\n
By the Victorian era, Christianity\u2019s beliefs had become obviously false…<\/em><\/p>\n
Rationally-inclined liberal Victorians developed secular moral philosophy, trying to find new, rational foundations for more-or-less the same morals.\u00a0 (Current secular morality, both left and right, derives primarily from Christian morality.)<\/p>\n
Romantically-inclined Victorians hoped for an–<\/span>alternative\u00a0spiritual<\/strong>\u00a0foundation for ethics.\u00a0 Rejecting rationality, they were sure Truth lay in the mystical connection of the True Self with the Absolute Principle of the Universe.\u00a0 Some great civilization, in a land less barbarous than the ancient Middle East,\u00a0must<\/strong>\u00a0have discovered a correct system of ethics, and\u00a0must<\/strong>\u00a0have based it on this mystical unity.\u00a0 Surveying the world\u2019s religions, Buddhism looked most promising. (Buddhist morality is surprisingly un-bad compared with pre-modern alternatives.)\u00a0 Ah, the ancient wisdom of the exotic East!<\/p>\n
Unfortunately, traditional Buddhist morality is plainly inferior to liberal Victorian morality.\u00a0 And, Buddhism does not use mysticism to justify its morals.\u00a0 But, these are mere details! Buddhism\u00a0must\u00a0have the correct ethics\u2014so we need to look harder to find it.<\/p>\n
In fact, since it is not there, the Victorians wrote the ethics they wanted onto Buddhism, creatively hallucinating the object of their desire.<\/p>\n
But this was not just a European project.\u00a0 Asian Buddhist modernizers had their own reasons for inventing \u201cBuddhist ethics,\u201d and they collaborated vigorously in the project.<\/p>\n
First, educated Asians recognized that European morality was, in fact, superior.\u00a0 It was at minimum a\u00a0stage 4<\/a>\u00a0ethical system: a rational\u00a0structure of justifications\u00a0that eliminates arbitrary rules and assigns sensible weights to different moral considerations.\u00a0 Traditional Buddhist morality goes no further than stage 3, which aims only at communal harmony, not justice.\u00a0 Although Asian intellectuals disagreed with some specifics, they could see the value of a justifiable structure; so the idea of a Buddhist version was compelling.<\/p>\n
Second, Asian rulers constructed modern Buddhism as a defense against colonialism.\u00a0 Europe\u2019s moral justification for colonialism was \u201cbringing the benefits of civilization to the benighted savages.\u201d\u00a0 Demonstrating that an Asian country was fully civilized successfully prevented the colonization of Thailand and Japan.\u00a0 One of the greatest benefits of civilization was a just system of ethics, for which Christianity was the standard.\u00a0 Christianity was an instrument of colonialism, so it was urgent for Asians to invent an alternative system of ethics that would compare favorably with Christianity\u00a0on Europe\u2019s own terms
\n
\n(How Asian Buddhism Imported Western Ethics<\/a>, some formatting changes)<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n
At a later state of the same process, we get the wishy-washy\u00a0 American Buddhism<\/a>, which is really just therapeutic moralism with a side of meditation.\u00a0 It is easy enough to find some hippie teacher who says that Buddhism is just about getting rid of unhealthy attachments while living the life you always wanted, but this is completely foreign to the\u00a0 complete renunciation of all pleasures<\/a>\u00a0demanded by most of the historical forms of Buddhism.<\/p>\n
In particular, Buddha’s “Middle Way” does\u00a0not<\/em>\u00a0refer to a comfortable middle class existence; rather it refers to Buddha’s conclusion that severe ascetic practices intended to torment the body are just as distracting and unhelpful as pleasure-seeking.<\/p>\n
If you are looking for a sex-positive religion, Buddhism isn’t it!\u00a0 When an early disciple named\u00a0Sudinna<\/a>\u00a0had intercourse with his wife, solely because his family wanted an heir, the Buddha rebuked him severely:<\/p>\n
Worthless man, haven’t I taught the Dhamma in many ways for the fading of passion, the sobering of intoxication, the subduing of thirst, the destruction of attachment, the severing of the round, the ending of craving, dispassion, cessation, unbinding?\u00a0 Haven’t I in many ways advocated abandoning sensual pleasures, comprehending sensual perceptions, subduing sensual thirst, destroying sensual thoughts, calming sensual fevers?<\/p>\n
Worthless man, it would be better that your penis be stuck into the mouth of a poisonous snake than into a woman’s vagina.\u00a0 It would be better that your penis be stuck into the mouth of a black viper than into a woman’s vagina.\u00a0 It would be better that your penis be stuck into a pit of burning embers, blazing and glowing, than into a woman’s vagina.\u00a0 Why is that? For\u00a0that\u00a0reason you would undergo death or death-like suffering, but you would not on that account, at the break-up of the body, after death, fall into deprivation, the bad destination, the abyss, hell.\u00a0 But for\u00a0this\u00a0reason you would, at the break-up of the body, after death, fall into deprivation, the bad destination, the abyss, hell.\u00a0 (from the Vinaya Pitaka,\u00a0quoted here<\/a>)<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n
[Note that as discussed\u00a0 previously<\/a>, my quotations are from the Theravadan Pali canon, to keep them as close as possible to the historical Buddha’s teaching.]<\/p>\n
To a monk who questioned whether it is really necessary to give up all sensual acts (perhaps thinking he would do them without becoming attached to them) the Buddha replied:<\/p>\n
For a person to indulge in sensual pleasures without sensual passion, without sensual perception, without sensual thinking: That isn’t possible.\u00a0\u00a0(Discourse on the Water Snake Simile<\/a>)<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Of course this is extremely difficult to do if you aren’t a monk; so it was understood (even in the Theravada traditions) that most laypeople would still eat nice food, and have sex with their spouses, and love their kids\u2014but that just means they are currently\u00a0failing<\/em>\u00a0to become enlightened in this life.\u00a0 Hopefully, by being decent and moral people (ideally by taking vows to abstain from killing, sexual immorality, stealing, lying, and drinking alcohol), they can improve their chances to succeed in the next reincarnation!\u00a0 (Hence Buddhist texts like the\u00a0Advice to Sigala<\/a>, encouraging householders to adhere to a sort of conventional-bourgeoisie work ethic.)\u00a0 But it was generally understood that actual enlightenment was not really compatible with fulfilling such social roles.\u00a0 In this respect, Buddhist monasticism is\u00a0not<\/em>\u00a0like ordination in other religions, where you can be e.g. a fully practicing Jew without becoming a rabbi, or a fully practicing Catholic without becoming a priest, monk, or nun.<\/p>\n
(A lot of later schools of thought in Buddhism can be understood as reacting to the difficulty of this Theravada teaching by adding mitigating features\u2014for example Mahayana adds to Buddhism the idea that\u00a0bodhisattvas<\/em>\u00a0(Buddhist saints) can intercede on behalf of ordinary people to make Enlightenment easier for them; while Tantric Buddhism allows for the indulgence of sensuality and for breaking traditional Buddhist vows as an alternative path towards enlightenment.\u00a0 But as far as I can tell, both of these are departures from Buddha’s original teaching.)<\/p>\n
Seeing that the human condition is full of suffering, Buddhism looks around for the door marked\u00a0Exit<\/em>.\u00a0 (In a system with reincarnation, you can’t just top yourself.)\u00a0 The goal is to permanently escape from the cycle of births into cessation of suffering, returning (if at all) only to help other people also escape from life.<\/p>\n
I take it that Nirvana (literally<\/a>\u00a0“blowing out” or “quenching”) is not necessarily regarded as\u00a0quite<\/em>\u00a0the same thing as nonexistence, but it would at least seem to involve the ceasing of all that makes us uniquely human.\u00a0 No Christian would ever use the word “extinguished” to refer to the state of heavenly glory, let alone the state of the resurrected saints reigning with Christ in the New Heaven and Earth.\u00a0 By contrast, Buddha himself refused to say whether the enlightened person persisted after death, holding that any possible viewpoint on the issue would keep one entangled in suffering:<\/p>\n
[Note: the repetitiveness of many Buddhist sutras was designed to make them easier to recite by memory.\u00a0 In the following quote I retain this feature, despite its awkwardness in written text.]<\/em><\/p>\n
Vaccha, the position that “after death a Tathagata exists” is a thicket of views, a wilderness of views, a contortion of views, a writhing of views, a fetter of views.\u00a0 It is accompanied by suffering, distress, despair, & fever, and it does not lead to disenchantment, dispassion, cessation; to calm, direct knowledge, full Awakening, Unbinding.<\/p>\n
Vaccha, the position that ”after death a Tathagata does not exist” is a thicket of views, a wilderness of views, a contortion of views, a writhing of views, a fetter of views.\u00a0 It is accompanied by suffering, distress, despair, & fever, and it does not lead to disenchantment, dispassion, cessation; to calm, direct knowledge, full Awakening, Unbinding.<\/p>\n
Vaccha, the position that ”after death a Tathagata both exists & does not exist” is a thicket of views, a wilderness of views, a contortion of views, a writhing of views, a fetter of views.\u00a0 It is accompanied by suffering, distress, despair, & fever, and it does not lead to disenchantment, dispassion, cessation; to calm, direct knowledge, full Awakening, Unbinding.<\/p>\n
Vaccha, the position that ”after death a Tathagata neither exists nor does not exist” is a thicket of views, a wilderness of views, a contortion of views, a writhing of views, a fetter of views.\u00a0 It is accompanied by suffering, distress, despair, & fever, and it does not lead to disenchantment, dispassion, cessation; to calm, direct knowledge, full Awakening, Unbinding.<\/p>\n
(To Vacchagotta on Fire<\/a>)<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Thus, while Buddhism encourages many noble virtues, its core goal is what some Christians might refer to as a “mortal sin”, which (unless it is repented of) is inconsistent with salvation.\u00a0 By this I do not<\/em> mean that it is a vice for which God arbitrarily withholds salvation.\u00a0 Rather, I mean that, if any Buddhist in fact succeeded in their quest to unmake themselves, it would be a\u00a0logical contradiction<\/em>\u00a0for them to also receive the Kingdom of God, as Christians understand it.\u00a0 (The sins of the flesh, like sexual immorality, are quite trivial in comparison to the existential despair that causes a person to seek spiritual suicide.)<\/p>\n
But I don’t want to be misunderstood as making a judgment about the final state of salvation of Buddhists, since not all of them will succeed in damning themselves.\u00a0 I would not be very surprised to find out that a great many Buddhists (perhaps even Buddha himself) were sincerely trying to follow the best they knew, and will be rewarded with a fuller knowledge of the truth in the age to come.\u00a0 But this will necessarily require them to stop chasing after annihilation, and instead go through the gate of life.<\/p>\n
The Goodness of Creation, and Suffering<\/strong><\/p>\n
Christianity believes that\u00a0physical existence is good<\/a>; because it was created by a God who is good.\u00a0 Redemption is not about escaping from physicality, instead it is about God assuming human nature in Christ and healing it from within.\u00a0 It is true that we are called to\u00a0 die to our selfishness<\/a>, and to be willing to sacrifice anything else\u00a0if<\/em>\u00a0it conflicts with our relationship to Christ, but only so that we may become the holy people who God truly created us to be, more human than ever before!\u00a0 Unlike Buddhism\u2014and most sects of Hinduism\u2014it does not preach the destruction of our essential individuality.\u00a0 We are not to be merely absorbed into something impersonal.\u00a0 The Christian message is called the gospel (good news<\/em>) for a reason.\u00a0 Our good news is better than their “good news”!<\/p>\n
To be fair, I should probably note that in the past, many Christian monastics came very close to a “Buddhist” interpretation of Christianity, where the ideal monk is supposed to renounce every sort of earthly pleasure or desire, for the sake of seeking Christ alone.\u00a0 Many early church fathers spoke out against “passions” in general.\u00a0 And there are passages in Roman Catholic spiritual classics such as\u00a0\u00a0The Imitation of Christ<\/a>\u00a0(by St. Thomas \u00e0 Kempis) or the\u00a0 Ascent of Mount Carmel<\/a>\u00a0(by St. John of the Cross) which seem to advocate a total renunciation of everything that is not God.\u00a0 It must be remembered that Christianity developed in a world which was\u2014partly due to cultural influence from the East\u2014far more sympathetic to asceticism than most moderns are comfortable with.<\/p>\n
But this was only one strand of Christian tradition.\u00a0 At least in theory, Christianity has always affirmed the goodness of the physical creation, including marriage and procreation.\u00a0 The emotions expressed by St. David in the Psalms, crying out to be delivered from earthly troubles, are representative of a much older view: that you can put God first without having stoic indifference towards the world.<\/p>\n
(On the other hand, modern Christians, especially Protestants, are far<\/em> more likely to fall into the opposite mistake, thinking that the point of worshipping God is to live a fulfilling earthly life; while ignoring all the scriptural passages cautioning us not to set our hopes on this world, but to store up treasures in heaven.)<\/p>\n
Zooming out more broadly, it is actually kind of surprising to me how many religions teach that suffering is, in one way or another, basically our own fault.\u00a0 Pagans look to propitiate the gods whenever something goes wrong; Buddhists say it is our own desires that cause suffering; the doctrine of karma implies that we deserve whatever we get.\u00a0 Even the medieval Rabbis, somehow overlooking or misreading the Book of Job, taught that all misfortune is a punishment for sin (although I gather that the Holocaust has led most modern Jews to reconsider this idea).<\/p>\n
But Christianity has always allowed for the existence of unjust suffering.\u00a0 It follows a Messiah who was not ashamed to be seen weeping, who felt the full range of human experiences, who went to the Cross in order to suffer on behalf of others.\u00a0 Instead of karma, it offers\u00a0grace<\/em>, undeserved favor.\u00a0 We get something unimaginably better than what we deserve, including the privilege of suffering with Christ, alongside the needy and oppressed.\u00a0 And if we share in his sufferings, we will also share in his joy.<\/p>\n
Next: <\/em>Spiritual Experience<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
[It’s hard to believe it’s been nearly 3 years since the last post in this series; maybe writing about a “long delay” jinxed me.\u00a0 Anyway I got pretty busy with academic stuff, but now I’m on sabbatical.\u00a0 Like the rest … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8710","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ethics","category-theological-method"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wall.org\/~aron\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8710","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wall.org\/~aron\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wall.org\/~aron\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wall.org\/~aron\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wall.org\/~aron\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8710"}],"version-history":[{"count":315,"href":"https:\/\/www.wall.org\/~aron\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8710\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9591,"href":"https:\/\/www.wall.org\/~aron\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8710\/revisions\/9591"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wall.org\/~aron\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8710"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wall.org\/~aron\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8710"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wall.org\/~aron\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8710"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}