notself wrote:As I said, Buddhism can be religious, especially Tibetan Buddhism and Mahayana. Theravada and Zen can go either way.

There is a sutta in the Theravada canon where Gotama asks his follower, Ananda, if he believes in rebirth. Ananda answers, "No, not yet." Gotama considered that an excellent answer. Ananda was keeping an open mind to the possibility but was straight forward is stating his disbelief.

The trouble with the link you provided is it describes Buddhism as if all Buddhist believed the same things. That is not the case. It wasn't even the case at the time of the Buddha.

I will just repeat what I said before. If one is seeking a religion, then one can find religion in Buddhism. If one is interested in a philosophy one can find a philosophical system. I am interested in the philosophical system.

Yeah, but as I said, that can be said for all religions.

Girlysprite wrote:
Yeah, but as I said, that can be said for all religions.

All other religions require faith in and obedience to a god. There is no all powerful god in Buddhism; no concept of grace; no concept of sin, no baptism; no redemption through the death of a god, no intercession by third parties; no priests; no eternal soul.

Name one other religion, if you want to think of Buddhism as a religion, that is missing a creator god or creation story, and is missing the things I mention above. Other religions cannot be separated from the concept of god, sin and soul and looked at as philosophy.

If I am wrong about this, then please name the religion, other than Buddhism, that does not require a belief in a god, sin and soul and also name a non religious philosophy that contains these three things.

Buddhism is a religion. It's also a trend, a fad, a philosophy, and a hobby to some.

Ciarin wrote:Buddhism is a religion. It's also a trend, a fad, a philosophy, and a hobby to some.

Agree, it's all of these.

Girlysprite wrote:Well, Christians and Muslims are sometimes also quick to say that such violence wasn't in line with the teaching, Christianity having the line about turning the other cheek, after all. The violence occurred because people didn't agree on details and/or rules of the teachings. Like who is the incarnation of who? Are certain things that happen because of Karma?
And there have been Buddhists encouraging war, like in japan in the WW2 period. There are enough texts speaking of a 'holy war', which is meant as an internal struggle to get rid of bad elements within yourself, but if you twist them a bit...And other texts that speak of obedience, very useful for political leaders.
http://www.darkzen.com/Articles/zenholy.htm

The Japanese considered themselves to be the master race. Most of them were also Buddhist. They tried to conquer the world because of their feelings of racial superiority, not in defense of or desire to spread their Buddhism. You could just as easily point out that they used chopsticks and then build a case that the use of chopsticks was central to their empirial desires.

No doubt that you're right about the misbehavior of certain Buddhists, but my point is that twisting the texts is necessary in Buddhism, but not in xtianity or Islam, where statements directly encouraging violence against non-belivers can be found. There is no early Buddhist text that advocates violence against others based on their non-Buddhist status. The oldest and most reliable source of what the Buddha taught is the Pali Canon used in Theravada Buddhism. Mahayana and Tibetan traditions have written texts that originated long after the Buddha died, so most scholars of 'what the Buddha really taught' don't source them. I've read some pretty whacked-out shit written by Buddhists!!

Such details are not, or barely known to us, and it might seem as if they did much less in terms of violence then other religions. But don't forget that we grew up learning the history of Christianity and Islam because those religions are around us and have interacted. That does not count for the eastern version of Buddhism, which makes it easier to say 'oh, it wasn't that bad'.

Agreed! It requires a lot of careful scrutiny over a very long time to see it clearly. I certainly didn't see the 'big picture' when I was ordained in Thailand. That's when I found out how Theravada is actually practiced. I've been living in South Korea since 1996 (minus the year in Thailand) and have studied Korean (Mahayanist) Buddhism closely. The texts they use and their practices resemble what is described/prescribed in the Pali Canon only minimally. But that's not surprising and I can't see any reason to expect things to be different.

Anyway, I enjoyed discussing it with you!

notself wrote:Thank you.

Yes, clearing the decks is sometimes refreshing.

Did you hear about the flap in Thailand about Ajahn Brahm? I now understand why you are the FBM.

I remember reading something about it a while back, but forgot the details. What happened? (I could look it up, but I imagine that a couple of others might enjoy reading about in in this thread. )

Edit: OK, curiosity got the best of me. I couldn't wait.

http://wyaryan.blogspot.com/2009/11/ajahn-brahm-expelled-for-ordaining-nuns.html

I say 'Hat's off to Ajahn Brahm'! (Or hair's off?)

The one thing I would like to point out is the ordination of women is not a modern movement. Women were fully ordained by the Buddha at a time in India when women who were not married and had no children had no existence in society. The ordination for bhikkhunis (fully ordained women) has continued in China and Korea since Buddhism spread to those countries. It died out in Theravada countries most likely due to war and famine.

The bhikkhuni lineage was restored to Theravada in 1996 in India, Sri Lanka and some other Theravada countries and in the United States but Thailand refuses to recognize the women as ordained. The issue is one of male vanity, power and control as well as cultural bias.

Ajahn Brahm (who lives in Australia) decided he was never going to get permission from the leaders of his lineage (in Thailand)to ordain women, so with the support of the laypeople of Australia, he went ahead anyway. Thailand exploded and pieces are still falling from the sky. Here is the statement of Ajahn Brahm about the ordination. http://sujato.wordpress.com/2009/11/07/ ... municated/

This video (definitely not approved for viewing in Thailand) explains it all and even includes Nazis.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P7YJVRw5j-M

notself wrote:

Girlysprite wrote:
Yeah, but as I said, that can be said for all religions.

All other religions require faith in and obedience to a god. There is no all powerful god in Buddhism; no concept of grace; no concept of sin, no baptism; no redemption through the death of a god, no intercession by third parties; no priests; no eternal soul.

Name one other religion, if you want to think of Buddhism as a religion, that is missing a creator god or creation story, and is missing the things I mention above. Other religions cannot be separated from the concept of god, sin and soul and looked at as philosophy.

If I am wrong about this, then please name the religion, other than Buddhism, that does not require a belief in a god, sin and soul and also name a non religious philosophy that contains these three things.

While it does not have the concept of sin exactly like Christianity, it does have the concept of 'you deserve everything you get in life', which doesn't work out for a lot of people. It is used as an excuse to not do anything about bad conditions people live in, or even used as an excuse to exploit it.
Same goes for the soul - something is reborn, and it is not exactly the same concept of soul that the Christian religion has, it is something eternal and immortal about people that goes on.

In the details, yes, Buddhism is quite different from the other major religions. But what I mean to say is that it has its dark sides. And also, all things that can be said to excuse or explain these dark sides can also be said to excuse or explain the bad things of other religions.

notself wrote:

If I am wrong about this, then please name the religion, other than Buddhism, that does not require a belief in a god, sin and soul and also name a non religious philosophy that contains these three things.

Heathenism. I know of atheist heathens, where they follow heathenism as a philosophy.

What is heathenism? What is the philosophy of heathenism? Excuse my ignorance but I have only heard the term used as a pejorative by Christians.

notself wrote:What is heathenism? What is the philosophy of heathenism? Excuse my ignorance but I have only heard the term used as a pejorative by Christians.

It's a set of pagan religions that are based on pre-christian northern european traditions and beliefs.

Ciarin wrote:

notself wrote:What is heathenism? What is the philosophy of heathenism? Excuse my ignorance but I have only heard the term used as a pejorative by Christians.

It's a set of pagan religions that are based on pre-christian northern european traditions and beliefs.

All pagan religions had priests or shamans and worshipped spirits or gods requiring sacrifices of various sorts. I never thought of these religions as being philosophies any more than Catholic is a philosophy.

According to the thread on Heathens on this board you are a Heathen theist. There seems to be a lack of specifics in your answers on the Heathen thread about paganism so here are some links about the ancient Celts who were the pagans of northern Europe. They all believed in gods, sin or violation of the rules of the gods, and in eternal souls. The Church had little or no trouble absorbing them into the Christianity. http://www.watson.org/~leigh/celts.html#myth http://www.historyworld.net/wrldhis/Pla ... track=pthc

k, is that supposed to negate the existence of atheist heathens?

Ciarin wrote:k, is that supposed to negate the existence of atheist heathens?

The Celtic (heathen) religion and ritual were lost after being suppressed for generations by Christianity. There is no accurate, detailed record of the Celtic (heathen) beliefs. There are just wide brush strokes that some people are trying to fill in. I am negating the idea that what is being practiced as Celtic heathenism today has direct correlation to the practices of pre-Christian Europe.

If people wish to call what is practiced today "New Age Heathenism" and they want to categorize this as a religion without a god, soul or sin, I have no problem with that. If they want to categorize "New Age Heathenism" as a philosophy with gods, soul and sin, then I am OK with that as well. What ever floats their boat. All religions and philosophies have to start somewhere.

What do the celts have to do with heathenism?

notself wrote:This video (definitely not approved for viewing in Thailand) explains it all and even includes Nazis.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P7YJVRw5j-M

You'd think that if the Buddha saw fit to ordain women and agreed that they're just as capable of attaining enlightenment as men, then surely Buddhists, of all people, would agree... :facepalm:

XiledSpawn wrote:Very old and repeated question, but no forum is complete without it

I know somebody who considers himself a Buddhist. I think its a tricky question. Like all religions, there are divisions and not all of them believe the same thing. There are branches of Buddhism that have no supernatural beliefs. They still have philosophical ideas that we would say don't stand up to evidence although they obviously think they do. If its someone who simply says, "I don't know that the philosophy is factually true but its true for me because the practice brings me the state of mind it says it will", is it true or not? If there's no supernatural beliefs and he doesn't claim its universally true but only that it works for him- ? Well, the evidence is that it works for him.

For a lot of Buddhism though, there are beliefs about 'The True Self' and 'Enlightenment' for which I don't think there's any empirical evidence. If there is, I'll reconsider. I suppose it also depends on how you define those terms.

From what I have been told, the distinction between religion and philosophy is largely a western one and that most Eastern cultures traditionally didn't draw such a distinction.

Buddhism is full of woo. Buying talismans to ward off evil, elaborate rituals performed by priests to lead "hungry ghosts"to the Pure Land, gossipy tales about magical powers bestowed on hardy meditators, etc etc

At this point in time it seems that it's part of the human condition to believe in this. I don't think it's good, but it's what we're faced with...but in Buddhism there's also a motion which seems to run counter to these tendencies...which seems to refuse superstition. The thing I got from Zen is that religion, reciting sutras or prostrating oneself on the floor to show one's attitude toward the universe, is not for me. Yet to some, those things are an essential part of Zen.

People will always be superstitious. The Buddha made specific rules against monks and nuns casting horoscopes, dealing in talismans and amulets, making images of him. It just took under a century for all of this to pop up. Those monastics who take the code of conduct seriously do not deal in such nonsense, unfortunately they appear to be in the minority in Asia.

Buddhism with woo is a religion.
Buddhism without woo is a philosophy or a culture

Same goes with all almost all religions. One keeps the ethics (or the culture) and discards the metaphysical stuff e.g.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_atheism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_Muslim

I think that the is-a-religion question about buddhism has to do with the christian background of a lot of atheists. Buddhist "theology" is quite different from christian theology and a lot of (ex-)christians find it "exotic".