[Buddha-l] Buddhism and blasphemy

[Franz Metcalf]

Gang,

Well said, Alex. I'm not interested in parsing who's more or less 
liable to offend others in critiquing the shortcomings of others' 
cultural values and heroes. Isn't this one of the clearly enunciated 
forms of wrong speech? Let's, as you say, be both "humanly weak" and as 
"grown up" as we can be. I look forward, as you do, to the day when the 
sound of right speech and compassion thunders out from the minarets and 
the pulpits of the masjids.

And from the keyboards of buddha-l.

Oh, and to appease the asuras of buddha-l, a clarification: as I see 
it, there is no such thing as blasphemy (as usually conceived) in 
regard to Buddhism. Not ideally, anyway. Buddhas are by definition 
perfected beings without further karma. You can't defame them, only 
your own wrong view of them. And nothing you can say in slander of them 
but comes back to hit you, like spit into the wind. Of course, back in 
the real world, you can defame and critique false Buddhas, vain 
teachers, and cheap imitations. In fact, I wish more folks would; it's 
not blasphemy, it's dharma teaching. I just don't see the danger.

People afraid of cartoons are weak. Religions harmed by cartoons are 
weak. Prophets incensed by cartoons are false. If Mohammed (PBUH) was 
around now, he'd have bigger fish to fry--and closer to home--than 
Danish cartoonists. And if the Buddha was around now, he'd maintain a 
noble silence.

Wish I could do the same,

Franz