[Buddha-l] "Indigenous"

[curt]

Margaret Gouin wrote:

 >> Although Tibetan Buddhism has done its best (at least in the past) 
to get rid of
Bon--usually by teaching it is an inferior, shamanic, indigenous religion,
which it is not (on any of the three counts)--there has been a notable
lack of success there, and 'modern Bon' flourishes in exile. <<

As far as I am concerned this is the essential point. Namely that the 
Buddhist response to Bon, whatever Bon might be, does not rise to the 
level of "extirpation". Christianity and Islam have established a very 
clear precedent in this regard - to play in their league one must 
successfully extirpate (that is "to remove or destroy totally") large 
numbers of religions - not merely teach that they are inferior and wish 
for their demise - and possibly "influence" their beliefs and practices.

The below is from Eusebius' "Institutes of Ecclesiastical History" (Book 
II, Century IV, Part I) - speaking of the emperors who immediately 
followed Julian the Apostate . Basically, Eusebius is praising the 
Christian emperors for their religious intolerance while criticizing 
them for not going far enough in their persecution of Paganism. History 
suggests that all later Christian rulers for the next thousand plus 
years would heed both Eusebius praise and his criticism.

"15. .... All these were Christians, and did much to advance the 
religion they professed. They all endeavored, thought not with equal 
zeal to extirpate wholly the Pagan religions. In this particular, 
Theodosius the Great, the last emperor of this century, exceeded all the 
rest. He came to throne in AD 389 and died AD 395. And during his whole 
life, he did all he could to extirpate idolatry though all the provinces 
of the empire, and enacted  severe laws against the adherents to it. The 
same design was prosecuted by his sons Arcadius and Honorius; so that in 
the close of this century, the ancient superstitions were ready to 
expire, and had lost all their respectability.

"16. Yet this severity of the government could not prevent the existence 
of some Pagan fanes and ceremonies, especially in the remoter provinces. 
Indeed, these rigorous laws against the worshippers of the Pagan Gods, 
seem to have been aimed rather against the common people, than against 
persons of rank and distinction. For it appears, that during the reign 
of Theodosius, as well as after his death, individuals filled the 
highest offices, and continued in them till old age, who are known to 
have been averse from Christianity and attached to Paganism. Of this 
Libanius is an example who was very hostile to the Christians, and yet 
was made praefect of the praetorian guards by Theodosius himself. 
Perhaps greater indulgence was shown to philosophers, rhetoricians, and 
military commanders, than to other people, on account of their supposed 
usefullness to the commonwealth.

"17. Yet these very rhetoricians and philosophers, whose schools were 
supposed to be so profitable to the community, exhausted all their 
ingenuity, both before the days of Constantine the Great, and 
afterwards, to arrest the progress of Christianity. In the beginning of 
this century, Hierocles, the great ornament of the Platonic school, 
composed two books against the Christians; in which he had the audacity 
to compare our Saviour with Apollonius Tyanaeus, and for which he was 
chastised by Eusebius [Caesarensis] in a tract written expressly against 
him. Lactantius speaks of another philosopher who endeavored to convince 
the Christians they were in error; but his name is not mentioned. After 
the reign of Constantine the Great, Julian wrote a large volume against 
the Christians, and Himerius and Libanius in their public declamations, 
and Eunapius in his lives of the philosphers, zealoously decried the 
Christian religion. Yet no one of these persons was punished at all, for 
the licentiousness of his tounge or of his pen.

"18. How much harm these sophists or philosophers, who were full of the 
pride of imaginary knowledge, and of hatred to the Christian name, did 
to the cause of Christianity in this century, appears from many 
examples, and especially from the apostacy of Julian, who was seduced by 
men of his stampl. Among those who sished to appear wise, and to take 
merate ground, many were induced by the agrumgenst and explanations of 
these men, to devise a kind of reconciling religion, intermediate 
between the old superstition and Christianity; and to imagine that 
Christ had enjoined the very same things , which had long been 
represented by the Pagan priests under the envelope of their ceremonies 
and fables. Of these views were Ammianus Marcellinus, a very prudent and 
discreet man, Chalcidius, a philosopher, Themistius, a very celebrated 
orator, and others who conceived that both religions were in unison, as 
to all the more important points if they were rightly understood; and 
therefore held that Christ was neither to be condemned, nor to be 
honored to the exclusion of the Pagan Gods."

Curt Steinmetz