Posted inBuddhism

Dalai Lama’s brand of Buddhism believes in some really weird stuff

It was an eye-opener for me. Or mind-opener. A story in TIME magazine about what will happen after the Dalai Lama dies, how he became the Dalai Lama, and other details about his brand of Buddhism. I've had the impression that the Dalai Lama was a scientifically oriented person who didn't buy into the supernatural side of Buddhism. But I readily admit that this was based on my fairly cursory knowledge of books and talks by the Dalai Lama aimed at Western audiences. The TIME story by Charlie Campbell seemed like it was written by a devotee of Tibetan Buddhism.…
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Posted inBuddhism

More Zen pseudo-wisdom from Dainin Katagiri

Carrying on from my previous post where I criticized what Dainin Katagiri said in some concluding chapters of his book Each Moment Is the Universe: Zen and the Way of Being Time, here I'll share some additional criticisms now that I've finished reading the book. While naturally I'll focus on what Katagiri said, his confusing, non-sensical statements are reflections of general problems I have with similar books about spirituality and religion. I'm open to persuasive evidence and arguments for things that I used to believe in, but no longer do. Like, the existence of God, life after death. immaterial consciousness,…
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Posted inBuddhism

Bodhisattva B.S. is an annoying part of Buddhism

I'm finding more not to like in the concluding chapters of  Each Moment Is the Universe: Zen and the Way of Being Time, by Dainin Katagiri. In my previous post I criticized Katagiri for buying into the Buddhist notion of past lives, which reeks of unproven supernaturalism. In some reading I did in the book today, I came across another subject that, thankfully, I've rarely encountered in other books about Zen Buddhism: bodhisattvas. Katagiri said: There are two ways of manifesting your life every day: there is an ordinary life and a bodhisattva life. The ordinary type of life is…
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Posted inBuddhism

Buddhist belief in past lives is ridiculous, especially for Zen Buddhism

While there's a lot to like about Buddhism -- of any religion it comes closest to being in tune with modern neuroscience -- the supernatural aspects of Buddhism turn me off. Like believing in past lives, whether this be called rebirth, reincarnation, or some other name. Buddhist scholars twist themselves into logical knots when trying to explain how it is that Buddhism, which embraces impermanence and the lack of an enduring self, can also assert that after death, some sort of essence remains of a person that ends up becoming a new person (or animal?). I much prefer secular sorts…
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Posted inBuddhism Mindfulness Uncategorized

Being fully absorbed in an activity is enlightenment

Usually I hate to stop reading a book after I've started it. Unless it is really bad. I figure that even though I'm not enjoying the book very much, there will be something in pages to come that I'll learn or be entertained by. So I'll read more rapidly, less carefully, as I make my way further into the book. This just happened to me with Each Moment Is the Universe: Zen and the Way of Being Time, by Dainin Katagiri. I go hot and cold with this book as Katagiri shifts from interesting practical advice about living to conceptual Buddhist…
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Posted inBuddhism

Turn toward true impermanence

With some books, I feel comfortable stating their message in my own words. With other books, I don't. Zen titles often fall into that category, because they tend toward subtlety, paradox, indirectness, metaphor. In that spirit, here's some quotations from Each Moment Is the Universe: Zen and the Way of Being Time, by Dainin Katagiri. I resonate with each of them, even though I may not agree fully with some of them. (Zazen is Zen meditation.) It is the momentary structure of time that makes you talk to yourself that way. Impermanence creates a gap that makes your mind blink,…
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Posted inBuddhism Free will Reality

“Each moment is the universe” — a great way of viewing time

For much of my life I've been consumed by a sense that I needed to use my time carefully. Partly this arose from a 35 year dedication to an Eastern philosophy that taught the purposes of human life were, first, self-realization, which led to the ultimate purpose, god-realization. Meaning, after realizing ourself as immaterial soul, we then could make a supernatural journey to eternal existence with God. Whew! I feel kind of exhausted just describing what used to be how I viewed the purpose of my life. Serious stuff. The course of my life after death depended on how well…
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Posted inBuddhism Neuroscience Reality

We need a philosophical and spiritual Copernican revolution

The Copernican Revolution in astronomy corrected the mistaken belief that our Earth was the center of the solar system. Instead, the Sun took its rightful place there in the minds of humans. That was one step in understanding our correct place in the cosmos. Another came when astronomers realized that what seemed to be objects within our Milky Way galaxy actually were other galaxies, each containing tens or hundreds of billions of stars. Now we know there are hundreds of billions of galaxies in the universe. All that should make us feel very small in the grand scheme of things.…
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Posted inBuddhism Mindfulness

Flow — the marvelous blend of body and mind, exemplified in an amazing video

There's words about flow. And there's the experience of flow. Both help us understand what flow is all about. But a video I learned about in the "Surfing the Moment" chapter of In Search of Now: The Science of the Present Moment by Jo Marchant provides an unforgettable vision of flow. Here's how Marchant describes the video. In a seven-minute online film called 'The Ridge', Scottish trials cyclist Danny MacAskill rows across a remote loch on the Isle of Skye before hauling his mountain bike out of the boat onto the windswept beach. Once in the saddle, he wheels away…
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Posted inBuddhism Mindfulness Neuroscience

Epilepsy and meditation: two paths to “everything is as it should be”

So, I was reading along in In Search of Now: The Science of the Present Moment by Jo Marchant, which I've been blogging about recently, and came to a passage that reminded me of a post I wrote a few weeks ago, "What if everything is okay just as it is?" I described the feeling: There are moments when we look upon life not as a series of problems to be solved, but as a complete answer lacking even the need for a question. Sex, drugs, rock and roll. These can lead to such moments. So can meditation, nature, exercise,…
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Posted inAwareness Buddhism

I love reality as it is, and I also love reality as it isn’t

I've been thinking about my previous post, "Magical realism is an apt term both for Zen, and for life as a whole." Mostly the post was excerpts from a chapter about magical realism in a book by a Zen teacher, James Ishmael Ford. I said, "He makes a lot of sense here." I still feel that way, though now that I've finished Zen at the End of Religion, I stand by my statement that it isn't one of my favorite Zen books. Probably this is partly because I'm not as interested in Zen now as I was for most of…
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Posted inBuddhism

Magical realism is an apt term both for Zen, and for life as a whole

To most of us, certainly me included, there's magic (fake, but often captivating), and then there's reality (genuine, but often boring). Yet like so many apparent dualisms, there's good reason to view magical realism as a notion that blends the best of two seeming incompatibilities. That's how Zen teacher James Ishmael Ford views things in his book, Zen at the End of Religion: An Introduction for the Curious, the Skeptical, and the Spiritual But Not Religious. I'm almost finished with the book. It's not among my favorite Zen books, but there's quite a bit to like about it. My first posts…
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Posted inBuddhism Mystics Religions

Splitting is the biggest danger in religiosity and mysticism

There are lots of good reasons to be wary of religiosity and mysticism. Splitting is one of the most important. It comes in various forms. Most obviously, religiosity and mysticism split us from other people. It is easy, almost compulsory, really, for a believer to consider that they are on a path that makes them special. Perhaps they are saved, while others are condemned. Perhaps they are God's chosen, while others are ignored by God. Perhaps they possess some special revelation, while others wallow in ignorance. But there's another way of looking at splitting that seems to be the foundation…
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Posted inBuddhism Spiritual practice/meditation

Buddhism’s fourth noble truth can be ignored, because there’s no need to follow a path of liberation

My previous post was "The first three of Buddhism's Four Noble Truths are obvious. The fourth is unappealing." True. But I should have made it more clear that in addition to being unappealing, the fourth truth also is unnecessary. That's why I said that Zen is more appealing than traditional Buddhism, because it doesn't buy into the whole Right View, Right Resolve, Right Speech, Right Conduct, Right Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, and Right Concentration stuff. Or at least nowhere near as assiduously as traditional Buddhism does. Since in that post I'd quoted James Ishmael Ford as saying that he's…
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Posted inBuddhism Spiritual practice/meditation

The first three of Buddhism’s Four Noble Truths are obvious. The fourth is unappealing.

Here's the blog post about James Ishmael Ford's book, Zen at the End of Religion: An Introduction for the Curious, the Skeptical, and the Spiritual But Not Religious, that got pre-empted by my detour into a recently discovered essay that I'd written more than 25 years ago. I like Ford's style. Warm. Informal. Non-dogmatic. You know, what I'd expect from a Zen practitioner. Early on he speaks about three forms of Zen that lie outside Buddhism. Jewish Zen and Christian Zen are two of them. They don't interest me. Then there's secular Zen, which is the Zen I resonate with most…
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Posted inBuddhism

As an atheist, this is what I like about Buddhism’s Pure Land Tradition

Surprisingly, even to me, I've enjoyed learning about the Pure Land Tradition of Buddhism after buying a book by Taitetsu Unno four years ago. From time to time I pick up River of Fire, River of Water, liking the parts that resonate with me, downplaying the parts that don't. As I said in a title of a blog post earlier this year, "I enjoy Buddhism's Pure Land tradition, but I don't believe in it." This is common among atheists like myself. It's possible to be moved by religious devotion without accepting the teachings of a religion. When I see a…
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Posted inBuddhism Mindfulness

Just this — a simple yet profound Zen saying

Zen Buddhism is known for focusing on the natural world rather than abstract concepts. Chopping wood and carrying water are favored over devotion to God and similar thoughts divorced from everyday reality. Just this. A simple yet profound Zen saying. Just this breath in meditation. Just this step in walking the dog. Just this seeing of the full moon. Just this sensation of a hot bath. There's nothing lacking in just this, nothing to strive for, nothing to hope for, nothing to pray for. The present moment is complete. Undeniable. Impossible to argue with. Beyond doubt. Religious notions of faith…
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Posted inBuddhism Neuroscience

“Myself” is a transient thought, like all other thoughts

Who am I? Who are you? Who is anybody? These questions, which all point in the same enigmatic direction, are central to many different fields. Psychology. Neuroscience. Spirituality. Philosophy. Sociology. Anthropology. Broadly speaking -- very broadly, really -- there seems to be two approaches to answering the Who am I? question. I'll sum them up as the Hidden Pearl and the Flowing River. Hinduism is an example of Hidden Pearl. There's a divine Self lurking within the human psyche, Atman, which, when recognized, is closely related to Brahman, the Supreme Being. Another way of putting it is the true Self…
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Posted inBuddhism Radha Soami Satsang Beas Religions

Just breath. Arising out of nothing. Returning to nothing.

Most religions say that the purpose of human life is to merge with God. Maybe not become God, but at least become really close to God. Christianity, Islam, Judaism, and Hinduism obviously differ in many respects. However, they all espouse achieving a closeness to the Almighty that expands the usual conception of what being a person is all about. The Eastern religion that I belonged to for 35 years, Radha Soami Satsang Beas, had a similar teaching: the creative power of God extends throughout the creation. Through meditation and other spiritual practices, it is possible to first become self-realized as…
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Posted inBuddhism Radha Soami Satsang Beas

If a religion claims to know ultimate truth, how can its teachings change?

This morning I read another chapter in Scott Carney's The Enlightenment Trap: Obsession, Madness and Death on Diamond  Mountain. "Diamond Theosophy" included some interesting Buddhist history that I wasn't aware of before. I did know that Buddhism became less popular in the area where Buddha lived, modern day India. China and Japan became Buddhist centers, along with south Asia. But Buddhism also made its way into Tibet in the fifth century, where it thrived.  Carney writes: Modern scholars who have studied the original manuscripts were unsurprised to learn that the translations that endured the legions of miles on monks' backs…
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