Are Buddhism and Catholicism compatible with each other?

[InquisitiveCath]

Catholicism believes in the existence of God.

Buddhism denies this.

Ok…my fellow Christians and Catholics. Let’s clear this one up right now. Because frankly, this bandied opinion is starting to annoy me. We live in the 21s century and we shouldn’t be perpetuating opinions that belong back in the 18th and 19th century.

Furthermore, given what our Church has had to suffer through, i’d like to take the stand that if we wish to criticize, we criticize on what people actually believe in - not what we say they believe in.

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From a previous thread on this forum:

Because Westerners are so focused on the concept of God, they have an unfortunate tendency to judge all other religious configurations based on that concept.

When Buddhism first came West, it was done via the Pali Canon of the Theravada tradition. And the work was primarily completed during the Victorian era by the sanskrit scholar Eugene Burnouf. At the time, Buddhism was interpreted by the Victorian scholars and interested scientists of the time as a tradition that saw the universe governed by natural laws sans divine intervention. There was nothing Supernatural about Buddhism, or so the claim went.

However, the Buddhism which so fascinated the Victorian mind (and later on portions of the modern Western mind) is deemed by both modern scholars of Buddhism in the West and by those lineage holders of the various Buddhist traditions in its indigenous Asian milieu as simply a Construct. It was a “Buddhism of the Texts” without any recourse to how it was actually practiced “on the ground” in its environment.

The narrative progresses something to the effect of “We Westerners saved Buddhism from its native environment since it developed cultural baggage that flooded the religion with superstition.” etc. etc.

So does Buddhism believe in deities? Sort of.

Theravada Buddhism holds no belief in an independent Creator who rules the world. However, it has countless references to various deities ~ who are ALL subject to the universal law of karma. They live, they love, and they die - and get reincarnated.

So they exist, but they are not exactly relevant to bringing one out of dukkha/suffering. Primarily because the bad things that happen to you in your life aren’t the judgments of the divine hurling thunderbolts down on your head (although these gods can help/hurt you since they too are sentient beings who have their own agendas).

Rather the ground state of consciousness from which all mental activities arise (bhavanga) is the source of karma and hence of the phenomenal world experienced by a person. Defiled and unclear, you are bound to make mistakes and push yourself into the endless cycle of death and rebirth.

Now this is where the Victorian strain of thought would dismiss those deities as “cultural add-ons” that infected “pure Buddhism.” And this is where the Sri Lankan and Thai buddhist monks would put their foot down and say that’s complete hogwash.

The game completely changes when we start considering Mahayana Buddhism.

Long story short, the Mahayana considering the Theravada Buddhists to be absorbing the “idiot’s Guide to Buddhism.” This is not to say what they learned is “false,” rather its more for people who are not ready to absorb the more advanced teachings of the Buddha.

The Mahayana in its various forms (which is probably what your dealing with in Japan, unless your hanging around Nara these days), teaches the “trikaya” doctrine ~ three bodies.

So Buddha was an Enlightened being, but the Buddha we saw “Siddartha Gautama” is only an Emanation of a higher being. This was its Physical Body, the Nirmanakaya.

Skipping to the 3rd body, the Dharmakaya is “beginningless, unborn, undying, permanent, etc. Nondually pervading the minds of all unenlightened and enlightened beings alike.”

So while there are numerous Buddhas preaching the Dharma to various worlds, all of these are simply Nirmanakaya bodies of the One Dharmakaya which transcendent of all conceptual elaborations and existent throughout all Space and Time.

Now is that a God? Depends on how you look at it i suppose. IMHO, it seems resonant with the “God of the Philosophers” that the Greek philosophers posited existing above and beyond the petty squabbling gods that inhabit their worldview.

The thing that must be, in order for other things to Exist (or, exist Impermanently at least).

 

[InquisitiveCath]

And Part 2:

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All the sects based off the Lotus Sutra (so that’s Tendai/Tiantai, Nichiren, Pureland i think) have a foundational belief in the Eternity of the Buddha.

Since I attained Buddhahood
the number of kalpas that have passed
is an immeasurable hundreds, thousands, ten thousands,
millions, trillions, asamkhyas.
Constantly I have preached the Law, teaching, converting
countless millions of living beings,
causing them to enter the Buddha way,
all this for immeasurable kalpas.
In order to save living beings,
as an expedient means I appear to enter nirvana
but in truth I do not pass into extinction.
I am always here preaching the Law.
I am always here,
but through my transcendental powers
I make it so that living beings in their befuddlement
do not see me even when close by.
When the multitude see that I have passed into extinction,
far and wide they offer alms to my relics.

Translation: The whole discussion of entering into extinction is an “upaya” a skillful means used by “Cosmic Buddha” to nudge people in the right direction of getting rid of their bad karma. The truth is the Buddha is Eternal. Unfortunately smaller minds are unable to handle that truth, so Cosmic Buddha has to put into terms that they can understand.

And apparently an understanding of that Truth is in fact superior to all the dissections of the five aggregates the Theravada go into.

Now, perhaps this is my Catholicism getting in the way, but that “Cosmic Buddha” pretty much sounds like a God, even though the Buddhists wouldn’t use that term. But, call a Duck a Duck.

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Well, those two snippets from the thread should at least illustrate to you that this whole “Buddhists are all Atheists” is a bit of a skewed assessment.

Some are, because some schools don’t particular care about the metaphysical issues attached to Buddhism. They deny supernatural entities and reincarnation.

But that’s like saying Evangelical Christianity or Mormonism is representative of Catholicism or Greek Orthodoxy.

Essentially they have psychologized the religion.

Its like Thomas Jefferson’s Bible - he kept all of the ethical teachings of Jesus but snipped all of the miracles out.

 

[aspirant]

Yes, there are differences between Buddhist schools.

What I was saying about Nirvana before is something I’ve heard from both Theravadans and Mahayanists, so it crosses schools, but I’m sure there are variations even within these.

the West’s knowledge of Buddhism is a bit…skewed i suppose?

I think a lot of older Western texts about Buddhism are inaccurate. But even the more accurate presentations one finds these days are not easily compared to Western philosophies and religions because terms are used so differently (e.g. meditation and contemplation).

 

[Ahimsa]

Now this is where the Victorian strain of thought would dismiss those deities as “cultural add-ons” that infected “pure Buddhism.” And this is where the Sri Lankan and Thai buddhist monks would put their foot down and say that’s complete hogwash.

I would add, further, that for Sri Lankan, Thai, and other Theravada Buddhists the Buddha himself is the “Teacher of Gods and Men”, is the one who has gone beyond the Gods.

 

[Ghosty]

Theravada Buddhism holds no belief in an independent Creator who rules the world. However, it has countless references to various deities ~ who are ALL subject to the universal law of karma. They live, they love, and they die - and get reincarnated.

In other words they are not God, or even gods in the sense the word is used in the West. They are merely creatures that are slightly more powerful, but otherwise utterly identical to us; they might as well be the difference between an adult and a child, or a billionaire and a working stiff. In such circumstances it is perfectly legitimate to say that they don’t believe in deities, using the Western definition of the term.

As for the non-Theravada traditions, I think it’s safe to say that they depart substantially from Siddartha’s actual teachings. Some of them are closer to the Truth, IMO, than Theravada, but they break very much with the actual teachings of the Buddha on some fundamental points. It’s not unlike the relationship between Joseph Smith’s Mormon teachings and Apostolic Christianity, it seems.

Peace and God bless!

 

[InquisitiveCath]

In other words they are not God, or even gods in the sense the word is used in the West.They are merely creatures that are slightly more powerful, but otherwise utterly identical to us; they might as well be the difference between an adult and a child, or a billionaire and a working stiff. In such circumstances it is perfectly legitimate to say that they don’t believe in deities, using the Western definition of the term.

I wouldn’t go so far to say that. In terms of polytheistic religions in the West, you can kill gods. Mostly because a higher god decides to smite them. Or traveling to the Underworld/Hades/The Duat/etc. tends to have a corrupting effect unless you happen to be the god of said domain. Heck, the whole Norse pantheon of deities dies off in Ragnarok. Osiris is chopped up into itty bitty little pieces until his wife resurrects him.

And you’ve closed the gap a little too close as well. They aren’t just “slightly more powerful” because they interact with reality on levels that material beings cannot. They can curse whole generations of humans, reshape material reality, etc. etc.

What they do not fit, which is essentially a culturally bound construct, is the idea of the “God of the Philosophers” - this “thing” that must exist for other things to exist.

As for the non-Theravada traditions, I think it’s safe to say that they depart substantially from Siddartha’s actual teachings. Some of them are closer to the Truth, IMO, than Theravada, but they break very much with the actual teachings of the Buddha on some fundamental points. It’s not unlike the relationship between Joseph Smith’s Mormon teachings and Apostolic Christianity, it seems.

Safe to say…if your a 19th century Buddhologist.

First, none of the Mahayana schools actually jettison the Theravada corpus. The Four Noble Truths, the Twelve Links of Dependent Origination, etc. etc. These are the Cornerstones of Buddhism, and they persist throughout all variations of it.

Second, what are Buddha’s “actual teachings” beyond the Basics?

There were 13 Nikayas or Early Schools of Buddhism, of which both the Theravada and the early Mahayana schools came out of. I’ve read the literature of about 7 of those schools, and i can tell you that while the approach is generally the same, the metaphysical commitments are strikingly different.

The confusion is made worse by the fact of Buddha’s Silence to the following questions:

Is the universe eternal?
Is it not eternal?
Is the universe finite?
Is it infinite?

Is soul the same as the body?
Is the soul one thing and the body another?

Does the Tathagata exist after death?
Does He not exist after death?
Does He both (at the same time) exist and not exist after death?
Does He both (at the same time) neither exist nor not exist?

He refused to answer the interlocutor because none of these questions would bring him out of suffering (ie: your focusing on the wrong thing buddy).

But because he never gave a definitive public answer, literally every Buddhist school has interpreted that Silence in one manner or another.

Some say he couldn’t answer it, others would say he gave answers to specific disciples he deemed ready to receive the Truth.

Furthermore, modern scholarship in Buddhism is actively undermining the idea that the Theravada are the sole claimants to the words of the Buddha. Remember what i said about Super-Rationalist Victorians? They pushed aside the Mahayana precisely because they saw aspects of the religion that were, well, if i may paraphrase one writer, “Similar to the superstitions of Catholicism and early Christianity.”

If your already invested with a world view like that, of course your going to say that one side is True and the other side is “Degenerate.”

 

[Ghosty]

I wouldn’t go so far to say that. In terms of polytheistic religions in the West, you can kill gods. Mostly because a higher god decides to smite them. Or traveling to the Underworld/Hades/The Duat/etc. tends to have a corrupting effect unless you happen to be the god of said domain. Heck, the whole Norse pantheon of deities dies off in Ragnarok. Osiris is chopped up into itty bitty little pieces until his wife resurrects him.

I didn’t say anything about mortality, and I didn’t claim that immortality was a trait of divinity. Killing a god does make it something other than a god. What makes a being a god, in the sense that Bp. Basil is using and which the Western religions support, is that the being represents some underlying, fundamental power of the universe; that is not the case for Theravada Buddhist gods. Such “gods” are even more deluded than humans, and are no more or less a foundational aspect of reality. They are merely more “powerful” beings, but no closer to the “Truth” (they are just as far, if not further, from Nibanna, being more trapped in their own ideas of self).

In the West, and especially as the word has come to be used, the gods represent fundamental aspects of reality. Hades IS the underworld as well as being a person, for example. In Theravada Buddhism there is no such correlation between reality and divine beings, and in fact it is quite the opposite.

As for putting Theravada and Mahayana on the same footing with relation to the Buddha, I’m afraid I’ve seen nothing to support this. My step-father was a Theravada monk, and I’ve learned about Buddhism from Buddhists themselves. Everything I’ve read and learned indicates that the Mahayana came along much later, “filling in the gaps” with their own approaches. The approach of the direct disciples of the Buddha was most certainly the Theravada school, and this much is simply historical fact and has nothing to do with religious questions or accretions. One can argue that the later Mahayana were “closer to the truth”, just as people argue that the Protestant Reformation was “getting back” to the original Faith, but one can’t argue that the Mahayana, with their metaphysical worldview which is so different from the Theravada who learned at Buddha’s feet, were the direct successors of the Buddha.

Peace and God bless!

 

[InquisitiveCath]

Killing a god does make it something other than a god. What makes a being a god, in the sense that Bp. Basil is using and which the Western religions support, is that the being represents some underlying, fundamental power of the universe; that is not the case for Theravada Buddhist gods.

Yeah, Bp. Basil is drawing of an intellectual tradition that defined divinity to be that way. It works if your a Jewish, Christian, or Muslim because those particular traditions accepted those definitions and ran with it.

And like i said, its what the Monotheistic religions of the West agree with. The status of “Underlying, Fundamental Power of the Universe” was solely reserved for the Good or The Prime Mover in Aristotle’s construction of it. I have but only to turn to the Reconstructionist Pagans and early Graeco-Roman religion and we see a very different picture.

As for putting Theravada and Mahayana on the same footing with relation to the Buddha, I’m afraid I’ve seen nothing to support this. My step-father was a Theravada monk, and I’ve learned about Buddhism from Buddhists themselves. Everything I’ve read and learned indicates that the Mahayana came along much later, “filling in the gaps” with their own approaches. The approach of the direct disciples of the Buddha was most certainly the Theravada school, and this much is simply historical fact and has nothing to do with religious questions or accretions. One can argue that the later Mahayana were “closer to the truth”, just as people argue that the Protestant Reformation was “getting back” to the original Faith, but one can’t argue that the Mahayana, with their metaphysical worldview which is so different from the Theravada who learned at Buddha’s feet, were the direct successors of the Buddha.

I’m sorry, i can’t simply accept terms based on “my step-father is a Buddhist monk.”

Given the fact that i’ve interacted half my life with Thai, Tibetan, Japanese, and Chinese monks and lay practitioners.

And yes i’ve actually seen the arguments that they are in fact the direct successors - i’ve even seen them argue (perhaps dialogue is the better term since argue implies something more rancorous) with each other over that matter.

And i’ve seen secularist scholarship errode both viewpoints. The sticking point goes around what exactly the Buddha taught as a metaphysical worldview. The Theravada Abhidharmic texts which outline that tradition’s metaphysics came at least by the third century BCE. That’s a bit of ways after the time of the Buddha.

Theravada can claim all it wants, but that’s because they are the only surviving school of early Buddhism. For crying out loud, the Sarvastivadin and the Theravadin chronicles disagree about were the first Schism in their religious community occurred!

I mean, if that’s the criteria we’re judging things by, then i guess Bart Ehrman is right when he criticizes Orthodox-Catholics by stating that the early Church Fathers attained their position as we know it because they simply “outlasted” the Marcionites, Ebionites, Judaized Christians, and Gnostics.

 

[Ghosty]

And like i said, its what the Monotheistic religions of the West agree with. The status of “Underlying, Fundamental Power of the Universe” was solely reserved for the Good or The Prime Mover in Aristotle’s construction of it. I have but only to turn to the Reconstructionist Pagans and early Graeco-Roman religion and we see a very different picture.

I’m not talking about a single, underlying power of the universe, I’m talking about powers of the universe. You keep absurdly minimizing the substance of my points. Hades is not the fundamental power of the universe, and can’t be reduced to Aristotle’s “Prime Mover”, but Hades remains ***a ***fundamental universal principle. This same concept of deity is found in both the Eastern and Western theistic religions, including ancient Greek Paganism, Hinduism, and Shintoism. Theravada Buddhism doesn’t have deities in this sense, and the “deities” it does have are simply more powerful self-deluded entities. Any being, no matter how powerful, that clings to “self” fails to attain Nirvana, and the “deities” of Theravada Buddhism most certainly fall into this category.

I’m sorry, i can’t simply accept terms based on “my step-father is a Buddhist monk.”

Given the fact that i’ve interacted half my life with Thai, Tibetan, Japanese, and Chinese monks and lay practitioners.

All you’ve presented so far is some notion that any concept of Buddhism that disagrees with you is based on Victorian-era Eurocentric exceptionalism. I’m saying that the presentation of Theravada being the most ancient form of Buddhism has nothing to do with Euro-centric understandings, and can be found in Buddhism itself (as presented by Theravada monks, like my step-father, without any solid refutation from Mahayana Buddhists and other, more distant off-shoots) and from the existant historical record.

Even you admit that the historical evidence places Theravada Buddhism closer “to the source”, but you still insist that the other forms of Buddhism are more representative. Your argument has no basis in reality.

And i’ve seen secularist scholarship errode both viewpoints. The sticking point goes around what exactly the Buddha taught as a metaphysical worldview. The Theravada Abhidharmic texts which outline that tradition’s metaphysics came at least by the third century BCE. That’s a bit of ways after the time of the Buddha.

Which still puts it centuries before anything that can be considered Mahayana, and only a century or so from Buddha himself. That would make Theravada Buddhism comparable to the records of Apostolic Christianity, if you exclude the New Testament itself.

No matter how you cut it, Theravada sits closer to Buddha (historically speaking) than anything the Mahayana schools can put forward. Again, your argument holds as much water as the Baptist “Trail of Blood” which supposes the existance of 16th century Protestant theology in 1st century Apostolic Christianity based on a lack of evidence against it. It has nothing to do with “outlasting”, and everything to do with the fact that there is absolutely no record of anything like Mahayana Buddhism prior to the turn of the “Common Era”. We know what the contemporaries of the Apostles taught, and we know what the contemporaries of the Theravada school taught, but we have no indication of Baptists alongside St. Ireneus, and no indication of Mahayana prior to the time after Christ.

Regardless, the bottom line is this: nothing that Buddha taught approaches the concept of deity, and nothing his nearest historical successors taught approaches the concept of deity. Your attempt to dress down other posters is baseless, even aside from the fact that it doesn’t address the substance of their points.

In short, the only Buddhism that teaches anything approaching the concept of deity was certainly NOT taught by Buddha according to any evidence (the absence of evidence either way does not support deities in Buddhism, after all), and whether or not Theravada Buddhism is completely true to the Buddha’s teaching it doesn’t change the fact that the oldest extant Buddhism does not accept the concept of deity. Even the forms of Buddhism that do support some concept of deity do not approach the Catholic concept of divinity, which puts an unbridgable chasm between Buddhism and Catholicism (which is the actual point of the this thread).

God bless.

 

[rossum]

Which still puts it centuries before anything that can be considered Mahayana, and only a century or so from Buddha himself.

We can place the Vinaya (rules for monks) to within about 100 years of the death of the Buddha because we have the Mahasangika, Sarvastivada and Theravada versions of the Vinaya still extant. We can place the Suttas to at least 100 years later because we have the Sarvastivadin and Theravadin versions which are essentially identical. Unfortunately the Mahasangika versions are now lost, and it is probably from the Mahasangikas that the Mahayana derived. The Sarvastivada and Theravada Abhidharmas are very different and so date from after the two schools diverged.

The Mahasangikas go back to well before the Theravada/Sarvastivada split. We have written versions of the Mahayana sutras from before Christ, and all the early Sutras (Lotus, Perfection of Wisdom, Lankavatara) have verse sections in Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit so the oral versions will have been earlier than the writter versions, as with the Pali suttas.

Regardless, the bottom line is this: nothing that Buddha taught approaches the concept of deity, and nothing his nearest historical successors taught approaches the concept of deity. Your attempt to dress down other posters is baseless, even aside from the fact that it doesn’t address the substance of their points.

An excerpt from the Brahmajala sutta, Digha Nikaya 1:“That honourable personage is the Brahma, the great Brahma, the conqueror, the unconquered, the all-seeing, the subjector of all to his wishes, the omnipotent, the maker, the creator, the supreme, the controller, the one confirmed in the practice of jhana, and father to all that have been and shall be. That honourable Brahma has created us. He is permanent, stable, eternal, immutable and as everlasting as all things eternal. We, who were created by the honourable Brahma, are impermanent, changeable, short-lived and mortal. Thus have we come into this human world.”

Bramajala sutta 44
That section of the Brahmajala sutta describes who that Brahma is, why He thinks what He does and why He is mistaken. The Buddha did deal with the concept of an all powerful creator and showed why that concept is in error.

rossum

 

[InquisitiveCath]

I’m not talking about a single, underlying power of the universe, I’m talking about powers of the universe. You keep absurdly minimizing the substance of my points. Hades is not the fundamental power of the universe, and can’t be reduced to Aristotle’s “Prime Mover”, but Hades remains ***a ***fundamental universal principle. This same concept of deity is found in both the Eastern and Western theistic religions, including ancient Greek Paganism, Hinduism, and Shintoism. Theravada Buddhism doesn’t have deities in this sense, and the “deities” it does have are simply more powerful self-deluded entities. Any being, no matter how powerful, that clings to “self” fails to attain Nirvana, and the “deities” of Theravada Buddhism most certainly fall into this category.

“Absurdly minimizing?” Great wonderful, let’s enter the world of the pejorative.

And you can’t necessarily make that claim either - Hades can’t be a fundamental power of the universe. He attained his position, and like most of the other gods, can be dethroned from said position. Zeus won his crown by killing his father who killed his father.

The Office, the Seat, if you will, can be deemed fundamental in the sense that the “portfolio” represents a concept. The Occupant can change however.

The sole exceptions to this in the ancient world were obscure powers like the Fates, the God of the Philosophers, and the Mystery Cults (Isis, Mithras, et al) who ascribed to said deities something more than just “mere divinity” (immortality, ability to shape destiny, etc.) These Gods cannot be destroyed, they cannot be dethroned. They don’t merely hold a seat - they ARE (= or Equal to) their concepts. its embedded into their very nature. They are unable to stop being who they are, whereas i can trap Mars in a jar and declare myself the God of War.

All you’ve presented so far is some notion that any concept of Buddhism that disagrees with you

Not me - i’m not an originator of this. How can I be?

I’m saying that the presentation of Theravada being the most ancient form of Buddhism has nothing to do with Euro-centric understandings, and can be found in Buddhism itself (as presented by Theravada monks, like my step-father, without any solid refutation from Mahayana Buddhists and other, more distant off-shoots) and from the existant historical record.

Understood, but i’m saying that one of the primary reason why we’ve come to accept this in the West is because that particular line of thought was favored due to sociological conditions.

and must you always bring up your step-father? I’m not saying that as a pejorative, i’m saying that…mm… how to put this.

I can point to Buddhist monks who say for instance, that Zen Buddhists are not Buddhists for whatever particular reason. And i can point to others who say that despite the oddness or the unorthodox style of Ch’an/Zen, they’d still consider them as part of the Sangha.

Do you understand what i’m trying to say? Doesn’t really give me much to work off of, regardless of whether i might have a personal relationship with the interlocutor.

Even you admit that the historical evidence places Theravada Buddhism closer “to the source”, but you still insist that the other forms of Buddhism are more representative. Your argument has no basis in reality.

And this is where you’ve completely misunderstood me. I’m not insisting other forms of Buddhism are more representative. Heck, this line of argumentation sits very uncomfortably with the Tantric Buddhists (i don’t really understand why though).

I’m saying that i can’t render an exact judgment.

Think about an atheist for a second. He sees the early Church, he sees all these little random sects running around doing their own thing. They have their own set of Gospels, or interpretations of the Synoptic Gospels and John. He can read the Church Fathers polemical attacks and read the Counters to those attacks.

He can watch while every single one claim that they hold truth of Christ. But ask him to render a judgment on who actually does? Lacking faith in the propositions, he can’t.

What he can do is be as careful as possible. He can point for instance that the earliest extant texts are Paul’s Letters. But what does that mean? Was Paul who he said he was (and of course he’s disinclined to believe the Saul of Tarsus story) or did he just “hijack” Christianity as some people claim.

I’m in a VERY similar position with Buddhism. I obviously don’t believe in Buddhism. I don’t hold the doctrines of reincarnation or karma. I can point to the earliest extant texts, i can hear the counter arguments of both sides.

How could i possibly render a precise judgment?

And i can’t accept any of the arguments of adherents to the tradition precisely because i MUST take them as being biased positions (regardless of how nice a man your step-father might be, or my friend’s father whose a Nichiren monk).

All i can do is describe the positions of all sides in question.

 

[InquisitiveCath]

Which still puts it centuries before anything that can be considered Mahayana, and only a century or so from Buddha himself. That would make Theravada Buddhism comparable to the records of Apostolic Christianity, if you exclude the New Testament itself.

Yes, but i’ll make a point for Christian Exceptionalism. Getting Doctrine right (in fact i think a few people claim we invented the concept of religious doctrine) is an obsession that started within the boundaries of Christianity. Because unlike most other religions, ours is centered not on a divine law or set of rules, but on whether or not a particular being was more than just a man. Writing things down (and getting it right) is overly critical for us.

Oral tradition tends to be other format, which is something Buddhism did at its outset.

Can you be so certain that between the time of Buddha and the time we start seeing the Nikayas collected, we don’t see things that the Buddha said start slipping out of the tradition or things being inserted?

I know i know your going to say

the oldest extant Buddhism does not accept the concept of deity

but if you remember the origin of this thread the person who asked this question asked whether Buddhism and Catholicism were compatible.

Do you remember my response? Maybe. It depends on what variation (i mean, “Western Psychological Buddhism” doesn’t really run counter to the dictates of the Church, any more than holding a political ideology. Being a Tibetan Budhdist would).

However, you’ve taken it upon yourself to basically cancel out whole systems and descriptions of Buddhism as its practiced outside of your step-fathers traditions.

If you’ve often made comparisons to the Protestant Christianity in the process. So i mean, what are you driving at? Protestants aren’t Christians because they happen to believe in differently from us?

no record of anything like Mahayana Buddhism prior to the turn of the “Common Era”

And this is where it gets dicey right? This is where the arguments come from whether or not Mahayana is the logical outgrowth of either Mahasanghika or Sarvastivada.

Your attempt to dress down other posters is baseless, even aside from the fact that it doesn’t address the substance of their points.

God bless.

Well, aren’t those two sentiments rather ironic when paired together.

Dress down posters? Is that what you honestly think this is about?

That’s my whole goal here, i somehow get my kicks for doing this?

I don’t even know how to respond to that.

I mean, what do you want me to say. mea culpa?

Even the forms of Buddhism that do support some concept of deity do not approach the Catholic concept of divinity, which puts an unbridgable chasm between Buddhism and Catholicism (which is the actual point of the this thread).

Well. Here’s something we can agree on.

 

[TheAtheist]

This has to be, one of the most informative and interesting threads currently on these boards.

Even Rossum has decided to grace the thread with his presence. A clear sign of its caliber, take note 1st time readers.

But may this humble atheist make a comment?

Inquisitve. Ghosty. I think your fighting over absolutely nothing. Because you’ve misinterpreted each other.

Inq over here, thinks and talks like an academic. And like most academics, he wants a level of certainty. Barring that level of certainty, he can only try to show variation.

this whole “Buddhists are all Atheists” is a bit of a skewed assessment.

That’s your quote Inq, i’m holding you to that. I’m guessing you wanted to show that not all Buddhists were all atheists. That its more like a Venn Diagram.

Ghosty however, seems to have interpreted your actions as being some sort of haughty high and mighty forum posting basher.

He’s not completely in the wrong in the sense that if you had just explicitly stated that’s what you wanted to do in the first place, well this thread wouldn’t have run off its tracks.

So say your mea culpa Inq.

Conversely, Ghosty, if that’s what you really thought. You could have asked for clarification. That and, you kind of shifted your argument.

I think it’s safe to say that they depart substantially from Siddartha’s actual teachings

to

whether or not Theravada Buddhism is completely true to the Buddha’s teaching it doesn’t change the fact that the oldest extant Buddhism does not accept the concept of deity

In Quote 1 the implication is that you actually know the actual teachings of Siddartha.

Then you slide away from that in the Quote 2 by trading on the fact that the school you’ve mentioned is the oldest extant version.

As to the whole concept of deity point, both of you are talking past each other. Inq seems to interpret your actions as an attempt to invalidate if i may use his words, all other types of Buddhism. The subtext for that is a concern for religious tolerance i’m assuming given the “are Protestants not Christians then?” comment.

Ghosty seems far more concerned about what i jokingly call ChristoJudaHindilam. Extreme syncretism where the god of Christianity = the Raelian supreme high commander or whatever supreme being you wish to posit.

Incidentally, Inq’s characterization of the atheist position in terms of Christianity is spot on. Well, except on when the young kiddies are yelling about Flying Spaghetti Monsters and Invisible Unicorns.

If you accept a skeptical standpoint neither tradition nor texts are good enough. Unless Einstein’s wrong and we can bend time to go backward to actually hear what the Indian prince said, assuming he existed in the first place, we cannot actually know with a level of Cartesian certainty just what the actual words of the Buddha were. anymore than we can know the actual words of Jesus.

Otherwise, your left relying upon the institutions that exist or the writings that are left behind. Let me emphasize that for someone who is an extreme skeptic: That is an act of faith.

Things like carbon dating or linguistic analysis might allow you to exclude certain things. But it will never get you that 100% or at least 90% level of certainty.

So you have one of two options. Withhold judgment or take up a side.

Inq’s chosen the former by displaying all the holes, Ghosty chosen the later by working with the evidence at hand.

You folks are just never going to agree.

I see two very sharp minds whose posts i read with interest. And the best you can do is to offend each other.

so why even bother?

 

[rossum]

Even Rossum has decided to grace the thread with his presence. A clear sign of its caliber, take note 1st time readers.

"I would like to thank many people without whom I would not be here today. Firstly my parents, without whom I would not be. Secondly Pat the Taxi Driver without whom I would not be here but still be waiting at the airport..." Modest? *Moi?*
rossum

 

[LayingHands]

We can place the Vinaya (rules for monks) to within about 100 years of the death of the Buddha because we have the Mahasangika, Sarvastivada and Theravada versions of the Vinaya still extant. We can place the Suttas to at least 100 years later because we have the Sarvastivadin and Theravadin versions which are essentially identical. Unfortunately the Mahasangika versions are now lost, and it is probably from the Mahasangikas that the Mahayana derived. The Sarvastivada and Theravada Abhidharmas are very different and so date from after the two schools diverged.

The Mahasangikas go back to well before the Theravada/Sarvastivada split. We have written versions of the Mahayana sutras from before Christ, and all the early Sutras (Lotus, Perfection of Wisdom, Lankavatara) have verse sections in Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit so the oral versions will have been earlier than the writter versions, as with the Pali suttas.

An excerpt from the Brahmajala sutta, Digha Nikaya 1:“That honourable personage is the Brahma, the great Brahma, the conqueror, the unconquered, the all-seeing, the subjector of all to his wishes, the omnipotent, the maker, the creator, the supreme, the controller, the one confirmed in the practice of jhana, and father to all that have been and shall be. That honourable Brahma has created us. He is permanent, stable, eternal, immutable and as everlasting as all things eternal. We, who were created by the honourable Brahma, are impermanent, changeable, short-lived and mortal. Thus have we come into this human world.”

Bramajala sutta 44
That section of the Brahmajala sutta describes who that Brahma is, why He thinks what He does and why He is mistaken. The Buddha did deal with the concept of an all powerful creator and showed why that concept is in error.

rossum

Goodness, after all that I wondered how long it would be before someone remembered that Buddhism is originally a Hindu based religion from Brahmanism through India! The Budda was not the first nor the last Budda (Enlightened One)…even Judaism, Christianity and Catholics have to thank the Hindu Brahma Religion for their incorporation of this 1st Wisdom Religion foundation, which was taken and included into the Old and New Testaments understanding of the Creation Trinity (GODHEAD TRINITY, i.e. Brahma Trimurti)…Brahmahism was an oral tradition millenia before it was written around 1500 B.C. So everyone did this or that, decided to believe this way or that way…bottom line, ALL the world religions which have a Triad, Trinity, Triple Godhead Creation originated from Brahmanism…Brahma, Vishu and Siva…