Burn The Buddha???

Now that one part of the world has calmed down a bit and another part is breathing a sigh of relief, I thought it might be appropriate to say something about the Dhammic response to criticisms or insults to Buddhism or the desecration of objects of special significance to Buddhists. In the Digha Nikaya the Buddha said, ‘Should anyone speak disparagingly of me, the Dhamma or the Sangha you should not get angry, resentful or upset because of that. For if you did you would not be able to recognize if what they said was true or not. Therefore, if others speak disparagingly of me the Dhamma or the Sangha you should explain whatever is incorrect saying, “This is not correct”, “That is not true”, “We do not do this”, “That is not our way”’. (D.I,1-3). And the saintly Santideva had this advice on how to respond to even stronger attacks on Buddhism. ‘Hatred towards those who speak insulting about or damage sacred images or stupas in inappropriate. The Buddha did not get angry at such things.’ And a quick tour through Google Image turns up plenty of thoughtless, insensitive and insulting uses of the Buddha’s name and image. Nonetheless, the Buddha’s instructions and Santideva’s advice still holds good.

Yasodhara, The Invisible Woman

Everyone knows the story about Yasodhara, the Buddha’s wife - you know, the beautiful young maid, the competition to win her hand, her happy life with Prince Siddhattha, her slumbering with Rahula as her husband left the palace at night and, when the Buddha returned to Kapilavatthu, her telling Rahula to approach the Buddha and ask for his inheritance. What most people don’t know that Yasodhara is not mentioned by name anywhere in the Tipitaka and that none of these stories, except the last one, appear there either. And even this last story, ‘Rahula’s mother’ as she is called there, makes only the briefest appearance (Vin.I,82). All the rest comes from the later Buddhist tradition; a bit from the Pali commentaries and much more from other ‘Hinayana’ literature. And while Yasodhara is literally a non-person in the Pali Tipitaka and little more than that in the commentaries, there are many legends about her, some of them quite interesting, in later Sanskrit literature.

The great Buddhist scholar Andre Bareau has written a most fascinating article on the Yasodhara legends which is now available at http://www.buddha-kyra.com/wife.htm Kyra Pahlen, who translated this article from French did a rather poor job - Kathmandu instead of Kapilavatthu, Mahavasti instead of Mahavastu and even Solomon instead of Suddhodana!!! But don’t let these and a few other clangers put you off this most interesting bit of research.
The top picture is a sculptural representation of the Kapilavastu incident from Amaravati (4th cent.). The Buddha is represented as an empty throne. The next picture is of a painting of the same story from Ajanta (7th cent.) while the last one is a 19th century Thai painting.

A Few More Books

On Sunday the 5th of September our group, the Buddha Dhamma Mandala Society, held a book launching ceremony for my new publication To Eat or Not to Eat Meat. In it I argue that while the Buddha did not advocate vegetarianism, avoiding eating meat is more in harmony with the Buddha’s teachings of care and compassion for others. A large crowd turned up and after my usual Sunday morning sermon I spent time signing copies of the book for people. Already someone has offered to reprint 2000 of the book.

Then on the afternoon of the next Sunday (i.e. the 12th) some friends and students accompanied me down to Peninsular Plaza to distribute 100 copies of the Burmese translation of my book Good Question Good Answer. Peninsular Plaza is the main meeting place for Burmese working and studying in Singapore and large crowds gather there on weekends. Several shops in the Plaza have small lending libraries and one Buddhist group has a small drop-in centre with a lending library. It also distributes books for free and occasionally organizes weekend talks. This is the third time we have distributed the Burmese Good Question Good Answer amongst Burmese expatriates and apparently it is proving to be very popular.

India!

India! Accommodating, nourishing, welcoming, confusing, spiritual India.
A road sign in Himachal Pradesh.

Panikkar Passes

On the 26th of last month Raimon Panikkar passed away at the ripe old age of 92. Panikkar was probably Catholicism’s most well-known, most learned and most articulate proponent of ‘dialogue between men of living faiths’. Over the decades he wrote dozens of books and countless articles urging Catholics to dialogue with and learns from Eastern religions, mainly Hinduism and Buddhism. In some ways he was uniquely placed for this endeavor having had a Hindu father and a Catholic mother and being educated at Benares Hindu University. Some of his more notable works are The Silence of God: The Answer of the Buddha (1989), The Unknown Christ Of Hinduism: Towards An Ecumenical Christophany (1981) and Espiritualidad Hindu: Sanatana Dharma (2006). One of his oft quoted sayings is, ‘I left Europe (for India) as a Christian, I discovered I was a Hindu and returned as a Buddhist, without ever having ceased to be a Christian’. I can’t say I ever read anything by him that suggested that he was a Buddhist, although many of his ideas did sound like Christian (or perhaps better ‘theistic’) concepts wrapped up in Buddhist terminology. Inter-religious dialogue is a good thing if it takes place in an atmosphere of mutual respect and if the benefits are shared by all parties. But myself, I sometimes have trouble shaking off the impression that another strategy lies behind dialogue, at least for some people. In her obituary of Raimon Panikkar published in Time (20,9,2010) Amy Sullivan writes, ‘Some Catholics saw (Panikkar’s) work as dangerously radical. But to his students and many admirers, Panikkar was a prophet whose teachings helped Christianity spread like wildfire throughout the non-Western world’. Now I’m not sure I would agree that Christianity is growing that fast, but it certainly is in the ascendant in Asia, including in traditional Buddhist countries. Could this be the unspoken rationale behind some dialogue?
Whatever the case, Panikkar was a deeply spiritual man and a very warm, open one as well. And he could be most interesting to listen to. Here is parts of a dialogue he engaged in on the subject of love.

http://www.fetzer.org/resources/resource-detail/?resource_id=300

'Animal Release'

‘Animal release’ (fang sheng) is a term used by Chinese Buddhists to refer to the practice of purchasing animals that are due to be slaughtered and letting them go. While the rationale for this practice is the Buddha’s teaching of kindness and compassion to all creatures, even the most humble, the earliest evidence of the practice actually comes from the Pali Tipitaka. According to the Vinaya, a monk once came across a pig caught in a hunter’s trap and feeling compassion for its plight he released it. By the convention of the time he was guilty of theft. When the matter was brought to the Buddha’s intention he said that from the perspective of the Dhamma the monk had committed no offence because he had acted ‘out of compassion’ (karunnena, Vin.III,62).
The Chinese Buddhist tradition of animal release has its origins in the Suvarnabhasottama Sutra (Chinese Jin guang ming), composed in the early centuries of the Common Era. According to this work, a merchant’s son named Jalavahana, while traveling through a forest wilderness during summer, came across a pond in which the fish were struggling to survive in the rapidly evaporating water. All around the pond crows, cranes and jackals had gathered waiting to snap up the unfortunate fish. Moved by compassion and determined to save the fish Jalavahana cut some foliage and placed it in the pool hoping to shield the water from the sun and prevent its evaporation. When this proved ineffective, he traced the empty stream bed that had provided water to the pool and found that the water had been diverted from it by a great hole that appeared in the bed of the stream. Unable to block this hole himself he approached the king, told him of the situation and asked for some elephants, which the king gave him. Jalavhana’s ingenuity and efforts eventually paid off and he was able to fill the pond with water and save the fish.
When the Suvarnabhasottama Sutra was translated into Chinese the story of Jalavahana in particular had a powerful influence on people’s attitude towards animals. Soon, rather than releasing animals on an individual basis the custom developed of releasing large numbers animals in elaborate public ceremonies. The first person to organize such events was the monk Chih-I (538-97). In time, many temples came to provided ponds where people could release fish and tortoises, lofts for pigeons and pastures for goats, cows and horses.

Sadly, today ‘animal release’ practice frequently takes the form of a mere ritual more destructive to life than life-saving. In countries with significant Chinese communities a whole industry of capturing wild birds simply so they can be released has developed. The birds are taken from their natural environment, shipped to the cities and set free in the ‘concrete jungle’ where they often soon die. Temple ponds are commonly so crowded that the fish and tortoises lead diseased and miserable lives. According to environmentalists the two leading threats to the Asian Temple Turtle (Heosemys annandalii, so-called because it is favored by Chinese Buddhists for ‘release’) are the restaurant market and the temple trade. Several of the more progressive temples here in Singapore now try to educate the Buddhist public about the proper way to practice animal release or even prohibit the practice within their premises.

A Hole In The Heart

Please read this and see what you do think you can do to help.
http://records.photodharma.net/?p=1448