Module 5: Religious and spiritual approaches to human happiness
  Lecture 11: Jain and Buddhist Philosophies

Vajrayana Buddhism, is an school of Buddhism which has assimilated power of mantras etc. It does not say that the world is illusionary or that there is no happiness in the world but it draws our attention to the changing nature of the conditioned world. It claims the “the world is bound by passion, also by passion it is released. Thus it favours a homoeopathic treatment of passion (Williams and Tribe, 2000, 202). It also draws our attention to value of higher planes of happiness.

Vajrayana [esoteric] tradition recognizes four stages of bliss: that arising from the senses (ananda), from the dhyanas (paramananda), from the attainment of Nirvana (viramananda), and from the realisation of the non-duality of the conditioned and the Unconditioned (sahajananda) – literally ‘congenital’, i.e. innate or natural bliss. (Sangharakshita, 1967, 95)

Thus looked at from the perspective of Vajrayana tradition Buddhism attaches higher value to the realization of non-duality (very much like Advaita Vedanta) of the world and the truth behind the world. As the followers of Advaita Vedanta commonly say that realization of Brahman is not a negation of consumption but consumption as such is devoid of the realization of Brahman, A Buddhist may say that one who has achieved sahajananda may live in this world, at least for the benefit of others.

To quote Radhakrishnan (1954, 39): Though he questioned many beliefs, he never doubted the existence of the moral order of the universe or the supreme reality and value of the life of the soul. His incessant insistence on the practice of virtue and the critical testing of opinions by the standard of reason were based on ardent positive conviction. The absolute is for him the law of righteousness. It is the answer to human hope and striving, that on which the whole existence of the world is founded. It is the meaning of history, the redemption of all creation.