[Buddha-l] Re: Core teachings [was Where does authority for "true" Buddhism come from?]

[Richard P. Hayes]

On Mon, 2006-01-30 at 11:32 -0700, Jim Peavler wrote:

> I claim that, to be a Buddhist, a person must accept the Four Noble  
> Truths as worthy of basing ones activities upon, and that one must be  
> making a sincere effort to follow the path toward the cessation of  
> misery. 

Sadhu, sadhu, sadhu. Well said, Brother James. Just about everyone in
the Buddhist tradition would agree with this fine statement you have
made. 

Of course, the Four Noble Truths were not at all unique to Buddhism.
They were also part of the traditions of just about every school of
philosophy in India, and they were not at all unlike principles accepted
by several guilds of Greek philosophers. So what makes someone a
Buddhist, as opposed to someone else earnestly striving in the general
direction of reducing (and, if one lucks out, even eliminating) nuisance
(dukkha), is doing that striving in the context of going for refuge to
the three jewels. 

Going for refuge to the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha is usually
described in such a way that even a person who had never heard of Gotama
Buddha would qualify.
For example, that notorious freethinking heretic Vasubandhu tells us
that going for refuge to the Buddha means nothing more nor less than
striving to cultivate the virtues that every Buddha has, which include
such things as intellectual and emotional flexibility. So part of being
a Buddhist is struggling to overcome the tendency to be rigid and
dogmatic and unforgiving. 

Going for refuge to the Dharma means striving for Nirvana, the
elimination of dukkha. 

Finally, going for refuge to the Sangha means being willing to learn
from those who have eliminated belief in a permanent self, eliminated an
attachment to vows and good conduct (which is further explained as
following vows and cultivating good conduct in order to gain merit for
oneself), and eliminated the tendency to dismiss new ideas without first
thinking about them; and to learn from those who have reduced (not
necessarily eliminated) anger and lust; and of course to learn from
those who have eliminated anger and lust and those who have gone a step
further and uprooted all pride, and all tendencies to compare oneself to
others, all attachments, even to the subtle pleasures of meditation. 

In short, if you are aiming in the general direction of nirvana, and are
cultivating wisdom and compassion and rooting out dogmatism, and if you
admire people who have accomplished something through their practice
(which means getting over the tendency to belittle them or be envious of
them), you qualify as a Buddhist. 

Nowhere in any list of requirements I have ever read (except for those
emanating from northern Spain) is there a requirement to believe that it
is literally true that in the past life one might have been Mark Twain
and that in some future life one might be a the great granddaughter of
Dicky Cheney's lesbian daughter.
 
> I hope I stated that strongly enough.

Like you, Brother James, I love strong statements almost as much as I
love strong whiskey. I admire the strength of you statement on this
matter (although I doubt it was strong enough to penetrate the thick
armor worn by the Spanish conquistadores who seem intent on bringing
their peculiarly narrow-minded brand of Buddhism to the New World), and
I suggest we break open a bottle of Wild Turkey next time you visit
civilization.

-- 
Brother Richard