Buddhism, Hinduism and Christianity fitting together?

[OrdinaryMelkite]

Nor is it Buddhism. The material world is seen as deceptive. It is not nothing, but neither is it what it seems to be.

Gods are merely another form of living being in the world who themselves need to attain enlightenment and to realise the deceptive nature of the world. Buddhism is not strictly atheist; it just does not consider gods to be of any real importance.

rossum

That is somewhat why Buddha refused to talk about an afterlife------the afterlife, like the Gods, tended to be unimportant. That is why Buddhism is probably the religion par excellence of the HERE and NOW (leaving out Taoism outis for a moment, since it more of a philosophy than a religion, attempts to make it one notwithstanding—and Confucianism, which is more of a political and social philosophy rather than truly a religion).

OTOH-----
Buddhism does not emphaisze or endorse an eternal life in a heaven with one’s God—t simply says that after one achieve’s Nirvana one goes out like a candle being “put out.” One (or whatever WAS one) just dissipates into the universe. Loss of “identity,”----which according to Buddhism, one never REALLY had in the first place.
Is that not pure atheistic pantheism?
I think so. You may disagree------that’s fine.

I’ll take good ole Christianity with its boring soul and eternity in heaven or hell, thanks.

 

[Sufjon]

This is the problem: the common, though incorrect, belief that Hinduism (leaving Buddhism out of this for a minute) is “pantheistic”.

Pantheism is the equation of the material universe with “God”, such that there is no non-material reality. Everything is composed of matter/energy, and a pantheists places the label “God” upon this collection of matter/energy.

That’s not Hinduism.

In the Gita, Krishna explains that (1) there is the realm of matter/energy (called the “gunas”); and (2) there is That Which Transcends, and yet Pervades, matter/energy:

“He who faithfully serves Me
with the yoga of devotion, going
beyond the three gunas, is ready
to attain the ultimate freedom.” – BG 14:26

A commentary on this verse indicates that the realm of matter/energy is not to be equated with God (even though God pervades the material cosmos, nonetheless): “In this verse Lord Krishna is specifically answering how such a jiva or embodied being transcends the three gunas or modes of material nature. One who is exclusively devoted to the Supreme Lord alone without cessation…is able to completely transcend all influences of the three gunas and achieving the state of the brahman or the spiritual substratum pervading all existence becomes worthy of moksa or liberation from material existence and ultimately attains the Supreme Lord Krishna.”

Well said.

Your friend
Sufjon

 

[rossum]

That is somewhat why Buddha refused to talk about an afterlife------the afterlife, like the Gods, tended to be unimportant.

Heavens and hells are relatively unimportant because they are temporary. Nirvana is important so the Buddha was willing to talk about it. He tended to use negative descriptions; there are problems with describing the ultimate when you have to use non-ultimate words.There is, monks, an unborn, an unbecome, an unmade, an unconditioned. If there were not that unborn, unbecome, unmade, unconditioned, no escape would be possible from the born, become, made, conditioned. But precisely because there is an unborn, unbecome, unmade, unconditioned, escape from the born, become, made, conditioned is possible.

• Udana 8.3

That is why Buddhism is probably the religion par excellence of the HERE and NOW

Correct. Ask any enlightened Buddhist “Where were you when you reached enlightenment?” and “What time was it when you reached enlightenment?”; the answers are “Here,” and “Now.” We can only attain enlightenment here and now.

Buddhism does not emphaisze or endorse an eternal life in a heaven with one’s God—t simply says that after one achieve’s Nirvana one goes out like a candle being “put out.” One (or whatever WAS one) just dissipates into the universe. Loss of “identity,”----which according to Buddhism, one never REALLY had in the first place.

Be careful here, all descriptions of nirvana are incorrect. You are right about identity; what you think is your identity isn’t.

rossum

 

[benedictus2]

Of the many incarnations of God in human form, yours is indeed the only one I know of that started a chain of churches. He did mention founding one, but insofar as I know, He didn’t prescribe any particular permutation. There were a number of initial iterations that condensed into one about 300 years later, split into two about a 1,000 years after that, and then countless numbers of branches since, so I don;t think anyone could say that any particular one resembles what He might have had in mind.

Sorry but Christ established only one Church- the Catholic Church. The pride of men thought they can go ahead and start one themselves.

As for Hinduism, it is true, that while we have incarnations of God,

Who?

we have no Colonel Sanders or Ray Crock figure as a founder. There are no franchise rights from a centralized corporate headquarters, no formal hierarchy, no one with property rights to corporate holdings like a city, buildings, coffers, private corporate jets, swami-mobiles and so on. All our incarnations left was a message of spirituality and a promise of unity with them. Not much to glom onto from a materialistic perspective. You do have the market cornered on all that, and I yield to your accomplishment on that regard. You can also keep it for yourselves, because none of those things lead anywhere but away from what you sought.

You are losing steam Sujon. This to me is an attempt at obfuscation - give a lot of irrelevant information and hopefully the other person will not notice that you have not provided any relevant ones.

Of course I never said that He wasn’t God, or that He claimed to be. But to me He looks like all the others who hold the same claim. That is the difference between what you see and what I see.

Your friend
Sufjon

Who are the others?

 

[benedictus2]

You’re kidding right? On one hand you ask me who Hindus consider to be incarnations of God and then you tell it’s not quite true to say that you know very little about Hinduism.

Your friend
Sufjon

Again, who? Or don’t you know the personalities in your own religion?

 

[benedictus2]

Nor is it Buddhism. The material world is seen as deceptive. It is not nothing, but neither is it what it seems to be.

Gods are merely another form of living being in the world who themselves need to attain enlightenment and to realise the deceptive nature of the world. Buddhism is not strictly atheist; it just does not consider gods to be of any real importance.

rossum

So Buddhism is polytheistic?

 

[rossum]

So Buddhism is polytheistic?

Yes. There are many gods. Their primary purpose in scripture is to applaud at the right places when the Buddha is speaking.

rossum

 

[benedictus2]

Yes. There are many gods. Their primary purpose in scripture is to applaud at the right places when the Buddha is speaking.

rossum

I take it you are being sarcastic. So obviously the gods you are referring to are not gods at all considering they also need to attain to enlightenment.

If the material world is an illusion, does that mean you are an illusion?

 

[benedictus2]

You’re kidding right? On one hand you ask me who Hindus consider to be incarnations of God and **then you tell it’s not quite true to say that you know very little about Hinduism. **

Your friend
Sufjon

Sufjon, can you please tell me where I ever said that I know a lot about Hinduism? In my previous posts, I said I know something about Hinduism but I am not totally ignorant of it. I said my knowledge is limited.

So, when are you going to start reading posts properly so I don’t have to keep correcting you about what I have written?

 

[rossum]

I take it you are being sarcastic.

Only a little. Applauding is one of the primary function of the gods in Buddhist scripture. The others are asking questions, being converted to Buddhism and making spiritual progress thanks to the Buddha’s teaching.

So obviously the gods you are referring to are not gods at all considering they also need to attain to enlightenment.

They are gods. If they have attained enlightenment then they are also Buddhas. All living beings who have not yet attained enlightenment need to do so. Since gods are living beings that includes them as well.

If the material world is an illusion, does that mean you are an illusion?

The material world exists. The problem is that it is not what we think it is. The illusion is inside our heads, not in the outside world.

rossum

 

[Lion_of_Narnia]

Rather than get bogged down in competing claims of “who was first”, let me state this again:

1. Jesus’ claims of deity occur within a Jewish monotheistic culture–He addressed them to either Galilean peasantry (hardly likey to partake of syncretism) or within the very grounds of the Temple. No where is he recorded as having any interaction with groups like the Essenes who might have had gnostic influences.
2. A guru’s exoteric teaching are supposed to lead the listener to the inner, esoteric teachings. On all 8 points of difference between Monotheistic Judaism and Eastern Monist or Pantheistic beliefs, Jesus exoteric teaching sides with Judaism.

 

[Contarini]

I take it you are being sarcastic. So obviously the gods you are referring to are not gods at all considering they also need to attain to enlightenment.

Or rather, the Buddhist conception of a "god’ is very different from the Christian conception of God.

If the material world is an illusion, does that mean you are an illusion?

Did Rossum say that the material world was an illusion?

In Buddhist thought, we are indeed “illusions” in the sense that we imagine ourselves to have a permanent identity, when we are more like a chain of causal continuity. (Rossum, tell me if I’m not representing your views accurately–Buddhism is complicated and diverse, I know.)

Edwin

 

[Contarini]

But as I have earlier said, is the kind of detachment you have explained, how one must feel about evil?

As I said, I’d like to hear adherents of Eastern religions explain this more. But if you take the Zen story about the two monks and apply it to evil–if the two monks had seen someone beating up someone else, the wise monk would have stopped the evil-doer but not allowed himself to fixate on the evil in a way that embittered his own spirit.

The problem that I have with the Zen (and by extension Hindu/Buddhist generally) approach to evil is not that I think it leads to passivity but that the action it engenders seems very pragmatic and consequentialist. An Eastern metaphysic seems to me to lead to an ends-justify-the-means approach, as when Krishna tells the heroes of the Mahabharata to break the rules of warfare in order to win. I’m quite willing to be persuaded that I’m wrong, but that would be my main critique.

Edwin

 

[Sufjon]

Rather than get bogged down in competing claims of “who was first”, let me state this again:

1. Jesus’ claims of deity occur within a Jewish monotheistic culture–He addressed them to either Galilean peasantry (hardly likey to partake of syncretism) or within the very grounds of the Temple. No where is he recorded as having any interaction with groups like the Essenes who might have had gnostic influences.
2. A guru’s exoteric teaching are supposed to lead the listener to the inner, esoteric teachings. On all 8 points of difference between Monotheistic Judaism and Eastern Monist or Pantheistic beliefs, Jesus exoteric teaching sides with Judaism.

Hi Lion of Narnia:

-Again, I will clarify that Hinduism is monotheistic.

-Jesus acted more like an Essene than a temple Jew.

-I cannot see in any of His teachings where He is in conflict with any of the teachings of the other Avatars.

-I do see differences in how certain (but not all) early church leaders interpreted the teachings of Jesus when compared to eastern thought. I am more interested in Jesus than I am in them.

Your friend
Sufjon

 

[Sufjon]

Sufjon, can you please tell me where I ever said that I know a lot about Hinduism? In my previous posts, I said I know something about Hinduism but I am not totally ignorant of it. I said my knowledge is limited.

So, when are you going to start reading posts properly so I don’t have to keep correcting you about what I have written?

You and I don;t seem to be able to understand each other very well. It clearly must be my fault, so we should probably just move on.

Your friend
Sufjon

 

[Ahimsa]

Ok------But it DOES teach that after a soul achieves release from reincarnation, it is “reabsorbed” back into Brahma-----does it not?

Only the radical non-dualist Hindu traditions teach about realizing one’s utter non-difference from Brahman. “Reabsorption” is not correct (though reabsorption might be more of a Neo-Platonic understanding, or an interpretation of Neo-Platonic teaching) – because one was never ultimately separate from Brahman in the first place. “Reabsorption” implies “two-ness”. Non-dual Hindu traditions deny that two-ness exists, ultimately, so reabsorption would not apply.

But most Hindus (from surveys I’ve seen) are not radical non-dualists. Most Hindus believe in some version of dualism (that is, God and soul are different, and remain different) or modified non-dualism (God and soul are different in some ways, but similar in other ways).

In the dualist traditions, there is no absorption into Brahman whatsoever, and Brahman is conceived as a Person, not impersonally. Many Hindu dualist traditions also believe that not everyone will be saved: some people will forever remain embedded within samsara.

Modified non-dualist traditions tend to believe that salvation involves a deep, profound communion with God (conceived as a Person as well as impersonally), to a much greater degree than the dualists, but not to the degree of the non-dualists. Modified non-dualist Hindu traditions are the ones that come closest to Catholicism and Orthodoxy’s idea of salvation as divinification or theosis.

The reason that most Hindus are dualists or modified non-dualists is quite simple: most people, of whatever nation, need to express their feeling for God, their devotion to God. Such devotion is most easily expressed to a Person. Radical non-dualism acknowledges that Brahman can manifest as a Person, but that’s not Brahman’s most essential manifestation, which is impersonal. Dualists and modified non-dualists, however, tend to believe that God as Person is God’s primary form, and His impersonal form is secondary.

 

[Ahimsa]

As I said, I’d like to hear adherents of Eastern religions explain this more. But if you take the Zen story about the two monks and apply it to evil–if the two monks had seen someone beating up someone else, the wise monk would have stopped the evil-doer but not allowed himself to fixate on the evil in a way that embittered his own spirit.

The problem that I have with the Zen (and by extension Hindu/Buddhist generally) approach to evil is not that I think it leads to passivity but that the action it engenders seems very pragmatic and consequentialist. An Eastern metaphysic seems to me to lead to an ends-justify-the-means approach, as when Krishna tells the heroes of the Mahabharata to break the rules of warfare in order to win. I’m quite willing to be persuaded that I’m wrong, but that would be my main critique.

Edwin

What sort of rules were broken?

 

[benedictus2]

Only a little. Applauding is one of the primary function of the gods in Buddhist scripture. The others are asking questions, being converted to Buddhism and making spiritual progress thanks to the Buddha’s teaching.

So Buddha is higher than the gods? But Buddha never claimed to be god.

They are gods. If they have attained enlightenment then they are also Buddhas.

So the goal is to be Buddha. What then is Buddha if he is higher than the gods?

All living beings who have not yet attained enlightenment need to do so. Since gods are living beings that includes them as well.

What then differentiates gods from other mortals?

Or it is something like these: mere mortal → gods —> buddha?

The material world exists. The problem is that it is not what we think it is.

If it is not what we think it is, then what is it? To know that it is not what we think it is, we must have some idea of what it actually is.

The illusion is inside our heads, not in the outside world.

rossum

That i get but if we think we are being decieved then how do we know when we get to the stage of not being deceived? There must be some objective thing by which we gauge what and is not an illusion.

 

[benedictus2]

You and I don;t seem to be able to understand each other very well. It clearly must be my fault, so we should probably just move on.

Your friend
Sufjon

On that one I agree.

 

[benedictus2]

As I said, I’d like to hear adherents of Eastern religions explain this more. But if you take the Zen story about the two monks and apply it to evil–if the two monks had seen someone beating up someone else, the wise monk would have stopped the evil-doer but not allowed himself to fixate on the evil in a way that embittered his own spirit.

But how would he have felt about the evil at the time he was confronting it?

The problem that I have with the Zen (and by extension Hindu/Buddhist generally) approach to evil is not that I think it leads to passivity but that the action it engenders seems very pragmatic and consequentialist. An Eastern metaphysic seems to me to lead to an ends-justify-the-means approach, as when Krishna tells the heroes of the Mahabharata to break the rules of warfare in order to win. I’m quite willing to be persuaded that I’m wrong, but that would be my main critique.

Edwin

I have never heard of that one but it seems the Krishna teaches evil then. No wonder it is so contrary to Christian teaching.