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  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 5:40 pm on July 12, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , Cargo Cults, , , , Kant, , ,   

    Buddhism 101: It’s What’s Inside that Counts… 

    If you’re looking for Gods out there, then good luck, because the source of all godliness is inside. And this pertains heavily to the preeminent issue in the history of religion, whether there is one god or many, and it turns out that the answer may instead be ‘none of the above,’ the Kantian solution to a Cartesian problem, any dualism only apparent, when the real issue is the One or the Many…

    The problem of plurality is obvious, just add a god or two for every new situation, even if you’re really just adding another statue or sculpture along the way, thus another manifestation or appearance of a primordial god, rather than a new god itself, him or herself. Because what is a god really and truly worth, if you can simply create a new one on demand?

    This gets into what I would call the ‘Cargo Cult Conundrum’ in which one might erroneously be led into thinking that a longer runway or a higher control tower might attract the really big cargo 747’s with the really good stuff, straight from some celestial factory drawn directly by the supplications of the sentimental and superstitious. But if God is really just an inner projection, then the outer trappings are just that, so much decoration and nothing more nothing less.

    Monotheism was a huge development in the history of religion, usually credited to the Jews, and the Christians and Muslims who came after them in droves, as if everything that came before was polytheistic, and lesser in development. If this is to assume that focus is better than the scatter-shot, then they may be on to something, but I don’t think that’s the heart of the matter.

    I think the gist is that multiple gods are simply too costly, in terms of time, effort, and money, and there you can find much logic. A superstitious view of religion is simply to assume that the more that is invested, then the greater the reward, when there is no evidence to support that. The only thing certain is that giving can feel good, when it is given with faith in deliverance, regardless of the whys and wherefores.

    So now we can simply skip the intermediate steps, if we all agree that God is but a manifestation of our innermost needs and desires, so the trappings can be laid aside and we can work on training our minds toward truth, beauty, and goodness without all the random superstitions tossed in for good measure.

    And that is what Buddhism does, at its best, it goes straight to the heart of the matter, all gods optional, all articles of faith tentative. Because to be a good Buddhist, you really don’t have to do anything. You can meditate in a cave all your life, and go down in history as a maharishi par excellence. Or you can give and donate till your pockets are bare, and it’s all the same.

    The most important thing is what you don’t do. Do no harm. Do no kill. Do not steal. Etcetera etcetera, Five Precepts are almost identical to the Ten commandments, and that is likely no accident. The only thing certain is negation, and that is quantifiable, and measurable. What you do is your choice, the sea of probabilities. We are all connected on the inside, and that is where it counts…

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 12:13 pm on July 5, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , , , , , vegetarian,   

    Nature Asserts Herself with a Vengeance, and a Virus… 

    Nature is not ours to conquer. Nature is there for us to respect, honor, and obey. And if this seems like common sense, derived from common knowledge, believe me that it is one of the hardest commandments to obey, maybe because it was never written down, or maybe because it is somehow counter-intuitive, that what looks like ‘Nature’s bounty’ to us is somehow limited and precious and subject to restrictions on access.

    And isn’t that the way we males perceive our access to the feminine side of life? Because that’s what Nature is, even at its wildest, it is the feminine principle to life, as opposed to the will and violence that haunt the halls of patriarchal civilization. Because even at its most violent, the mighty lion subduing the gentle lamb, I don’t think that there is any enjoyment implied or expressed, simply the fact of life that big fish eat small fish, no offense intended.

    Only we humans have the willpower to construct cities, or the conscious intent to choose vegetarianism, when it is not our historical path that has led us to that conclusion, but pure consciousness. Now I could be wrong, but I don’t think that it is likely that any other species will soon emulate that decision, though they may very well be vegetarian by nature, and who knows the path that Nature has bequeathed upon that other species, whose story we little know, and that has brought them to that conclusion?

    But now we have come full circle, from nature and back again and the only thing that has changed is that we are one step closer to a complete revolution around a celestial body that is in itself in revolution around a celestial body, in some giant circle dance in some giant sky that only makes sense from a distance. So we build cities and take what we want from Nature, gentle bountiful Nature, as if it were a stray lamb on the edge of the flock, and there must surely be more where that came from.

    But there is not, not in any accessible form, that is. Because we are limited by light and gravity, and the restrictions placed by that fourth dimension of Time. Almost anything is possible in Space, but Time in a single dimension is less forgiving than Space in three, and Nature is the perfect example of that. In more than one SE Asian language it is something like the Thai ธรรมชาติ, thammachaht, i.e. dharma jati, the law of birth, straight from the Sanskrit, as filtered through the lens of Buddhism.

    And that’s what Nature is, too, the law of birth, and death, as it pertains to our lives and those that we are privileged to share with. If it took a pandemic virus for us to see that clearly, then so be it, better late than never. Because the new normal will have to be greener and cleaner, or it won’t work. Mother knows best…

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 12:24 pm on June 28, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , ,   

    Zero: the Middle Path between Buddhism and Mathematics… 

    Zero (shunya) is not just emptiness but boundlessness, capable of multiplying one (or any number) exponentially. Shunyata is the Buddhist concept of emptiness, of course, usually seen as an extension of the non-self anatta concept, which serves as one of the founding pillars of Buddhism, but which to this day is also one of the most-debated, if not quite so much as karma and reincarnation. But if shunya was there at the beginning, it only picked up steam later, finally finding a home in the emerging Mahayana school of Buddhism, the ‘large vehicle’ which incorporates such disparate philosophies as the Dadaist notions of Japanese Zen and the Kabbalistic leanings of Tibetan Vajrayana.

    But Mahayana also incorporates much of Chinese Taoism by most accounts, and possibly even Greek platonic idealism, if my hunches are correct. That the word shunya means ‘zero’ is undeniable. Many Asian languages can attest to that simple fact. Its translation into English as ‘emptiness’ can be debated, though, as well as the historical fact as to which came first: the graphic symbol 0 or the philosophical concept variously described as ‘emptiness’, ‘voidness’, or probably best—simply ‘zero-ness’, with all that term implies and denies. Most recently it implies ‘boundlessness’, by Japanese translator Tazuaki Tanahashi. This is a great improvement over previous connotations of nihilism and desolation.

    After all, in Western psychology ‘emptiness’ is generally considered a feeling to be avoided at all costs, and best treated with pharmaceuticals, if all else fails. American-style Buddhism has many divergences from the original, of course, and might even be considered ‘Buddha-flavored Christianity’, but that is another issue. The issue at hand is whether ‘boundlessness’ is indeed an accurate translation of shunyata or whether that is just wishful thinking, and careful marketing for the particular predilections of the Western lands. I think it is not only accurate, but enlightened, as long as it is used in conjunction with the concept of ‘emptiness’ or ‘voidness’. We are talking about ‘zero’, after all, and while that can mean ‘nothing’, it can also mean ‘infinity’, in that the simple addition of zeroes, in place notation, by definition implies an infinity in the act of multiplication, i.e. powers of ten.

    While I personally wouldn’t define shunyata by that one exclusive synonym, I am happy to use it in conjunction with the more traditional translation of emptiness. The truth might lie somewhere in between, at least in passing. So this is more like the Mahayanist ‘middle path’ than the Theravada, the middle path between existence and non-existence, not simple luxury and lack. And this was India’s supreme initial contribution to mathematics, back when simple addition and subtraction were the order of the day, and division and multiplication must have been a complicated affair. It would have been with no zero, yes? The interesting fact is that we still had decimal systems even without the zero. Why? Good question.

     
    • Five's avatar

      Five 10:41 am on July 1, 2020 Permalink | Reply

      Yes, definitely “boundlessness”! Lama Shenpen Hookham of ahs.org.uk calls it “Openness” too.
      But find it through practice, meditation – actually experience it – rather than trying to think your way to it. It is beyond thought. Great to clear up some wrong views, good discussion! There is good reason to use the term “emptiness” as well though. Search “emptiness” on piecesoffive.uk
      Five

      • hardie karges's avatar

        hardie karges 11:14 am on July 1, 2020 Permalink | Reply

        Yes I think it is time to reconcile 0 and 1, emptiness and singularity, a good task for modern Buddhists. Thanks for your comments…

  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 11:24 am on June 21, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , ,   

    Buddhism and the Myth of the Alpha Male… 

    Buddhism is a peaceful reaction to an aggressive world. And that is the beauty of it, of course, the fact that some 2500 years ago, situations were such that the increasing aggressivity of the world was obvious, and remedies would certainly need to be taken, better sooner than later, even if the worst were yet to come.

    Because the paradigms are timeless, the aggressivity of men, in their quest to subdue nature to their needs of reproduction and nutrition and survival. So we worship the Alpha male as if there no other choice. But there is. That was then. This is now. The Alpha male is no longer ‘naturally selected’ for evolution the minute that women say ‘no’ and the other males say ‘me, too’. And that is that.

    Cultural evolution trumps the biological survival of the fattest, and history proceeds on a more equal footing. But it was always cultural, wasn’t it? Even in the ranks of the ‘lesser animals’ the myth of the alpha male only rules to the extent that others are unwilling to step up to the fight, and to train themselves for it. But the fight is the problem, now, isn’t it?

    Because fights are destructive, by definition, and many people are unwilling to submit to that, even when it means a possible increase to their dignity. And dignity is more than ego. Dignity is the inherent sense of self-worth that makes life worth living and fights worth fighting, even when they ultimately must be replaced by a better system of discourse.

    Are we ‘psychologically evolved’ for a system that no longer is viable in a world soon to be ten billion souls? The question is circular, because natural selection cannot predict. Natural selection can only rationalize the past. Only free will can create the future, even if none of us are truly and absolutely free.

    Use the illusion. And it doesn’t matter to me if we move backwards into that future with an eye to inclusion, rather than slashing and burning our way into that future with no reference to the past and its by-products, which includes most of the population of this world. Ten billion people slashing and burning will not a better world create, but only with careful and cautious movements designed for long-term sustenance, if not unrealistic permanence.

    Our mistakes are the raw material of evolution, random mutations not a superior product in itself, but the clay from which a better piece of pottery will emerge, whether by conscious design or brilliant mistake. And that is what Buddhism does, suggesting a middle way between aggression and escape, being and nothingness. A better world awaits, neither north, south, east or west, but somewhere deep inside…

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 12:07 pm on June 14, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , , , , , , sankhara   

    Buddhist Impermanence and Greek Change, flip sides of the same coin… 

    Change doesn’t have to be a cause of suffering. It can also be a cause of liberation, if it’s compassionate, kind and helpful. And if that deviates from the standard Buddhist line of progression, then I’m sorry, but I think it holds true, at least for the modern day, with our modern ways. I personally haven’t shed too many tears over coming changes in a long time, but maybe that’s just a part of growing up, not sure, so maybe I better re-listen to Bruce Springsteen, since he sometimes gets it right, even if the Buddha didn’t. Now I embrace change, but true, it’s certainly better if it’s a change I initiate, so maybe that is the crucial line of distinction.

    So when the Buddha is quoted as saying ‘sabbe sankhara anicca,’ i.e. all things are impermanent, the implication is that that is bad, but maybe that is a faulty conclusion. It is one of the three Buddhist marks of existence, after all, along with suffering and no-self, but that doesn’t necessarily indicate ‘badness’, so maybe it’s just a fact for your perusal, echoing Heraclitus some 3000mi/5000km away (as the crow flies) in Greece right about the same. Coincidence? Ask that crow; only he knows for sure, and he might be fibbing. The fact that both likely had ancestors from the same ‘hood up north 2000 years before is likely irrelevant at this point, so I won’t mention it.

    Bottom line: everything changes but change itself, and if that scares you to death as a child about to move to a new town, or a young adult about to experience Love’s first great letdown, then rest assured: not only does this get easier, but you might even learn to like it, and seek it out, the other, if not another, geographical changes generally considered more socially acceptable than personnel changes, especially after a certain ‘use-by’ date, after which the changes become functionally impractical, and old dogs find it hard to learn new tricks.

    But learn they can, if the will is there, and who knows what ‘sankhara’ means anyway? (It does NOT mean ‘karma’ as modern ‘re-birthers’ like to suggest) I say ‘things’ as shorthand for ‘I don’t know,’ but the devil may indeed lie in the details, if ‘formations’ implies that it is my own fault if they change against my wishes, since I set myself up for that fall in advance. Because he never said that everything changes, but that all ‘formations’ are impermanent, and that is not necessarily the same thing, if ‘formations’ can exist or not exist without necessarily undergoing any intermediate state from one existence to another.

    But our lives necessarily proceed from one point to the next as if we had moved from one point to the next, not simply ceased to exist at one point and re-emerged at another. And so we measure our lives in time. And we mark our journeys in space. And we formulate emotions in reaction to it all. And we develop theories to explain it. So don’t become discouraged if the journey is long. All paths eventually lead home…

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 12:24 pm on June 7, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: #BlackLivesMatter, , , curfew, injustice, lock-down, ,   

    Buddhism and Other People’s Crises: Lockdown and Curfew, Monasteries in the Making… #BlackLivesMatter 

    Maybe sometimes entire societies should go on extended retreat, shut down temporarily, and contemplate their existence. So societal lock-down doesn’t have to be so bad, whether for pandemic or riot-inspired curfew, not if you take advantage of the opportunities implicit therein.

    After all, monasteries are essentially locked down all the time, and the only people complaining are those who never really wanted to be there in the first place. The ones who are there by choice are not complaining about the poverty implicit in such a situation, either.

    In fact, any true monk takes a vow of poverty just for the privilege of being in lock-down. Implicit in the monastery deal is that there will be a community of supporters to take up the slack, of course, at least in Buddhism, and that is the sore spot for any Western culture, which tend to avoid class distinctions, even, or especially, when the class involved is a priestly one.

    I suppose this system works best, then, in SE Asia, where people are accustomed to such a system, and who find much value in it. I personally would probably prefer to grow my own food, if given the chance, even as a monk, and that is what many Buddhist monks in Japan do, if I’m not mistaken. I’m not sure about China or Taiwan, but I’ve never seen monks doing the morning alms walk in either, of that I am sure, ditto Korea, especially the north, haha.

    And for those who are in lock-down, but not by choice, maybe you should consider that as an attractive option, if only temporarily, for many non-monks also pay for the privilege of extended retreats. And while it is tempting to march in the streets right now in the name of rights and justice, that may not be the wisest option, and I’m not sure how much good it does, anyway, especially when some people of lesser ideals are obviously taking advantage of the uncertainties implicit, thus making the idealists complicit.

    In desperate political situations, aren’t the best remedies economic, i.e. boycott and/or divestment, or at least disinvestment? Isn’t that what changed the government in South Africa (if not the economy)? Isn’t that what drove the British out of India? People ask what is the Buddhist response to injustice…

    The Buddhist response to injustice is to provide a refuge to make you a better person, so that you will make good decisions. Nothing is gained by hate or anger or violence, and that includes language. Now is the time to create a new society, calmly and soberly and without prejudice. Reject the drama. Embrace the dharma.

     
    • kathleen chapman's avatar

      kathleen chapman 7:44 pm on June 7, 2020 Permalink | Reply

      is there a buddhist organization I can ask for help finding refuge? ideas are great but I am about finding solutions. any ideas for solutions? There are a whole lot of us elder folks barely existing thru this lockdown. We have no resources since the pandemic was not part of our plans. thanks

      • hardie karges's avatar

        hardie karges 7:35 am on June 8, 2020 Permalink | Reply

        I would imagine that there are Buddhist organizations in your neighborhood, but you’d have to google that for details. There are many Buddhist groups on Facebook, one of which I administer, but which is more oriented to quiet study than riotous debate. Others range from the devotional to the discursive. Many books on Buddhism are available from libraries, all of which now have online ‘overdrive’, where I’ve checked out at least a hundred in the last year or two. I sent you an invite to the FB group I administer. Feel free to check it out…

  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 12:11 pm on May 31, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , , , , ,   

    Because, that’s why: Buddhism, Descartes, Castaneda and the urge to merge in meditation… 

    Words can cut like knives or heal like bandages, so be careful what you think, and even more careful of what you say.

    The fact that we think in languages is the starting point for many a fine thesis and many a sleepless night, because in one sense Descartes was right when he said ‘cogito ergo sum,’ i.e. I think therefore I am.

    And if that is usually taken as a badge of pride for the West, and a flag of caution for the East, in fact I think it is neither. It is simply a status update for the human condition.

    Because we can debate endlessly over whether human beings are indeed the homo sapiens, wise men, that we claim, but we can certainly agree that they do think, whether or not they are some arrogant s-o-b’s to label themselves as ‘wise’, at the expense of all others, which at that point in history was largely limited to the white ‘race.’

    And so it is with thinking, which we assume as our birthright, and limited to us, and only us. But all animals think. They just don’t all do it with language.

    And that is why we meditate, many of us, whether you categorize it into one of the two original Buddhist classifications or one of the four now in vogue, complete with the obligatory ‘mindfulness,’ as guided by your local ‘dharma teacher,’ namaste.

    When really all you need to do is sit down and STFU, and don’t move a muscle, or scratch an itch, or swat a fly for at least a good quarter hour for starters, and quadruple that for peer professionalism, without moving a muscle, I repeat.

    Because I don’t know what’s going on in your head inside, but I know it’s directly related to what’s going on with your body outside, and this is easily measured by perturbations in the visual field.

    If you’re twitching, I think we can assume that you have yet to achieve any of the four dhyana states, or was it five? I lost count.

    Because all that really matters is to stop the internal dialogue, if only for a moment, and that’s almost the only thing I took away from Carlos Castaneda and his avatar Don Juan and all his tales of Ya(n)qui power in the deserts of our own mind-fields, as they leapt off cliffs with intent and little else.

    And that is what the brain researchers who wanted to scan my brain in and out of meditation alluded to, also, and asked if I understood what they’re talking about. Huh? Doesn’t everyone?

    Now I don’t know if they read Castaneda, but of course I understood. I just don’t know why Buddhists don’t say it that way, or at least not in so many words.

    Because that is why meditation exists, for me, to return to basics, proto-consciousness, or paleo-consciousness, if you will, i.e. thought without language, just like the old days, just like the animals do, before all the new frontiers, and all the limits of language.

    Curiously many Buddhists think that is an injunction to not think, but I don’t think that is correct. Once we have language, then the choice is ours what to do with it. Because the Buddha never said not to think. He said to think rightly, and quite rightly…

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 11:28 am on May 24, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , , ,   

    Money and other Buddhist Sins of Commission… 

    Attachment to money is the worst form of craving, because, as a medium of exchange, it is something totally false, mere paper, typically folded and mutilated, if not spindled, simply because no one knows what that means.

    And if I launch into a sermon on the use of punch cards, you still might not know much more unless you voted in the US twenty years ago, and still remember it. But what we really love are the numbers, anything more than zero considered a plus, by definition, and anything less subject to penalties, typically the sins of omission more than the sins of commission, because you really don’t have to do anything to suffer, or cause others to suffer, given the time dimension, and the fact that results and effects are often delayed far from the source of the original action, or karma, if you prefer.

    Conversely, the less you do, than the fewer sins you commit, but if you do too little, then you may indeed starve, and if you fail to help another in need, then you may indeed be a direct cause of their suffering, even if you weren’t a direct cause of their pain.

    So life has always been a search for sustenance, from the semi-tropical Garden of Eden, where fruit hung ripe from the trees, to the far northern steppes, where the big game ran wild and the satisfaction ran deep as the snowbank you could use to keep that slab of meat cool for a while.

    So how did the big game get transformed into roulette wheels and lotteries and one-armed bandits, slot machines with no feelings nor dogs in the hunt? That is the history of the world, my friends, the transfer of feeling from fields to factories, by hook or crook, since it wasn’t always voluntary, least of all in the place of its origins, as the British Enclosure Acts claimed common grounds for capitalists, and sent crofters to the Commonwealth countries or factories, often with no other choice, as is typical in a class system based on caste, even where much of the deep ancestry is similar or even the same.

    But cities are the same regardless of their location or countries of origin, and money is their common denominator, 0’s and 1’s in the ledger book of life. And dharma is the same, also, the truth of human circumstances and interactions and their repercussions across time and space. The medium used for commercial transactions is not the medium of human interaction, though the Middle Path may sound similar. It is not.

    Money is superfluous, and best kept hidden. To flaunt it is to worship it, and a cardinal sin of commission, an insult to polite society. There is a reason that Buddhist monks in Thailand are forbidden to touch it. We’re playing for keeps here, not possession, but forever, always changing…

     
    • Lilirin Lee's avatar

      Alexis Adder 3:44 pm on May 26, 2020 Permalink | Reply

      They turned money into a cult and forced everyone into needing it all thr time.

      • hardie karges's avatar

        hardie karges 3:50 pm on May 26, 2020 Permalink | Reply

        Yes, it’s quite the conundrum: can’t live with it, and can’t live without it. I think the main thing is not to be obsessed with it, so neither broke nor gambler, so as to think of it as little as possible…

    • Dave Kingsbury's avatar

      Dave Kingsbury 4:19 pm on May 30, 2020 Permalink | Reply

      I like to count mine every day. It doesn’t take long … 🙂

      • hardie karges's avatar

        hardie karges 4:22 pm on May 30, 2020 Permalink | Reply

        I know the feeling…

  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 11:33 am on May 17, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Ahmaud Arbery, , , , , Homer, Iliad, ,   

    Karma, Buddhism, Newton, Homer, and Ahmaud… 

    Law of Karma (action) = Newton’s Third Law of Motion: Every action is followed by an equal but opposite reaction, which is pretty easy to understand, and even if it can’t foresee the further ramifications of quantum theory, it still applies in most cases.

    But the religionists couldn’t leave well enough alone, so rather than being content to foresee what Newton would take credit for some 2500 years in the future, they had to go and ‘religio-fy’ it with fear and loathing and generation-jumping superpowers such that a theory of mind that foresaw a theory of physics ends up not even with some valid psychology, but instead a religion of vengeance.

    For many people in this round-ish world of almost 8B truly believe that if they do something wrong, as defined by tradition, then they will be hunted down and threatened with retribution like Ahmaud Arbery in Redneck County, Georgia, and forced to either submit to summary non-justice on suburban streets or fight for their lives like a fox in the hunt.

    But Karma doesn’t usually take such an active role, truth be told, and generally comes only into play as retrofit logic, i.e. if your life has difficulties, then it must be from something you did several generations back, passive voice past subjunctive, and then you just keep filling holes trying to back-fill the logic, rather than take a more active role in trying to subdue your oppressors and thereby prevent further abuses to improve your life.

    Because if a young girl is raped, then she is certainly not the cause, in this life or previous, but the victim, though I have heard a Buddhist monk accuse her exactly of that. But this is a perversion of Buddhism, a dive into superstitions and perverted logic, all for the sake of laziness and fear, to deal with a situation almost too difficult to bear. But bear it we must, if our lives are to have meaning, and the world is to serve our purposes rather than we serve its.

    As always I choose the middle path. My potential Asian Buddhist PhD professor insists that I use passive voice almost exclusively while my potential American literary agent insists that I never do that. But is it not the same language and is it not the same life in the same world? It is, and the call to action—or not—resides within the halls of this hollowed if not hallowed brain, defined equally by emptiness and thing-ness.

    Because Homer proved this point also 2500 years ago with his Iliad in which the protagonists and the antagonists resided only a short 300km/200mi apart, but divided by the Aegean Sea and 1000 years, since they both left the Aryan steppes in search of greener pastures and more fertile valleys, but by different routes, such that this minor sea defines the major gulf that separates Indo from Euro in each of our bicameral minds.

    So House fights Senate and Dems fight Repugs, but really we are all fighting ourselves inside, if not outside, as our random tendencies fight for supremacy, and good struggles against evil. But this is no time for fighting, as worlds lie dying and hospitals are full to overflowing. Now would be a good time to practice some kindness and compassion, and that is the true meaning of Buddhism…

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 11:21 am on May 10, 2020 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , , , ,   

    Buddhism, Nature, and the Middle Path between Religions… 

    Nature is not something to be conquered. It is something to be revered. This is the basis for most feminine religions, without sword and without a book, just the smooth rounded edges of nature’s leaves and branches, hardened by brute experience with that same Nature’s lightning and thunder.

    Eventually that religion typically may evolve into a form of devotion, ‘bhakti’ for Hinduism, or one of the later sects for Buddhism, because few of us are really made for the rigors of metaphysics, when it’s easier just to bow the head and utter some formulas, or simply swear allegiance to mother Maria.

    And many Buddhists would gladly turn Descartes on his head and proclaim ‘non cogito ergo sum’, ‘I don’t think, therefore I am’, as many a devoted Theravadin truly believes, but which I take exception to. I’m just not that kind of Buddhist, I guess, for better or worse, confused or whatever, and I don’t for one minute think that Buddhism is better than all the others, simply that Buddhism is what is right for these times.

    That’s because I don’t see Buddhism as something established by some transcendental Buddha to which the earthly blokes are mere manifestations, any more than I see Jesus as a Christian version of the same thing, the Platonic ideal of love and forgiveness, Buddha that of compassion and forbearance. Because they were both just blokes, however enlightened, but with differences that have defined East and West at least since Homer’s recall, and likely before.

    So I see Christianity as the active aggressive alternative, dominated mostly by men of Aryan provenance, and despite their brutality, to see what could be accomplished in the state of Nature was a Noble (hint hint) quest, free enterprise, laissez-faire and all that rap, late nights with bright lights a reasonable relax.

    The Jains were, and are, just the opposite, of course, in which the less you do the better, to the point that death by self-starvation (ever heard of inanition?) seems only logical in the quest to do no harm. Just do nothing at all. The Buddhists have tried to walk the middle path to relative success, but still there are those who lapse into the do-it-all or do-nothing extremes.

    Bottom line: the Christian Capitalists have definitively gone too far, to the extent that we are killing ourselves knowing and willingly, grinning like Cheshire cats while going over the cliff, just like the Jains in spirit, if not letter, blindly proceeding with disaster. I revert to the demands of Nature. There is always a path to (re)conciliation, and that is THE path, I would say…

     

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