[Buddha-l] Buddhism, the second largest religion in the world

[Richard Hayes]

On Wednesday 28 February 2007 14:29, Vicente Gonzalez wrote:

> ¿can somebody confirm these dates?
>
> http://vipassanafoundation.com/Buddhists.html

Which dates? The only dates I saw were the birthdates of people like Bhante 
Gunatatana, Ven. Karunadharma and Thich Nhat Hanh, all of which agreed with 
dates I've seen published for those same people elsewhere.

What troubled me was that I took the test to see whether I agree with the 
teachings of Buddhism and somehow managed to flunk it. There were nine 
questions, and one has to answer five of them affirmatively toqualify as a 
bona fides Buddhist. I answered three only affirmatively, and either was 
undecided or answered negatively on the other six. What a substandard test! 
Was it devised by Benito, or what's the deal?

By the way, I think the estimates of the number of Buddhists in the world is 
wildly exaggerated on that web site. Not only that, but their reasoning is 
about the worst I have ever seen. About the only thing I can conclude from 
this website is that Vipassana practice must lead to severe brain damage.

-- 
Richard P. Hayes
Department of Philosophy
University of New Mexico
http://www.unm.edu/~rhayes