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Christianity and Buddhism
MindGate
United States Veteran
Why Christianity is good:
In Christianity, Jesus seems (for the most part) to be teaching good morals (Gnosticism shows this even more, I think). This can be good for people with no role-model to look to.
Christianity teaches of hope. Hope that God is watching over and everything will be okay.
Christianity can bring people together. Church, for instance, has been shown to improve people's happiness.
Why I chose Buddhism over Christianity:
Christianity teaches us that we will be punished for our negative actions.
Buddhism teaches we will be punished by them.
Christianity teaches us to have beliefs.
Buddhism teaches us to let go of them. (Disregarding superstitions in different sects.)
Christianity teaches us that true happiness will be in the future. (Heaven)
Buddhism teaches us that true happiness can be right now.
Although, I do respect Christianity, but I believe people would be happier as Buddhists for these three simple reasons about. (Well, people who gives a rat hat about religion and philosophy to begin with.)
In Christianity, Jesus seems (for the most part) to be teaching good morals (Gnosticism shows this even more, I think). This can be good for people with no role-model to look to.
Christianity teaches of hope. Hope that God is watching over and everything will be okay.
Christianity can bring people together. Church, for instance, has been shown to improve people's happiness.
Why I chose Buddhism over Christianity:
Christianity teaches us that we will be punished for our negative actions.
Buddhism teaches we will be punished by them.
Christianity teaches us to have beliefs.
Buddhism teaches us to let go of them. (Disregarding superstitions in different sects.)
Christianity teaches us that true happiness will be in the future. (Heaven)
Buddhism teaches us that true happiness can be right now.
Although, I do respect Christianity, but I believe people would be happier as Buddhists for these three simple reasons about. (Well, people who gives a rat hat about religion and philosophy to begin with.)
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Comments
They are also to produce confidence which can overcome the attachment to a constructed 'poor me'
Formless practice as my teacher calls it is the highest practice. The highest tantra of dzogchen and mahamudra. Don't get confused the objective is not to attain a formless realm, the formless practice is just opening the door into the highest tantra but is not the tantra itself.
You reap what you sow - you do something bad, something bad comes back to bite you - punishment.
That's why I tend to reject the "punishment" angle. It takes the focus away from some sort of celestial machinery and brings it back to just us and our decisions, our actions. We cause the reactions that eventually result from our wise or erroneous actions. There's nobody in the equation but us, no one doing any punishing. The law of cause and effect is neutral, there's no good or bad. No one passing judgment and meting out punishment. "Punishment" and "reward" are our own projections onto events, IMO. A very human thing to do, granted. Maybe this would be a good subject for a thread.
Where did you get your quote?
In the story of the woman "taken in adultery", Jesus asks her who accuses here. When she says that no one does, neither does he. This echoes his statement that we see him hungry and naked but do not clothe or feed him. When asked when we saw him, he makes it clear that it is the hungry and naked of the world who accuse us. It is not some "Spirit in the Sky".
We really do have to be careful to avoid holding on to kindergarten Christianity. It is our neighbour, our sister, our brother whom we must serve. This is the heart of the Gospels' message, the answer to Cain's question (cf. Genesis).
No. It is in the 'subtext' that the concordance arises. Both men have set out on a mission to teach. They have accepted to do it, self-sacrificially. For Gotama, it meant decades of wandering, often in appalling conditions of terrain, weather and personal danger, to say nothing of the incomprehension that must so often have greeted his message.Having taken the time to decide whether or not to go out and teach, he stuck to it and, at the end, died, as we all shall.
Jesus chose his mission too, as I see it. His time travelling around, undergoing foul weather, dubious terrain and very real peril, was much shorter. Whatever we judge to be the internal or 'doctrinal' reasons for his death, it was certainly an extreme example of sticking to the task, as he himself acknowledged with that last cry of Tetelestai.
So, during this week, as I follow the old liturgy in my tatty missal and (sometimes) miss the bells and smells, not to mention the fellowship, of church-going, I have no difficulty in finding deep and similar gratitude to these two teachers whose words and example bring us the possibility of liberation.
It is not always easy, as some people seem to think when they accuse us 'syncretists' of intellectual laziness, to tunnel down through layers of dogma, doctrine, prejudice and consecrated jargon until we find the golden thread that joins us all in the liberation struggle, but I have found it well worth the effort.
With Metta
After CW's posts on Jesus' life in the East, I decided to do some research. I recently received from the Nicholas Roerich Museum in NYC copies of a couple of articles that came out in US papers, after the Roerichs found the Hemis Monastery texts that discussed Jesus' life in India, and translated them. One article appeared in the NY Sun, the other in a Boston newspaper. The texts dealt exclusively with Jesus' stay in India during his youth, the "lost years". There was no mention in the articles about a return to India after the crucifixion. The texts said he "studied the words of the Buddha", and afterwards devoted himself to teaching to low-caste communities who, at that time according to the texts, were routinely excluded from religious teachings. I suppose they were left to their folk beliefs, perhaps deemed unworthy of the attentions of spiritual teachers, or considered incapable of absorbing the material. The texts note that after some years, Jesus returned to his home, and eventually was persecuted. If there's more interest in this, I can post a separate thread with more info.
This thesis is pretty interesting. Its about shentong buddhism (which I am interested in) as compatible with christian negativistic mysticism.
www.interfaithmarianpilgrimages.com/pages/THESIS.doc
Since sin, souls, Jesus and a creator God have no place in Buddhism - even a 'minimal' philosophical Buddhism - it's hard to see how the two systems of thought can be reconciled. I know people have tried - but in doing so, one of them has to shift some fundamental views.
Sure, "looking past our differences to a common humanity" is an admirable and healthy thing for interfaith dialogue, but in the end, different traditions serve different purposes.
christianity or rather christian mystics seek the big other or God and through meditation/prayer/faith come into the source of their being.
being is consciousness manifesting in physical form. being becomes obvious when consciousness rest upon itself thus creating a radical subjectivity.
buddhism is NOT a doctrine or philosophy or belief system. it is a path/method for freedom.
once freedom is had then you can assert any belief system you want, while understand the source.
since all belief systems are valid because they come from the source hierarchy is meaningless. since there is no hierarchy or structure we can respond to any situation wholeheartedly when we are aligned in our being.
most christians miss the mark. most buddhist miss the mark.
find god within yourself. find emptiness within yourself. find consciousness within yourself.
:om:
4 -6 Still, anyone selected out for life has hope, for, as they say, "A living dog is better than a dead lion." The living at least know something, even if it's only that they're going to die. But the dead know nothing and get nothing. They're a minus that no one remembers. Their loves, their hates, yes, even their dreams, are long gone. There's not a trace of them left in the affairs of this earth.
7 -10 Seize life! Eat bread with gusto,
Drink wine with a robust heart.
Oh yes—God takes pleasure in your pleasure!
Dress festively every morning.
Don't skimp on colors and scarves.
Relish life with the spouse you love
Each and every day of your precarious life.
Each day is God's gift. It's all you get in exchange
For the hard work of staying alive.
Make the most of each one!
Whatever turns up, grab it and do it. And heartily!
This is your last and only chance at it,
For there's neither work to do nor thoughts to think
In the company of the dead, where you're most certainly headed.
11 I took another walk around the neighborhood and realized that on this earth as it is—
The race is not always to the swift,
Nor the battle to the strong,
Nor satisfaction to the wise,
Nor riches to the smart,
Nor grace to the learned.
Sooner or later bad luck hits us all.
12 No one can predict misfortune.
Like fish caught in a cruel net or birds in a trap,
So men and women are caught
By accidents evil and sudden.
Now what does Buddha teach, the same thing but he shows more on claiming you own body and centering it. how to not to me mean, to see the world and men different everyday. Christ shows us how we need to LOVE with our souls and Buddha shows how to LOVE with our bodies, and we all need to get out of judgement to others.
Christ said that it is better to have a heart like a child, and enter into God.
one line I hold tight is the one both Christian and Buddhist know. life and death is in the power of the tongue. saying the tongue is a double edge sword.
Now take the Chakras, there are seven as well as the seven fruits of the spirit. found in Galatians 5:22.
Chakra-color-fruit of the spirit- verse
Crown- violet-goodness-Matthew 22:37(let God's goodness fill your mind when you love him)
third eye-indigo-joy- Romans 8:30 (God see us clean we should do the same to see others with the joy God see in us)
Throat-blue-patience- Ecclesiastes 5:2 ( let your words be few)
heart-Green-Love-John 13:35 ( LOVE )
Solar Plexus- yellow- peace- psalms 29:11 (the worry goes away in trust)
Sacral- orange- kindness- Romans 12:10 ( love as a family )
base- red- Faithfulness- Jeremiah 17:7-8 "But blessed is the man who trusts me, God, the woman who sticks with God. They're like trees replanted in Eden,
putting down roots near the rivers— Never a worry through the hottest of summers, never dropping a leaf, Serene and calm through droughts,bearing fresh fruit every season."
And all that don include the four noble truths or 8 folds. with centering myself around that brings peace. so there is some of this for starters LOL
Mohandas Gandhi
in the start of the world it say God walked with us till we lied. till be sinned and God knew we was going to. he just wants to walk with us again. believe don't believe, our hearts know what is real and the world see it. we just have to let our paths guild us to where we are to go and trust in something.
I see nothing wrong with belief as a starting point. Belief inspires action and with luck that action doesn't do too much harm. Buddhists and Christians both espouse beliefs as a starting point. Where I think they part company is when those beliefs are put under an attentive and responsible microscope. Orthodox (small 'o') Christians (and if I am being totally ignorant, I apologize) return and return and return again to the necessity of belief and the primacy of the Bible or the Vatican or some similar authority. (Before someone jumps my bones, I will acknowledge Meister Eckhart, John of the Cross, George Fox and others ... the marginalized mystics.)
Buddhists likewise begin with belief, but then inject it with a sharp, patient and determined focus and never stop investigating until they are satisfied that they can answer the question that I can't imagine does not plague a Christian mind or heart: "Yes, but who IS God?" Buddhists may not refer in their question to "God," but the target is the same -- an experience that brooks no doubt and goes beyond the doubts that inspiring
beliefs, of necessity, imply.
I am not trying to drive a wedge between Christianity and Buddhism. I wouldn't do that any more than I would try to wrap them both in the same gift box. Here in the United States, which is predominantly Christian, it behooves us all to know something about the roots that have grown us ... and that includes atheists. But all in all, I prefer the metaphor Christmas Humphreys once used when speaking of various religious or philosophical persuasions. More or less, he wrote, "All roads lead to Rome. You walk your road and I will walk mine. And when we get to Rome, we can both have a good laugh."
After two thousands years evolution, the god system of China includes Buddhism and Taoism simultaneously, they have their positions (sorry for omit the detailed introduction). So maybe it is not an alternative option between Buddhism and Christianity.
In a famous literature wrote in 300 years ago, a Taoist and a Buddhist live together.
Second part, you have begun using the collective we. You have begun putting everybody in one basket based on your belief. This is why many people are bothered with most Christians. It has a dominating world-view. All are children of God. All need salvation. etc. etc.
I could go into my disagreements, but they don't need to be addressed in this topic. I understand that the two can be mixed, but I do not think you can mix them homogeneously. You will sacrifice some kind of integrity in one of the religions. This does not mean that the resulting belief system is invalid or that it is lesser. You have created something unique, and that is great. But I don't think you can completely and perfectly mix the two, that's all.
You cannot mix sects homogeneously or else there would be nothing that divides the two, no? So yes, that makes sense.
So, when there are people like me, who mix Christianity and Buddhism, I think we look for the most admirable principles that we can accept from each. That would definitely not work in the old way of thinking of a religion, but it fits very well in the way many people tend to think today.
I think mixing religions is great. I don't mind the picking and choosing. I only label myself Buddhist because it most closely fits my beliefs. But I could probably call myself a Humanitarian too. I think Christ taught some wonderful things and Buddha did too. Even Mohammed taught some good things. If anything, I believe being able to follow your own reasoning/heart/mind to discern the truth in religious dogma shows a sign of spiritual maturity.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Voice-of-the-Martyrs-USA/11006419356?sk=wall&filter=2
They believe getting tortured or suffering for their faith will be closer to god.
"Look, I've being tortured by evil men. I am getting closer to god."
"Look, I've being tortured by evil men. I am getting closer to god."
Christ said that many in time will stand and say "Lord Lord, have we not cast out demons in your name." and Christ said his response would be. "depart from me for I never knew you." the idea Christ puts is not to run around by his name but live in a relationship with him to know him to seek him.
those in other countries that have to fight like that is hard, and I have explanation for it. but it is not what you do in, God's name, it is knowing God.
Heck my wife thinks I am going to hell.
Buddhism is about the cessation of suffering.
Both views and the means to achieve those aims are quite different and broad.
That being said, whatever contributes to one's and others wellbeing, happiness and joy, I say is a worthwile endeavor.
All the best,
Todd
I think that is a good perspective. I have come more and more to the conclusion that the basic purposes of the two religions is not the same.