Buddhism

[TockTockTock]

I couldn't find a thread on this, so... I decided to make one. If you're Buddhist, then awesome and we can talk. If you're interested in Buddhism, then ask questions, etc. Personally, I think this is a wonderful religion (if it can even be considered a religion - it's more of a philosophy or lifestyle), and is probably the best one out of all the others. This is just my opinion, though. Vedanta followers are welcome as well. I am currently a Theravada Buddhist, and I find this it to be lacking in the religious dogma that is found in many of the sects of Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhism. Although, I haven't been a very good Buddhist lately... Anyways, let's get started.

[ProggyMan]

Well, 'Buddhism', like Taoism is, in it's original form in India/China and the rest of SE asia, more of a folk religion than anything. What makes you say Theravada has less dogma than Mahayana and Vajrayana? Seems to me like it's the other way around, but I prefer Taoist philosophy anyway, though Buddhism (Specifically Mahayana/Ch'an and Zen) could be said to be more practical, more focused on what needs to actually be done, so while I disagree I understand the appeal.

[TockTockTock]

Originally Posted by ProggyMan

Well, 'Buddhism', like Taoism is, in it's original form in India/China and the rest of SE asia, more of a folk religion than anything. What makes you say Theravada has less dogma than Mahayana and Vajrayana? Seems to me like it's the other way around, but I prefer Taoist philosophy anyway, though Buddhism (Specifically Mahayana/Ch'an and Zen) could be said to be more practical, more focused on what needs to actually be done, so while I disagree I understand the appeal.

No... Theravada Buddhism deals less with deities and religious practices than the others do (i.e. religious dogma, etc). It is a more "philosophical" version of Buddhism... even though they are all philosophical. I guess you could say it doesn't require as much faith, in a sense.

Zen Buddhism is classified under Mahayana, so I suppose that particular segment of Mahayana Buddhism has less religious dogma. Overall, however, this is not the case.

[Guybrush]

As far as I know, buddhism has some pretty nasty large scale moral implications today. It could for example be the assumption that someone who has a miserable life in a low caste has somehow earned it because they were bad in a previous life. Buddhism is also often criticized for being and perpetuating sexism as the belief that women are morally flawed compared to men and are not able to reach the same levels of enlightenment or do as well in the cycle of life and death is common.

I'm no expert on buddhism, but to me as a westerner, I believe it is almost always heavily romanticized here.

[TockTockTock]

Originally Posted by tore

As far as I know, buddhism has some pretty nasty large scale moral implications today. It could for example be the assumption that someone who has a miserable life in a low caste has somehow earned it because they were bad in a previous life. Buddhism is also often criticized for being and perpetuating sexism as the belief that women are morally flawed compared to men and are not able to reach the same levels of enlightenment or do as well in the cycle of life and death is common.

I'm no expert on buddhism, but to me as a westerner, I believe it is almost always heavily romanticized here.

You're half-right. Buddhism DOES NOT promote sexism. I'm not sure where you got that, but it never has. Now, there may be sexist Buddhists, but they do not directly reflect the religion (philosophy?) of Buddhism. Buddha even appointed bhikkhuni monks, or female monks. Buddha thought all women were equal to men, and he sometimes even pointed our how women could be morally superior in certain instances (and this was around 500 BC). As for the caste dilemma, there is, unfortunately, that in the world. And that DOES reflect Buddhism. They even believe that children with mental problems are born with them because of their negative karma. Of course, if these people were REAL Buddhists, then they would see that instead of neglecting them that they should help them and show them kindness. Thank you for not being blunt and antagonizing, though. Down where I live, people can give... hateful comments about Buddhism.

[OccultHawk]

I've never met a white Westerner who called himself a Buddhist who wasn't a jerkoff.

[Guybrush]

Originally Posted by JackPat

I'm not sure where you got that, but it never has.

Actually, I saw this in a documentary about buddhists in Norway. It seemed like a pretty central part of their dogma. Anyways, checking Wikipedia, I can find the following stuff :

Originally Posted by Wikipedia's article on Women in Biddhism

Although early Buddhist texts such as the Cullavagga section of the Vinaya Pitaka of the Pali Canon contain statements from Gautama Buddha, the founder of Buddhism, speaking to the fact that a woman can attain enlightenment, it is also clearly stated in the Bahudhātuka-sutta that there could never be a female Buddha. As Prof. Heng-Ching Shih states, women in Buddhism are said to have five obstacles, namely being incapability of becoming a Brahma King, `Sakra` , King `Mara` , Cakravartin or Buddha. This is based on the statement of Gautama Buddha in the Bahudhātuka-sutta of the Majjhima Nikaya in the Pali Canon that it is impossible that a woman could be "the perfectly rightfully Enlightened One'", "the Universal Monarch", "the King of Gods", "the King of Death" or "Brahmā'".
In Theravada Buddhism, the modern school based on the Buddhist philosophy of the earliest dated texts, Buddhahood is a rare event. The focus of practice is primarily on attaining Arhatship and the Pali Canon has examples of both male and female Arhats who attained nirvana. Yashodhara, the former wife of Buddha Shakyamuni, mother of his son Rahula, is said to have become an arhat after having joined the Bhikkhuni order of Buddhist nuns. In Mahayana schools, Buddhahood is the universal goal for Mahayana practitioners. The Mahayana sutras, like the Pali Canon literature, maintain that a woman can become enlightened, only not in female form. For example, the Bodhisattvabhūmi, dated to the 4th Century, states that a woman about to attain enlightenment will be reborn in the male form. According to Miranda Shaw, "this belief had negative implications for women insofar as it communicated the insufficiency of the female body as a locus of enlightenment".
However, in the tantric iconography of the Vajrayana practice path of Buddhism, female Buddhas do appear. Sometimes they are the consorts of the main yidam of a meditation mandala but Buddhas such as Vajrayogini, Tara and Simhamukha appear as the central figures of tantric sadhana in their own right. Vajrayana Buddhism also recognizes many female yogini practitioners as achieving the full enlightenment of a Buddha, Miranda Shaw as an example cites sources referring to "Among the students of the adept Naropa, reportedly two hundred men and one thousand women attained complete enlightenment". Yeshe Tsogyal, one of the five tantric consorts of Padmasambhava is an example of a woman (Yogini) recognized as a female Buddha in the Vajrayana tradition. According to Karmapa lineage however Tsogyel has attained Buddhahood in that very life. On the website of the Karmapa, the head of the Karma Kagyu school of Tibetan Buddhism, it is stated that Yeshe Tsogyal - some thirty years before transcending worldly existence - finally emerged from an isolated meditation retreat, (c.796-805 AD), as "a fully enlightened Buddha" (samyak-saṃbuddha).
There are predictions from Sakyamuni Buddha to be found in the thirteenth chapter of the Mahayana Lotus Sutra, referring to future attainments of Mahapajapati and Yasodhara.
In the 20th Century Tenzin Palmo, a Tibetan Buddhist nun in the Drukpa Lineage of the Kagyu school, stated "I have made a vow to attain Enlightenment in the female form - no matter how many lifetimes it takes".

After a google search, this book on Burmese buddhism was the first to come up. It says that in Burma and their flavour of buddhism, women are seen as morally inferior to men and that the biggest reason for this is because their libidos are thought to be insatiable. To attain englightenment, you have to release yourself fro your libido. That's something women are not able to and so their relentless sex drive makes attaining nirvana impossible and is also a danger to men who seek transcendence as they may be tempted and corrupted by women.

Source : Misogyny: the male malady - Google Bøker

[Ska Lagos Jew Sun Ra]

Originally Posted by tore

Actually, I saw this in a documentary about buddhists in Norway. It seemed like a pretty central part of their dogma. Anyways, checking Wikipedia, I can find the following stuff :



After a google search, this book on Burmese buddhism was the first to come up. It says that in Burma and their flavour of buddhism, women are seen as morally inferior to men and that the biggest reason for this is because their libidos are thought to be insatiable. To attain englightenment, you have to release yourself fro your libido. That's something women are not able to and so their relentless sex drive makes attaining nirvana impossible and is also a danger to men who seek transcendence as they may be tempted and corrupted by women.

Source : Misogyny: the male malady - Google Bøker

Well, that's a certain sect of Buddhism. True Buddhism I believe doesn't even have Buddhas, or deities at all. I think Buddhism has largely suffered from the same problem as Christianity as in that it's been twisted to create bureaucratic hierarchies. Which are just as, if not more, corrupt, and twisted against the original point as Christian sects.

This of course stands against nearly everything Buddha himself was trying to say. I think to truly be Buddhist, and this is my personal opinion, you have to avoid seeking advice from others, and find your own answers through meditation.

Now as for the criticism of the caste system. To me, that's just western world ego. Same people who spew phrases like "communism doesn't work", and hold the concept of 100% free enterprise as a solid statute, and the belief in the "American Dream"(I use simply as a metaphor seeing as this applies to most of the first world) of everyone can get rich if they try hard enough.

It's not truth, and it's not the way karma is supposed to work. I don't think the caste system is flawed, I just believe it's different. Just because you were born a sheep herder, it doesn't mean you can't be a painter, or a musician, or anything.

Now, personally, I've only been flirting with Buddhism(Atheist Buddhist, I don't believe in magic forces ruling the universe) since I believe it's anti-materialistic values tend to level one person, and lead for a less stressful way of living, and thinking. I mean, what's the difference between a casio, and a rolex if they both succeed in their function of telling time.

Buddhism teaches you that most of your wants, and desires are psychosomatic, and gives an avenue to focus on what really matters. The reason why the caste system is such a small thing is because Buddhism teaches you money does not equal value.

[Guybrush]

Originally Posted by Skaligojurah

Well, that's a certain sect of Buddhism. True Buddhism I believe doesn't even have Buddhas, or deities at all.

If you read the quotation, you'll see it's not just one "sect", it's several branches that believe this. And calling for example Burmese buddhism, which is followed by almost 90% of the Burmese population, a "sect" when it is in fact over 40 million people - and even that is just a drop in the ocean of the people who do believe in a religion that teaches women are morally inferior, then you're obviously trying to make the issue seem smaller than it is. The way it seems to me, if you consider yourself a buddhist who does not believe women are morally inferior to men, you are part of a minority, not them.

Obviously, you are not buddhist because you believe in your own path to enlightnment without guidance which is contrary to some of the most central stuff in buddhism, the three jewels (Buddha, Dharma, Sangha), which even I know about.

Originally Posted by Skaligojurah

Buddhism teaches you that most of your wants, and desires are psychosomatic, and gives an avenue to focus on what really matters. The reason why the caste system is such a small thing is because Buddhism teaches you money does not equal value.

I agree that buddhism can teach us stuff about values, but does it really teach us to care about stuff that matters? The way I understand it, the real ideal of buddhism seems rather naive to me. Simply put, animals like us need three things; to eat and drink, to survive and to make babies. Desires to have money, to have sex, to be successful are somehow manifestations of these biological needs and help us fulfill them as best as we can. Enlightenment in buddhism seems to me to mean a complete carelessness for these needs and a general dissolvement of the ego, something which is completely unnatural and would unable us to live a natural life as it requires you to ignore natural needs. While your ancestors have managed to fulfill these needs, which is why you are on this planet, living up to a buddhist ideal like celibacy would make you an evolutionary dead end. The reason this is so hard for us to do is because every grain of biological sensibility in your being, the subconcious part of you which cares about perpetuating your genes through further generations, should be completely against it. Needless to say, enlightnment wouldn't be very impressive if everyone could do it.

We know what rewards following your desires may have; you can perpetuate your genes through your children and having wealth will give them a good start in the contest known as life which again gives them a better chance of perpetuating their genes. The reward for following buddhism, however, is much more abstract and intangible. A few reach englihtnment, whatever that is, and the rest will just have to hope that their hardship is rewarded in the great cycle of life and death. Are buddhists really trying to attain what is important in life? I don't think so.

I won't deny that at worst our natural desires may turn into obsessions which come in the way of our happiness, but that doesn't mean buddhism is a good recipe for a happy life.

[SATCHMO]

When the Buddha spoke of the cessation of desire, he wasn't implicitly speaking of the natural instinctive desires of the body to satiate itself through eating, sex, acquisition of wealth et al, but the of the elimination of the suffering that arises from the psychological attachment to what one desires. Even though all forms of Buddhism are replete with asceticism, What's intrinsic to the central and first of the four noble truths "Life is suffering" is meant to bring the follower a place of acceptance where he/she can transcend that suffering through finding peace within the present moment, which is all we really have. That, in my own personal estimation is what true enlightenment is.

There are many sects of Buddhism, Mahayana I believe is one of them, that don't perceive enlightenment as a permanent escape from the endless birth/death cycle, but as a genuine acceptance that suffering and joy must exist as contrasting components of each other, that each contain elements of each other, and that through that acceptance, life, the present moment, in it's finite transitory and nature, can truly be embraced.

I don't really know about the sexism thing. I don't doubt that it exists within the tenets of many sects of Buddhism. I know that the cast system is still very present in a lot of Buddhist,Hindu, and Vedantic cultures, sects, and belief systems, but I would hope that this would be something that even these ancient religions and cultures would be able to evolve beyond.