[Buddha-l] Dangerous religious literature?

[Richard Hayes]

On Tuesday 11 September 2007 14:25, curt wrote:

> Back in the day, the British Authorities suspected that Sri Aurobindo's
> writings on "karma yoga" were intended to encourage people to join the
> independence movement and fight (with arms) against the British colonial
> administration. They (the Brits) were probably right, as a matter of fact.

Aurobindo did, after all, serve time for setting off a bomb that killed 
people. One could be forgiven for thinking he had some hostility issues that 
he had not fully dealt with. Maybe he should have been required to go to AA.

In my spare moments when I've been walking from once place to another today, I 
have been wondering which 150 books on Buddhism I would suggest that 
prisoners could read. (The Lotus Sutra would definitely not make the list of 
allowed readings, and Buddhism Without Beliefs would definitely be on the 
required reading list for all Buddhist prisoners, but aside from that, I am 
open to suggestions.)

Frankly, I can't think of anything more difficult that agreeing on which books 
in Buddhism are so important that they surely must be on a list of the only 
150 books that a prisoner can read. The whole idea of coming up with a list 
of allowed books seems preposterous to me.

While trying, without success, to find a list of the 150 allowed Buddhist 
books, I stumbled upon many blogs. This issue has really brought the vermin 
out of the woodwork. Some people (obviously Sam Harris fans) think that there 
should be NO religious literature at all available to prisoners, since 
religion is at the root of all dangerously anti-social behavior. Others said 
that prisoners are all stupid, or else they wouldn't be in prison, so they 
probably shouldn't be allowed to read anything. Still others thought that 
felons should realize that if they wanted to have freedoms, they should have 
thought about that before becoming felons. One fellow thought it wise to 
allow prisoners to read nothing but the Bible, so they could have time to 
reflect on all the hideous sinfulness they had inherited from that wickedly 
disobedient wench, Eve. (I'm not making any of this up.) Ah, it is wonderful 
to see the honey of compassion flowing so freely through the veins of 
American bloggers. Gives me such hope, don't you know?

-- 
Richard
http://dayamati.blogspot.com

"Are grammatical mistakes due to ignorance or apathy?
I don't know and I don't care." --- William Safire