Talk:Buddhism/Archive 1

This is an archive of past discussions about Buddhism. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

Archive 2

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Archive 5

Vocabulary

I feel we should have a Buddhist vocabulary of some sort. All the Sanskrit/Pali/Tibetan/Japanese is disturbing to some people, but many terms lack good translations. There is a List of Islamic terms in Arabic so I'll start "List of Buddhist terms". Initially it will be short so feel free to discuss the format before the list gets too long. I suggest we make a rough school-language division:

--What are the following words meant to mean? Are they supposed to be equivalences? --

Sanskrit - Mahayana (biksu)
Japanese - Zen (no good term seems to exist, sensei?)
- Roshi? Uyanga 00:23 23 May 2003 (UTC)

--Roshi and Sensei are wrong. A zen monk has a different name to a zen master.

Tibetan - Tantric (lama)

--This is very mistaken. A Tibetan bhikkhu is called a gelong if he is fully ordained, or getsul if he is a novice monk (of 36 vows). Tantra is a sanskrit word (The word "gyu" is the normative tibetan word for the sanskrit word Tantra), and is not equivalent to Theravada - Tantra is not a school. There are four well-known schools in Tibet, and numerous sub-schools and small schools, with different canon, different vinaya, and different lineages.Secondly, there are also four separate schools of philosophy in Tibet. What is Theravada? A school or a philosophy? The meaning of "lama" is a (canonical/normative) tibetan word for the Sanskrit word Guru. Also, almost all Tibetan Buddhists are Mahayana (tib. tegchen), but the monastic tradition holds a savarstivadin(sp.?) -Hinayana Vinaya tradition in the 'Sarpa' schools. Most modern tibetan practitioners will practice according to the entire Hinayana, Mahayana and Tantrayana texts. Far from being degreded, the Tibetan canon has the most complete and accurate set of sutras and commentaries as was found in Nalanda university during the 8th - 11th centuries. The sutras of the Pali canon (the Dhammapada is not a sutra, and is not found there) are all found in the tibetan canon and are also regarded as normative- therefore the Tibetan tradition is -inclusive- it is an EXTENSION of the hinayana tradition. So we cannot make big ideas about 'Lama==Bhikku'.

Pali - Theravada (bhikku)
English - common to all schools (monk)
Korean
Vietnamese
Burmese

Should these be as separate articles or one file? Or maybe both?

A 'Buddhist glossary' in one file would be a great idea. It should be basic; covering all 5 categories you've mentioned because there are many well done glossaries on the www. We can just add an external link section for, example, the AccessToInsight.Org glossary, etc. Usedbook 21:58 Mar 16, 2003 (UTC)

Meditation

Q: There have been some questions about how much lip service should be given to meditation on the Buddhism front page. I've attempted to at least allude to it since it is a central practice to most traditions. Any other thoughts? Maybe a fork to a "Buddhist Meditation" page would be the best place to elaborate on the topic once it is given approriate coverage on the main page.

A:Meditation should get the same amount of coverage as virtue, I agree. If you want detail, you should add to the Meditation page. Usedbook 21:58 Mar 16, 2003 (UTC)

Q: Can anyone find the Wikipedia page listing famous/"celebrity" Buddhists?

A: it's under listing of noted Buddhists

Homosexuality

A summary of Buddhist views on homosexuality should be started on the new page discussing Religion and homosexuality.

Agreed, but I don't think Buddhist views on homosexuality are particularly central to the religion.

Homosexuality in Buddhist monasteries is quite a topic itself. We should add a Buddhist view to the Religion and homosexuality because most 'faiths' are anti-homosexual (like Islam). Buddhism is anti-caste & anti-racist. Usedbook 21:58 Mar 16, 2003 (UTC)

historical treatment would be appreciated

Q: Why are the links to "Perfecxtion of wisdom" not working in the section on Mahayana sutras? rossum 2002-11-13

A: Because they should be "Perfection of Wisdom" - capital W.

The Buddha vs Many Buddhas

I do have a problem with the wording in the page because it puts much too much emphasis on "the Buddha". In many traditions of Buddhism, there is the premise that there are many Buddhas, and that everyone can become a Buddha.

I removed a few instances of "the Buddha" from the article. I think the ones that are left shouldn't be a problem. Your observation on "many Buddhas" and "everyone can become a Buddha" is of course a good one.

I agree. But, you should know that the premise of many 'Buddhas' is recognized in Theravada AND Mahayana (Vajrayana included). The only difference is that Mahayana emphasizes these 'other Buddhas' more in practice, whereas in Theravada, Buddhists worry about this eon and its Buddha and Dharma. Usedbook 21:58 Mar 16, 2003 (UTC)

In all of the traditions I've read about where there are multiple Buddhas, they are held to be aspects of the same entity. All parts of the universal consciousness. It's all really just a minor matter of semantics.

-Are you refering to the Mahayana schools such as those of Tibetan origin? I think the idea of a universal consciousness is rejected by Gautama Buddha in the suttas where he describes the 25 false views of the self. I assume that in this analysis he'd also be refering to himself. - RSA

That is a violation of Anatta. Even Mahayana scholars adamantly professed that the 'Universal Consciousness' is NOT a self! This seems to never make it into modern Western Buddhist books for obvious reasons: to propagate the god-like bodhisattva who can evade impermance for eternity to save every single being in samsara out of compassion. Usedbook 21:58 Mar 16, 2003 (UTC)

Rebirth

I am surprised to find that the main article on Buddhism makes no mention of reincarnation and only has a link to nirvana. is this just my ignorance of buddhism (which is vast) or could these have been missed? I know that the average reader at least would expect treatment of these two issues as well as a snapshot of daily life for the average buddhist: visit to shrines, ancestor worship (which is also not mentioned), etc...
also, from the historical perspective, would it be appropriate to detail ways in which buddhism shows its hindu roots (if it has such roots, again, i think the average reader might expect clarification on this?) --Plasticlax

Gautama Buddha never taught Reincarnation. He taught his version of Rebirth. Vajrayana, what is practiced in Tibet, Bhutan, Mongolia, etc., does subscribe to reincarnation but this was transmitted from Hinduism into its all schools. 'OM' for example, which is used in Vajrayana is from Hinduism and is a derivative of Hinduism's 'AUM'.
The Buddhism section is still in it's infancy so we thank you for your input. We will work hard to provide concrete content. Usedbook 21:58 Mar 16, 2003 (UTC)

I removed "The precepts to seek Nirvana" and "The virtues". It seems Buddhism is literally prone to lists. Perhaps we will add them later in paragraph. Usedbook 14:33 Apr 9, 2003 (UTC)

For most people the distinction between reincarnation and rebirth is one of name only. So I think reincarnation can be mentioned, though it should obviously be done in such a way as to make it palatable to Buddhists.

kh7 11:17 Apr 14, 2003 (UTC)

What about adding a section on the history of buddhism from its foundation until the modern day? 28 apr 2003

Good idea, our anonymous friend. See 'History of Schools' for the contribution. Be well! Usedbook 19:46 16 May 2003 (UTC)

NPOV Issues

I removed the following since it is POV and historically incorrect. Should I mention 'Hinduism' never existed at the time of Gautama Buddha? Even democracies have their authoritive figures. Lastly, the Sangha order is a tradition and the 31 planes of existence is cosmology. Usedbook 14:07 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

68.5.87.191 wrote on May 3, 2003: Buddhism originated as a Hindu equivalent of Protestantism, but it departed more significantly from its parent tradition. The Buddha believed that his contemporary Hinduism had grown to place too much emphasis on authority, ritual, the supernatural, cosmology, determinism, and tradition. Authority, ritual, and tradition he expressly forbade; determinism he denied; cosmological speculation and mystical activity he dismissed as a dangerous waste of time. All that was left was meditation and self-improvement. After the Buddha's death, however, these six elements did appear in his religion.

Pre-Hindu would be the correct term. He did not forbid tradition, but I understand and am with you on the points. How should we work this into the article? Usedbook 19:43 16 May 2003 (UTC)

I don't see how that is either POV or historically incorrect. (I think I can see how you could call it incorrect, but not historically IMO.) That's exactly what I was taught.

And I do think that "Hinduism" is as good a term as any to describe the contemporary religion of the Buddha's day. He was more or less a contemporary of the writers of the Upanishads. --Smack (yes, I am 68.5.87.191)

Its quite rare for "Hinduism" to be used in this context in history books but I do notice it. We never label Jesus Christ as a Christian. He was a Jew. In the same respects, Brahminism during Siddhartha Gautamas time isn't remotely close to what we now know as Hinduism. It is even quite the opposite in some ways (cows are no longer sacrificed by Brahmin priests but presently worshipedby Hindu preists). In regards to the Upanishads, like most pre-Hindu and later Indian texts, they're not canonical and have authors making deletions and entries spanning many centuries.
Your paragraph touches on a noteworthy subject. In every society that Buddhism propagated into, they native indigenous cultures and religions were not disturbed. Although Gautama openly expressed his 'Right View', he did not supress other cultures. If a rite wasn't detrimental to the wellbeing of the people, it simply was ok. In Thailand, you will notice miniture houses infront of homes (of an ancient tradition) that are shrines used to respect the spirits. This unBuddhist ritual is considered usless, yet no coercion was issued. Often people mistaken the culture practiced in Buddhist societies as Buddhist. There are professed Buddhists who are speculative mystics practicing ritual within the complex of a Buddhist temple, and there are also professed Islamists by the thousands willing to commit kamikaze (an act they consider the duty and 6th pillar of Islam), but this doesn't mean its in the Qur'an and "in the religion".
I do apprieciate your work and agree that Buddhism is under a veil of culture; mistakenly an aspect of it but really just tolerated custom. Gautama was against many rituals that some Buddhists now adhere to. These I myself am against but the practitioners must, with their free will in mind, be able to see for themselves. The religion he established in doctrine and discipline is available for them under all that frivolous mumbo-jumbo. Be well. Usedbook 06:56 20 May 2003 (UTC)

How does 'proto-Hinduism' sound?

'proto-Hinduism' is more acceptable than Hinduism, but the whole sentence (as would be revised) "Buddhism originated as a proto-Hindu equivalent of Protestantism, but it departed more significantly from its parent tradition." remains set in POV. The teachings of Buddha were unconcerned with cosmology - this distinction means that Buddhism had little in common with either denying or supporting proto-scientific doctrines on the nature of the universe. Buddha basically told us that we would be less miserable if we stopped being self-centred. This idea was revolutionary, and remains revolutionary.

Unwanted External Links

We have had issues regarding the links at Buddhism and recently, User:Kh7 also had to remove many unwanted externals, stating that this article is not a directory for sites. I removed the following because we simply cannot have unrelated material; the trend spreads. If we add this one, why not for America, Canada, and France and entire Europe, since it has a higher numbers of converts. Australia has high Asian immigration (consisting of those escaping persecution, poverty, etc.), which is the majority of the growth number. Usedbook 19:43 16 May 2003 (UTC)

Nelson, Darren. Why is Buddhism the fastest growing religion in Australia?. BuddhaNet.

I added that link 'cause I thought we were supposed to quote sources. I had it listed as a source. Is there a problem with that? -- prat

Perhaps source links should be made for less popularly known facts. I think your paragraph is fine without it. Be well. Usedbook 07:10 20 May 2003 (UTC)

I wouldn't have seen Buddhist as the fastest growing religion in Australia being a 'popularly known fact', with respect to a global wikipedia audience .. but, I don't really care either way... -- prat

Buddhism in the UK

There probably should be some material on the history of Buddhism in the British Isles and Western Europe and the role the Theosophical Society, the Younghusband Expedition, etc. played in its introduction. Uyanga 20:37 16 May 2003 (UTC)

I'll try to get on this from a Theravada perspective. I have some reference material from Ajahn Chah and Ajahn Sumedho describing some of the early attempts at establishing a buddhist monastic community in England but I have no material for the Mahayana tradition. As earlier mentioned this would probably be best put under a different topic. --RandomCoda 13:20 22 May 2003 (CST)

Hinayana & Mahayana

I think it would be important to add some explanation of the origin of the terms 'Mahayana' and 'Hinayana.' I tried to do this, but then I realized that there were some problems with the structure of the article. The current structure of the section on the two schools places Theravada first and Mahayana second, which is logical because the paragraph on Mahayana needs to be followed by a discussion of the various subdivisions of that school. However, in the interests of the name explanation, it would be best to place Mahayana first, since it is the one that first named itself after the raft metaphor. --Smack 06:03 20 May 2003 (UTC)

Good idea, Smack. Historically, of course, Theravada should remain first but with the name explanation, what ever makes the Maha-Hina conflict understandable is good for the reader. We should note that Theravada and Hinayana are not the same, which badly needs to be noted. Be well. Usedbook 07:10 20 May 2003 (UTC)

It is best to tread this ground very lightly and try our best to make this topic as opinion free as possible. I'll try to get a friend (whose researched this extensively) to take a look. --RandomCoda 13:20 22 May 2003 (CST)

RandomCoda: Are you planning to get this friend of yours to write up a paragraph or two on this? What exactly is going on?

Structure

Well I'm newish here but I'm looking at this page and wondering what the hell is going on. I started tidying up bits but realised that there are major structural difficulties with the way Buddhism is handled. The whole subject area of Buddhism needs restructuring to make it more conherent and navigable. I've mucked around with the entries a bit before discovering this page so forgive me if I've stepped on anyone's toes. I'm looking around at how general books have structured their chapters to see if they provide a good model. But otherwise I'll try to make some thing up - I'm a librarian so this is what I'm good at. Michael 8 Aug 2003.

Buddhism Wikipedia is filled with errors

I am a specialist in Buddhist studies and have looked at a lot of the material contained here in the area of Buddhism. Most of it is terribly inaccurate and misleading. People should not be writing entries for a reference work if they are lacking in expertise on a topic. It will give people the wrong information, and give the project a bad reputation. Please don't write on a topic if you don't know what you are talking about. Charles Muller (www.acmuller.net/ddb)

On the internet you could be a dog posing as a Buddhist scholar, who knows? Just because you're a self confessed 'specialist', doesn't mean you have the patent on what Buddhism is. 'Specialist' opinions on Buddhism have changed radically since 'specialists' started taking an interest, and continue to change. All any of us can do is give the 'truth' as we see it. Part of the fun of doing wiki is writing what you think, and then watching someone correct it with something better, so lets not get all anal retentive about it.

BTW when you do add your 'specialist' opinion, do take the time to link it into other entries, and do check to see what links to the information you have moved, and either change those links or provide forwarding (and backwarding). Otherwise, and this is my 'information specialist' opinion; otherwise however special your opinion is, it doesn't contribute to a harmonious whole. Also you can sign your posts here by doing ~~~~. Mahaabaala 09:08, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Seems our specialist in Buddhist studies spat the dummy and went home with his toys. He's left a range of evils amongst the Buddhist pages which will take a while to track down and correct. Mainly a very academic approach which will bewilder most general users, but also a whole lot of links to his personal Buddhist directory which don't work because a login is required! Mahaabaala 16:27, 15 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Audience

We need to think about who the audience for this page, and it's subsidiaries, is. Is this, for instance, supposed to be for the general public, or it is an academic reference work. The level is very mixed at present with most of it aiming at a general audience, but eg the schools section now looking like a university text book Mahaabaala 09:28, 15 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Buddhism - Please Read Before Editing Buddhism

The purpose of this comment is to prevent an otherwise inevitable edit war.

"Buddhism" is a term that is not traditionally used by "Buddhists". Instead, we ("Buddhists") have a whole set of other terms for "Buddhism" - such as Dharma, the law, etc. Also we 'Buddhists' traditionally tend to call ourselves "insiders".

I would suggest that the 'Buddhism' page be split into several subsidiarys that would allow for the plural nature of the 'Buddhist' culture to be more easily divulged.

We could have: Western Academic views of Buddhism.

Theravadin views of Buddhism.

Chinese (pure land) views of Buddhism.

Chinese (zen) views of Buddhism.

Japanese (zen) views of Buddhism.

Tibetan views of Buddhism. etc..

This would help us get over the philosophical and editorial problem of a "ONE TRUE VIEW" that contradicts directly the message of Anatta (Skt. anatman), and moreover would demonstrate that the idea of syncretising (US: syncretizing) a set of cultures, beliefs and ethics that have been diversifying for over 2,500 years is really an activity that will not reflect those cultures and beliefs without reducing them to something that loses their plural, exciting diversity. We should embrace diversity, not try to choke it with some reductive approach to unification, just to make it "fit in" with outsider's ideas of categorising everything into nice boxes such as 'religion'.

Regarding the current Buddhism article, to me it appears to be based upon (outsider) western academic ideas; to quote: "The Mahayana arose in the first few centuries". Well, according to whom? Certainly not according to Mahayana insiders! (Mahayana insiders assert that e.g. the events described in the "heart of the perfection of wisdom sutra" happened during Siddhartha Gautama Buddha's lifetime.)

Well, given that Wikipedia is intended as a quasi-neutral reference source, shouldn't the position of secular scholarship predominate? I would assume, similarly, that the Wikipedia entry on the Bible discusses its composition and redaction by human authors and editors.कुक्कुरोवाच 15:12, 31 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Moreover, the very class of assertion about the Mahayana implies a reified, acontextual (objective) Weltanschauung (English: worldview) - something that many insiders would find it difficult to accept, as it contradicts with the basic message of Anatman (Pali: anatta).

Also, there is a seeming crisis in the Pali/Sanskrit issue; do we always need to write this with a predominance of one over the other e.g: Anatta (Skt. anatman) ? Do we need to do this at all? (Note the mild parodies above). Moreover, choosing Pali over Sanskrit appears to indicate a continuing subscription to an unfortunate split in traditional opinion; (what appears to be a Theravadin intolerance towards the Mahayana), which may not even be there. Hence, the idea of allowing for diverse views to be covered, high up in the tree of the Buddhism article, can avoid these challenges.

Well, since we write in a linear format, something has to come first, if we're going to include both. Certainly we have to include at least one (since there aren't, generally, adequate English translations that are general enough to ensure that people know they're talking about the same thing). Seems to me both should be included for terms that are important both within the Pāli-language tradition and within the "Sanskrit" of the Mahāyāna. (Actually, almost no Buddhist writers (Nāgārjuna being the obvious exception) used Sanskrit; the Mahāyāna sutras are more typically composed in what is called "Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit" (BHS), which is really just a prakrit dressed up to look like Sanskrit...but there's really no convenient way to indicate that in a short form that the average reader will understand, and most of the lexical items look the same as their Sanskrit equivalents, anyway.) The rule should be that when the term originated in Pāli (or, rather, when our first evidence of it is in the Pāli canon) and was grandfathered into later the BHS writings, then the Pāli term should come first. When the term is specific to the Pāli writings, it should be listed in Sanskrit only. (Unless it also wound up in Theravāda literature, though I don't know if that ever happened). I don't see how differentiating the origin languages for terms indicates any sort of bias; it's just good scholarship.कुक्कुरोवाच 15:12, 31 Mar 2004 (UTC)

The image

How does everyone feel about the current image accompanying this page "the Big Buddha"? I don't like it that much, I think it looks kind of silly. I can think of better images, but I don't know what is available in the public domain. - NYK 09:08, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

The Zen painting seems to be the most approachable visualization of Nirvana. A statue just represents the insecurities of man, not to mention innovation in religion. Usedbook 21:19, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Changes Mar. 14

Wanted to give an account of why I'm messing with some changes that 195.232.57.17 made today. I took out the part about how laypeople are often do not consider the 1st precept binding. I'm not sure if that's true and emphasizing it so early in the article makes it seem like Buddhists condone killing, which would be a misunderstanding. I also took out the word "uncontrolled" in "totally transformed them beyond birth, death, and subsequent uncontrolled rebirth" because again I'm not sure it's true and I think it detracts from the impact of the sentence -- also might give the impression that Dharma is about an ego trying to control his rebirths. I removed the reference to Chan under Bodhidharma; I don't think it's necessary to go into all that here; the article on Zen is supposed to be about Zen/Chan/Soun in general as well as Japan-specific Zen.

I also added a new line about how some schools have additional "grave" precepts: I've seen several different lists of 8-10. One more thing, it looks like we now have a complete list of which countries practice Mahayana, Theravada, etc. in two different places. I didn't fix that this time, but we probably should at some point. - NYK 07:09, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

On a somewhat related note, I slapped together a {{msg:buddhism}} toolbar for the Buddhism pages. I figure I'll try adding it to the main page and wait for people to yell at me. To edit it, go to: MediaWiki:Buddhism

Regarding Hinayana

I also pulled this:

"(A common misunderstanding of the term "Hinayana" is that it means "inferior", and was intended to be derisory, which it was not - see the main article for more about this)"

[...]

Which seemed to me to not at all justify a claim that "Hinayana" is non-derisive. And, indeed, I'm pretty sure it is derisive, and that we ought to find another.

Not wanting to be too annoying about this, there has been much talk about this particulary issue over at Hinayana. A dictionary definition of derisory is "expressing contempt or ridicule", and the Mahayana schools did not and do not express contempt or ridicule towards the Hinayana traditions, schools, or practices. If you can find legitimate primary sources that conflict with this, then let's change the article (and remove the provisio here) (20040302 08:44, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC))

I do not change my opinion, but I feel that the issue of derisoriness (or not) of Hinayana is no longer needed in the Buddhism article. So, let's go with your pull. Moreover, the issue of derisoriness belongs to the Hinayana article, and is yet to be fleshed out, either by myself, nat, mahabala or anyone else (20040302 09:09, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Is śravakayāna, mentioned in the Hinayana article, sufficiently general in its appeal to replace Hinayana in the Buddhism entry, and possibly to take the place of the Hinayana article, with that redirected?

It was used a lot in early India, and by the chinese visitors as (Sravaks). There are many advantages to saying Sravakayana, but it is used less in the west due to the high dependancy on secondary literature and poor translation. (20040302 08:44, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC))

I think that's apt; the conversation is clearly still important, but can take place off the Buddhism main entry. This should improve flow in the article and reduce clutter. Also, perhaps "derision" is too strong, but it's quite clear the term is perjorative. See Talk:Hinayana#Etymology for an etymological note.

(Moved) over to Hinayana talk (20040302 12:28, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Also, I looked over the Hinayana page, and saw two good suggestions: First, either take the NPOV discussion of Early Buddhist schools as such to either a Sravakayana page or an Early Buddhist Schools page. Might I suggest that the interested parties resolve that question either by a vote of some kind or by someone simply going ahead and creating one or the other? (With proper discussion in the intro paragraph and a redirect, there won't be much lost either way.)

This has now been done - the Hinayana page now deals with the Hinayana (but still needs a better approach), the Early Buddhist Schools stuff is now on Early Buddhist Schools and looks good there. We should attempt to get more links to that, rather than Hinayana, so as to avoid the Hinayana debate obscuring useful history regarding early buddhist schools. Acc. to Mahayana literature, Sravakayana substantially deals with the motivation of the individual (although is differentiated from Pratyekayana by method of transmisison). (20040302 12:28, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Thanks! And I'll keep an eye out for Hīnayāna links that should be switched over.कुक्कुरोवाच 14:59, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Second, convert the existing Hinayana page entirely to a discussion of the term itself, or take that discussion, integrate it into the Buddhist polemics page, and make the Hinayana either a redirect or a disambiguation page. (I prefer the second option, but that's just because it looks neater from an organizational point of view.)

this is yet to be done, but a good idea, one way or another. (20040302 12:28, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC))

What do you guys think? कुक्कुरोवाच 10:49, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

There has already been some discussion on this at Talk:Hinayana. Actually, I don't know if there was ever a consensus on the issue, and I keep meaning to go back over that and hash some things out to seem if we can reach some conclusions. - Nat Krause 05:12, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Transliteration

By the way, I'm not really enthusiastic about adding diacritics to Sanskrit, but I certainly have no objection if you want to. On the other hand, if we are going to standardize Chinese transliteration, can we agree on the modern standard pinyin (i.e. Linji instead of Lin-chi)? - Nat Krause 05:12, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I think it's important to get the right diacritics, because otherwise (a) we're not spelling things properly, (b) we are potentially furthering the corruption of terms in the semi-informed sector, and (c) I think it's important that Wikipedia be standard on issues like this. Obviously this all holds for Pinyin just as much, but of course there are some (like me) who are more familiar with Wade-Giles (owing to the inertia of the Religious Studies field) and won't always know how to convert. So, help on that front is much appreciated. What I'd like is to eventually get it so that the Buddhist terms and concepts page has correct transliterations (and ideally also characters, for those languages) from all the key languages, so that users can depend on it as a reference. कुक्कुरोवाच 10:55, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Well, I'm afraid that I respectfully disagree with you on all three points, at least as far as marks for vowel length are concerned. (a) I don't think that diacritics falls under the category of "spelling" in English. English is a very anti-diacritical language: there are very few if any native English words that require them. Because of this, the information that they provide to a reader of English is limited. (b) This being my opinion, I don't see how not using diacritics will further the corruption of the terms. Actually, I'm nt really sure what you are referring to, so an example might be good. (c) I'm also not sure why it is important for Wikipedia to standardize this. What difference does it make if one page is one way and another another? It might be marginally desirable for them to be the same, but I don't see why it is important.

I will be happy to help with conversion to pinyin, since this is something that I do know a little about. I took a look at Buddhist terms and concepts but there don't seem to be any terms listed in Chinese. By the way, note that Chinese words should also technically have diacritics to mark the tone, but this very rarely done in practice. - Nat Krause 15:25, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I know about the dearth of Chinese equivalents. Do you where one would look to find some? I mean, most of these things will have to have translations and/or transliterations, given the number of sutras that got translated...

Not sure what you mean. You want Chinese equivalents for various Buddhist jargons? I guess you could try www.acmuller.net. I don't really think it's necessary, though. Chinese Buddhism has had very little direct impact on English vocabulary. Everything's in Japanese, Tibetan, etc. - Nat Krause 17:57, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)

For pinyin and other Chinese transliteration, we tried to come up with some standards for Chinese articles. In the end, people just type the tone marks and/or numbers if they can be bothered/have them on hand - eventually someone who finds this unaccepable will fix it. Pinyin is sometimes, but not always typed in italics. Personally I like italics... nihao looks better in a block of text than nihao.

Regarding Chinese Buddhism's impact on western vocabulary, fairly widely used terms like 'Chan' are Chinese (though traditionally romanized Ch'an, which is not pinyin). Mostly names of schools, scriptures, and Boddhisattvas important to Mahayana traditions are frequently referred to by English speakers using their Chinese names.

--prat 21:28, 2004 Apr 5 (UTC) (currently living in China)

You live in China? Cool, me too! Anyway, as far as pinyin standards, I'm sure there's more discussion of this elsewhere, but the only thing I think is important is to generally use it instead of Wade-Giles. I don't think tone marks are very important because very few English speakers will know what to do with them anyway. If possible, I like to have them the first time the word is used in the article. I've made a little personal project of converting tone-numbers to tone marks, but I don't anybody else needs to worry about using one or the other or neither if they don't want to.

As for Chinese vocabulary, I was thinking of non-Proper Noun terminology. Clearly, the names of schools, places, and people specific to China will usually be said in Chinese (although some people still say Rinzai or Eno or Tendai). But those are mostly not in the Buddhist terms and concepts page anyway. The words that are there mostly do have Chinese equivalents, but, for instance, the Chinese word for satori is, as that page mentions, wu. But I've never heard anybody actually say wu in English. Or, for instance, bodhisattva: I've heard a few people, in English, call them bosatsus, but never pusas. Same with the names of specific figures. Everyone I've ever talked to uses either the names in Sanskrit or in Japanese (except for Guan Yin). I guess it depends who you talk to. My point, go ahead and put in Chinese equivalents, especially for proper names, but it doesn't seem like a really pressing issue to me. - Nat Krause 04:09, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)

New Pali or Sanskrit Wikipedia?

Unsure how many people here are advanced in either of these two languages (I'm certainly not yet very talented...), but believe it could be a good idea to start thinking about starting new Wikipedias using them. This is particularly the case for Sanskrit, which seems to have quite a large following from a number of philosophical traditions... --prat 13:17, 2004 Apr 3 (UTC)

Sanskrit actually has one [1]. However, I can't seem to find any content, suggesting that perhaps it isn't so much of the functional. I'd love to have one, but I'd hate to take on the responsibility for constructing one; I have some training in reading Sanskrit and I can even translate reasonably well, but producing Sanskrit would be much harder. I mean, I could cobble together entries that were technically grammatically correct, but it wouldn't look anything like what an actual Sanskrit speaker would say...but maybe that's not such a big deal, as there aren't exactly a lot of native speakers running around...

Plus, the sa.wikipedia is UTF-8, bless its heart. कुक्कुरोवाच 14:00, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Hrrm, it must have just started working again recently. I checked some time ago and sa: links just died. The site, however, states that it was started in January 2001. There are a total of two articles(!), one of which is the main page, and one of which is a single line long. Perhaps if interest can be generated here and elsewhere ([link removed due to spam filter], mailing lists, etc.) then we could give it a good kick-start? --prat 23:34, 2004 Apr 3 (UTC)

Actually, you guys might want to find out about the Indian intellectual scene. Since with Sanskrit, unlike latin, we know close to the sort of inflection and word order a native speaker would use, most people who learn Sanskrit can speak it fluently and converse with one another. There are huge societies, especially in India, wherein people actively create new vocabularies that are internationally agreed upon. There is a newschannel whereon daily news is given completely in Sanskrit. --LordSuryaofShropshire 00:27, Apr 7, 2004 (UTC)

95 Theses

(I just moved a bunch of stuff around in this section for clarity's sake. The chronological order wasn't working with the point-by-point replies breaking up the numbering and whatnot. I hope I didn't mess anything up too badly, but perhaps this is exactly the kind of overzealousness that's led to the current confusion of Buddhism.

Also, what's the etiquette on archiving or deleting old discussions. Can some of the older stuff get filed so this page isn't so huge?कुक्कुरोवाच 16:02, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Well, I don't know if you should do this normally, but I approve the change. And archiving is very common - Nat Krause 17:45, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Nah, I'm joking, it's nothing as serious as that. But there have been a surprisingly large number of edits to this page in the last few weeks (I'm talking primarily about the ones before Kukkovacara's latest round) -- it's really in a state of flux. Some of the changes are improvements and some of them seem troublesome to me. However, rather than just alter everything exactly to my liking, I figured I should bring up the issues here and see what people think about them. --Nat Krause

Nat Krause re: anonymous

On Mar. 22, anonymous removed the entire "Three Treasures" section from the intro replacing it with a bit about nirvana and meditation. Clearly, the Three Treasures should be mentioned in this article, but where? I think that the intro as it stands now is a little bit of a mess -- it used to have some concision, but now it sprawls out to more than a page on my browser. Maybe we should have a separate thread to hash out exactly what should be mentioned in the intro, so as to make it less ad hoc.

Note, I went ahead and put the 3 treasures back in in the body of the article. - Nat Krause 12:04, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

The same anonymous user changed the etymology of "Buddha" to "one who has been awakened" instead of "one who is awake". Can someone who knows about Indic languages comment on this? Is it a valid difference? I don't see the point of the extra words.

Yeah, "Buddha" is a past passive participle, so technically "one who has been awakened" is correct. The implication that the Buddha awoke and was not always awake is good; the passive construction is secondary (it's just that other past participles aren't as common in Sanskrit; it's not that the Buddha was awakened by someone else). How about "one has become awake"? It's a little clumsy in English, but it captures all the necessary implications and leaves the others out.

That sounds good to me. - Nat Krause 12:04, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

He also says that mindfulness is the most important of the Eightfold Path. Is that a valid claim? I had never heard that there was a most important part of it, except maybe in the opinion of Thich Nhat Hanh.

I agree with you Nat - All three trainings are essential. (20040302 11:02, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC))

It's a worthwhile discussion, and there are places where it's implicit that mindfulness has some form of priority, but it's not something that has to go in Buddhism. It would probably make more sense under Noble Eightfold Path.

I stand corrected. Thank you. I will withdraw the paragraph.

From the same guy: "[The 4 noble truths] were not to be taken as accepted truths, but as truths that could be understood to be truths after careful investigation and reflection." How does he know how the Buddha meant for them to be taken? Better, I think, to leave that out. We convey the same idea under 8fold Path anyway.

I agree with you again. (20040302 11:02, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC))

(I am new to wikipedia and didn't realize there was this discussion here.) I wrote that since there is often confusion that these truths are considered already known to be true and must be accepted without question. My source for this is the Kalama Sutta http://www.accesstoinsight.org/canon/sutta/anguttara/an03-065.html.

The eightfold path is not so much a "truth" in the conventional sense as a path through which to understand the other truths.

Well, welcome to the party. Feel free to create an account, if only for ease of communication (grin). कुक्कुरोवाच

Anonymous: it's certainly a valid position, but let's leave it out from the 4 nobles section and handle it elsewhere. - Nat Krause 12:04, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

On Mar. 24, an anonymous user replaced "non-violence" in the intro with "non-harming" (which is now "non-harm"). I would prefer to go back to nonviolence because it's less jargony, which is important for the intro. The same user added: "This ultimate soteriological goal is called nirvana ... which literally means something like "extinction", as in a candle being blown out, where the fire that was once in the candle diffuses through the universe." I quibble with this for two reasons, 1) there are different ways of interpreting what nirvana is supposed to symbolize, and 2) it's a very awkward metaphor. Who can picture a fire, once in a candle, diffusing into the universe? I prefer just to say that it means "extinguishment" and leave it at that.

Totally agree. Also, what is wrong with nirvana linking to Nirvana ?

Sounds fine as long as it doesn't link to Nirvana.

Extinguishment, extinction, etc. doesn't have an object, so it's difficult to understand. Perhaps, "extinguishment of _________." where _______ is some word you think is suitable.

I think it would be difficult to find a suitable word to fill that blank. If it's not difficult to understand, then we're probably giving the wrong impression. - Nat Krause 12:04, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

How about the Dhammapada quote (added by an anonymous user on Mar. 26)? I kind of like it, but the intro is crowded as it is. Maybe when we restructure the intro, we could make that the last thing in the intro, as a segue to the main article. Or maybe elsewhere in the text, like as a segue from Origins to Principles ... (also, why is it "Dhammapā" now instead of "Dhammapāda"? - Nat Krause 09:05, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I like it too, but it would be good to find the source in Sutra rather than depend upon the Dhammapada as source. (20040302 11:02, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Isn't the Dhammapada a sutra? - Nat Krause

The loss of the "da" is almost certainly my fault (accident, now fixed), and I have no special attachment to that quote, or any quote, in that position. It might be nice to see some nice topical quotes in various of the subsections, though.कुक्कुरोवाच 16:02, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I added the quote since it is often taken as a concise 3 line summary of Buddhism. It doesn't need to be there of course.

No, the quote is good. The question is just where to place it in the article. - Nat Krause 12:04, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Nat Krause to Kukkurovaca

"Hindu", etc.

Kukkoravaca, what do you mean by " 'proto-hindu' is relatively meaningless, as is 'hindu'; Atmic philosophies were simply mainstream Indian philosophies. Also, 'Brahminism' is misleading, as the kSatriyas played a key role" (re: your Mar. 23 edit)? Do you really mean that Hinduism is not a valid concept? Isn't "mainstream Indian philosophy" exactly what Hinduism (or proto-Hinduism) means? Brahminism might be the wrong word to use, I don't know. We should probably consult with actually Hindus on what term they prefer.

Romila Thapar argues well for "Vedic Brahmanism", though I find "Proto-Hinduism" bearable. Modern Hinduism is definately not the same as the religious practices of 2.5 thousand years ago, (Most of the rituals were performed by 'kings', overseen by 'priests') and the Sramanic movements (of which Buddhism and Jainism survive) differed from them. (20040302 11:02, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC))

"Hindu" is technically just an ethnic term with the same meaning as "Indian", more or less. It has come to be associated with the dominant religious practices of the people of the region, but it's a lot like the confusion of "Muslim" and "Arab," just more popular. So, really, the Buddha was arguing against certain strands of, I dunno, "Post-Vedic Indian Philosophy". The most decisive way to distinguish Buddhism from traditional "Hinduism" is to say "Indian philosophies which recognize the Vedas as canonical" and "Indian philosophies which don't recognize the Vedas as canonical." But I think "main-stream" is less cluttery.

The philosophy of, say, the "Bhagavad Gita", which many regard (wrongly) as very characteristic of "Hinduism" (it's a bit more localized than that), is not very Brahmanical; it's a story about ksatriyas, with the key religious role played by a charioteer (the charioteer is the traditional epic narrator in India, and traditionally a role occupied by a Brahman-Ksatriya half-caste). कुक्कुरोवाच 16:02, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Well, Kukko, you have a problem with Vedic Brahmanism? Was the Gita around at the Buddha's time?

Ha! No, the Gita is considerably younger. But The Buddha was dealing with the post-vedic philosophical tradition. The Upanishads are from the period of several hundred years before the Buddha, for example.

- - ::: Basically, as the old Vedic religion decayed, several philosophical movements branched off. You had formalists interested in preserving the tradition of ritual sacrifice (these were certainly Brahmins), you had the specific cults of various gods which elevated them to near monotheism, you had atheistic dualists (samkhya-yoga) who believed the world was made of the confluence of matter and spirit, and you had the monists who believed that all was one. All of those come in several sub-flavors, and I'm leaving some out. There is no word that encompasses all of these, and their doctrines are as different from one another as any of them is from Buddhism. So "Vedic Brahmanism" is definitely misleading, yes. -

Well, I do get your point about proto-Hinduism (though Hindus may like the idea as it allows them to identify with deeply ancient dates). Also, you know that early sutras (and the Jataka) only mention "The Three Vedas", don't you?

I reckon that we can still follow historians like Thapar, and identify Buddha as subscribing a Sramanic trend that was distancing itself from the state-based Vedic Brahmanism that was still very apparent at the time. Yes I get the point that there were also folk religions (Yaksha worship is big in the Jataka), and other philosophical schools being developed (also, as you imply, India was a gigantic place with a lot going on). But the purpose of the article here is to paint a picture of what sort of religious environment Prince Gautama was exposed to - and being a Prince (whatever that means in Maghada at the time), we can expect him to be surrounded by Vedic Brahmanism, possibly more than other schools. Moreover, he met a Sramana on his world-famous chariot rides, and the Sramana was a part of this early movement. Agreed? (20040302 20:01, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Aha! I've got it. Just say, "Hindu philosophy", and pass the buck of defining what the hell that means to that page and its redactors.

- ::: On a sillier note, now all I can think of is, "I'm koo-koo for Kuko puffs."

Haha .. sorry. Kukko :-)

Hinduism and Vedic culture: A religion need not be the same as it was at its inception to be called the same religion. Beyond silly fancies about age of religion, Hinduism is a 'name', not the entity itself. It signifies a very real tradition of Vedic belief, hence another name Veda Dharma, that has survived continuously since, I'd say conservatively, 1500-2000 BCE.

Early Judaism or Early Christianity were completely different faiths from what they are now. Indeed, Christianity didn't even have anything close to its current sacraments or even its Bible! (consolidated w/ NT c. 4th century) for centuries. But they are still referred to as the same religion due to the clear retaining of older founding principals, a general terminology and a visible development (but not sundering) from the base tradition.

Buddhists in general make the mistake of thinking that departure from older beliefs implies a split. Indeed, the streams of "Hindu Philosophy aforementioned are Hindu because they accept the doctrine of the Vedas and BUILD on Vedic or Vedic-developed philosophy and metaphysics. The Upanishads or Vedanta (end of Vedas) are direct commentaries on them (Upanishads perhaps best defining the foundation of classic and modern Hinduism). Mantras, like the Mahamrityunjaya and Gayatri, plucked straight from the Vedas are more popular than ever. Even goddesses like Saraswati are still in active play. Gods like Vishnu and Shiva, though many erroneously assume independent indigenous growth, found (the former his name) much of their personality and philosophy from the Vedas. Shiva would, without the Vedas, have taken a completely different course, since his prototype was a horned protector of beasts, not the HOwler/Desctructive force oF Rudra, which name is now a major part of his persona. Also, without Vedanta, Tantra would not exist as it does today. Its practices would exist, surely, but with a far different philosophical formation bereft of the Upanishads. Beyond that, dharma would not exist as a concept, I'd wager, without its nascent Rta philosophy and use in the Vedas and final explication in the Upanishads. Lastly, Upanishadic mystics, before Buddha, broke away from Brahminism. But do you know that Brahminism still exists in many temples in India today? In a limited sense, yes, but by Brahminism, I mean hereditary right to conduct Vedic ritual pujas in temples. The tradition, though modified, plus its branches, continued till today.

The Indian philosophical schools, though some who would like to do away with the Hindu entity, are based on a very simple idea. Astika (orthodox) and Nastika (heterodox). Hinduism is the former, hence the term Hindu Philosophy, and Buddhism, Jainism, Charvaka form the latter.

As it is, Hinduism, though a recent coinage, has been referred to variously (for centuries) as Sanatana Dharma (Eternal Dharma), Veda Dharma, Arya Dharma (I believe Buddhadeb too used Arya-noble frequently) and Yoga Dharma. And, of course, as is endemic to each dharma faith, plain 'dharma.'

A rose without a name would smell as sweet.

--LordSuryaofShropshire 18:07, Apr 6, 2004 (UTC)

p.s. anyone call for a Hindu? --LordSuryaofShropshire 18:14, Apr 6, 2004 (UTC)

Well, I disagree, Surya - to me your ideas suggest a reductive approach that would not be acceptable to most modern scholars or historians of India. If we were to follow your logic, then christians and muslims would be jews. Read Thapar for a distinction between (her terms) vendantic brahmanism and puranic hinduism. Also, many scholars indentify 'hindu' to mean a group of people, (living near the Indus) which has no representation of religion. Hindu is a difficult word at the best of times. (20040302 08:18, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Well, it's true that there are broad continuities between the Vedas, but also some sharp discontinuities. I personally like the Orthodox/Heterodox distinction, is it is meaningful, clearly definable, and has a coherent basis--there are some Indian philosophies which hold the Vedas as canonical and innovate by re-interpreting them, and some which do not hold them as canonical and innovate by other means. It's clean. But I'm not sure it'll make enough rapid common sense to work for the Buddhism intro page. (The scholar in me rebels mightily at the prospect of using "Hindu" in any historical context, as it reeks of imprecision.)कुक्कुरोवाच

"Well, I disagree, Surya - to me your ideas suggest a reductive approach that would not be acceptable to most modern scholars or historians of India.

Unfortunately, it is not a reductive approach. The scholar in me, moreover, revolts against the acceptance of one scholar's word as gospel. Note that she does not cut off the culture but speaks of its development. The word Hindu is indeed a new appelation, but as I said, it does not negate the very real existence of a continuous culture. How can you explain the retaining and indeed very much extant custom of brahmins learning the Vedas and reciting them, or performing their ritual, and insinuate a different religion? It has been known variously as Sanatana (Eternal) and Veda Dharma.

As for your statement on scholars in India, that is the most ludicrous thing I have ever heard. There are plenty of very notable and internationally respected scholars on India and Hinduism who, in India and abroad, are fine with the term Hindu since, while it may have not been native, still describes a real tradition. It's not an artificial grouping. If you don't like calling it Hinduism call it Sanatana Dharma. Buddhists may like to do away with the idea of the Veda Dharma culture (I'm only reflecting a statement made above about Hindus and the age-issue).

I think you need to study Hindu traditions more and also chart the course of progression of thought from within the Vedas to the Upanishads and to modern Hinduism. It doesn't matter whether you call it vedic or puranic brahminism, it's still the same tradition. Also, I don't know if you've read the Vedas, but it contains a whole range of beliefs, from henotheism to pure monism and monotheism, from its beginining to final mandalas. Thus, to impute even a philosophical 'split' is erroneous 'scholarship'. If you're so appalled by the name, as I've said, Hinduism, then all it Sanatana or Veda Dharma. Also, calling it 'indian religion' is silly because that groups together hinduism, buddhism and jainism. Rather, it is the Astika religion, the six philosophical schools, and the two (three with Charvaka) nastika systems. Whether you call the Astika systems and the related bhakti/tantra schools Hindu, Sanatana Dharma or Veda Dharma doesn't change the fact that it's a real religion.

A critic visiting the first exhibitions of a new wave of art was appalled by the grotequeries he saw there. It was a new wave, and he mockingly derided it, saying, "This is not art! These are mere impressions!" The name stuck, since it was appropriate. Should we now say Impressionism never existed? --LordSuryaofShropshire 14:00, Apr 7, 2004 (UTC)

P.S. You obviously didn't get my logic. I clearly spoke about splitting of from the parent culture, denying it and effecting a complete split of beliefs. The early Vedics and the Upanishadic Hindus both reverenced the Vedas, the basic cosmology and the same gods. Later Hindus developed their monist and monotheistic beliefs but retained, with equal reverence for the Vedas, the original belief system. It altered but didn't not split. Your example of Christians and Muslims being Jews is illogical according to what I said since Christians clearly defy Jews' rejection of Christ as Messiah and formulate their own text, defining themselves as different from the Jews in faith. The Muslims CLEARLY reject Christians and Jews. The six philosophical schools (astika) of Hinduism are for this very reason grouped together as they ACCEPT the Vedas as well as evolved directly from them. --LordSuryaofShropshire 19:22, Apr 7, 2004 (UTC)

Honestly, I don't think there is any merit in continuing this here. We must accept differences in our reciprocal opinions. We find each other's view to be contrary to our own. There is nothing that you have said that has changed my views on the issue, and I suggest that there is nothing I have said that has changed your views likewise. So let us be friends in our differences. (20040302 19:56, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Gods, etc.

Part the first

Yesterday, Kukkovacara changed the beginning of the second paragraph from "Amongst the world religions, most of which proclaim the existence of a Creator god, Buddhism is regarded as unusual for being both non-theistic and a religion" to "Buddhism is unusual among world religions for de-emphasizing the role of deities in human religious life. While Buddhism does not deny the existence of gods (indeed, gods are frequent characters in Buddhist scripture), they are not regarded as ultimate powers in the universe or as special sources of salvation" Thanks for getting rid of the "amongst". However, it looks to me like you've changed the meaning of paragraph a little, still accurate, but less relevant.

I think the average reader is more likely to want to compare Buddhism to the monotheistic religions that they are familiar with, rather than polytheistic religions with multiple "deities". Furthermore, I think it's a really good idea to avoid words like "god" or "deity" which, in contexts like this, are so vague as to be almost useless. I don't think there's anything in Buddhism that could accurately be called a "god" in English -- the sutras talk about devas, so let's say devas. In any event, I don't think we need to discuss that in the intro.

Also, Russell Dovey changed it to: "Buddhism is unusual among world religions because it does not involve the worship of gods or other higher beings. Buddhism does not deny the existence of gods, and they are frequently referred to in Buddhist scripture, but they are not regarded as ultimate powers in the universe or as special sources of salvation."

This looks fine to me. I don't like changing it to "devas", as that's just taking advantage of a language barrier to euphemize. I would accept changing it to "supernatural beings," though. Deva means "god," and particularly if we take it in the lower case, that shouldn't be a problem. We can also get into the issue of God with a capital G, but that might lead us into a Mahayana-Early Buddhism conflict, as the metaphysical moves that make it clear that Early Buddhism is incompatible with Monotheism (and pan-theism, and monism) are later drastically reinterpreted in some Mahayana schools.

(Formerly No Worship of Higher Beings-now merged)

"Buddhism is unusual among world religions because it does not involve the worship of gods or other higher beings."

Isn't this completely misleading? Now, without ad hominems, let's consider boddhisattwas and Buddha, as well as Buddhism, which though its sects can largely be said to abide quite closely to main principles and texts, is quite diverse in practice. I know Buddhism quite well, and I know its philosophies. However, in popular practice, especially Theravada and Vajrayana, petitions and rituals involving Boddhisattvas, who are basically depicted as quasi-divinity-god figures, and even the Buddha himself, are quite common. With nitpicking one can say they are 'only being looked up to for support' or being 'venerated for their wisdom', but they are CERTAINLY higher beings, whether formerly enlightened humans or not, and they are being worshipped to quite an extent, including many crossover practices from other Dharma faiths including incense, and devotional ritual. The culture surrounding Ma Tara, a co-opted Hindu mother divinity, is a potent example of higher-being worship culture. Thus, the introductory paragraph, imho, is inaccurate. I invite a discussion, to consider the statement (reproduced above) and assure you that I will not change anything without vigorous (and ahimsa-abiding) discussion. --LordSuryaofShropshire 16:04, Apr 6, 2004 (UTC)

Your concerns are well-taken. We've already had considerable conversation on this issue (I just put some of it under the header Talk:Buddhism#Gods,_etc., for convenience of reference). Personally, I've been avoiding raising the issue of what constitutes "worship" (and I'll agree with you that the Buddhism practiced by the majority of Buddhists definitely involves worship) until we've pinned the question of what constitutes a god...

But if we wanted to get down and dirty and truthful, wouldn't we have to say something like this: "While Buddhism does not deny the existence of gods (and, indeed, many are discussed in Buddhist scripture), it does not ascribe ultimate power, either for creation or salvation, to them; they may, however, be regarded as having less ultimate powers to effect worldly events and to aid seekers of enlightenment, and are frequently honored through ritual. Advanced Buddhist beings (Buddha, Bodhisattvas, etc.) may be regarded as similarly belonging to such an intermediate class of beings."कुक्कुरोवाच

Actually, the more I look at that language, the more I like it. Would anyone have any objection to my putting it up in place of the current version, at least tentatively? Obviously it won't stay that way any longer than anything else on wp...

I think the paragraph as Surya quotes it shows evidence of having been written by committee, so I don't know how firmly any one person would stand behind it. It seems to me that it is difficult to make any one blanket statement for Theravada, Mahayana, and Vajrayana Buddhists on this. I have no idea how those Tantric types would describe their relationship with various dharma protectors, wrathful spirits, dhyani buddhas, etc. But the suggest that a Buddhist could "worship" anything other than, perhaps, Buddha as an abstract concept, deserves at least to be controversial, the same as it would be if you described Christians as worshipping saints. कुक्कुरोवाच's suggested text above is definitely an improvement, although I think it's still a little too strong (I would prefer "having some powers") and I am still uncomfortable with using "god" here (see below). Moreover, I don't see why this should be discussed in the intro; if it gives the impression that deva and asura veneration is a key point, that's misleading; and we haven't even introduced the concepts of buddha and bodhisattva yet. - Nat Krause 04:42, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Okay, I went ahead, if only because the old wording was bugging me. Please feel free to revert if this was hasty of me. I changed gods>divinities and used Nat's "some powers" wording: "While Buddhism does not deny the existence of divinities (and, indeed, many are discussed in Buddhist scripture), it does not ascribe ultimate power, either for creation or salvation, to them. They may, however, be regarded as having some powers to effect worldly events and to aid seekers of enlightenment, and are frequently honored through ritual. Advanced Buddhist beings (Buddha, Bodhisattvas, etc.) may be regarded as belonging to a similar intermediate class of beings." I also moved the para to the end of the intro section, since (while I think it's not a bad thing to talk about up front), I agree that it is nowhere near what is most important or primary about Buddhism. Now, that's not to say that any part of the intro really presents a dynamic introduction to the religion....कुक्कुरोवाच 06:13, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Part the second

" think the average reader is more likely to want to compare Buddhism to the monotheistic religions that they are familiar with, rather than polytheistic religions with multiple "deities". Furthermore, I think it's a really good idea to avoid words like "god" or "deity" which, in contexts like this, are so vague as to be almost useless.

The first, no offense meant, sounds like way too much POV. oh, by the way, Hinduism isn't polytheist, so the blanket statement is also uninformed. The second statement is just lack of effort: the buddhist boddhisattvas are very much deities, which differentiates them from God or a God-concept, and if you feel the term is vague, define it on the page for deity or in a brief appositive. --LordSuryaofShropshire 18:29, Apr 6, 2004 (UTC)

For your first point, I disagree that this is a POV issue. It doesn't involve any difference of factual statements, just of which facts are placed where. That is an unavoidable editorial decision in any article. But I think that it is somewhat pointless to worry about right now, because I think that the whole intro should be scrapped and rewritten anyway. Also, I have never said that Hinduism is polytheistic, although I have said that as I use the terms, a religion with multiple deities is perforce polytheistic. But clearly you use these words differently.

On your second point, I think that what we have here, Lord Surya, is basically a lexicographical difference. I think that the word "deity" is synonymous with "god". That being the case, I do deny that Buddhas and Bodhisattvas are deities, or that anything else in Buddhism is accurately called deity. This sort of disagreement is part of the reason that I say "god" and "deity" are hopelessly vague. The other part of the reason is that "god" (usually lower-case) can mean something like, say, Zeus or Ishtar, or it can (usually capitalized) mean something like Yahweh or Brahman, which seem to me like to whole different categories. Since these categories are likely to get confused if we call them both "god", I prefer to use other terms unless the context is clear. Hence my preference for deva. - Nat Krause 04:42, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Surely there is a distinction between gods in Buddhism against gods in other religions, in that the following is asserted for all gods, regardless of what it is we wish to define as 'god'

Gods are not immortal (though buddhas may be)
Gods are not omnipotent (nor are buddhas)
Gods have no ability to prevent the fruition of karma
Gods do not (and cannot) decide your fate
God(s) did not create the universe, and are not involved in any fundamental creative act
There is no God element, just as there is no Atman

It appears that every other religion subscribes to one or more on that list.

Most of the functions of 'God' (judge, creator, interceder) were deliberately replaced by the 12 dependant links and the Buddhist notion of Karma: We are responsible for our actions, and no-one but ourselves can get us out of the mess; any divine particle or permanant entity (atman, paratman(sp), etc) was identified as redundant too. (The flow of mind is vehicle enough for rebirth). Moreover, the worship of gods was never banned in Buddhism, but it was not identified with leading to Buddhist enlightenment. Striking a deal with a local deity was seen as business, not liberation. (Look at early Yaksha practices)

Therefore, to start quibbling about folk-belief is going to make a hash of what could otherwise be very clear.

As for yidam and other tantric deities, the issue is deeply involved with upaya (for comments on your interpretation of upaya, kukko, go to talk:hinayana), but the above points stand. Most of the Buddhist tantric tradition involves in an increasing shift of understanding of what is going on in the practice, based upon the individual's own realisation, so there is never one meaning or attribution attached to a ritual. Because tantric Buddhism lacks the position of a one true path, there is no worship that can be identified as such in the tantras, except when it is what is most appropriate according to the realisation (or lack of it) of the practitioner. (20040302 06:09, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Nat: Our lexicographical differences do seem great. By deity I was differentiating between gods that decide fate and simply referring to higher beings. Whatever. I think it would be difficult to dispell notions of worship of higher beings with Buddhist sects of Ma Tara. You can still worship a being that you feel doesn't control the universe.

Also, since you're very knowledgable, I will remind you that Brahman is not a god. Brahman is analagous to atman, has no attributes, no form, no-being or non-being, is pure consciousness and yet without ego. It is both transcendant and immanent. Also, in Hinduism, we are completely responsible for our karma and gods cannot change the fate. Our love for God aids us in developing purity, or sattwa, and the divine grace of the universal Atman, also seen by some sects as the One Vishnu or Shiva, etc. is supports our developing non-karma-inducing behavior, what has been called 'acting without regard for the fruits of those actions.'

Also, your idea of polytheistic is very simplistic, since polytheism implies separate gods whereas Hinduism understands them to be different colors of the same prism. Hinduism since the dawn of the Upanishads has been monist or monotheistic accomodating emantive deities from the One. Even in the early Veda it spoke of Only One truth known variously.

Deity worship is very much existent in Buddhism. If one splits hairs about whether they are technically deities or not, they are nonetheless higher beings who are in one way or the other worshipped. --LordSuryaofShropshire 14:16, Apr 7, 2004 (UTC)

Sunshine, you point out the distinction of your understanding from that of Buddhists. Your understanding of 'divine grace' is considered by Buddhists to be contradictory to Karma (I remind you that Buddhist Karma is distinct from Veda Karma, in this light -generally Buddhists do not accept the premise of non-karma-inducing behaviour, though Jains do). Your understanding of Brahman (the God element) is contradictory to Buddhism, as is Atman, let alone the omnipotence and permanence of God (all of which Buddha considered to be redundant, unnecessary and even detrimental to liberation). You contradict yourself if you assert that God is both omnipotent, yet powerless to help others.

In the end, we have to agree that Buddhism has a different agenda to Hinduism, and any effort of syncresis will deprive both of these fascinating and wonderful religions. Both Buddhists and Hindus share commonalities, and one of those commonalities is the acceptance of different paths. We must respect each other's views as being distinct and different. We must accept plurality, and rejoice in our ability to do so.

This implies that any given word, sentence or doctrine may be freely interpreted, but in our interpretation, we cannot claim to know the views of others by it. It is possibly (probably) inevitable that the Buddhist view of Hinduism (or what-have-you) will always differ from that of Hindus, just as the Hindu view of Buddhism will always differ from Buddhists. Why not accept that as being a wonderful lesson in the Dharma?

Here is a question for you: If Buddhists see their 'gods' as powerless to help them, unable to intercede, and unable to change their lot, why do they spend their time in worshipping them? What is their purpose? (20040302 14:49, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC))

You know something, I was not trying to bring in comparisons of Hindu and Buddhist philosophies and impose one on the other. I was simply responding to misstatements you made about Hindu beliefs, and then went on to talk about Buddhist ones. I am the first to understand that many beliefs, while overlapping, are oft irreconcilable. Secondly, you can't read, because I never called Brahman omnipotent. I said it was the Divine Ground. It's essentially the complete opposite of void, but it transcends duality, and thus is not an active force in governing our lives. It is immanent and transcendant. Brahman is beyond description, Nat Krause, and hence cannot be described. Brahman is not cognizable within a time-space-causation continuum since brahman is not limited by it and we are. Thus, it preempts Buddha's idea that we cannot describe shunyata, or formulate it in words.

Secondly, Prajnaparamita was hailed as the Mother of all beings who showered them with knowledge. Such was claimed to be Buddha's saying by Nagaijuna in the Prajnaparamdita Sutra. That's why Mahayana Buddhist worship goddesses. As I said, one doesn't need to think that one's fate is governed or anything by a higher being in order to supplicate it. Stick to the points and stop indulging in erroneous tangents about Buddhist-Hindu comparisons, because I was never talking about that. I'm quite fine with their differences. I was here speaking of Buddhist deity worship. --LordSuryaofShropshire 18:48, Apr 9, 2004 (UTC)

Part the third, in which Nat does respond to Lord Surya

Dear sir, our lexicographinate differences are very significant, but I think I have yet to notice any differences so far as on any other matters. However, the conclusions we do or do not reach will still have an important effect on how the article winds up looking. It seems that we also disagree on the meaning of the word "worship", or rather, I am not totally clear on what I think it means, if anything, outside of the context of monotheists worshipping God. Looking at the dictionary, it seems that it agrees with me on deity but with you on worship. No matter.

I'm afraid I am not quite as knowledgeable about Hinduism as you seem to believe I am. In fact, were I more knowledgeable on the subject, you would never have to correct me! However, looking at the article on Brahman it appears that what you call Brahman is the same thing as what I call God. Yet another lexicon difference! On the other hand, I will agree that my idea of polytheism is fairly simple, not sure if that makes it simplistic.

You say "Deity worship is very much existent in Buddhism. If one splits hairs about whether they are technically deities or not, they are nonetheless higher beings who are in one way or the other worshipped." I must continue with my analogy with Christianity. Would you show up in Talk:Christianity and cavalierly say, "Many Christians commonly pray to St. Mary and a whole army of other saints. Clearly Christians worship saints. Let's not split hairs."? Would you expect those sentiments to be non-controversial?

By the way, I should note that I happened, for an unrelated reason, today to be discussing with a Chinese person the distinction between two words in Chinese: shén and xiān, which both describe "higher beings". A shén is an eternal, benevolent spiritual being, which sounds very much like what we in English call a god, vis a vis for instance Greek or Norse heathenism. A xiān, on the other hand, is basically a mortal being that has freed itself from the constraints of ordinary mortal life (as the Taoist Immortals) and has attained a great deal of power but may or may not be friendly. As it happens, they use xiān to refer to Buddhist devas. I would argue that they got the terminology right. - Nat Krause 15:52, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Nathaniel Esquire,

God according to a dictionary:

A being conceived as the perfect, omnipotent, omniscient originator and ruler of the universe, the principal object of faith and worship in monotheistic religions.
The force, effect, or a manifestation or aspect of this being. A being of supernatural powers or attributes, believed in and worshiped by a people, especially a male deity thought to control some part of nature or reality. An image of a supernatural being; an idol. One that is worshiped, idealized, or followed: Money was their god. A very handsome man.
A powerful ruler or despot.

God has attributes. Brahman does not. Brahman also falls under none of these categories remotely.

Secondly, if you are squeamish about god or deity, say higher being. Also, worship entails supplication or reverence to something. I would tell Christians that they worship Saints and Mary. Praying to St. Catherine or asking a divine being like the Virgin Mother for Christ's intercession fits the bill. If a lion insists that it is a tiger, but we see the mane, the stance, the lion behavior, the fur, the genotype, and everyone knows its a lion, we shall ignore its attempts to insist it is something other than what it is. --LordSuryaofShropshire 18:44, Apr 7, 2004 (UTC)

But Christians are, by their own declaration, monotheists. If they worship something other than one God, they cease to meet the description of Christians. Therefore, a Christian who worships St. Catherine or Mother Mary is not a Christian. By definition, Christians do not worship saints.

P.S. On the Brahman page it lists several attributes of Brahman. I would suggest that this means that, taken literally, the article is incorrect. Similarly, one might say that the dictionary definition of God, taken literally, is also incorrect. - Nat Krause 12:11, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

The thing about dictionaries is that they have to be general. (Wikipedia is not a dictionary. (grin)) "Brahman" has several meanings. (There's a saying among sanskritists that every word has at least three meanings: what it normally means, the opposite of that, and something sexual. That doesn't apply here, but it's not a bad rule of thumb.) Brahman was at one point understood to be something like a creator god or even a slightly minor demiurge in comparison to the more popular Shiva and Vishnu (B=Creator, V=Sustainer, S=Destroyer). Later, however, it came to be identified as a monistic absolute. (This is evident in many parts of the Upanishads and was codified more logically by the Vedantic philosophers. Well, some of them.) It is in this capacity as a monistic absolute that it is held to be without attributes or qualities. Now, "Brahman" (I like to spell this one "Brahmin", but that's just something the English made up) also refers to the priestly class (="Levite"), and if you think this is confusing, this is only scratching the surface...

I would suggest, however, that we take a somewhat more Wittgentseinian view of language here. You guys are searching for a "common core" definition that will encompass all uses of certain words, while we should recognize that word-uses have more of a "family resemblance" relationship (some have the same nose, others the same ears, others the same way of walking). Thus it's not wrong to say that Christians dont' "worship" saints, because they don't use the word the same way we might use word in other contexts. (Though I say that's a particularly loaded word and we should avoid it.)कुक्कुरोवाच 23:41, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Your description of Brahman is inaccurate, because Brahma-Vishnu-Shiva are evolutions from it. As the concept arose, Brahman became the progenitor and is not to be confused with Brahma.

So... Christians who pray to saints are not Christians? Interesting idea. But pretty flimsy. I think Catholics would take exception.

"Brahman was at one point understood to be something like a creator god or even a slightly minor demiurge in comparison to the more popular Shiva and Vishnu "

Completely wrong. Brahma was and is a demiurge. Brahman is not the same as Brahma. Also, your threefold rule about Sanskrit meanings is on the ball in describing multiple meanings, but woefully off-base with your 'normal meansoppositesexual'. But anyway, I'm not going to go into Sanskrit, because it's inexplicably tied to Vedic thought and religion and most people here have demonstrated a thorough lack of understanding about Hinduism.

I'm talking not about Hindu/Buddhist comparisons but was rather interested, as I've said above, the deity worship, which is pretty obvious. People claim to be one thing and do another, which only makes them hypocrites. I'm not calling mahayana deity worship hypocritical, but rather I would aver that people who claim that deities aren't deities and worship isn't worship miss the point. You have taken a non-human, or a super-human (a boddhisattva) and engaged in prayer practices involving their form, conception and noted characteristics. --LordSuryaofShropshire 18:54, Apr 9, 2004 (UTC)

"So... Christians who pray to saints are not Christians? Interesting idea. But pretty flimsy. I think Catholics would take exception." It might an interesting experiment for you to go the the Catholicism article, insert some lines about Catholic worship of Mary and other saints, and then see what response you get in Talk:Catholicism. My point is that you might call it hair-splitting, but some people consider these distinction to be very important. I'm not sure which camp I fall into it, but if it is important, then I must split hairs and say that you are wrong; on the other hand if it is not important, why are we wasting so much time arguing about it? - Nat Krause 02:20, 10 Apr 2004 (UTC)

very well... you are correct... there is no point... as it is, the introduction has already met with my own assertions. Good day, sir Krause, his faithful friend, and the number man. --LordSuryaofShropshire 01:53, Apr 11, 2004 (UTC)

Atthakavagga and Earliest Buddhism

In his edits yesterday, Kukkurovaca added a section about the Aṭṭhakavagga and Pārāyanavagga Sutras which "reveal an earlier form of the religion." This may or not be true, but the way it stands it begs for further information. In any event, I think it should be under "history of the schools" or something, rather than in its current spot. Any of this "earlier form of" stuff is usually going to have POV problems, because it is heavily contested by Buddhists.

Hmm. Yeah, I suppose it's out of place. I added a link to an article in "Philosophy East and West" that discusses them, and I'm planning to put together an article on them which will summarize said article and substantiate the issue more generally, and also discuss their contents. I'm not sure they belong in history of the schools, however, as they aren't especially important within any school of Buddhism. But perhaps we can insert a bit at the beginning of "History of the Schools" talking about "Earliest Buddhism" and what is and isn't known about it.

Have now moved the info to its own page.कुक्कुरोवाच 20:27, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Nat Krause to 20040302

My pal 20040302 made some changes on Mar. 24, including one referring to Hinayana literate as "encourag[ing] nirvāṇa| rather than Buddhahood]]. I don't even want to try to wrap my brain around the question of whether we can validly contrast nirvana and Buddhahood. Can we just say "arhatship rather than Buddhahood"? Also, is it necessary to say "spiritual enlightenment either for ones-self, or for all beings" in the intro? Couldn't we just say enlightenment there and explore the subject further somewhere else?

I concede your first point. I think your approach is well spoken. However, the sencond point (ones-self, or for all beings) I feel should remain. If it is not made explicit, most people will think that the enlightenment is for ones-self only, so it is good to point out that this is not always the case, though I am sure you could find a more eloquent way of phrasing that. (20040302 11:02, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC))

I agreee with 20040302 on both points.कुक्कुरोवाच 16:02, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Well, if you guys want to keep it, let's. But I think it's kind of damned-if-ya-do, damned-if-ya-don't situation. Taking it out might cause the problem you cite. But leaving it in sets up this dichotomy between "enlightenment-for-self" and "enlightenment-for-others" which is not necessarily valid. I will defer to your judgment. - Nat Krause 12:34, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Also on the 24th Mar. 2 wrote "All traditions accept the Hinayana teachings as being authentic (and they are generally considered to be the earliest)." This is a little misleading. By "earliest" do we mean that they were taught by the Buddha earlier in his life, or do we mean that they developed earlier as schools of thought? If the first, it's generally true unless we count the Avatamsaka Sutra, the basis of the Huayan school, which was supposedly taught before the sermon at Sarnath. On the other hand, Mahayanists, etc. traditionally do not believe that their schools developed historically later than Hinayana.

Well, I'm all for the standpoint of secular scholarship on the points of dating. I think NPOV for encyclopedias should be regarded as secular (though never anti-sectarian) anyway, but in issues like dating, it just gets too confusing otherwise, and sooner or later you get somebody saying the Mahayana was writting millions of years ago in a different yuga.कुक्कुरोवाच 16:02, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Hmmm, I'm skeptical of the idea that secular research is necessarily NPOV whereas religious claims are not. There's a lot to be said for the idea that western scholars do (or at least did at one time) bring a lot of their preconceived notions to bear in interpreting eastern religions. On the other hand, the extreme case you describe about different Yugas does not seem very desirable either. In any event a) I'm still not sure what the phrase is supposed to mean exactly; b) "generally considered" in this context sounds like we're talking about Buddhists. If we're talking about what scholars generally consider, then we should specify that; c) I'm not sure how strong the scholastic opinion is right now on which schools developed first. For instance, how much of the Gandhara material has been incorporated into the academic consensus? Generally, considering the lack of contemporary documentary evidence, I regard all the research on this stuff to be interesting but fairly weak, so I would prefer to tread more lightly on the subject of what's the earliest and what isn't. - Nat Krause 12:34, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Nat Krause to ?

Oh, yeah, and then there this thing about the "open source" canon ("Since it is a basic tenet of the tradition that anyone may become enlightened, it is also possible for new authoritative sermons to be delivered and recorded). That's been in there for awhile, not sure who put it in, but it always seemed questionable to me. What exactly is this referring to? What does it "enlightened" mean here? People really aren't supposed to go around adding new sutras to the canon -- the Platform Sutra is a very unusual case, and I think that's a mistranslation from the Chinese anyway.

I didn't put the text there, though I did link it to "open source", which was somewhat silly of me, I suppose. I'm not attached to it, as I don't think any scriptural canon is ever as closed as its owners think it is.कुक्कुरोवाच 16:02, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Conclusion

Okay, so tell me what you think. If there are any points above that no one has anything to say about, I will probably start making some changes in about a week. - Nat Krause 11:44, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Thesis the 96th

What the? Anon user 67.42.67.85 put this in the intro section:

Buddhism largely consists of the doing of good action, the avoidance of bad action, and mental training. The aim of these practices is to put an end to suffering and achieve spiritual enlightenment either for ones-self, or for all beings. Spiritual Enlightenment (a translation of "Bodhi" in Sanskrit and Pali or Satori in the Zen tradition) is considered to be touching or abiding in Nirvana (Sanskrit; in Pali, Nibbana, literally, "unbinding" or "extinguishing".) Nirvana is a supramundane state which is unconditioned, unmade, unborn, unfabricated and results from unbinding from or extinguishing all that was conditioned, born, made, or fabricated; Nirvana can be thought of as a state of ultimate peace or reality in which all duality in the universe is resolved.

What's up with this "unbinding" business?कुक्कुरोवाच

Okay, I took out the bit on Nirvana, and stuck it on the Talk:Nirvana page. Then I streamlined the rest somewhat to this:

"Buddhism largely consists of the doing of good action, the avoidance of bad action, and mental training. The aim of these practices is to put an end to suffering and achieve enlightenment either for ones-self, or for all beings. Enlightenment is considered to be touching or abiding in [[Nirvana|

]] (Sanskrit; Pali: Nibbāna), which means "extinguishing" or "extinction.""

Howzzat?कुक्कुरोवाच 17:25, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I like your change. I'm still kind of uncomfortable with having the word "extinction" in there. Clearly that word will have strong negative connotations for most people who read it. "Extinguishment" is more neutral -- on the one hand it might imply something like the Fire Sermon, with the individual as a burning thing that needs to be put out. However, if you want to keep "extinction" in, maybe if we want to shake people up a little on purpose, then let's keep it. Which do you think is more faithful to the original Sanskrit? - Nat Krause 12:43, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Featurenom

I deleted the "featurenom" msg, as (a) We're actually on the Featured Articles list already (how the hell did that happen?), and (b) the only other article that actually has a featurenom tag is DOOM. And while it's always nice to be a in a group that selective...कुक्कुरोवाच

Yeah, I've got to say, I would have waited for the page to settle down a little before featuring it. - Nat Krause 04:31, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)

syncretic mixtures of Christianity and Buddhism?

Near the end of the History of Schools section there's a phrase regarding Tocharia, etc. in modern day Xinjiang, China which includes "syncretic mixtures of Christianity and Buddhism". I'm curious what the source was here, as I've never heard of 'syncretic mixtures'. Buddhism: yes. Nestorianism: yes. Mixtures? No. I'm removing the phrase for the moment... if someone has a source, please add it again. --prat 22:23, 2004 Apr 5 (UTC)

About the Image Redux

Well, nobody except Usedbook said anything the last time I brought this up, but I still don't like the page's main image. I just saw this article for the first time as a "Featured Article" and the image, to me, makes me feel like not reading an article about Buddhism. Any idea where to look for better ones that are publicly available? Also, I notice the image kept moving around on the page for awhile. Why shouldn't it be up at the top where people can see it when they first load the page? - Nat Krause 08:00, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I agree very m,uch, I'd like to see a happy fat buddha, I've seen many red statues such as this, and any of them would be welcoming to the page. Sam Spade 06:15, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Well, that's not the response I was expecting. Heh, I was thinking the current image is too fat and too happy! Oh, well, if most people like the current image, then by all means, it's fine with me. Carry on. - Nat Krause 16:13, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC)

What do you think about this picture ? i can upload it if you can think it fit in the article. | Chmouel 13:50, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

The happy, fat, red Buddha of statuary fame is usually the Chinese version of Maitreya, Mi Fo, not Gautama. FWIW, I think the current HK Buddha photo is fine... Fire Star 15:11, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I'm partial to aniconic representations of the Buddha myself. Footprints and the like.कुक्कुरोवाच

How do you feel about one of those "flaming dharma-wheel" symbols? I don't know, maybe a little too nouveau? - Nat Krause

Nice pictures, Chmouel. The one you suggest is pretty good, but it probably wouldn't work as the main image because it is shot at angle and there is a fair amount of stuff in the background. Some of your photographs of Thai temples and stuff are pretty cool, though. I'm sure we could use those somewhere - Nat Krause 03:19, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Indeed. In fact, we could really use some info on Thai temples generally, as it's one of the unrepresented regions on our temples pages...hint hint.कुक्कुरोवाच

Let me know if you need any pictures, i have as well some Laotian pictures that you may be interessed. | Chmouel 06:54, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Three marks of existence

Here's a nit-pick about the three marks of existence (I've never seen mention of the "three marks of conditioned existence" before). Not all three are about conditioned things nor about all dhammas.

The Dhammapada, verses 277-279, states:

       All conditioned things are anicca
       All conditioned things are dukkha
       All dhammas are anatta

As I understand it, "dhamma" as used in this context is the most inclusive, catch-all category in Pali. Sue Hamilton (Very Short Introduction to Indian Philosophy) translates it as "knowable things", which I like. (2004-04-09T08:05+0000)

Hmm. That's a fair point about "conditioned"--not that it's not conditioned existence, but what in Buddhism wouldn't be conditioned? Pratitya-samutpada tells us all things arise dependently, which is to say under conditions.

Similarly, the "dharma" is the fundamental phenomenlogical constituent, so everything that enters into our experience is composed of "dharmas", so everything is about "dharmas," as well.

"Knowable thing" is an entirely problematic translation, since the "dharma" is not an object of consciousness but an element of it, and of all experience. "Phenomenon" is the best short translation; one might also fuss about with "sensabile," if one so desired.

All that said, what specifically might you want changed in the text as it stands? I'm not sure I see the distinction just yet.कुक्कुरोवाच

(Meant to be on holiday, but hey.) Well, Nibbana is most often cited as being unconditioned. Certainly, Nibbana that was Dukkha or Anicca would undermine Buddhism in a pretty major way, but everything is definately Anatta. (20040302 18:40, 10 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Ah, good point. Though that's a tangled metaphysical issue unto itself.कुक्कुरोवाच 19:35, 10 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Scavenger Hunt

Okay, I've just stumbled across, like, five articles that weren't indexed in the "List of Buddhist Topics", which ideally should be encyclopedic. Keep your eyes open!कुक्कुरोवाच 23:30, 10 Apr 2004 (UTC)

vegetarian

guys, how can you talk about buddhism without mentioning vegetarianism?

Good point. I'll write something up when I get a chance. There are a couple different angles on it. - Nat Krause 03:43, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC)

When you do, it may be relevant to mention that vegetarianism was a proposed rule suggested (?demanded) by Devadatta that resulted in the earliest schism. (20040302 08:11, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC))

There is a buddhist diet article somewhere...

Buddhist cuisine <-- a bit chinese..

Hmm, at some point I'll get around to actually writing something up on this. But it will be brief. - Nat Krause 17:05, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Without atman

Kukkovacara, your edit of the section on anātman, which starts out, "All things are without an ātman, meaning a "soul", or "self" in the metaphysical sense. In Indian philosophy, this carries the implication that they are without any unchanging, permanent essence," is very learned, but can we switch back the first line to something that would be a little more straightforward? The way it is now, it sounds like some kind of debate over Indian logical terms, and "implied" makes it sound like the meaning of non-self is tentative or unclear.

Hmm. How about something like, "All things are without an ātman, (Sanskrit: "soul"), meaning they have no eternal essence or nature."? It's important that we clarify in what sense things are said to be soulless, or selfless, as soulless and selfless alone each have their own particular (and equally if differently irrelevant) meanings in English.कुक्कुरोवाच 16:02, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I agree this needs to be said, but there are many views of anatman in Buddhism. It is all well and good that I do my best to follow Nagarjuna, but others don't. So it maybe less controversial limit ourselves to sentient beings "... we do not have 'ātman', (Sanskrit: "soul"), meaning that we have no (eternal?) essence." (First person plural gets people to think about it more personally). I also feel it may be necessary to pull the 'eternal' qualifier (see Tsongkhapa), and assert the stronger statement (that we have no essence whatsoever), but also we lose the 'nature' as a stand-alone (it has many meanings in buddhism, and the statement could be misconstrued), though I am more happy with 'no essential nature' (though I am not sure what one of those would be). Also, the idea that e.g. a television (re. all things) has a soul is not something most readers would relate to.

How about "All beings are free from having any sort of 'ātman', (Sanskrit: "soul")', meaning that we have no essence, or essential nature." (Damn. essence is a stub).

Though I agree with Kukko in principe, I feel we should not be too explanatory here, but we need to intrigue the reader into wanting to learn more. (20040302 05:00, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC))

I think the description in the article and as you are discussing is great. I just want to change the first sentence so that is says something clearly in English. In the second and succeeding sentences, we can develop what that means in terms of ātman. How about "All beings have no self"? - Nat Krause 12:19, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

How about now?कुक्कुरोवाच 23:48, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

How about now? I think the current version makes the succeeding sentences read better, too. I also made a few other small changes based on the "95 theses", which hopefully should be agreeable to everyone. One thing: I took out "extinction" from the translation of nirvana -- let me know if you object. - Nat Krause 07:57, 13 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Hmm. I do object, because

has connotations of both extinguishing and extinction (these two words are actually the same, but have developed different connotations--thus my affinity for using both to translate

. However, just "extinguishing" is acceptable for the Buddhism main page, I suppose. Grr. (grin)कुक्कुरोवाच 12:11, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Well I leave it entirely to your judgment if you want to put it back in. - Nat Krause 17:15, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Reincarnation

If there is no soul, in what sense can someone be reincarnated? Is it in some way similar to the way someone at age eighty can have virtually none of the atoms that were in his body at age two and yet be the same person? Gingekerr 17:03, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Well, let me ask you this: if there is no soul, what is it that experiences anything from one moment to the next in the course of your one life? - Nat Krause 09:19, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Reincarnation and rebirth are used interchangeably which causes confusion. Rebirth has to do with becoming, with "rebirth consciousness" which is really the mental equivalent of the process you (Gingekerr) refer to. In other words, in an unenlightened being, there is a self which changes. The changes occur over time due to karmic repercussions of thoughts, words and deeds. The karmic effects can be felt after the body has died, and the body has causes in karma which was created before the body sprung up. I hope this helps.

Hi. I just expanded the stub at Rebirth_(Buddhist) but it could use some wikification and tidying up if anyone is interested. I'm rather new to this, but it looks like this is the appropriate place to make this sort of announcement and suggestion. Shantavira

Quite right. Also delightful to see the piece on Conze. In the future, you may want to add your contributions to the List of Buddhist topics, which is a sort of general index to the Buddhism-related articles.

Thanks, Shantavira, I will take a look at that sometime. - Nat Krause 09:19, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)

(divinities) frequently honored through ritual?

The phrase at the end of the introductory section claiming that divinities are frequently honored through ritual is a bit iffy in my view, particularly if you class Boddhisattvas and Buddhas as regular beings. At least in the Theravada tradition Devas, etc. are mainly spoken of in stories, but not ritual as far as I know. Mahayana does have some divinities such as Heavenly Kings, however I don't see these as being frequently honoured through ritual... --prat 03:10, 2004 Apr 14 (UTC)

Well, the current language I think arises from a conversation with that Hinduism guy, Lord Surya (see 7.2.2 above, three sections). I'm not so comfortable with divinities now that I think about it: makes me think of divinity school, i.e. monotheist God. But "frequently honored through ritual" I think is fair, especially if you include buddhas and bodhisattvas, which I think the author of that section intended to. Even if you don't, certainly the Tibetans and those in their sphere of influence, if no one else, can be said to honor supernatural beings through ritual. - Nat Krause 05:06, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I amended the text quite a bit, as I disagree with honor. And I pulled the Buddhas and bodhisattvas sentence as too clumsy. (20040302 08:13, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)) PS I am 'in the sphere of influence' of Tibetans, and prefer the current edition.

I'm willing to concede "supernatural beings" purely in the interest of not squabbling, but for the record I think it's better to refer to them as deities which are in accord with nature than as "beings" who supercede it. "Transmundane" might be more apt, but certainly sounds goofy.

But what, particularly, is wrong with "honor"? Are Buddhas and Bodhisattvas not honored during ritual? And, if we do get rid of "honor", can we please find something other than "communicate", which I can only envision in the form of some kind of Buddhist seance?

I liked the other changes, btw.कुक्कुरोवाच 12:17, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Yes - I get your point. There is an implicit ambiguity in the text - are we talking about supernatural beings such as buddhas and bodhisattvas (in which case, just how are they supernatural?), or are we talking about supernatural beings such as yakshas, nagas, pretas, devas, smell-eaters, etc?

The paragraph is fine if we look at it's interpretation as to not include yakshasa thru smell-eaters, but not so fine if we wish to include buddhas and bodhisattvas! If we use 'transmundane', then this would work for buddhas and their sons, but not for yakshas etc.

So with regards to the practices that surround yakshas etc, there is a degree of 'honoring' them, just as we would politely 'honor' a guest at dinner. But we would not worship them, just as we would not worship a guest. Yes, communicate is not appropriate - maybe propitiate or appease (but both imply a defensive nature - one of being protected from wrath, which is not always the case) - we do not invite friends to dinner to appease them! (Well, not always!) But also, with the case of preta practices, the guests are invited to eat food as a means of appeasing their life in the lower realm. The act is purely based from generosity and compassion, and in this sense, honor could be read to mean that Buddhists consider ghosts to be superior to humans, which would be a mistake.

So, how about associate? Still dry, but generic enough as well, and no mediums! (this is what I did)

As for the practices concerning Bodhisattvas and Buddhas (the transworldly deities), they are much more complex; first of all there are indeed 'dinner parties' which involve inviting various transworldly deities, but there are many more that treat them in a distinctly different light - and in this way, we are left with interpretations based on oral lineage concerning the identity of the deities. For instance (and there are many interpretations, according to the context of the practitioner), the Buddhas and bodhisattvas are none other than the practitioner in a future state - so the contract is more like a sort of time travel: practitioner-present/practitioner-future rather than teacher/student or creator/creation relation. Thoughts? (20040302 13:05, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Ooh Nat.. I don't know about spiritual beings.. There is a gigantic difference between spiritual and supernatural. (20040302 17:31, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Ah, you pre-empted my explanation! Go ahead and revert if you object, but this strikes me as the best option. I don't like the word spiritual very much as a euphemism for religious, but in this case, isn't it what we're talking about: karmic beings with "subtle" (as Thich Nhat Hanh and probably some other people would say) bodies? Supernatural, on the other hand, I don't know -- I can never figure out what that's supposed to mean. I'm unfamiliar with a Buddhist concept of naturalness or something above it. But if you think spiritual is objectionable and supernatural less so, then that's fine. - Nat Krause 17:48, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I just changed the current text again, to:

While Buddhism does not deny the existence of other-worldly beings (indeed, many are discussed in Buddhist scripture), it does not ascribe power for creation, salvation or judgement to them. However, they are regarded by some as having the power to affect worldly events and to aid seekers of Enlightenment, and in this regard they are associated with via ritual.

How does the 'other-worldly beings' phrase look? In this way they are not seen as natural or supernatural, a distinction which some might call in to question. Also removed seemingly-superperfluous 'materially' (aid seekers of enlightenment...) - prat 01:00, 2004 Apr 15 (UTC)

This is all a bit of a bounce through the thesaurus, but how about 'mystical'? other-worldly is a little bit alien-lander, supernatural indeed has etymological troubles, spiritual can be read to be religious (and not supernatural), immaterial is not always the case (the texts claim that they do have material bodies, albeit subtly so); mystical just says 'mysterious' - or does that say religious too?

Prat, regarding materially - it was there solely to distinguish in a non-ambiguous manner that it would not be understood to mean something like 'divine grace' - which would be an ability to destroy one's karma. I'm not so precious about it, but don't want to go down divine worship for divine blessings (again). (20040302 04:49, 15 Apr 2004 (UTC))

While Buddhism does not deny the existence of mystical beings (indeed, many are discussed in Buddhist scripture), it does not ascribe power for creation, salvation or judgement to them, but as they are regarded as having the power to affect worldly events, just as humans can, they are associated with via ritual by some Buddhists. - well, it's not so well structured as a sentence, and begins to warrant some explanation as to what sort of mystical beings there are... But to put it so high in the article would be a mistake.. ideas? (20040302 05:01, 15 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Ai. What a mess. Pratyeka's last rewording helped, somewhat, and we're whittling it down to...something onoffensive, at least. But at this point, I'm inclined to say, delete it and create a subsection farther down the article (towards the end of the "Principles" section, mayhap) that goes into these issues in more detail. That way we don't have to decide whether Buddhas and Bodhisattvas are on the same level as devas, or whether it's better to say gods or devas; we can actually take a moment to explain these things.

I know that the difference(s) between Buddhism and other modes of belief are important, and that it's good to get people clear on issues like this, but if we can't come up with a coherent short answer that's really satisfactory, there's no reason to subject casual readers to this sort of confusion. And if we entitle it "God(s) and Buddhism", or something equally transparent, people who are wondering about whether Buddhists believe in God will probably be able to locate it quickly enough.कुक्कुरोवाच 08:20, 15 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Actually, Prat's re-phrasing brings the sentence to life much more than my hash. I like it, and where it is now - as it immediately addresses issues of Buddhism as comparative religion. I definately like the idea of a full sized article on Buddhism and God or Divinity in Buddhism or something like that (Pratyeka - you have any good ideas?) etc. etc. - there is a lot of interesting stuff in talk:buddhism that would be edifying for the general public, including the creatively provocative (if unsubstantiated) discourses engaged in with Surya above. (20040302 09:20, 15 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Hrrm. On a potential Buddhism and God, Alexander Berzin has a great article over at his site regarding Islam and Buddhism. Seemingly he's had discussions with a great deal of Islamic religious leaders and academics, and has come up with a strategy for fostering dialogue between the two religions. He used a concept known as adi-Buddha from "Kalachakra (Cycle of Time) teachings", which sounds pretty Vajrayana and therefore unknown to me, but it seems to work. If someone's right in to it, they could do the research, send Alex some questions (I have his email address) and we could get the wiki started. prat 02:09, 2004 Apr 16 (UTC)

Early Buddhist schools additions

I just added a bigger and more information-laden tree of the 18+ early schools over at Schools of Buddhism, and I'm in the process of making stubs for several of them, on the grounds that stubs are better than nothing, though I know there are some who disagree. (grin) Editing, enfleshing, and correcting on any and all of these things is much appreciated. However, I'm not going to put these in the Open Tasks, as some of these are genuinely obscure, and I don't expect them to get dealt with for some time. If you're more optimistic about some of them, feel free to add them.कुक्कुरोवाच 03:28, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

More theses, perhaps

I have some concerns over a spate of edits made recently by 2.718281828 to the precepts, 8-fold path, and three jewels. I did some re-wording on them and 2.718281828 has gone back to do some more, and now I'm wading in again, which just has a bad feeling about it. There's progress, however, as I like this last round much more than the first one. But one persistent problem is with glossing Dharma as "ultimate truth" and calling it a refuge from suffering and fear. (A) Dharma is an extremely complex concept word/concept, and I think that "ultimate truth" may be misleading and in any case doesn't cover the complexity. Better just to link to the page and go into detail there. So I'm pulling both "ultimate truth" glosses. (B) It is not, in particular, a refuge form suffering and fear, as I understand it; one takes refuge in all three from suffering and fear.

I finally found this discussion...I had been looking before under the "vs. Anonymous section." First I want to thank you for honing what I wrote and for your bold editing. Of course, I will defer to you as to the literal meaning of Sanskrit words. However, when Buddhists take refuge, they are doing something very specific which may not preserve the original or even the correct meaning of Sanskrit. The only real refuge is Nirvana which is lumped under the "Dharma" heading. However, following the Buddha's teachings provides a limited and conditional sort of refuge. Buddha's teachings are considered a raft, and a raft provides a certain amount protection in perilous waters, however, the true place of refuge, is the other side. The Buddha and Sangha are less of a refuge and more of an inspiration.

According to Atisha and the subsequent Lamrim tradition, there are several purposes of refuge. In fact the Lamrim tradition introduces the concept of scope based exactly on these purposes. Worldly scope is to improve this life, Low scope is to gain high rebirth, middle scope is to achieve nirvana, high scope is to achieve buddhahood. (20040302 09:38, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC))

I don't think Atisha is saying these are legitimate purposes of refuge (except for the highest one). Scrupulous Buddhists avoid any lesser "scope" than the highest scope Atisha articulates.

Are you refuting the claim based on actual knowledge of this specific tradition, or just on spec? Because there's a lot of range in what "scrupulous" Buddhists believe. And given the importance of the two-truths doctrine (we should really have an article on that) in so much of Buddhism, the concept of varying "scope" seems right at home. However, I'm willing to grant that one specific school's interpretation and no others' makes the section seem a bit lopsided, so I'm moving the Lamrim material to the Three Jewels page. Hope that's allr ight with 20040302.कुक्कुरोवाच 03:24, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Going for refuge has more or less the same meaning, as far as I can tell across traditions, although of course there will be different people saying slightly different things. For example, see, Bhikku Bodhi's Interpretation, Llama Surya Das's Interpretation, A compendium of stuff from the Lam.rim tradition The last one seems to imply that in the Lam.rim tradition, the lesser causes or motivations must be accepted along with the higher motives. So I take back what I said about "scrupulous Buddhists." I would also like to pose the question of whether there is a distinction to be made about what leads people to take refuge, and the purpose of taking refuge while refuge is being taken.

That's delightful. We should put that in the Three Jewels section and/or the corresponding page (which is at the moment a stub.) The only that would need to be changed to make it article-ready is "In fact the Lamrim tradition introduces the concept of scope based exactly on these purposes,"--how about, "The Lamrim tradition frames this in terms of different "scopes."" (I'm not familiar with the tradition, so not sure how best to frame it.)कुक्कुरोवाच 10:03, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

How about that? Amend as you see fit. Atisha's text has an excellent late mahayana explanation of the complete lack of antagonism towards hinayana schools. See http://www.lamrim.com/hhdl/LordAtishasLife.pdf, page 8&9. (20040302 11:53, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Also, I don't see how the refuges have intrinsically so much to do with surrendering the ego as to a teacher. I mean, not that that doesn't happen, I'm sure, but I'm uncertain as to the pertinence.

The act of going for refuge helps put one in the right frame of mind.

Also, 2.7 might consider moving some of the extended discussion to the separate pages for the various topics. कुक्कुरोवाच 07:12, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I want to thank you for your suggestion Kukkurovaca. However, I think some discussion is necessary, because while these lists of things (4 truths, 8 fold path, 5 precepts etc.) help in remembering these things to people who already understand what they are, it's difficult to see what they are saying from a bare list. Also I want to thank you for editing me, and I apologize for any long-winded quasi-personalized verbiage I may have written.

No need for apologies. As you point out, Wikipedia is about bold editing. (grin) And indeed I think the language in several places is better now than it was a while ago. But one of the reasons that the Buddhism main page may seem a little bare-bones is that it has to serve as an introduction to the whole spectrum of Buddhism, which includes an incredibly wide range of what, in many cases, are conflicting interpretations, doctrines, and practices. As a result, we have to be careful what we declare to be straightforwardly true. One of the reasons it's better to deal with the real meat of issues on their own pages is that there, we can have some room to maneuver and present multiple analyses of the complex situation.कुक्कुरोवाच 03:43, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Kukku, I agree with your edits. Something about this guy's style of editing makes me uncomfortable: shows up at an already fairly complete article and without discussion starts adding longwinded and quasi-personalized text to an encyclopedia article. Of course, he should be bold in making edits but also we should be bold in unmaking them if it will improve the article. I don't know, partly I just have a bias against people making anonymous edits. - Nat Krause 08:25, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

(s)he is possibly new to wiki, and feels that (s)he has something to add. Nat, you are v.good at encouraging the anonymous to be registered.. (20040302 09:38, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Yeah, you're right, I probably shouldn't be so critical. After all you were once an anonymous contributor, and you turned out to be an okay guy. But I do think it's important for people who are going to make significant edits to register. - Nat Krause 15:47, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Boy, I feel like a doofus now that I realized 2.718281828 was never anonymous after all, and that that number actually is his user name. What is that, the number e? I see that it is. Well, number e, I apologize for seeming a little bit nasty there before. I do think contributors, especially new contributors, should be conscious that when you make changes to an article that is already being actively worked on, you are essentially deleting the work of other contributors. That doesn't mean you shouldn't do it, just that you should be careful and you shouldn't feel bad when other people change what you wrote. And I don't mean this to imply that number e acting wrongly. - Nat Krause 10:55, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Thesis 97 (2.718281828)

Okay, let's see if we can't work through a couple of the actual issues at hand.

Dharma
- One of the edits: "In this way, dharma offers a refuge. Dharma used in the sense of the Buddha's teachings provides is a raft and is thus a temporary refuge while entering and crossing the river, however, the real refuge is on the other side of the river which is Dharma used in the sense of "ultimate truth.""
- An explanatory bit from this page: "However, when Buddhists take refuge, they are doing something very specific which may not preserve the original or even the correct meaning of Sanskrit. The only real refuge is Nirvana which is lumped under the "Dharma" heading. However, following the Buddha's teachings provides a limited and conditional sort of refuge. Buddha's teachings are considered a raft, and a raft provides a certain amount protection in perilous waters, however, the true place of refuge, is the other side. The Buddha and Sangha are less of a refuge and more of an inspiration."
- Discussion
  - (A) This imbalance in the trinity (Buddha and Sangha "less of a refuge") looks suspicious to me. Certainly it doesn't look representative of the whole tradition. This could be discussed in reference to whatever schools or teachers advocate this view, preferably on the "Dharma" page.कुक्कुरोवाच

I agree that it could sound suspicious, but I haven't really found anything that says otherwise. In searching around to see if it was a representative view, I uncovered some material which would indicate that taking refuge in the Buddha is tantamount to taking refuge in the Buddha nature in one's self, and similarly with the Sangha, but it all seems to point back to the idea that realization of what is called dharma, what the dharma is pointing to (not simply the teachings themselves or listening and practicing the teachings) is the actual refuge.

Well, we certainly can't use "Buddha-nature," as that's clearly and solidly specific to certain Mahayana traditions. As to the broader issue, it's probably true that many traditions would say that the Dharma is the most important refuge (and others would probably say the Buddha), but I certainly wouldn't demote any of them to mere "inspirations".कुक्कुरोवाच

- - (B) Similarly, where is "dharma" used to mean ultimate truth? As I've encountered it, Dharma usually means the Buddha's teachings (which may be regarded as ultimate truth, but this isn't the actual meaning of the world, merely an attribute of it). Certainly I think it's wrong to say that all of Buddhism defines Dharma as "ultimate truth"; it's vague, it's misleading, and I think it might misrepresent a number of schools.कुक्कुरोवाच

You're probably right about all of that, and please see the discussion above. "Ultimate truth" may not be the best way to say it, although it frequently appears as a trope in different traditions. I would welcome a better way to put this.

Oh, I also came across this link I thought you would be interested in because it's intrinsically interesting as a statement about what Buddhists from different traditions agree on, and also because it uses the words "ultimate truth":http://www.serve.com/cmtan/buddhism/Misc/unify.html

That's a really nifty link. And you're right that "ultimate truth" is used frequently in Buddhism; I'm just reluctant to have it be the primary gloss for "dharma." And indeed, Rahula posits it as the goal of the path, not as the dhamma.कुक्कुरोवाच

Thesis e and refuge

I am proposing this paragraph as a substitute for the Atisha stuff (currently the final two paragraphs) to be placed as the first paragraph under the 3 Jewels, which now that I (think I) understand it, I agree with:

"The pervasive suffering, stress and dissatisfactoriness (dukkha) in the world causes Buddhists to go for refuge from this suffering. The individual Buddhist may want to simply abate their own immediate suffering, to abate suffering in the future, to end suffering permanently, or to end suffering permanently for all living beings (or some combination of these). One kind of sub-motivation for some Buddhists comes from a pervasive sense of dissatisfaction with life which is related to questions similar to: Why we are here? Why were we born? What can we achieve? Is this all there is?"

I'm not crazy about the last bit, but I can live with it. I tweaked the wording very slightly for stylistic reasons, but otherwise it seems quite good.कुक्कुरोवाच

I struggle with this replacement, and indeed your thesis, e. My reasons are that they tend to point away from fact and towards POV. I basically disagree with the idea that there is a neat and tidy way in which people do or should take refuge: That there are many motives for adopting and practicing (any) religion is evident all around us. We find the same sort of discussion in modern christianity- the priest (or what-have-you) will say 'You must really understand and believe', but the individual may be thinking "Yadda yadda, I'm doing this because my wife to be is a Christian, and she asked me."

Secondly, the current writing style lends itself towards something that appears more relavant in a Buddhist journal than in an encyclopedia.

Moreover, what reasons do you have for not talking about Atisha? There is no doubt that he belongs to just one branch of Mahayana (albeit v.influential in Tibet), but his ideas are relavant and important to all of Buddhism. (20040302 09:59, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC))

I think Atisha may be too particular to bring up at this juncture when concise explanation seems to be what the page is about. I tried to make the phrasing as neutral as possible--as something that all Buddhists would agree with, and thought I was simply paraphrasing what Atisha and others were saying.

Sorry if I am coming across defensive, e; I appreciate the intention, but wonder about the context: As I see it, this article's purpose is not about what Buddhists (in total, in majority, or popularly) agree upon, but what the facts are concerning Buddhism. The former is still POV (albeit Buddhist POV) and must end up being poorly syncretized; while facts remain NPOV. What appears (to me) to be useful about Atisha is that it is fact. He said it. He is an Indian, Nalanda (Mahayana) Buddhist. Citing his text helps in two ways: It shows that there are plural approaches to the concept of refuge in (primary source) Buddhist scripture, and secondly, it offers a valid alternative to the scholastic approach that the differing views and writings of Buddhism is evidence of widespread Buddhist polemical infighting.

Secondly, by removing the attribution, it turns the article into what looks like journalism - a set of (apparently rhetorical) statements that may be elegant, but that are not visibly grounded in facts. This means that subsequent editors will not be able to identify where key concepts of the article are coming from, even though the article may read better.

I don't think it is possible (or useful) to take all the moments of experience of all Buddhists over the last 2500 years and to definitively generalise them into some sort of reductive yet meaningful statement of what Buddhism is; we would have to include anyone who has ever had any relation to the word (and what it relates to in all the ways it is interpreted), regardless of whether or not they were a Buddhist; moreover, we are not even able to definitively draw a line (that everyone agrees upon) as to who is, and who is not, a Buddhist. So, 'what Buddhists agree upon' to me does not equate to 'what Buddhism is'. (20040302 16:49, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)~)

Well put!कुक्कुरोवाच 03:14, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I welcome your comments. user:2.718281828

Atman/Soul Question

Hey, folks. If you look at the Atman and Soul articles, (a) neither is satisfactory, and (b) maybe we should move the soul stuff to the atman page. Or point both towards anatta.

I figure we can all just chip away at (a) as necessary, but what about (b)?कुक्कुरोवाच

Ew. I hadn't looked at atman.. I added it to the x-ref line above. I don't know about mere points, as I think that we can say something about soul and atman rather than just 'this is what we think of anatta'. atman is illusion. yeesh. Sounds too much like some form of transcendentalist maya structure. (20040302 11:31, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC))

A "model" Buddhism article?

I'm thinking partly for Wikipedia:WikiProject Buddhism here, but also for general utility: is there some article we have that's just a really good example of what articles on Buddhism should look like? (It could also be more specific: an article that's a really good example of what an article on a Buddhist text should look like, for example.) If so, what are the aspects of the article that constitute particular draws for you? If not, what would it take for an article to make the cut?कुक्कुरोवाच 03:33, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

What would it take?

Accurate listing of sources
Presentation of multiple perspectives (NPOV)
Completeness (exhaustion of sources)
Up to date (contains summaries of latest research/findings on subject)

Pretty similar to any other article, I think ... Buddhist or not. prat 14:10, 2004 Apr 20 (UTC)

Hesse and Van De Wetering

It seems like these guys don't necessarily warrant inclusion on the Buddhism "see also", but I'm not sure they fit in properly with "list of Buddhists"...do we have a "List of Buddhism-related authors" or something like that?कुक्कुरोवाच 02:37, 27 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Agreed. Couldn't we just put them under "Buddhist topics"? - Nat Kraus e 03:36, 27 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Capitalization question

Nick-in-South-Africa has made some edits to the Buddha article with the following summary: (Changed general term of buddha as in a buddha, anyone who happends to be 'awakened' to lower case leaving upper case for Siddhatha Gotama or The Buddha.) Is it just me, or is that wildly wrong?कुक्कुरोवाच 14:46, 27 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I'm not sure. I'm afraid that I've noticed I myself using that word capitalized and not somewhat arbitrarily. I wonder if there is an accepted standard in English-language academics? Same for bodhisattva. - Nat Kraus e 15:24, 27 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Well, the only English-language standard I listen to is the OED, and the OED has: "Buddha. The title given by the adherents of one of the great Asiatic religions, thence called BUDDHISM, to the founder of their faith, kyamuni, Gautama, or Siddartha, who flourished in Northern India in the 5th century B.C. kyamuni is regarded as only the latest of a series of Buddhas or infallible religious teachers, which is hereafter to be continued indefinitely," which treats it as a formal title throughout.कुक्कुरोवाच 15:47, 27 Apr 2004 (UTC)

With the humblest respect to Buddha, and all buddhas, the proper name rule is generally quite evident. As Doctor Smith is a doctor, so Akshobhya Buddha is a buddha, and christians claim that God is the only god. Can anyone think of a capitalisation rule that is not sentential, acronymic, or proper name based?

Ah but that is interesting, Kukku - that the OED should say "latest of a series of Buddhas" ! Hmm. The author says "the title, so here indicates that is similar to e.g. Doctor - But that still doesn't work in the generic. Also, did the author really write 'kyamuni' ? That has to be poor etymology - to split the name of the Sakya clan!? I also concur about the OED, but in this case, I am not sure I can agree with the article's author regarding capitalization, as it seems to be an exceptional case. (20040302 16:22, 27 Apr 2004 (UTC))

The "kyamuni" is almost certainly a function of OED's workaround for diacritics and special characters. As unicode isn't fully supported yet, a lot of sites make do by sticking image files in to represent characters like ś, and these don't cut and paste very well. Damn you, latin encoding, DAMN YOU!!!--sorry, what were we talking about? Ah, yes. I think Buddha has a different usage pattern than "doctor", and that while doctor as title (and thus implicit laudative) is not implied by "doctor" as mere agent noun, Buddha always carries enough of a charge (laudative, sacred, etc.) that it makes sense to me to always capitalize it. BTW, does someone have access to the Wikipedia-approved style manuals? They might help.कुक्कुरोवाच 18:01, 27 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Hmm, what about bodhisattva, though? It seems like the same standard would apply, but to capitalize every instance of bodhisattva looks awkward to me. - Nat Kraus e 12:58, 28 Apr 2004 (UTC)

So, does silence mean approval? Do we agree on a standard of capitalizing every instance of "Buddha" but not capitalizing "bodhisattva"? - Nat Kraus e 06:50, 4 May 2004 (UTC)

Does silence mean approval? Your question is your koan, Nat! I think it is fine. I was surprised by Kukko's point in the OED, and it probably remains controversial, but let us stay with that.

Tibetan question from Ref desk

On you begining paragraph for "Dalai Lama", you say that he is the most important religious leader in Tibetan Buddhism after the Penchen Lama. Then there is a link to "Penchem Lama", and the opening paragraph says that he is the second most important leader second to the Dalai Lama. Who is more important?

What is this about? For the record: This appears to be an issue of pre-chinese politics - at which time the Dalai Lamas were (at least nominally) the heads of state, and the Panchen Lama was second to him in terms of religious representation, so this is more to do with Tibet than Tibetan Buddhism.

Certainly nowadays the 14th Dalai Lama is the Tibetan Buddhist teacher with most students, and he is undoubtedly a VIP at airports and hotels (and to me!), whereas the Panchen Lama is famous for being the youngest political prisoner of modern times and hasn't been seen by anyone but the chinese for several years. (20040302 04:54, 30 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Rogers and Buddhism

I was attracted to the mention of Carl Rogers wrt to Buddhism.

I recently wrote papers on psychotherapy and Humanism at the same time as writing on the Information Society and found many links between social contributions and technology, two examples being the invention of the book and now the Internet -- and this Wiki.

I see some flaws in even the best western psychology and I am therefore moving east to look for ideas.

John john_van_v@yahoo.com

supernatural vs. mystical

Okay, I'm back! Actually I haven't really been anywhere, but I've been ignoring some of these issues for a while. So, we settled on "mystical" beings? I object, but gently. I think that "mystical beings" is not a phrase is common currency, so it will sound weird to suddenly say, "we do not deny their existence", like if you said "I do not deny the existence of purple zebras," you would come across as kind of wacky. In fact, I'm not really sure that I know what "mystical beings" means. I don't see the downside of "spiritual beings" (spiritual roughly conveying "subtle bodies", or am I wrong?), but failing that, I think "supernatural beings" is acceptable and would be widely understood. On the other hand, I would still like to see us hash out the intro from scratch, which I will move towards doing when I get a chance. - Nat Kraus e 15:31, 25 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Well, the only thing about supernatural is that one of us thought it sounded quite a ghostly, sort of medium word. My issue with it is to do with etymology; it doesn't make sense to classify devas, dakas, dakinis, bhuta, ghandarvas, pretas, yakshasa, rakshasa, etc. all as being supernatural. E.g. are dwarves, elves, dragons etc. supernatural? According to viking beliefs they are/were real beings, inhabiting the same 'dimensions'. How about bigfoot? Is bigfoot supernatural? No. Mystical? Well, yes in the sense that his existence is mysterious, non-obvious, and hard to see.

Regardless, I do understand the resistance to mystical. (20040302 13:00, 12 May 2004 (UTC))

Yes, mystical is atrocious. I like supernatural because, while it isn't 100% apt, for the reasons pointed out, it conveys more or less the right range of meaning in English. I forget, did we already discuss "superhuman"? -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽

Mar. 2, the meaning that you are worried about people taking is not so far off, is it? Especially if we also include categories of demons and hungry ghosts. I don't think "mystical" is appropriate unless maybe if we're talking specifically about Buddhas and bodhisattvas. "Supernatural" does have etymological problems, but it has such a standard conventional gloss that it is probably the clearest thing we can say.

Interesting how we each have our own pet phrase we would like to use instead. Hopefully, we can agree on "supernatural" as a second best. Wouldn't "Superhuman" make it sound like we believe in superheroes? "While Buddhism does not deny the existence of Superman and Spider-man, it does not ascribe power for saving the day to them." - Nat Kraus e 09:13, 13 May 2004 (UTC)

Hahaha lol. No, I am very happy with supernatural - yes! We all have our own preferences, and I guess supernatural isn't too bad. Superhuman would be a mistake, but Kukku was merely being provocative about it. (Buddhism would never say that pretas were more significant than humans).

Mythological may be better, though most people identify the word to mean fictional nowadays, so let us stay with supernatural. (20040302 05:04, 14 May 2004 (UTC))

Hinayana/Shravakayana/EBS/Nikaya terminology

I'm moving this discussion here from Talk:Schools of Buddhism, because it affects multiple pages and I want to make sure that all the concerned parties notice it. I also brought this up a few weeks ago on Talk:Hinayana, but, at the time only 20040302 responded, so I'm not sure if anyone else read it.

Nat K.: Hey, Prat, I'm not sure I understand why you switched the "Nikaya" category back to "Early Buddhist schools". It seems to make less sense. We're listing Theravada there, but Theravada is not just early but also current (and not terribly early, either). We also list Japanese schools like Ritsu that were founded in the latter part of the 1st millennium CE, much later than some of the schools in other categories. The reason that I had in mind for having a Nikaya Buddhism article was that it would provide an umbrella term linking Theravada to the other non-Maha-non-Vajrayana schools, regardless of vintage, and this seems like just the sort of situation that calls for it. I suppose we could have a separate category for "Early Indian schools", but the current set-up doesn't make a great deal of sense.

Then, in the text, it refers to these schools as Shravakayana, provides two links to Early Buddhist schools, and one to Nikaya Buddhism. So we have three different terms for roughly the same thing, none of which are the most common term that most people are familiar with, which is Hinayana. We can consider calling the whole thing Shravakayana instead of Nikaya, but I think there are downsides to that that should be discussed. - Nat Kraus e 16:47, 25 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Sorry, must have missed this update, it's been ages since I've been spending much time with wikipedia now (a week!). From memory, I hadn't seen the phrase 'Nikaya schools' before, so did a web search. It turned up much less hits than Shravakayana in its myriad romanizations, so I was going to use that, but must have decided on something reasonable instead. Shravakayana is just a redirect to Early Buddhist Schools or vice versa anyway. I am against using Nikaya schools purely because I'd never read it until I got here and saw someone use it, and google turns up few uses - leading me to believe that it's not, actually, a commonly used phrase. We are all aware of the problems with the term 'Hinayana'. prat 23:35, 2004 Apr 28 (UTC)

I don't think one can really say that any term for this school is a commonly used phrase, other than Hinayana. I had originally wanted to put the equivalent of the Nikaya Buddhism article under Hinayana, which resulted in the great Hinayana debate that wracked the internet and, dare I say it, all of America a few months back. 20040302 argued passionately and fairly convincingly that the word Hinayana should not be used in this sense, not on the grounds that it is derisive (he doesn't think it is), but on the ground that it is inaccurate and unclear. Shravakayana is a euphemism that some people use to be more polite, but it is no more accurate or clear than Hinayana. I don't think simply to say "early Buddhist schools" is sufficient, because it is awkward to apply it to schools that existed after the early period, such as Theravada or the Japanese Ritsu. Furthermore, even if it is empirically true that the early schools were all Hinayanist (to use the term in its conventional Western sense), they are logically separate concepts. "The early Buddhist schools were Hinayana" is a cogent statement, whereas "The early Buddhist schools were early Buddhist schools" is not. Or, what if new empirical data comes to light in the future? How can you say, "New evidence indicates that Vajrayana may predate early Buddhism?" if that is the only way you have to describe it?

Shravakayana appears to have a little more currency than "Nikaya" in this sense, but I don't think it is a major difference. Surprisingly, the wikipedia described Theravada as a Nikaya school before I ever got here -- I think that's the doing of that guy a c muller. I found about 600-650 responses on google for "Shravakayana" and "Sravakayana" together, and about 270 for "Nikaya Buddhism" and "Nikaya schools" together. And, looking at this way, we assume that all of the Śravakayāna references are talking about it as a school (which they aren't -- a cursory glance shows that a lot of them are talking about a style of practice as conceived of by Tibetan Buddhists); and that none of the other 30,000+ responses for "Nikaya" are talking about it as a school (if 2% of them were, that would equal the responses for _ravakayana). As an aside, I would note that Thich Nhat Hanh seems to prefer to call it "Many Schools" Buddhism which means roughly the same thing as "Nikaya."

Basically, none of these expressions is commonly used. I don't think most educated people will know what we mean unless we say Hinayana. If we're going to be stuck using an obscure term, we might as well pick the clearest and most accurate one, to avoid the possibility of having to change it again in the future -- in my estimatation, that’s Nikaya. In a lot of situations, we might also want to have a note pointing out that this is the same as what most Western people call "Hinayana." - Nat Kraus e 03:10, 30 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Some babies just won't sleep, eh?! Hinayana still needs a lot of editing, but I guess it is not so bad. The first sentence could include a link to Nikaya just as it does to early buddhist schools. Personally I think that the argument against 'Nikaya' because of it's lack of popularity is poor - a word or name does not have to be popular/non-popular to be accurate. IMHO we will always be misleading if we use Yanas (<--- which severely needs a rewrite) for classifying schools.

The entire classification of Buddhist tradition into Mahayana / non-Mahayana seems pretty unstable, and I suspect that the trouble we are having with 'Sravaka/Nikaya' is to do with finding an apposition to 'Mahayana'. Is there really a good argument for splitting Buddhism into two, and if so, is this actually the right point (acceptance/non-acceptance non-pali-canon sutras) to do it?

In brief (but maybe for different reasons) I agree with Nat on maintaining Nikaya. We can still add a redirect from Shravakayana and Hinayana early on. (20040302 05:14, 30 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Well now we have three articles:

Early Buddhist schools (alias Shravakayana), which is a summary of the early Buddhist schools' development and their legacy;
Nikaya Buddhism, which looks a lot like a dictionary entry;
and Schools of Buddhism which links to both of them in an unenlightening fashion: Main article: early Buddhist schools. See also: Nikaya Buddhism.

Leaving aside for a moment this interesting state of affairs, I agree that the Mahayana, non-Mahayana division is unstable and unnecessary and I think we can merge the Schools of Buddhism article's Mahayana schools in to the tree under the 'Early Buddhist schools' heading, and eliminate the division. Somehow merging the Tibetan traditions might be somewhat more difficult, but is no doubt possible (esp. Tiantai). We could then write a list of schools or a summary of the history and influence of the various commonly cited divisions (Mahayana, Theravada/Hinayana, Vajrayana/Tibetan) in a short paragraph for each division on the Schools of Buddhism page. Does this sound OK? prat 07:28, 2004 Apr 30 (UTC)

Well, I guess that doesn't sound like a bad idea. But, if I understand the proposal right, we would still be splitting Buddhism up into schools, just that they would limited to "Tantric" and "Sutric", no? This classification seems novel enough that it might get perilously close to "original research" rather than "just the facts, ma'am". On the other hand, I think Wikipedia gives too much importance on the "original research" issue -- I mean, you can't write an encyclopedia without doing some research (Hinayana is a good example of that). But I'm still not sure how this will work in practice. As a thought experiment, I went ahead and merged EBS with Mahayana on the Schools of Buddhism page. What about other contexts? For instance, what should we say about Theravada in the intro to that article?

I fully concur with Nat regarding original research - indeed any collaborative work which involves substantially different backgrounds of the collaborators will end up being original research. Take for instance the Mahayana/Hinayan divide discussion. We are attempting to root out 'Just the facts, ma'am. Something that is not always straightforward. (20040302 05:12, 14 May 2004 (UTC))

FYI, Shravakayana is not a redirect; at the moment it's a disambiguation page pointing to early Buddhist schools and Hinayana. And I wouldn't say that Nikaya Buddhism looks like a dictionary entry. It's an article on the etymology and use (or lack thereof) of the term. To me, it makes sense to have most of the meat of that subject at Theravada, with some at early Buddhist schools and some at Pali Canon. - Nat Kraus e 09:30, 3 May 2004 (UTC)

Hi, I changed the title of the sections "three yana" to "three schools of buddhism". The concept is totally Tantric. Theravadan won't recongised three wheel/vehicle concept. I also killed Hinayana and switched to Theravada or Theravadan. This isn't a place to offend other shcools of buddhism. FWBOarticle 13:17, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)

That's wise. Hinayana is what Mahayana buddhist call Theravadins. Hence the fruitful discussions about yanas, what's inferior and what's superior. The way you put it is the best.

History of Indian Buddhism

I've been hoping that some kind soul would take me up on writing a Decline of Buddhism in India article, because, while I know several things on the subject, it's such a big topic that I don't where to get started making a complete article. However, the moment seems to have been brought to its crisis by the fact that some guy came along and added some history to the Indian Buddhism page. I didn't want to just delete it, but it's still uncomfortably incomplete sitting there the way it is now. If anybody wants to go over there and flesh it out, it would be a good idea. Even if you add one sentence, the article needs it.

PS: I have plans to write a little bit about vegetarianism and add some something to Western Buddhism real soon. I mean it this time. - Nat Kraus e 16:32, 13 May 2004 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I absolutely cannot help with the delcine of Buddhism in India, as I know nothing about that. I did contribute some history on Indian Buddhism per se (i.e., the 18 schools) on the "Schools of Buddhism" page (I think), which perhaps could be summarized somewhat on the "Indian Buddhism" page as well...or maybe what we need is separate pages on "Early Indian Buddhism", "The Decline of Buddhism in India," and "Neo-Buddhism"...or maybe we need to merge "Early Buddhism" and "Indian Buddhism" or....there's also the "Early Buddist Schools," to be accoutned for. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽

Texts for Wikisource

If anyone knows any Buddhist texts in the public domain or released under the GFDL [this] is the place to list them. There's nothing there ATM. Shantavira 19:17, 12 Apr 2004 (UTC)

There's a "Buddhism in a Nutshell" explanatory page (http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/bps/misc/nutshell.html) with a lot of info, and this copyright notice:

For free distribution only.

You may print copies of this work for your personal use. You may re-format and redistribute this work for use on computers and computer networks, provided that you charge no fees for its distribution or use.

Is this kosher? Also, I assume the entire Pali Cannon is in the Public Domain. Translations, otoh, may not be. Quadell 14:17, 27 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Um...the Pali Canon itself would have to be public domain, I guess, but the individual translations and the published editions (especially scholarly ones) needn't be so.कुक्कुरोवाच

This does need to get done!

I can think of ACIP, but that's all OTTOMH (20040302 21:13, 25 Apr 2004 (UTC))

Re: recent edit by Heartjewel

Heartjewel recently added this:

"There are two main branches of Buddhism: the Mahayana with an emphasis on attaining enlightenment through the development of bodhichitta; and the Hinayana with an emphasis on attaining liberation from samsara through the practice of moral discipline."

to more or less the very beginning of Buddhism. Now, the article already provides a discussion of the three vehicles that has been the subject of considerable out-hashing, and I don't think we need the discussion broached at the beginning of the article, but this can be the subject of further discussion. In any case, this division is fairly suspect, and would have to be heavily reworked, I think. Also, wouldn't it be "bodhicitta"? -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 23:05, May 13, 2004 (UTC)

'bodhicitta' Well, both spellings are generally used. I prefer the lack of the h, but then those who do not have any experience with the asian languages have difficulty with pronouncing it.

Regarding the division though - yes. I still agree that the division remains deeply suspect, albeit incredibly popular. Regardless, Heartjewel is mistaken regarding the hinayana - both of these divisions depend upon the three higher trainings (sila/samatha/jnana), though mahayana traditions use the meme of six perfections, whereas the theravada prefer the eightfold path. Regardless, we should pull it until HeartJewel has something to say (20040302 04:42, 14 May 2004 (UTC))

"Books" section

Huh. Obviously if this stays, it should be standardized to whatever the standard is ("Further reading" or somesuch, I think). But should it stay? Certainly one such text, apparently limited in scope, is a bad thing. But do we remove it or just plaster lots of texts there? Or create a separate page for a big list of buddhism-related books? Or list buddhism-related books in a lump on terms and concepts and then link to that lump? Or.... -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 01:04, May 17, 2004 (UTC)

Well, I took it off. It seems crazy to think that there is one book that deals with Buddhism! Moreover, a book written by a catholic (Williams is radically ex-buddhist at the time of authoring this book) about Buddhism seems even more crazy. (20040302 07:50, 17 May 2004 (UTC))

Reply: Your reason for deleting my book recommendation is absolutely unfounded! Williams is an internationally renowned expert, whose introductory book "Buddhist Thought" ranks among the best ever written about this topic! Here´s what none other than Richard Gombrich (Boden Professor of Sanskrit, Oxford Univ.) says: "I found this one compelling reading, for the ideas are presented with logical cogency and stylistic clarity. The summary of the Buddha´s own views would be hard to better." [By the way, do you think one has to be a Nazi in order to be able to write competently and objectively about Nazism ...?!]

Well, he was internationally renowned- and indeed his book "Mahayana Buddhism" is often used as a collegiate textbook. However, people change. Moreover, someone who wishes to equate Buddhism with Nazism is unlikely to win support for their choice of books. Regardless, I think that no-one actually resists William's book being here as an interesting sholastic work, but that it alone represents a culture and set of traditions that span half the globe over 2500 years pushes the boat out somewhat, do you not think? So, why don't we start to compile a set of core literature here on Talk - and then when we have a list that does appear to be useful for the many audiences of Wikipedia, well then we can post it on the main article. But, friend, while there are just one or two books, let us compile the list here?! (20040302 19:31, 17 May 2004 (UTC))

Reply: Don´t twist my words, I certainly do not wish to equate Buddhism with Nazism as regards ideological content! My argument from analogy was merely aimed at the nonsensical claim that a Catholic or any other Non-Buddhist--per se--cannot write competently and impartially about Buddhism! Moreover, I of course do not claim that the two books I recommend are the only ones that deserve to be mentioned. But that these two impeccable scholarly works are actually highly recommendable is beyond doubt.

I'm also against a book list as it's basically not adding much to the encyclopedia that a simple search for 'Buddhism' at your local bookstore, library or Amazon isn't going to trump. My understanding is that normally we only list sources for the article in question, and not further reading unless the article is quite specific and the sources difficult to track down. prat 04:52, 2004 May 18 (UTC)

Hmm. There are now more books in the list (which is good), but I'm still unconvinced. First off, "list in progress" can't stay, as it's self-referentiality, which Wikipedia frowns on. Second, I think it's doomed to either be too short to be accurate and complete or too long to wieldy on the page. My vote is that we make it a separate page (my suggestion is "List of books on Buddhism") and then link to it from "See also". That way we can have individual sections for books on/from specific schools, western stuff, etc, and it won't be assailing the casual reader. Until this is either accepted or shot down, I'm going removing the section to this talk page, where it can be added to in the meantime. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 10:32, May 18, 2004 (UTC)

Reply: Well, Mr Remover, the point is that you´ll hardly find any books in which Buddhism is depicted more accurately than in the ones listed below! But do as you please ...

Wow. "Mr. Remover" is a pretty cool epithet, though it would be better if I were a deletionist rather than an eventualist. That said, my objection isn't so much accuracy as appropriateness; there's no different set of books that, if you'd said them instead, I'd be all for it. I'm gonna go ahead and create the list and start doing some sectioning and maybe add a few things in the more specific categories. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 20:20, May 20, 2004 (UTC)

Okay, started List of books related to Buddhism. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽

Reply: All right, looks promising—hatchet buried. :-)

Standards for inclusion of external links?

Are there any wikipedia-wide standards for what external links are deemed includable? I just deleted one singularly crappy-looking one, but maybe I overstepped. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽

Yeah, I was just thinking the same thing. I don't know that there are rules, which makes it hard to know what should stay and what should go. I see now somebody has changed the "google directory" link on this page to the "dmoz directory", but I have no idea what makes one better or worse. There's also kind of a funny new link on Zen, Sit Down and Shut Up!, which is kind of an interesting site, but I am inclined to say it is not general interest enough for this page. - Nat Kraus e 04:36, 28 May 2004 (UTC)

I think that in terms of Buddhism, any external link should at least meet the criteria deals with entire concept of Buddhism rather than a specific tradition or aspect. In this way, we will keep links to relevant pages. There are a few to be removed even if we only decide on a simple rule like this one. --prat 01:10, 30 May 2004 (UTC)

Okay, I went through and tried to make it so that all and only the links that are both encyclopedic and pertinent to Buddhism as a whole are included. But others should check and make sure I didn't miss anything and/or unfairly exclude anything. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 04:52, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Deer Park picture

Am I totally goofy or did the Deer Park picture used to be a whole different picture? I could have sworn it was a landscape at one point. - Nat Kraus e 17:46, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC) P.S. - Enjoy your trip, number man!

User:JoaJoa opinions of Buddhism

Most Buddhist and other people, they don't unsderstand buddhism sharply. In buddhism, Buddha means the God. Any other religion in the world insist that human can't become the God (the god as in Christ, Muslim). but only the Buddha insist that human can be the god. this is greatest religious revolution in the earth. this is most important (core of the core) teaching of the Buddha. this is fundamantal difference to any other religion.

so, in buddhism, meditation practice(study, not pray) and the zen test is most important. a person pass the zen test, he (or she) is authorized that he become the God.

now, in south korea only, a few people has passed the exam. -- thirdid 01:01, 2004 Sep 6 (UTC)

Uh-huh. Why in South Korea only? You wouldn't happen to be South Korean, would you? I've noticed that all of your edits seem to involve promoting various things as being exclusively Korean. - Nat Kraus e 08:21, 5 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Why? South korea only?? It's not nationalism, POV...I don't know other officially. Do you hear that I(a certain person) pass the Buddha exam? I realize?? In korea, newspapers notify it first. But I don't know any other. And, in buuddhism, exam system is most strict in the world. If some people who becomes the God, He must be identified by all living buuddha. Korean buddhism opened open exam festival two years annually. In the world, four living buddha is famous. tibet, vietnam, korea, cambodia monks. but I don't know that they all pass the exam.
The Buddha agreed that only one student become the God, Maha Kassapa. This exam is most difficult in the world becuase he is the God or not.
And, to any other religion people, he or she becomes the god, he can pass the exam. Buddhism don't treat a peson discriminatingly because of tribe, class(caste), religion, etc. Buddhism only emphasize meditation (not pray) and so, test strictly that he becomes the God or not. This is the core of the core. If you have gratest teacher, he can say that these writings is right or not.
conuntry? tribe? caste? school? Mahayana or not? Zen buddhism or not? this is not core. Many people who don't know buddhism well learn many various teachings, and confuse buddhism and other religion.
Buddhism is the religion to become the God.
It's not my opinion personally. I only write it for easy understanding begginer or other religion people.
I study and ask...many...Buddhism study amount is very much and difficult. I can brief core of the core...recently...
Budda realize what??? what is buddha?? It is very difficult and an abstract concept. But many years later, I know that Buddha is the God in christian. I know that different word confuse me.
I don't insist stronly this. you agree this or not now, you must know this some years studying. and asking to masters.
I only try to help any buddhist in the world...not confusing the core. -- thirdid 01:01, 2004 Sep 6 (UTC)

Regardless of the qualities and special features of Buddhism, unfortunately the thesis in this case in mistaken, Thirdid. Various branches of Hinduism also say that it is possible to become God. Moreover, there are certainly parts of the Vedas that allude to this, which would mean that this religious revolution could not be said to have originated in Buddhism. Believe me, I personally have great faith in the paths of Buddha - more so than in any other spiritual paths, but I am merely pointing out an error in your somewhat militant statement. (20040302 09:19, 5 Sep 2004 (UTC))

Of course, In korea, korean traditional religion also say that. So, Who is a living God, now? they also have most strict test system? Dead God, Dead Buddha is not useful, any. Telling is easy. Anyone can tell. But action for about 3000 years is not easy. If someone who becomes the god in the world, he must passed all famous exams in the world. And...for testing someone, a scorer(teacher) must be exist. -- thirdid 01:01, 2004 Sep 6 (UTC)

Pictures

I have no scanner to hand, but SURELY we can find a better image than that one? It looks like an early-90s PCX! - prat 01:00, 2004 Apr 15 (UTC)

It would be nice to have a picture of Buddhists (e.g. monks or nuns), especially as this article is Buddhism.. (20040302 05:12, 15 Apr 2004 (UTC))

This one? What do you have?

Yeah, I think that's better. Personally, I've got no idea to look for images that are usable under the Wikipedia license. After I get around to buying a camera, I'll try to take some pictures of stuff over here. Could probably also get permission to use some images from my temple back stateside, but I don't know if any of them are of general enough interest to be useful. - Nat Kraus e 16:32, 13 May 2004 (UTC)

Yes - I just replaced the gilded picture, forgetting the context! thanks Nat for moving the photo to a more appropriate position. (20040302 05:05, 14 May 2004 (UTC))

Ok, I'm not really sure how to do this but here it goes. I have several pictures of Buddhist sculpture and one of three monks that I got as a comp download with some imaging software. I assume they're public domain. How would I know for sure? I'd be happy to upload them. Don't know how to add signatures and such yet. My Winki SN is AtticusFinch

Please see your talk page, AtticusFinch. -- PFHLai 05:37, 2004 Sep 5 (UTC)

Damn you, 1.3!!!

Huh. Well. This kind of blows chunks. Specifically: (1) The new style, monobook, while aesthetically pleasing in the extreme, specifies Verdana, such that if you use it, the majority of Sanskrit diacritics will be not so much of the available. Also, Verdana's a pretty lame font as such.

Okay, update on this. It's pretty easy to customzie the css; just create yourself a subpage called monobook.css and include something like

 * {font-family:"Arial Unicode MS"}

I'm sure there's a less brutal way of doing it, but I wasn't in a patient mood. Also, does anyone know of (a) a good serif face with a full suite of unicode glyphs, and/or (b) a good free font of any kind with a full suite of unicode glyphs? -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽

I used to use this one, a long time ago. I can't for the life of me tell you how well it supports Devanagari -- or even whether it's serif or not -- but I do remember its CJK support was decent (at least for the time). --Aponar Kestrel (talk) 03:13, 2004 Sep 7 (UTC)

Using a font to change characters only works on those CPUs that have that font.. and Arial Unicode MS is generally found only on Windows.

With respect to UTF-8, the reason that mediawiki doesn't encode it by default is probably that the DB Engine of choice (mysql) did not properly support UTF-8, so I guess the bods at mediawiki decided not to implement UTF-8 encoding until it was supported properly by mysql. (20040302)

(2) My beloved msg: system of transliteration seems to break somewhat in 1.3. Which is unfortunate. It also doesn't seem to break in a coherent or predictable manner. As I don't thin anyone else was using this extensively, this probably isn't a huge concern, but I will say that changing from msg: to template: helps exactly some of the time, and that part of the problem comes from having two msg: tags in the same word. The simplest thing would be to change over to subst: and have these things go back to their numbered entities, but unfortunately this doesn't always work. I'm pondering solutions currently.

Okay, some of the time it helps to use a | at the end of the template name, like {{Nirvana|}}, but only some of the time. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 00:02, 30 May 2004 (UTC)

Also, why the hell didn't they switch to UTF, while they were messing everything else up? -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 22:38, 29 May 2004 (UTC)

Brutannica's edits

1: I started a section called "Buddhism After the Buddha" and wanted to know if I should keep it that way or if I shouldn't. I'm not sure if there's an article about the history of Buddhism, specifically; I think there should be one, but even if there is one, there should at least be a brief summary on this page, like the one I started, only a bit longer.

2: Shouldn't we move the "Origins" material to the page on Gautama Buddha, especially since it seems to be pretty detailed and the Buddhism page is considered too long? Brutannica 00:40, 5 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I don't have any objection to the post-Buddha division. There are articles on history (Timeline of Buddhism, for example, and I think there's one on history of Buddhist polemics, or history of the schools, or somesuch. As for the "Origins" material, it's useful to have to put the religion in context for readers. It maybe could use some trimming, though. My concern is with "This was partially due to Muslim invasions, and partially due to Hinduism absorbing Buddhist principles." On what are we basing the claim that Buddhism's decline in India was owing to Hindu appropriation? That sounds like a difficult thing to state as a fact (though certainly it also sounds like a defensible hypothesis), and could potentially draw some flack. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 06:30, 5 Jul 2004 (UTC)

"One reason that Buddhism died out in India is that Hinduism absorbed many of its ideas and principles." - p. 25, "The 100," Michael H. Hart. Not terribly specific, I know, but I don't have any evidence of my own. Personally I think it sounds more realistic than Muslim invasions. Brutannica 07:13, 5 Jul 2004 (UTC)

That's not really a strong enough source for my taste. And it's arguable, for example, whether various Hindu branches absorbed Buddhist principles, the opposite happened, or they simply emerge from the same cultual movement critiquing older forms of the orthodox religion. Perhaps we should remove it until we can find a better source. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 07:19, 5 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Sigh*... all right... But what should I put then? Just "Muslim invasions," or leave out reasons? Brutannica 00:00, 7 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I don't know. Does anyone actually dispute Brut's version of events? At the very least, we could say that Hinduism absorbed most of Buddhism's base of support. I would reference this from Skilton's book, if my copy were not in another country, but I have read the same basic story in different places. The main differences I've seen are just in how much one or the other (Muslim invasion or Hindu absorption) is emphasized (Udit Raj believes that it was entirely the work of Brahmins and the Muslims had nothing to do with it, but I don't take him as a very credible source for history). We might could also consult with our friend Lord Surya. - Nat Kraus e 09:30, 7 Jul 2004 (UTC)

A statement like, "scholars/thinkers/writers/whatever such as X have proposed", particularly with a reference to the book (title will do for now, we can fill in more details later) should suffice. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 04:02, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Actually, the version I first learned was that around that time Hinduism started emphasizing sex, which simultaneously attracted former Buddhists and the wrath of invading Afghan Muslims, who wiped out many temples (possibly not distinguishing between Hindu and Buddhist?). I didn't include that for space and controversy reasons. Opinions?Brutannica 21:04, 7 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Well, I've never heard that before, but I don't suppose that makes it wrong. I know that people love to flap their gums about tantric sex (in Hinduism and Buddhism), but did Hinduism in general ever emphasize sex? That sounds far-fetched. Plus, I don't know about you, but, to me, "invading Afghans" doesn't sound like something that would need a lot of provocation in order to draw their wrath. Clearly, in the long run, north Indian Buddhism got the worst of it (a history of India I read -- don't remember the name -- suggested that this was because the Muslim and Hindu establishments reached a compromise where the latter would be treated as dhimmis while the Buddhists would not, although I would want to include that unless we can find something more authoritative). - Nat Kraus e 06:54, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I would agree with NatKrause. Hinduism did in fact compete with Buddhism, so it seems logical that yoga with its esoteric concepts attracted many some late indian Buddhists (or prevented some who would otherwise choose Buddhism to join), but sex had nothing to do with that (sex goes under niyama, it's not permitted for serious practitioners). Esoteric practices are somewhat different from classic Patanjali's yoga, but anyway they didn't have sex all the time they would want to. If we stick to Buddha's own sermons, the deterioration of Buddhism began even before Shakyamuni's parinibbana. When Buddha permitted women to join the female sangha, he said that as a result of this, the 'golden era' will be reduced from 1000 years to 500.

Sex? Not relevant or accurate. The answer is probably a good deal more complex than one or two reasons. I would err on the side of caution on this one, and say that there are various theories about why - then quote the sources if you wish. Here is my theory: latter-day Indian Buddhism was pretty much centred around Nalanda university - and it may be that the muslim invaders saw that institution as too much of a political threat. Secondly, the Udyana buddhists had already been wiped out early on in the muslim invasion, and this probably influenced them away from negotiating settlements. (20040302 15:01, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC))

Good, but I have no books and very little knowledge about Buddhism at all, so these theories and things ought to be included with someone well-read, not me (and someone who knows English). Brutannica 04:41, 11 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Is Atman a Buddhist philosophical concept?

Hey, "Buddhism" contributors: over at Atman, Surya is holding the categorization of "Atman" into "Buddhist philosophical concepts" hostage to a debate he and I were having, and I was wondering if others might jump in. Maybe I'm crazy, or he is, but in either case I wonder that others haven't expressed an interest. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 15:08, 6 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Sorry for the delay. Also, I will be away for a month from the 18 (going to India) - so keep the wiki-fires burning! (20040302 15:04, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC))

Whether Atman belongs to Buddhism depends on how dogmatic you are. I am sure there will be a diagreement on this subject among followers of various schools. But then Atman is not a philosophical concept, it's something you need to experience by way of practice, to attain by way of meditation. Many Buddhist esoteric practitioners (you can find some in caves of Indian Himalayas, they are not interested much in sophistics) do not differetiate that much between the Hindu yogic terminology and Buddhist terms. If we follow their logic, the following words mean the same thing: Atman, Nirvana, Emptiness, the True Self. Various schools lead to this goal, but use different roadmap. As to the scientific community and followers not so advanced in meditation, there is disagreement whether (for example) 'the true self' and 'emptiness' are the same, Atman and Nirvana is the same etc. I remember H.H. Dalai Lama 14th lectured on this topic when he compared various Tibetan schools. So, I am of the opinion that Atman fits perfectly well into Buddhist concepts. But there always will be some dogmatic Theravadin that would remove it as 'un-Buddhist' :-)

Amongst the core principles of Buddhism, besides The Four Noble Truths and Noble Eight-Fold Path, is the Three Characteristics (Marks) of all Phenomena -- Anicca, Dukkha & Anatta (Impermanence, Suffering, Non-Self). Depending on the definition of Atman used, if it refers to an eternal, everlasting, permanent self, then it would be in somewhat contradiction with the Buddha's own words! In some later texts, the True Self or Nature is used to describe Emptiness, and although it seem to imply the same word, its meaning is still "having no inherent self or characteristics", which points back to the basic Three Characteristics. In its common usage, Atman refers to a "fixed, permanent entity", a soul, hence would detract from Buddha's words, and hence would in this sense *not* be considered a Buddhist philosophical concept. -- ZhiXing-Bhikkhu 20:08, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC)

The fact that Buddhists have written about it as a phenomenological concept negates what you're saying, regardless of whether or not the Buddha would have approved. see Shantideva and Chandrakirti's writings. --LordSuryaofShropshire 20:19, Sep 18, 2004 (UTC)

Re: edits by Usedbook

A couple days ago, Usedbook re-added a couple changes that he had put in place originally towards the beginning of the month. I think they should be removed again, but I wanted to give my reasons before doing so. With regard to nirvana="unbinding", Kukkurovaca, whose Sanskrit, I think, is better than any other regular editors here, has said on Talk:Nirvana "Nirvana does not literally mean 'unbinding'". Usedbook says in his edit summary, "extinguishing definition rejected by Siddhartha". What's the source for this? And what does this even mean? How do you reject the meaning of a word? I could say something like, "The Great Extinguishment is not the putting out of a fire," but that wouldn't change the definition of the word extinguishment, especially not if you're giving a literal translation of it into another language. I also take issue with "all beings have non-self", which is grammatically questionable and adds nothing over "all beings have no self." - Nat Kraus e 10:17, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Well, I'm no expert, and Nirvana is a rather widely interpreted word. But I'm pretty certain it originally meant extinguishing, and certainly that's the literal meaning. I think I suggested previously that if the "unbinding" definition has roots in a tradition, we should talk about that as part of that tradition, but certainly it shouldn't be given as the base definition. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 19:26, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Captions

I'd like to make all the captions full sentences (following the guidance at Wikipedia:Captions), but I'm afraid my background would mislead me into writing an incorrect caption. Perhaps someone who understands Buddhism better can take a shot at it.

For the first picture of Tian Tan Buddha, I thought the caption might discuss the purpose of Buddha statues something about the Buddha (are all statues of the first Buddha?), or some other background that would help bring the picture together with the article.

For the later picture of three Buddha statues, I'm not sure how it ties together with the text. Perhaps the caption could make a particular tie.

Thanks! -- ke4roh 02:02, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)

Well, let me think about this some more. I'm not sure I agree with the policy described on Wikipedia:Captions. If use the image caption on the main image, which is one of the first things you see when you look at the article, to expound on a subject like the role of Buddhist statuary, that could be distracting to the reader from article's more central points. - Nat Kraus e 05:36, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia_talk:Captions is a great place to discuss that policy :-). I mention the role of statuary only because the statue shows up several times in the article and frequently in the Buddhist world - leaving me to wonder what its role is (in short sentence form). That's only one tack to writing a full-sentence caption for the first picture. There may well be a better way to tie the picture to the article and lead the reader into the article. -- ke4roh 02:35, Aug 29, 2004 (UTC)

Here are some thoughts on the captions as starting points (in order of the pictures in the article) in case they help reveal the approach of this Christian to understanding:

Already discussed above.
Already pretty good, though I wonder about the work of art - who else is there? Is it a special moment in Buddhist history (like The Last Supper is in Christian history)? When was it made? etc. If you recognize more about it, perhaps that could go on the image description page.
Buddhists are praying at the temple - do Buddhists usually/always/occasionally pray at the temple? Are they praying to the statue or near it? What's with all the gold? It looks like the people are holding scepters. There's much more in this picture than I understand.
Sutras? I figured out those were Buddhist reference materials by reading context within the article, but I would mention that in the caption.
These three Buddha images are each different. Are the differences significant? Is there anything else special about these statues? Are they characteristic of a particular branch of Buddhism? Do you suppose they're for sale?

Don't put too much stock in my thoughts about the captions - they're just places to start if you're wondering what someone might want to know about the pictures. -- ke4roh 02:35, Aug 29, 2004 (UTC)

Okay, good effort on getting started. You ask interesting questions, although I wish I knew the answers to more of them. I'll try to add a little here and there. Re: 2, yes, it's a special moment, the Buddha's first public sermon, more comparable perhaps to Jesus' baptism than to the last supper. Re: 3, I don't think those are sceptres, I figure it's some weird kind of incense, but I'm not sure. - Nat Kraus e 14:13, 29 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Pali canon translation

By the way, the Aum Shinrikyo page says that Aum is the only group that has ever translated the complete Pali Canon into a modern language. Does anybody know if this is true? I have no trouble believing they made the only Japanese translation, but it seems like somebody would have done one in Thai or Sinhala or English or something. - Nat Kraus e

The Pali cannons started to be translated into Japanese in late 19th century. Japanese Imperial Universities always had Indian Philosophy department and that created sizable population of Sanskrit scholars in Japan. And when I say Sanskrit, I mean all Sanskrit dialect including Pali. The complete translation of Pali cannons was first published somewhere in late 50s. Aum attracted lot of young university science graduates but they didn't attract any people who were engaged in serious academic study of buddhism. English Translation of Pali Cannon published by Pali Text is about 20 volumes and it involved decades of hard work. Aum's claim is total BS. FWBOarticle 06:26, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I read Wiki article of Aum Shinrikyo. It appeared to be written by a member. FWBOarticle 06:47, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Yes. - Nat Kraus e

It seems you're discussing the changes I made (those that appear to be written by a member, although I am not a member). I still can't check whether the full Aum translation is full and whether it is unique, but hope to finish with that someday. One correction: Sanskrit and Pali shouldn't be mixed. Sankrit was the language the educated elite spoke, but simple folks didn't speak it. Shakyamuni taught in Pali, that's important. So the most ancient (and thus reliable) sutras are in Pali. That's why I believe Aum was so interested in Pali sutras (they are harder to obtain and besides, much less scholars know Pali than Sanskrit). As to actual ability to translate, that's another topic. To my knowledge, the group that translated the sutras learned Pali during their Aum period (but I may be wrong, can't check right now). Anyway, Aum had close relations with Ven. Ananga Maitreya and this monk was even called 'translator monk' in Sri Lanka. So, to obtain sutras, learn Pali and translate the Canon to Japanese is still possible, however unbelievable it seems. I know nothing about how hard is to translate from Pali, but if we were talking about translating 20 books from say, German to English, it is entirely possible for a group of five people to do it in 4 years at most. Depends on how well you know the language and how hard-working you are.

Translations of Pali Canon: was it ever translated in full?

To my knowledge, the full Pali Canon has never been translated directly from Pali into any of the modern languages, including English. Can anybody shed light on this fact - is that true? The thing is that I recently learned than Aum Shinrikyo, a Japanese new religion (it is known for its subway gas attack in 1995) has translated the Pali Canon into Japanese (and in full). But NatKrause says that the Pali Canon was translated to Japanese even before, but I can't check it. How could it be? Anybody can confirm?

Didn't the PTS do a full translation to English? And I believe the major Asian languages have had their versions of the canon since ancient times. I don't know if these were all "full" translations--though I think the Mahayana tended to add to the Tripitaka, not take away. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 00:20, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I wanted to restate something I wrote on Talk:Aum Shinrikyo, to the effect that www.accesstoinsight.com claims that "almost all" of the Pali Canon had been published in English, with exception of "a few obscure books". This is tangential to Kukku's point, though, because the PTS may have translated the whole thing but declined to publish certain parts (also, it was FWBOarticle, and not me, that commented on the Japanese translation). - Nat Kraus e 04:16, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC)

The Pali Canon is also available in Sinhalese, Burmese and Thai. In the Mahayana (Chinese) Canon, is one of the sections on the Agamas, though that is from the Sanskrit translation and *may* differ from the Pali sources. PTS has more or less the full translation, though I believe some of the "smaller texts" (Khuddka Nikaya) is yet to be translated. Furthermore, the Sinhalese, Burmese and Thai translations each had minor differences in terms of their Abhidhamma.--ZhiXing-Bhikkhu 20:09, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I want to clarify what appears to be a minor confusion on the part of Kukku and ZX-B. "Pali Canon" is a subcategory of "the agamas", i.e. it is specifically the Theravada version. Therefore, the fact that the traditional Mahayana canons have their own versions of the same texts, while very interesting in general, is not relevant to the specific claims that Aum Shinrikyo makes about the Pali Canon. Well, it is not relevant to the literal truth of those claims, although it might put their claims in a different light if there were pre-existing versions that were nearly identical. (And, of course, the Sinhalese, Burmese, and Thai versions that ZhiXing mentions are almost certainly translations of the Pali version, anyway). - Nat Kraus e 09:27, 19 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Upaya

By the way, I noticed the upaya and upaya-kaushalya pages recently. Looked like none of our usual Buddhism contributors had edited them before. I merged the pages and did some editing, but if anybody else can give the once over, that would be cool. Also, I put the combined page at upaya-kaushalya, because that's where most of the edit history was, but I think it should ideally be at upaya, so, the next admin who sees this, can you please delete upaya for me? That page has never been anything more than a dicdef. - Nat Kraus e 10:34, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Good stuff. The traditional story is right out of the Lotus Sutra - it may be good to attribute it? (20040302 11:08, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC))

I have moved the article to Upaya. older≠wiser 12:37, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Thanks! - Nat Kraus e

human realm?

I just stumbled on human realm (linked to from Human). What's the status of this? If it is valid, it should probably be polished and linked, if not, it should, hm, also be dealt with ;) dab 15:22, 29 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Sure it's valid (not sure about the "graphical representation part, though; it would be nice if someone could take a look at that), and it does need polishing and wikifying. I've been meaning to suggest to User:beta m that it might be a good idea to merge human realm, animal realm, asura realm, hell realm, hungry ghost realm, and Gods realm into one more comprehensive six realms article. - Nat Kraus e 16:04, 29 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Suggestion regarding lists of terms, persons, etc.

Chuck Muller here. I'm a pretty extensive contributor to the Buddhism area. Suggestion: regarding the Buddhism box, I think the entry at the top "terms and concepts," is a redundant piece of human labor that does not well utilize Wikipedia's built-in tools, like ((Category:Buddhist terms)). In other words, rather than building a separate word list, we can just add Category links at the bottom of all these terms. I've begun to do it. Eventually, I would suggest the same kind of strategy for Buddhist persons, temples, texts, etc. Acmuller

I've been thinking about this for awhile. Eventually, categories will probably replace all sorts of lists. In the meantime, some people still avoid using categories, so duplicating efforts might not be a bad thing. I think one should feel free to work on one or the other or both. Currently, lists do provide some advantages, primarily that it is easier to edit entries in one action. Suppose we have a list of people, and I want to add the years when each one lived. I can do that in a category by the format [[Category:Ancient Buddhist rock stars|Attila T. Presley (566-593)]] or whatever, but it's a hassle to go through and do that for a bunch of people. In the future, there may be tools to make this easier. - Nat Kraus e 09:26, 14 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Sanskrit name

Is it really necessary to have the Sanskrit for Siddhartha Gautama in the intro here? I'm inclined to move it to Gautama Buddha. - Nat Kraus e 06:42, 7 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Well, there's an essential error in the way it's phrased, actually. "Siddharta Gautama" is Sanskrit, no matter what script it's written in. Now, the computer I'm using now can't read the unicode in question, but I'm assuming it's Devanagari, in which case it's inappropriate simply because Devanagari has no special relation (I don't think) to whatever language Gautama would have spoken, in the first place--it later acquired an intimate relationship to Sanskrit, true, but it's not as though the Buddha spoke Sanskrit either. It's useful to use Sanskrit forms because they're the forms from which multiple prakrit terms derive, but that shouldn't give the language pride of place in discussing Buddhism. So, if that is Devanagari (if it's not, I look pretty silly) it shouldn't be included in any Buddhism articles. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 18:42, 7 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Good point. Unless I'm way off, it is Devanagari. Still, if we can include Chinese, then I don't see why we couldn't include Devanagari script, too (some of the Buddhism-related pages have Chinese or Japanese translations, although most don't)? - Nat Kraus e 05:40, 8 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Well, as I'd imagine my signature proves, I'm no opponent to Devanagari. On the other hand, I don't think there are any historical Buddhist communities that have used Devanagari (I may be wrong about this--paleography isn't really my department), which can't be said of Chinese or Japanese. I mean, if someone can put together the unicode for Kharoṣṭhī, or some other such script used in Buddhist texts, I'd be all about throwing that in here. I mean, I'm not stridently opposed to it, because one can make the argument that Devanagari is a tolerably close relative of whatever scripts Indian Buddhists actually used, though there's little visible resemblance between, say, Devanagari and Kharoṣṭhī, which uses rather different shapes and is written in the other direction. (I mean, they're definitely related, but you don't get a sense of the one just by looking at the other.) -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 16:57, 8 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Apparently I'm wrong about Kharoṣṭhī. Huh. Cool. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽

Abolitionism

Moved to Talk:Buddhism/Abolitionism

Recent Theravada categorization

Several articles were recently categorized by anon 62.252.128.15 as belonging to category "Theravada Buddhism"; this includes some articles, such as "Dharma", that some might argue (i.e., I might argue) should be implied to inhere to all forms of Buddhism, and that a Theravada category tag should be applied only to things pertaining to Theravada Buddhism as opposed to other forms of Buddhism. Otherwise we're going to get some serious redundancy going on. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 23:40, 23 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Totally. The Buddhism category should do it for Buddhist terms and terminology. (20040302 17:23, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC))

Agree, also. - Nat Kraus e 12:29, 26 Oct 2004 (UTC)

References

I notice that on Wikipedia talk:Featured article removal candidates people seem to be talking about references as a standard requirement of featured articles. Should we try to put together a list of works we've consulted in editing the Buddhism page? Most of my edits to this particular page have actually been based on general knowledge rather than specific texts, but if anybody can recall texts they've used... -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 19:31, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I don't know how widely available the NetLibrary service is, or to what percentage of their books the local libraries of other Wikipedians might subscribe, but I can use it to get to a couple of useful resources like Gethin's Foundations of Buddhism and something non-useless called Thirty-five Oriental Philosophers from whatever computer I happen to be using at a given moment and it allows full-text searching, so it might be good for fact-checking. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽