Temporary Ordination

I have had the view for many years that Sri Lanka was closer to the Buddha's teachings on one point than Thailand or Burma or Cambodia.  Thailand, Burma and Cambodia allow temporary ordinations, where a man is ordained as a monk with the intention of giving up the robes and returning to lay life after a period of time, commonly three days or three months.  Sri Lanka, as a general rule, does not, although there are individual teachers who will ordain a person for one week.

Although no one disputes that the Buddha allowed monks to give up the robes and return to the lower life (there are a fair amount of instances of this in the Tipitika), there is nowhere, at least that I had come across, a record of him ordaining anyone who had the intention to return to lay life.  The Buddha's intention in instituting the bhikkhu Sangha was clear - the person renounced the life of householders and went forth into the holy homeless life.  (It is still called the homeless life, even though it was only in the first ten years or so that all monks were literally homeless, wandering from place to place, sleeping under trees or on rocks.  The Buddha then allowed monks to stay in dwellings offered to them by the laypeople, and almost all monks nowadays do.  Some restrictions apply.)

The Apadana is a book in the Khuddaka Nikaya that had so far gone untranslated into English.  A few years back, however, Prof. Jonathan Walters published online his translation, Legends of the Buddhist Saints, in 2018.  Since it had never been printed, I obtained his permission (which, by the Creative Commons license he released it under, was not strictly necessary) and have printed a number of copies of the first two volumes.  (Please contact me if you would like one free of charge.)  

I recently came across a sutta in it, 288. Sattahāpabbajita (Renouncer for a Week).  The Apadana is about the previous lives of many different arahants under Sakyamuni Buddha, and their small acts of good merit under previous Buddhas, who experienced the fruits of their actions and who eventually became arahants (enlightened people) under Sakyamuni Buddha. Most of the suttas in the Apadana are about small acts of generosity towards a previous Buddha.  A few are about other meritorious actions. In this sutta, Sattahāpabbajita went forth (a standard Tipitika term for becoming a novice monk) for a week (!) after a rift among his family members.  

The fruit of this week as a novice (samanera) was that for the ninety-one aeons since he has not had a bad rebirth.  He declares that's the fruit of (a week's) renunciation.  And then in his last life, under Sakyamuni Buddha, he becomes an arahant.

So we have a clear Tipitika foundation for temporary ordinations, at least as a novice.  

This is one of the things I like about reading the Tipitika directly rather than books about dhamma by later authors.  One finds hidden gems that make things clear.

Central Tenet of Christianity

 The central tenet of Christianity, according to most Christians, is that Jesus, who is both God and the Son of God, can forgive you of your sins so you will not be punished for them in the after-life.

If the cause of suffering is God punishing you, then it makes sense that the cure for suffering is obtaining God's forgiveness.  If the cause of suffering is not God punishing you, then it does not make logical sense that obtaining God's forgiveness would cure you of suffering.  Of course, thinking such thoughts invites God's wrath and eternal punishment.

Buddhism is far more convincing in pointing out the cause of suffering as craving, and providing a path to the eradication of craving and thereby suffering.  The cause of suffering is ultimately within one's own mind and one's own actions.

Criticism

A Vajrayana Buddhist friend said that there are things he regards as Buddha vacana which he does not approve of.

Firstly, there is the question as to whether the belief that it is Buddha vacana is a reasonable one.  For example, the post-Buddha teachings (i.e. Mahayana and Tantra) that are put in the mouth of the Buddha, it is not reasonable to regard them as Buddha vacana.

Secondly, everyone gets criticized, there is no escaping it.  The important question is, is the criticism a criticism from below or a criticism from above?

What is a criticism from below?

A criticism from below is where a person says, "The Buddha was free of craving, lust, passion and greed, and spoke in favor of the abandoning of craving, passion and greed.  I am not free of craving, lust and greed, and do not approve that He was free of them and spoke in favor of abandoning them."

Or a person says, "The Buddha was free of anger, aggression and hatred, and spoke in favor of abandoning anger, aggression and hatred.  I am not free of anger, aggression and hatred, and do not approve that He was free of them and spoke in favor of abandoning them."  This is also criticism from below.

Or a person says, "The Buddha did not kill or otherwise harm sentient beings and spoke in favor of non-killing and non-harming.  He recognized abortion as a kind of murder, and did not even kill animals, and spoke in favor of non-killing.  I enjoy killing and the direct fruits of killing, and do not approve that He spoke in favor of Not Killing. "  This is also criticism from below.

Or a person says, "The Buddha did not steal.  I enjoy stealing and the direct fruits of stealing, and do not approve that He spoke in favor of Not Stealing. "  This is also criticism from below.

Or a person says, "The Buddha was free of passion, did not engage in sex at all, let alone sexual misconduct, and spoke in favor of abstaining from sexual misconduct.  I am attached to adultery, and do not like that He spoke in favor of abstaining from sexual misconduct. "  This is also criticism from below.

Or a person says, "The Buddha did not lie and spoke in favor of not lying.  I am attached to lying, and would have to revise some of my views and experience some consequences I would not like if I did not lie. I do not approve of this."  This is also criticism from below.

Or a person says, "The Buddha did not drink alcohol.  I am attached to alcohol, and do not like that He spoke in favor of abstaining from alcohol. "  This is also criticism from below.

Or a person says, "The Buddha was sane.  He had views which differ from some fashionable views.  I do not approve of disagreeing with fashionable views."  This is a criticism from below.

And what is criticism from above?  A person says, "It is good to abandon passion, aggression and delusion.  It is good to abandon killing, stealing, sexual misconduct, lying and drinking alcohol.  It is not good to harm others."

The Virtue of Unselfishness

When I was in a college, I saw a poster advertising an Ayn Rand study group and the book The Fountainhead.  Was disgusted by the summary of her philosophy, "The Virtue of Selfishness."  Seemed like portraying ordinary ignorance, selfishness, as wisdom.

Saw the movie recently The Fountainhead.  Finished it, and still wasn't sure whether it had anything to do with philosophy, or if it was just a movie that happened to have the same name.  The movie was certainly full of disreputable characters, and the protagonist didn't seem much better.  He was an architect who was loyal to his artistic vision and eventually got to design something according to his personal vision.

Like, so what?  He was fortunate that he won in the end, but that's all it was, was good fortune.  He had no morality, or ability to see beyond himself.  

It's depressing that there are people who think that this is somehow a commendable philosophy or a virtue.  I can be happy for an architect that he succeeded as an architect, but it was nothing more significant or commendable than that.  Everyone in the movie was selfish.  The protagonist was no different.  He had an artistic vision which he was loyal to, but this was no more selfish than anyone else.  So why pretend that the movie somehow displayed that selfishness is a virtue.

Rand was just an ordinary person lacking the ability to understand morality or virtue.  The world is full of them.

Truthfulness

 If your views cannot survive truthfulness, what does that say about your views?  What does that say about your life?

The Fig Tree Outside of Bethany

Dr. David A. Wood, a Christian apologist and expert critic of Islam, speaks from time to time of The Principle of Embarrassment.  His principle states that in ancient historical texts, details that are embarrassing to the point of view of the writer are the most likely to have actually occurred.  

Though Wood applies the principle only to the Quran and Hadiths, the principle, if sound, applies also to the Bible.  Under the principle, then a leading candidate for the most likely New Testament passage to have actually occurred is Matthew 21:18–22 and Mark 11:20–25. 

The next day, when they had left Bethany, Jesus was hungry. 13Seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, He went to see if there was any fruit on it. But when He reached it, He found nothing on it except leaves, since it was not the season for figs. 14Then He said to the tree, “May no one ever eat of your fruit again.” And His disciples heard this statement.

So let's look at the statement not from the intent of the author of the passage, but from what it reveals.  It is not presented as a parable but as something that actually occurred.  Jesus was hungry, saw a fig tree, hoped that it would have figs, even though it was not the season for figs.  He was not only disappointed, but got angry at the tree and cursed it.

He did not laugh at himself, saying, "Silly me, for a moment I expected to find figs on a tree out of season!"  No, he cursed the tree.  For this to have made sense, the tree 

• Would have had to have had the ability to produce figs out of season
• Would have had to have had free will
• Would have to have known that Jesus was hungry and needed the tree to produce figs just for him
• Would have to have known that Jesus was not just an ordinary person, but was The Son of God
• Would have to have refused to produce figs for him on the spot.

Any one of these elements missing and his anger and his curse would not have made sense.  This is not a problem if one admits that the Bible was written by many different ordinary human beings over many centuries or millennia.  It is a challenge if one believes the Bible to have been divinely dictated.  

The standard response of most Christian apologists is to focus on the author's intent in order to distract from the question of the literal truth of the passage and what it says about Jesus if true.  

Evidence for Jesus's Resurrection

 David Wood, PhD, is a Christian apologist and critical expert on Islam.  Prior to his entertaining channel on YouTube, the only accessible critical source of information on Islam was theReligionOfPeace.com. 

Although in the past Wood spoke mostly about Islam (in order to defend Christianity), he does sometimes speak about Christianity, more so as time goes on.  His most doubtful assertion is that the Resurrection is the best documented historical event.  There is only a single non-Christian contemporary mention of the crucifixion:  by Tacitus.  “Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of ... Pontius Pilatus”.  Tacitus, however, does not say where he learned of this.  Was it from Roman records, or from Christians?   There is no indication that the Romans kept records of their crucifixions.  

Since it is a given that the Resurrection is a Christian belief, then one might think that Wood’s claim could only be true if there was not a single piece of evidence of any other historical event of antiquity.  But he regards the Christian Biblical accounts as evidential.  

Wood does have some reasoning for this, however.  Since up to eleven of the apostles were martyrs, they would not have willingly gone to their deaths for the sake of something they knew to be a lie.

But there are many problems with this.  The logic only holds if the apostles were given the option at the point of the sword to renounce specifically their belief in the resurrection of Jesus.  There is no evidence that this was the case.  

Worthy of note is that there are many other accounts of people being resurrected in the Bible, both in the Old and New Testaments.  

Christians place a lot of emphasis on the Resurrection, even claiming that theirs is the only religion in which it could happen.  The Buddha lived 500 years before Jesus. Listed in the Tipitika (the Three Baskets, the Buddhist bible) are the powers that the Buddha had.  One of the powers he had, that he taught to his advanced students, was the ability to make copies of himself, that is, to appear in more than one place at the same time. Suppose Jesus developed this power by going to India in the missing 18 years in the Bible. (Ages 12 - 29)   They could then crucify a copy, leaving the original intact.  

In the Buddha’s teachings, the Dhamma, however, importance is given to seeing the reality of impermanence.  So such a stunt would have served no purpose to him.