Posted on 01/16/2010 6:46:41 AM PST by cold start
Vadodara: His Holiness the Dalai Lama is known for his wisdom and witty remarks so no one was surprised when he declared on Friday that he cannot say that Buddhism is the best religion.
Speaking at International Convention on Buddhism in Vadodara, the 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet said, “We cannot say that one religion is best. I am a Buddhist but I can’t say Buddhism is the best religion. It depends on a person’s perception that what is best for him.”
He further added that, “We should respect all religions. India is a secular country where all the religions are equally respected.”
In a very witty remark, Dalai Lama said, “Mr Modi (Mahabodhi Society of India Patron Dr. Bhupendra Kumar Modi) told me that Indians consider me a fellow Indian. I must tell you, I am India’s son. My knowledge and my wisdom come from India and I am really proud of it.”
Adding another tongue in cheek remark, Dalai Lama said, “Though I have Tibetan parents so my flesh and blood is Tibetan. But, as a matter of fact, spiritually I am an Indian and physically I am a Tibetan.”
Praising India’s unique culture and communal harmony, Dalai Lama said, “India is unique because it follows a culture of non-violence accepted across religions coexisting in the country. There is not much difference in the cultures of Buddhists and Muslims in India as they both follow the tradition of truth and non-violence.”
He went on to add that, “Indians are ‘Guru’ and we (Tibetans) are ‘Chelas’ because Buddhism originated from India. So, when I travel to different parts of the world, I introduce myself as an Indian messenger. I propagate ‘Ahimsa’ so now my guru India, should start promoting non-violence again.
Continuing his refreshingly witty speech, Dalai Lama further added, “Chinese are the senior students of Buddhism while Tibetans are the junior students. So, whenever I give teachings to Chinese Buddhists, I jokingly tell them that the knowledge of ‘junior students’ is not bad.”
Launching a veiled attack on the Chinese atrocities in Tibet, Dalai Lama said, “The condition of Tibet is in turmoil. I want the heritage of Tibet to be given back to India as it is the only place where they will be in safe hands.”
Dalai Lama was at his spiritual best at the function. Speaking about the importance of satisfaction in life, he said, “I had a friend who was very rich but he was not happy. This shows that money and power don’t necessarily guarantee happiness. One should seek inner peace. This inner peace and spirituality can be achieved through love, compassion and affection.
He also advocated the idea of ‘Vasudhaev Kutumbkam’, saying, “The recently concluded Coopenhagen Summit was like a ray of hope for the world affected badly by global warming. The reason for the failure of the summit was that all the world leaders considered their national interest more important than the global interest. This is a wrong approach.”
In any case he has proven to be great front man for his faith. He comes off as very friendly, un-neurtoic intelligent compassionate guy.
I think your teacher said it well.
I’m not entirely sure what your point is. I am perfectly in agreement that Hinduism incorporates monotheistic aspects.
My point is that Hinduism can also incorporate the most “pagan” and polytheistic tendencies. Krishna is not saying that all other gods are false, only offering devotion to himself as a way to salvation. Within the overall umbrella of Hinduism there are a great many other ways to get there.
Christianity cannot do this, it has only way way of reaching salvation. By its very nature, along with Islam and Judaism, it is exclusive. A lot of people dislike it, but that is the nature of these partisular beasts.
Christ, and Mohammed, and Moses are exclusive to each other and to other religions.
I respect your opinion. I would respectfully point out, however, that you have provided absolutly nothing to disprove any of the points I have made.
I hope it doesn’t come as too great a shock to you, but stating that someone is full of bullshit does not prove ot to be so. An assertion is not even evidence, much less proof.
There are very few Buddhists left in India. If your story is accurate, it should probably be blamed on Hindus, not Buddhists.
Nope. They followed a variety of religions, including Christianity, but were mostly shamanistic. The Mongols didn't become Buddhist, blended with local religions as in Tibet, till a period starting in the late 1500s, centuries after Genghis and Kublai.
I think the confusion here is the mode of “salvation” that is at the heart of the difference in beliefs. From reading the comments by the others on this thread, I think the whole question can be distilled into the following:
One system believes that all life is “holy” but “separated” from the “Supreme” seeking reunion as “ultimate perfection”, through “reincarnation” (Dharmic religions), while the other system believes in one of the two:
(1) life is a “trial of faith” (Protestantism, Islam), and only those that “pass” this “trial”...
(2) life is an opportunity to follow a set of rules and only those that do (Judaism)...
...get to a place where they will live eternal lives, in their original being, but “perfected”, to negate the flaws from the “fall” i.e., the Semitic “heaven”.
This difference, I thought, would be clarified from the Gita excerpt I posted earlier, namely:
“And, at the hour of death,
He that hath meditated Me alone,
In putting off his flesh, comes forth to Me,
Enters into My Being—doubt thou not!”
Catholicism requires “works” plus “faith” as the prerequisites for “salvation”, which is why I demarcated it separately from Protestantism, which is reliant on faith alone as the path to salvation.
I am perfectly in agreement that “Eastern” religions, for lack of a better term, define salvation differently from the Abrahamic religions.
The Eastern religions are by definiton generally much less prescriptive, much looser as to defined terms.
Which was kind of my point. It is quite possible, that many Buddhists, as one of the posters above pointed out, are perfectly willing to believe that a person can be both a Christian and a Buddhist. I would contend that most Christians, and more critically Christ himself, would disagree.
In an odd way the Eastern religions are no more tolerant than the Abrahamic ones. They absolutely reject the claims of the Abrahamic religions to exclusive truth.
BTW, I’m not sure that Protestants, Muslims or Jews will agree completely with your short explanation of their beliefs. :) Catholics may be more likely to agree, as I understand their teachings.
Heh heh heh!
I agree with your last reply!
” The word Objectivist is not one to throw around lightly. As an Objectivist, myself, I am unable to accept that you were once in total agreement with Ayn Rand’s philosophy, which reduces your post to something less than honest.”
Then you must know me better than I know myself. Believe it or not, some people grow up and figure out that all ethics and the nature of reality cannot be deduced from A=A without a lot of hand-waving.
As to my honesty, I certainly thought I was an Objectivist. I read every book she published multiple times—”Objectivist Epistemology” (I think that was the name) was badly dog-eared and underlined. I gobbled up copies of old newsletters I could get. Wrote essays based on her epistemology and annoyed people with them. But perhaps I wasn’t pure enough.
On the other hand, Rand maintained that there is an objective reality (correctly imo). You might consider that I followed the evidence of that very reality to a probability (high imo) that there is a God, he made some rules, and sent His Son to die for us on the cross. And that there will be hell to pay for those who don’t get on board with that objective reality. The is a God and He makes the rules and will mete out the consequences. The sacrifice of his Son lifted the punishment due for those who submit to Him. There’s a good deal of pretty good evidence that is true.
Do I know that’s true? No. But that’s where the evidence took a pretty skeptical scientist. And my life is much better for it.
When you follow the evidence and you end up in a place that Ms. Rand would object is impossible because she deduced it was impossible from her first principles, are you not being more consistent with “objective reality” than Ms. Rand who rules out the possibility of any knowledge of God. Such evidence says there is either an error in first principles or the deductions she made therefrom were wrong.
But all that aside, do you really believe that once one is an Objectivist, even a very pure one, it is impossible for them honestly to change their mind? And what if they are confronted with inconsistent evidence from reality?
Most of all I can speak from the experience of having practised the teachings long and hard. Not as well as some others and perhaps not as well as I should have but more than most I think and with some strong approval from my teacher for my understanding specifically. He has pointedly said so when I have been in doubt and it is not in his personality to make idle comments much less flatter anyone.
What you have said is simply utter bull shit. I don't give a fat rat's ass if you like that or not it is the truth.
Shermy baby, you are welcome to believe whatever you want to believe. I know what I know and I am in a position to know it.
It was the Muslims that nearly wiped the Buddhists out of India.
That is not entirely true.
In 1260, when Khublai became Khan, he conferred upon Phagpa the rank of Kuo-shin, the State Instructor. Later, after his nirvana he was promoted to the rank of Ti-shih, the Imperial Tutor. Although at that time Tibetan Buddhism was only the religious faith of the Mongolian imperial clan and the people of the higher class, it had begun to greatly influence the thought of many Mongols.(snip)
Be that as it may, as already mentioned, the Buddhism espoused by Khublai Khan and Phagpa, The Great Master of Sakya, flourished only among the Mongolian ruling class, failing to profoundly affect the masses. Consequently, following the collapse of the Yuan Dynasty (1368) and the isolation of Mongolian lands, Buddhism faded away along with other foreign religions, giving way to the revival of the old shamanistic religion.
More about Mongolia can be learned here.
“In an odd way the Eastern religions are no more tolerant than the Abrahamic ones. They absolutely reject the claims of the Abrahamic religions to exclusive truth.”
With that definition of tolerance, it can be argued that the victims of terrorism are no better than the murderous terrorists because we do not accept their point of view which they believe is the only true one and by not agreeing to be killed by them are showing the same kind of intolerance that you suggest the eastern religions are guilty of.
“Early Mongolian contacts with Buddhism are dated to the fourth century, when the activities of Chinese monks among the population of this border area are reported in contemporary Chinese sources. Buddhist influences spread as far as the Yenisei region by the seventh century, as evidenced by Buddhist temple bells with Chinese inscriptions found there. Another factor in the spread of Buddhism into Mongolia was the flourishing of Buddhist communities in the predominantly Uighur oasis states along the Silk Route. Furthermore, the palace that was built by Ogedei Khan (1229-1241) in Karakorum, the Mongol capital, was constructed on the foundations of a former Buddhist temple; some of the murals from this temple have been preserved, Sources for this early Buddhist activity are rather scarce.
Reports in Mongolian sources on the early spread of Buddhism shroud these missionary activities in a cloak of mysterious events that testify to the superiority of Tantric Buddhism over other religions during the reign of Khublai Khan (1260-1294). Contacts with the Sa-skya pandita Kun-dga’rgyal-mtshan (1182-1251) were established during Ogedei’s reign, but Buddhism only gained influence with the Mongols after their expeditions into Tibet, which resulted in the sojourn of Tibetan monks as hostages at the Mongol court. The activities there of the lama (Tib., bla ma) ‘Phags pa (1235-1280) resulted in an increase in conversions to Buddhism, his invention, in 1269, of a block script led to the translation into Mongolian of great numbers of Buddhist religious literature, the translations often based on already existing Uighur translations.”
LOL... I also went to Catholic School.. How funny... thanks for sharing
Apparently so.
Inaccurate. While Muslims attacked Buddhists in India, by the time they showed up in force, the 10th century, there weren't very many Buddhists left in India. Buddhism had largely been absorbed by Hinduism, with the Buddha relegated to one the many avatars of Vishna, I believe.
This absorption of the Buddha as just one of the many Hindu gods or gurus is of course exactly what would happen to Christianity if it gave up its claim to exclusive truth. Christ would be added to Buddha as a god or guru, and Christianity would at best become another sect of Hinduism.
Buddhism greatly influenced later Hinduism, which became a lot more spiritual and mystical, and less focused, at least among the more educated, on sacrifice and ritual.
While Buddhism survived the decline of the Maurya Empire, and was “exported” to Han China in the 1st century AD via the famed Silk Route along with trade goods, by end of the 3rd century AD its popularity began to decline.
Read more at Suite101: The Rise and Decline of Buddhism in India: History of Buddhism in India, 5th Century BC to Present http://indian-history.suite101.com/article.cfm/the_rise_and_decline_of_buddhism_in_india#ixzz0csv3el4R
Kind of my point. They weren't mostly or primarily Buddhist at the time of their great conquests. Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, Manichaeism and probably Taoism and other religions were practiced freely by Mongols. This is especially because the Mongols largely absorbed rather than destroying other nomadic tribes. There were a great many more "Mongols" by the time of Kublai than when Genghis started his career. Of course the assimilated groups all brought their own religious practices with them.
The Mongol rulers respected and supported all religions, up to the point when the western and central khanates began converting to Islam.
I have no desire to challenge your superior understanding of Tibetan Buddhism as taught to you.
My point has always been that the faith has many aspects.
Perhaps an analogy will help. In the Church of England, for many centuries there were Low Church and High Church tendencies. The Low Church varied all the way over towards Calvinism, while more extreme versions of High Church Anglicanism were very nearly indistinguishable from Roman Catholicism.
In fact, throughout its history the COE tended to leak individuals and groups in both directions, as they became too far from the compromise position held officially by the Church.
This is with a Church with official dogmas, creeds, statements of faith and all that. I suspect Tibetan Buddhism varies at least as much, since I believe it lacks any such formal statements of doctrine.
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