The end of another year (2020)

 

Winter blooms and 2020 ends.

In my location we are still not yet to 2021 at the time of this posting.

I have fixed feeling about the tradition of New Year's resolutions. They are often a form of wishful thinking that can actually depress people when the resolution fails, especially if it's made in black and white (giving up this, taking up that).

Fifteen years ago I recall a Buddhist teacher saying to a small group that the precepts cannot be broken. We can take them up or set them down. But the precepts themselves are still there waiting. The same person also compared that to the practice of staying and returning in meditation. If your mind wanders from focus, just return. No judgment. It's all a success. Just stay focused as long as you can and then return when you notice your attention has wandered.

Perhaps more New Year's resolutions would benefit those making them if they were approached in this way, whether it be losing weight or taking up a new hobby or building relationships.

This is a good time for reflection as societies are also reflecting, giving us some momentum. Also a good time to then look ahead. We can't know what will happen, but we can think about who we've been and who we want to be.

If you have any resolutions, I wish you success.

hello again

 

There is either quite a lot to say or not much at all.

This blog was much more active between 2005 and 2014. I was going to start writing more in again in 2016, then midway through the year I started a new job that took up much of my time and the political and religious environment started becoming much darker. When I logged on to write, criticism and frustration emerged.

There has been much to criticize the past four years, but I didn't want to be bitter or give an impression of bitterness to others. I also found myself just being very, very tired in many ways - physically, mentally, emotionally, socially. And, to be honest, I wasn't sure what to write beyond pointing out the hypocrisy and harm of those who substitute idolatry for faith.

When I became tinythinker many years ago, I was coming from a somewhat American fundamentalist Christian background. I had already left all of that behind and was still near the beginning of my graduate school days, studying evolutionary theory, cultures from the past and present around the world, and so much more. I started using the name for message boards back then, where I encountered some interesting Buddhists on forms otherwise full of Christian and atheists going at it. Sometimes with respect or some kind of boundaries, and sometimes not. So even before I brought my net handle to this blog, I had developed a curiosity in things like Unitarian Universalism, Buddhism, and even mystical Christianity.

I continued exploring such things to varying degrees between 2005 and 2014, as evidenced by the content from that period. But it wasn't just those thing in of themselves, though that was also intriguing, but also what they might mean for questions people tend to wrestle with and the answers that they fight over. Still, for me much of it was also self-image and construction, solving intellectual puzzles, and just finding out about different views that seemed so interesting.

Around 2010, having gotten into readings the preceding couple of years on contemplative and mystical Christianity, and with no Buddhist groups around, I tried attending a nearby church for a while. It was interesting, and I participated pretty well, but after a couple of years my curiosity and interest expired. So my attendance and participation drifted off. Still, I had been able to go beyond a lot of what I had previously experienced and known in my youth, through books and actual live services.

Which left a question.

What then?

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.

The star fish will always be with you.

[Pixabay]

The title might throw you off, but the topic is about charity, compassion, and religious outreach.

OK, so here's how we get from A to Z.

I was thinking recently about how some religious organizations and groups plan and organize their efforts to connect or engage with the community. The fact is that I tend to be either uninterested or skeptical about such efforts, so I wondered why that should be so and what advice I would offer. Not that my opinion should carry more weight than anyone else's, but to see if I could come up with something other than a complaint.

To be clear, I wasn't thinking of any particular effort, like a bake sale or raffle, just the general idea. And one of the things that occurred to me is the way that people sometimes have a tendency to treat other people as objects to validate their view of the world or as means to an end. In short then, interaction in such situations isn't about the individual as a person, a whole person, but some value attached to that person from the perspective of another party.

To stick with the religious example, from an institutional point of view, it may seem desirable to have more members. There are many reasons for this, but that desire there and we know it. From the perspective of validating one's worldview, there may also be a desire for people to join or convert to your religion or a specific form of that religion. These things may be rationalized as being "good for" the individuals converting and becoming members, yet the tell is in how people are being treated.

For example, how concerned is the institution or organization interested in the overall well-being of the individual versus their loyalty or commitment of the individual to the institution and its rules and requirements? How much pressure is there to conform to the institution's view of the world and its emphasis on how to live regardless of the effect this has on the individual's mental or emotional heath Or social development and fulfillment. Regardless of the individual's doubts, objections, or concerns?

This is a more extreme example, but subtler forms also exist for many institutions, social movements, and self-conscious social categories. My thoughts lead me to consider what effect these subtler forms of objectification/reduction of individuals have and what a different approach might look like.

This caused my thinking to take a bit of a "spiritual" turn.

Is there room for prayer in modern Buddhism?

[Pixabay]

Why such discomfort with the word "prayer" and activities that would fall under it's domain?

This question comes from a re-post on the Dangerous Harvests blog, and for context it is referring to contemporary (convert) Buddhists in post-enlightenment, post-modern societies whose cultural history doesn't have ancient connections to Buddhism. That would include the societies of nation-states such as the from the Americans, Europe, and so on. More directly it implies the more economically powerful or "developed" nations such as the United States of America.

I read the post last night and composed a comment in response. It had to be divided into two longer comments given the character limit imposed by Blogger. I think the reply was very concise but also very dense, so I decided to sleep on it. I still like the tight and compact form I originally composed, but upon reflection it seemed that there was still a little more that could be said to help clarify what I was getting at, so rather than submitting a three-comment-long response I decided my reaction would work just as well as a full length post here.

What follows is an expansion of  and elaboration on the original comment(s), and it's still pretty tightly packed even with some additional exposition and examples added in. My response is based on roughly ten years of observing convert Buddhists online and in print as well as privately studying various forms of Buddhism, and I don't claim any special titles or expertise in the matter. Nonetheless I hope it may help answer the question that was posed. It also provides another angle to my recent exposition on prayer and provides a kind of follow up to some thoughts on contemporary convert Buddhists and God.

 -------------

Well, your own post suggests a large part of the problem, both in something you identify and in the way you try to parse things. This get's a little long so I had to break it into two comments. [Or transfer it to this post instead.]

Buddhism has historically accepted that what modern post-enlightenment folks think of as the material or physical world is only one facet or angle of a larger reality. Focusing on it exclusively as the only reality was considered to be an error refuted by the Buddha.

Thus, when people from such modern societies speak of spiritual beings or places like the Buddha-fields, including Amitabha's Pure Land, there is often an automatic dichotomy set up between symbolizing something and referring to something "real" (i.e. a being or place technically defined as spiritual or supernatural, but that in a way that still treats it as a physical entity that occupies some other dimension with different laws of existence).

Why Western Buddhists Need God

[Bolton Abbey - Pixabay]

Take in that feeling that you are bringing from the title above. 

How does it feel? How do you feel? 

Consider this for a moment before reading on.

If you identify in some way with Buddhism and you are affiliated with the Western convert community, there is a decent chance you are having a negative reaction. Perhaps you are even looking to see what I am going to write in support of the premise in the title with a little hostility, ready to be especially critical of whatever comes next.

Maybe even you're feeling a little "Bodhier than thou".

Funny that. Whatever tradition, school, or sect of Buddhism you follow, I am betting that the teaching you have encountered discuss the attitudes and assumptions, the emotionally charged disposition, that one brings into each experience.

So for those rolling their eyes or scowling at the screen, what kind of unhealthy attachment is it that is generating such a reaction?

If you don't identify with Buddhism or if you are intrigued rather than bothered by the title, there is something here for you, too. Let's have a look.

To pray or not to pray

What is prayer and who is it for? Does it matter?

[Pixabay]

I sometimes discuss issues of religion or spirituality on social media with Clark Strand, former senior editor at Tricycle magazine and author of books on Buddhism and how to access underappreciated or misunderstood elements of religious tradition.

While working on a new book, Clark has been posting quite a bit over the past year or so about prayer with an emphasis on the rosary.

Recently he posted that "everything prays" and that "the purpose of life... is life".

I replied that I used to say (here on this blog, actually, in 2006 and again in 2008) that we need to replace "of" with "is" in "the meaning of life."

I also thought that his sentiments resonated with the idea that everything we do is a prayer, so the question becomes not "Should I pray?" but "What am I praying for?"

This raises the question of what we mean when we use the term prayer, and this actually gets back to something I recently wrote about spirituality.

So what is prayer and who it for, anyway?

Non-engaged Buddhism?

Let me ask you something: What is non-engaged Buddhism?

This is a much more revealing question that "What is engaged Buddhism?", since it really requires you to think very carefully about what that term even means. For example, one can argue that developing compassion, loving-kindness, patient acceptance, and equanimity is a way to positively engage with your community and through that to positively impact the society in which you love. Or one can argue that such awareness can directly improve the well-being of others through a shared root consciousness. One could try to use various methods of cultivation of awareness and empathy, such as breathing exercises and visualization, as a way to address the negative stress afflicting many people. Do those count as engaged Buddhism?

One way of answering such a question is to connect engagement to social movements that aim to reshape some major aspect of society, such as abolishing the death penalty or supporting marriage equality. Many of these social movements blend into progressive political activism, which then leads to the question of what makes engaged Buddhism, well,  Buddhist, other than the people engaging happen to identify as Buddhists? By trying to argue that Buddhist principles, axioms about the nature of existence, or the ideals of Bodhisattvahood or Buddhahood support or require such activism?

It is sometimes suggested that traditional Asian Buddhism is all about escaping the physical world into a spiritual bliss of liberation from form, and so the Western emphasis is exclusive in caring about social concerns rather than personal enlightenment. Yet there is a strong history in some traditionally Buddhist countries in which it was believed that supporting the right form and practice of religion would cause the society to prosper. So maybe it is more of a matter of the nature of the relationship between Buddhism and social being and how this is mediated.

Here are two examples to help you consider and reflect on the matter. First, we have the Dr. Rev. Danny Fisher, coordinator of the Buddhist Chaplaincy Program at the University of the West. He regularly circulates petitions calling for social justice via social media. He takes his students to Skid Row, advertises ways to support Buddhist Global Relief through T-shirt sales, and endorses  the sale of badges supporting workers and children in traditionally Buddhist countries which simultaneously promote environmental activism. That is, when he isn't blogging for sites such Shambhala Sun and Buddhadharma or writing books.

Next we have Ittetsu Nemoto, a Japanese Zen Buddhist priest trained as a monk in the Rinzai tradition. According to a profile on his work that appeared in The New Yorker, after becoming the chief priest in at a rural temple, he decided he wanted to use his interest and experience in talking with people about their suffering to help those who felt suicidal. He has organized workshops and field trips for those who have seriously contemplated killing themselves, including practices and rituals in which participants can more readily face and discuss the prospect of death. This has helped many of those who have made the trip to visit him. According to the profile, he thinks one can gain great insight from suffering, and that life is a precious gift even when it is seems hard.

So do either, both, or neither qualify as engaged Buddhists? Are they Buddhists who happened to be engaged? And does it matter which it is? Share your thoughts in the ample space in the comment section.

The Trinity and Buddhism? Social Trinitarianism and Dependent Co-Arising

Andrei Rublev's Trinity, representing the Father, Son and Holy Spirit in a similar manner. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Yeah, well, it may sound strange, but it's still a provocative way of approaching the topic of Buddhist-Christian dialogue. Brian McLaren gives his formulation of a particular view of the doctrine of the Trinity, a view known as Social Trinitarianism, in a recent article for Tikkun magazine. He uses this view as a basis for understanding our fundamental interconnected with all things, including each other and the source from and of which all things spring and to which they return, which sounds like part of the description of God frequently used on this blog (source, substance, and sustainer of existence) which kind of sprang out of reflections the Tao, Tathata, and Dharmakaya.

Here is a sample of what McLaren wrote:

At the heart of Social Trinitarianism is the concept of perichoresis, which images God as a dynamic unity-in-community of self-giving persons-in-relationship. The Father, Son, and Spirit in this view are not three independent units (or monads) eternally bound together in a larger unity. Nor is God one independent unit with three identical parts. Rather, each person exists in dynamic social relationship with the others, and God is the relational unity in which they relate.

Similarly, the being of one person of the Trinity is not independent of the being of the others, so that one could be subtracted and the other two would stand. Nor does the being of one person stand over against the being of the others so the Father could be defined as “not the Son or the Spirit” or the Spirit as “not the Father or the Son,” and so on. Rather, the very idea of person — whether applied to human beings or to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — is redefined in Social Trinitarianism as “being in relationship.” A person’s relationships with the others, in other words, aren’t an accessory to the person who exists apart from them. Those relationships are what and who that person is, and that person cannot be said to exist apart from those relationships. Being, then, for God as for us, means interbeing, being in relationship, so the three persons of the Holy Trinity are not merely one with each other: they are one in each other. 

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Just say no to "American Buddhism"?

9th century fresco from the Bezeklik grottoes near Turfan, Tarim Basin, China. The person to the left is an European/Western Asian trader or monk (distinguishable by his red hair and full beard and face), to the right an East Asian buddhist monk. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I've been coming across criticisms of the mostly white/upper middle class Buddhism of American bookstore shelves, magazines, and Dharma centers for years. This is often coupled with a criticism of an over-emphasis on Zen, Tibetan Buddhism, and Vippasna and their meditative elements. It is also sometimes accompanied by complaints such as unnecessary secularization, over-simplification, a neglect of Asian-American Buddhist communities, and commodification.

If you are curious about these criticisms, whether or not you find them valid, Angry Asian Buddhist is a good resource for the neglect of Asian Americans, and The Zennist argues forcefully against the secularization trend. Discussion of the other issues are spread throughout the Buddhist Blogisphere.

But I have yet to come across a criticism as blunt and unapologetic as found at buddhafolk:

Recently in media by Buddhist orientated sites online and in print through Tricycle, Buddhadharma, and Shambala Sun much has been made about the national form that Buddhist followers should or as they assume will eventually take in the USA.

Their Protestantism of Buddhism or rather a sanitizing or erasing/rewriting of Buddha’s history and rejection of what they identify as irrelevant to modern Americans today.  This means all the ethnic Buddhists from Thailand, Sri Lanka, China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Korea, India, Tibet, Nepal, Indonesia, Phillipines, Malaysia or other American countries or Europe are to be cleansed and shunned from Americans or American Buddhists as it starts with white men who are protestants who already rejected the catholics because they have monks and nuns… or maybe they are jewish who didn’t like christians at all and or even those who prefer to embrace every oddball newly created religion and market it.

...

This sanitizing of Buddhism is wrong.  It is a symptom of lack of effort and study of Buddha dharma.  It’s rote repetition of wrong teachings based on fear of loss of their own leadership due to aging and somehow they must keep their flame alive and make a historical memory so their efforts don’t seem wasted to others.  The fact of the matter is the hippies are old and their start into Buddhism was filled with false intentions, most are failed monks and they are damn mad that people did not support them when they were innocents in robes, so they formed their careers by damning the robes and those that wear them.  All of them… look up the writers for yourself in the rags, tricycle, shambala sun, buddha dharma, the big 3 have featured all white… and all secular people claiming to be experts and leaders of Americans ‘cuz they failed to be monks.

There are other issues woven into the full post, but this is fairly representative of the content and tone. Are these issues boiling under the tranquil surface of American Buddhism, or is this an outlier view? And in either case, what do you make of the complaints? What do you find valid in the critique?

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.

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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.

Judeo-Christian Readings for Buddhists: Naaman and Elisha

English: Naaman in Jordan River (2King 5:14) Русский: Нееман окунается в реку Иордан (4Цар. 5:14) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Second Book of Kings, Chapter 5, Verses 1-14:

Now Naaman was commander of the army of the king of Aram. He was a great man in the sight of his master and highly regarded, because through him the Lord had given victory to Aram. He was a valiant soldier, but he had leprosy.

 Now bands of raiders from Aram had gone out and had taken captive a young girl from Israel, and she served Naaman’s wife.  She said to her mistress, “If only my master would see the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy.”

Naaman went to his master and told him what the girl from Israel had said.  “By all means, go,” the king of Aram replied. “I will send a letter to the king of Israel.” So Naaman left, taking with him ten talents of silver, six thousand shekels of gold and ten sets of clothing. The letter that he took to the king of Israel read: “With this letter I am sending my servant Naaman to you so that you may cure him of his leprosy.”

As soon as the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his robes and said, “Am I God? Can I kill and bring back to life? Why does this fellow send someone to me to be cured of his leprosy? See how he is trying to pick a quarrel with me!”

When Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his robes, he sent him this message: “Why have you torn your robes? Have the man come to me and he will know that there is a prophet in Israel.” So Naaman went with his horses and chariots and stopped at the door of Elisha’s house.

Elisha sent a messenger to say to him, “Go, wash yourself seven times in the Jordan, and your flesh will be restored and you will be cleansed.”

But Naaman went away angry and said, “I thought that he would surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of the Lord his God, wave his hand over the spot and cure me of my leprosy. Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Couldn’t I wash in them and be cleansed?” So he turned and went off in a rage. 

 Naaman’s servants went to him and said, “My father, if the prophet had told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more, then, when he tells you, ‘Wash and be cleansed’!”  
 
So he went down and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times, as the man of God had told him, and his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy. 

Three important themes that come up from time to time in the Bible (especially in the Gospels) are worthy of consideration by contemporary Buddhists, especially North American Buddhists.

Does the path begin with "me" or "we"?

Contemplation (Photo credit: Susan Hall Frazier)

No, I'm not answering the question. It's for you.

In the Summer 2012 issue of Tricycle magazine Fleet Maull ponders:

Conventional contemplative wisdom states clearly that the path begins with ourselves, that we have to do our own work of cultivating mindfulness and awareness. We are told that we need to make friends with ourselves and develop loving-kindness and compassion before venturing very far into the sphere of bodhisattva activity or engaged spirituality. But what if this is an unnecessarily limited or even mistaken view? What if the path actually begins with us, the collective us, with interbeing, as Vietnamese peace activist and Zen master Thich Nhat Hahn teaches? What if the paths to both genuine liberation and collective awakening are inseparable and best informed by a social view of spirituality from the beginning?

He does not give an answer. I have no idea how we would actually answer any of these questions. How would you answer them?

The thoughts that initially occurred to me centered on the fact that the traditional teachings of contemplative wisdom were framed in historical and cultural context in which the hyper-individualism of many industrialized nation states, particularly the modern United States, was practically unknown.

The basic precepts of Abrahamic and Dharmic teachings (along with other major and minor religious paradigms), which are heavy on ethics, charity, and introspection, would have assumed a more intimate and collectivistic sense of identity and associated relationships. These basic precepts and the teachings in which they were grounded would have been expected then to be worked out in close relationship to others. In fact, virtually all of them must be worked out in relationship to others. You cannot cultivate (or discover) qualities such as mindfulness, loving-kindness, and compassion in a social vacuum.

In that sense, the work one is supposed to do for herself through an exploration of her inner landscape is directly connected to her perceptions of and behaviors in her outer landscape.

When you cannot believe in the meaning of the practice which you are doing

"If our practice is only a means to attain enlightenment, there is actually no way to attain it! We lose the meaning of the way to the goal. But when we believe in our way firmly, we have already attained enlightenment. When you believe in your way, enlightenment is there. But when you cannot believe in the meaning of the practice which you are doing in this moment, you cannot do anything. You are just wandering around the goal with your monkey mind. You are always looking for something without knowing what you are doing. If you want to see something, you should open your eyes."

Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind

Substitute "enlightenment" with "salvation" if you wish.

The meaning of the practice? That nirvana, that the kingdom of God, is already here. That it is within us, and that we are within it. That we are imperfectly perfect as we are. No formal theology, no deep philosophy, no dogmatic litmus tests, no reject of spiritual depth, no achievement syndrome.

English: The Valley of Moses in the Desert of Sinai (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

"When you cannot believe in the meaning of the practice which you are doing in this moment, you cannot do anything. You are just wandering around the goal with your monkey mind. You are always looking for something without knowing what you are doing."

When you cannot believe in the meaning of the practice which you are doing, you are just wandering around looking for something without knowing what you are doing.

We are lost in the desert, looking for the Promised Land.

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.

More on the value of the absurd in belief

Post Surreal Configuration, oil on canvas, 1939 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Originally posted on two months ago as a comment at Real Life with Ryuei (for full context visit the link).

I am wary of any “hardwired” argument for highly complex and interactive sets of behavior given the discovery of the extensiveness of neuroplasticity and the hierarchical nature of developmental regulation. Highly reproducible and even impelled complex behavior to a limited degree within the proper genetic, hormonal, anatomical, ecological and social contexts? Perhaps. Indeed, it appears that indeed some experiences which are essential for compassion, such as empathy, are either enabled, encouraged, or generated by evolved neural architecture that allow and direct us to read the body language and vocalizations of others and mimic their projected feelings. But the hard problem of consciousness remains. Does the brain generate consciousness and its attributes or focus it in an ephemeral localized expression? For all of our metaphysical and scientific investigations, a definitive answer in analytical, reductive terms remains elusive.

Yet whatever the answer to hard problem, there is also the question of why it should be that nature would produce creatures with conscious awareness or why consciousness should exist at all. In neither case do I refer to structural or adaptive arguments about origin or persistence of a trait (“consciousness is the result of the confluence of the following neurological processes which became interconnected when…” or “consciousness has the following functions that enhance inclusive fitness…”). There are even arguments that consciousness is just a sloppy shorthand for an apparent coherence to brain function that doesn’t really exist and is instead a mirage. But I am thinking here of why consciousness, whatever it is or isn’t, should exist at all in the realm of possibility.
The problem with popular depictions of mysticism is that it is often associated with a “left-brained” literalism applied to the poetic/metaphoric nature of supernatural and religious imagery, which are intended to point to that which is beyond the capacity of the rational mind grasp except in a distorted and partial glimpse. The mystical becomes tied up with buffoonish characterizations of magical thinking and the kind of dreadful superstition born of flat imagination and a desire to control the unknown and the unknowable.

It strikes me that a more genuine and useful mysticism would, in fact, be rooted in forms of consciousness which do not limit themselves to such a piecemeal approach but facilitate what is sometimes referred to as a more unitive state. This need not be assumed to be either a superior or inferior form of awareness, but perhaps simply a different way to process information and engender perception. That is, whether deep meditation merely takes us to the root of the neural processes generating conscious awareness and our most rudimentary perceptions/distinctions/valuations or whether it is pointing to a non-localized consciousness that precedes material existence, it is still taking us to the ground of being or the root of “form” (where “form” is phenomenological prior to an ontological theory of its nature or origin).

God is samsara (the fear of God)

Originally written on December 12th, 2011.

This is part of a series reflecting on God-talk and Buddhist terminology. It is an opening to dialogue, not a final word on the subject.

The fear of God has often been taken to mean either fear of divine punishment (i.e. eternity in a lake of fire) or a sense of awe so overwhelming it borders. In his writing, Thomas Merton highlights another option--the fear of facing reality. Of course, which usage makes sense depends upon the context. But for our purposes here we will use the third option.

Fear can of course also be tied to other Buddhist concepts such as impermanence (the wrath of God) and no-self (the love of God). To modify a familiar expression, we tend to favor the devil we know to the God we don't know.

Samsara is a sense of dissatisfaction with life--not just with a particular experience that has been labeled as a problem or disappointment, but with life in general. In Buddhist conception, we tend to simply react without real insight, stumbling blindly about from one thing to another and tripping over one problem while we were trying to avoid another.

Why is life so frustrating? Why is it that even when we seem to be on top, to be winning, another crisis is just around the corner? Isn't their any rhyme or reason? Isn't there a way out of this mess? This is the challenge of samsara.

Recognizing this challenge is also step toward the fear of God.

God is emptiness (the transcendence of God)

This is part of a series reflecting on God-talk and Buddhist terminology. It is an opening to dialogue, not a final word on the subject.

Emptiness. If you are ever going to get tired of hearing people talk about a Buddhist concept this has to be a front runner.

If you spend time reading about emptiness in popular magazines and books or popular websites, you will learn that some older translations into English included "void", and that this negative impression still remains with emptiness.

In attempting to correct this, other images are sometimes suggested. Emptiness refers to a lack of something, but what? One expression popularized by Tibetan Buddhists is that things don't exist "on their own side". Chan/Zen Buddhists favor "lack of intrinsic existence". Pure Land Buddhists, Nichiren Buddhists, and others have similar variations on this theme.

Another way to approach the matter is to turn the negative into a positive. If something does not exist under its own power or will (emptiness), but is instead made up of and connected to other things (dependent co-arising), then everything must be subject to change (impermanence) and hence can only exist because they are not permanent and independent objects (no-self). The capacity for change, the formless ground from which phenomena emerges, can be thought of as the essence of potential itself. The power of possibility. 

That sounds much more affirming and exciting than talking about what things are not. Yet it is precisely in emphasizing what things, including our basic categories of perception and thought, are not that emptiness does its best work. This is probably because emptiness itself is not a thing at all, but an insight about things.

Simple, right?