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The Pali term Buddhadhamma (Buddhadharma in Sanskrit) refers to the teachings of the Buddha that are at the root of the multiplicity of Buddhist forms, beliefs and practices that have developed over the two and a half thousand years since Siddhartha Gautama outlined them. The Bhavana Community practices in accordance with these teachings. Feedback welcome at catherine@bhavanacommunity.org
We aspire to the role model of the Buddha, we study and practice the teachings (the Buddhadhamma), and the community of practitioners (Sangha) serves as our support for these activities. We also find much to admire in the role model of Buddha's attendant, Ananda. Ananda was believed to be able to recite all of the discourses of the Buddha and eventually awakened and became a beloved teacher himself.
a. Buddha was human and accomplished his awakening through investigation, reason and practice and thus, we too are capable of awakening. We expect to benefit from the wisdom of an accomplished teacher, from studying the teaching and from participating in a community that values the teaching and practices of all varieties of Buddhist traditions.
b. The Buddha abstained from speculation about what he did not know. In the earliest teachings, there were no metaphysical principles and no orthodoxy, nothing we are required to believe or to have faith in other than what we can experience for ourselves. It is through the practices and the insights that emerge that we can achieve liberation from suffering.
a. Understanding and acting on the Four Insights and cultivating the Eight-fold Path lead to peace and happiness in this life. This entails a commitment to the practice of ethics, mental development and wisdom. Letting go of attachments and reactivity, including attachment to views, is a core wisdom practice that is encompassed by the path at many levels.
b. All phenomena arise and cease in response to causes and conditions. Although we have confidence that the patterns of arising and ceasing of experience can be discerned through the practice of introspection using mindfulness and investigation, we are also aware that our habits and instincts bias and distort what we choose to investigate and the conclusions we draw from those practices. We supplement these practices with observations that are informed by knowledge of these biases so we can see things as they are.
c. The Buddha made three important observations about the nature of things as they are. in Pali, yatha-bhuta nyana-dassana, is literally translated as "knowledge and vision of things as they are." The first of these observations is that there is suffering, dukkha. This is the first insight which became the First Noble Truth. Suffering can be experienced to arise and pass away. This is the second insight, anicca, the impermanence of all constructed phenomena. Buddha's third insight, is termed anatta, not self, which is the idea that the self is just another impermanent constructed phenomena.
d. Study, Meditation and Path Practice in general are directed toward understanding the world ‘as it is’ and cultivating skillful and wholesome states of mind that lead to skillful and wholesome actions. Skillful and wholesome actions are those that lead away from suffering. The model for these aspirations is a list of 37 qualities that lead to awakening, the Bodhipakkhikā dhamma , and a later list known as the Perfections, the Paramis.
a. The community of practitioners, the sangha, was/is more egalitarian than hierarchical. Recognizing that humans are inclined to organize themselves hierarchically, we aspire to an organization based on the moral and personal characteristics exhibited by a serious practitioner of the path. Each follower is encouraged not to believe any point of doctrine until they see for themselves that it is true for them.
b. We are not to follow any teacher simply because they are the teacher. All practitioners are encouraged to teach and share their wisdom regarding the path for the benefit of the community.
To be awake is to live with ease in bodies that are of the nature to get sick, old, and die and to be able to craft skillful actions out of honor and respect for the lives of all beings.
Our Community Center and Yoga Studio is located at:
106 Marshall Court, Unit 120
Wilmington, North Carolina 28411
(just behind Winslett and Walls Dental Excellence at 7643 Market Street)
Phone: Text or Call (910) 520-6846
Email: admin@bhavanacommunity.org
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