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Yehoshua Eben posted:Why in Buddhism is idolatry not considered something to abstain from? The idea of worshiping a statue created by human hands, while not physically causing suffering to anyone else, seems to not be productive in spiritual enlightenment. Well to understand that you need to know a bit about the history of Buddhist iconography (note; this is mostly me trying to remember stuff from my class on Buddhism from 7 years ago so this is more a vague, general outline). See in India, after the Shakyamuni Buddha had died, his body was divided up into several different stupas for non-monastics to use for their meditative practice. On the stupas were recorded images from the Buddha's life and his previous lives, except they depicted an eight spoke wheel in place of Shakyamuni to represent the 8 fold path the Buddha followed. This was done because an early understanding of Nirvana was that not only were you completely extinguished from existence, but that you were so thoroughly gone you shouldn't be represented in art. During early Buddhist lay practices people began to venerate the image of Buddha that they focused on during their practice, and it's thought that from this practice the more common iconography came into existence. I"m not entirely sure if that's true or not, but I do know that in Mahayanna practice (especially the more esoteric forms like Shingon) the image of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas can be a form of meditation. In Chinese and Japanese esotericism, it's thought that a path towards Buddhahood was to have a specific patron, a Buddha or Bodhisattva that you completely identify with. During meditation you're meant to imagine yourself as being that Buddha or Bodhisattva, with the intent that by identifying yourself with them you would transform your own karma into theirs, or something like that. Yehoshua Eben posted:Do Buddhist feel that complete detachment from you body in this world is possible, as in your personality not dwelling in your flesh any longer, being in a purely spiritual plain of existence? I'm going to say not really, cause that's not really what Nirvana is meant to be and for a lot of Buddhist sects (like my own, Jodo Shinshu) that sort of detachment really isn't the end goal
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Jun 23, 2016 20:20
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you know what you can do if you have major depressive disorder? nembutsu practice. heck shinran would probably say if the mentally healthy can be "saved" by amida, so much more so the depressed
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Jun 26, 2016 04:50
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The Phlegmatist posted:Well, to let me ask a more pointed question with an example, yeah, that would have arisen because of his past karma. as to the morality of samsara, you have to remember that samsara is a bad thing. you don't want to be in samsara, you want to move towards nirvana (extinguishment/buddhahood, depending on who you ask) in order to escape its grip. there are tons of passages from the sutras about buddhas and bodhisattvas being moved to tears by the state of humanity in samsara (for example, kannon's head explodes thinking about all the sorrow that exists in samsara, and amida gives her eleven heads to contemplate the infinite sorrow in samsara; when she tries to reach out to those in need her arms split into thousands of pieces, and amida gives her a thousand hands to reach out to the people in samsara and offer relief) also you need to remember that in most buddhist traditions, not everyone can practice. in theravada and some mahayana traditions it's the monks only who are "really" practicing buddhism, and it is because of their karma that they were born in a position to be able to practice as opposed to the non monks whose karma is to instead support the monks in order to expiate bad karma and accumulate good karma in the hopes that in the next life they might be reborn as monks. it isn't until american buddhism, or at least modern and post-modern buddhism, that non-monastics do things like meditate and do zazen. this isn't so much seen as a question of morality so much as an understanding that in the world of samsara, evils are always going to come about HOWEVER, in my own tradition (jodo shinshu), we would not consider such a person to be incapable of practicing buddhism. or i should say, not as being anymore unable of practicing buddhism. in the jodo shinshu perspective, no amount of meditation or zazen will bring a person to buddhahood, because all of humanity is too depraved to be able to save themselves from samsara. instead, only by a person opening themselves up to amida's infinite compassion can one be reborn in the pure land, and from there receive the instruction in buddhist practice to be able to achieve buddhahood. it's a matter of simultaneous becoming. amida said that if he were to be a buddha all people, regardless of who they are, will be reborn in his pure land if they call on his name. therefore, amida cannot truly become a buddha until all are reborn in the pure land, and no one can be reborn in the pure land unless amida is a buddha. now, you might be thinking, "that's all well and good but the man i am talking about cannot distinguish between good and evil," to which the pure land practitioner would respond, "no one does!" in the tannisho shinran told yuien "the good will be reborn in the pure land, so so much more so the evil." the way of nembutsu practice isn't for the monk in a monastery, it's for the butcher who cannot have a livelihood without killing, the burakumin who is considered to be on the lowest rung of society, for those who cannot cease to commit evil. in fact part of shinjin is understanding that one is falling into hell at the same time as being reborn in the pure land. so a sociopathic man, who cannot distinguish between right and wrong, might not be able to practice zazen but he can practice nembutsu. though i can go into more depth about how nembutusu is not actually a jodo shinshu practice, it's more like jodo shinshu non-practice because even asserting the nembutsu (which is the process of chanting "namo amida butsu," i rely on the amida buddha) as a practice is the same as asserting that there is some self power that can pull one out of samsara, so it's more like other power, but the main point i'm trying to say is that jodo shinshu is for those for whom other forms of buddhism are impossible KingColliwog posted:Is there a lot of people in this thread who are into Buddhism as a philosophy kind of and not into the religious side as much? A lot of Buddhism ideas are close to my way of thinking and I already enjoy meditation and would like to spend more time meditating. I just found out there are a few zen Buddhist circles in my city and I'll probably try hitting them up as a way to practice meditation/learn more about it. But I can't for the life of me start believing/be interested into the more "magical/religious" side of it. The academic stuff can be interesting, but since it tends to be based on the religious side so I can't really give it too much importance for my personal life. Basically, I love the Buddha's teaching that go something like "don't know/can't know/anyway it's not important" on the more magical stuff like god since this is exactly how I see it. I don't know/care if we are reborn (in the traditional western or "river flowing" Asian way) or not and I think most of what makes Buddhism core still apply anyway. i don't know about here but there's a lot of people like you in western buddhism. in fact, i'd go so far as to say the defining characteristic of american buddhism is an unwillingness to associate with what's often derisively referred to as "superstition" within buddhist traditions. which i personally think is really sad, not the least of which is because it means that american buddhists are far less likely as a whole to really engage with the idea of pure land practice (it's not like d.t. suzuki, modern buddhist scholar responsible for the "it's a philosophy" camp, wrote books about pure land buddhism with the description that it should form a strong basis for american buddhist practice or nothing) try not to think of yourself as being closer to the "true" teachings of buddhism, or that you're somehow superior to "other" practitioners, though! a lot of western atheist buddhists fall into that trap, and it's really racist and just a toxic mindset to practice buddhism in
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Jul 6, 2016 14:01
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Paramemetic posted:Pure Land Buddhism is the Faith Alone school of Buddhism first of all, the name of the pure land in japanese is jodo. jodo shinshu actually means "true pure land teaching," which distinguishes it from jodo shu which is just pure land teaching. i'm not much of a buddhist philosopher, though, so i don't really know quite what jodo shinshu believes happens after rebirth in the pure land. you probably wouldn't recognize the japanese names, but basically the sutras that jodo shinshu uses are the sutra of the buddha of infinite life, the sutra of contemplation of the buddha of infinite life, and the amitabha sutra. there's also the seven pure land masters, seven teachers that start with nagarjuna and end with shinran (the founder of jodo shinshu)'s master honen (the founder of jodo shu, which like way to go shinran making your own school and saying it's the true version of your master's school). these masters are nagarjuna, vasubandhu, t'an-luan, tao-ch'o, shan-tao, genshin, and honen. i'm mentioning these because if what you're referring to is found either in the sutras or the seven sages, then it might be a thing in jodo shinshu. otherwise i don't think it would be in general i think jodo shinshu is far more interested in the process of being reborn in the pure land, less so on what the pure land looks like. but i can barely be considered a pure land practitioner. i haven't even been to many dharma services, let alone received a buddhist name, so my understanding is fairly limited to the texts i've managed to read, and the sutras are not among those texts.
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Jul 6, 2016 14:42
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Ammonsa posted:Hi, newcomer here to Buddhism, I'm seriously looking into it and seeking refuge. well, this question has a lot of different answers depending on what tradition you're part of and who you ask. some people believe that following the five precepts is only a requirement if you take specific vows, others believe that all who follow the eightfold path hold to them. for my tradition, jodo shinshu, it's encouraged to follow the precepts as best you can (less alcohol, less meat, etc) but not because following the precepts leads to enlightenment. in jodo shinshu we believe that human beings are incapable of achieving buddhahood through our own effort, and we rely on tariki or other power to move us towards an understanding that only through amida buddha's vows can we become buddhas, and that realization leads to us calling on amida's name (the nembutsu, or namo amida butsu (i rely on amida buddha)). this state is called shinjin. therefore, keeping the precepts as though it is a good buddhist thing to do which will lead us towards buddhahood is not relying on other power, but is instead self power and should be avoided. the reason we should make some attempts to keep the precepts (though it's impossible for lay people to follow them entirely, or at least in most cases) is in thanks for the nembutsu and for amida's gift of shinjin (the state in which other power compels us to recite the nembutsu) essentially, you can still drink if you want to because it isn't by abstaining from drinking that you become a buddha, but you shouldn't get drunk every night either.
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Jul 23, 2016 11:56
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Senior Scarybagels posted:I got a question for you about Jodo Shinshu, if Humans can't attain Buddhahood, then what was Siddharatha Gautama and the future Maitreya? I am honestly curious. well it's not so much that humans CAN'T, it's that the era in which through self power humans can achieve buddhahood has passed. the founder of jodo shinshu, shinran, lived in the kamakura period of japanese history, which was characterized by widespread war and political instability (the first warring states period, essentially). this, coupled with him and honen (his teacher and one of shinran's seven pure land masters) being laicized by the emperor because other students of honen had some inappropriate contact with the retired emperor's concubines (i'd like to think it was consensual, but let's be honest it probably wasn't) led shinran to doubt the efficacy of the intense meditative practices he engaged in on mt hiei as a member of the tendai sect. he believed he was living in mappo, and as a result thought that self power could no longer be relied on as a means to buddhahood so it's not so much that humans are entirely depraved by their natures, so much as our place in history has lead to human depravity of such a level that we cannot attain buddhahood through our own effort
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Jul 23, 2016 14:58
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Annual Prophet posted:Not sure if this is directly relevant to you (does shin consider itself part of jodo?) but Chion-in is an amazing, beautiful temple. jodo shu is a different sect from shinshu. honen is the founder of jodo shu, which means pure land teaching while jodo shinshu means true pure land teaching. shinran was kind of a jerk that way the major difference is that while shinran teaches total human depravity, honen acknowledges that people can attain buddhahood through self power, but that this was a rarity for most people and instead relying on amida's primal vow was a better and more fruitful means of attaining buddhahood. also a major difference; we shinshu say "namo amida butsu," while shu say "namu amida butsu," but this is ultimately unimportant since it's different japanese pronunciations of the same sanskrit word that's cool, though.
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Jul 23, 2016 15:35
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Mr. Mambold posted:What horseshit. cool comment, friend
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Jul 23, 2016 15:42
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Mr. Mambold posted:Maybe use some critical thinking as Gautama recommended as much as i want to be snippy and just tell you to go read the pali canon, instead i'm going to say that within buddhism there is a wonderful diversity of practices and sects, and that just because mine doesn't have much in the way of practice (in fact, ours is the buddhism of no practice) doesn't make it inferior pure land buddhism (not just jodo shinshu) is the most practiced form of buddhism in asia and globally. even if you don't agree with the jodo shinshu concept of human depravity (which some jodo shinshu scholars have gone against, like takamaro shigaraki) pure land practice has a lot to offer to buddhists in general and especially to american buddhists and dismissing it as "total horseshit" or lacking critical thinking does both my tradition and your own practice a disservice
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Jul 23, 2016 16:32
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Senior Scarybagels posted:So does the Jodo Shinshu reject the idea of the future Buddha to come? nah it's just not really as important as amida jodo shinshu doesn't REJECT different buddhas and bodhisattvas, it's just amida and the nembutsu are of central importance
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Jul 23, 2016 18:35
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It's a good thing I didn't tell you guys about the pews
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Jul 24, 2016 14:30
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Jodo Shinshu in America is known as the Buddhist Churches, and their services are arranged similarly to Christian worship services with hymns, call and response, and, of course, pews. The heads of temples are called reverends, there are bishops, and all sorts of trappings more familiar to Protestant Christianity than to the zen hall. The reason for this is that in the 19th century, discrimination against the Japanese and suspicion of Buddhists was in full swing. The hope of the American branch of the honpa hongwanji mission was that by adding the trappings of American Christianity, pews included, they would be seen as less foreign and therefore treated more like equals Students of American history might recall this did not have that effect, and so the BCA became less an attempt to be Buddhist Christianity and more a means for Japanese Americans to retain their Japanese identity and sense of community in the face of American discrimination, similar to Black Churches (though unlike black churches, the BCA spent more time teaching about culture and less time teaching the religion) The BCA is currently moving towards teaching the dharma more than being a repository of Japanese culture, both because the people want better instruction and because there's a feeling that Jodo Shinshu has been in this country longer than some more popular forms of Buddhism, and should be part of the American Buddhist landscape. Basically working to make sure pure land practice is as acceptable and common as zazen in America
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Jul 24, 2016 22:46
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i'm going to preface my response to your post by saying that i recognize that while your interpretation of karma might be a little unorthodox, that doesn't make it invalid. however because it is a little unorthodox, that makes responding to it slightly difficult since i do not share the same materialist focus that you have. therefore interpret my response as you will, and hopefully it will lead you to your own understanding of karma and samsara i will say that it is true that there is no "self" (or atman) which exists within a person that persists between lives. the me who is forums poster mo tzu, a transgender woman who, quite frankly, can be a mean bitch sometimes (well, okay, a lot of the time) does not persist after death as mo tzu, transgender woman who is a huge bitch because individual personality is not an intrinsic part of reality. however, that is not to say that i am not karmically linked to my previous lives. as way of textual example, i would point to both the jataka tales and the larger sukhavativyuha sutra.the jataka tales are a collection of stories about the previous lives of the shakyamuni buddha, in which each life he lives is part of a karmic chain of events that leads to him being born as shakyamuni and achieving buddhahood. if karma was merely about creating a world in which events lead to a person becoming a buddha, then it wouldn't particularly matter what lessons a bird may have learned that would have prepared it for rebirth as shakyamuni. the larger sukhavativyuha sutra contains the vows of the bodhisattva dharmakara undertakes 48 vows that he promises to fulfill should he become a buddha (one of which being the primal vow of amida, that all who call upon his name with sincerity be reborn in his pre land). this wouldn't quite make sens if there wasn't something that existed between dharmakara and amida. the mechanics of why some people are reborn to certain lives isn't exactly clear. there are a number of sutras that try to link certain karmic evils that cause people to be reborn in worse positions than others, as well as certain karmic deeds that allow people to be reborn in better circumstances. in general, though, it's understood that through the accumulation of negative karma by doing evil deeds a person is more likely to be reborn in a worse circumstance, say as an animal or in hell. the main issue is that being reborn in these circumstances are poor not so much because being an animal or being in hell is bad in itself (though obviously being reborn in hell is not a good thing in itself) but rather that an animal or hellbound person cannot practice buddhism and therefore cannot attain buddhahood (though there are some tales of animals or people in hell reciting the nembutsu and entering the pure land). this is why in more traditional forms of theravada buddhism lay people feed monks; by providing food for the monks to live, they acquire the positive karma necessary to allow them to be reborn as monks and work towards nirvana. i will say it's not entirely clear if being reborn as a rich man vs a poor man is necessarily a better rebirth vs a worse rebirth. if the rich man is born in america and is the son of a fundamentalist christian, then his ability to hear and practice the dharma is severely damaged and the likelihood of him being able to work towards buddhahood (or realize his inability to do so and be moved by Amida to rely solely on him for rebirth in the pure land, as my tradition dictates) is very low. on the other hand, the poor man might be born in thailand or japan, and therefore be exposed to the dharma and be much more receptive to it. and while the poor man in most forms of buddhist thought might also not be able to practice buddhism to such an extent that he would be able to achieve buddhahood, in my tradition he would be in prime position to be moved towards the nembutsu. so in a lot of ways rebirth is a lot more subjective than the social reality in which a person lives
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Jul 26, 2016 13:10
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Mr. Mambold posted:Since you bring it up- And honestly I really haven't given it much thought. I had already transitioned when I converted from Catholicism to Buddhism. At this point other than occasionally wishing I could have kids I don't think about it that much. All I know is that my karma and my choices and the choices and actions of everyone around me has led to where I am now quote:Part 2 of this. as mo tzu, transgender woman who is a huge bitch(well, okay, a lot of the time) does not persist after death as mo tzu, transgender woman who is a huge bitch because individual personality is not an intrinsic part of reality. But no seriously anatman is a concept I've historically had a hard time understanding so I have no problem saying I was talking from half memories and trying to understand a Wikipedia page and a shin Buddhism webpage. I'm probably not understanding this correctly Fun fact I recently applied to a religious studies adjunct position, let's hope for those students' sake I don't get it quote:in a lot of ways rebirth is a lot more subjective than the social reality in which a person lives I have no idea, sometimes I write things I think sound really smart and then I look back at it and it's the stupidest thing I've ever seen Senju Kannon fucked around with this message at 01:21 on Jul 27, 2016 |
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Jul 26, 2016 22:06
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Paramemetic posted:Hey Mo Tzu importing a question from the other thread: does pure land still hold to the three practices of discipline, meditation, and wisdom? jodo shinshu at least holds that it is completely impossible to practice buddhism in this era, and that the only practice one should engage in is "no practice," which is opening oneself up to amida buddha to be moved by him to call on his name (in other words, a true nembutsu which comes from other power, or tariki). so no, we don't hold to those. there's probably some nuance that i'm not getting because i'm still fairly new to thinking about and studying jodo shinshu but as far as i'm aware even holding to the precepts aren't fully necessary, because in this age it's impossible to fully practice them and even to engage in practicing the precepts as a path towards nirvana is born of self power which is antithetical to the other power focus of jodo shinshu.
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Oct 21, 2016 14:16
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first warring states period, coupled with shinran's dissatisfaction with the practices he was doing as a tendai monk as well as his own ambivalence towards being defrocked by the emperor (after his teacher, honen, had some disciples of his break into the retired emperor's harem and then be executed for the crime) basically law and order seemed to be falling apart, and then he got banished to a part of the country he never lived in with his monk status lost and then having to make sense of all that stuff. kinda makes sense really
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Oct 21, 2016 14:32
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i'm kinda gonna have to disagree with your interpretations there (though i gotta say, kudos on actually watching the shinran anime i couldn't get past the terrible animation and the godawful fauxld man voice they gave shinran). the first might be more of a quibble over vocabulary but the way you describe "giving yourself over" isn't quite right, in my opinion. i'm gonna have to use shinjin here, just because there isn't really a good way of describing this without it, but basically shinjin is the state in which an individual becomes aware that without the amida's perfect grace, there would be no escape from hell. i, as an individual, cannot make myself one with amida. only by amida's compassion and call to me can i respond. saying "i center my life on compassion and understanding" isn't quite right, because centering yourself (unless i'm misinterpreting you) is self power, and jodo shinshu is about other power. the second objection i have is fairly simple; you're kinda stripping jodo shinshu of its metaphysical properties, which i will grant you is still pure land. like if you said that about pure land practice in general i'd say "cool that's like what pure land practitioners in taiwan say," (except not exactly, since for them the pure land is a place in which one can practice buddhism without encumbrance, which can exist in this world and can only come about by creating the structures to create that world but you see what i mean, it's like an individualist interpretation). like, amida buddha exists. it's pretty essential that he does. what existence means for a buddha i would not be able to say, since i'm both poorly educated in buddhist philosophy and also because a buddha exists on a level beyond me, but amida is a buddha. like the existence of amida and a literal pure land are fairly essential for jodo shinshu and is one of the thing that separates jodo shinshu from other pure land practices quote:Much like with Tibetan stuff it's a hang up from a culture that used gods as symbols colliding with western Christianity.
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Nov 3, 2016 00:42
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I don't think the pure land being identified with nirvana was something shinran did. I haven't exactly read a lot of primary sources but I'm sure it's not a shinshu teaching at least. I've heard it described that instead of envisioning the pure land as Sunday and this world as Saturday it's more accurate to do the opposite, because once we enter the pure land that is when we do the hard work of becoming a Buddha Also lmao if you have a hard time believing the "supernatural" stuff. I'm looking forward to flying and reading minds when I become a Buddha. I won't use it to win a golden bowl, tho
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Nov 3, 2016 14:33
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so this might not be an appropriate place for me talk about this, since i know i'm maybe one of two shinshu practitioners and mostly you guys are pretty american with some exceptions, but i figure since we're all buddhists maybe you all might have some insight into this problem i'm having. so i used to be christian, right? not a big deal, a lot of us here in the west were at some point, or if not actually christian at least familiar enough with it. the point is, i'm used to praying when things go bad. someone gets in danger of losing their house, i say to them "i'll pray for you," which is both a way of saying "hey, i see your pain and i want to help but this is the only way i can think of doing it," and a way of me, you know, helping them. but since converting, i can't really do that anymore. we don't "pray" to the buddhas or boddhisattvas for earthly things. there are some practices concerning healing, but for me at least those aren't a possibility. as a jodo shinshu practitioner i believe that i have no practice; anything i do is a product of amida nyorai and cannot be said to be my own effort or practice. the only thing that matters is a true nembutsu, which is said when i am in alignment with amida's call and have no self power at all. a nembutsu said for another person is not a true nembutsu, because it is a demonstration of self power. shinran himself, when his wife was in danger of death from illness, shut himself off to recite the nembutsu continuously but ceased when he realized the contradiction within it. however, even though a nembutsu said like this is not a true nembutsu, it's said that a false nembutsu can help lead to a true nembutsu so it is not entirely without merit. this is a bit rambling but my point is; i just recently found out an old friend of mine from college has been diagnosed with cancer, and that it has gotten so bad it's spread to the lymph nodes. his doctors have given him two years, and while sure i reached out to him on facebook that still doesn't feel like i'm doing enough for him. when i was christian i would have prayed a divine mercy novena for him, probably even arranging for masses to be said for him. however, as a buddhist i do not have access to those types of spiritual practices. so i feel like i'm left having to deal with this with one hand tied behind my back. part of me says, "gently caress it, shinran said that the kami are the protectors of buddhism, and so it's right for shinshu practitioners to make offerings to the kami for things like healing," which i of course take to mean "if god is real, and god would need to practice buddhism because god would not be god forever, god would still potentially be able to help with things like this so as long as i understand it within this worldview it could be permissible to pray like this." but the rest of me says that this was a compromise shinran made in order to avoid imperial suppression, since maligning the buddhas, bodhisattva, and kami other than amida would be tantamount to treason. additionally, this sort of appeal to imperial authority is what lead to honpa honganji and nishi honganji's complicity in promoting japanese aggression which obviously had disastrous consequences. so perhaps taking shinran's obsequience as an excuse for syncretist practice might not be great. another part of me looks to popular japanese buddhism, also known as funerary buddhism, and how reciting the nembutsu for dead friends and relatives is extremely common. if a false nembutsu isn't necessarily an impediment to a true nembutsu, then what would be the harm in reciting the nembutsu in hope that my friend be reborn in the pure land? but this isn't quite the same as praying for healing, is it? i don't know, i feel frustrated that i don't know how to deal with this spiritually, and i should probably e-mail my local bca priest about this but i feel like he has more to worry about like the joint pet funeral he did this weekend (i am assuming my local bca temple isn't exactly flush right now). has anyone else had this sort of experience of feeling helpless in the face of illness and death?
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Nov 22, 2016 06:18
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well, i know for a fact that jodo shinshu has historically fought against the claim that they dismiss all other buddhas and bodhisattvas that aren't amida, and shinran even made a statement that while they cannot help us towards liberation they still exist and their vows would presumably also exist. practicing medicine buddha practice might not be strictly orthodox, but it doesn't necessarily seem like it would be heretical. i mean, takamaro shigaraki talked about the need for jodo shinshu to incorporate mahayanna thought into its way of thinking, and he even mentioned that perhaps the path of sages can lead some to enlightenment, so if he could say all that and still be shinshu i don't see why i couldn't practice medicine buddha practice, especially since his vows say nothing about all beings being reborn in his pure land but does say that he will cure the sick and clothe the naked. thank you for your advice
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Nov 22, 2016 15:04
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Shinran Shonin said that if his teacher honen had deceived him, and that amida was not a buddha, he would surely fall into hell. being aware of how little we have to practice is part of shinshu thought. and quite frankly any wisdom or compassion i have is thanks to amida So if I'm self deluded i will be reborn in hell, but even so this practice of no practice is the only thing i can do. in the face of a friend's death it's difficult, because i am not in shinjin, but still how can i do any practice other than the nembutsu that tatthaghatta calls me to?
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Nov 22, 2016 17:25
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i ended up e-mailing the reverend at the local buddhist church near where i live, and i'm going to copy his response here since it was a really good response.quote:Thank you for your email and please forgive me for being a bit slow in responding. I am so sorry to hear about your friend’s dire situation. I am most impressed by your understanding of Jodo Shinshu. Your questions are good ones. Let me begin, however, by talking about my perspective on Jodo Shinshu and especially on the Nembutsu. As you said, the Nembutsu is not a practice to heal others or to make miracles. Rather, it is for you to realize the limits of Self-Power. It is to remind us that the beginning is the start of the end and the end is the beginning and that we live lives that flow along naturally and that are beyond our control. This, indeed, is our practice. It is our very realization that life and death are beyond our control that makes each moment of life precious. More, if one can grasp fully the reality of this idea, then there is in those moments of grief, sorrow, or anxiety the comfort of the Nembutsu always with us. So the Nembutsu is not magic to heal people but it can be very healing. In other words, the Nembutsu is for you, not for others. i have a lot of personal baggage related to christianity so i don't think i can actually pray, but doing medicine buddha practice is a good compromise for me since he does have vows that say he'll heal the sick
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Nov 26, 2016 01:49
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i think if your buddhism looks down on the buddhism asian people practice, and actively avoids contemporary asian conceptions of buddhism and scholarly takes on buddhist practice, then you're probably going to want to ask yourself why that is because it's probably not for reasons you're gonna like like if you quote the dhammapada at someone who's a pure land practitioner (not even necessarily jodo shinshu, like a tendai person who just likes the nembutsu) you gotta ask yourself why it is you're so unwilling to understand where that person is coming from that you quote a text to them that isn't that important in their tradition.
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Nov 29, 2016 02:28
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Senior Scarybagels posted:Playing Devil's Advocate; but if someone is honest in their approach to Buddhism, have done the research and everything, their practice doesn't look down upon the practices of others; its just their own observations and meditations lead them down a more secular path of buddhism, is that really wrong? morally wrong or like ontologically wrong? like as long as us white western buddhists don't push asian american buddhists out of their spaces and are both aware and respectful of more traditionally buddhist practices then i guess go nuts. i think literally all practices don't lead to buddhahood and it's only thanks to amida's primal vow that in this age of depravity we can be reborn in the pure land and do the hard work of practicing buddhism so like ontologically yeah they wrong cause amida is real and amida is my friend.
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Nov 29, 2016 03:53
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Apparently you boil the worms inside their cocoon so it does kill the worms, and it has a higher carbon footprint to boot Plus I personally prefer cotton, though I think we're all aware of the problems cotton has had, historically speaking
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Dec 2, 2016 01:15
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i've heard of him. it'd be hypocritical to say i'm not sure i trust his approach to interreligious dialogue, what with the period of time i spent trying to be both catholic and pure land, but while i understand the spirit with which he approaches zen and catholicism i find myself asking the same question i always ask christians who have multiple religious belongings; is this appropriate, or appropriation? the fact that he's still able to be a jesuit despite being a roshi is a bit suspicious, though the jesuits have had a long history of being cool with different religion's practices that doesn't necessarily mean they acknowledge the other religion's cosmology. i don't know i think the rites controversy doesn't necessarily show that the jesuits had a more accurate reading of chinese religiosity so much as a more shrewd approach to missiology, and something like this smacks of new type of missiology aimed at christianizing buddhism to sell back to asian people. not that he's necessarily doing that, but this sort of approach to interreligious dialogue and multiple religious belonging is in danger of becoming that, especially in his capacity as a catholic priest.
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Dec 23, 2016 18:35
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Annual Prophet posted:i take it you're exclusively committed to pure land at this point? if you feel comfortable discussing it, what led you to move from catholicism to pursuing both, and then from that to just pure land? as to the latter, was it more a feeling of discomfort with the differences in doctrine/cosmology (and/or being less happy with orthopraxy, syncretism, etc.) or more feeling at home with pure land, or a combination of these, or something else? I'm trans and the Catholic Church is not a fan of that whole way of being, but Jodo Shinshu doesn't care. I also found Jodo Shinshu's faith alone approach interesting, since I've never been a fan of American Buddhism's focus on meditation. After giving up on a career as a theologian I just gave up on being a Christian entirely. I used to be sort of Buddhist before I became a Christian so the anthropology, soteriology, and cosmology were things I was familiar with and could/did believe in, so it was a bit of an outgrowth from that
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Dec 24, 2016 00:25
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Annual Prophet posted:Thank you so much for your reply, Mo Tzu. It sounds like a very difficult road you've been on. In fact, I can hardly imagine the kind of courage it must have required. I mean, thanks but it wasn't that rough it was just life happening you know. I mean that's just karma right there
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Dec 24, 2016 12:52
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Herstory Begins Now posted:Pure Land sounds a lot harder to reconcile with Catholicism than Zen. I know a significant number of monks from various Catholic orders were practicing at Zen Centers for a while. Formal Zen (i.e. what you find if you turn up at a practice center, as opposed to reading some Zen forum online) is very reverent of other monks and contemplative traditions and beliefs. Besides, there's not that much in Zen that's really incompatible with being a practicing Christian and no Zen Center worth its salt is going to be telling anyone what to believe or not to believe. Even the more informal 'family style' of Zen isn't really going to care what your background was. One of the groups I used to sit with had people of all kinds of other backgrounds turning up: lots of Tibetan Buddhists, a couple people from Christian orders, nominal Christians, atheists, Sufis etc. i mean i was about this side of becoming a jesuit (talked to the order, was doing discernment, etc) but before i could do the spiritual exercises or whatever i came out as gay and all of a sudden celibacy was a lot less appealing, so i kinda know a bit about jesuits. heck i even took about half the classes i took at seminary at a jesuit school, and my thoughts on interreligious dialogue were formed by jesuit theologians and some of my jesuit professors, so when i say i'm suspicious of a jesuit priest able to comfortably teach zen it comes from the understanding of what it means to be a priest and a member of the jesuit order. people have been censored for even having the appearance of dual religious belonging, so the idea that this guy can teach zen and not be censored would make me think that his zen is devoid of a lot of buddhist cosmology and like you can say all that but there was an article in some journal of buddhist/christian dialogue where a zen roshi from japan was ripping into this jesuit who taught zazen because he would be completely unable to accept certain teachings of zen that are especially anti-theist. admittedly i read this in undergrad so i'm not gonna remember it like i would five years ago, but i don't think i'm off base by saying that there are aspects of zen buddhism that are not compatible with catholicism, and that the catholic church is especially concerned about doctrinal purity and has silenced asian theologians that they consider to be crossing the line between dialogue and syncretism, and thus someone who is able to comfortably be a priest within the catholic church AND teach zen cannot be considered to be on the same level as, say, a roshi in japan. not to mention that the whole "interreligious dialogue" thing is usually done on christian terms, with christian vocabulary and christian methodology which other religions have to learn in order to be part of the dialogue. i didn't consider this to be accurate until i read a jodo shinshu priest writing about interreligious dialogue between jodo shinshu and christianity, and had i not known the author was a japanese shinshu priest i would have thought he was a protestant theologian because he cited mostly theologians and western scholars as opposed to japanese buddhist thinkers and scholars. i think being suspicious of the cost of even coming to the table is important, and in this case being suspicious of a jesuit teaching zen is especially important
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Dec 24, 2016 20:57
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also they might not have seen it this is a very silly conversation
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Mar 13, 2017 19:30
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Nessus posted:This is pure theorycrafting coming out of an unrelated ethical discussion. it's not about not eating meat, but not taking life. so about the same as eating any other kind of meat; depends on who you ask. some say you only need to not eat meat if you take the five vows, some say everyone has to eat veg, some say only monks, and some say it doesn't matter if you eat meat or not because there is no way you can become a buddha through your own efforts and so you have to realize ultimately that it is only through amida's grace and compassion that you are able to be reborn in his pure land and begin the hard work of becoming a buddha.
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Jun 8, 2017 06:27
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Take the plunge! Okay! posted:If you live in the West as a Buddhist and aren't destitute you have exactly zero valid reasons not to be a vegan. no one is able to perfectly follow the teachings, but even if we were eating vegan doesn't make you a buddha
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Jun 8, 2017 12:21
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i just finished reading a translation of Rennyo's letters (Rennyo is an important figure in Jodo Shinshu, and is regarded as one of the most important figures in the sect, second only to the founder, Shinran Shonin) and wanted to post a quotation from it that i thought people here might like (I don't i think people here will hate it lmao but I want to try promoting shin buddhist thought here, at least a little bit)Rennyo Shonin posted:When we carefully consider the transiency of human life, we realize that the living will certainly end in death and that the prosperous will eventually decline. This is how life is in the human world. Even so, we vainly live days and nights, spending spending months and years to no purpose. Indeed, we may lament about it, but I feel that we could never really comprehend the true extent of this pitifully sad situation.
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Jun 12, 2017 05:16
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Nessus posted:I have a question for the Jodo Shinshu folks such as Senju (I think? Forgive me if I'm missing a nuance): there's some good articles online and you can find the writings of shirnan and rennyo translated, but for the most part yeah you gotta like look REALLY hard to find any good ones. the important thing to realize is that dharma talks and temples do not lead to buddhahood, but only amida. essentially, the temples and the talks are there to help people understand the call that amida is making everyday. it's kinda like how calvinists believe that everyone is predestined for heaven or hell, but still have church services weekly
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Jun 27, 2017 13:40
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seminaries are just really bad at teaching people about religions other than christianity unless you specifically do theology of religions, and even then you gotta be really, really fuckin good at it to not come out the other side with some hosed up ideas about like islam or hinduism or buddhism or somethin
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Aug 15, 2017 10:12
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Annual Prophet posted:You should suggest he contact Fr. Robert Kennedy, S.J. or aloysius pieris, also sj
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Aug 15, 2017 14:12
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i'd argue that constantly trying to compare everything you learn about another religion to something in christianity at the start of interreligious dialogue amounts to shooting yourself in the foot. you're far more likely to misinterpret why things are done if you constantly go back to your own religious faith. better to try to understand buddhism on buddhisms many terms than apply it to christianity. once you have a firm foundation THEN you can begin to look for similarities
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Aug 15, 2017 17:32
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all i can say is, having taken classes with catholic seminarians, you're giving them more credit than i'd give, especially if they're not jesuit
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Aug 15, 2017 20:37
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considering how common sick person blaming akin to the friends of job is among christians of all stripes those are some pretty heavy stones to throw in s glass house
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Aug 15, 2017 21:29
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| # ¿ May 9, 2024 09:40 |
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none that i know of, that's kinda the point of nirvana
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Aug 20, 2017 03:10
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