Referat The history of buddhism - what is illumination ?, the extension of buddhism

THE HISTORY OF BUDDHISM:

580 - 480 (b. Ch.) Gautama Siddharta (later he is named BUDDHA) is the son of the King of India.

He lived in wealth. His father didn't let him go out of the Palest because the majority of Indian people were leaving in poverty. But one day when he went out of the Palest he saw an old poor man, a ill child and dead man who was lying on the street.

These pictures of illness, dead, sorrow and age was the reason why he left his family to go out in the world as an Asket. He wanted to get known what's the real sense of life is ?Why is he living?.

After a year Siddharta noticed that this live is the wrong way to find the 'deliverance'

So he stopped being an Asket and left his supporters.

One day during his meditation he had the 'illumination'.

At that moment he knew what the sense of being alive was. With this knowledge he convinced a lot of people. Siddharta preached this theory till his dead.

WHAT IS ILLUMINATION ?

The Buddhism says that you live in a circular course, you are born you die you'll be born again

If you want to be in the NIRVANA, which is the illumination, you have to take notice of four 'eternal verities':

1. 'THE PAIN'

You have to ask yourself, what is pain in my life?

2. 'THE FORMATION OF PAIN'

What's the reason of my pain?

3. 'THE CACELLATION OF PAIN'

HOW CAN I CONQUER MY PAIN?

4. 'THE WAY TO ABOLISH PAIN'

WHICH WAY SHOULD I GO TO ABOLISH MY PAIN?

You can't recognise this four eternal verities in one life. You have to be born twice or thousand times till you understood the whole meaning of this sentences.

Then you are ready to go into the NIRVANA.

THE EXTENSION OF BUDDHISM:

After Siddharta`s dead a lot of disciples built temples and cloisters. Hundreds of people idolises him. He is called BUDDHA.

During few centuries Buddhism is spreading out in Asia, Ceylon, India, China, Japan and Tibet and also in Europe.

Buddhism is part into four big branches:

 HINAJANA (Nepal, India, Japan)

 This means 'the little vehicle'

This kind of Buddhism beliefs only on the real Buddhism, without other gods, tents or verities.

MAHAYANA (China, Korea, Japan, Vietnam)

This means 'the big vehicle'

They belief on Buddha and other gods.

VAJRAYANA (Tibet, Nepal, Mongolia)

 ZEN BUDDHISM (Japan, China)

 They have no tenets. They say that only the mediation has the aces to the meaning of life.

THE STORY OF GRACE FRANCIS

How her Buddhist practice helps her to live with sickle-cell anaemia.

She was 17 when she was diagnosed as suffering form sickle-cell anaemia. She had been sickly throughout her childhood. She was always tired and felt very ill. The problem was that the illness didn't show her that she is ill.

Sickle-cell anaemia is an incurable disease, which affects people in different ways. It was suffered by Afro-Caribbean's, and has the effect to making you resistant to malaria, but in a cold country with no threat of malaria it turns on the body itself.

The oxygen-carrying cells in the blood deform into a sickle shape. They can become stuck, and attack the internal organs. In her case, the main problem has always been the joints in her legs, which became acutely painful, and also her breathing. The doctors first of all said that she probably only had a few months to live, then they said she wouldn't see 21.

When she realised that she became withdrawn and depressed. Even she tried to live a normal life. She started working as soon as she left school, but because of the illness, however competent or hard - working she was frequently sacked. The problem was that she continues to look healthy - no one could see the pain. She went to bed every night hoping to die. And when she woke up in the morning, she cried because she was still alive. Twice she actually tried to commit suicide.

Some years later, still she was feeling suicidal, she was invites to an SGI-UK general Meeting. This meeting changed her life. She started to practise.

Eight years into her practise, in 1993, she had realised that she was able to live with the illness in much better way, now she was practising. Now she has the force to go on.

When she wakes up in the morning now, instead of felling suicidal, she is filled with joy and gratitude just for being alive. She fells that for the first time she truly understands the eternity of life.

 'Far from dying at 21, I AM STILL VERY MUCH ALIVE AT 37' said Grace.