…it must be noted that the Buddha is the only Indian holy man before early modern times who bears an epithet explicitly identifying him as a non-Indian, a foreigner. It would have been unthinkably odd for an Indian saint to be given a foreign epithet if he was not actually a foreigner.
Moreover, the Scythians-Sakas are well attested in Greek and Persian historical sources before even the traditional “high” date of the Buddha, so the epithet should presumably have been applied to him already in Central Asia proper or its eastern extension into India—eastern Gandhāra.
There are also very strong arguments—including basic “doctrinal” ones—indicating that Buddhism had fundamental foreign connections from the very beginning, as shown below.
It is at any rate certain that Buddha has been identified as Śākamuni ~ Śākyamuni “Sage of the Scythians” in all varieties of Buddhism from the beginning of the recorded Buddhist tradition to the present, and that much of what is thought to be known about him can be identified specifically with things Scythian. Moreover, it must not be overlooked that we have no concrete datable evidence that any other wandering ascetics preceded the Buddha.
The Scythians were nomads (from Greek νομάδες ‘wanderers in search of pasture, pastoralists’) who lived in the wilderness, and it is thus quite likely that Gautama himself introduced wandering asceticism to India, just as the Scythians had earlier invented mounted steppe nomadism.
One way or the other, it would seem that the Buddha’s teachings were unprecedented mainly because they opposed new foreign ideas—the Early Zoroastrian ideas of good and bad karma, rebirth in Heaven (for those who were good), absolute Truth versus the Lie, and so on—which were previously unknown in “India proper”. He did this because he himself was foreign, and people actually understood and accepted that by calling him Śākamuni.
Beckwith, Christopher I.. Greek Buddha: Pyrrho’s Encounter with Early Buddhism in Central Asia (pp. 6-7). Princeton University Press. Kindle Edition.
UPDATE: Sixth Amendment of theConstitution of the United States
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.
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I keep seeing Erika’s supporters asserting her ‘right’ to a speedy trial. She is not the accused. She does not have this right in this trial. This right belongs to Tyler Robinson. And in this case, speedy does not mean kangaroo-court speedy where the prosecution does not provide to the defense the evidence they hold against the accused — Robinson, which is precisely what the prosecution is doing. To my eye, this trial looks like a blatant set-up to speedily convict a patsy who may well be unalived speedily; case closed. ABN
“From direct negotiations between the United States and Iran for the first time in nearly half a century… to coordinated diplomatic and military movement across the Middle East, South Asia, and beyond… the old geopolitical order is being replaced in real time. This is not chaos. This is strategy.”
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This is required viewing if you are interested in what is happening in Iran, the Middle East and the world. It’s a great take on the events of today and historically. I hope he’s right. ABN
President Donald Trump is reportedly planning to sign a new executive order that will increase research into psychedelic drugs used to treat mental illnesses, potentially paving the way for their legal use in controlled environments.
The commander in chief is in talks to draft the order, which would release new guidance for medical research on drugs such as psilocybin and ibogaine, multiple insiders told The Washington Post.
While speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One on Friday, Trump teased an upcoming announcement scheduled for Saturday morning on something he feels ‘strongly about.’
The president called the impending revelation a ‘very positive thing,’ adding that he would be joined by a ‘very good, very smart, very caring’ person to make the official announcement.
Motivated reasoning means reasoning to gain. Speaking to effect means speaking to cause something.
Both are the most common forms of thought and speech for all people with few exceptions.
Speaking to effect and motivated reasoning maintain personas.
Because it is difficult to tell truths and because trying to do so brings calamity, we don’t. We narrow thought instead; our voices dull faceless muffled sounds with no meaning.
This is the tone and timbre of samsara, the feeling of group delusion, the Suffering of the First Noble Truth.
Besides enjoying what he did, I love the sound of spoken Hungarian. What looked like defeat, may turn out to be a victory for Europe as well as Hungary. ABN
The Artemis II commander, who says he is ‘not religious’, was reflecting on his mammoth mission to space during a press conference yesterday.
One reporter asked the crew whether they had experienced any shift in consciousness following their 10–day journey to the dark side of the lunar surface.
Wiseman confirmed he had, referencing a moment that occurred after the team were picked up by the US Navy following their splashdown in the Pacific Ocean.
‘I’m not really a religious person but there was no other avenue for me to explain anything or experience anything,’ he said.
‘So I asked for the chaplain on the Navy ship to just come visit us for a minute. When that man walked in – I’d never met him before in my life – but I saw the cross on his collar and I just broke down in tears.’
Wiseman said it’s ‘very hard to fully grasp what we just went through’ and in the week since the astronauts came back, they have not had time to process their experience.
‘It was other–worldly and it was amazing,’ he said.
‘Our model proposes that the universe actually has seven dimensions: the four we know, plus three tiny extra dimensions curled up so tightly that we cannot directly perceive them.’
This means that spacetime can not only fold, but twist – creating a new physical effect known as torsion.
It turns out that this so–called ‘torsion field’ is key to understanding what happens to black holes when they appear to vanish.
According to the researchers’ theory, as a black hole evaporates away to the smallest scales possible, its seven dimensions essentially tangle into a knot.
When this knot becomes small enough, the folding of these hidden dimensions creates an outward force that prevents the black hole from collapsing entirely.
This leaves behind an astonishingly tiny remnant, some 10 billion times smaller than an electron.
However, this twisted knot of hidden dimensions still holds onto all the information that fell into the black hole like a tiny permanent memorial.
Instead of disappearing, black holes shrink so much that their hidden dimensions knot and twist into a shape that keeps them stable forever. This is called a ‘torsion–stabilized black hole remnant’
Schwartz led nationwide Covid-19 vaccine deployment and her long track record of directly issuing rights-crushing civilian and military vaccine mandates, including mandating injection of smallpox, anthrax, and flu vaccines into U.S. Forces, and discipling those that refused, reflects she lacks the basic ethics and morals to lead the CDC.
This agency does not need another cheerleader for industry; it needs a regulator over industry.
Her prior promotion, let alone mandates, of nearly a dozen different vaccines leave little hope she will objectively oversee CDC’s vaccine program which has, between 1986 and the 2026, gone from 3 injections to 29 injections, including in utero, by an infant’s first birthday, while chronic childhood disease has gone from under 10% to over 40% of children, most related to immune system dysregulation.
The 29 injections in 2026 only include routine vaccines and the Covid-19 vaccine. Also see table on page 37 of Vacines, Amen.
For rise in chronic health, see:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/3944229/ (https://perma.cc/NGA9-93KW)(“According to data from the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) [1979-1981] over two million children under 17 years (3.8%) are afflicted by chronic conditions that cause some limitation of activ-ity.”);
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9551003/ (https://perma.cc/JTZ5-JBNK) (Among “children younger than 18 years who were included in the 1992-1994 National Health Interview Survey … [a] significant proportion of children, estimated at 6.5% of all US children, experienced some degree of disability.”);
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21570014/ (https://perma.cc/62JZ-SRY4) (The 2007 National Survey of Children’s Health found that: “An estimated 43% of US children (32 million) currently have at least 1 of 20 chronic health conditions assessed, increasing to 54.1% when overweight, obesity, or being at risk for developmental delays are included.”);
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40058728/ (https://perma.cc/3VHC-L7H2) (Only considering a “condition that is typically pediatric-onset and expected to be persistent or severe” or a “functional/ activity limitation related to a condition that is typically pediatric-onset and expected to be persistent or severe” from the National Health Interview Survey data it found that children falling into this category “has risen from 22.57% in 1999/2000 to 30.21% in 2017/2018”); https://www.cdc. gov/school-health-conditions/chronic-conditions/index.html (https://perma.cc/298V-C59B) (“In the United States, more than 40% of school-aged children and adolescents have at least one chronic health condition”); See Part IV of Vaccines, Amen for additional sources. For relationship of chronic health issues to immune system dysregulation, see among other sources:
American Buddhist Net 