>As far as the concept of emptinessor the ultimate nature of reality is concerned this is one area where there is an emerging convergence between the Buddhist understanding of the ultimate nature of existence and the evolving contemporary scientific view. This convergence relates to the unfindability of entities when these are analytically sought. In modern science the methods of analysis are principally applied to investigating the nature of material entities.
>Thus, the ultimate nature of matter is sought through a reductive process is reduced to the microscopic world of particles.
>Yet, when the nature of these particles is further examined, we find that ultimatepy their very existence as objects is called into question.
>This interface between non-substantiality and phenomena is a fundemental focus of Buddhist philosophical analysis and experimental analysis through meditation on the nature of mind.

REMINDER THAT HINDUISTS, GUENON, ABRAHAMICS AND EVERYONE ELSE= BTFO BY SCIENCE AND BUDDHISM

>>14921255
Buddha

If Guenon said all religions are equally true then why do his followers here cry so hard over Buddhism?

>>14854720

>>14727609

>>14717109
The Dhammapada
Tibetan Book of the Dead

I bow down to horse-headed Rati, the red yogini, heading a lotus and a human torso.

I bow down to garuda-headed rudhiramadi, the red pale yogini, heading a lotus and a cudgel.

>Practicioners should make these prostrations while clearly visualising before then the form of deity, in perfect detail, and while experientially cultivating the deity's nature and inner meaning of the symbolism.

So do Eastern Buddhists believe in these deities in a literal sense or is the only the symbolism important? I ask about actual easterners not the western hippie materialists.

>>14526910
Good post breaking it down.

>Buddha could have lived forever if he wanted to but he simply chose not to

I support the Rinpoche but how is this better than any of the nonsense the Christians claim?

https://youtu.be/N9dlvObXLbY

>"You, monks, should not thus cultivate the notion (samjna) of impermanence, suffering and non-Self, the notion of impurity and so forth, deeming them to be the true meaning [of the Dharma], as those people [searching in a pool for a radiant gem but foolishly grabbing hold of useless pebbles, mistaken for priceless treasure] did, each thinking that bits of brick, stones, grass and gravel were the jewel. You should train yourselves well in efficacious means. In every situation, constantly meditate upon [bhavana] the idea [samjna] of the Self, the idea of the Eternal, Bliss, and the Pure ... Those who, desirous of attaining Reality [tattva], meditatatively cultivate these ideas, namely, the ideas of the Self [atman], the Eternal, Bliss, and the Pure, will skilfully bring forth the jewel, just like that wise person [who obtained the genuine, priceless gem, rather than worthless detritus misperceived as the real thing.]"

- The Buddha, Chapter Three, "Grief",The Mahayana Mahaparinirvana Sutra

> "The Tathagata also teaches, for the sake of all beings, that there is, in truth, the Self in all phenomena" (The Buddha in The Mahaparinirvana Sutra, Chapter Three).

https://www.nirvanasutra.net/

How will annihilationist non-self fags ever recover? The Buddha himself taught True Self as his final teaching before he achieved Paranirvana, while dismissing annihilationists as deluded fools.

Annihilationists are servants of Mara, delighting in Maradharma, and are bound to err in Samsara, through hell or on earth in the form of beasts, for countless aeons.

Which translation of the Dhammapada should I read?

*blocks your path*