Views of Buddhists towards any religion

last SG · 2008-03-08T13:39:39+00:00

During the era of the Buddha, there are some 300 plus religions (still exists today in India), each espousing that their religion is the one and only, and th...

Spnw07 SG

I wish to just say something which holds true for anyone who is a true Buddhist.

Buddhists consider all teachings of most religions (especially those that we Singaporeans are familiar with, even on a superficial level; example, Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Sikhism and so on) to be good and correct.

However, it is also in our opinion that the teachings of other religions are not comprehensive enough in explaining certain phenomena of our world or certain truths leading to complete liberation.

It is this part of Buddhism that attracts me to stay on as a Buddhist; the bigness of heart to embrace all without blindly following, the bigness of heart to discern but not judge without experiencing it on our own.

And that usually in this world, there is no absolute and only one way to attain liberation for any individual, only that one has to find the right one for him/her.

The teachings of other religions are never judged covertly or overtly to be false or wrong per se. Even if other religions's teachings are considered to un-Buddhist, we do not see any problem with that, and we do not go about trying to change people's minds about what they want to believe aggressively or over-zealously.

We simply acknowledge that those teachings exist to cater to the unique needs and aspirations of every individual on earth.

Should I one day choose not to stay a Buddhist, I will stay a free-thinker. I want to be able to regard, respect and embrace all religions as good and true in essence, but what really answers my doubts is Buddhism.

Buddhism is really very good for me, I thank myself for having planted good dharma karma during one or some of my previous past lives.

I thank my parents from previous lifetimes, the present and the future, the Buddhas and saints of all directions and from all time periods (past, present and future).

If this expression of thanks or gratefulness has even one drop or speck of sincerity in it, may I and all sentient beings being able to gain fast and complete liberation from life and death and be reborn into Amitabha Buddha's Western Paradise of Ultimate Bliss.

justdoit77 SG

And that usually in this world, there is no absolute and only one way to attain liberation for any individual, only that one has to find the right one for him/her.

We simply acknowledge that those teachings exist to cater to the unique needs and aspirations of every individual on earth.

You are right that buddhism is very open to other religions, even if some of their teachings conflict with the dharma, we won't go around launch wars to force people to convert. This is one of the uniqueness of buddhism. Sometimes my friends try to brainwash and tell me that there is no cause and effect concept, no rebirth, I just smile and ignore them.

Other religions although teach people to behave good and refrains from doing bad, but obviously it is not complete, it doesn't explain the ultimate truths for the disciple to follow.

Yes, there are many ways to attain liberation, that's why buddhism has so many dharma doors that suits people of different capacity.
May I know what you meant by not to stay as buddhist. We are buddhist because we take refuge of buddha, dharma and sangha meaning in simple terms trust the enlightened beings, follow the teachings and guidance of them and practice towards enlightenment.
If one say he give up as a buddhist, I will be surprised as I never come across any ex-buddhist.

Spnw07 SG

There are a few I know personally who were ex-Buddhist but later converted into Christianity. One of them was my sis, who can consider an ex-Buddhism believer (as in having respect towards Buddhism and enjoys listening to audio cds of Buddhist mantras). She didn't go through the Triple Gem Refuge undertaking, but she used to enjoy listening to the Great Compassion Mantra, Heart Sutra. But after she went for overseas studies, she simply told us that she has found her true calling, her true refuge in Christianity.

My dad was so heartbroken, that he couldn't sleep for many nights and it was until now that my sister's married, we can see him learning to let go bit by bit. But we know deep in our hearts, it still pains him to see his own daughter turn to Christianity after returning from overseas. It is a very cruel reality for him.

There are others too, mere acquaintances so to speak ,who convert from Buddhism to Christianity. The numbers of those doing so are still consistently heard, or witnessed directly by me.

I know it is unbecoming of me as a Buddhist to think or feel this way, but I'm just..I don't know..sad? Whatever.

My cousin, who's a Christian, challenges me on Buddhism, when I ask him to share with me more about Christianity.

His points are roughly the same as any Christians out there:

1) Are the teachings authentic? How do you know they are authentic? The Bible is a collection of letters or testimonies that point to more or less the same person with the same behaviour, that shows the Bible is authentic.

2) Buddhism doesn't teach about the beginning of the world, that means it's not practical/scientific/insightful at all.

3) Buddhism teaches falsehood, as it doens't explain properly how the world has so many wonderful things, how things are created and so on..There has to be a God who creates all these things around us, as they all have a complex and intricate design.

There are many others, but the above are three main points raised by him.

I'm still trying to do more research into point one. So can't say anything yet.

I have no problems with his second point, as I told him that it does not matter to me personally how the world began, so I don't see the need to dispute who is right or wrong about whether there is a Creator God.

I replied his third point by saying that all things are 'created' by our own mind. （华严经：万法从心想生). But he said it sounds incredulous that our thoughts can turn into trees or animals literally. I just kept quiet and then said I was sharing with him cos he asked and I respect his belief.

And the above took place 2 years ago, when I was still merely a Buddhism believer, not a Buddhist.

Sometimes I wish I have the wisdom of the Buddha and can teach things according to each sentient being's level of understanding and acceptance.

Oh well, I guess I have to wait and practise till 3 great aeons are over...haiz...

sanath SG

Hi,

let me try to answer your cousin's points -

(1) The whole point about Buddhism or Buddha-Dharma is about "Investigation", not just blind faith and belief. Of course, we must have faith in the teachings as well before we begin our path of investigation. The teachings direct people of different capabilities with different inclinations (對癥下藥) to lead to Nirvana.

Moreover, the Bible has also gone through several revisions (bet your cousin and most christians do not really care or know about this). For the New Testament, the majority of it, other than the gospels and some letters by John and other disciples, are letters by a person (Paul) who did not even meet Jesus and was not even a direct disciple, even though it is said that Jesus "revealed" himself to Paul. The Old Testament is nothing but a historical account of the Jews, and the God of the Jews in it, is not a compassionate being.

(2) & (3) are about the same, so i will answer them like this:

Buddha-Dharma is more concerned about the PRESENT state of a being in suffering. Why would a suffering being want to know about the creation of the universe? (Of course, christians do not think they are suffering, but anyway...) So what if one knows how the universe was created? Will it lead him to a greater understanding, or to liberation and emancipation? Also, Buddha-Dharma talks about "Interconnectedness" and "Interdependence" (緣起), there are so many causes, so there really cannot be just a single cause (god's creation etc), THAT is why it is so intricate and complex. If it were just a single cause, then why was it made so intricate and complex? One example, if we were to go back 20 generations, how many people would it take before "I" am born - 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256......so can there be just a single cause?

Gassho

Herzog_Zwei SG

Hi,

let me try to answer your cousin's points -

(2) & (3) are about the same, so i will answer them like this:

Gassho

When a person can never have faith in anything, where does his spiritual standing belong?

justdoit77 SG

His points are roughly the same as any Christians out there:

2) Buddhism doesn't teach about the beginning of the world, that means it's not practical/scientific/insightful at all.

Oh well, I guess I have to wait and practise till 3 great aeons are over...haiz...

It is good that you share christian's doubt on buddhism with us. Indeed, there are many other misunderstanding about buddhism by christians.
1) The teachings are authentic, from buddha time until now, we been talking about the same teaching, cause and effect concept, rebirth, compassion, noble 8 fold path, 4 noble truths and so on. Even though it is translated to many languages, transmited to various lineage and schools, the teaching doesn't change. I agree with Sanath that bible itself has gone through many changes, though it is good that they discovered and corrected the errors in bible (eg. conflict with Galileo's discovery).

2) Buddhism did explain the creation of the universe so clearly and detail until no other religion or even modern science can compare to it. Many elite scientists including Albert Einstein admitted this fact. Buddhism sutras are so vast and huge. If the teaching are as little as a tiny little book, then we will be able to focus on the creation of universe alone, but then again it is not meaningful to talk abt the past if it doesn't help our spiritual practice. We rather focus on more practical thing for our future than to talk about some fairy tale in the past.

3) This is similar to question 2. What you meant doesn't explain the wonderful things on earth? yes, there are many things be it wonderful or not wonderful, but why it is that must be a god to create it? Next time if your cousin criticize buddhism again, pls ask him why "christian god" create hell to torture people who don't believe in him, why create retarded baby, they will go to hell because of not able to accept christian, isn't it.

Regarding things are 'created' by our own mind, the meaning of create is not to physically make an object. Dharma is much more profound than viewing thing as a physical object. A physical object let's say a tree can be different things seen by different beings. It can be a source of food to an animal, a place to stay for a spirit, a playground for a child, source of income for a merchant. Some being even see it as series of molecules that exists with other molecules in the air, they don't even know why we human want to create a concept of tree. Even a glass of drinking water is seen as hot larva by hungry ghost. Why so many difference, it is our mind to view it this way.
There are no computer thousands year ago, but there are computers today, because the conditions to make computers is there, the cause is also there, so the result is automatically there, not because "christian god" create it. Buddha taught us the underlying concept for all phenomenon, it is not necessary for buddha to go through every single item on the earth and tell us the cause of this ant, that tree etc.

dragon_stone SG

However, it is also in our opinion that the teachings of other religions are not comprehensive enough in explaining certain phenomena of our world or certain truths leading to complete liberation.

"If science can explained all phenomenas, then there is no proof of the creator God's existence"

I heard this statement somewhere and some religions do not like and believe what science explained or discovered.

An Eternal Now SG

Originally posted by Spnw07:

There are ways to check for scriptural authenticity, like checking out the translator, source of scripture, and so on. Our scriptures were first recited 2 weeks after Buddha passed in parinirvana. Of course in certain case there are no sure ways to find out about authenticity, but that is not an issue. Because Buddhism places more emphasis on wisdom than authority. If the scripture contains great wisdom, it should be included into our reading list. Unlike the Bible, the focus of the issue is not on historical events, so whether they occured or not is not even an issue for us. The focus in Buddhism is on wisdom and qualities.

2) Buddhism doesn't teach about the beginning of the world, that means it's not practical/scientific/insightful at all.

Creationism, IMHO, is not practical and scientific. Sorry to all creationist here, that is just my opinion.

Buddhism on the other hand explains causation as a process of conditioning ad infinitum, this makes more sense, is certainly more practical and scientific to me.

I think I can't explain better than the following passage, and also Sanath makes a good point that conditionality is the only logical way to explain the 'complex and intricate.

http://www.uq.net.au/slsoc/bsq/budchr2.htm

In response to the above refutation, the Christian will maintain that the universe does not merely exist but its existence shows perfect design. There is, a Christian might say, an order and balance which point to its having been designed by a higher intelligence, and that this higher intelligence is God. But as before, there are some problems with this argument.

Firstly, how does the Christian know that it was his God who is behind creation? Perhaps it was the gods of non-Christian religions who designed and created the universe.

Secondly, how does the Christian know that only one God designed everything? In fact, as the universe is so intricate and complex we could expect it to need the intelligence of several, perhaps dozens, of gods to design it. So if anything the argument from design proves that there are many gods, not one as Christians claim.

Next, we would have to ask, is the universe perfectly designed? We must ask this because if a perfect God designed and created the universe, then that universe should be perfect. Let us first look at inanimate phenomena to see whether they show perfect design. Rain gives us pure water to drink but sometimes it rains too much and people lose their lives, their homes and their means of livelihood in floods. At other times it doesn't rain at all and millions die in drought and famine. Is this perfect design? The mountains give us joy as we see them reaching up into the sky. But landslides ~nd volcanic eruptions have for centuries caused havoc and death. Is this perfect design? The gentle breezes cool us but storms and tornadoes repeatedly cause death and destruction. Is this perfect design? These and other natural calamities prove that inanimate phenomena do not exhibit perfect design and therefore that they were not created by a perfect God.

Now let us look at animate phenomena to see whether they reveal perfect design. At a superficial glance, nature seems to be beautiful and harmonious; all creatures are provided for and each has its task to perform. However, as any biologist will confirm, nature is utterly ruthless. To live, each creature has to feed on other creatures and struggle to avoid being eaten by other creatures. In nature, there is no time for pity, love or mercy. If a loving God designed everything, why did such a cruel design result? The animal kingdom is not only imperfect in the ethical sense, it is also imperfect in that it often goes wrong. Every year ~lions of babies are born with physical or mental disabilities, or are stillborn or die soon after birth. Why would a perfect creator God design such terrible things?

So if there is design in the universe, much of it is faulty and cruel. This would seem to indicate that the universe was not created by a perfect all-loving God.

Herzog_Zwei SG

Creationism, IMHO, is not practical and scientific. Sorry to all creationist here, that is just my opinion.

Buddhism on the other hand explains causation as a process of conditioning ad infinitum, this makes more sense, is certainly more practical and scientific to me.

I think I can't explain better than the following passage, and also Sanath makes a good point that conditionality is the only logical way to explain the 'complex and intricate.

http://www.uq.net.au/slsoc/bsq/budchr2.htm

Firstly, how does the Christian know that it was his God who is behind creation? Perhaps it was the gods of non-Christian religions who designed and created the universe.

So if there is design in the universe, much of it is faulty and cruel. This would seem to indicate that the universe was not created by a perfect all-loving God.

Buddhism views any other religion as incomplete thus inferior to it.

Spnw07 SG

I feel so useless in not being able to know more about Buddhism, to develop more objectiveness in deciding whether to go for historial authencity or go for wisdom and qualities like what AEN has said when choosing which teaching/religion to follow.

As such, most of you can read about me asking almost the same questions every now and then, cos I believe every different individual has his/her own personal but perhaps insightful experience or knowledge to share about controversial topics as the above.

My cousin sounds like criticisng Buddhism, but I have to tell myself not to regard it as such whether or not he truly is. Why? Cos thinking in this way will only lead me to be complacent with my knowledge and way of cultivation.

I will admit to my inadequacies, my own lack of objectiveness and wisdom, than to think of others as critising 'MY' religion or personal belief. I want to tame my ego, my arrogance, my dogmatic views on all things in life.

Hence I will continue to ask similar questions and continue to reflect on the comments given by all of you here.

Thanks, guys for responding to my post and sharing all that you know deeply and personally on any topic I have posted so far. Hope this will be same for future topics by me too. lol. ^_^

Spnw07 SG

Originally posted by Spnw07:

Creationism, IMHO, is not practical and scientific. Sorry to all creationist here, that is just my opinion.

Buddhism on the other hand explains causation as a process of conditioning ad infinitum, this makes more sense, is certainly more practical and scientific to me.

I think I can't explain better than the following passage, and also Sanath makes a good point that conditionality is the only logical way to explain the 'complex and intricate.

http://www.uq.net.au/slsoc/bsq/budchr2.htm

Firstly, how does the Christian know that it was his God who is behind creation? Perhaps it was the gods of non-Christian religions who designed and created the universe.

So if there is design in the universe, much of it is faulty and cruel. This would seem to indicate that the universe was not created by a perfect all-loving God.

Thanks AEN, really appreciate all that information above. I have similar materials on the argument about connection between 'perfect design' and 'God' too.

In case anyone or any Christian in SGforums thinks I'm anti-Christian or a Buddhist fundamentalist or conservative, I wish to clarify by saying the following:

Most Christian churches and their members subtlely or zealously challenge members of other religions on their beliefs, which I think will not lead to inter-faith respect and harmony in the short or long term.

Therefore as a Buddhist, I need to continously re-affirm my belief, knowledge in Buddhist teachings, and develop spiritual wisdom. I also need to learn as many ways as possible to show clear and unwavering respect for the teachings of other religions and their members. One way is definitely to restrain myself from imposing, instilling or provoking the rise of doubtful thoughts in their members about their beliefs in any way, well-intentioned or not.

I will continue to seek guidance from the entire Buddhist community anywhere.

May I be able to meet the right Dharmma everywhere I go and may I quickly realise the Truth as experienced by the Buddha. And after that, I will definitely go ahead to help others to realise the Truth and gain quick and complete liberation from all suffering and delusions.

If there's any single speck of sincerity in my wishes, may it come true as quickly as possible with the empowerment of all Buddhas and Bodhisattvas and enlightened beings in all ten directions and all time periods.

justdoit77 SG

Hence I will continue to ask similar questions and continue to reflect on the comments given by all of you here.

Thanks, guys for responding to my post and sharing all that you know deeply and personally on any topic I have posted so far. Hope this will be same for future topics by me too. lol. ^_^

No need to feel what "useless", you should in fact feel happy to know abt buddhism.
Anyway, whether you are going by historical authenticity or by teaching, both are enough to justify the dharma, unless one want to see the whole process to take place in order to believe it.

Since you also interested about dharma, why not go attend some dharma talk. Discussing on forum alone is not enough. I know places that conduct dharma talk weekly, pls let me know if you are interested.

Spnw07 SG

I understand that discussion on forum alone is not enough. However, I have some emotional problems within myself and some conflicting doubts about Buddhism and the Buddhist community, so I normally go for Buddhist books and audio-visual materials on Buddhist teachings.

I can trust the Buddha, but can I trust myself? Can I trust others?

That is my main concern.

justdoit77 SG

I can trust the Buddha, but can I trust myself? Can I trust others?

That is my main concern.

oh, so there are more doubts in you. Just voice out lor.
Buddhism is good that we allow doubts to be voiced out and discussed.

Herzog_Zwei SG

oh, so there are more doubts in you. Just voice out lor.
Buddhism is good that we allow doubts to be voiced out and discussed.

That's just pure brainwashing.

An Eternal Now SG

That's just pure brainwashing.

That is not brainwashing. Brainwashing is to demand unquestionable acceptance *without discussion* of the words even if you do not understand it.

JitKiat SG

IMO, we should tell Christians that Christian teachings is similar to 人天乘 (Human and Heaven Vehicle) in Buddhism. For example, ten commandments include principles like no killing, no adultery, no stealing and honor your parents. The dharma of 人天乘 is the foundation/basis to more advanced dharma found in Theravada and Mahayana. It is like 人天乘 is the primary school, Theravada is the secondary school and Mahayana is the university. From the point of 人天乘, there is nothing wrong with believing in God and wanting to go to Heaven. In fact, if everybody in this world, despite having different religions, can really practise 人天乘, our environment will naturally improve and become Heaven. Christians and Buddhists can work together to make our world a better place. The dangers comes when we discriminate against each other's religion. Discrimination results in misunderstanding. Misunderstanding gives rise to conflicts and eventually war. Therefore, I usually avoid discussing the differences but focus on the common teachings when I speak to my Christian friends.

The following is a speech made by Dalai Lama to promote religious harmony:

Excerpts from His Holiness the Dalai Lama's address to the inter-faith seminar organised by the International Association for Religious Freedom, Ladakh Group, in Leh on 25 August

JitKiat SG

When a person can never have faith in anything, where does his spiritual standing belong?

=> This is very dangerous, the person will probably suffer great depression and end up committing suicide

Beyond Religion SG

Is this taught by the Buddha himself?

My view towards other religions is that, they are not good and correct in all entirety. There are portions which are good and correct (eg. the 6th to the 10th commandments), but there are also portions that are at odds with the teachings of Buddhism (slavery, human sacrifice, waging wars, establishing personal prestige and power, wholesale slaughter of human beings by God etc.).

But I also respect the rights of every person to believe and practice their own respective religion, independent of my views towards that religion. I also believe that in a multi-cultural, multi-religious and multi-racial society such as ours, we need to emphasize the common teachings of our religions rather than dwell on the differences.

goldevil SG

All religion are OK 1 unless it's a cult .

buddhism r widely misinterpreted because even some non-buddhist think that buddha is a god .

but i think from what i hear at church , they do critisize others , saying abt other religion praying to idol or clay ............

I really like churches that r solemn , it's really magnificient .