Could it be that a man named Siddartha who spoke Pali actually forged his so called Enlightenment, copying a young boy or girl named Magadha? Why else is there such confusion over the so called "language of the Buddha"

Can you help me with why I should care, please?

Procede with confidence

I'm confident this doesn't matter to the big picture.

The language named Pali is defined circularly as the language of the Pali canon. Siddhartha would have spoken the language of Magadha, which is called Magadhi. Pali seems to come from slightly northwest and slightly later than Magadhi.

Wans't Magadha a kingdon in ancient India?
Where is the idea about forgery of boy/girl named Magadha work's coming from?

Imho the reasonable thing to assume is that suttas can not be perfect representation of Buddha's teachings because these texts were written way after Gautama time and not by him directly. I myself always assumed things were changed, removed, added, etc. due to either forgery or misunderstanding or other reasons.

Reading suttas imho is best done not focusing on details and treat them as truth but general ideas of things to test/verify yourself.
Buddha had some teachers, did some practices, was not satisfied with what he learnt and set to discover better path to end suffering. Anyone else can do the same. Heck, imho the only way to really get enlightenment is by discovering stuff yourself.

If the plays of Shakespeare were written by someone else, do they become less entertaining?

My ideas are my own. I have said before I think Buddha's highest attainment was 2nd path. I almost expect for people to be dismissive.

The value of Buddhism is not in the "who said it" but the "what was said." That said (pun!), I love that you're able to dharma diagnose a person who's been dead for 2,500 years!

Also diagnose that person based on the model that that person himself supposedly has presented!

Who had the highest path then?

Besides, if there is progress over Gautama wouldn't it make more sense to add paths or call the whole think differently than rate a guy in his own model at lower path? Besides the 4th path wasn't even for Buddhas but Arhats...

I'm going to ask my original question again: Why does this matter?

Care to explain what you mean by "original question" and what do you mean by "this"?

I'll jump back in. Jesus says that to enter the kingdom of heaven you have to be like little children. Maybe he and his listeners were familiar with the so called Pali Canon.

Maybe forged is too harsh. Especially if buddhA was the 8th reincarnation of Lord Vishnu.

What's with the lightning bolt in the thread title?

Gautama is believed to be 9th https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dashavatara

Wonder who is this suspicious Kalki figure supposed to be...

He appears when only chaos, evil and persecution prevails, dharma has vanished
Given the state of the world and rather poor understanding of the Dharma in it I suppose it is the damn good time for Vishnu to stop doing whatever he is doing (watching funny kittens on space internets?) and come destroy whoever needs to be destroyed and be done with it

I'll also jump in Santa said all ye little children who are behaving good will get lots of presents this year! I honestly think he is talking about the Pali version of Morality here ... hm? 

 

"original question" = are human beings basically evil, or are they basically good?

"this" = the present moment without mental embellishment, often referred to as "just this"

"Present moment Without mental embellishment" - I would say that mental embellishment is Also Just This  

What is the present moment without mental embellishment Chris? Specifically, could you define 'present', 'moment', 'mental' and 'embellishment'?

Ni Nurta, I don't think Chris was addressing you. He's just in the habit of replying to the last post instead of to the thread. 

Can you please repeat your question but his time please provide detailed definitions of the words used therein? Put succinctly: Huh?

It means "whoa be unto those who post here."

Thought not. 

You thought right, Edward.

I believe Buddha, or Lord Vishnu if you will, actually authored the second part of the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali - "On Spiritual Disciplines" in a different pre fucked up world where ideas were like candy.

I still haven't reconciled the two views: forgery, Lord Vishnu, or what

I missed original question then.

If we rated all people how good and evil they were and made graph of them then nice normal distribution would show up with peak falling somewhere around the middle of being around equally good and evil. In one places there is more people more good, in others unfortunately more evil. Does it this answers your question?

"just this" is the same kind of coloring, the same fabricated reality as everyone experiences.

More important matter than what is absolute ground truth is how to improve it. To answer improve it perception of ground truth is important but it itself experientally is not as important, not worth to live in all the time, especially since then it changes nothing. One should always strive for this normal distribution to move slightly to good side and for this moment to be more nicer. Imho.

Ni Nurta, I'm sorry.

I was kidding around when I wrote that reply, and it's true that it actually wasn't meant to be directly to you. I pushed the "reply" button in your post out of habit. I was hoping that posting the silly smiley at the end of that comment would make it obvious I was joking around.

My dry humor doesn't often go over very well. Sigh.

That's why I include at least 3 smilies just in case  

Don't stress it, we are cool

I concentrated more on the questions and what kind of insight can I get from answering them
I use this forum as a platform to do cognitive word based reasoning and it is part of my training.

I'm surprised I don't see them more often : )