I'm a Buddhist modernist, secular Buddhist in bent. My skepticism isn't meant for trying to convert people to my way of thinking, just an expression of my thoughts. I'm not a Buddhist teacher. I grew up in the Triratna order and have been sanghaless for the past 10 years, sampling but never committing to a new practice. Recently I have become enamored of the Chinese hermetic tradition, the way I was of the Thai Forest Tradition, the Sri Lanka Forest Tradition.
I read on Reddit people who claim that Triratna isn't even a Buddhist sect. That seems pretty extreme and disrespectful to people's spiritual effort, and I don't fall for that kind of gatekeeping. One fellow seems sincere in directing people to traditional sects, because he thinks that's the right thing to do. I'm not sure if I could discuss things with him. I'm pretty sure every sect has had fishy stuff going on, and that doesn't invalidate the sincere adherents. There are sects I would avoid, but I think everyone has to make that decision for themselves. Just like priests molesting altar boys doesn't take away from the spirituality because worldly acts don't take away from attempts to connect to the transcendental.
I believe that syncretism with modern ideas doesn't invalidate a movement. The Buddha doesn't have anything to say about social media, various political developments, or any of the many many developments in society over the past 2,500 years since his death. We can apply the principles, but there's a wide range of ways of applying them and no key. The Buddha didn't even give an example of what minor rules to get rid of in the vinaya, so what you see as a minor rule will depend on a limited human judgement. Never mind the other developments.
I agree with sangharakshita by rejecting the lay/monk split. I agree that chanting the refuges and precepts is the act of a Buddhist, not a sect's belief in reincarnation, though I keep a humble open mind about the tradition and admit I don't know everything, in fact it's my skeptical nature that leads me to say we don't know much. I think lineage is a fairy tale, another glorious mythology, but alas one I don't share as a hermit. Therefore I'm not super traditional and will let Buddhist ideas swim amongst a rich soup of ideas. I still think it is Buddhism, and I'm more of a big tent Buddhist than a retrenching traditionalist who dislikes westerners colonist appropriations. I'm colonizing nobody except through the memosphere with text and images, and that's only by accident in expressing myself. I think this intersection with the western modernism and Buddhism is fascinating and will take hundreds and hundreds of years to process.
I watched this video on Nichiren Buddhism. Beautiful reverence and worship of the Lotus Sutra, which is an amazing magical book. I hope to reread it soon. What a glorious and amazing story this animated cartoon video presents.
It's not true that The Lotus Sutra was the last teaching of the historical Buddha, but you could say it emanated from the Buddha nature, the Buddha head, and part of the tradition is to claim any teaching the Buddha's teaching if it's inspired by him. Instead of an outlandish claim that my skeptical mind rejects, I prefer that it's just reverence for a wonderful sutra.
The Pali Canon has more claims to be the teachings of the Buddha. They're what's written down hundreds of years later after the Buddha died, when writing became more of a thing. It's almost a miracle that we can read it today, it was preserved in various places, but one was in Sri Lanka. Between the Pali Canon and the Lotus Sutra is a lot of Buddhism.
Simplifying is an important act, people who ask what to read in Buddhism will not find a straightforward answer. I saw follow your interests and develop an understanding. Quitting reading will be the only thing that limits your understanding. Reading the wrong book won't kill you as you gain a context to put it into, and use your critical thinking skills.
The Nichiren sect focuses on this one sutra, and with all the flurry of information, and in any person's practice however ecumenical, they only draw inspiration from a subset of the total literature of Buddhism. I'm always finding something new to read. The problem for me, is to begin to understand the sutra you really have to begin to know the whole history of Buddhism to realize it's importance.
Nichiren adds more onto reverence for a sutra. A reverence for a mantra. There are times when nationalistic ideas and reverence for one's ancestors is drawn upon. Zen priests collaborated with the war efforts from World War 2 in Japan (and elsewhere). Most sincere practitioners would have stayed out of it. It's utterly human to get swept up in the times, and to ignore the times. I ask myself if I'm doing enough to counteract the wrongs of my times. Anyway, nationalistic ideas don't feel like Buddhism to me. I wonder if an American Buddhism would help it's development. I don't think so though.
We do not know that mappo is true. Mappo is the idea that the world has degenerated too much for enlightenment to be present. Part of that is the idea that the teachings are not present in the mappo era. I find the teachings are present. While I am attracted to collapse ideas about our society, it's mostly because of environmental and human growing pains accepting responsibility for freedom. I'm afraid that mappo could be a self fulfilling prophecy and I want to turn that the other way. We're heading to a pure land.
I'm attracted to pure land mythology, and have read and listened to the pure land sutras. The sects built off those are questionable to me, smack of Christianity influence, but as a big tend Buddhist, they are still Buddhism and I am interested in them. For me the pure land ideas are more inspiration to really meditate, conduct oneself with ethics, devotional activity, friendship and to study the Dharma and history of Buddhism. You don't have to be a Pure Land Buddhist to draw inspiration from the sutras.
The Lotus Sutra is a glorious document, without all the rhetoric about its importance, it doesn't need that. Perhaps it's devotional expression, and I'm misreading them. There are so many different ways of talking and making sense of it all. We agree more than we usually think, and where we do disagree, that's OK too. People are responsible for their own spiritual journey and there are so many people who are willing to guide you. One thing that has happened in our capitalist society is that all the meaning has been drained out in the name of profit, and so people seek meaningful careers, and there are lots of career Buddhists in the USA. I've been going the other way on that, embracing self reliance.
Nichiren is a glorious beautiful Buddhist tradition that rubs me the wrong way at different levels that I've expressed above, but that's OK. I'm just one voice.
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