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Tom Coop
Philippians 4:6-7
July 7, 2013
Introduction To Buddhism
Today the focus on my remarks is on the Buddhist religion, a religion
that claims around 350 million adherents, about 6% of the world’s population,
making it the fourth most populous religion in the world.
But before we start … THE QUIZ!
Quiz on Buddhism
1. What was the real name of the founder of Buddhism?
Borobodur
Ashoka
Suryabaya
Siddharta Gautama
2. Which of the following is a popular form of Buddhism in Japan?
Matsushita
Zen
Totoro
Pikachu
3. The Buddhists believe in following a path to enlightenment. How
many fold is this path?
8
88
660
1,222
4. A Sanskrit word meaning 'action' or 'fate', a lot of people equate
it to 'what goes around comes around'. What is this term?
Sutra
Sangha
Nirvana
Karma
5. When a Buddhist individual reaches enlightenment, it is said
that they reach a certain state that can be literally translated as
'snuffing out'. What is this state?
Nirvana
Confusion
Texas
Cogito, ergo sum
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6. Buddhism is the religion of a substantial portion of the
population of which of the following countries?
Bhutan
Guinea-Bissau
Pakistan
Malasyia
7. Buddhism shares its roots with what other major world religion?
Zoroastrianism
Christianity
Hinduism
Islam
8. Buddhism had a difficult time catching on in China. Which of the
following is a major reason why?
Too many gods
Buddhist monks are expected to abandon family responsibilities
Buddhist art was too gaudy
Buddhists ate a lot of meat at the time, and the Chinese did not
9. What leader of Buddhist Tibet fled into exile after the communist
Chinese invaded Tibet, conquered it, and put down an uprising
during the 1950s?
Kublai Khan
Dalai Lama
Siddhartha
Karmapa Lama
10. Which of the following is Buddha also known as?
The enlightened one
The man of the people
The average one
The leader
Quiz on Buddhism Answers
1. What was the real name of the founder of Buddhism?
Your Answer: Siddharta Gautama Shakyamuni was also a name appointed to
Buddha. He was a prince of the Shakya family.
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2. Which of the following is a popular form of Buddhism in
Japan?
Your Answer: Zen Zen Buddhism arrived in Japan from China, where it is
called 'Chan'.
3. The Buddhists believe in following a path to enlightenment.
How many fold is this path?
Your Answer: 8 The eight-fold path includes various moral stances that a
practitioner of the religion ought to follow.
4. A Sanskrit word meaning 'action' or 'fate', a lot of people
equate it to 'what goes around comes around'. What is this
term?
Your Answer: Karma It is said that the karma you acquire in one life will
affect the results of your next life!
5. When a Buddhist individual reaches enlightenment, it is said
that they reach a certain state that can be literally translated as
'snuffing out'. What is this state?
Your Answer: Nirvana
Aside from being a cool grunge rock group, Nirvana is the ultimate goal of
the devout Buddhist.
6. Buddhism is the religion of a substantial portion of the
population of which of the following countries?
Your Answer: Bhutan
Bhutan is an entirely Buddhist country tucked into the Himalayas. None
of the other countries mentioned have a reasonably large number of
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Buddhists among their populations. Bhutan sits between India and
China.
7. Buddhism shares its roots with what other major world
religion?
Your Answer: Hinduism Many of the ideas and tenets of Buddhism were
drawn from the more ancient south Asian religion called Hinduism.
8. Buddhism had a difficult time catching on in China. Which of
the following is a major reason why?
Your Answer: Buddhist monks are expected to abandon family responsibilities In
China, the family is sacred according to the Confucian tradition. This
Buddhist doctrine ran directly against the grain of Confucian morality and
was hence not well accepted amongst many Chinese.
9. What leader of Buddhist Tibet fled into exile after the
communist Chinese invaded Tibet, conquered it, and put down
an uprising during the 1950s?
Your Answer: Dalai Lama
10. Which of the following is Buddha also known as?
Your Answer: The enlightened one The name 'Buddha' means 'enlightened
one', as a matter of fact!
To really understand Buddhism we need to know something of its
founder, Siddhartha Gautama, called the Buddha, which means “enlightened
one.” Siddhartha Gautama was born in the foothills of the Himalayas in
modern Nepal in approximately 560 B.C.E.
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As a young man, Siddhartha, a Hindu prince of the warrior caste, lived a
sheltered, secluded life, and was kept out of sight from human suffering by his
father who believed a prophecy that said if his son never encountered suffering
he would become the greatest ruler in human history. The prophet added that
if the boy ever did see sickness, old age, death, and a beggar, then the boy
would give up his earthly rule and discover a way of salvation for all
humankind.
His father, wanting his son to follow in his footsteps, surrounded his son
with material comforts and kept him virtually locked up in the palace so as to
never be exposed to suffering.
One day, when Siddhartha was 29 years old, he ventured outside of the
palace, for the very first time, unbeknownst to his father, and he happened to
see four people: a man covered with sores, an old man, a corpse being carried
to his grave, and a begging monk who appeared to be peaceful and happy. Ah…
the prophecy!!!
That night he began to think about the look of peace on the face of the
poor monk and he began to wonder if there was more to life than the luxuries
of his palace. Late that night, he took a last look at his sleeping wife and
newborn child, and left the palace forever.
Siddhartha was determined to solve the riddle of life. So … he shaved his
head, put on a yellow robe and wandered the countryside as a beggar monk.
First he studied with the two of the finest Hindu gurus, but he could find
no satisfaction in them. Then he tried to find salvation through self-denial. He
starved himself until he was nothing more than a walking skeleton, but this
brought him no happiness either.
Finally, he sat under the Bodhi Tree. Desperation or exhaustion, we don’t
know. He entered the lotus (sitting) position and swore that he would not move
until he found what he was searching for.
During this time, Mara, the Lord of Death – aka the devil, tried to make
him give up his quest – but was unsuccessful.
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Alone under the tree, Siddhartha went deeper and deeper into meditation
during which time he saw all his previous lives and deaths and rebirths.
At the end of 40 days, he experienced the highest degree of Godconsciousness … nirvana … literally, the “blowing out” of the flame of desire
and the negation of suffering.
Now, Nirvana is not Heaven (or a rock group), but an eternal state of
being. Through this experience Siddhartha felt he had found “salvation.” From
then on, he was known as Buddha or the “enlightened one.”
Siddhartha’s detachment led him to believe he could extinguish the
passions and attachments that cause people so much pain. Rather than search
for God, he believed he could find answers and wholeness by searching within
himself.
After his life-changing experience, Siddhartha, now the Buddha, went
back into the world and began to preach and teach about the meaning of life
and the way to nirvana.
Soon he founded the Sangha, an order of monks. By the time Buddha
died, 45 years later, many thousands had adopted his teachings. And it just
grew and grew from there.
The main belief in Buddhism is that everybody suffers. Everyone is
trapped in a life of physical and emotional pain, attached to material goods,
and consumed by unimportant things like entertainment or food.
According to Buddhism, this sort of existence is unavoidable unless one
understands the Four Noble Truths, which explain why people suffer, and the
Eightfold Path, a practical set of guidelines for living. Only a person who
accepts the Four Noble Truths and follows the Eightfold Path can hope to
achieve the state of nirvana.
Buddhism is non-theistic. The Buddha taught that believing in gods was
not useful for those seeking to realize enlightenment.
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Most religions are defined by their beliefs. But in Buddhism, merely
believing in doctrines is beside the point.
In one of his best known sermons, the Kalama Sutra, the Buddha
pointed out the danger in fashioning one’s beliefs merely on the following
grounds: on hearsay, on tradition, because many others say it is so, on the
authority of ancient scriptures, on the word of a supernatural being, or out of
trust in one’s teachers, elders, or priests. Instead one maintains an open mind
and thoroughly investigates one’s own experience of life.
Instead of teaching doctrines to be memorized and believed, the Buddha
taught how we can realize truth for ourselves. And so, the focus of Buddhism is
on practice rather than belief.
To illustrate, the Buddha gave the example of a man shot by a poisontipped arrow who, before he would call a doctor to treat him, demanded to
know first who shot the arrow and where the arrow was made and of what and
by whom and when and where ... He said this foolish man would surely die
before his questions could be well answered. All that should matter is removing
the arrow and receiving an antidote for the poison.
In the same way, the Buddha said, the urgent need of our existence is to
find lasting relief from recurrent suffering, which robs us of happiness and
leaves us in strife.
Thus, the central teaching of the Buddha, around which all other
teachings revolve, is the Four Noble Truths. They are as follows:
1. The First Noble Truth is that all forms of being, human and otherwise, are
afflicted with suffering. Suffering is universal. We get sick. Our feelings get
hurt. We have painful experiences. Life is filled with anxiety and stress.
2. The Second Noble Truth is that the cause of this suffering is due to
attachment or craving. We continually search for something outside
ourselves to make us happy. But no matter how successful we are, we never
remain satisfied, because we are too attached to our health, wealth, status,
and physical comfort. We crave life, so we suffer when we face death. We
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crave to be loved, so we suffer when love is withdrawn. We crave food, so we
suffer when we go hungry.
3. The Third Noble Truth is that the cure for suffering is to overcome ignorance
and eliminate craving. Since to live is to suffer and suffering is caused by
craving, if a person could remove craving from his or her life, suffering
would end.
The Buddha’s teachings on the Four Noble Truths are sometimes
compared to a physician diagnosing an illness and prescribing a treatment.
The first truth tells us what the illness is, and the second truth tells us what
causes the illness. The Third Noble Truth holds out hope for a cure.
Which leads us to the Fourth Noble Truth. The Buddha taught that
through diligent practice, we can put an end to craving. Ending the hamsterwheel chase after satisfaction is enlightenment. The enlightened being exists in
a state called Nirvana.
4. And that’s the basis of the Fourth Noble Truth, that this peaceful and
blissful Enlightenment can be achieved through a gradual training, a Path
that is called the Middle Way or the Eightfold Path.
The way to end all suffering is called the Middle Way because it avoids
the two extremes of Sensual Indulgence on the one hand and Self-Punishment
on the other. Only when the body is in reasonable comfort but not overindulged has the mind the clarity and strength to meditate deeply and discover
the Truth.
The Eightfold Path is as follows:
1. Right View: which is the true understanding of the Four Noble Truths.
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2. Right Aspiration: The true desire to free oneself from attachment,
ignorance, and hatefulness. – This step involves giving up attitudes that are selfcentered or corrupt.
These two are referred to as prajña, or wisdom.
3. Right Speech: Avoiding slander, gossip, lying, and all forms of untrue
and abusive speech.
4. Right Action: abstaining from hurtful behaviors, such as killing,
stealing, and careless sex.
5. Right Livelihood: making your living in such a way as to avoid
dishonesty and hurting others, including animals.
These three are referred to as shila, or morality or ethics.
6. Right Effort: Avoiding negative thoughts and emotions, such as anger
and jealousy.
7. Right Mindfulness: the focusing of one’s attention on one’s body,
feelings, thoughts, and consciousness in such a way as to overcome
craving, hatred, and ignorance.
8. Right Concentration: Using meditation to reach the highest level of
enlightenment.
The last three are known as samadhi, or mental development.
While the Buddha did not embrace the theology of Hinduism, because he
experienced no blessings from it, he did accept some Hindu ideas. He
embraced the Hindu view that our good and bad deeds generate karma, a force
or energy that is passed on and determines the state we will occupy in the life
to come.
If we generate bad karma, we may return to the animal realm, or hell or
other realms, which I will explain in just a minute.
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If we do good, we will be reincarnated in a more positive state, at a higher
level. That is one reason why the Eightfold Path is so important to Buddhism:
By doing the right thing, you can attain a higher place in the next life.
In addition, the Buddha accepted the Hindu concept of samsara: the idea
that, after your death, your karmic force is immediately transferred to a child
being conceived in the womb, so you are born again and again and again in an
endless cycle.
In Buddhism, traditionally, there are six realms in which inhabitants of
the universe live. Known as the Wheel of Life, these realms represent the places
where all beings are born and reborn based on their actions in former lives.
These six realms are typically divided into three higher realms and three
lower realms: the three higher realms are the realms of the gods, demi-gods,
and humans; the three lower realms are the realms of the animals, hungry
ghosts and hell beings. These realms can be described briefly as follows:
The highest realm in the Buddhist universe is that of the gods who lead
long and enjoyable lives full of pleasure and abundance, but they spend their
lives pursuing meaningless distractions. When death comes to them, they are
completely unprepared; without realizing it, they have completely exhausted
their good karma (which was the cause for being reborn in the god realm) and
they suffer through being reborn in the lower realms.
The next realm is that of the demi-gods who have pleasure and
abundance almost as much as the gods, but they spend their time fighting
among themselves or making war on the gods. When they make war on the
gods, they always lose, since the gods are much more powerful.
The level where we currently reside, is the realm of potential
enlightenment. Here, humans are able either to seek awakening or to be
consumed with the desire to acquire and possess.
Then there is the animal realm. Wild animals suffer from being attacked
and eaten by other animals; so they generally lead lives of constant fear.
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Domestic animals suffer from being exploited by humans; for example, they are
slaughtered for food, overworked, and so on.
In the realm of the ghosts, hungry ghosts suffer from extreme hunger
and thirst. They wander constantly in search of food and drink, only to be
miserably frustrated any time they come close to actually getting what they
want. You see, the ghosts have necks that are so thin that food is unable to
pass to their perpetually hungry stomachs. The residents of the ghost realm live
there because of their jealousy and greed in their former lives, although they
were not so bad as to end up living in hell.
The final realm is the realm of Hell. There are actually eighteen different
types of hells, each inflicting a different kind of torment. In the hot hells, beings
suffer from unbearable heat and continual torments of various kinds. In the
cold hells, beings suffer from unbearable cold and other torments.
Buddhism comes in several different forms. Some Buddhists, for
instance, offer prayers and sacrifices to Buddha, hoping for his favor. Others
think that with concentrated effort, anyone can become a buddha.
And while many Buddhists are actually atheists, some are looking
forward to a new Buddha, a kind of messiah, who will bring enlightenment to
the earth.
Today, there are three main branches on the tree of worldwide
Buddhism.
The first is called, Theravada Buddhism, the “Way of the Elders,” and is
the oldest and most cohesive of the three, consisting of really one unified sect.
It is also the most conservative of the many strands of Buddhist thought and
practice and the most similar to what the Buddha taught.
Theravada Buddhism employs an essentially medical model, asserting
that a) there is a deep spiritual problem in our ordinary way of being. b) there
is a cure. And c) it involves adopting the lifestyle and meditative discipline of a
monk.
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Monks are primary in Theravada Buddhism and it is commonly believed
that only monks can achieve enlightenment and that the role of the layperson
is to support these monks as they do so.
Theravada Buddhism is predominantly found in southern Asia--Sri
Lanka, Burma, Thailand, and Cambodia.
By far the largest branch of Buddhism in terms of numbers, though, is
the Mahayana Buddhism, or “Great Vehicle,” so called because it originated as
a rejection of the strict monastic emphasis of Theravada and pioneered
approaches to Buddhism more geared toward lay persons in the midst of daily
life. In Mahayana Buddhism, anyone, lay or monk is able to achieve
enlightenment.
Mahayana Buddhism is predominant in Northern Asia--China, Japan,
Korea, and Vietnam.
The third branch of Buddhism is the Vajrayana Buddhism or the
“Diamond” Tradition. This is the kind of Buddhism predominant in the
Himalayan nations of Tibet, Nepal, Bhutan, and also Mongolia and is popularly
known as “Tibetan Buddhism.”
Vajrayana Buddhism is an esoteric extension of Buddhist thought and
practice which sees itself as a quicker, more effective path to enlightenment.
Great emphasis is placed on the role of gurus, called lamas, who are
religious teachers who have mastered the philosophical and ritual tradition of
their faith.
The Dalai Lama is the leading figure of this branch. And since the other
branches, so far as I know, do not place nearly so much stock in individual
leaders, the Dalai Lama has emerged as the leading figure in world Buddhism,
a status enhanced by the Dalai Lama’s tremendous personal magnetism and
resulting media attention.
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The Buddha taught often, but wrote nothing. As with Jesus, his
parables, lessons, and discourses were immediately memorized by his disciples
and only later put into writing. This occurred in the first century B.C.E.
Unlike Christianity, which believes the Bible to be inspired by God, the
Buddhist scriptures generally contain the words of the Buddha and his
disciples who were people, not gods.
Indeed, just as the Buddha taught his disciples to question even him and
to discover the truth for themselves, so the scriptures in Buddhism are
guidelines to be used inasmuch as they are practical and functional.
The oldest of these scriptures is called the Pali Canon and is often called
the Tripitaka, meaning the “Three Baskets,” since it was kept in three separate
baskets when composed in written form. The Tripitaka contains many sayings
of the Buddha along with sayings and commentaries written by his disciples
and later monks.
The three include the Discipline basket, which contains rules for the
higher class of Buddhists; the Teaching basket, which contains discourses of
the Buddha; and the Metaphysical basket, which contains Buddhist legends
and teaching.
The total volume of these three groups of writings is about 11 times
longer than the Bible.
Worship practices within Buddhism vary widely depending on one’s
tradition, one’s station in life, where one lives, and the individual’s own
preferences or habits.
Although we in the West almost make Buddhism synonymous with
meditation, not all Buddhists meditate. In fact, a great many do not. Instead,
some Buddhists may venerate a stature of the Buddha, while others may chant
the Buddha’s name or light incense in front of an image as a way of worship.
This can be done at home or at a temple. For those Buddhists who do meditate,
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they usually do so silently in a seated position for a consecutive set of minutes
or even hours.
There are a lot of Buddhists here in the United States, probably 2-3
million. Some you may recognize include: Richard Gere, Phil Jackson – former
Lakers and Bulls basketball coach, George Lucas - director of Star Wars,
Jennifer Lopez, Mark Wahlberg, Alice Walker – author of The Color Purple, Tiger
Woods, Angelina Jolie, Steve Jobs, Alex Rodriguez, NY Yankee baseball player,
Sting, and Sharon Stone, to name a few.
We have much to learn from our Buddhist friends. We need to be more
mindful about prayer and meditation. We need to avoid attaching ourselves to
all the wrong things. We need to recognize that our world is fleeting and not get
upset about things that do not matter. We certainly have much to learn about
nonviolence and justice and righteousness and love from our Buddhist
neighbors.
Next week we begin a two week journey into the world of Islam. I hope
you can join me.
Amen.