Where Did We Come From?
Found posted on http://www.wbsysl.org/962/
Where
did we come from? We come from out of the past, even as today comes out of yesterday.
This life is the result of the past life, before this life. We come from out of
the things we have done before, out of the past labours unfinished. Although we
have labored, our work is not complete, if it were we should not be here, we
should be somewhere higher. We come out of past vices and virtues, vices and
virtues we have accumulated, out of the darkness of our own desires.
Why
are we here? We are here because the past gives birth to the future. We are
brought here by our own joys, our own sorrows, but most of all we are led here
by our desires.
Where
are we going? We are going to the results of our actions, the effects of our
causes. Those whose labours are unfinished will go around the wheel of life,
samsara, returning again and again until their labours are finished and the
state of Nibbana, the complete cessation of suffering, has been reached.
Unless
one knows Paticcasamuppada one cannot begin to understand the real nature and
function of cause and effect, the cause of suffering, how suffering arises. In
meditation there is a stage where one becomes free from doubt about one’s own
existence; this requires a knowledge of Paticcasamuppada, a proper
understanding of cause and effect, so that no doubt exists as to how one arises
and passes away as a human being.
The
lives of men, in fact the whole universe of living beings, are governed by
unchanging, eternal laws, such as the laws of cause and effect, the laws of the
mind and of the laws of nature. The whole universe is governed by these eternal
laws, and not by any imaginary God, a God susceptible to change if one believes
that God has compassion to be aroused and partiality won. To the Buddhist the
laws of nature, the laws of righteousness which govern the universe, are the
always the same, the same for one and all. Therefore, a man’s duty is not to
break these rules, not to try to change these laws by means of any prayer or
guarding against them, but to know and understand them and to live in harmony
with them.
The
past is the background against which life goes on from moment to moment, the
future is yet to be. One the present moment exists, and the responsibility of
using the present moment for good or ill lies with each individual.
The
present being, present existence, is conditioned by how one faced circumstances
in the last, and in all past existences. Our present position in character and
circumstances is the result of all that one has been up to the present, but
what will be in the future depends on what one does now in the present.
I could not resist posting this article when I found it today; it seems to me to be the best explanation of Reincarnation I have found. I am excited about this find!
John Potts, Arriving Home at the Source
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