Western Buddhism and the New Age
Western Buddhism has been heavily influenced by the New Age movement. In online forums it is common to encounter nominal Buddhists proclaiming New Age beliefs that are alien or even antithetical to Buddhism. Adherents of such ideas rarely seem to be aware of those ideasโ origins, however; nor of their problematic nature from a Buddhist point of view. And even less rarely will they self-identify as followers of the New Age. The latter is typical, however. As Margrethe Lรธรธv remarks in a recent book about the New Age movement, โvery few people actually denote themselves New Age โ the preferred...
A Note on the Pฤli Canon
(Originally posted on April 27. Major revisions on June 3, 2022.) In chapter 5 of A Buddha Land in This World, I wrote that until the sลซtras in the Pฤli canon were written down they were recited in periodic meetings of monks, but we have no consistent evidence about the nature, form, and frequency of these meetings, nor about how reliable this process was. However, when I reread this, I wasnโt entirely happy with this sentence because it seems to suggest that I think that oral transmission is the biggest problem for the authenticity of the content of the Pฤli...
On Selfish and Selfless Readings of Buddhist Scripture
In Indian religions and philosophy, mokแนฃa โ the escape from the cycle of death and rebirth (saแนsฤra) and, thereby, the liberation from suffering (dukkha) โ is (typically) the ultimate goal of (oneโs/my/your) life. Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and other schools of thought disagree about various details โ Buddhists prefer the term nirvฤแนa instead of mokแนฃa, for example โ but all accept a version of the doctrine that right (non-) action leads to good karma, which leads to better rebirth, and ultimately to mokแนฃa. That ultimate goal is a selfish goal, however โ the ultimate aim of my right (non-) action (regardless...