Series: Christianity and World Religions April 30, 2006
Sermon: Buddha: The Man Who Awoke
BUDDHISM AND THE JEWS
You might now realize this but in many circles; Buddhism is a very fashionable religion. Tiger Woods, Tina Turner, George Lucas, Farrah Fawcet, Keneu Reves, Richard Gere and many others are Buddhists. So many Jews are converting to Buddhism; there is a name for them – Jew-Boos. I remember the concern at
THE STORY OF SIDDHARTHA GUATAMA
The story of Buddhism starts with a man. Not misty myths of pre-history but a man. His name was Siddharth Guatama. What is known is that in 563 BCE (actually dates on his birth are all over the map varying over 100 years!), in what is modern
He finally demanded that he be permitted to see his people and his lands. He did and he learned that all of us get old, sick, and eventually die. At the age of 29, Siddhartha came to realize that he could not be happy living as he had been. He had discovered suffering, and wanted more than anything to discover how one might overcome suffering. After kissing his sleeping wife and newborn son goodbye, he snuck out of the palace.
He studied for a while with two famous Hindu gurus of the day, but found their practices lacking. He then began to practice the austerities and self-mortifications practiced by a group of five ascetics. For six years, he practiced extreme self-denial and nearly killed himself living on a grain of rice daily. Siddhartha then realized that these extreme practices were leading him nowhere, that in fact it might be better to find some middle way between the extremes of the life of luxury and the life of self-mortification.
Siddhartha decided that he would sit under a certain fig tree as long as it would take for the answers to the problem of suffering to come. He sat there for many days opening himself up to the truth. On the full moon of May, Siddhartha finally understood the answer to the question of suffering and became the Buddha, which means “he who is awake” or “enlightened.”
Buddha finally decided to teach. At Sarnath near Benares
BASIC BELIEFS OF BUDDHISM
Diversity of Belief – Buddhist beliefs are actually very diverse. Theravadin and Zen Buddhists are strongly non-theistic and heighten the break with Hinduism. In this form, you have to be a full-time monk to really follow Buddha because there is no divine grace to help you achieve your spiritual goals. Other forms diminish the break with Hinduism and are much more religious (Mahayana and Tibetan Buddhsim of the Dalai Lama) and have something of a Buddha-based Trinity. This strain allows people to practice Buddhism part-time and believes that you must have the grace of Buddha to help you achieve nirvana.
Non-Theism - But Buddhism is not a theistic religion – no central belief in God. Remember, what interested the Buddha – which means ‘enlightened one’ or ‘awake one’ – is how humans can escape from suffering. Buddha simply believed that belief in God is simply irrelevant for what really matters in life. Based on his experience, this is understandable. He had turned to the strictest form of Hinduism – nearly killed himself as an ascetic - and found no help and no real encounter with a god of any type. In most forms of Buddhism, Buddha is not worshipped. But he is revered and emulated as a teacher who guides us to our new consciousness and spiritual wakefulness.
The basic beliefs of Buddhism can be demonstrated in the following concepts and doctrines:
THE FOUR NOBLE TRUTHS
1) Life is Suffering: Birth is painful and death is painful; disease and old age are painful. Not having what we desire is painful and having what we do not desire is also painful. 2) Suffering is caused by attachments: It is the craving desire for the pleasures of the senses, which seeks satisfaction now here, now there; the craving for happiness and prosperity in this life and in future lives. 3: We can overcome attachments and this is the ending of suffering. To be free of suffering one must give up, get rid of, extinguish this very craving, so that no passion and no desire remain. 4: The Holy Eight-fold Path leads to the ending of all pain.
The Buddha taught that the source of all suffering is that we have undue cravings and a tendency to cling to hopes and dreams, to life itself. I feel fear of growing old and death because I cling to youth and life. By being attached to youth and remaining young, I am attached to something transitory. I will experience suffering because I want what too much what is impermanent. This whole world is impermanent. Some Buddhists believe the whole world is an illusion that is passing. If I can let go of all my cravings, I can find peace and joy. How do you do this?
THE EIGHT-FOLD PATH
The Buddha laid out an eight-fold path that is the pathway to salvation. The beauty of Buddhism is that it provides a clearly defined method by which you can overcome anxiety and suffering. Remember – Buddhism is essentially a reformation of Hinduism to make it 1) more egalitarian, 2) more hopeful, and 3) a response to sufferings Hinduism didn’t seem to have an answer for.
So Buddha laid out an eightfold path – eight items to attend to to escape suffering. I’ll only discuss the first - Right Views: You must understand that everything in this world is impermanent and fleeting. This is fundamental to Buddhism. The point of meditation is to train your mind in understanding that the world is illusory and passing. Buddha said, Regard this phantom world as a star at dawn, a bubble in a stream, a flash of lightning is a summer cloud, A flickering lamp – a phantom – and a dream. The other agenda points on the path to salvation are Right views, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness and right concentration. Each of these has specific content I will not here explore. A Buddhist lama will tell you that these 8 paths are ideals not absolutes. You achieve them through meditation and when you actualize this knowledge you are enlightened – you are Buddha.
KARMA, SAMSARA AND NIRVANA
While the Buddha did not embrace the theology of Hinduism, he did accept some Hindu ideas. He embraced the idea that good deeds generated good karma and vice versa. This karma determines the state we will occupy in the world to come. By following the 8-fold path, we generate good karma which attains for us a higher place in the next life. However, Buddhists reject the Hindu notion of Atman – the divine soul – and accept a notion called annata – which in Pali means ‘no soul.’ This seems to be contradictory – how can reincarnation happen if you don’t have a soul to pass on?
Buddha believed that your karmic force – not a full-bodied soul – was all that was passed on. This might only be some vague memories and good mojo passed on. But by following the 8-fold path, and attaining enlightenment, you hasten your development toward nirvana – similar to Hinduism. Nirvana simply means ‘extinction’ which is exactly what it is. The goal of both systems is to escape suffering and end the cycle of rebirth so that your karmic energy simply dissipates. One American lama interviewed by Alan Hamilton describes it this way: “We believe once you attain enlightenment you stop generating karma, and that its really just waking up to the present moment, seeing the nature of reality as it really is.”
Thus Buddhism, in contrast to Hinduism, believes you have no soul. There is no ‘you’ in any way that continues after you die. Some karma-energy from you will continue on, and if you have achieved enlightenment, that energy simply dissipates into the universe rather than be passed on to another human being. Buddha also rejected the caste system and even belittled the Brahmin gurus of his day. He also simplified the complexities of the reincarnation system and the wheel-of-life; it is possible to attain nirvana much more quickly.
WHAT CAN WE LEARN FROM THE BUDDHA?
There is so much Buddhism can teach us. We are in many cases way too attached to this illusory world which is passing away. This is something that Jesus also teaches but Buddha heightens this teaching for us. We are way too materialistic. Much of the anxiety and sorrow we feel is because we are overly attached to this world. Meditation and reflection of the Noble Path can help release us from our anxieties. Buddhist moral imperatives can be very meaningful: “Never speak harsh words for they come back to you.” “Better than a thousand useless words is one single word that gives peace.”
The Mystery of the Ordinary: Buddhist (especially Zen) teach that every tiny detail of life is a gateway to the eternal. A Chinese Buddhist poet wrote, “It is a miracle – I am drawing water from a well!” A man drinking a cup of water is a miracle. Life and living is a miracle. Paul also teaches us that Christ is the cosmic glue that holds the universe together (
WHAT BUDDHISTS CAN LEARN FROM US
Critique One: Who is God? Buddhism starts with the Hinduism of its day. The Buddha simply found the Hindu understanding of Brahman completely unhelpful and inaccessible. He nearly starved himself to death trying to find the Atman/Brahman connection and inner peace. He ended up feeling complete futility. He didn’t deny that there was a God, he simply believed that God was of no real help in solving our deepest problems.
Of course, we understandingly disagree. God is at the heart of Christianity: In the beginning, God. Christianity begins with a picture of God as the loving father who welcomes back the prodigal son. Christianity teaches us that we can, by grace through faith, know God as a loving heavenly father. God laid down not an 8-fold path but a two-fold path: Love God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength; and love your neighbor as yourself (Matthew 22).
Critique Two: What is suffering? Buddhism is primarily interested in ending suffering through retraining the mind that, in spite of all appearances – everything we see is an illusion. Buddhism teaches extreme detachment from the world; life is an illusion, your children are illusions, your career is a phantom. Do not love these transitory things but love things that are permanent; righteousness, truth, beauty. There is some truth here; sometimes we feel sorrow because we wanted that promotion too much because we love this world too much. But imagine telling a person who is grieving the loss of a child; your sorrow comes from being too attached to this world – namely, your child.
I heard a story of a man who went to his lama with the grief he was experiencing over the loss of a child. The lama reminded him that the Buddha taught that all the world is an illusion, a phantom, a dream. The man wrote a poem to frame his grief; The world is an illusion, So I hear, And yet…and yet….
The NT teaches us that God loved this present world and died for it! The world isn’t an illusion but has real value. Suffering, for the Christian, is not an illusion. It is a fact, a terrible fact, a part of a brutal reality of living in a fallen world with fallen people who do bad things. It is a brutal reality that natural laws sometimes kill us. It is a brutal reality that people do bad things to each other. Suffering is real, not an illusion. It reminds us of our finitude and our need for grace and forgiveness.
Critique Three: How is Suffering Overcome?
The difference between Christianity and Buddhism is striking here as seen in our symbols. The image of Buddhism is of a smiling Buddha sitting on a lotus flower. The image of Christianity is of Christ on the cross. This flows from our differing perspectives. Buddhism teaches one to escape the world through embracing its transitory nature.
Christ conquers suffering by embracing it himself, by identifying with the depth of human suffering, and by overcoming it in such a way that lays the groundwork for our own victory over evil and death. That is what we celebrate when we partake of the Lord’s Supper together. Christ’s suffering is real. But it indicates that God does not let us suffer alone. He joins with our suffering in the person of Jesus. He transforms these sufferings into the very implement of our redemption, so that by trusting in him, we have grace for today and hope for eternity.