[Buddha-l] Social codes [was: Gandharan Buddhist Art at NY Asia Society]

[Franz Metcalf]

Gang,

Federico Andino quoted Richard Hayes and added:

>> My concern about the future of Buddhism in the West is that it has been regarded much too positively by the general public, thus setting the Buddha on a pedestal so high that the eventual fall will dash him to pieces. One of my duties as an academic is to inoculate naive enthusiasts of the Buddha-dharma against the disease of fulsomeness.
> 
> Ah, truer words were never spoken (or written). Where I teach
> (Universidad del Salvador, in Buenos Aires) whenever we review one of
> the more polemical writings (say, the sDom-gsum of Sakya Pandita)
> students are quite taken aback. Why is he so mean to Vajravarahi, they
> always ask? I´m afraid that they conflate the idea of the Pandita with
> the idea of a Christian Saint, so they leave no place for people like
> Ra Lotsawa.

I think Federico's observation is accurate. Further, the same dynamic occurs with contemporary teachers. When faced with, say, a Zen teacher (not mentioning any of the myriad names) screwing his students, other students will often be unable to process the events. They adopt one of several strategies, including denial, blaming the victim, reframing the actions as "teachings," abandoning Buddhism, etc. While these strategies are often successful in the short term, I do not think they are sustainable in the long term. Nor, of course, are they in the spirit of the Buddhadharma.

To avoid the dashing to pieces Richard mentions, Buddhism in the West needs to bridge the gap between the reality of its texts and teachers and the ideal of its ancient myths and its modern projections. This is hard work, and I think other schools can learn a lot from the example of the Jodo Shinshu school in Canada and the US.

Franz