dear agorman ,
By what I read so far, some people (Shinran) say just reaching the Pure Land means one acquired buddhahood. Others say one ends up fusing with Amitabha (in the end only Amitabha remains?!). Others say once you reach the Pure Land you need one more rebirth/reincarnation before reaching Enlightment. But they don't explain exactly what that "Enlightment" is all about. So how do I know which one of those alternatives is correct?
I can only answer through knowledge of mahayana buddhism through tibetan buddhism , although I belive the understanding to be the same it is just the practices which differ .
to my knowledge one may be born in amitabha's pure land simply through prayer in this life , by generating a desire to be born in amitabha's pure land , one does not need to be enlightened but may acheive enilghtenment by being born in sukhavati , one does not fuse or merge with amitabha , one in efect becomes a bhodisattva of that realm , a bodhisattva may take rebirth through compassion , through his desire his desire to help living beings atain freedom from the cycle of birth and death .
The last time I tried this school of Buddhism I had 3 Buddhas on my altar; Kwan Yin, Amitabha and Shakyamuni. And something odd happened. I started to get telepathic information from Amitabha; channelings which guided me to individual liberation of my true self from Maya. I heard no sound; they were what I can describe as "mental messages" or as some people say "inspiration". I actually got freightened and I thought I was becoming insane; I even tried to return the Buddha back to the store, but the seller said that was bad luck.
in a way you could call these experiences glimpses of ones liberation from maya , these "mental mesages" you describe , are in a way cracks in our worldly conception through which pure light of knowledge may shine in .
I can understand you saying that you became frightened , yes , the revelation of the true nature of reality if we were to see it all at once may by comparison to our worldly understanding might send us temporarily crazy , untill we realise that the true craziness to be our deluded worldly conception !
So Amitabha said to me the goal was no annihilation, no fusing with him, no union with the All, no eternal state of pure consciousness, but just becoming a Buddha, like him. Not becoming him, but becoming like him, one more Buddha. Was that the famous "wisdom of separation" that he's supposed to teach? That goal was OK for me.
just becoming like him , :yes:
one of his attendant bodhisattvas .
But as the weeks passed I felt my mind was shutting down. I turned very lazy and all I wanted to do was to stay there in front of the Buddhas all day, to do nothing and think of nothing. Eventually this begun to affect my daily life and I removed them from my altar. Now I just keep trying stuff on my own, but I'm in no particular path. Anyway, what happened to me with the Buddhas still puzzles me to this day.
this opening up to reality may take time and we should all take it as gently as we feel we need , prehaps it felt that your mind as you previously perceived it was shutting down but in truth through buddhist practice you are actualy opening up the closed , or limited worldly conception that the mind presently perceives . thus you correctly observed " individual liberation of my true self from Maya." , it is simply that this liberation was a glimpse of that reality , one has these momentary flashes of insight . the next stage is to work with such understandings .
in truth putting your buddhas away is some what like a child returning to the comforting sarroundings of the home , in this case the home is maya , but because we are accustomed to illusion we are comfortable with it , so we wish to return to that comfort , but as that child grows he becomes more curious about the outside world and ventures out again . simmilarly we have stages in our spiritual development when we become curious , so we venture out as you did , we all seek pure knowledge , but sometimes pure knowledge is just to brilliant , too astounding , we then need to digest that revelation .
Thanks in advance for any answers.
I canot truely give you any answers , as the answers you need will come from within , I can only give you reflections from my own understanding .
one thing I can say is that I am glad that the shop didnot take back the buddha because one day you may be glad that he is still with you .
in a way you have allready taken a step towards enlightenment , giving the buddha back canot undo that experience or glimpse of a greater reality .
prehaps if I may make a suggestion , .....you say you have removed amitabha from your alter , may I suggest that instead of keeping any buddha on what we might term or think of as an "alter" , that we think in terms of placing them in a shrine .
an alter has conotations of making some form of sacrifice in return for a result . where as a shrine is a place to keep any revered personality , at a shrine we may wish to make offerings purely out of love and respect , there is no request for a fixed result it is a far gentler reciprication purely by being there your buddha will rain blessings upon you .
prehaps you allready keep him somewhere nice in your home , but in case you have put him away ? I would just like to suggest that you keep him somwhere where he can bless you , the nicest thing would be to keep him on his own personal shelf in a high and suitably respectfull place , you can offer him flowers fruit or water , any thing beautiful and pure , there is no need to recite mantra or perform any procedures that you are not comfortable with . simply offer something small each day .
all that can possibly happen is that you form a conection with that buddha making it easier to understand the dharma that they reveal .that connection comes by way of their blessing, as it is by their blessings that obscurations are removed .
I often feel that without propper guidance we can rush in to a practice without fully understanding what we are doing , this is not our fault as it is natural to want to run into things , it is just a sad consequence of this age that we do not grow up with sufficiant guidance from an early age , so the unfortunate consequence is that sometimes we scare ourselves (as hapend with you) . this is why I am advocating a simple , simple one flower a day routine as steady steps are actualy much wiser than rushing in , with out the support which is so necesary .it is by no way your fault it is just a concequence of this age .
any how I hope my reflections are of some use
and if you are offering any flowers ...(or of course incence is allso a nice simple offering you could use) .... offer one from me , :namaste