Wisdom from the Buddha

by Robert Wilkinson

This is one of the most enduring statements of how to know truth from falsehood, wisdom from flapdoodlery, and whether you can or should believe something you've heard.

We are told that Gautama Siddhartha, the Buddha said these things:

Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumoured by many. Do not believe in anything simply because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it.

(from the Kalama Sutta)

Comments

[Sabina]

Dharmaruci just posted this interview with Jung in which Jung says much the same about belief and the right uses of reason:
http://astrotabletalk.blogspot.com/2010/12/jung-on-death.html
What is essential may be invisible to the eye but we know it when we 'see' it, nonetheless.

[Anne1Texas]

Happy New Year, Robert.