Until and unless I become enlightened I will be driven by my needs. At times I am aware and these urges do not overpower me but not always. What is wrong here according to Buddhism? Enjoyment? If yes that is the case then with all people who are enjoying writing in this forum. Desire to help others masquerades as compassion. I find desires as the central point of origin of actions. I have my doubts whether compassion is the real force. I think compassion is mixed with desire in all our actions till we are liberated. Please enlighten me. For the sake of clarity I am just a regular Joe not a monk.

I remember hearing somewhere about 4 types of beings in relation with the satipatthana sutta and that for each group one of the satipatthanas is most important/suitable to practice. Can somebody please give me a reference from the suttas or commentaries?

We all know the famous nine values of Lord Buddha that we often recite when worshiping Lord Buddha. But i've heard the extended versions of those 9 values. Can someone point me a source to learn them?

  Is a strictly pacifist Buddhism exactly correct or are there certain situations were violence or war might be appropriate according to the Buddha's teaching?   What did the Buddha say about the Military?   Given that Buddhist countries have soldiers, what doctrine[s] do they use to justify having a military to defend the people and the Dharma?   Is there anything in the Tipitaka to support the idea that a soldier  who selflessly tries to defend others and/or the Dharma by violent means, makes good karma? 

In the commentary it's said, in order to lie, all four conditions must be met: 1. An untrue statement 2. Intention to deceive 3. Effort is made 4. Other deceived by what is said But according to original Vinaya, AFAIK, whether one is deceived or not is irrelevant. I think that is because the intention to lie arises from the doer not the perceiver. But if last condition is not met i.e. a being is not dead, how can we say someone is killing?

I took the lay precepts after a short retreat. It was suggested that we say them however loudly we mean them. I'm kinda worried about this. I may have over-estimated how much I meant them, and also, I may have said them too loudly anyway due to getting caught up in the moment. This concerns me: what does it *mean* to break the precepts?

Thank you all for your kind answers to my questions. I feel that this community is really different from the others. If I asked the questions I made here in my country, I would be condemned heavily by now. Back to the question, as Buddhist hell only exists in one's mind, therefore the information on wikipedia must be wrong. Naraka Or is it correct? Why does no one change it?

Sex can lead us to suffering in many ways; however, if all of us are just like Lord Buddha according to his story, wouldn't humanity become extinct?

When we attend a meeting; just right after we leave the meeting room, every one understands the conclusions of the meeting differently. Even if it is written, every one interprets the message of the written message differently. In politic, people distort messages for their favor, even when the message is recorded, the interpretation can be quiet different. How do we believe in the ancient Tipitaka whether it is genuine or altered. We don't know the real teaching of lord Buddha. We believe what we believe as we interpret things on our own favor. We have our own versions of Buddhism that fit ourselves. Each of us has our own version of religion.

All Buddhist traditions hold that a Buddha is fully awakened and has completely purified his mind of the three poisons of desire, aversion and ignorance. A Buddha is no longer bound by Samsara, and has ended the suffering which unawakened people experience in life. The term buddha is also used in Theravada to refer to all who attain Nirvana. Within the Buddhist tradition, this term has commonly been interpreted as the extinction of the "three fires",or "three poisons",passion, (raga), aversion (dvesha) and ignorance. But does this all mean that fe Siddartha Gautama never worried about his health or was never doubting about hisself whether he was doing good or not?

The 37 Factors are sometimes paired as balancing factors. When they are out of balance there are some implications, and there is a controlling (or pivotal) factor which is instrumental in keeping the balance. In many publications these are scattered throughout, so I am looking for: - balancing factors, or pair of factors which need to be balanced - the implications of any imbalance - associated Controlling (or Pivotal) Factors ... with references from the Canon where these appear.

I have a Girlfriend that I met few years back. She loves me a lot,she is quite brilliant from her childhood, and now she is working in a big firm. I am working in a smaller firm than her. When we were in college, it seems we will not fight ever, but after we got passed and she got placed we are having a lot of fight. She sometimes says some bad words to me, that i can't handle.But i don't want to fight anymore, but I think I've ego problem. Every time i think not to fight but finally we ended up with big fight. What are the practical measures in Buddhism to get rid of such ego inside one's inside. Thank you.

Having read descriptions of perception and consciousness (two of the five skandhas), I still don't understand the difference. Is there an important difference? What is the difference and why is it important?

Please make sure you read the whole text before giving me an answer. I'm very serious about this and search a very good advise, something I didn't think before. This year I'll become 30 years and I'm standing in the middle of nothing. My boss fired me and all in all I feel I quitted more jobs in my life than changing my underpants. I've no motivation to do something cause I've no aim for something. When I started to do something (no matter what) I concentrate on it for a few days / weeks / months and than I left it and do something new or nothing, cause everything makes me bored from time to time or stressed me to much. Then there are times I decided to do something very cool. These are the times I started to do something new for a particular time. But when I'm into it and I don't "throw it away" I think about all the political decisions (internationally) and get paranoid of a world war 3 or something like this. That's the reason why I don't want to do anything, cause I think "When I do something and the worstcase comes over us, there was no need to learn / do it." I'm very deep in conspiracy theories and work sometimes hours, days, weeks and month to find out "the truth". That's the reason why I think like I mentioned above. And that brings me to another fact: I seriously hate this system of life. I've the opinion we are not on this planet to work and pay taxes. In my point of view, both are waste of time --> Working for money, to make a low life - never become that successful, that I don't have to worry about the most money-cases. In my opinion we are here to find a higher self. Now there are 2 possibilities: 1. I want to stay in a monastery. Become a monk. But I can't cause of my girlfriend. (But I think her thinking is right as well: "You just want to flee from everything".) 2. I don't want to build a future with making decisions with/for her when we broke up anyway someday. (That's just my thinking) My girlfriend is telling me, I should concentrate more on myself than on her. I should do more what I want, not what she want or what is "best" for a common future. (Yes, she really loves me - no sarcasm here) I've a handful of friends more or less but nothing I can work with for my personal life. It's not cause of them, it's cause of me, cause I don't like to talk about the most things. And I've less than a handful of leisure activities. I had no plan in the past and I don't have one right now. In my carreer I developed a photography-eye so my references in photography are remarkable. But I hate to stress myself out to search for some work for it (freelance) and I don't like to work with people at all (commercial studios who work for quantity, not quality). The second thing I can do very well is solving computer problems of all kinds. Even when I've to search in the www for solutions I can solve every problem since I'm a child. Hardware & Software. No matter which kind of operating system. Just doing it like I never did anything before. My actually situation is: I've safed a little money to survive for the next 1 - 2 month. I could search for another job, but the possibility I really hate it is very high and will quit anyway. And I feel myself is to old to do something totally different and become SO good in it, that I become very successful with it. So what should I do generally? I feel like "I just want to quit life and try something else." (if you understand what I mean) Cause everything I do is making me bored. Everything I aim on is not SO special (in my mind), that I would spend my life for it. (For example: Become a programmer: Oh no, it's not THAT cool ... and on and on)

Here is link giving a bit of details that Buddha preached about the decline of Buddhism after parinibbana.

http://www.lawsofthenature.com/GotamaSasana.aspx

I share with you the following passage taken from the page of the above link > The Buddha said that after His parinibbaana, only for 1,000 years will > the monks be able to acquire the analytical knowledge (Patisambhida), > or what we know as Arahanthship or deep knowledge. Then, as time goes > on, they will only be able to attain Anaagami (Never return). And then > only Sakadagami (Once return), and finally, only Sotapanna (Stream > enterer). With the death of the last disciple who has attained > Sotapanna, the attainments will disappear.

Here's my issue with the above. From what I understand is that after a certain period of time after parinibbana, the maximum attainment that one could achieve reduces from arahant to anagami and so on. But this is illogical because if a person attain anaagaami he/she will only have at most 1 life where he/she will become an arahant which makes the above statement false, unless it means that the person will be born as a deva maybe having a very long lifetime until the next Buddha. This is confusing.

Can someone point me some good sutras for Buddhist Cosmology. I'm interested in the Theravada school's teaching on this.

I have heard and read that relics of Buddha have certain supernatural powers. I was reading a book once that said that it is not the relic alone that performs these supernatural acts but the deities that protect the relic. Can anyone help me understand this. thanks!

I'm looking for some texts where the Buddha explains the nature of mind in relation with the process of learning/researching. I was reading a quote by a famous mathematician known to be very interested in Buddhism and I thought his point of view was related to some teachings of the Buddha. I would like to read more Buddhist literature to see if this connection is real. The quote: > The unknown thing to be known appeared to me as some stretch of earth or hard marl, resisting penetration… the sea advances insensibly in silence, nothing seems to happen, nothing moves, the water is so far off you hardly hear it.. yet it finally surrounds the resistant substance. (Alexander Grothendieck) I believe the idea of the "Rising Sea" can be understood in Buddhist terms. From my experience Buddhism has a lot of metaphors showing the mind/consciousness as an entity similar to the sea. I would like to see some texts where I can draw an analogy between the awakening process and the process of discovering something new.

Vicikicca or skeptical doubt, some interpret this as perplexity, is known to be one of the mental hindrances. But why is having doubt bad for one's mind?

For me, doubt is what makes me think more harder to understand certain issues. Doubt leads to creative thinking as well. I am sorry if I have misinterpreted vicikicca but would much appreciate if you could help me out with this

can we give them to animals, after offering the meal for Buddha's statue and where them put after offering?