Are there any enlightened people in the world today?

General discussion, particularly exploring the Dharma in the modern world.
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Nosta
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Re: Are there any enlightened people in the world today?

Post by Nosta »

In Portugal, my country, you will find that politicians are very enlightened...they have enlightenment enough to make people get even more poor and to make their pockets grow up...
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Zenshin 善心
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Location: Fukuoka

Re: Are there any enlightened people in the world today?

Post by Zenshin 善心 »

All beings since their first aspiration till the attainment of Buddhahood are sheltered under the guardianship of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas who, responding to the requirements of the occasion, transform themselves and assume the actual forms of personality.

Thus for the sake of all beings Buddhas and Bodhisattvas become sometimes their parents, sometimes their wives and children, sometimes their kinsmen, sometimes their servants, sometimes their friends, sometimes their enemies, sometimes reveal themselves as devas or in some other forms.
- Ashvaghosa, The Awakening of Faith
All beings since their first aspiration till the attainment of Buddhahood are sheltered under the guardianship of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas who, responding to the requirements of the occasion, transform themselves and assume the actual forms of personality.

Thus for the sake of all beings Buddhas and Bodhisattvas become sometimes their parents, sometimes their wives and children, sometimes their kinsmen, sometimes their servants, sometimes their friends, sometimes their enemies, sometimes reveal themselves as devas or in some other forms.


- Ashvaghosa, The Awakening of Faith

oroka
Tenzin1
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Re: Are there any enlightened people in the world today?

Post by Tenzin1 »

Nemo wrote:There numbers do seem to be dwindling of late.
It may seem so, if you're looking in the wrong places, or have the wrong expectation of what you're looking for. As the Karmapa said, "they're not going to look like me." Remember the Tibetan tale about the humble practitioner who runs into a bodhisattva on a mountain path, and receives the great blessing of enlightenment from him. Farther on the path, the man meets a woman and asks, breathlessly, if she saw anything unusual recently. And she answers, "Oh, you mean that mangy rabid dog who passed by? Yes, I gave him a wide berth." Bodhisattvas can disguise themselves as the most unlikely people. It's a measure of our attainment whether we have the discernment to recognize them when we see them.
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ronnewmexico
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Re: Are there any enlightened people in the world today?

Post by ronnewmexico »

Reminding me for some reason of another story....a spiritual adherant who found a half dead dog filled with maggots, carrying around the dead half dog on his shoulders, and actually having to suck the maggots from its body with his mouth so as not to kill the maggots and still save the dog from being consumed.....

finding in the end the half dead dog was a diety of sorts who had never ever left the spiritual person.
Though he thought he was alone, meditating alone for many years....he never was.... diety in some form being with him.

So that story reminded me though I had heard the second I had not heard the first.

WE tend I think to worship and respect the wrappers of things not so much the things themselves at this present time.
I have heard other describe these times in this way...of superficial appearences, that ar sought after.
Tibetan saying that....though I forget the source.
"This order considers that progress can be achieved more rapidly during a single month of self-transformation through terrifying conditions in rough terrain and in "the abode of harmful forces" than through meditating for a period of three years in towns and monasteries"....Takpo Tashi Namgyal.
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PadmaVonSamba
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Re: Are there any enlightened people in the world today?

Post by PadmaVonSamba »

Pleased define "enlightened"
My teacher only talks about realization of one's original state of mind which is completely free of confusion.
What exactly do you mean by the term?
EMPTIFUL.
An inward outlook produces outward insight.
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