DiscussWorldIssues - Socio-Economic Religion and Political Uncensored Debate - View Single Post - Is modern "Buddhism" moving away from the teachings of the Buddha ?

**EnubreBense** · 06-21-2010, 05:40 AM

This has led to a number of books on Buddhism that jump on the sceptical bandwagon.

The connection you are trying to make here is pure speculation, and a straw man. Dawkins' and Hitchens' views on Buddhism are quite different from those of Buddhists who see and practice the Buddha's liberative, non-superstition-based teachings.

I am thinking of books like "Reflections of a Sceptical Buddhist" by Richard P. Hayes or "Buddhism Without Beliefs" by Stephen Batchelor, whereas the latter author has published a number of similar titles.

Do these authors reference an influence of Hitchens and Dawkins? Or are you just making up as you go along?

Most of these books appeal to a single sutta, the Kalama Sutta, to bring across and justify their scpetical approach.

That is simply not true, and that falsehood can be seen for oneself by examining their works. It is clear from this statement that you are saying this from a standpoint of having not read Batchelor's works at all, and so are parroting what others tell you. Beyond that,as much as the fundamentalist movement despise, vililfy, and wish to excise the Kalama Sutta from the Nikayas, it is nonetheless a teaching of the Buddha. The question now becomes: So what if there is reference to the Kalama Sutta? There are plenty of other suttas that also stress that one can see the veraqcity of the Buddha's teachings and how they comport with reality. The Buddha asks his monks in MN 38 if they give their answers out of respect or reference to their teacher, for example. Vilifying the Kalama Sutta is a silly exercise in futility here.

There's been an insightful critique of Batchelor's book by Punnadhammo Bhikkhu, which is available in full here: http://www.darkzen.com/Articles/critiquez.htm. This critique points out some of the things that typically get overlooked by the modern sceptics.

I have read Punnodhammos' essay, and it is rife with innuendo and fallacious argument. It is as much a joke as Berzin's calling the Buddha's liberative teachings "Dharma Lite". Since you have brought it up, we shall take an in-depth look at Punnadhammo's polemic shortly.

This is the kernel of a new school of modernized, rationalized Buddhism; in essence a Protestant Buddhism.

More like a Copernican Revolution.

One aspect that Mr. Batchelor ignores is the importance that the Buddha placed on Right View. In Anguttara XVII the Buddha says that he knows of no other thing so conducive to the arising of wholesome states as Right View. In one of the frequently occurring formulas of Right View, as for example in Majjhima 41, the Buddha defines it as, among other things, a belief in karma and in "this world and the other world." Furthermore, there is much discussion in the suttas of Wrong View, one variety of which is precisely that of the materialists. "Since this self is material, made up of the four great elements, the product of mother and father, at the breaking up of the body it is annihilated and perishes, and does not exist after death." (Digha 1)

That is sammaditthi sasava; Defiled right view -- the superstitions that preceded the Buddha. The Buddha's own teachings he called Noble Right View that is without defilements, liberative, a Factor of the Path. Punnadhammo is equivocating here. Further, Punnadhammo directs his entire polemic against the straw man of "materialists" and "naterialism". unfortunately for him, however, the understanding of the Buddha's teachings he is railing against does not take a materialist position at all. he is, in effect, calling the Buddha a materialist.

As an aside, it should be pointed out that advocates of a materialist Buddhism

Straw Man. The Buddha's Noble, liberative teachings are not materialism, nor are those of us who follow them.

As an aside, it should be pointed out that advocates of a materialist Buddhism often claim that their view is different from this ancient annihilationism because it doesn't postulate a self.

On the other hand, the abhidhammic conception of reincarnation/"re-birth" is a hybrid eternalist-aniihilationism, which on one hand postulates an atta (though taking great pains to call it something else) that reincarnates eternally until one achieves certain prescribed goals, when it is then annihilated. The Buddha' liberative teachings transcend both eternalisn and annihilationism, and also any combination of the two. We also note that the Buddha himself was accused of being a materialist and an annihilationist by eternalists. they simply -- just like today -- could not see the Buddha's teachings beyond the influence of their own superstitions and assumptions.

While it would take us too far afield to examine this argument in detail, suffice it to say that from a traditional Buddhist understanding, any doctrine of materialism must have an implied self-view.

As must any doctrine of karma-and-reincarnation, or any of its variants.

In other words, it is incompatible with a true understanding of not-self.

As is any doctrine of reincarnation-and-karma.

This is because of, firstly, an identification with the single aggregate of bodily form and secondly, because of the belief in annihilation of consciousness at death which presupposes an existent entity to be annihilated (even if this is not articulated.)

Again the Straw Man, but this argument equally applies to the identification with the form of "stream of consciousness" (see the Buddha's humiliation of Sati the Fisherman's Son in MN 38 for proposing just that sort of a "consciousness" entity) that is proposed in reincarnation/karma strategies, and the belief in annihilation of that consciousness at Ultimate Death (Parinibbana), which presupposes an existent entity to be annihilated.

Another way in which an agnostic Buddhism violates fundamental teachings is the imbalance in the development of the faculties. One of the five spiritual faculties is saddha, translated as faith or confidence.

Equivocation. Saddha is "confirmed confidence", won though seeing and knowing for oneself. Punnadhammo would equate it with blind faith. Ne'er the twain shall meet.

This must be balanced with its complement and opposite number, panna or discriminative wisdom. Too much faith without any wisdom is superstition, too much discrimination without faith leads to cunning ( "a disease as hard to cure as one caused by medicine.")

Punnadhammo is taking a flyer here. The Buddha taught nothing of the sort.

That is, when we set our own reason upon a pedestal and denigrate the enlightenment of the Buddha with our skepticism, we can create our own false Dharma in service to the desires.

The Buddha taught that the ending of the asavas is for one who knows and see, and not for one who does not now and does not see. No one is creating a "false dhamma" here -- with the possible exceptions of those who push superstition in place of the Buddha's teachings. The ones Punnadhammo would accuse of creating a "false dhamma" are studying and practicing the Noble teachings of the Buddha himself. If there is any "false dhamma" here, it is the abhidhamma, the commentaries, and all of the other later bastardizations of the Buddha's teachings that Punnadhamma & Co. adhere to. The abhidhamma itself came about as the result of the hyper-intellectualization of the Buddha's teachings. But the Buddha declared his own teachings to be founded entirely in reason -- not just "logic", but reasoning. Rational, empirical Discernment. Blind faith has no place here.

It is precisely the ancient wisdom of Buddhism that is missing form the western world.

The ancient wisdom of the Buddha is largely missing both in the West and in the East, where it has been replaced with superstition.

The sense of a meaning in life,

The Buddha does not declare a "meaning in life". The Buddha declares that there is suffering in life, and teaches how to quench it.

the intrinsic value of human and other beings,

The Buddha does teach this Buddhist "agnosticism" does not deny the value of human life in any way. Punnadhammo is spitting at the Straw Man again.

the possibility of spiritual transcendence

The Buddha's liberative teachings are all about "transcendence". He even calls them lokuttara, "world-transcending". Of course, he has his own, non-superstitious definition of "the world" that is specific to this notion of "transcendence". Unlike superstitious Buddhism, agnostic Buddhism embraces this very transcendence of this very "world".

and the knowledge of that which is beyond the suffering, samsaric conditioned world accessible to science.

The Buddha spoke of science, as opposed to nescience. Science, of course, takes its roots from latin, and means "knowlege". Nesience is also Latin, and means "ignorance" (without knowledge). The Buddha spoke of Vijja, meaning knowledge, and avijja, meaning without knowledge. And the Buddha spoke of knowledge -- science -- as on of the highest things, and he stressed that anyone could see his Dhamma for themselves, and see the results of practising his Dhamma forthemselves. And this is what modern "science" is about, too. Funny how all that works out.

and the knowledge of that which is beyond the suffering, samsaric conditioned world accessible to science

Ah, the Courtier's Reply. The Buddha did not claim that his teachings and the liberation they promise lie beyond what one can know and see for oneself. He said is is all here in this fathom-long body for one to see for oneself.

It is tragically these very elements in the teachings that Mr. Batchelor. s approach would discard.

Not true. What is being discarded is superstition. And nothing is lost, and much is gained.

The teachings of the Buddha are very old. This means to radicals and modernists that they are out-moded.

This statement is just so wrong on so many levels: First, lets kill off the Straw Man -- No one is discarding the Buddha's teachings "because they are old". Second, agnostic Buddhists are by and large embracing thE Buddha's own teachings, rather than others' superstitions that preceded him or followed him. Third, it is funny that some would call us "radicals", and some would call us "fundamentalists" I have even seen the term "Tipitaka-Only Heretics" used (though that would be quite inaccurate as the abhidhamma is part of the Tipitaka; more correct would be "Nikaya-Only-" or "Buddha's Trachings-Only 'Heretics'"). And again, fourth, we see the folks who concern themselves with the teachings of the Buddha -- the most ancient teachings in Buddhism -- as "modernists". And again, no one is saying that the Buddha's teachings are "outmoded because they are ancient", we are saying that the Buddha's own liberative teachings are the most relevant, and that other extraneous crap and cultural baggage is irrelevant.

To the traditionalist it means that they are tried and true.

We agree that the Buddha's own liberative teachings are tried and true, and in addition we can see their veracity for ourselves. It is superstition and extraneous dogma that is being discarded.

Millions upon millions of beings throughout history have practiced and benefited from the full form of the Dharma

The Buddha's own liberative teachings are complete, perfect, and "in full form" without extraneous teachings and superstitions.

taught complete with rebirth and transcendence and a non-physical mind.

That "non-physical mind" is an atta, a Self. The Buddha refuted Attavada.

Many have benefited to the ultimate level of liberation.

Not believing in an Atta, no. Not according to the Buddha's liberative teachings, that is.

What is this arrogant pride of modern times that makes us think we are so much wiser?

Punnadhammo is confusing his own arrogance in defending his clinging to ancient eisegeses. We in this modern times are concerning ourselves precisely with what the Buddha taught, rather than superstitions and the eisegeses that attempt to defend them.

They have been cherished and handed on to us intact from our teachers going back to the Buddha.

this is probably Punnadhammo's most preposterous statement in this essay. While it is true that the Buddha's liberative teachings have been handed down intact, other "teachings" have been attached to them and covered over them over the years -- the abhidhamma and commentaries, "three-lives", "re-linking consciousness" and such, the superstitions, not to mention the witch doctors and the worshiping of gods that go on in teh Buddha's name in Tibet. No, the Buddha's teachings has not been "handed down intact", they have been covered over adn obfuscated with a whole lot of extraneous crap.

Can we possibly justify hacking and tearing at a living tradition to make it fit a cheap suit of modernist cloth?

The cheap suit was donned by the abhidhammists, the comentarialists, the "three-lives" Atavadists, the reincarnationists and adherents and believers of superstitions. We are not talking about "modernism" here; we are talking about going back to the Buddha's own liberative, noble teachings.

There is an urgent need to interpret and present these teachings to the modern west.

There is an urgent need to present the Buddha's Noble, liberative teachings to theh modern west, indeed. That is already being done, in fact. We are indeed part of Buddhism's Copernican Revolution -- right here and now.

This "Buddhism Without Beliefs" has sorely failed to do.

The criticism I would have for Batchelor's work here is that he relies too heavily on his background in mahayana and the tibetan religion, and should focus his efforts toward the Buddha's Noble, liberative teachings as we see in the Nikayas.

The prescription of this book amounts to an abandonment of the traditional Dharma

A tradition of superstition. Irrelevant to teh Buddha's noble, liberative teachings. No great loss.

and the transformation of Buddhism into a psychotherapy, which like all psychotherapies, has no goal higher than "ordinary misery."

Another Straw Man. The Buddha's liberative teachings are indeed a psychology, but they are coupled with a rock-solid ethics of reciprocity and a liberative practice that make them a super-religion, far better than the pack of superstitions that Punnadhammo and Co.ould reduce the Buddha's teachings to. The Buddha himself stated that his teachings are designed to address suffering and its extinguishment. He does so in the most profound way. To call this "just a psychology" is like calling the Buddhadhamma "just a bunch of words".

This is a Buddhism without fruition, without a Third Noble Truth.

Punnadhammo has the Dhamma completely backwards. I was wrong before, the above is the most preposterous statement we have seen here.

Should such teachings prevail then they will still validate the tradition in a backhanded way; because they will fulfill the prophecies of the degeneration of the Dharma in this age of decline.

The degeneration of the Dhamma has already long ago come to fruition with the overrunning of the Buddha's Noble,liberative teachings with superstition and cultural baggage perpetrated by the abhidhammists, the commentarialists, and other superstition-mongers.

06-21-2010, 05:40 AM	#18
EnubreBense Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 552 Senior Member	This has led to a number of books on Buddhism that jump on the sceptical bandwagon. The connection you are trying to make here is pure speculation, and a straw man. Dawkins' and Hitchens' views on Buddhism are quite different from those of Buddhists who see and practice the Buddha's liberative, non-superstition-based teachings. I am thinking of books like "Reflections of a Sceptical Buddhist" by Richard P. Hayes or "Buddhism Without Beliefs" by Stephen Batchelor, whereas the latter author has published a number of similar titles. Do these authors reference an influence of Hitchens and Dawkins? Or are you just making up as you go along? Most of these books appeal to a single sutta, the Kalama Sutta, to bring across and justify their scpetical approach. That is simply not true, and that falsehood can be seen for oneself by examining their works. It is clear from this statement that you are saying this from a standpoint of having not read Batchelor's works at all, and so are parroting what others tell you. Beyond that,as much as the fundamentalist movement despise, vililfy, and wish to excise the Kalama Sutta from the Nikayas, it is nonetheless a teaching of the Buddha. The question now becomes: So what if there is reference to the Kalama Sutta? There are plenty of other suttas that also stress that one can see the veraqcity of the Buddha's teachings and how they comport with reality. The Buddha asks his monks in MN 38 if they give their answers out of respect or reference to their teacher, for example. Vilifying the Kalama Sutta is a silly exercise in futility here. There's been an insightful critique of Batchelor's book by Punnadhammo Bhikkhu, which is available in full here: http://www.darkzen.com/Articles/critiquez.htm. This critique points out some of the things that typically get overlooked by the modern sceptics. I have read Punnodhammos' essay, and it is rife with innuendo and fallacious argument. It is as much a joke as Berzin's calling the Buddha's liberative teachings "Dharma Lite". Since you have brought it up, we shall take an in-depth look at Punnadhammo's polemic shortly. This is the kernel of a new school of modernized, rationalized Buddhism; in essence a Protestant Buddhism. More like a Copernican Revolution. One aspect that Mr. Batchelor ignores is the importance that the Buddha placed on Right View. In Anguttara XVII the Buddha says that he knows of no other thing so conducive to the arising of wholesome states as Right View. In one of the frequently occurring formulas of Right View, as for example in Majjhima 41, the Buddha defines it as, among other things, a belief in karma and in "this world and the other world." Furthermore, there is much discussion in the suttas of Wrong View, one variety of which is precisely that of the materialists. "Since this self is material, made up of the four great elements, the product of mother and father, at the breaking up of the body it is annihilated and perishes, and does not exist after death." (Digha 1) That is sammaditthi sasava; Defiled right view -- the superstitions that preceded the Buddha. The Buddha's own teachings he called Noble Right View that is without defilements, liberative, a Factor of the Path. Punnadhammo is equivocating here. Further, Punnadhammo directs his entire polemic against the straw man of "materialists" and "naterialism". unfortunately for him, however, the understanding of the Buddha's teachings he is railing against does not take a materialist position at all. he is, in effect, calling the Buddha a materialist. As an aside, it should be pointed out that advocates of a materialist Buddhism Straw Man. The Buddha's Noble, liberative teachings are not materialism, nor are those of us who follow them. As an aside, it should be pointed out that advocates of a materialist Buddhism often claim that their view is different from this ancient annihilationism because it doesn't postulate a self. On the other hand, the abhidhammic conception of reincarnation/"re-birth" is a hybrid eternalist-aniihilationism, which on one hand postulates an atta (though taking great pains to call it something else) that reincarnates eternally until one achieves certain prescribed goals, when it is then annihilated. The Buddha' liberative teachings transcend both eternalisn and annihilationism, and also any combination of the two. We also note that the Buddha himself was accused of being a materialist and an annihilationist by eternalists. they simply -- just like today -- could not see the Buddha's teachings beyond the influence of their own superstitions and assumptions. While it would take us too far afield to examine this argument in detail, suffice it to say that from a traditional Buddhist understanding, any doctrine of materialism must have an implied self-view. As must any doctrine of karma-and-reincarnation, or any of its variants. In other words, it is incompatible with a true understanding of not-self. As is any doctrine of reincarnation-and-karma. This is because of, firstly, an identification with the single aggregate of bodily form and secondly, because of the belief in annihilation of consciousness at death which presupposes an existent entity to be annihilated (even if this is not articulated.) Again the Straw Man, but this argument equally applies to the identification with the form of "stream of consciousness" (see the Buddha's humiliation of Sati the Fisherman's Son in MN 38 for proposing just that sort of a "consciousness" entity) that is proposed in reincarnation/karma strategies, and the belief in annihilation of that consciousness at Ultimate Death (Parinibbana), which presupposes an existent entity to be annihilated. Another way in which an agnostic Buddhism violates fundamental teachings is the imbalance in the development of the faculties. One of the five spiritual faculties is saddha, translated as faith or confidence. Equivocation. Saddha is "confirmed confidence", won though seeing and knowing for oneself. Punnadhammo would equate it with blind faith. Ne'er the twain shall meet. This must be balanced with its complement and opposite number, panna or discriminative wisdom. Too much faith without any wisdom is superstition, too much discrimination without faith leads to cunning ( "a disease as hard to cure as one caused by medicine.") Punnadhammo is taking a flyer here. The Buddha taught nothing of the sort. That is, when we set our own reason upon a pedestal and denigrate the enlightenment of the Buddha with our skepticism, we can create our own false Dharma in service to the desires. The Buddha taught that the ending of the asavas is for one who knows and see, and not for one who does not now and does not see. No one is creating a "false dhamma" here -- with the possible exceptions of those who push superstition in place of the Buddha's teachings. The ones Punnadhammo would accuse of creating a "false dhamma" are studying and practicing the Noble teachings of the Buddha himself. If there is any "false dhamma" here, it is the abhidhamma, the commentaries, and all of the other later bastardizations of the Buddha's teachings that Punnadhamma & Co. adhere to. The abhidhamma itself came about as the result of the hyper-intellectualization of the Buddha's teachings. But the Buddha declared his own teachings to be founded entirely in reason -- not just "logic", but reasoning. Rational, empirical Discernment. Blind faith has no place here. It is precisely the ancient wisdom of Buddhism that is missing form the western world. The ancient wisdom of the Buddha is largely missing both in the West and in the East, where it has been replaced with superstition. The sense of a meaning in life, The Buddha does not declare a "meaning in life". The Buddha declares that there is suffering in life, and teaches how to quench it. the intrinsic value of human and other beings, The Buddha does teach this Buddhist "agnosticism" does not deny the value of human life in any way. Punnadhammo is spitting at the Straw Man again. the possibility of spiritual transcendence The Buddha's liberative teachings are all about "transcendence". He even calls them lokuttara, "world-transcending". Of course, he has his own, non-superstitious definition of "the world" that is specific to this notion of "transcendence". Unlike superstitious Buddhism, agnostic Buddhism embraces this very transcendence of this very "world". and the knowledge of that which is beyond the suffering, samsaric conditioned world accessible to science. The Buddha spoke of science, as opposed to nescience. Science, of course, takes its roots from latin, and means "knowlege". Nesience is also Latin, and means "ignorance" (without knowledge). The Buddha spoke of Vijja, meaning knowledge, and avijja, meaning without knowledge. And the Buddha spoke of knowledge -- science -- as on of the highest things, and he stressed that anyone could see his Dhamma for themselves, and see the results of practising his Dhamma forthemselves. And this is what modern "science" is about, too. Funny how all that works out. and the knowledge of that which is beyond the suffering, samsaric conditioned world accessible to science Ah, the Courtier's Reply. The Buddha did not claim that his teachings and the liberation they promise lie beyond what one can know and see for oneself. He said is is all here in this fathom-long body for one to see for oneself. It is tragically these very elements in the teachings that Mr. Batchelor. s approach would discard. Not true. What is being discarded is superstition. And nothing is lost, and much is gained. The teachings of the Buddha are very old. This means to radicals and modernists that they are out-moded. This statement is just so wrong on so many levels: First, lets kill off the Straw Man -- No one is discarding the Buddha's teachings "because they are old". Second, agnostic Buddhists are by and large embracing thE Buddha's own teachings, rather than others' superstitions that preceded him or followed him. Third, it is funny that some would call us "radicals", and some would call us "fundamentalists" I have even seen the term "Tipitaka-Only Heretics" used (though that would be quite inaccurate as the abhidhamma is part of the Tipitaka; more correct would be "Nikaya-Only-" or "Buddha's Trachings-Only 'Heretics'"). And again, fourth, we see the folks who concern themselves with the teachings of the Buddha -- the most ancient teachings in Buddhism -- as "modernists". And again, no one is saying that the Buddha's teachings are "outmoded because they are ancient", we are saying that the Buddha's own liberative teachings are the most relevant, and that other extraneous crap and cultural baggage is irrelevant. To the traditionalist it means that they are tried and true. We agree that the Buddha's own liberative teachings are tried and true, and in addition we can see their veracity for ourselves. It is superstition and extraneous dogma that is being discarded. Millions upon millions of beings throughout history have practiced and benefited from the full form of the Dharma The Buddha's own liberative teachings are complete, perfect, and "in full form" without extraneous teachings and superstitions. taught complete with rebirth and transcendence and a non-physical mind. That "non-physical mind" is an atta, a Self. The Buddha refuted Attavada. Many have benefited to the ultimate level of liberation. Not believing in an Atta, no. Not according to the Buddha's liberative teachings, that is. What is this arrogant pride of modern times that makes us think we are so much wiser? Punnadhammo is confusing his own arrogance in defending his clinging to ancient eisegeses. We in this modern times are concerning ourselves precisely with what the Buddha taught, rather than superstitions and the eisegeses that attempt to defend them. They have been cherished and handed on to us intact from our teachers going back to the Buddha. this is probably Punnadhammo's most preposterous statement in this essay. While it is true that the Buddha's liberative teachings have been handed down intact, other "teachings" have been attached to them and covered over them over the years -- the abhidhamma and commentaries, "three-lives", "re-linking consciousness" and such, the superstitions, not to mention the witch doctors and the worshiping of gods that go on in teh Buddha's name in Tibet. No, the Buddha's teachings has not been "handed down intact", they have been covered over adn obfuscated with a whole lot of extraneous crap. Can we possibly justify hacking and tearing at a living tradition to make it fit a cheap suit of modernist cloth? The cheap suit was donned by the abhidhammists, the comentarialists, the "three-lives" Atavadists, the reincarnationists and adherents and believers of superstitions. We are not talking about "modernism" here; we are talking about going back to the Buddha's own liberative, noble teachings. There is an urgent need to interpret and present these teachings to the modern west. There is an urgent need to present the Buddha's Noble, liberative teachings to theh modern west, indeed. That is already being done, in fact. We are indeed part of Buddhism's Copernican Revolution -- right here and now. This "Buddhism Without Beliefs" has sorely failed to do. The criticism I would have for Batchelor's work here is that he relies too heavily on his background in mahayana and the tibetan religion, and should focus his efforts toward the Buddha's Noble, liberative teachings as we see in the Nikayas. The prescription of this book amounts to an abandonment of the traditional Dharma A tradition of superstition. Irrelevant to teh Buddha's noble, liberative teachings. No great loss. and the transformation of Buddhism into a psychotherapy, which like all psychotherapies, has no goal higher than "ordinary misery." Another Straw Man. The Buddha's liberative teachings are indeed a psychology, but they are coupled with a rock-solid ethics of reciprocity and a liberative practice that make them a super-religion, far better than the pack of superstitions that Punnadhammo and Co.ould reduce the Buddha's teachings to. The Buddha himself stated that his teachings are designed to address suffering and its extinguishment. He does so in the most profound way. To call this "just a psychology" is like calling the Buddhadhamma "just a bunch of words". This is a Buddhism without fruition, without a Third Noble Truth. Punnadhammo has the Dhamma completely backwards. I was wrong before, the above is the most preposterous statement we have seen here. Should such teachings prevail then they will still validate the tradition in a backhanded way; because they will fulfill the prophecies of the degeneration of the Dharma in this age of decline. The degeneration of the Dhamma has already long ago come to fruition with the overrunning of the Buddha's Noble,liberative teachings with superstition and cultural baggage perpetrated by the abhidhammists, the commentarialists, and other superstition-mongers.
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