Section 11; Group 1(Zen)
Elizabeth Barnard
Buddhism
was popular in the Middle Ages in China. Zen was a part of Buddhism that
flourished in the mountains of China away from all the other cultures and
religions. It was about The Great
Awakening. It relied on short sayings to awake a person’s mind from the
everyday type of thought and bring in a feeling of individualism or nirvana of
new possibilities and progression of life through thought. There are forms of
doubt in Zen. This is a part of waking up a person’s mind to experience life
for themselves verses through someone else. It is based on a positive movement
of being able to choose for one’s self. The idea was to grow spiritually
through politics and education.
Fact: T or F? Did Zen masters use short poems to
awake a person’s mind? True
Discussion: What do you think Vacaspati meant by a
reasonable probability? “Though there is nothing prescribed, yet what is
unreasonable cannot be accepted, else we should sink to the level of children,
lunatics and the like”. Do you think he felt we should find reason in Zen for
this very reason?
I do think we should meditate on all questions that pervade our minds, but only ones that seem to matter to us the most. Vacaspati was simply stating that he cannot accept the "meaning of life" if it makes no sense. I believe we are not meant to understand so quickly. It saddens me that there are people who are so smart and thoughtful that the notion of an afterlife truly drives them insane, or that there are adults who are so naive towards the idea that they are like children, but that is a lesson we have to take from others. No, we do not have to be crazy or innocent, but we must have a general understanding of how life works, and what that means to you, personally. We also don't have to have an answer to every question. I'm sure if Vacaspati wrote enough poems, he only would have kept the same idea, he just would've been more comfortable with it after.
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