Underinformed Speculation and Elaboration on Buddhist Teachings

[Pixabay]

Is there a point to the core Mahayana teachings that people in the West can appreciate today?

First let me tell you that the under-informed speculation and elaboration on Buddhist teachings refers to what I write here when I happen to be pondering such a topic. A perusal of the past eight years worth of material confirms this.

This means I am not here to present myself as speaking with any kind of authority on behalf of the Buddhist tradition as a scholar in the field or a long time fruitful and insightful practitioner who speaks from years of ever-deepening wisdom. It's important to state that up front. If you think I sound ignorant, I probably am.

So what background am I coming from? In my spare time I've read some key sutras, many commentaries on major sutras, summaries of commentaries on important sutras, and summaries and commentaries compiled about the summaries and commentaries of those sutras, and once in a while I actually attempt some form of practice. Plus I've got a little familiarity with materials comparing different traditions such a Christian and Buddhist mysticism and monasticism. If that sounds impressive, you're funny. If you think it is, trust me, it isn't.

So with that introduction out of the way, off we go.

The World of Illusion

So much ink and so many pixels have been used to write about terms such as emptiness for Western audiences and who, including me, have little real appreciation for the unspoken cultural transmission and atmosphere that provides context for such concepts.

And I suspect that many people are intellectually over-dosing on these terms.

I think they are useful and even ingenious, but I can't help feeling that they are what are called skillful means, or tricks to get people to follow the right path and help them overcome obstacles on the path. Allow to me to explain what I mean by using the broad, generic translations of the terms as they are widely known in the English-speaking world.

Emptiness refers to lack of intrinsic existence of phenomena, i.e. things we encounter in our experiences of reality. We discriminate our experiences into different individual "things" (phenomena), divide those phenomena into named categories (taxa), assign properties and qualities to those taxa (traits), and establish causal scenarios in which taxa interact with each other via their traits. We use these causal relationships to understand and explain what we observe. For example, the Earth's gravity pulls the ball back to the ground. Earth and ground are the primary phenomena, and gravity is another phenomenon that acts as a property of the Earth acting on an unnamed property of the ball (its mass) to produce an effect -- the falling of the ball.

Social scientists and psychologists study how we come to have a sense of reality and how it works. By making our taxa and weaving them together into causal scenarios, we have a sense of how things are and how things ought to be. We produce a subjective sense of reality. We use our mental algorithms for shaping and interpreting our perception to augment that sense of reality and similar algorithms to explain and predict what is happening around us based on that sense of reality.

If those latter algorithms seem to correctly predict things more often than not, we assume they are accurate, even though it is possible that we are right sometimes for the wrong reasons or that we are simply selectively seeing things that match our expectations or interpreting our experiences to fit our expectations. Because we have a sense of how thing ought to be as well as a sense of how things are, we feel any disconnect between the two in emotional and moral terms: fairness, justice, rightness, satisfaction, and so on, as well as their opposites such as unfairness, injustice, wrongness, dissatisfaction, regret, longing, and so forth.

"Fine", you may be thinking, "but where are you going with this?"

Fair enough. Here is why it matters to the topic at hand.

Didn't I already know this?

Do you ever ask yourself, "Didn't I already know this?"

I'm going to be sharing a few things over the next week or two that I see when I look at the current terrain in the spiritual landscape, starting with my own  current outlook. The question I opened with is one that comes up from time to time and is good for taking stock of where you are.

To clarify what I mean by that question, I keep realizing every year how the recurring bits of wisdom teachings I have been exposed to keep eluding me. They do this in a sneaky way: by seeming to actually offer some really helpful or interesting new insight. And then they do it again. And each time, you kind of get the feeling that "Now I really get it!", only to later realize that there was some aspect of it that I still didn't realize applied to me or my life.

For example, even though there is contemplative/apophatic wisdom that promotes seeking in silence, not clinging to or rejecting thoughts, and so on. It's fairly impossible not to try to understand this or to think you've "got it!" by using discursive reasoning and abstract thought! It's one of those things that's so simple we have to make it complicated.

And of course there is the well-known opposite, trying to make your conscious mind a total blank. This goes hand in hand with misunderstanding warnings about fixating over how we conceptualize our experiences, concluding that all experiences (whether perceptions, imaginings, etc) are always misleading and dangerous. As if lack of any form or degree of awareness, some kind of total oblivion, is the only way to be "free" or "pure".

Think about it. You've got teachings saying that God, or Buddha, or the Tao, or whatever is in all things and beyond all things (simultaneously immanent and transcendent). That every though, feeling, and other kind of experience is a reflection or manifestation of what the spiritual seeker is trying to recognize. So there is no analysis needed to try to settle into appreciating that -- that now matter how boring, useless, or dreadful something may seem, it's part of the larger reality one is trying to connect with.

As I've tried to articulate with the following recurring image:

"It's one thing to imagine you have a fundamental connection to a sunset or a rainbow or a butterfly. It's nice to be the rainbow. But it's not nice to be the landfill. It's not nice to be fundamentally connected to rapists, to murderers, to peverts, to worst of humanity as well as the best. Yet Being cannot discriminate. That's where the idea of Jesus bearing the sins of the world comes into play. By accepting your true nature as a manifestation of Being you accept the whole thing. You have compassion for the whole thing."

But despite this there is still, even among those who claim to be inspired or to live by such wisdom teachings, this persistence in trying to create a pure/impure or enlightened/unenlightened duality when trying to realize whatever is hiding behind the name that a particular seeker has given to what they are seeking. As if collecting certain thoughts and behaviors and weeding out others will in and of itself summon the thing being sought, like rubbing a lamp to summon a genie.

Yet the deeper wisdom currents in various spiritual traditions suggest that what one is seeking cannot be define by or limited to a particular object, let alone any abstraction, which we can conjure through a particular set of efforts. Those efforts may help us to see more clearly what is already there, but that is a different understanding of them (and what is being seen) altogether.

Buddhist Readings for Christians: Come follow me

Dynamic tranquility: the Buddha in contemplation. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This is a follow-up to a post about some similarities in the writings on Buddhism by Nikkyo Niwano, the founder of modern Nichiren Buddhist lay organization Rissho Kosei-kai, and some elements of Christian teachings. The following excerpts are taken from the chapters in Buddhism for Today corresponding to chapters 14 through 16 in the Lotus Sutra. Some is simply common to spiritual discipline and advice, others perhaps not so common. Only some of many possible examples are given.


The point here is not to make claims about the relative truth of Buddhism or Christianity, or to try to encourage people to convert to a particular religion. But maybe there can be more understanding between people with different backgrounds regarding religion.


From Chapter 14:

[I]n a movie we see a man carrying a pack weighing thirty or forty kilograms on his back and climbing a mountain, bathed in perspiration. Viewers of such a film must feel how arduous it is to climb the mountain. Sometimes it takes three or four hours to advance only twenty or thirty meters. Moreover, the climber risks his life with every step. If it grows dark while he is scaling a rocky cliff, he must hang from the rock and sleep in place in subzero temperatures. If a man were obliged to undergo such an ordeal on the orders of his employer, then indeed he could bring a complaint against the employer for infringing his human rights. However, a mountain climber does this voluntarily. Though he certainly feels pain, his mind is peaceful, and his pain even contributes to his pleasure and enjoyment.

In practicing the teaching of the Lotus Sutra, so long as a person forces himself to endure persecution and the scorn of outsiders though filled with anger and resentment, he is a beginner in Buddhist disciplines. A person who has attained the Way can maintain a peaceful and calm mind even while suffering, and can feel joy in the practice itself. Until a person attains such a state of mind, he must take scrupulous care not to be tempted or agitated by the various setbacks in his daily life.

...

Buddhist Readings for Christians: Appearing Buddha, Original Buddha

Awakening of Faith in the Mahayana (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

From Buddhism for Today, a contemporary commentary for the Lotus Sutra, by Nikkyo Niwano, the founder of Rissho Kosei-kai, a modern Nichiren lay organization.  Sound familiar?

The "appearing Buddha" indicates the historical Shakyamuni, who was born in this world, attained Buddhahood after years of asceticism, and died at the age of eighty. Therefore the Law of Appearance includes the teachings of the organization of the universe, human life, and human relationships on the basis of the experience and enlightenment of Shakyamuni, who attained the ideal state of a human being. Shakyamuni also teaches us that wisdom is the most important attribute for maintaining a correct human relationships.

Shakyamuni has continually taught people throughout the universe since the infinite past. In other words, the Buddha is the truth of the universe, that is, the fundamental principle or the fundamental power causing all phenomena of the universe, including the sun, other stars, human beings, animals, plants, and so on, to live and move. Therefore the Buddha has existed everywhere in the universe since its beginning. This Buddha is called the Original Buddha (hombutsu).

The human form in which the Original Buddha appeared in this world is the historical Shakyamuni as the appearing Buddha. We can easily understand the relationship between the two when we consider the relationship between electric waves and television. The electric waves emitted by television transmitters fill our surroundings. We cannot see, hear, or touch them, but it is a fact that such electric waves fill the space around us. When we switch on our television sets and tune them to a particular channel, the same image appears and the same voice is heard through every set tuned to that wavelength. The Original Buddha is equivalent to the person who speaks from the television studio. He is manifest not only in the studio but also permeates our surroundings like electric waves. The appearing Buddha corresponds to the image of this person that appears on the television set and to the voice emanating from it. The appearing Buddha could not appear if the Original Buddha did not exist, just as no television image could appear and no voice be heard if electric waves did not exist. Conversely, we cannot see the Original Buddha except through the appearing Buddha, just as we cannot receive electric waves as images and voices except through the medium of a television set.

Thus, the Original Buddha is the Buddha who exists in every part of the universe from the infinite past to the infinite future, but only through the teachings of Shakyamuni, who appeared in this world in obedience to the truth of the Original Buddha, can we understand that truth. We cannot declare that either the Original Buddha or the appearing Buddha is the more holy or the more important: both are necessary.

Radio and television stations emit electric waves, in the hope that as many people as possible will receive them through their television sets and radios. In the same way, the Original Buddha exists in every part of the universe, ready to save all beings of the universe. He instructs men, animals, and plants; and salvation means the full manifestation and complete development of the life essential to each form of life according to its true nature.

The Original Buddha is one with the truth of the universe. We have only to tune the wavelength of our own lives to that of the truth of the universe, and the Buddha appears to us. At that time the dark cloud of illusion covering our minds and bodies vanishes completely and the brilliant light of our essential life begins to shine from within our minds. This state of mind is our real salvation, and the spiritual state that we should attain.

The Original Buddha exists permanently from the infinite past to the infinite future, that is, this Buddha is without beginning or end. This Buddha appears in various forms appropriate to the particular time and place for the salvation of all people by means suited to their capacity to understand his teachings. This is the concept of the Original Buddha.

Smashing Idols With Pat Robertson

In this video clip televangelist Pat Robertson advocates for vandalism and destruction of property regarding a viewer's friend and her Buddha statue:



While I have no intention of labeling Mr. Robertson an idolator, this clip reminds me of something I wrote not too long ago--

You sometimes hear people warn against chasing after false idols, or being idolatrous, and the like. Yet idolatry is limiting the divine to a particular form and raising up that form as an icon of exclusion and ultimately intolerance. The idols become overly elaborate and demanding, serving to reinforce the existing views and prejudices of their creators. Those who can only see the divine in their own holy symbols, which they then guard jealously, are the actual idolaters.

I do think that the concept of idolatry has its uses, but it should be used cautiously and with a good dose of introspection and humility. Idolatry is a kind of hardening of the mental arteries as well as of the heart. It leads to a kind of choking, a lack of flow.

Buddha, It's Your Birthday. And Rebirth Day. Happy Wesak 2012!

Bodhisattva Siddhartha Gautama determines that if he's really going to attain enlightenment, the bowl will float upstream. And so it does... He subsquently attains enlightenment that very night. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The birth, enlightenment, and death (or parinirvana) of Siddhartha Gautama, a.k.a. Shakhyamuni Buddha, or to most in the western world, simply the Buddha. Celebrating all of these at once obviously makes Wesak (or Vesak) an important Buddhist holiday, filled with candles, lanterns, offerings, prayers, and the like as suitable for any major religious festival.

And like any proper major religious holiday, it contains a deeper significance than the outward observances. Wesak is about transition and rebirth, the acknowledgement that everything in the phenomenal realm is always in motion, impermanent, and dependent. It calls for meditation and reflection on this insight--that the movement of the phenomenal realm is related to the movement of mind--and the virtues it inspires.

If we follow this reflection and if we recognize that what we take as the real world is largely a projection of our own internal perspective and personal psychology (keeping in mind that all of our perceptions, impressions, thoughts, and the like take place in the dark, lightless cave inside our crania), and that we and others are often trapped in delusions of our own making, this shared experience and the realization that our actions and reactions toward others are often more about us (and theirs about them) is a foundation for the development of compassion, loving-kindness, equanimity, and empathetic joy.

Have a meaningful and beneficial Wesak, whatever your views on religion or Buddhism.

Is Buddha a better Jesus?

Image via Wikipedia

There are many complex psychological, cultural and historical forces at work influencing why a segment one society adopts the religious narratives and symbols of another: the new cultural form is appealing to those disenfranchised by or disillusioned with the traditional form, it fills a gap that societal changes have created, etc.

Any single explanation of the appeal of Buddhism in the West, then, would be as incomplete as any single explanation for the appeal of Christianity in the East. But that doesn't make adding something new to the list of reasons for such a shift isn't worthwhile.

Here is a candidate for the list of reasons why people in the West find Buddhism appealing: Buddha is a better Jesus.

That is to say, the Buddha offers many of the things people who grew up in or around Christianity like about Jesus but without many of things they don't want.

Or another way to put it is that people may have an image of the kinds of things Jesus represents, such as peace, non-violence, suffering for the welfare of others, conscious union with the deepest aspect of reality, which they find appealing or compelling, but which is connected to a larger Biblical narrative and associated imagery that the find offensive or that just doesn't ring true for them.

Here are a few examples:

If you meet Jesus on the road, kill him

Image by Greg_Smith via Flickr

Anything, including God, that we can choose or lose, is not true Being. It is an illusion. An idol. It's like the saying about finding the Buddha on the road. You have to kill him. Otherwise you were just grasping at another idea. God must die to find God. Jesus must die to find Jesus. The Buddha must die to find the Buddha. We must die to find ourselves.

We must even learn to move beyond the road. Clinging to Jesus or the Buddha or the church or sangha: these are useful as we get to our feet and learn to walk and to run. Good spiritual therapy. Cling to Lao-Tsu or Moses or another if you like. But eventually we have to use that new-found freedom and go beyond our therapy sessions. Doesn't mean we have to reject any of it, but rather stop holding to it as if it were the end rather than the means.

Some Wisdom From Anthony De Mello: Wake Up/Stay Awake

I keep meaning to get some of his books...

"Is there anything I can do to make myself enlightened?"

"As little as you can do to make the sun rise in the morning."

"Then of what use are the spiritual exercises you prescribe?"

"To make sure you are not asleep when the sun begins to rise."

~ From One Minute Wisdom

Spirituality means waking up. Most people, even though they don't know it, are asleep. They're born asleep, they live asleep, they marry in their sleep, they breed children in their sleep, they die in their sleep without ever waking up. They never understand the loveliness and the beauty of this thing that we call human existence. You know — all mystics — Catholic, Christian, non-Christian, no matter what their theology, no matter what their religion — are unanimous on one thing: that all is well, all is well. Though everything is a mess, all is well. Strange paradox, to be sure. But, tragically, most people never get to see that all is well because they are asleep. They are having a nightmare.

~ Quotation from Approaching God : How to Pray by Steve Brown

Hmm, what was it Jesus and Siddhartha kept saying again...?

We know Jesus, and the Buddha, and the rest too well

Or to put it more accurately, in many ways we don't really know them at all.

I have alluded before to something that many theologians have known for a long time, something I didn't come up with on my own, that in many ways Jesus was a radical.  That isn't to say he was a raving ideologue, or some kind of Jewish anarchist.  From the depictions we have of him he favored quiet, peace and rest as well as good times with friends and family.  He also appears to have been very observant, going to the temple, singing the Psalms, and reading from the Torah.  Yet he saw past clinging blindly to the letter of the law and ignoring its spirit, in which he revealed its source and intent: love for God and for neighbor.  No interpretation of religious law that defied this mandate could be genuine and no secular law that ignored it could be just.

Then there were the early churches.  I've heard they initially shunned the iconography of the cross.  It isn't surprising.  The cross in that era was a sign of shame, terror and agony.  It was the visible symbol of what happened to those who defied Rome and its Emperor.  To look at a cross was to look at the power of the largest known empire in the world and its dominion over your life.  To have taken up the cross as their own symbol, the members of the church would have been doing what so much of the Gospels did, inverting familiar signs of power and meaning.  It was an act of defiance.  What you proclaim as death we proclaim as life.  What you intended to cause despair has become a source of hope.  But how can that symbol carry the same impact today?

Solid rock or shifting sand?

Image via Wikipedia

How does one have faith in events such as the Christian teaching of the resurrection of Jesus?  Is it just agreeing because other people say they believe it?  Is belief in such a case solely matter of accepting or rejecting an idea?  A historical proposition? Or is it a matter of heartfelt trust and experience-inspired insight?

To try to make such an event into a mere historical fact or a mere historical falsehood or just a metaphor or any other easily accepted and comprehended label is a stumbling block because it denies or ignores the mystery at the heart of the matter.

As I am slowly coming to see it, if it were a simple thing that could be fully comprehended and conclusively decided at the level of our ordinary intellect, then it would just be an idea to reject or accept based on everyday standards for ideas. Instead, events such the Paschal mystery (including that of the Resurrection and the Ascension) are explored by living them out through liturgy and charity.

Brothers

The idol of no form

[I tried to post this as a "diary" entry at Street Prophets as a reply to something written by Clark Strand, which is cross-posted from his own blog, but there is some technical issue with my account and publishing, so here is what I was trying to "say"...]

I can appreciate the problem with idolatry, of seeking the Kingdom of God, the Pure Land, the Gohonzon, etc, outside of yourself. The Buddha, and Christ, and others can themselves be recast as idols, and this is a very subtle problem. But over-correcting and swerving too far the other way can be a problem as well. Ancient Jews were prohibited from making idols and wouldn't allow any graven image, even decorative engravings or paintings or trim, were not permitted. Nor could they speak the name of God. And thanks to the controversy over a Danish cartoonist depicting Mohamed, many of are aware of the prohibition in Islam against producing images of either Mohamed or Allah.

But if we stop and pause, is that not a form of idolatry as well? Idols are made to bring Mysteries and Powers down to a level where they can be contained and constrained by the human will and rendered by the human imagination into something limited enough to be comprehensible. Perhaps even controlled by a magical system of rules. But simply becoming attached (having an unhealthy craving or dependency to fill an unrequited need for to feel whole) to the image of no image can be just as egotistical and just as small-minded.

But if we have a panentheistic view, which at least sounds sympathetic to some of Strand's recent writings, we see why both views - the idol of form and the idol of no form, are equally dangerous. In panentheism, the Ground of Becoming, the Source, is always giving rise to the phenomenological realm, like an ocean gives rise to waves. The ocean (the limitless potential of existence) and the waves (the phenomena) are really the same stuff. And the interdependent web of causality co-determines which waves will arise where and in what form and in what direction, speed, etc. Co-determines? Yes, because of the fact that some of these waves are sentient and have the capacity to choose.

Buddhists will likely appreciate the above metaphor as compatible with the notion of form and emptiness, karma (cause and effect), etc. Many Abrahamic theists and certainly many "Hindu" will recognize the infinite nature of their Creator which encompasses the whole ocean. I have read similar depictions of God from many theologians. And the basic premise then is that we are already connected to God, the Tao, the Dharmakaya, etc. But we have forgotten it as our sentience and imagination and awareness of our mortality emerged. This is, as Strand has suggested elsewhere in other writing, the source of delusion in Dharmic traditions like Buddhism and the source of original sin in the Abrahamic faiths.

Hence the goal is to get past the distraction of our false limited view of self (i.e. "ego") and recall that connection, the universal quality of Buddha nature, that inherent awareness of our wholeness which can enable us to end our attachments and suffering (Buddhist version). It is to die to that false view of self and be reborn to that original connection to God (Christian version). Fill in your tradition here if it isn't already listed.

Hence, we are told, the Pure Land, the Kingdom of Heaven, etc, is within us. In Buddhism there is a saying that samsara (the world we live in because of our delusion) and nirvana (reality without delusion) are not separate places. That is, the Pure Land is here right now for those liberated from delusion, and the Kingdom of God is here right now for those who have been reborn. Two but not two. That is, the distinction is in our hearts and mind. There is also the notion that an ordinary person sees deluded beings, while an enlightened mind sees only Buddhas. This is echoed in the Abrahamic teachings about seeing God in the faces of others and the commandment to love God and to love others as we love ourselves. Why? Because all of creation is of God and hence everything is sacred.

It is the human mind, owing to its capacity for imagination and choice, which can create unreal or false views which can then lead to ignorance, greed, and hatred, and in turn lead to suffering. And if the human mind creates the option for evil, what is in the heart of humans, their insecurity and misery, will in turn be reflected in their actions. Hence we create for ourselves a world of war, poverty, discrimination, etc. Everywhere we build false idols to gain some sense of control. But now we can appreciate why the idol of form and the idol of no form are both dangerous and false. Because God (or whatever you choose to call God) is not any thing nor no thing. God isn't just a superlative form in the realm of form. God is the infinite in the finite and the eternal in the moment.

The idolatry of no form is, as I suggested, very subtle. For example, in Buddhism some have the goal of destroying the self. Self is the enemy, and I will slay it and claim the prize of enlightenment. Muhahaha! Others say no, I will simple ignore the ego and give it the cold shoulder, hence allowing enlightenment to arise. But as a Chan monk instructed me, both notions are wrong and only compound our delusion. Instead, we must learn to live with the ego in peace, neither expending energy to focus on it or to try to push it away. I am sure the Christians here and those of other faiths have similar wisdom about the need to accept and forgive ourselves and God for what we are in order to be open to our wholeness and to truly live.

When we touch the Ultimate, presumably we are touching all that is, was, will be, and possibly even what could have been. But it would be all at once - a totality where linear distinctions like past and present and here and there break down. I am guessing here that this is what is meant by the omniscience of a Buddha. In human form the mind would likely not be able to process all of this properly but I have heard various accounts of mystics who claim to have had such visions in which they could grasp everything but not in relative terms like meters or seconds, hence afterward they couldn't tell you stuff like where Hoffa is buried or the date on which human first entered the New World.

Now, these mystics may have been insane or hallucinating. But it does pay to consider the seeming duality of experiencing life from a limited historical perspective and from an ultimate perspective. From the historical perspective there is an emphasis on dividing things into beginnings and endings, but that might be hard to define in an ultimate view. Still, we hear the the Pure Land is here if we can see it, and that the Kingdom of Heaven is with us already. I have been noticing many account lately in which the exegesis of the crucifixion and ascension are re-examined in terms of history. The idea being that, for example, when Christ says that the one thief will be with him that day in paradise, it doesn't mean until after they die, that it means it starts right then, while they are still nailed to some hunks of wood. I believe Strand has commented on this as well. Many Buddhist masters seem to say something similar. The idea is that we don't have to wait for death to begin eternal life, that we have it and are it and just need to realize that.

I don't have a clue what that does or doesn't mean in terms of an afterlife, though speculation may be fun, but the thing is, I don't think the Pure Land is deathless because it is just some escapist death-aversive pipe dream any more than heaven is the same thing, although I would agree both can and have been used in that fashion. But then, religious wisdom is always open to abuse. I see the Pure Land and similar depictions as a reflecting a Pure Heart and a Pure Mind. In the steps of dependent origination in Buddhism, the first step isn't birth, it is ignorance. Buddhahood is a deathless state because it is a birthless state because it is free from ignorance. It has no beginning and it has no end. It is whole, and perfectly appreciates its participation in the totality.

In a sense then, being reborn into the Kingdom of Heaven or being reborn into the Pure Land is a bit of a misnomer, although it is easy to see why such depictions seems apt. Yes, religion sometimes mistakes the flash for the substance, and the Buddha can be idolized in a certain form, and so can Jesus, the Pure Land, and the Kingdom of Heaven. But I am just as wary of the errors in the teaching of avoiding the Pure Land as much as the errors of seeking it, in the errors of rejecting the Buddha as much as embracing him. Many masters used to rinse and spit after saying words like Buddha as if they were foul words or curses to avoid the risk of idolization, but they kept saying it and passing on the teachings anyway. The idol of no form is as dangerous as the idol of form. The only solution as far as I can tell is a living, dynamic faith that is open to all sources of genuine insight.

Why I am not anti-religious

(A summary of some discussions I've had recently on this topic)

I see religion is the shared, ritualistic experience of spirituality and the collected insights of a culture's attempts to deal with existential concerns. In traditional societies religions weren't separate from other spheres of life and in fact offered a blue print for living a full and meaningful life. They still do for billions of people.

If this is true, then we should hope that the basic insights of religions will be more or less the same since we are all human. (In fact, a series of meetings of representatives of various religions called the Snowmass Conference came up with a list of commonalities.) There is more to religion than doctrine, dogma, and blind faith. These things are pushed by some to try to preserve the teachings of a tradition so that they will be accurately and completely passed on from one generation to the next. But there is also the long history of people arguing for the spirit of tradition over the letter of tradition, just as people also argue over the spirit of the law over the letter of the law. This just how humans behave. The question is how to strike the right balance of structure and flexibility.

What each tradition offers (including the newer ones) is a unique story that speaks to certain people, echoing their pain, their joy, their confusion, and their hopes. Each story paints a picture and offers a path leading to surrender and transformation, complete with rituals to commemorate and reaffirm one's journey. Each tradition offers a common history and presents a vision of the future that resonates with those who embrace it. Each tradition challenges preconceptions, egos, and a self-centered view in its own way. Each tradition provides a complete working system that can assist us to see and fully embrace its received wisdom, like having a coach and teammates working toward a goal, to encourage or carry us when we are tired and when we stumble.

I have found that the reason so many things good or bad are associated with religion is that it is a fundamental structural aspect of most societies - in other words, everything by default has some religious significance. Religion is used to address the existential issues people face and in each society it lays out a map for how to live a complete life. In fact, in most cultures there isn't a separate category "religion" apart from the rest of life. It is simply a part of the whole. Hence cultural and societal values are officially accepted and made part of tradition by being incorporated into religion.

It's also why people do certain things "in the name of religion" - because they are seeking to legitimize their actions. Yet that alone doesn’t obviate the value of our spiritual impulses or religious institutions. Religions aren't just philosophies or social groups. They are living traditions. No one can be debated into understanding that. It would be foolish to try. But the truths and practices which are purely about getting closer to appreciating the Divine have been effective for thousands of years. They have molded and nourished the very saints and gurus whose spiritual wisdom many revere.

I think that sacred texts contain vital wisdom, even for those who are not religious or consider themselves non-religious. Every culture from every society has a collection of stories and rituals that address fundamental existential needs, and hence religion influences more than just those who participate in them. Their orientation towards existence and symbolism influences the basic assumptions and perspectives of everyone in the culture, even though these influences are often and may not officially labeled as religious. (I am not just talking about obvious influences, but ontological orientations of which we are not usually conscious until we encounter significantly different perspectives.) Western civilization has a debt to ancient Greece, Judaism, and Christianity, plain and simple. Hence understanding religion helps us understand ourselves in a secular sense, even if one sees no further use for it.

I see the Bible as part of an ongoing story of (a portion of) humanity's efforts to know themselves and to know God, which includes insights from when they are actually in tune with God (embracing and supporting all) and from when they are following an idol that allows them to continue in their delusion of superiority, of personal gain at the harm of another. I view the Bible and other sacred texts are about timeless insights into the human condition and helping to reveal a path to God. This path also can be found running through Buddhist sutras, through the Hindu Upanishads, etc, etc. We are already a part of God and God's creation, which can never be separated. We are just ignorant, deluded, sinful. We forget who and what we are and settle for something less. The path isn't a path to God so much as a path to remembering/awakening to God, and this path runs through the heart.

As an example, the resurrection is also part of a larger story representing our struggles with our limitations, our struggles with God, the importance of surrender of the ego in our liberation, etc. There is more to most Biblical stories than whether they are historically verifiable. They open us up to ahistorical truths about ourselves, timeless truths that need to be part of a story, not an instruction manual. I trust in the resurrection because I see it happening in the lives of people, Christian or otherwise. Those who have died to the self, who have stopped struggling with their egos, and who have been reborn to something greater than they were before - more generous, humble, confident, and optimistic. Whether they believe in God or call God by another name or no name, they are open to the Spirit. It doesn't matter to me whether we could go back in time and find an empty tomb. The basic truth of the resurrection story has been demonstrated to me. A similar understanding underpins my views on related topics such as the divinity of Jesus.

Faith is not oppressive – a blinder to the mind or a weight in the heart. It is a living energy, liberating and opening us to our fullest potential.

Jesus, the Buddha, and others tried to liberate the people of their day from overly rigid and judgmental religious customs and thinking. Prophets such as Micah proclaimed that the institutionalized religious elite and powerful rulers would be held to account for how they treated to poor and oppressed. Many of the founders and major representatives of various religions spoke of the Divine as caring for and being accessible to all, not just for the powerful and the rich. Various Hindus, Jews, Christians, Muslims, Jains, etc have followed these teachings and dedicated their lives to the compassionate service of others, even unto the death, sometimes at the hands of the less tolerant members of their religion.

Yet religion can also be used for division and oppression. One view is that humans from their earliest days would have had societies and beliefs that were tribal in nature, which is speculated to have included a distrust of those who looked, dressed, or spoke differently. These so-called "tribal" instincts are further speculated by some to still be with us today. Even if you discount that story of why we might be that way, how many of us deny that in fact we do have those tendencies? The desire to be better than others, to be more loved or to belong more than others, to possess more than others, and to distrust people who seem too different from us. Is it any wonder then that religions would acquire teachings and beliefs that cater to such instincts?

Every religion, overtly theistic or otherwise, has two major threads running through it. On the one hand we see those who claim to have experienced something Greater, vastly so, than themselves, and whose response is to see all humans as their beloved brothers and sisters. They speak of God as beyond comprehension but experienced as infinite wisdom and love. As Julian of Norwich said of how she felt in such rapture: "All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well." On the other hand, we also see another thread, in which God favors one group over another, in which God appears to order atrocities along tribal lines, and which punishment and judgment are emphasized as part of God's righteousness.

Those who (primarily) follow the thread of "God is love"/"faith, charity, hope" etc are going to tend to see and use their religion as a unifying force. Their faith focuses on giving out of acceptance and forgiveness, seeing God/Jesus/Buddha/etc in everyone they meet. Those who (primarily) follow the thread of "God is righteous"/"salvation is for the few" are going to tend to see and use their religion as a divisive force. They want to separate themselves from evil influences and those who would corrupt them, to keep to what they believe is holy, and emphasize ideas like strict obedience and separating wheat from chaff.

Of course, most (theistic) religious people are complex, being human after all, and may swing from one end to the other during a lifetime or even a single day. Yet for thousands of years, both threads have been woven into religions because they reflect the internal conflict and confusion in the human heart. Spirituality provides an exterior reflection of what is happening in the heart and religion is the institutionalization of that spirituality, reflecting the history of our existential concerns and how we have attempted to reconcile them. Hence (theistic) religion can be both divisive and unifying because of the human capacity for intolerance and acceptance, for justice and retribution and for compassion and forgiveness. The paradox in religion, then, is simply a mirror of the paradox of the human heart - our collective hopes, fears, and dreams.

To me the relevant question is which path we are going to choose and which one do we want to be representative of our reality. I believe there is only one path, the path of God, in which salvation cannot be bargained or excluded by or from anyone. The other option(s) are false choice reflecting our inability to fully trust in God and to love one another without compromise. That's what the hope is all about, as well as the part where people go out and serve to make it happen. That's what counts, and that's what I'm concerned with.

Added: If you were looking for or would like to read discussion about the objections raised by the New Atheists, I would recommend starting with this book. (6/21/09)

Being Buddha, Being "a" Buddha

Another nice find, both in terms of a blog and particular blog content, comes in the form of BuddhaDharma Mum and specifically the post on The Supreme Identity which features a video of a talk by the late Brother Wayne Teasdale. The format is an interview with Ken Wilber. While the talk itself is, typical of Teasdale, and interspiritual / intermystical / interfaith review of Ultimate Nature, it tends to use the most common term for such Supreme Identity, a.k.a. God. To me this was reminiscent of my recent musings on Ultimate Reality and taking refuge as well as James' discussion of a famous quote by Pai-chang that all is Buddha --

Each form, each particle, is a Buddha. One form is all Buddhas. All forms, all particles, are all Buddhas. All forms, sounds, scents, feelings, and phenomena are also like this, each filling all fields.
-Pai-chang

In turn, this reminds me of a collection of quotes I gathered once in contemplating the regarding the implications of emptiness and the nature of existence and identity...

Do you want to understand? The whole world is one of your eyes, the body produced by your parents is a cataract. All ordinary people ignore the indestructible, marvelously clear, unfailingly mirroring eye, and cling fast to the dust cataract produced by the relationship of their father and mother. Therefore they take illusions for realities, and grasp at reflections as the physical forms themselves.
-P'u-an

Ultimately, all phenomena are contained within one's life, down to the last particle of dust. The nine mountains and the eight seas are encompassed by one's body; the sun, moon and myriad stars are contained within one's mind.
-Nichiren

The Smaller Sutra is a highly imaginative portrayal of the realm of enlightenment in very concrete terms: bejeweled railings, nettings, trees; bathing pools lined with golden sands with steps of gold, silver, lapis lazuli, and crystal; pavilions covered with exquisite jewels built on the earth made of gold. The atmosphere is filled with celestial music, rare and exquisite birds, and a subtle breeze blowing through jeweled trees which produces a melodious chorus. This rich and colorful description is said to be a manifestation of emptiness (shunyata) that expresses itself freely in any way it chooses. Since reality is empty of permanent being and all things are in flux, it can take any form.
-Taitetsu Unno

Once you stop clinging and let things be, you'll be free, even of birth and death. You'll transform everything; you'll possess spiritual powers that can't be obstructed; and you'll be at peace wherever you are. If you doubt this, you'll never see through anything; you're better off doing nothing. Once you act, you can't avoid the cycle of birth and death, but once you see your nature, you're a Buddha even if you work as a butcher."
-Bodhidharma

When I was a young novice, I told my Master, 'If the Pure Land doesn't have lemon trees, then I don't want to go.' He shook his head and smiled. Maybe he thought I was a stubborn youngster. However, he did not say that I was right or wrong. Later when I realized that both the world and the Pure Land come from the mind, I was very happy. I was happy since I knew that lemon trees and star-fruit trees exist also in the Pure Land, with dirt roads and green grass on all sides.
-Thich Nhat Hahn

Each Buddha-Tathagata, as the body of the Dharmadhatu, pervades the mind of all sentient beings. This is why when your mind perceives the Buddha, it is your mind that possesses the thirty-two prominent features and the eighty secondary attributes. This mind that creates the Buddha is the mind that is the Buddha, and the wisdom of the Buddhas true, universal and ocean-like arises from this mind. This is why you should single-mindedly fix your thoughts and contemplatively examine that Buddha, that Tathagata, that Arhat, that Supremely Awakened One.
-The Sutra of Contemplation on the Buddha of Immeasurable Life

Which brings us back to the discussion by Teasdale and Wilber, particularly the difference between saying all things are of the substance of God but that no one thing can claim to be God. This can be confusing unless one applies a concept like dependent co-arising and emptiness, in which the fullness of "God" is in all things but no one thing can be separated out/singled out as God, as in a localized, intrinsic, or dualistic identity. This would be the difference in Triyaka doctrine between the created body which manifests in time and space and limitless body of the Dharma itself. Hence in terms of the latter, all things are Dharmakara and Dharmakara maniefests in and as all things, and one who awakens to this is called enlightened. That is the difference, such as it is, between being Buddha and being a Buddha.