I have some citizen concern about the implications of Vajrayana teachings.
The concept of compassion as understood in Vajrayana is utterly different from how Westerners and Western culture conceptualizes and practices compassion.
These days, especially in America, many of us fear to feel basic empathy, others of us have disrupted parenting and grow up lacking opportunities for learning empathy. Or if we dare allow ourselves to notice someone's pain - or
notice our own pain, we may find ourselves unable to cope with an upsurge of
emotion.
My concern is that adding Vajrayana tantra to this might
for many of us become spiritual bypassing -- use of spirituality to sidestep painful emotions and experiences and worse, conceal crippled areas of our inner lives.
Tantra teachers taken as children from their mothers, sent away to live
in all male monasteries would themselves be lacking opportunities for emotional warmth -- and normal play. How can teachers raised in this manner identify
Westerners with impaired empathy and know to advise them to avoid tantra or at the very least postpone requesting initiation into it?
Rachmones - Hebrew for compassion
Caritas -- Latin for Christian love for all humanity
Compassion - from Latin "co-suffering, feeling-for, empathy" - concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others.
While doing some Google searches, I stumbled upon something entitled
"DHARMA Dzongsar Khyentse Longchen Nyingthig Practice Manual"
I wish to quote a small portion of this text so as to express my opinion -
and also my puzzlement.
DHARMA Dzongsar Khyentse Longchen Nyingthig Practice Manual
[www.scribd.com]
Google cache - text only
[webcache.googleusercontent.com]
Corboy Questions and Opinions
We have some big differences here.
In English, the root words for compassion are the Latin, 'suffer with' or 'co-suffer' -- to share pain with someone, which in turn leads to concern, accompaniment, and often some attempt at relief.
In an article on the meaning of compassion in the Buddhist tradition, compassion has an entirely different meaning from that of 'suffering with"
Rachmones - Hebrew for compassion
Caritas -- Latin for Christian love for all humanity
Compassion - from Latin "co-suffering, feeling-for, empathy" - concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others.
Corboy: Why would it not be diplomatic for a Vajrayana/Mahayana Buddhist to go to an inter-religious conference and courteously and clearly state what
makes bohichitta compassion different from how how compassion is understood in Judaism, Christianity and other religions.?
Friends, readers, here is what in Corboy's opinion distinguishes Vajrayana from Judaism, Christianity and western humanism.
This is it, folks. You're gonna read this right here, in public and for free.
* Human individual -- real or just a fiction?
* Nature of time
* How many lives one has to live - one or many
* Attitude toward suffering --
One: In Vajrayana/Mahayana Buddhism, the human person, the individual is regarded as unreal. There is no inherantly separately existing entity anywhere.
Mahayana/Vajrayana Buddhism: we are reborn, again and again, and the cycle of rebirth is the cycle of suffering and delusion. The only escape is to wake up
to the true nature of reality and then assist all beings to have that same realization. The incentive for doing Vajrayana practice and especially Vajrayana tantra is to attain maximum realization in one lifetime so one can
become enlightened as soon as possible and then help all others to become enlightened.
Ultimate compassion in Vajrayana is to teach suffering people to realize the true nature of reality - then they cease suffering.
In Judaism and Christianity, the main doctrine is, we have one life, history moves forward in a line, God works through history, through creation, and through art.
In Judaism and Christianity, the human person is regarded as real-- and God takes an interest in each human person. Those of us who identify as atheist or agnostic usually experience ourselves as bounded entities.
In Vajrayana/Mahayana, suffering originates from our minds, it orginates from our ignorance that reality is essentially empty, that there is nothing inherently separately existing.
Suffering and anguish mean you need to awaken to the true nature of reality.
By contrast, Judaism, Christianity and western humanism each regard suffering as part of being human, and the response is to offer accompaniment, care for
the suffering body and care for the soul. Not ultimate healing, because that
may never be possible. But...at the very least, accompaniment.
Judaism:
To relieve human suffering today to pay forward with gratitude what
G-d did for us.
"I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. Exodus 20:2
Remembering our past vulnerability empowers us do the same today
""Do not oppress a foreigner; you yourselves know how it feels to be foreigners, because you were foreigners in Egypt."
Christianity: God became a human -- and a human being reduced to the utter depths of physical and emotional suffering. To care for suffering human beings
and not turn aware from their suffering is to walk with God as Jesus.
Western Humanism:
Viktor Frankl - Man's Search For Meaning
It is time for representatives of the different faith traditions to have
frank discussions in which they list exactly those features that distinguish
their doctrines from each other.
How can a Roman Catholic delegate make an informed decision to participate in a Vajrayana meditation event unless he or she knows just how differently the Vajranayanists regard bodhichitta as opposed to caritas?
A Jewish or Roman Catholic might, if given full disclosure, decide that he or she would rather preserve their own understanding of suffering as potentially having meaning, even dignity, and courteously refuse to go to the Vajrayana meditation retreat.
Some of us care about our faith commitment and want to avoid anything that
we decide could be in conflict with it.
Here is another item Corboy wants to rant about.
Corboy: I disagree. No, Christian love and tolerance do not necessary victimize you in the end, and do not necessarily make you codependent and eventually backfire on you.
What an assumption to make.
There are plenty of Christian, Jewish and atheist or agnostic social workers out there who are caring for the world hands on, face to face with real, living breathing people -- and who know all about codependence, victimization and getting burned out.
And they do not see it as a sign that they're inferior or stupid because they
got soul seared or heart broken.
These days there is no shortage of training and literature available for people in counseling and social services work. You go to school to become a minister, a priest, a social worker and therapist and --- you have to take classes on how to love wisely and well and not get burned out.
You assemble and have staff conferences and you have supervisors and mentors who remind you to take breaks.
Still, the people who are out there, face to face with the pain of the world do get their hearts broken.
Their hearts heal, too. Prayer, meditation, going to a stupid movie with friends.
Being a Jew or a Christian does not automatically put a Kick Me sign on one's back, or condemn one to a life of co-dependency.
And, as we have seen in Chogyam Trungpa's own career, becoming tantra initiates
with profound understanding of relative and absolute bodhichitta appears to have backfired and led to co-dependency-- too many of Trungpa's tantra students excused his alcoholism, his keeping them waiting for hours, his social snobbery in demanding they learn to speak with Oxford accents when functioning as his servants -- accepting this as enlightened teaching--
They were tantra initiates and seem to have fallen into the same codependency trap that Kyentse Rinpoche fears that compassionate Christians fall into.
The concept of compassion as understood in Vajrayana is utterly different from how Westerners and Western culture conceptualizes and practices compassion.
These days, especially in America, many of us fear to feel basic empathy, others of us have disrupted parenting and grow up lacking opportunities for learning empathy. Or if we dare allow ourselves to notice someone's pain - or
notice our own pain, we may find ourselves unable to cope with an upsurge of
emotion.
My concern is that adding Vajrayana tantra to this might
for many of us become spiritual bypassing -- use of spirituality to sidestep painful emotions and experiences and worse, conceal crippled areas of our inner lives.
Tantra teachers taken as children from their mothers, sent away to live
in all male monasteries would themselves be lacking opportunities for emotional warmth -- and normal play. How can teachers raised in this manner identify
Westerners with impaired empathy and know to advise them to avoid tantra or at the very least postpone requesting initiation into it?
Rachmones - Hebrew for compassion
Caritas -- Latin for Christian love for all humanity
Compassion - from Latin "co-suffering, feeling-for, empathy" - concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others.
While doing some Google searches, I stumbled upon something entitled
"DHARMA Dzongsar Khyentse Longchen Nyingthig Practice Manual"
I wish to quote a small portion of this text so as to express my opinion -
and also my puzzlement.
DHARMA Dzongsar Khyentse Longchen Nyingthig Practice Manual
[www.scribd.com]
Google cache - text only
[webcache.googleusercontent.com]
Quote
In
order to enhance the determination oI dwelling not only on the right path, but also on the
greater path, we practice the bodhicitta. We are now talking about the mahäyäna path,
which is a path oI dwelling neither in samsära or nirväna. The quintessence oI the
mahäyäna path is the bodhicitta so it is a much, much greater path.
Eor many oI us, we
have a vague idea the mahäyäna concept oI bodhicitta has something to do with kindness,
tolerance, and some sort oI humanitarianism, such as with providing a certain social
service. Although quite good, this understanding is really not good enough, as it is but one
small aspect oI bodhicitta. II your understanding oI the absolute bodhicitta is limited to the
notion oI kindness, compassion, tolerance, humanitarian charity work, or even the sacriIice
oI your own liIe Ior the sake oI others, you still do not have a complete picture oI the
I
Bodhicitta.
One of the Main Foundations
35
bodhicitta.
And to have a complete picture, one should not Iorget that there is a relative
and an ultimate bodhicitta.
OI course, at an inter-religious conIerence, we have little choice but to speak
diplomatically and say: 'Christians talk about love and compassion. Judaism talks about
love and compassion. We Buddhists talk about love and compassion. All religions talk
about love and compassion and thereIore, we all have the same goal, but diIIerent routes.¨
This is what inter-religious conIerences are Ior.
I am not trying to be chauvinistic. What I
am saying is Buddhist compassion and the mahäyäna concept oI compassion does not stop
there. There is something Iurther that is behind this compassion. II you don`t have that, the
Buddhist compassion, love and tolerance are exactly the same as Christian compassion,
Christian love and Christian tolerance. It can be the same as the very love, compassion and
tolerance that makes you co-dependent and eventually backIires on you. The tolerance or
compassion that does not have this something more` really victimises you in the end. You
need a complete picture oI the bodhicitta. And when we talk about the complete picture oI
bodhicitta` we are reIerring to the ultimate bodhicitta.
Corboy Questions and Opinions
We have some big differences here.
In English, the root words for compassion are the Latin, 'suffer with' or 'co-suffer' -- to share pain with someone, which in turn leads to concern, accompaniment, and often some attempt at relief.
In an article on the meaning of compassion in the Buddhist tradition, compassion has an entirely different meaning from that of 'suffering with"
Quote
[skydharma.com]
The meaning of compassion in the Buddhist tradition
by Lama Ivo
How does “compassion” work
"Compassion in the Buddhist context is the dissolution of the individual self, as reflected in the seemingly valid perception of “others”. The teachings on compassion use the logic of the dualistic mind and present methods which resolve a perceptual illusion. When we engage in the development of altruistic attitude and the subsequent compassionate actions, we gradually soften the solidity of the individual self. If we manage to dissolve completely the boundary between ourselves and others, our karmic perception will in turn dissolve. The teachings on compassion are the most direct route to this dissolution simply because our grasping of self and others is the center of the Samsaric mandala – it is the key focal point which holds the whole thing together....
Even if we understand all this conceptually, which is not easy to do, we often fail to apply it, because the karmic interdependencies are so complex and intricate, that we lose ourselves completely. Still, this understanding is vital, as it will counteract the tendency to practice compassion as charity, and also the tendency of the idiot compassion so aptly explained by Trungpa Rinpoche. Compassion as a Buddhist practice is not charity, nor indulgence, it involves working with our own perception in a much more direct way. The situation is very sophisticated – you are facing a magical show, created by none other than yourself, intended to deceive none other than yourself
Rachmones - Hebrew for compassion
Caritas -- Latin for Christian love for all humanity
Compassion - from Latin "co-suffering, feeling-for, empathy" - concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others.
Quote
And to have a complete picture, one should not Iorget that there is a relative
and an ultimate bodhicitta.
OI course, at an inter-religious conIerence, we have little choice but to speak
diplomatically and say: 'Christians talk about love and compassion. Judaism talks about
love and compassion. We Buddhists talk about love and compassion. All religions talk
about love and compassion and thereIore, we all have the same goal, but diIIerent routes.¨
This is what inter-religious conIerences are Ior.
Corboy: Why would it not be diplomatic for a Vajrayana/Mahayana Buddhist to go to an inter-religious conference and courteously and clearly state what
makes bohichitta compassion different from how how compassion is understood in Judaism, Christianity and other religions.?
Friends, readers, here is what in Corboy's opinion distinguishes Vajrayana from Judaism, Christianity and western humanism.
This is it, folks. You're gonna read this right here, in public and for free.
* Human individual -- real or just a fiction?
* Nature of time
* How many lives one has to live - one or many
* Attitude toward suffering --
One: In Vajrayana/Mahayana Buddhism, the human person, the individual is regarded as unreal. There is no inherantly separately existing entity anywhere.
Mahayana/Vajrayana Buddhism: we are reborn, again and again, and the cycle of rebirth is the cycle of suffering and delusion. The only escape is to wake up
to the true nature of reality and then assist all beings to have that same realization. The incentive for doing Vajrayana practice and especially Vajrayana tantra is to attain maximum realization in one lifetime so one can
become enlightened as soon as possible and then help all others to become enlightened.
Ultimate compassion in Vajrayana is to teach suffering people to realize the true nature of reality - then they cease suffering.
In Judaism and Christianity, the main doctrine is, we have one life, history moves forward in a line, God works through history, through creation, and through art.
In Judaism and Christianity, the human person is regarded as real-- and God takes an interest in each human person. Those of us who identify as atheist or agnostic usually experience ourselves as bounded entities.
In Vajrayana/Mahayana, suffering originates from our minds, it orginates from our ignorance that reality is essentially empty, that there is nothing inherently separately existing.
Suffering and anguish mean you need to awaken to the true nature of reality.
By contrast, Judaism, Christianity and western humanism each regard suffering as part of being human, and the response is to offer accompaniment, care for
the suffering body and care for the soul. Not ultimate healing, because that
may never be possible. But...at the very least, accompaniment.
Judaism:
To relieve human suffering today to pay forward with gratitude what
G-d did for us.
"I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. Exodus 20:2
Remembering our past vulnerability empowers us do the same today
""Do not oppress a foreigner; you yourselves know how it feels to be foreigners, because you were foreigners in Egypt."
Christianity: God became a human -- and a human being reduced to the utter depths of physical and emotional suffering. To care for suffering human beings
and not turn aware from their suffering is to walk with God as Jesus.
Quote
Matthew 25:35-40New King James Version (NKJV)
35 for I was hungry and you gave Me food; I was thirsty and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger and you took Me in; 36 I was naked and you clothed Me; I was sick and you visited Me; I was in prison and you came to Me.’
37 “Then the righteous will answer Him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You, or thirsty and give You drink? 38 When did we see You a stranger and take You in, or naked and clothe You? 39 Or when did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?’ 40 And the King will answer and say to them, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.’
Western Humanism:
Viktor Frankl - Man's Search For Meaning
Quote
“But there was no need to be ashamed of tears, for tears bore witness that a man had the greatest of courage, the courage to suffer.”
? Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning
Quote
“It did not really matter what we expected from life, but rather what life expected from us. We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life—daily and hourly.
Our answer must consist, not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct. Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual.”
? Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning
It is time for representatives of the different faith traditions to have
frank discussions in which they list exactly those features that distinguish
their doctrines from each other.
How can a Roman Catholic delegate make an informed decision to participate in a Vajrayana meditation event unless he or she knows just how differently the Vajranayanists regard bodhichitta as opposed to caritas?
A Jewish or Roman Catholic might, if given full disclosure, decide that he or she would rather preserve their own understanding of suffering as potentially having meaning, even dignity, and courteously refuse to go to the Vajrayana meditation retreat.
Some of us care about our faith commitment and want to avoid anything that
we decide could be in conflict with it.
Here is another item Corboy wants to rant about.
Quote
What I
am saying is Buddhist compassion and the mahäyäna concept oI compassion does not stop
there. There is something Iurther that is behind this compassion. II you don`t have that, the
Buddhist compassion, love and tolerance are exactly the same as Christian compassion,
Christian love and Christian tolerance. It can be the same as the very love, compassion and
tolerance that makes you co-dependent and eventually backIires on you. The tolerance or
compassion that does not have this something more` really victimises you in the end. You
need a complete picture oI the bodhicitta.
Corboy: I disagree. No, Christian love and tolerance do not necessary victimize you in the end, and do not necessarily make you codependent and eventually backfire on you.
What an assumption to make.
There are plenty of Christian, Jewish and atheist or agnostic social workers out there who are caring for the world hands on, face to face with real, living breathing people -- and who know all about codependence, victimization and getting burned out.
And they do not see it as a sign that they're inferior or stupid because they
got soul seared or heart broken.
These days there is no shortage of training and literature available for people in counseling and social services work. You go to school to become a minister, a priest, a social worker and therapist and --- you have to take classes on how to love wisely and well and not get burned out.
You assemble and have staff conferences and you have supervisors and mentors who remind you to take breaks.
Still, the people who are out there, face to face with the pain of the world do get their hearts broken.
Their hearts heal, too. Prayer, meditation, going to a stupid movie with friends.
Being a Jew or a Christian does not automatically put a Kick Me sign on one's back, or condemn one to a life of co-dependency.
And, as we have seen in Chogyam Trungpa's own career, becoming tantra initiates
with profound understanding of relative and absolute bodhichitta appears to have backfired and led to co-dependency-- too many of Trungpa's tantra students excused his alcoholism, his keeping them waiting for hours, his social snobbery in demanding they learn to speak with Oxford accents when functioning as his servants -- accepting this as enlightened teaching--
They were tantra initiates and seem to have fallen into the same codependency trap that Kyentse Rinpoche fears that compassionate Christians fall into.