Walking the Wall

NOTE: I will warn that this will probably be a long ramble as I’m sorting much of this out as I go.

I’ve read a couple things lately on various blogs and a Buddhist message board about how difficult it seems to be for Westerners to choose a specific religious tradition within Buddhism (and I think even within Christianity these days).

There does seem to be a trend that the Western mindset is more reticent to join and fully commit to one tradition. I think many (not all) of them are coming to Buddhism as adults and out of one tradition or another of Christianity. I certainly fit that demographic and am coming out of a Fundamental Baptist Christian tradition which was very group oriented and very much held the ideology that they had the monopoly on truth and spirituality and other traditions within and without of the Christian faith did not. This background has two impacts on me in terms of choosing a single tradition: one, I have a distrust of organized religious groups, and two, I have a dislike of “my way or the highway” mentality. Now, I am not saying that specific Buddhist traditions have the mindset of “my way or the highway” (although I am sure that there are some)–I’m simply saying that is what it sometimes translates to in the mind of someone who has struggled to come to an acceptance of truth found in many and diverse paths.

That being said, I understand and even agree that there is strength found in finding a tradition and following it, there is a continuity and power in being focused, rather than scattered. One of the things I respect about Buddhists, such as Thich Nhat Hanh and the Dalai Lama (I believe), is their understanding of the powerful impact of our root traditions. They really encouraged me to go back to my root tradition (our cultural spirituality that we are raised with–for many Westerners that means Christianity) and find truth and peace within that if possible. This caused me to go back to Christianity and look for a spiritual center, a truth, that stood outside of a specific tradition (like the Fundamental Baptist segment I was raised with). I found a new movement that embodies the best that Christianity exemplifies and a core belief that is beautiful and to be respected. I saw individual people, like my mother and my grandmother, who come from different Christian traditions but exemplify the beauty found in Christianity. I found in my close Christian friends a “new to me” open heart and mind approach to Christianity that lets go of traditions and returns to core beliefs. In the end I reaffirmed that it was not a path for me, but it has been very healing for me to let go of some of my anger and pain that are tangled with that tradition and find the beauty and truth that resonate there.

Which swings me back around to picking a specific tradition. Buddhism, like Christianity (I should qualify that as New Testament Christianity), started out with a core individual who offered a new, reimagined truth to their time–Gautama Buddha and Jesus. They taught and exemplified a core set of truths and ideas and walked a path for others to follow. Since their respective time periods these core ideologies have been taken up by many different groups and cultures and have blended with other cultural ideologies and beliefs and have split off into many and various traditions. I think this process would be true of any spirituality that lasts any length of time but I don’t know enough of other groups to talk about them. My concern when it comes down to choosing a specific Buddhist tradition is colored by the damage to core teachings of Jesus that I see some Christian religious groups have done over the centuries. I do not believe that Buddhism is exempt from this process of shifting a spiritual practice and ideology to a religious “ism”. One of the most powerful books I read that addresses this issue within the context of Buddhism is Handbook for Mankind by Buddhadasa Bhikkhu–the opening chapter entitled “Looking at Buddhism” is a very powerful look at the way Buddhism has changed and splintered over the centuries. “The real practice of Buddhism,” he writes, “is based on purification of conduct by way of body and speech, followed by purification of the mind, which in its turn leads to insight and right understanding” (19). He asserts that many of the “ism” aspects, the ceremonies and traditions and “add ons” so to speak, “obscure the real Buddhism and its original purpose” (16). (For Christians, I’m sure there are similar books, I think The Velvet Elvis by Rob Bell is a good one) I think it is well worth tracking down a used copy of Handbook for Mankind–but you can also read the whole thing, or at least the first chapter I’m talking about, online (this link goes directly to a .pdf file). There is also an excellent essay or talk of his found online about the essential points of Buddhism where he tells about a metaphor the Buddha made:

While walking through the forest, the Buddha picked up a handful of fallen leaves and asked the monks who were present, which was the greater amount - the leaves in his hand or all the leave in the forest. They all said that the leaves in the forest were much more, so much that it was beyond comparison. Even now, try to imagine the scene and see the truth of this, how much more they are, The Buddha then said that, similarly, those things which he had realized and which he knew were a great amount, equal to all the leaves in the forest - but that which was necessary to know, those things which should be taught and practiced, were equal to the number of leaves in his hand.

It reminded me of a verse in the Bible that notes that if everything there was to be known was written down, the books would fill up the entire earth–yet when Jesus is asked what the most important truth or commandment was, he said it was to love the Lord your God, and to love your neighbor as yourself. You had to love God, you have to love yourself, and you have to love your neighbor the same as you love yourself. A handful of leaves with love and compassion at the core. For Buddhism, it is the understanding and cessation of suffering.

And so, I have talked myself all the way around to the fact that while I believe it can be comforting, I don’t believe that choosing a specific tradition or branch of any religion is necessary, and sometimes I think it can be detrimental to spirituality because it sometimes obscures the very simple core truths that should be the focus of our path.