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

[Richard Hayes]

On Monday 05 March 2007 12:01, David S wrote:

>   For the number of Buddhists in the U.S., I have seen estimates from as
> low as 100,000 to over 10 million. 

This is probably another one of those questions that sounds sensible to ask 
but cannot possibly be answered until some agreement is reached as to what 
counts as a Buddhist. Right here in my home town there are a couple of 
informal meditation groups that have no formal membership lists. They use all 
kinds of terminology associated with Buddhism but do not in any formal way go 
for refuge. If many of these people were pushed to ask what they consider 
themselves to be, some might say Buddhist, but others almost surely would 
not. How to count people who resist being counted as anything.

Just for fun, I took the nine questions from the Vipassana Foundation web site 
into my Introduction to Asian Philosophy class and asked students to score 
themselves. It turns out that about 75% of the students got enough points to 
be a Buddhist or "have compatible views with the principles of Buddhism." 
(Interestingly enough, one student who is a member of a local Buddhist outfit 
did NOT have enough points to qualify as a Buddhist. Should I send him to 
someone for more effective brainwashing than he is getting at his local 
Buddhist laundromat?) So my serious question is, how does one go about 
putting any kind of numbers on how many people are Buddhist anywhere?

As I have said before, I suspect that anyone who tries to put numbers on the 
number of believers, practitioners or adherents of any religious or 
philosophical movement is probably doing it for questionable reasons. The 
spiritual bean counters of this planet are trying to make themselves feel 
important or successful in some way, or they are seeking money or political 
influence, or they are in some subtle way trying to denigrate others or 
minimize their perceptions of themselves as worthwhile. All of these are (in 
Buddhist terms) at worst sick motivations and at best simple wastes of time 
and energy that could better be applied to helping themselves and others 
reduce greed, hatred and delusion.

The wisest response of all to the claim that Buddhism is the second largest 
religion in the world came from the buddha-l denizen who said "So what?"

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