Critical Buddhism
A few weeks ago I stumbled upon the term "Critical Buddhism." By definition it seems to be pretty much what I am doing here -- critically picking apart the Buddhist teachings. The Wikipedia article on it is very brief, I'll just paste the content here in its entirety:
I agree with this quote attributed to Hakamaya, that "Buddhism is criticism." The way of looking at the world as taught by Buddha himself is very analytical, having no problem rejecting something that has been disproved.
This leads to the problem I am personally having with much of "Buddhism" as it is practiced today, I just don't find it to be true to the core teachings of Buddhism itself. That was, in fact, the whole reason I decided to start putting down my thoughts like this, it became necessary to better organise in order to understand. I had been hoping to find that these things I have been perceiving as discrepancies would actually be misunderstandings on my part and in the end it would all make sense, although I am consistently finding that it is in fact really discrepancies.
This in itself is not tragic, and it does not invalidate the widely practiced traditions of Buddhism I am referring to such as Tibetan and other Mahāyāna in my eyes, because the most important concepts for humanity as I see them -- of compassion and respect for life -- are further upheld despite the addition of superstition and belief in divine entities. Even the Theravāda school which I favour, a tradition widely considered atheist (although more accurately non-theistic) actually has its gods and deities itself.
One of my favourite Buddhist monks and teachers, Ajahn Brahm (incidentally of the Theravāda tradition), gave a talk on the Sects of Buddhism in which he referred to the different traditions as all being 'the same cake just with different frosting.' As Buddhism spread throughout the world, it absorbed existing beliefs and traditions of the areas it was brought into, the can look completely different from the outside, but the Dharma remained the same because that is the point of Buddhist philosophy.
It's clear that belief in deities within the major schools of Buddhism have been adopted from these existing cultures and their pre-Buddhist religions. Many entities are taken directly from Hinduism (India) and Bön (Tibet), for instance.
I found it important to note the teaching attributed to Buddha that a personal god not be essential to enlightenment and the cessation of suffering (yet I've felt confident that Buddha himself did not believe in the existence of a God). Though I did feel initially that this did not definitively preclude the belief in and worship of a god or gods it simply considers them unnecessary, other sources I come across actually offer a view in striking contrast, for instance:
The more ambiguous interpretation led directly to one specific point of Buddhism that I particularly like -- it doesn't boss you around. Buddha laid out his ideas for a happy life and solving problems and said here it is, use it if you want. If it doesn't work for you, reject it.
There is the exception of monastic Buddhism, with it's set rules for monks and nuns, which I think very obviously serves the purpose of consistency -- if you want something to be a certain way then you must do so-and-so.
I find source after source not "requiring" practices, but instead "encouraging" them, leaving it ultimately up to the individual, with no threat of eternal damnation or excommunication, only warning of the direct consequences of their own actions which would be suffered regardless of what religion or philosophy they practice.
The reason I find this so appealing is not for the immature perception that one could simply consider it permitting of undesirable behaviour but because it lets us think for ourselves and come to our own conclusions without the hindrance and confinement of predetermined law being applied.
And with this in mind I find that theistic institutions, although possibly condoned to an extent within Buddha's teachings, have a tendency to quickly break down within them as well, being that they are illogical and are not upheld by a sound sense of reason.
The fact of the matter seems to me to be that any deities considered "Buddhist" are ultimately not, and that it should be a personal matter of each individual whether or not they believe in such entities, not prescribed by a belief system that considers itself Buddhist, regardless of whether we believe that Buddha himself specifically condoned the practice of worshiping or believing in these deities or not -- because they are in contrast with other, definitive teachings, and so do not require their own special consideration.
Still, I don't even consider it a "choice" of each person, because I don't believe that we consciously choose to believe in a god or gods, we simply do or we don't or we feel agnostic. This is another reason it should not be forced upon or denied anyone -- it's beyond our control. What we can control is whether or not we are educated enough to know what we believe.
Critical Buddhism is a trend in Japanese Buddhist scholarship, associated primarily with the works of Hakamaya Noriaki and Matsumoto Shirō. According to Lin Chen-kuo, Hakamaya's view is that "Critical Buddhism sees methodical, rational critique as belonging to the very foundations of Buddhism itself, while 'Topical Buddhism' emphasizes the priority of rhetoric over logical thinking, of ontology over epistemology."[1] Hakamaya himself defines it as the position "that 'Buddhism is criticism' or that 'only that which is critical is Buddhism.'"[2] He contrasts it with what he calls Topical Buddhism, in comparison to the concepts of critical philosophy and topical philosophy. (source)
I agree with this quote attributed to Hakamaya, that "Buddhism is criticism." The way of looking at the world as taught by Buddha himself is very analytical, having no problem rejecting something that has been disproved.
This leads to the problem I am personally having with much of "Buddhism" as it is practiced today, I just don't find it to be true to the core teachings of Buddhism itself. That was, in fact, the whole reason I decided to start putting down my thoughts like this, it became necessary to better organise in order to understand. I had been hoping to find that these things I have been perceiving as discrepancies would actually be misunderstandings on my part and in the end it would all make sense, although I am consistently finding that it is in fact really discrepancies.
This in itself is not tragic, and it does not invalidate the widely practiced traditions of Buddhism I am referring to such as Tibetan and other Mahāyāna in my eyes, because the most important concepts for humanity as I see them -- of compassion and respect for life -- are further upheld despite the addition of superstition and belief in divine entities. Even the Theravāda school which I favour, a tradition widely considered atheist (although more accurately non-theistic) actually has its gods and deities itself.
One of my favourite Buddhist monks and teachers, Ajahn Brahm (incidentally of the Theravāda tradition), gave a talk on the Sects of Buddhism in which he referred to the different traditions as all being 'the same cake just with different frosting.' As Buddhism spread throughout the world, it absorbed existing beliefs and traditions of the areas it was brought into, the can look completely different from the outside, but the Dharma remained the same because that is the point of Buddhist philosophy.
It's clear that belief in deities within the major schools of Buddhism have been adopted from these existing cultures and their pre-Buddhist religions. Many entities are taken directly from Hinduism (India) and Bön (Tibet), for instance.
I found it important to note the teaching attributed to Buddha that a personal god not be essential to enlightenment and the cessation of suffering (yet I've felt confident that Buddha himself did not believe in the existence of a God). Though I did feel initially that this did not definitively preclude the belief in and worship of a god or gods it simply considers them unnecessary, other sources I come across actually offer a view in striking contrast, for instance:
To liberate himself mankind has to shed his delusions, and one of these is the existence of God.
...
But the argument which the Buddha most frequently uses is what is now called the "argument from evil" which in the Buddhist sense could be stated as the argument from dukkha (suffering or unsatisfactoriness). This states that the empirical fact of the existence of dukkha cannot be reconciled with the existence of an omnipotent and omniscient being who is also all good. (source)
The more ambiguous interpretation led directly to one specific point of Buddhism that I particularly like -- it doesn't boss you around. Buddha laid out his ideas for a happy life and solving problems and said here it is, use it if you want. If it doesn't work for you, reject it.
There is the exception of monastic Buddhism, with it's set rules for monks and nuns, which I think very obviously serves the purpose of consistency -- if you want something to be a certain way then you must do so-and-so.
I find source after source not "requiring" practices, but instead "encouraging" them, leaving it ultimately up to the individual, with no threat of eternal damnation or excommunication, only warning of the direct consequences of their own actions which would be suffered regardless of what religion or philosophy they practice.
The reason I find this so appealing is not for the immature perception that one could simply consider it permitting of undesirable behaviour but because it lets us think for ourselves and come to our own conclusions without the hindrance and confinement of predetermined law being applied.
And with this in mind I find that theistic institutions, although possibly condoned to an extent within Buddha's teachings, have a tendency to quickly break down within them as well, being that they are illogical and are not upheld by a sound sense of reason.
The fact of the matter seems to me to be that any deities considered "Buddhist" are ultimately not, and that it should be a personal matter of each individual whether or not they believe in such entities, not prescribed by a belief system that considers itself Buddhist, regardless of whether we believe that Buddha himself specifically condoned the practice of worshiping or believing in these deities or not -- because they are in contrast with other, definitive teachings, and so do not require their own special consideration.
Still, I don't even consider it a "choice" of each person, because I don't believe that we consciously choose to believe in a god or gods, we simply do or we don't or we feel agnostic. This is another reason it should not be forced upon or denied anyone -- it's beyond our control. What we can control is whether or not we are educated enough to know what we believe.