[MD] A formalised Code of Art

[MarshaV]

At 05:34 PM 10/11/2006, Mark wrote:
>
>In a message dated 11/10/2006 22:16:18 GMT Standard Time,
>marshalz at charter.net writes:
>
>Mark,
>
>Are you a student of Buddhism or Eastern  Philosophy?
>
>Marsha
>
>
>
>Hello Marsha,
>I've studied Indian philosophy (Buddhism) at BA and MA level.
>
>Nothing the Buddha wrote has been past down to us - there is a gap of  about
>200 years between his death and the formal Pali canon.
>Books with titles like, 'What the Buddha said' tell us what was formalised
>from oral transmission of his teaching. The severe repetitious nature of some
>of  his teachings were designed to aid the fidelity of oral transmission, but
>we  don't have any written documents.
>The Buddha lived in a culture dominated by very rigid social rituals of
>religious significance, and it was these concrete rituals he 
>attacked with his
>arguments. The Buddha had an audience and he knew what he was doing.
>The Buddha is often taken literally when what he is doing is undermining  the
>social codes of his culture through clever word play and imagery. Satire
>plays a large part also.
>
>Later thinkers like Nargajuna had to deal with evolutionary developments
>that were not around when the Buddha first taught. Logic and high level
>abstraction are given the Buddha treatment because the project of 
>undermining
>structure with clever argument had already been established.
>
>I'm not dismissing the possibility that one may live a life of DQ.
>I've never met anyone who does.
>I would be suspicious of anyone who claimed they did.
>I am convinced however, that art can the job very well indeed, even at  the
>intellectual level.
>
>Love,
>Mark

Mark,

Interesting.  Are you, or have you ever been, a meditator?

Marsha