[Buddha-l] Question for acedemic teachers of Buddhism

[Erik Hoogcarspel]

Lidewij Niezink schreef:
>> Any time a university course on religion is taught in such a way
>> that it makes followers of that religious tradition happy, it is
>> not being taught properly. If people want to feel warm and fuzzy
>> about some religious tradition, let them go to a church, a
>> synagogue, a mosque or a temple. Classrooms have no room for such
>> sentimentality.
>>
>> This seems to me an oversimplification, if not just untrue. If followers of
>>     
> a particular tradition attend university courses and find parts of the
> philosophy explained particularly well, the consequence might be
> happiness.This does not necessarily mean that the course was bad, does it?
> On another note (and of course in my own experience), many academics seem to
> be particularly warm and fuzzy about their (religious) traditions too...
>
> Lilly
>
>
>
>   
I reckon very few students are attending class in order to become happy. 
The issue seems to be more wether buddhists have the same prerogative as 
bats in Thomas Nagels famous article 'What's it like to be a bat?' It is 
something for a Buddhist to be one and this is something one has to know 
more or less if one wants to have any idea at all of what Buddhism is. 
For Buddhists nirvaa.na is something very desirable, so it cannot be 
nothing or something negative. If some texts are suggesting just that, 
there may be something wrong with them or with the hermeneutics. I don't 
want to defend a solely sociological or phenomenological approach, but I 
do think that texts depend on practice and the other way around. 
Pratiitya samutpaada, right?

And yes, Richard, the Vienna approach is still strong in Europe. I'm 
glad that the U.S. of A. has a more diverse buddhological landscape.

-- 


Erik

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