GREEK PHILOSOPHY AND BUDDHISM

GREEK PHILOSOPHY AND BUDDHISM 

We discover early on that life is hard and filled with natural distress, pain and death.
Buddhism, as an Eastern Philosophy, was born around the time of Pythagoras. It primarily asks the question and nature of suffering.  Buddha called the state of nature the Dukkha and it is an unavoidable fact of life we are born and die in. Buddha taught that suffering comes from ignorance, greed and fear. He proposed that by following a path of right thought and action we could do away with the mental anguish which he proposed as the primary source of our unhappiness.

Suffering was understood as a terror of the mind or a disillusionment. Fear and greed, for instance, steel away the capacity of the mind to find a state of tranquility, a state of enlightenment. Deep thought was equated to not thinking at all. However, the Greeks proposed not to dispense with the virtue of reason. They promoted clear thinking using Logic and Skepticism. Fear can be controlled by using the mind, not emptying it.

Buddhism steered away from the empirical Greeks when it proposed an unproven "metaphysical world" of Karma and reincarnation. Even the Dharmapada (the "bible" of Buddhism ) referred to gods. Much of the eastern world was deeply rooted in the superstitions of the Hindu Upanishads and their many gods. Nature was not seen in terms of atoms and void. The gods were behind fate and destiny at every turn. To Epicurus, if you wanted to be "one with the Universe" you do so with science and reason. Don't leave both your sandles and critical facilities at the temple door.

The ancient Greeks used skepticism to question belief systems. It was Epicurus that became the most prolific writer and influence for natural philosophy as it was called. Natural philosophy, for all intensive purposes, is the study of science. Causes and conditions are born in the natural world and can be measured and known.

To the Greeks, Nirvana was not to be achieved in a state of detachment. The Greeks were focusing on knowing versus believing, in reason versus revelation and in science versus spirit.

To both the Buddha and to the ancient Greek philosophers the end of suffering could be achieved by what Buddha called the Eight-fold path. It ended suffering with right thinking, ethical living and perseverance.

To Epicurus, these are all virtues to follow but total suffering ends only when both the body is free of pain and the mind is free of the false beliefs of the gods and the fear of death. Epicurus would advise against believing in Karma, reincarnation (Samsara) or the Buddhist demon Mara. 



"Death is nothing to us, because a body that has been dispersed into elements experiences no sensations, and the absence of sensation is nothing to us." 
- Epicurus (Principle Doctrine 2)