[Buddha-l] NYTimes.com: Let Us Pray for Wealth

[L.S. Cousins]

I can't understand some of this.

1. Hindus and Buddhist are not fighting in Sri Lanka. The Tamil 
Tigers - a Marxist organization founded and led by members of the 
Christian community - are fighting to establish a separate 
linguistically-based Tamil state. I do not believe that most 
Buddhists or Hindus have any interest at all in extirpating each 
others' religion. Some Marxist members of the Tigers might be an 
exception, but if so, they would probably want to extirpate all 
religions (except Marxism).

2. I fail to understand how Communists fighting to control their 
colony in Tibet has anything to do with whether Buddhists 
historically try to extirpate other religions.

3. Again it is difficult to see how persecutions by the Communist 
government in China have anything to do with the point.

4. I don't understand the reference to Korea.

5. The only valid point here is the reference to the Tokugawa 
shogunate, assuming one accepts that the Shogunate was Buddhist. But 
we should note that this was a response to a rather vicious campaign 
of murder and destruction carried out by 'Christian' military forces 
across Asia. Unfortunately, we have to acknowledge that violence is 
infectious and Christian/Muslim violence has sometimes infected other 
religions on their frontier.

It is regrettable that many generally well-meaning Christians and 
Muslims are unwilling to acknowledge the degree of violence in their 
history.

Lance Cousins

>curt <curt at cola.iges.org> wrote:
>>SJZiobro at cs.com wrote:
>>>  Curt,
>>>
>>>  Yes, you are missing something, namely, openess to the historical 
>>>record.  For example, what are the Hindus and the Buddhists 
>>>fighting over in Sri Lanka?  What are the Communists fighting over 
>>>in Tibet?  Do you need more hints?
>>>
>>>
>>>   
>>If you contend that there are, somewhere hidden from our view because of
>>deficiencies in the historical record, cases in which Hindus, Buddhists,
>>etc, have extirpated other religions then there needs to be some
>>evidence or at least reasoning to support that claim. In the cases of
>>Christianity and Islam there is no doubt.
>
>Curt,
>
>There is also no doubt relative to what I mentioned earlier, plus 
>the anti-Christian extinction efforts of the Tokugawa shogunate in 
>Japan, of the persecutions in Korea, of the continuing efforts in 
>Communist China.  I know this doesn't fit into your worldview, but 
>neither can it be denied by any rational observer.
>
>Regards,
>
>Stan