01:840:211 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Gautama Buddha, Theravada, Northeast India
Document Summary
Nirvana - not able to reach in current world; due to the time frame - closed. Need to wait for the next generation. Buddhism: begins in northeastern india around the 5th century b. c. e. : an era marked by the emergence of several new religious orientations in india: : these different traditions are, during this historical phase, similar in their preoccupation with the problem of redeath. All forms of buddhism presuppose the workings of karma (pali karma): begins exist within samsara (the unhappy cycle of re-death) and their status and position within the cosmos is due to their prior accumulation of merit. The solution to this problem - being stuck in samsara was given as the cultivation of liberating wisdom (jnana) of the essential unity of the soul (atman) and brahman in. Upanisadic hinduism, the buddhists offered a radically different answer, one which denied the existence of the soul altogether.
