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It's funny that you say "cherry pick" because throughout this entire thread you have cherry-picked Steven Batchelor as somehow representative of all modern Buddhists, when clearly, he is not.
Thanks for distorting the implications of my OP. Your OP (and subsequent posts) have perpetuated the ridiculous notion that Batchelor somehow represents all of "Modern Buddhism". That's no distortion, it's the truth.
As I said before, although I am on the far edge of the evil "Modern, secular Buddhist" I am no apologist for Batchelor and he does not speak for us skeptical Buddhists. He speaks for himself. Nor am I rejecting what he has to say. Only those conformists like Songhill insist that Buddhism means passing a ten or twelve point creed to be authentic and join the club.
I take my religion very seriously. I always have. I was practically raised in a church by a preacher Grandmother. To me, your spirituality is something that both transforms your life and demands sacrifices. It's also a very personal, individual experience because while we all have much in common, we've each experienced life differently.
So I see no difference between Songhill and Batchelor. They have both met their Buddha on the road to enlightenment and instead of killing it, sat down and worshipped at its feet. That's all right. We all do, at least for a time. What the koan doesn't tell you is, there are a multitude of Buddhas in your mind because it's your mind that creates them to begin with. When you get tired of either worshipping or killing them, you'll discover who the real Buddha is. You won't discover that by either worshipping the Sutras or burning them. But maybe for you, it's a necessary step.
Fortunately, nobody has the right or authority to proclaim anyone an authentic Buddhist or that one version of the Dharma or list of beliefs is valid. And for most of us, we're only happy that the other person cares enough to try and answer the tough questions and live up to the Buddhist ideal.
I have never read Batchelor's book, only quotes delivered by his enemies so I suspect his actual message is much more nuanced because that's human nature, to focus on the one word or paragraph that pushes buttons and ignore the parts you might agree with. So far, I find no fault in any of his words. But then, I'm not his intended audience.
Out of curiosity, I wonder why Batchelor is drawn to the idea of calling what he proposes "Buddhism?" Why not call it "Beliefs without Buddhism?" I don't mean that sarcastically; I really want to know why he feels the term Buddhism should be invoked.
I think the point is that it's quite possible to do Buddhist practice without a set of beliefs. And somebody who does Buddhist practice is a Buddhist, so.....
A person who takes Refuge is a Buddhist. I've seen plenty do Buddhist meditation but they do not take refuge.
What do you mean by taking refuge? Refuge in the 3 jewels, or refuge in a particular tradition, or something else?
"...And another camp, which would include, obviously, people like myself, who I would maybe portray as more liberal, more secular in orientation, who have exactly the opposite problem—mainly, they cannot conceive of a Buddhist practice or at least an intelligible Buddhist practice, having to incorporate what looks to them, but looks to me, like an antiquated, pre-modern belief."
Yes, that does come across as somewhat patronising.
I take it for granted that you have not read many of the Buddha's discourses—maybe less that Batchelor. And I take it for granted that you are full of Western prejudices. You could even be a dog in the Buddhist manger.
As I said before, although I am on the far edge of the evil "Modern, secular Buddhist" I am no apologist for Batchelor and he does not speak for us skeptical Buddhists.
I put skeptical Buddhism right up there with Batchelor in terms of modernity. Here is an example of skeptical Buddhism.
Sincere Buddhists with a different opinion are not dogs. I resent that remark @Songhill
They are dogs if the Buddhism they imagine to be Buddhism isn't true Buddhism—and especially if they actively distort what the Buddha taught trying to market it to newbies as Buddhism.
personDon't believe everything you thinkThe liminal spaceVeteran
edited November 2012
I listened to that video on skeptical Buddhism and in general I liked it. Toward the end though it seemed to me that, for all her talk about being free from views and opinions, she held the firm opinion that the traditional Buddhist teachings are nothing more than old cultural trappings and couldn't possibly hold any validity. So its not that a skeptical Buddhist doesn't believe these things for me its when they belittle them or exclude them saying they aren't verifyable when they are certainly taught to be verifyable and should only be accepted fully if they are.
The issue is mind. How can anyone but yourself verify something that is completely first person. You're all mindless zombies, prove it to me otherwise or I'm becoming a Solipsist..
I'm sorry, but considering I love dogs and feel a real kinship with them, calling me a dog of any sort loses any power to insult. Of course there are intolerant Buddhists. Buddhists are just people, prone to the same problems as anyone else.
And I have read many of the sutras, as well. Even more now that there are some fairly decent translations on the web. But, I'm not a scholar and I'm more interested in the history of Buddhism as it spread through the world than in splitting hairs over obscure and tongue-twisting theological points.
Some points of view are so far apart, all we can do is pity each other from a distance, I suppose.
Sincere Buddhists with a different opinion are not dogs. I resent that remark @Songhill
They are dogs if the Buddhism they imagine to be Buddhism isn't true Buddhism—and especially if they actively distort what the Buddha taught trying to market it to newbies as Buddhism.
That is scorning others and a wrong mind to hold, People with wrong views need correcting not insulting.
It is one thing to correct a point of error and another to harm the sentient behind the action.
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personDon't believe everything you thinkThe liminal spaceVeteran
I just came across this informative debate between Batchelor and Bante Sujato. They cover all of the points and each have good arguments for their view.
Personally I feel that Batchelor ducks his more ardent stances with arguments towards practicality. I agree with the practical argument but I didn't think it was his honest opinion. If you know anything about body language Batchelor engages in guarding gestures when he makes those practical arguments.
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personDon't believe everything you thinkThe liminal spaceVeteran
I should add that the fact that this debate is taking place removes any worry for me that a false dharma will be able to find any strong foothold. Debate and dialog is an important part of Buddhism and offers self correction to false views.
It's not Batchelor's beliefs that bother me; it's his implication they should make others' extinct.
I don't know how much can be said of Batchelor's beliefs, because it seems to me he is more focused on anti-beliefs. He's not saying, "It's okay to not believe in rebirth," but "You shouldn't believe in rebirth."
He has never said this. To the contrary, his position is an agnostic one; he says "we don't know" if there is rebirth or not. There is no implication that he wishes other beliefs to become extinct. He's only saying: it's ok to doubt rebirth.
Atheist means you don't believe in Gods. A lot of Buddhists are atheists but believe in literal reincarnation. Never read the book, but it's just a title.
Atheist means you don't believe in Gods. A lot of Buddhists are atheists but believe in literal reincarnation. Never read the book, but it's just a title.
From the Bhuridatta Jataka No. 543 the Buddha appears not to be making a case for why there is no god. In fact, in the Jataka he seems to accept there is a god—but a god that is unjust. So why worship an unjust god?
He who has eyes can see the sickening sight Why does not God set his creatures right? If his wide power no limit can restrain, Why is his hand so rarely spread to bless? Why are his creatures all condemned to pain? Why does he not to all give happiness? Why do fraud, lies, and ignorance prevail? Why triumphs falsehood — truth and justice fail? I count your God one among the unjust , who made a world in which to shelter wrong."
Atheist means you don't believe in Gods. A lot of Buddhists are atheists but believe in literal reincarnation. Never read the book, but it's just a title.
From the Bhuridatta Jataka No. 543 the Buddha appears not to be making a case for why there is no god. In fact, in the Jataka he seems to accept there is a god—but a god that is unjust. So why worship an unjust god?
He who has eyes can see the sickening sight Why does not God set his creatures right? If his wide power no limit can restrain, Why is his hand so rarely spread to bless? Why are his creatures all condemned to pain? Why does he not to all give happiness? Why do fraud, lies, and ignorance prevail? Why triumphs falsehood — truth and justice fail? I count your God one among the unjust , who made a world in which to shelter wrong."
It is a case against a " Creator God" which Buddha rejected and his teachings do not support the existence of. Samsaric Gods on the other hand Buddha had plenty of interaction with them according to the Sutra's.
He has never said this. To the contrary, his position is an agnostic one; he says "we don't know" if there is rebirth or not. There is no implication that he wishes other beliefs to become extinct. He's only saying: it's ok to doubt rebirth.
In the last section of the third chapter entitled "Rebirth", SB writes:
"Where does this leave us? It may seem that there are two options: either to believe in rebirth or not. But there is a third alternative: to acknowledge, in all honesty, I do not know" (pp. 37-8)
.
It seems that SB hasn't read much Buddhism. There is no need to take up Huxley's agnosticism which appears to be taken from Sextus Empiricus' Outline of Pyrrhonism which rests on the important principle of suspension of judgment (ἐποχή, epokhē).
Has SB ever studied the Nikayas to learn about safeguarding the truth? Here is a passage he obviously missed.
There are five ideas that ripen here and now in two ways. What five? Faith, preference, hearsay-learning, arguing upon evidence, and liking through pondering a view. Now something may have faith well placed in it and yet be hollow, empty, and false; and again something may have no faith placed in it and yet be factual, true, and no other than it seems; and so with preference and the rest. If a man has faith, then he guards truth when he says, "My faith is thus," but on that account draws no unreserved conclusion, "Only this is true, the other is wrong." In this way he guards the truth; but there is as yet no discovery of truth. And so with preference and the rest. — M.ii.170-71 (Emphasis added.)
Simplifying this passage, a person who earnestly seeks the truth, who has not yet gained the truth of which the Buddha speaks of in his discourses, safeguards the truth. He has faith, but as yet there is no discovery of the truth which he seeks. One who safeguards the truth doesn't have to play SB's agnostic game of I don't know. Instead, they can say: I have faith in the Buddha's words about rebirth, but as yet have not come to the conclusion that it is true, the other is wrong.
@Songhill said: One who safeguards the truth doesn't have to play SB's agnostic game of I don't know. Instead, they can say: I have faith in the Buddha's words about rebirth, but as yet have not come to the conclusion that it is true, the other is wrong.
Which is why it could be named dogmatic Buddhism. Questioning and doubt are allowed; only on the condition that the outcome of that process of questioning and doubt finally is that the Buddha was right after all. And this has to be acknowledged from the start. The only problem about that is: that’s not questioning.
It's not Batchelor's beliefs that bother me; it's his implication they should make others' extinct.
I don't know how much can be said of Batchelor's beliefs, because it seems to me he is more focused on anti-beliefs. He's not saying, "It's okay to not believe in rebirth," but "You shouldn't believe in rebirth."
He has never said this. To the contrary, his position is an agnostic one; he says "we don't know" if there is rebirth or not. There is no implication that he wishes other beliefs to become extinct. He's only saying: it's ok to doubt rebirth.
But he says that I have "an extraordinary paucity of evidence" for my belief, and that my failure to summon forth the courage to risk a "nondogmatic" (anti-rebirth) stance is "liable to blur my ethical vision."
With all due respect, that is a completely different message than "it's okay to doubt rebirth." if there were any doubt left on whether he thinks it's okay for me to remain agnostic, he reminds me, "A truly agnostic position is not an excuse for indecision." (Wha?!)
I must decide, and in order to have the chance of remaining ethical, I really should decide to reject rebirth.
Atheist means you don't believe in Gods. A lot of Buddhists are atheists but believe in literal reincarnation. Never read the book, but it's just a title.
From the Bhuridatta Jataka No. 543 the Buddha appears not to be making a case for why there is no god. In fact, in the Jataka he seems to accept there is a god—but a god that is unjust. So why worship an unjust god?
He who has eyes can see the sickening sight Why does not God set his creatures right? If his wide power no limit can restrain, Why is his hand so rarely spread to bless? Why are his creatures all condemned to pain? Why does he not to all give happiness? Why do fraud, lies, and ignorance prevail? Why triumphs falsehood — truth and justice fail? I count your God one among the unjust , who made a world in which to shelter wrong."
"I count YOUR God."
He's not saying something about God or no God in general, but clearly is speaking about someone else's perception of or belief in an unjust God.
I am not following your reasoning. How is safeguarding the truth "dogmatic Buddhism"?
You just exactly proved Zenff's point.
Zenff doesn't quite understand what the term "dogma" means. Based on the O.E.D. definition of dogma, "dogma is an imperious or arrogant declaration of opinion."
Safeguarding the truth doesn't even come close to the above definition of dogma. True Buddhists, who have taken refuge in the Triple Gem, must have faith in the Lord's teaching even though there is as yet no discovery of its truth.
I am not following your reasoning. How is safeguarding the truth "dogmatic Buddhism"?
You just exactly proved Zenff's point.
Zenff doesn't quite understand what the term "dogma" means. Based on the O.E.D. definition of dogma, "dogma is an imperious or arrogant declaration of opinion."
Safeguarding the truth doesn't even come close to the above definition of dogma. True Buddhists, who have taken refuge in the Triple Gem, must have faith in the Lord's teaching even though there is as yet no discovery of its truth.
The first thing I think you should focus on is to stop talking down to people.
In case tone is getting lost in all this, I'm not anti-Stephen Batchelor (or any other writer). I do want to know why he takes what feels to me like an approach of scaring or guilting people into his view. Maybe even more, I'm interested in hearing why others feel this is okay. I know that Batchelor is often recommended right away, to aspiring Buddhists; if his view teaches them to look on other Buddhists with disdain, though, or condescension, this worries me. I suppose it worries me just as much that he tells them to "pick a camp." I don't believe this kind of pressure serves any healthy purpose. What is the goal of pushing people like this?
Can you give some examples of his scaring and guilting? Maybe it's hard for me to see because I already had a very similar view to his when I encountered him.
In case tone is getting lost in all this, I'm not anti-Stephen Batchelor (or any other writer). I do want to know why he takes what feels to me like an approach of scaring or guilting people into his view. Maybe even more, I'm interested in hearing why others feel this is okay. I know that Batchelor is often recommended right away, to aspiring Buddhists; if his view teaches them to look on other Buddhists with disdain, though, or condescension, this worries me. I suppose it worries me just as much that he tells them to "pick a camp." I don't believe this kind of pressure serves any healthy purpose. What is the goal of pushing people like this?
I think you're getting close to the heart of darkness which modernity has allowed. There is an underlying aggrogance and disdain in SB's BWBs; not so much in his later work which is more autobiographical. I sense that SB is tired of the old Buddhism. He wants to transform Buddhism into something else.
Ironically, there is nothing specifically Buddhist about BWBs except that Buddhism has been twisted into something alien to spirit which the modern ethos allows. This something involves trying to make Buddhism socially relevant even if it means destroying Buddhism's spiritual core.
Can you give some examples of his scaring and guilting? Maybe it's hard for me to see because I already had a very similar view to his when I encountered him.
By scaring, I mean (as it struck my psyche, anyway), such statements, mentioned above, that there are warring camps separated by fault lines, I must pick a side, and if I don't my ethical soundness is in peril. By guilting I mean the suggestion that as a reasonable Westerner, I ought (for genetic reasons? Cultural?) to dump several of my beliefs, because according to him, they are not reasoned (who knew), but instead merely a gullible and (genetically?) unacceptable swallowing of Indian superstition.
From what I have read so far, his writings haven't included nods toward tolerance such as "but to each their own" or even "but whatever floats your boat." He concludes the above paper, for example, with the words "...we will only gain by releasing our grip on such notions." Yet only lines before, he's said an agnostic position is no excuse for indecision. If I am to release my grip on "such notions" as karma and rebirth, yet not be so lame as to remain indecisive, it's clear what my decision must be: reject karma and rebirth.
I totally celebrate his evolving beliefs on karma and rebirth or anything else; it doesn't offend me in the slightest. He is just palpably uncomfortable with mine, and I certainly don't think he'll celebrate my retaining them
On the more serious side, he's using a lot of strong language to pressure people; I think it's incredibly unfortunate that a Buddhist teacher would introduce Buddhism by telling people the Buddhist world is divided into camps of those who believe in karma and rebirth, and those who wisely reject it, and that they can be agnostic for several minutes and then must pick a side.
I'm sorry for the double post, but wanted to mention another curiosity I find troubling, or troubleosity I find curious. From the article on question:
Institutionalized Buddhism throughout Asia not only has a doctrinal commitment to rebirth but also an economic and political one. In contrast to most Tibetan lamas, for whom the belief in the doctrine of rebirth is essential to the continuing authority of their institutions in exile, other Asian Buddhists in the West have felt freer to adapt their teachings to suit the needs of a secular and skeptical audience whose interest in the dharma is as a way of finding meaning here and now rather than after death.
It's goofy and historically bizarre to suggest Tibetan teachers have clung to rebirth as a 50 year old strategy to maintain a refugee administration in Dharamsala, as opposed to the reality that they have by and large accepted rebirth as a core philosophical theory for well over 1000 years.
If the Dalai Lama had never fled Tibet, all evidence indicates rebirth would still be a core theory of Tibetan teachers.
Adaptation is considered a generally positive word, but Bagchelor's suggestion that Tibetan teachers, having accepted the case for rebirth for 1000 years, should then swiftly changed their minds to suit my Western tastes, doesn't seem immediately positive. At any rate, no Tibetan teacher has ever told me I must believe in rebirth.
By scaring, I mean (as it struck my psyche, anyway), such statements, mentioned above, that there are warring camps separated by fault lines, I must pick a side, and if I don't my ethical soundness is in peril.
Searched the thread for "war", and the only relevant quote I found from Batchelor was "An agnostic Buddhist vision of a culture of awakening will inevitably challenge many of the time-honord roles of religious Buddhism." (etc.)
I don't think this has anything to do with "sides." There are no sides for the tathagatha. What he's saying is that institutionalization has clouded the Buddha's original intent. His position is clearer in this precis. I recommend reading the whole thing, it's a good deal shorter than this thread, and gets to the heart of the matter. But here is the conclusion:
The early discourses suggest that awakening was a common occurrence among those who listened to the Buddha and acted upon what he said. A difference in degree was acknowledged between those who had experienced the initial moment of awakening and entered the path, and those who had further cultivated the path and even reached the point where the habit of craving was extinguished. But access to the process of awakening itself was relatively straightforward and did not entail any great fuss.
Yet as Buddhism became institutionalized as a religion, awakening became progressively more inaccessible. Those who controlled the institutions maintained that awakening was so exalted that generally it could be attained only with the detachment and purity of heart achieved through monastic discipline. Even then, they admitted, it was rare. To explain this state of affairs they appealed to the Indian idea of the "degeneration of time," a notion that regards the course of history as a process of inexorable decline. According to this notion, those who lived at the time of the Buddha were simply less degenerate, more "spiritual," than the corrupted mass of humanity today.
Periodically, however, such views were challenged. The doors of awakening were thrown open to those barred from it by the strictures and dogmas of a privileged elite. Laity, women, the uneducated—the disempowered—were invited to taste the freedom of the dharma for themselves. Awakening was not a remote goal to be attained in a future lifetime. No: awakening was right here, unfolding in your own mind at this very moment.
To put it bluntly, the central question Buddhists have faced from the beginning is this: Is awakening close by or far away? Is it readily accessible or available only through supreme effort? If its proximity and ease of access are emphasized, there is the danger of trivializing it, of not according it the value and significance it deserves. Yet if its distance and difficulty of access are emphasized, there is the danger of placing it out of reach, of turning it into an icon of perfection to be worshipped from afar. Doesn't the question itself deceive us? Aren't we tricked by its either/or logic into assuming that only one option can be true? Couldn't the ambiguous logic of both/and be more appropriate here? Awakening is indeed close by—and supreme effort is required to realize it. Awakening is indeed far away—and readily accessible.
There is nothing here about war, fear, or guilt. Or if there is, at most it's a war on obfuscatory institutionalization, fear of not attaining the goal, guilt about misdirected effort. In other words, it's nothing personal. He is saying that all are free to believe as they wish, but if they want to reach the goal of awakening, here is a reason why some traditional beliefs might stand in the way of that. That's a position the Buddha himself took over and over again: "I teach one thing: suffering and its cessation." It's not strong language and it's not a pressure tactic, it's a pragmatic technical observation, of much the same sort that an engineer might make about a machine which is not running very efficiently. Of course, someone who is attached to the machine's current configuration might find that sort of observation difficult to hear, but that fault is not necessarily in the observation itself.
By guilting I mean the suggestion that as a reasonable Westerner, I ought (for genetic reasons? Cultural?) to dump several of my beliefs, because according to him, they are not reasoned (who knew), but instead merely a gullible and (genetically?) unacceptable swallowing of Indian superstition.
It's really got nothing to do with the content of the beliefs. You should abandon them if you find that they are getting in your way, but you are not obliged to. I would say, based on this thread as well as many like it, that they get in the way for a lot of people. And so do the "opposing" beliefs. A good diagnostic to ask is "Are these beliefs conditioned by contact? What is triggering their arising at the moment? What becoming and birth are they associated with?"
From what I have read so far, his writings haven't included nods toward tolerance such as "but to each their own" or even "but whatever floats your boat." He concludes the above paper, for example, with the words "...we will only gain by releasing our grip on such notions." Yet only lines before, he's said an agnostic position is no excuse for indecision. If I am to release my grip on "such notions" as karma and rebirth, yet not be so lame as to remain indecisive, it's clear what my decision must be: reject karma and rebirth.
There is no room for relativism when it comes to evaluating the success of a technique for achieving a clearly defined goal. But the "culture of awakening" which Batchelor is talking about is not about rejecting them so much as ignoring them (and only the cosmological aspects; obviously karma and rebirth as they arise on smaller timescales are critical to awakening.) They don't have to be rejected, because a lot of people who held these beliefs have attained awakening. But they don't have to be accepted either; they are ancillary to the goal of awakening. The "indecision" referred to in that passage is talking about ethical indecision, not ontological indecision:
A truly agnostic position is not an excuse for indecision. If anything, it is a powerful catalyst for action; since in shifting concern away from a hypothetical future life to the dilemmas of the present, it demands precisely the kind of compassion-centered ethic advocated by Shantideva.
Here he's just saying that the post-mortem rebirth/karma cosmology is not necessary to ethical behavior.
Yes he makes it sound like rebirth is a tool to control the masses. I guess Karl Marx said the same thing when he said "religion is the opiate of the masses". But this cynicism from Stephen Batchelor is for one thing off putting and non-refreshing. On another side I think there is no causal link established between rebirth institutionalized and having a motive to control others.
And Batchelor does not get off the hook for this statement. It is a serious allegation to say that others are using mind control with malicious intent to hook people to their religion. Perhaps I am too naive but I find this either geniously and brutally honest or more likely to me it could be an ignorant statement.
It would be equal as a foul for me to say that Batchelor makes all his arguments just to make money as an author. So I am saying accusing established Buddhists as using rebirth as an intimidation or otherwise mind control is just as flagrant of language and accusatory statement as if I accuse Batchelor of being a gold digger.
I find it more likely that both of the flagrant statements in my third paragraph are false, both mine and Batchelor's.
The first thing I think you should focus on is to stop talking down to people.
Thank you so much for your condescending and patronizing remark.Wow. A respectfully-worded and reasonable request to treat other posters more kindly, met with sarcasm and disdain.
Songhill, you are a terrible advertisement for your beliefs, and a perfect illustration of the difference between knowledge and wisdom.
It is a serious allegation to say that others are using mind control with malicious intent to hook people to their religion. Perhaps I am too naive but I find this either geniously and brutally honest or more likely to me it could be an ignorant statement.
It would be equal as a foul for me to say that Batchelor makes all his arguments just to make money as an author. So I am saying accusing established Buddhists as using rebirth as an intimidation or otherwise mind control is just as flagrant of language and accusatory statement as if I accuse Batchelor of being a gold digger.
I can understand how it reads that way, but that is not actually what he's saying. Such power structures calcify around social systems without any conscious intent, just as defilements evolve in our minds without any evil intent as the initial cause.
The power structures echo how everything works. There is a cell in the body. There is inside and outside. And an energy structure of how one cell relates to the others. In Buddhist circles there are mandalas they are called. Batchelor created a mandala around himself also, unavoidably. Mandalas interact with other mandalas. Right now look at it in action. We have, @Songhill, attacking peoples beliefs (also mandalas). Right now the mandala guardians of NB and 17 ideologies are coming to expel him.
We have no other options. Everything is a mandala.
No, I didn't call rebirth belief a defilement. Ugh.
The power structure relied on the belief in post-mortem rebirth and (according to Batchelor's model) temporal degeneration to justify a claim that awakening has become a rare event restricted to monastics. I'm not even claiming that the power structure, in and of itself, was a defilement, but the belief that awakening is rare and restricted to monastics definitely is.
I don't agree that the belief enlightenment is rare would be a defilement. Could batchelor give some examples of people who were enlightened? I can think of padmasambava and Milarepa. Some people say Trungpa.
Why would it be a defilement rather than a legitimate opinion?
It's the difference between saying you disagree with republicans and saying they are a cancer.
Comments
I take my religion very seriously. I always have. I was practically raised in a church by a preacher Grandmother. To me, your spirituality is something that both transforms your life and demands sacrifices. It's also a very personal, individual experience because while we all have much in common, we've each experienced life differently.
So I see no difference between Songhill and Batchelor. They have both met their Buddha on the road to enlightenment and instead of killing it, sat down and worshipped at its feet. That's all right. We all do, at least for a time. What the koan doesn't tell you is, there are a multitude of Buddhas in your mind because it's your mind that creates them to begin with. When you get tired of either worshipping or killing them, you'll discover who the real Buddha is. You won't discover that by either worshipping the Sutras or burning them. But maybe for you, it's a necessary step.
Fortunately, nobody has the right or authority to proclaim anyone an authentic Buddhist or that one version of the Dharma or list of beliefs is valid. And for most of us, we're only happy that the other person cares enough to try and answer the tough questions and live up to the Buddhist ideal.
I have never read Batchelor's book, only quotes delivered by his enemies so I suspect his actual message is much more nuanced because that's human nature, to focus on the one word or paragraph that pushes buttons and ignore the parts you might agree with. So far, I find no fault in any of his words. But then, I'm not his intended audience.
I take it for granted that you have not read many of the Buddha's discourses—maybe less that Batchelor. And I take it for granted that you are full of Western prejudices. You could even be a dog in the Buddhist manger. I don't know about the straw dog of which you speak, but I do see dogs in the Buddhist manger. They are very modern dogs, too.
"you can't teach an old dog new tricks"
Gee thanks Pops, I'll look into that!
The issue is mind. How can anyone but yourself verify something that is completely first person. You're all mindless zombies, prove it to me otherwise or I'm becoming a Solipsist..
And I have read many of the sutras, as well. Even more now that there are some fairly decent translations on the web. But, I'm not a scholar and I'm more interested in the history of Buddhism as it spread through the world than in splitting hairs over obscure and tongue-twisting theological points.
Some points of view are so far apart, all we can do is pity each other from a distance, I suppose.
It is one thing to correct a point of error and another to harm the sentient behind the action.
Personally I feel that Batchelor ducks his more ardent stances with arguments towards practicality. I agree with the practical argument but I didn't think it was his honest opinion. If you know anything about body language Batchelor engages in guarding gestures when he makes those practical arguments.
It seems that SB hasn't read much Buddhism. There is no need to take up Huxley's agnosticism which appears to be taken from Sextus Empiricus' Outline of Pyrrhonism which rests on the important principle of suspension of judgment (ἐποχή, epokhē).
Has SB ever studied the Nikayas to learn about safeguarding the truth? Here is a passage he obviously missed. Simplifying this passage, a person who earnestly seeks the truth, who has not yet gained the truth of which the Buddha speaks of in his discourses, safeguards the truth. He has faith, but as yet there is no discovery of the truth which he seeks. One who safeguards the truth doesn't have to play SB's agnostic game of I don't know. Instead, they can say: I have faith in the Buddha's words about rebirth, but as yet have not come to the conclusion that it is true, the other is wrong.
Questioning and doubt are allowed; only on the condition that the outcome of that process of questioning and doubt finally is that the Buddha was right after all. And this has to be acknowledged from the start.
The only problem about that is: that’s not questioning.
I am not following your reasoning. How is safeguarding the truth "dogmatic Buddhism"?
With all due respect, that is a completely different message than "it's okay to doubt rebirth." if there were any doubt left on whether he thinks it's okay for me to remain agnostic, he reminds me, "A truly agnostic position is not an excuse for indecision." (Wha?!)
I must decide, and in order to have the chance of remaining ethical, I really should decide to reject rebirth.
http://www.stephenbatchelor.org/index.php/en/rebirth-a-cmase-for-buddhist-agnosticism
He uses the term agnostic constantly, but his message is not really one of agnosticism, from what I can see.
He's not saying something about God or no God in general, but clearly is speaking about someone else's perception of or belief in an unjust God.
Safeguarding the truth doesn't even come close to the above definition of dogma. True Buddhists, who have taken refuge in the Triple Gem, must have faith in the Lord's teaching even though there is as yet no discovery of its truth.
Ah, that's it!
And maybe we can fit "pompous" in the definition?
Ironically, there is nothing specifically Buddhist about BWBs except that Buddhism has been twisted into something alien to spirit which the modern ethos allows. This something involves trying to make Buddhism socially relevant even if it means destroying Buddhism's spiritual core.
From what I have read so far, his writings haven't included nods toward tolerance such as "but to each their own" or even "but whatever floats your boat." He concludes the above paper, for example, with the words "...we will only gain by releasing our grip on such notions." Yet only lines before, he's said an agnostic position is no excuse for indecision. If I am to release my grip on "such notions" as karma and rebirth, yet not be so lame as to remain indecisive, it's clear what my decision must be: reject karma and rebirth.
I totally celebrate his evolving beliefs on karma and rebirth or anything else; it doesn't offend me in the slightest. He is just palpably uncomfortable with mine, and I certainly don't think he'll celebrate my retaining them
On the more serious side, he's using a lot of strong language to pressure people; I think it's incredibly unfortunate that a Buddhist teacher would introduce Buddhism by telling people the Buddhist world is divided into camps of those who believe in karma and rebirth, and those who wisely reject it, and that they can be agnostic for several minutes and then must pick a side.
Institutionalized Buddhism throughout Asia not only has a doctrinal commitment to rebirth but also an economic and political one. In contrast to most Tibetan lamas, for whom the belief in the doctrine of rebirth is essential to the continuing authority of their institutions in exile, other Asian Buddhists in the West have felt freer to adapt their teachings to suit the needs of a secular and skeptical audience whose interest in the dharma is as a way of finding meaning here and now rather than after death.
It's goofy and historically bizarre to suggest Tibetan teachers have clung to rebirth as a 50 year old strategy to maintain a refugee administration in Dharamsala, as opposed to the reality that they have by and large accepted rebirth as a core philosophical theory for well over 1000 years.
If the Dalai Lama had never fled Tibet, all evidence indicates rebirth would still be a core theory of Tibetan teachers.
Adaptation is considered a generally positive word, but Bagchelor's suggestion that Tibetan teachers, having accepted the case for rebirth for 1000 years, should then swiftly changed their minds to suit my Western tastes, doesn't seem immediately positive. At any rate, no Tibetan teacher has ever told me I must believe in rebirth.
I don't think this has anything to do with "sides." There are no sides for the tathagatha. What he's saying is that institutionalization has clouded the Buddha's original intent. His position is clearer in this precis. I recommend reading the whole thing, it's a good deal shorter than this thread, and gets to the heart of the matter. But here is the conclusion: There is nothing here about war, fear, or guilt. Or if there is, at most it's a war on obfuscatory institutionalization, fear of not attaining the goal, guilt about misdirected effort. In other words, it's nothing personal. He is saying that all are free to believe as they wish, but if they want to reach the goal of awakening, here is a reason why some traditional beliefs might stand in the way of that. That's a position the Buddha himself took over and over again: "I teach one thing: suffering and its cessation." It's not strong language and it's not a pressure tactic, it's a pragmatic technical observation, of much the same sort that an engineer might make about a machine which is not running very efficiently. Of course, someone who is attached to the machine's current configuration might find that sort of observation difficult to hear, but that fault is not necessarily in the observation itself. It's really got nothing to do with the content of the beliefs. You should abandon them if you find that they are getting in your way, but you are not obliged to. I would say, based on this thread as well as many like it, that they get in the way for a lot of people. And so do the "opposing" beliefs. A good diagnostic to ask is "Are these beliefs conditioned by contact? What is triggering their arising at the moment? What becoming and birth are they associated with?" There is no room for relativism when it comes to evaluating the success of a technique for achieving a clearly defined goal. But the "culture of awakening" which Batchelor is talking about is not about rejecting them so much as ignoring them (and only the cosmological aspects; obviously karma and rebirth as they arise on smaller timescales are critical to awakening.) They don't have to be rejected, because a lot of people who held these beliefs have attained awakening. But they don't have to be accepted either; they are ancillary to the goal of awakening. The "indecision" referred to in that passage is talking about ethical indecision, not ontological indecision: Here he's just saying that the post-mortem rebirth/karma cosmology is not necessary to ethical behavior.
And Batchelor does not get off the hook for this statement. It is a serious allegation to say that others are using mind control with malicious intent to hook people to their religion. Perhaps I am too naive but I find this either geniously and brutally honest or more likely to me it could be an ignorant statement.
It would be equal as a foul for me to say that Batchelor makes all his arguments just to make money as an author. So I am saying accusing established Buddhists as using rebirth as an intimidation or otherwise mind control is just as flagrant of language and accusatory statement as if I accuse Batchelor of being a gold digger.
I find it more likely that both of the flagrant statements in my third paragraph are false, both mine and Batchelor's.
Songhill, you are a terrible advertisement for your beliefs, and a perfect illustration of the difference between knowledge and wisdom.
We have no other options. Everything is a mandala.
The power structure relied on the belief in post-mortem rebirth and (according to Batchelor's model) temporal degeneration to justify a claim that awakening has become a rare event restricted to monastics. I'm not even claiming that the power structure, in and of itself, was a defilement, but the belief that awakening is rare and restricted to monastics definitely is.
Why would it be a defilement rather than a legitimate opinion?
It's the difference between saying you disagree with republicans and saying they are a cancer.