Buddhism and Christianity: The Buddha and what He Taught

[Garland-Green]

Article ID: DB565-1 | By: J. Isamu Yamamoto

This article first appeared in the CHRISTIAN RESEARCH JOURNAL, Spring 1994. The full text of this article in PDF format can be obtained by clicking here. For further information or to subscribe to the CHRISTIAN RESEARCH JOURNAL go to: http://www.equip.org/christian-research-journal/

Summary
In recent years Asian immigration to North America has risen dramatically, and with these people has come their Buddhist faith. At the same time many non-Asian North Americans have adopted Buddhism as their religion. In order to present the gospel effectively to both of these groups it is clear that Christians need to have a fundamental understanding of Buddhism. Siddhartha Gautama lived over twenty-five centuries ago, but as the Buddha his life and teachings still inspire the faith of millions of people throughout Asia. The Buddha rejected the religions of his day in India and taught a new approach to religion — a life not of luxury and pleasure nor of extreme asceticism, but the Middle Way. Even in the West many find Buddhism appealing because its principles seem sensible and compassionate.

I must confess: I love peaches. The juicy texture, the sweet fragrance, the luscious taste — I love everything about peaches. I always have. As a youngster I grew up in San Jose, California. During the fifties, San Jose was a small town nestled in the Santa Clara Valley. At that time it was a valley full of fruit orchards. Today it is known as “Silicon Valley,” and most of the orchards are gone. Forty years ago I could wander through orchards and enjoy cherries, apricots, and, of course, peaches.

One day I was with my dad, who worked in the orchards as a field hand. It was a hot sunny afternoon, and I was famished. When I saw a tree laden with peaches, I scurried over to it. There was one peach that was within my reach. I quickly noticed the red blush on its orange skin, and I knew it was ripe for my enjoyment. I touched it, and it felt soft and round in my hand. I wanted it.

Just as I was about to bite into it, my dad grabbed it out of my hand. He looked at it closely, and then he broke it open. A slimy worm was crawling around the core.

OBSERVATIONS AT THE PARLIAMENT
At the 1993 Parliament of the World’s Religions, held at the Palmer Hotel last summer in Chicago, I recalled this early lesson about discernment. In fact, three incidents occurred during the opening plenary session of the first day of this convocation, which was the centennial celebration of the World’s Parliament of Religions held in Chicago in 1893, when many of the Eastern religions were first established in North America.

Since I live in the western suburbs of Chicago, I gave myself an hour and a half to drive into the city, park my car, obtain my press pass, and find a seat in the Grand Ballroom where the plenary session would occur. It was not enough time, however, for by the time I entered the Palmer Hotel, all seats in the ballroom were taken. Initially I kicked myself for not allowing more time, but then I realized that God had it planned for a crowd of people to jam me against the lower end of a railing on a stairway going downward. As I looked over the railing, Parliament staffers were coming up the opposite stairway, clearing the path for the procession of dignitaries — the religious leaders who represented the many world religious traditions and who were to parade into the ballroom to commence the proceedings.

Soon a high official of the Parliament directed one group after another into the ballroom. What was amazing to me was not so much that I was an arm’s length away from these religious leaders, but the way in which this official commanded the movements of these people. Here were the leaders in the Hindu, Buddhist, Islamic, and Jewish faiths. There were also Sikhs, Zoroastrians, Jains, and even Wiccan priestesses. In addition, Catholic priests and Protestant clerics participated in this procession. But no matter who they were they all submitted to the directions of that Parliament official, who ordered them about like a police officer directing traffic.

A moment of levity occurred during the middle of this proceeding when the Parliament official cried out, “Where are the Protestants? Go get them!” He was obviously irritated that they had not promptly presented themselves according to his game plan. One of the spectators shouted, “They’re upstairs having a drink.” Loud laughter then erupted just as the Protestants scurried in with meek smiles on their faces.

This was the first incident in which I said to myself, “These people are like lambs led to the slaughter, but unlike lambs they have chosen to be compliant.”

After the entire procession had finally entered the ballroom, I hurried to the overflow room where televisions monitored the plenary session. One dignitary after another blessed the conference, such as Swami Ghahanananda of the Vivekananda Vedanta Society, Lady Olivia Robertson of the Fellowship of Isis, and Cardinal Joseph Bernardin of the Roman Catholic church. They spoke of harmony and peace, and how this Parliament was a gigantic step forward in achieving unity among the different faiths.

As long as they spoke into the microphone, we could hear them well, but if they didn’t, we could only observe them on the television screens. Most of the speakers used the microphone correctly, but one of the Native American speakers neglected the microphone and we didn’t hear anything he said. Strangely, however, as soon as he concluded his presentation, the people in the overflow room cheered and clapped enthusiastically.

Here was someone who could have said anything, and the people in the room would have demonstrated their highest approval. I was amazed at how easily swayed were the people who attended this Parliament. This was the second incident that reminded me of how alluring was that peach.

Toward the end of the plenary session, Rev. Gyomay Kubose of the Buddhist Council of the Midwest offered his blessing to the conference. Kubose spoke directly into the microphone, and his words were clear and easily understood. He too urged people to promote world peace and universal brotherhood. He said we must create harmony. He then read an ancient Buddhist poem, which said that there is one source, one law, and that “all life is one.”

How wonderful for Kubose and all the other speakers to encourage peace and harmony among different peoples of different faiths! Their words sounded good. They were certainly appealing. Indeed, they were enchanting. But were they really saying what we thought we heard? Was what appeared on the surface of what they were saying at the core of their beliefs as well? Can there really be harmony among all the world religions?

Since I have been a Christian for over 25 years and have seriously studied Buddhism for nearly 20 years, I believe there cannot be this harmony. Kubose’s words were a third indication to me that a very alluring, but also very corrupt peach was being presented at the Parliament of the World’s Religions.

In this article and the three that will follow, I would like to demonstrate how there can be no harmony between the Buddhist doctrine and the Christian faith. I will also reveal how we as Christians can show this difference to Buddhists who are currently living in our society.

In the past 20 years the number of legal and illegal Asian immigrants into North America has increased dramatically. In fact, estimates of the number of illegal immigrants alone entering America each year range from 50,000 to 500,000. With these people has come their Buddhist faith. Most Americans of Asian descent still are professing Buddhists, which accounts for a sizable population. For example, according to the 1990 U.S. Census, over 800,000 Americans point to Japan as their nation of origin. At the same time thousands of non-Asian North Americans have adopted Buddhism as their religion. Not surprisingly, there are now over one thousand Buddhist temples, monasteries, and centers in the United States.

Of course, Buddhists belong to many religious traditions, and in many cases it seems that there is little similarity between the various schools of Buddhism. Nevertheless, all Buddhists point back to the Buddha as the founder of their religion and accept certain fundamental principles that he taught. Therefore it is important that we preface our examination of Buddhism in America with a look at the life and teachings of this historical figure.

THE BUDDHA
Over three thousand years ago the Aryans (a powerful group of Indo-European-speaking people) spread in several directions throughout Europe, the Middle East, and South Asia. After conquering the Indus valley, the Aryans instituted Brahmanism (today it has developed into Hinduism) and the caste system in the Indian culture, which enabled the invaders to maintain the purity of the Aryan race and establish themselves as spiritual and social masters over the native Indians. The Brahmin (or Brahman) priests further centralized their power over all the castes and soon set up a religious monopoly for a privileged few.

In the sixth century B.C., a number of important religious traditions were formed. One was Jainism, which was founded by Mahavira and has survived to this day. Another was the birth of Buddhism, which was to rival Hinduism as a major world religion. The founder of Buddhism was Siddhartha Gautama, revered by millions of people throughout the world today.

The biography of Siddhartha Gautama was not written during his lifetime.1 The earliest available accounts of his life were collected some three hundred years after his death. Since then, both historical and legendary descriptions of his life have been included in the Pali Canon and Sanskrit accounts. Historians have debated where to draw the line between history and legend, but no one can know what are the facts. What follows is an account of the Buddha which most Buddhists accept but which almost certainly contains much myth. Nevertheless, whether the stories about Siddhartha Gautama be true or myth, his life has been and still is an inspiration and model for all Buddhists.

Siddhartha Gautama2 probably was born in 563 B.C. and died about eighty years later.3 His father was King Suddhodana Gautama, a raja (or chieftain) of the Sakya clan, a family of the Kshatriya (warrior-nobility) caste of ancient Bharata. His father reigned over Kapilavastu, a small district on the Indian slope of the Himalayas in a region that borders between India and Nepal.
At birth Gautama (his family name) received the name of Siddhartha, meaning “he who has accomplished his objectives.” He is also called Sakyamuni (“the wise sage of the Sakya clan”), Bhagavat (“blessed with happiness”), Tathagata (“the one who has gone thus”), Jina (“the victorious”), and, of course, the Buddha (“the Enlightened One”).

During Siddhartha’s infancy, the sage Asita4 visited King Suddhodana’s court and prophesied that Siddhartha would become either a great ruler like his father if he remained within his father’s palace or a Buddha if he went forth into the world. King Suddhodana believed that if his son observed human misery in the world, Siddhartha would leave his home to seek for truth. Naturally, the king wanted his son to ascend to his throne after his death. Therefore, he issued strict orders to his subjects that the young prince was not to see any form of evil or suffering.

As Siddhartha grew to manhood, he manifested extraordinary intelligence and strength. For example, at the age of sixteen Siddhartha won the hand of his cousin, Yashodara, by performing twelve marvelous feats in the art of archery.5 Siddhartha might have married other women, but if so, Yashodara was evidently his principal wife.

Meanwhile, despite the diligence of his father to sequester him from the sight of evil and suffering, Siddhartha decided to elude the royal attendants and drive his chariot four times through the city. During his excursions outside his father’s palace, he observed an old man, a leper, a corpse, and an ascetic.6 He realized from his observations that life was full of sorrows and that happiness was an illusion. Thus Siddhartha became aware of human suffering.

On the same night in which Yashodara gave birth to their son Rahula, Siddhartha left his family and kingdom to seek for truth.7 Siddhartha certainly anguished over his decision to leave everything he loved, but now that his son, whose name means “hindrance,” was born and could continue the royal line, he felt free to begin his spiritual quest. He took his faithful servant Channa and his devoted horse Kanthaka as far as the forest, where he shaved off his hair and changed his robes. He left them there and began a pilgrimage of inquiry and asceticism as a poor beggar monk.8

For six or seven years, Gautama sought communion with the supreme cosmic spirit, first through the teachings of two Brahmin hermits and then in the company of five monks. He practiced the traditional methods of asceticism such as fasting. Other physical austerities included sleeping on brambles to mortify the desires of his body and abstaining from sitting by crouching on his heels to develop his concentration. For long periods he ate nothing except a single grain of rice each day.

Despite all these efforts, Siddhartha did not succeed in attaining truth. Finally, in a moment of profound insight he realized that his life as an ascetic was of no greater value than his previous life as a prince. Self-torture was vain and fruitless; privation was no better than pleasure. He understood then the importance of what he called the Middle Way. Abandoning a life of extreme austerities, Siddhartha ate solid food. This act angered his fellow monks, who thought Siddhartha had weakened and succumbed to his physical needs. They promptly deserted him, thoroughly disgusted with his seeming worldliness.

On the wide bank of Meranjana at Gaya (a major city in northeast India) near the village of Urvela, Siddhartha sat at the foot of a fig tree (commemorated as the Bodhi tree). There Mara,9 the evil one, tried to thwart Siddhartha from becoming the Buddha, enticing him with worldly temptations during his meditations. Siddhartha withstood all the challenges and experienced the revelation of liberating awareness — the way that provides escape from the cruel causality of samsara (the cycle of rebirths). He discovered the Four Noble Truths, which became known as Pativedhanana, the wisdom of Realization. Siddhartha henceforth was the Buddha — the Enlightened One.
After his enlightenment, the Buddha was faced with a crucial decision. He could either renounce the world and withdraw with his knowledge as most monks did who thought they had attained spiritual truth, or he could remain with people and share the Four Noble Truths with those who also sought truth. Out of his compassion for others, the Buddha chose the later. Thus the followers of the Buddha believe that Buddhism is built not only on truth, but also on compassion — both wisdom and compassion are equally important to the Buddhist faith.

In the Deer Park at “Isipatana” (near the Ganges River in northeast India) two months after he had experienced enlightenment, the Buddha gave his first sermon, setting in motion the Wheel of the Law, the symbol of the Buddhist faith and of the Buddha as well. There he approached the five monks who had deserted him. At first they ignored him, but finally they sensed that he had achieved some kind of realization of truth. So they sat and listened to his teachings and were soon converted. He received them into the Sangha, the mendicant order that has spread the Dharma (the doctrine of the Buddha) and the Vinaya (the disciplinary regulations concerning Buddhist conduct).
For more than 40 years the Buddha dedicated himself to his ministry. Although he did not proselytize among the masses, he was concerned for others and was fired with a zealous sense of mission. The Sangha quickly grew. Many people were attracted to this man who was calm, reasonable, gentle, and who possessed a sense of humor.

The Buddha was 80 when Cunda the blacksmith served him pig’s flesh or, perhaps, mushrooms. He became extremely ill. Before he passed away, he sent a message to Cunda saying that he should not feel guilty for being the cause of his death, for it was destined to be. The Buddha died at Kusinara (modern Kasia) in the district of Gorakhpur. Just before his death, he exhorted his disciples not to grieve. His last recorded words were: “Decay is inherent in all component things! Work out your own salvation with diligence.”10

The Buddha probably never believed he was a god but rather that he was an enlightened human being.

THE DHARMA
Dharma is an Indian term, which can mean either conformity to one’s duty within society or the basic principles of one’s existence within the universe. In its general sense it is simply understood as the law of life. Within Buddhism, the Dharma took on a more specific meaning, being understood as the teachings of the Buddha.

After the death of the Buddha, his disciples convened their first council at Rajagrha, where they tried to organize his teachings within a system of doctrines on which they could agree. These teachings were then orally passed down to future generations of Buddhist monks within various Buddhist communities in India. About four centuries later, in about 80 B.C., Buddhist scribes finally compiled the teachings of the Buddha on paper, which became the Pali Canon. The written collection of the Buddha’s teachings is also called the Tripitaka (the “three baskets”) because they contain rules for conduct, methods for spiritual attainment, and the ethics taught by the Buddha.

Like many of his contemporaries, the Buddha protested against the aristocratic religion of his day, first because it was corrupt and tyrannical, and second because it was too refined and intellectual for the common people. His teachings were open to all who would listen, and they were taught incisively and clearly so that they could be understood and experienced.
The religious tyranny of the Brahmins in India was uncompromising. The Brahmins held that the opportunity for the union of the individual soul (Atman) with the Universal Soul (Brahman) was reserved for the sage caste and that only through numerous rebirths could lower castes enter into this caste. Since the spiritual hope of the Indian people was to someday become one with Brahman, this doctrine forced all other castes to submit to the rules of the Brahmin priests in order to attain to higher castes through rebirths. Not only this, but also it created an atmosphere of awe and fear of Brahmin authority.

Contrary to the prevailing Brahmin doctrine, the Buddha recruited disciples from all castes. According to him, nirvana (deliverance from suffering) is extended to everyone who strictly obeys the laws of a monastic life, not withstanding their caste prior to conversion. The Buddha, however, did not seek to abolish the caste system. Instead, he believed it was necessary for the framework of the temporal life. Since Buddhist monks were committed to the Dharma, only they were exempt from caste distinctions. Nevertheless, however much the Buddha accepted the caste system sociologically, his teachings on this issue were a gigantic step forward in reforming the religious corruption of his day in Indian culture.

In addition, the Buddha argued against the philosophical speculations of the Brahmin priests, who tried to join the concept of the soul’s oneness with God (Brahman) and the concept of reincarnation into a coherent theological system. The Buddha rejected these speculations as futile because he believed they prevented spiritual seekers from achieving true enlightenment. He considered such speculations as vain and nonproductive.

Furthermore, the Buddha rejected subservience to a supreme God and denied belief in an eternal self. His concept of karma (the transcendental effect in a person’s life of actions accomplished in that person’s previous existences) has sometimes been misunderstood. Certainly he believed that karma determines the kind of rebirth a person experiences according to past merit. The Buddha, however, did not believe there is a self or soul that is reborn. Instead, he taught that at birth there is a rearrangement of the elements of a person’s identity, which are called the “self” — much as a “chariot” is a name for a certain grouping of parts that can be rearranged to be something else while still comprising the same parts.

The Buddha also defined nirvana differently from the Brahmins. Whereas in Brahmanism, nirvana or moksha is attained when the individual soul becomes one with the Universal Soul, the Buddha held that nirvana is actually the termination of rebirths — that is, the identity of an individual is extinguished. One way to distinguish classical Hindu teaching from Buddhist teaching on this subject is to present the traditional metaphors taught in these two religions. In describing nirvana symbolically in classical Hinduism, the individual self is like the raindrop that falls into the ocean, becoming one with the Universal Soul. In describing nirvana symbolically in Buddhism, the identity of a person is like a candle flame that is blown out.

The Buddha taught that true nirvana is not immediately accessible — several lives are required to achieve it. He declared that if nirvana depended only on the suppression of all feeling and thought, then the deaf, the blind, and the insane could enter into it. Instead, he said the journey to nirvana is long and difficult, but the fruits of this spiritual quest are inner peace and harmony with all beings prior to nirvana and finally deliverance from suffering at nirvana.
The Buddha believed that suffering dominates the lives of all human beings, and he taught a practical way of deliverance from suffering. These teachings on suffering are the heart of the Dharma and are known as the Four Noble Truths: (1) the universality of suffering, (2) the origin of suffering, (3) the overcoming of suffering, and (4) the way leading to the suppression of suffering. The first Truth defines the nature of being; the second and third Truths develop various aspects of being; and the fourth Truth indicates a practical way to deliverance from suffering.

The first Noble Truth is known as Duhkha. The Buddha taught that all people discover that life is full of sorrow through the experience of birth, aging, and death. Contrary to the pantheism of Brahmanism which taught that a divine thread is woven in all beings, the Buddha spoke of the self as a temporal creation cursed with suffering until deliverance is achieved.

The second Noble Truth is Tanha. The Buddha taught that suffering is caused by the false desires of the senses that have been deceived into clinging to the impermanent world. A hopeless quest for immortality further aggravates human pain, either because people are obsessed with survival or because they fear the failure of obtaining ultimate peace.

The third Noble Truth teaches how deliverance from suffering can be attained. If the false desires of a changeable and perishable self cause suffering, then the desires need to be suppressed, abandoned, or rejected in order to nullify their effects. Ignorance of the way of deliverance and the delusion that there is a permanent self are the primordial cause of suffering.
The fourth Noble Truth is the Buddhist ethic, which the Buddha taught as the Noble Eightfold Path. It is a sacred path with eight branches called: right views or understanding, right aspirations, right speech, right conduct or action, right livelihood, right effort or endeavor, right mind control or concentration, and right mindfulness. These eight branches are not stages that can be lived out in succession or isolation from one another. Rather they are different dimensions of a total way of life.

According to the Buddha, suffering is the result of selfish desires that chain people to the wheel of insubstantial impermanent things. Living according to the Dharma aims at eliminating these selfish desires in ways described in the fourth Noble Truth, thus guiding the individual to nirvana.

Although the Buddha did not deny the existence of gods, he taught that the worship of gods obstructed one’s quest for nirvana. To him the gods inhabit the cosmos and are impermanent like all other living beings. Thus they too must escape rebirth through nirvana. Ironically many Buddhists revere the Buddha above the gods. What was important to the Buddha, however, was certainly not the worship of gods or himself but the following of his teachings.

THE SANGHA
After the Buddha addressed his first sermon to the five monks near Benares, he continued to preach the Dharma to his followers rather than to the masses. The five monks and those disciples who came later became the first Buddhist monastic order known as the Sangha, a society of Buddhist believers. During the Buddha’s lifetime, these Buddhist monks were wandering beggars and not priests. They tried to exemplify the way of deliverance through the conduct of their lives. If a person wanted to learn the Dharma and become a part of the Sangha, he had to become a beggar-monk.
Those who did join the Sangha were usually at least 15 years old. After one was accepted as a novice, his head was shaven to symbolize his renunciation of the world. He was then given a new name and a new robe. Finally, he made the vows of a Buddhist monk. Later, after having completed his term as a novice and having been accepted into the order, he again was given a new name and a new robe. At any time, as a novice or a full monk, he could return to lay life either temporarily or permanently.

The Buddha taught the Middle Way to his followers. He wanted them to abstain from self-torture as well as self-indulgence. Therefore, these early Buddhists renounced the world and material comforts, but they also rejected severe self-mortification.

Heated debate currently rages in Buddhist circles over the Buddha’s teaching concerning women in the Sangha. Certainly women had great difficulty being accepted into the Buddhist community. Some say the Buddha was deeply suspicious of women: since he taught against the physical temptations of the world, he must also have denounced the sensual attraction that women exercise on men. Therefore, the Buddha continually warned his disciples against the sinister guile of women.

For a long while, the Buddha apparently resisted having women in the Sangha, but finally he consented to their becoming a part of his wandering entourage of followers. Nevertheless, numerous restrictions were placed on the nuns. First and foremost, the nuns were subject to the authority of the monks in all circumstances. “A nun,” the Buddha laid down, “though she be a hundred years old must reverence a monk, rise on meeting him, salute him with clasped hands and honor him with her respects, although he may have been received into the order only that day.”11

Some Buddhists continue to hold this kind of attitude toward women within their Buddhist community. But other Buddhists argue that the Buddha went against the male chauvinism in his culture by permitting women to serve in prominent roles within the Sangha. His remarks about women, they say, were made because he could only communicate on the level that his listeners could spiritually grasp at the time. Later Buddhists would come to realize that women have equal value to men, which the Buddha already knew. It is indeed interesting that today the teachings of the Buddha attract a strong following within the feminist movement in the West.

Meanwhile, the laity during the Buddha’s lifetime were permitted to follow his teachings while they continued to live in the world. Although they could earn some benefits (such as material prosperity) for aiding the monks in the Sangha, the laity could not attain nirvana or receive any of the higher fruits of the Dharma (such as inner tranquillity). One significant benefit they could receive from their dedication to the Buddha and their generosity to the Sangha was that they could be reborn as a person who becomes a beggar-monk — for only total renunciation of the world leads to deliverance.
After the Buddha passed away, his followers continued to wander from village to village, spreading his doctrine of deliverance from suffering and receiving food, clothing, and sometimes shelter. As the Sangha grew, the Buddhist monks broke apart from one another, forming numerous groups with each interpreting the Dharma a little differently than the others.

During the rainy season, wealthy landowners would provide shelters for many of these groups of monks. In time one group after another would accept the patronage of a landowner. Thus monasteries were established throughout India, the Sangha eventually evolving from a society of wandering monks and nuns to a community of Buddhist monasteries.

Since a systematic Buddhist theology was apparently not put into written form until four centuries after the Buddha’s death, schisms split the Sangha as Buddhists within different monasteries argued over the content of the Dharma. By the close of the third century B.C., the Buddhists were separated into no less than 18 schools. Three major branches of Buddhism eventually developed: Theravada (“the doctrine of the elders”), Mahayana (“the Great Wheel”), and Vajrayana (“the Diamond Vehicle”). How these branches of Buddhism reveal themselves in the West will be the subject of my next three articles on Buddhism. At this point it is enough to know that the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha are known as the “Three Jewels” of Buddhism.

FURTHER OBSERVATIONS AT THE PARLIAMENT
As the various forms of Buddhism have arrived in the United States, there has been a general desire among these schools to achieve some type of unity. But just as the leaves of a maple have their source in the same tree, yet must inevitably fall and go their own way because of their individuality, so the individual Buddhist schools have divided and separated because of their difference in practice and doctrine, despite their common origin. Now the Eastern winds are blowing across the West and bringing with them foliage of a variety of shapes, colors, and designs, but all from the same tree.
How should we, as Christians, respond to the presence of these people who follow the teachings of the Buddha in our society? Should we demand that they get rid of their idols? Should we forbid that they teach their false doctrines in our Christian country? Should we tell them to go back to where they came from?

These questions came to my mind at the Parliament of the World’s Religions during one of the Buddhist sessions. The speaker, Havanapola Ratanasara, a Sri Lankan and president of the American Buddhist Congress, was enraged. Evidently he had come across a handout that Christians were passing out at the conference. After bitterly commenting on the handout, he read a portion of its content, which stated that the reader would be blessed “if you obey the Bible and cursed if you don’t….You may come here from another nation as an individual but you may not bring your gods, festivals, your temples and your priests, nor your statutory ways, because they violate the blessings of our country and bring on God’s judgment.”12

Needless to say, these words not only infuriated the speaker but also angered most of his listeners. At that moment the handout confirmed in their minds that Buddhism is a religion of tolerance and peace while Christianity is a religion of bigotry and ignorance.

In one sense, the teachings of Christ are intolerant. Jesus quite frankly said there is no way to the Father except through Himself. In another sense, this handout disturbed me as well. I don’t mind being ridiculed by nonbelievers because I believe that only in Christ can we find salvation. I do mind, however, when my witness is linked with a provincial and condemning attitude.

At a time when many countries are closing their doors to Christian missionaries, I welcome the opportunity to share my faith with Buddhists who are coming to our shores. Indeed, we should see the immigration of Buddhists to North America as an opportunity to share the Gospel with these people rather than a reason for God to angrily punish the United States and Canada. For that reason I want to examine the beliefs of the three major types of Buddhists who live in our communities in the next three issues of the CHRISTIAN RESEARCH JOURNAL — not for the purpose of equipping Christians with information so they can clobber Buddhists with the truth, but for the purpose of enabling Christians to intelligibly convey to them with power and grace the wonderful news that Jesus has died for them.
I have one final observation to share regarding my experiences at the Parliament. I attended another Buddhist session, which was held in a small room. There were about 20 people squeezed in this room to hear Yoga Guru, an elderly holy man from India, talk about Nagarjuna (Nagarjuna is as important to Buddhism as Paul is to Christianity) and the philosophy of emptiness in Buddhism.

After this modest gentleman spoke for about 10 minutes about Nagarjuna’s background, one of his listeners interrupted him. He, like most of the listeners, was a Caucasian Westerner who was not really interested in what Yoga Guru had to say. Instead, after briefly saying how wonderful are the teachings of the Buddha and Nagarjuna, he then encouraged all the people in the room to chant the sacred Hindu word OM. For the rest of the session, everyone — except myself — chanted this word.

From my 20 years of interacting with people of other faiths, I knew that these people were much like most Westerners who dabble in Eastern religions. They are far more interested in what they can mystically experience than what they can theologically understand. Using the metaphor of the peach once more, they would prefer to enjoy the consumption of the fruit rather than examine the quality of its content.

Clearly, how we present the Gospel to these people must be different than how we present it to Asian Buddhists. This is another subject that I would like to address in my upcoming articles on Buddhism.

The life and teachings of the Buddha can be quite enchanting with their emphasis on compassion and wisdom. The call for peace and harmony among people of different faiths can also be alluring. But what is the fruit that is really being offered? What will it cost those who partake of it? As Christians, we will resist such a temptation. But we must also be like my dad. We must open the fruit in the sight of Buddhists of all backgrounds so they can see what is crawling inside of it.

NOTES
1.My primary source for the biography of Siddhartha Gautama is The Life of Buddha as Legend and History by Edward J. Thomas (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969).
2.Devout Buddhists avoid the use of his personal name and refer to him as the Buddha.
3.Theravadin tradition dates his birth at 623 B.C.
4.Other accounts say he was visited by eight Brahmin holy men.
5.Other texts give her such names as Yasohara, Bhaddakacca, and Bimba.
6.Other accounts say he merely envisioned these four states of humanity.
7.Other accounts say he was born seven days before; others say that his mother conceived him that night.
8.Some accounts say his horse died of a broken heart and was reborn a god.
9.The name Mara is found in Sanskrit accounts outside of Buddhist texts in the identity of death, but not as a character. In early Buddhist texts, Mara appears as a demonic figure who personifies at various times evil, transitory pleasure, and death.
10.Christmas Humphreys, Buddhism (London: Penguin Books, 1951), 41.
11.Henri Arvon, Buddhism (New York: Walker and Co., 1962), 55.
12.This handout was produced by the Cumberland Missionary Society in Evensville, Tennessee.

Source  

[Garland-Green]

Theravada Buddhism: Southeast Asians Bring Their School of Buddhism to America
Article ID: DB565-2 | By: J. Isamu Yamamoto


Theravada Buddhism- A Summary Theravada Buddhism in North America is primarily associated with Southeast Asian Americans. It is a religious tradition with roots that go far back to the early days of Buddhism 25 centuries ago. Today the religious beliefs of Southeast Asian Americans are quite varied because this group includes peoples with diverse histories and cultures. While Vietnamese Americans are more inclined to Mahayana Buddhism, the other Southeast Asian peoples practice and believe in a religion that is a strange mixture of Theravada Buddhism and animism. Christians need to understand the cultural diversity of these peoples and comprehend the Buddhist strains that distinguish them.

Nobu Yamaguichi came to the United States with her husband in the early 1920s. She was a Japanese immigrant devoted to her Buddhist faith. Twelve years after they arrived in Watsonville, California, her husband passed away, and Nobu was left with a 10-year-old son to raise. Jimmy Yamaguichi loved both his mother and his country. So when he graduated from high school, he was torn between joining the army, which he had always wanted to do, and remaining home to take care of his mother. With his mother’s encouragement, he joined the army. To help her cope with loneliness, Jimmy got her a beagle puppy, which she named Bugle because she mispronounced what kind of dog he was. After the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and Japanese Americans were ordered to concentration camps, Nobu learned that Bugle could not go with her. For over a year Nobu and Bugle had been constant companions, and she loved him almost as much as she loved her son. Her heart ached, knowing that she would be separated from her dear friend. But of even greater concern to her was that Bugle might be destroyed if she couldn’t find a new home for him. One of her Caucasian neighbors, who was occasionally friendly to her, would always mention her Christian faith whenever they chatted. Since this woman had affirmed that Christianity is centered on compassion and forgiveness, Nobu thought she might give Bugle a new home. Although Nobu was naturally timid, her deep affection for Bugle compelled her to go to this neighbor and ask for help. Sadly the woman was so upset with the Japanese attack that she refused to even listen to Nobu’s request. And so, Bugle had to be put to sleep just before Nobu was taken away to camp. Two years later while still in camp, Nobu learned that her son had sacrificed his life along with hundreds of other Japanese Americans to save a Texas battalion somewhere in France. To this day whenever someone talks to her about the merits of Christianity, Nobu closes her ears and hardens her heart. Today a new wave of Asian Buddhists has immigrated to North America. As Christians, can we learn from past mistakes and more effectively demonstrate our faith in Jesus Christ to these people?

Theravada Buddhism: THERAVADA: ORIGINAL BUDDHISM?
Having encountered so many forms of Buddhism, I have often wondered: What was the original form of Buddhism when Gautama, the Buddha, held sway over a community of monks and nuns in India 25 centuries ago? To look back into time and observe the daily life of a follower of the Buddha is, of course, impossible. Equally impossible would be to discover that contemporary school of Buddhism whose religious philosophy and practice is the identical twin of the Sangha (Buddhist community) of Gautama’s day. Even if such a Buddhist school existed, how would we know that it is like Gautama’s Sangha or, more importantly, how could we come to a consensus that it is? Theravada Buddhism might be a key in understanding what Buddhism was like during its early days, since Theravada has tried to maintain the essence of the Buddha’s teachings without indulging in further revelations. The simplicity and the fundamentalism of Theravada Buddhism might be the clearest image of a scene now long past.

Therevada Buddhism: Historical Background
After the Buddha died, schisms continually rocked early Buddhism and subdivided the Sangha (the Buddhist community) into numerous schools and sects. The wide variety of beliefs and practices among the many schools further facilitated the spread of Buddhism, but it also blunted its ability to compete successfully with Hinduism in India. Since the words of the Buddha were not recorded during his lifetime, the transmission of the Dharma (the teachings of the Buddha) depended on the memory of his disciples and their understanding of what he meant. The traditional Theravada account is that in 477 B.C.,1 Kashyapa, the leading monk at that time, assembled a council of the disciples of the deceased Buddha in Rajagriha. During the meeting Kashyapa questioned Ananda, the Buddha’s closest disciple, concerning the Buddha’s discourses. Ananda’s answers constitute the Sutras (sermons of the Buddha). Also during that meeting, Upali, another close disciple of the Buddha, was questioned on the practical affairs of the Sangha. His answers constitute the Vinaya (the rules and regulations within the Buddhist order). The Buddhist schools responded to and interpreted the Sutras and the Vinaya differently. Two major philosophies eventually emerged within Buddhism — Theravada and Mahayana Buddhism. The adherents of Mahayana (“the Greater Vehicle”) Buddhism later referred to those Buddhists who held strictly to the letter of the Buddhist doctrine as followers of Hinayana Buddhism, the Little or Lesser Vehicle.2The Hinayana branch comprised most of the earliest schools of Buddhism. One early Buddhist school that predominated and survived resented the Hinayana label because it denoted an inferior method of Buddhism. This school identified itself instead by the name Theravada Buddhism, “the doctrine of the Elders.” Similarities can be drawn between early Buddhism and early Christianity. Buddhism had to overcome the fierce hostility of its parent Hinduism, just as Christianity had to with its parent Judaism. Both Hinduism and Judaism, as the established religions, attempted to eradicate what they regarded as heretical sects. Futhermore, the ruling authorities in both parts of the world severely persecuted each faith respectively until a later emperor decreed it a state religion. The ruler who favored Buddhism was King Asoka (? — 238 B.C.). He was the third emperor of the Maurya dynasty in India, and he has been referred to as “the Constantine of Buddhism.” Early in his reign Asoka was an ambitious conqueror who extended his power over much of the Indian peninsula. This ambition caused him to set his sights on Kalinga, a region on the east coast of India which had tenaciously opposed Mauryan rule. In 260 B.C., he attacked and defeated the forces of Kalinga. After the fighting, however, he became deeply grieved over the carnage and bloodshed of the battle. The gentleness and compassion of Buddhism gave Asoka solace for the guilt of his crimes. After he sought penitence in Buddhism, he studied the teachings of the Buddha and later instituted Buddhism as the state religion. About 245 B.C., Asoka assembled the third Buddhist council, which finally established a definitive canon (the Pali texts — see below). He also commissioned Buddhist missionaries to spread the teachings of the Buddha into foreign lands, possibly as far as Syria, Egypt, and Greece. This evangelism was successful in South and Southeast Asia, particularly Sri Lanka (formerly Ceylon). It was Mahinda, possibly a relative of Asoka, who introduced Theravada Buddhism to Sri Lanka, where it has flourished even until this day. Much credit, however, must go to Asoka for the diffusion of Buddhism because of his missionary vision and zeal. During the Gupta dynasty in India (A.D. 300—650), Buddhism apparently enjoyed its greatest success in that country. Nevertheless, Hinduism had far from disappeared from the scene. In fact, a Brahmin revival had occurred in India about the second century B.C. From then on, the Brahmins commenced an aggressive campaign against Buddhism. In the following centuries, Buddhism experienced periods of growth and persecution in the land of its birth. At the end of the Gupta dynasty, the Huns (a nomadic Mongolian people) invaded India and destroyed many Buddhist monasteries. In the eighth century, the reformation of Hinduism contributed to the progressive disappearance of Buddhism from Indian life. By the ninth century, Buddhism flourished only in those places where the state awarded it special privileges. Finally, the Muslim invasion of India ended the career of Buddhism in India after fifteen centuries. This culminated in 1193 when Muhammad Bakhtyai razed Buddhist monasteries to the ground and massacred Buddhist monks. Today the number of Buddhists in India is small (less than one percent); most of them inhabit North Bengal, where Tibetan influence has preserved Buddhism. Nevertheless, by the time Buddhism had departed from most of India, it had entered and become an essential part of many other Asian cultures. Theravada Buddhism can best be found in Burma (now called Myanmar), Cambodia, Laos, and particularly Sri Lanka. Yet even in Southeast Asia, Theravada Buddhism has experienced a history of ups and downs. It was highly popular during the immediate centuries following the birth of Buddhism. About the fifth century A.D., however, it began to decline and for 14 centuries it slowly withered. The 19th century was the turning point for Theravada Buddhism in Southeast Asia. First, the faith of the Buddhists was revived in reaction to the challenge of Christian missionaries who introduced their religion. Second, profound thinkers emerged to defend the ancient religion. Third, the translation of the Pali texts into Western languages gave it strength to spread beyond its Asian borders. At first Theravada Buddhism struggled weakly against the evangelism of the Christian faith in Southeast Asia during the nineteenth century. Four men, however, rose up to turn back the tide. Two were Easterners and two were Westerners. Mohotiwatte Gunananda was a Sri Lankan monk who studied both the Christian Scriptures and Western rationalist writings that were critical of Christianity. From his research, he formed arguments that he used to preach against the Christian faith. From 1866 to 1873, he publicly debated with Christian missionaries. These debates were published and distributed throughout Southeast Asia and the West. Henry S. Olcott, an American, read these transcripts and was impressed with Gunananda’s arguments. In 1875, Olcott and Madame Blavatsky organized the Theosophical Society, which has some of its roots in Olcott’s understanding of Theravada Buddhism. In fact, five years later he established the Buddhist Theosophical Society, which has been responsible for building numerous Buddhist schools in Sri Lanka. Needing an interpreter to communicate in Sri Lankan, Olcott enlisted the aid of Anagarika Dharmapala, one of the most dynamic thinkers of the Theravada tradition. It was Dharmapala who organized the Maha Bodhi Society in 1891, which has branches throughout the world. And it was Dharmapala who was primarily responsible for stimulating interest in Theravada Buddhism in the West through his speeches and writings in the early twentieth century. The spread of Theravada Buddhism would not have gone very far, however, had it not been for T. W. Rhys Davids. Davids founded the Pali Text Society in 1881, resulting in the translation of much of the Pali Canon into English. The English translations, in turn, stimulated wide interest in Theravada Buddhism, starting in England and rippling out to all parts of Europe and North America.

Theravada Buddhism- Theravada Today
Today there are about 120 million adherents of Theravada Buddhism, principally in Southeast Asia. Meanwhile, Theravada Buddhists who have immigrated to the United States primarily reside in San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, Seattle, Miami, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., New York, Boston, Minneapolis, Pittsburgh, New Orleans, and Salt Lake City.3 According to the United States 1990 Census Bureau, about a million people in the United States reported a Southeast Asian background, half of whom reside in California: Cambodians — 147,411; Laotian — 149,014; Thai — 91,275; Burmese — 6,177; Sri Lankan — 10,970; and Vietnamese — 614,547. These numbers, of course, do not reflect the vast number of illegal aliens in the United States. In either case, most of these people are either first or second generation Americans, and most of them are also Buddhists of some type.

Theravada Buddhism- DOCTRINAL DISTINCTIONS
The Buddha was primarily concerned with deliverance from samsara (death and rebirth — reincarnation) and the path that leads to nirvana (the extinction of the individual soul). He did not try to establish a new religion nor construct an elaborate philosophy. Instead, he taught his disciples a discipline that was based on the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path (discussed in Part One of this series). As a discipline, early Buddhism at once contained strength and weakness. On the one hand, it accommodated itself to most religious philosophies throughout Asia; this probably was the chief reason for the wide expansion of Buddhism in the East. On the other hand, it did not provide a refined, unified system of beliefs and practices; this was perhaps a major cause for the inevitable triumph of Hinduism over Buddhism in India. Theravada Buddhism is said to be the fundamentalist branch of Buddhism because it has preserved most of the original nature of Buddhism. By the first century B.C., Buddhist scriptures were collected and written in the Pali language, a vernacular descended from the Indian Sankrit language. These scriptures became known as the Pali Canon and serve as the foundation of Theravada beliefs and practices. The Theravadins believe that the Pali Canon is an accurate account of what the Buddha taught even though they acknowledge that a number of its discourses can be solely attributed to several of his disciples. Theravada Buddhism contains major points of doctrine that generally differ from the beliefs of Mahayana schools. Most significantly, the Theravadins revere the Buddha as a great ethical teacher but do not consider him a god, as do many of the Mahayanists. Furthermore, their teachings are reserved for the Buddhist monastics and not for the common people, another departure from many of the Mahayana schools. Nirvana is also limited to those select few who practice the rigid disciplines that are taught in the Pali scriptures. In Theravada Buddhism, believers are instructed to become arhats, Buddhist saints who have achieved their own deliverance from samsara. In Mahayana Buddhism, converts are taught to become bodhisattvas, great beings who are destined for Buddhahood but who delay this goal to help others achieve deliverance. The difference between these two Buddhist doctrines is that the arhat focuses on his own enlightenment while the bodhisattva seeks liberation from suffering for all creatures. Unquestionably the foremost commentator of Theravada Buddhism is Buddhaghosa, a Brahmin born in the latter half of the fourth century A.D. The Buddhists of South and Southeast Asia regard him as the father of their religion. He converted to Buddhism and traveled to Sri Lanka, where he compiled an extensive encyclopedia of Pali Buddhist literature that retains its authority to this day.

Theravada Buddhism- PROFILE OF SOUTHEAST ASIAN IMMIGRANTS
Southeast Asian Americans are a highly diverse population. Not only do they come from different countries, but also they include a wide range of people, representing different histories, languages, political beliefs, and even religions. They include the educated, families on welfare, affluent merchants, gang members, and respected community leaders. Nevertheless, they share common experiences, having been uprooted from their former homelands because of war and civil disorder and having suffered further hardships in order to arrive in their new homelands. Indeed, most have lost family members and everything they owned. Almost all of the Southeast Asians in North America prior to 1970 were students or diplomats and their families. These people came of their own free will. Since 1970, however, over a million Southeast Asians have fled to the United States alone. Unlike most immigrants to the United States who came here in search of the American dream, Southeast Asian immigrants are actually refugees who were compelled to leave their homelands because of severe persecution. In 1975, the first massive wave of Southeast Asians came to the United States because of the evacuation of American troops from Vietnam. Most of these immigrants were from South Vietnam, trying to escape from the Vietnamese communists. Many of them were educated professionals, business people, and Catholics. A high percentage of Southeast Asian immigrants sought asylum in the United States, whose government felt obligated to receive them. Despite attempts by the U.S. government to assimilate these people into its society, Southeast Asians encountered severe difficulties adjusting to their new social climate. “American ways were confusing to most refugees,” says William McGuire. “There was not enough understanding of such problems on the part of the social workers. As sympathetic as the social workers were, their background in the culture of the different Southeast Asian peoples was often inadequate. The idea was to help people give up their customs and adopt ‘American’ ones. That policy went against the traditions of the Southeast Asians and caused even more worries.”4 In time, however, most of the first wave of Southeast Asian immigrants successfully integrated into American society, both socially and economically. Meanwhile, they have maintained their cultural distinctions, remaining devoted to their dietary habits, family customs, and religious traditions. In 1980, the second major wave of Southeast Asian immigrants entered the United States. Horrible violence had erupted in countries such as Laos and especially Cambodia. Most of these refugees were uneducated people, such as farmers, laborers, and fishermen. They were less likely to know English or even read or write their own language. To add to their difficulty, the U.S. government did not establish reception centers and other programs to assist their orientation into this country as it had with the first wave. In addition, federal and state funds were not plentiful to help them. This second group of Southeast Asian immigrants also endured terrible hardships prior to their entry into America. First, the governments of their old homelands enacted harsh, and sometimes cruel, measures on people whom they deemed undesirable — whether they were the intellectuals and professionals in Cambodia or the ethnic Chinese and noncommunists in Vietnam. Second, after they escaped their homelands, they either suffered extreme atrocities at the hands of Thai guards in refugee camps in Thailand or became subject to the brutality of pirates on the seas as boat people. The psychological damage done to these people can hardly be overestimated. Having arrived in the United States, these refugees from Southeast Asia encountered further problems, the most important being the language barrier. At first, the U.S. government tried to spread the Southeast immigrants throughout the country to facilitate their integration into U.S. society, but the people missed the companionship of their own kind and social intercourse in their own languages, compelling them to resettle close together in pockets of different communities. One of the largest settlements is called Little Saigon in Garden Grove, California. Different Southeast Asian immigrants have their own distinct profiles. For example, many Cambodian refugees have suffered deep depression because of what they experienced and observed in their old homeland, where the brutal regime of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge massacred at least one million people in a country that had only six million people. This was known as “The Killing Fields.” Unlike the Vietnamese, whose religious beliefs are more a strain of Mahayana Buddhism with a strong influence of Confucianism, most Cambodians — as well as Laotians, Thais, Burmese, and Sri Lankans — observe a religious mixture of Theravada Buddhism and animism (the belief that nature and natural objects possess conscious life). Another group is the Hmong people from Laos. Since they had sided with the United States during the Vietnam War, many have had to flee from their homeland. Their adjustment to American society has been the most difficult of all because they came from a preliterate, tribal society. They have the highest percentage of people on welfare, and they cling to ancestral beliefs that cause them to worry about evil spirits, distrust modern medicine, and put their trust in shamans (medicine men). The American public has negatively stereotyped Southeast Asians based on some facts. For example, some Southeast Asian youths have formed gangs and resorted to violence, patterning their activities after big-city gangs. Many Southeast Asians live below the poverty level and readily accept menial jobs at extremely low wages. This negative stereotype, however, cannot apply to the majority of Southeast Asian Americans, who have made significant contributions to American society. For instance, these people have done well financially, thus paying taxes that far exceed what the government pays in welfare to other Southeast Asian Americans. Another example of their contribution has occurred in San Jose, California, which has the third largest population of Southeast Asians. They refurbished a rundown area in a shabby district of the city and transformed it into a thriving shopping center. From their own perspective, there have also been pluses and minuses for their children. On the one hand, a high number of their children are honor students and are faring extremely well in the American education system. On the other hand, their children, as they absorb American culture, do not pay them the same kind of respect that children extend to their elders in the old countries. The most important holiday of all Southeast Asians is their New Year,5 which is celebrated in late January or in February. Whether they are Buddhist, Confucian, or Catholic, they all participate in this three-day festival that occurs when the moon is full just prior to spring planting. During this time, they pray for the spirits of their ancestors and invite them to join the festivities. For Southeast Asian Americans, this annual event provides a way for them to link with their past life and history in their old homelands.

Theravada Buddhism- EVANGELISTIC SUGGESTIONS
Part One of this series on Buddhism in America offered an illustration of a peach — one that appeared sumptuous on the outside but was corrupt on the inside. An analogy was then drawn between this peach and Buddhism, a religion that is the spiritual sustenance for millions of people but ultimately will lead to their spiritual destruction. Theravada Buddhism is one of the three major branches of Buddhism, and it exemplifies how a religion can appear to be full of life but actually contain the vestiges of death. For its central doctrines, including those tenets identical and different from the other forms of Buddhism, conflict with the basic teachings of Christ. In addition, the peoples of and from Southeast Asia, many of whom subscribe to Theravada Buddhism, have an animistic mindset, which further enslaves them into spiritual bondage. It is strange that people can hold a Theravada world view and believe in animistic superstition. For example, the Buddha taught that speculation about spiritual beings hinders one from achieving spiritual enlightenment; yet animists are constantly concerned about appeasing spirits, particularly demonic spirits. It is at this point that Christians should understand that most Southeast Asian Americans who regard themselves as Buddhists are not learned students of their religion. Rather, they possess an elementary understanding of Buddhist doctrines and are more concerned with the religious rituals peculiar to their own cultural customs, which have been heavily influenced by ancient animistic beliefs. Therefore, one should not regard the following evangelistic suggestions as foolproof formulas pertinent to every Southeast Asian American. Instead, while implementing these suggestions, one should also consider the cultural distinctives of the person with whom one is sharing his or her faith, the depth of that person’s devotion to the Buddhist faith, and the intelligence of the person in so far as he or she can comprehend doctrinal and spiritual concepts.

Theravada Buddhism- Consider Language Difficulties
Many first-generation Southeast Asian Americans are still learning English. Naturally, one must converse with them as simply as possible. But even succeeding generations of these people — who are fluent in English — will not have been exposed to Christian doctrines enough to have a clue as to what words like atonement, sanctification, and resurrection mean. Thus, Christian concepts must be described to Southeast Asian Americans in terms appropriate to their experiences, intelligence, and education. More importantly, Christians should avoid theological abstractions, but instead illustrate their message with personal stories about sin, forgiveness, and God’s love. Casting Jesus’ parables into Southeast Asian American cultural experiences can be marvelously effective. In addition, Christians need to be aware that certain religious terms or phrases that have one meaning in a Christian setting can have an entirely different meaning to people of a different religious heritage. Tissa Weersingha, a Christian scholar and pastor in Sri Lanka, illustrates this point extremely well: “If a Buddhist were to be asked, ‘Do you want to be born again?’ he might likely reply, ‘Please, no! I do NOT want to be born again. I want to reach nirvana.’ The Buddhist quest is for deliverance from the cycle of rebirths. If a Buddhist confuses ‘new birth’ with ‘rebirth,’ the Christian message will be completely distorted.”6 Thus, avoid unexplained Christian cliches.

Theravada Buddhism- Distinguish Between Self-effort and God’s Grace
A central theme of Theravada Buddhism is that enlightenment, nirvana, or self-perfection can be attained only through one’s own efforts. Living a life of detachment from wrong desires and actions, practicing meditation, observing the required rituals, as well as performing any other duties demanded by their traditions are works devout Theravadins do either to achieve deliverance from earthly life or to be reborn as a better person. Again, one must be careful with terminology. Grace is a Christian idea quite confusing to Buddhists, especially Southeast Asian Buddhists. In fact, even when they finally do understand the basic meaning of God’s grace, they may regard the Christian teaching on salvation as simplistic and irrational. For example, how is it possible for an all-powerful God to allow Himself to be killed, or for that matter, executed in such a humiliating manner as on the cross? In most successful cases, it takes time for them to comprehend God’s love and forgiveness, their sin nature and their inability to resist sin, and the other issues that pertain to grace.

Besides their initial mental abhorrence to the Christian concept of salvation through the death of Christ, they must also overcome their deep cultural belief that in order for something to be gained, it must be worked for diligently. According to this value system, the higher the goal, the harder they must work for it. Thus their barrier to receiving God’s grace is not only intellectual but also cultural. God’s grace, therefore, must not appear to them to be a handout given frivolously, which it is not. Instead, they must understand that His great love for us reflects the value of this gift. In fact, God placed such a high value on obtaining salvation for us that it cost Him the death of His beloved Son. And God’s mighty power raised Jesus from the dead so that His grace would have eternal value for us.

Theravada Buddhism- Distinguish Between Nirvana and Heaven
Sometime in each person’s life he or she will ask the question, What will ultimately happen to me? The hope of Theravadins is that if they live a good enough life, they will be reborn to a more holy life than the one they presently live, and that finally, after a life as a Buddhist saint (arhat), they will experience nirvana — in which they will cease to exist altogether. Meanwhile, Christians have the assurance that they will be raised from the dead and enjoy eternal fellowship with Christ in His heavenly kingdom. It might seem incredible that people would cling to the hope of nothingness while rejecting the promise of immortality with a loving God, but the fact is that many do. Attachment to family traditions, present earthly pursuits, and disbelief in such a God as Christ obscure how much better the Christian hope is. It should be noted that most Southeast Asian Americans do not see a difference between biblical principles and the American lifestyle. For instance, it is difficult for them to understand the biblical view of God’s heavenly kingdom when so many American Christians are heavily invested in living a prosperous life in this world. We need to make clear the distinction between that to which the Bible has called us and that for which too many of us have settled. In recognizing this disparity, we can admit that some of us have fallen short but declare that others are being true to God’s calling.7
Theravada Buddhism- Be Prepared for Spiritual Warfare
Finally, we must recognize that when we share the gospel with Southeast Asian Americans, we become engaged in spiritual warfare. Of course, conflict with evil always exists, especially when we evangelize. But in evangelizing these people, spiritual warfare is particularly intense since they participate in idol worship, the veneration of the spirits of deceased ancestors, and ceremonial rituals for the purpose of appeasing evil spirits. The Christian message is that we need not fear evil. Instead of appeasing these spirits, we can confidently resist them in Christ, who boldly cast them out during His earthly ministry. Christ’s victory over evil spirits is frequently displayed in the Gospels, and the Christian should often point these passages out to Southeast Asian Americans to assure them of this truth. “Dear friends,” said the apostle John, “do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world…You, dear friends, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world” (1 John 4:1, 4). Thus the Christian should pray that God will bind these demons from their lives and show them that Christians have no need to fear evil spirits because the love of Christ is greater than any other force (Rom. 8:38-39).

Theravada Buddhism- FINAL THOUGHTS
After the Lord delivered the Hebrews out of Egyptian bondage and before they entered the Promised Land, God commanded them “to love those who are aliens, for you yourselves were aliens in Egypt” (Deut. 10:19). God’s command has not changed. As His people, we are to love those who are strangers in our midst. We — individually and as a church — are divinely called to provide for their needs, lobby for their rights, and share with them the greatest gift we can give them — the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And perhaps, like the Moabite woman Ruth, they will say, “Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God” (Ruth 1:16).

NOTES
1 Buddhist scholars disagree on the date. 2Yana means vehicle or the path one progresses to attain nirvana; Maha means great; and Hina means little. 3 Grolier Encyclopedia of Knowledge, vol. 10 (Danbury, CT: Grolier Incorporated, 1991), 49. 4 William McGuire, Southeast Asians (New York: Franklin Watts, 1991), 34. 5 The Vietnamese call it “Tet.” 6 Tissa Weerasingha, “Karma and Christ: Opening Our Eyes to the Buddhist World,” International Journal of Frontier Missions, July 1993, 103. 7 Two ministries are successfully bringing Christ to American Buddhists of Asian descent, but in different ways. One is the Sonrise Center for Buddhist Studies (Jim Stephens — [818] 797-9008, P.O. Box 4796, Panorama City, CA 91412), dedicated to informing and training Christians who are working to evangelize Buddhists. The other is Harbor House (Bill Squires — [510] 534-0165, 1811 11th Ave., Oakland, CA 9460 cool , devoted to meeting the physical and spiritual needs of Southeast Asians who are trying to integrate into U.S. society. In their own ways, both men are being true to God’s calling to bring these people to Christ while living sacrificial lives for Christ.

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[Garland-Green]

Jesus and Buddha: Two Masters or One?
Article ID: DJ660 | By: Douglas R. Groothuis

This article first appeared in the Effective Evangelism column of the CHRISTIAN RESEARCH JOURNAL, volume 25, number 04 (2003). The full text of this article in PDF format can be obtained by clicking here. For further information or to subscribe to the CHRISTIAN RESEARCH JOURNAL go to: http://www.equip.org/christian-research-journal/

Popular and prolific Buddhist author Thich Nhat Hanh reports in his book, Living Buddha, Living Christ, that his “personal shrine” contains images of both Buddha and Jesus, whom he deems spiritual brothers, both worthy of veneration. Given the current popularity of the Dalai Lama and books and magazines on Buddhist meditation and practice, it seems many Americans might also hold Hahn’s perspective. Those caught in the strong winds of religious toleration and relativism shrink from logically judging the truth claims of these great religious founders. Instead, people often assume that they were equally significant “spiritual teachers” who taught roughly the same thing. Accepting both Jesus and Buddha as enlightened beings is taken to be nonjudgmental, inclusive, and affirming of both Christians and Buddhists. Why bother considering one teacher above the other — especially in our contemporary pluralistic culture? How should Christians, who worship Jesus alone, respond to this pervasive notion that Jesus and Buddha were great spiritual masters on the same plane?

The essential religious truth claims of Jesus and Buddha differ radically from one another. To think otherwise is to ignore history, logic, and the well-being of one’s soul, since Jesus and Buddha proposed radically different spiritual paths. Jesus, in fact, warned that the path to life was narrow and that many fail to find it (Matt. 7:13). Jesus’ followers must not shrink back from the seriousness of His statement, especially in our pluralistic society.
Before comparing the basic teachings of Jesus and Buddha regarding God, humans, and salvation, one should point out to those enamored of the Buddha that the earliest written documents about the life of Buddha (563–483 b.c.) come about five hundred years after his death. In his edited collection, Buddhist Scriptures, Edward Conze notes that Buddhism has nothing that corresponds to the Christian New Testament, which is an authoritative canon of Scriptures written a short time after the life of Jesus.1 Let no one, therefore, take Buddhist records as hard history and then discount the New Testament for being too ancient to be historically credible.2

Two Virgin Birth Stories. Some try to narrow the gap between Jesus and Buddha by saying that both are recorded as having come into the world through spiritual means via a virgin birth. In their recent book, The Original Jesus, Elman Gruber and Holger Kersten go even further and argue that the story of Jesus’ virgin birth was borrowed from a Buddhist source that claimed the same kind of supernatural origin for Buddha.3 This is unlikely. First, this view overlooks significant differences between the two accounts. In the Buddhist account, the prehuman Buddha came in the form of a white elephant who entered the side of his mother. Religious scholar Geoffrey Parrinder notes that it “was not a virgin birth, since she was married, and in this story…it is celestial influence rather than a divine seed that enters her.”4 The Gospel’s account of Jesus’ conception and birth differs radically (Luke 1:26–35).

Second, the Buddhist sources are dated long after the gospels of Luke and Matthew. The Buddhist story comes from a fifth-century a.d. text and is absent from the most ancient Pali canon of Buddhism.5 If any borrowing occurred, it is more likely that Buddhists selectively borrowed from the Gospels than vice versa.6 The New Testament documents were all written in the middle to the late first century. According to renowned biblical scholar J. Gresham Machen, the virgin birth material had “been in existence only a few decades from the time when Jesus lived.”7 This is quite different from the late emergence of the Buddhist stories.

What about Jesus’ and Buddha’s essential worldviews, that is, their teachings on ultimate reality, the human condition, and spiritual liberation?
Two Views of Ultimate Reality. Jesus affirmed the existence and unity of a personal and moral God, who is both sovereign over history and involved with it. He taught His disciples to pray, “Our Father who is in heaven” (Matt. 6:9 nasb). Jesus never challenged the monotheism of His Jewish brethren but affirmed it and intensified its spiritual and moral challenges (Matt. 5–7).
Buddha, however, did not deem theological matters worthy of consideration. He regarded them as metaphysical speculations, unedifying and irrelevant to attaining spiritual liberation. He challenged key features of the Brahmanism of his native India but did not embrace belief in a Creator God as fundamental to proper spirituality. Buddha’s image is worshiped around the globe, but he never considered himself a revelation of God. He rather considered himself an enlightened teacher (“Buddha” is a title that means “the enlightened one”).

Two Views of the Human Condition. Human beings, according to Jesus, were created by God (Matt. 19:4) and ought to worship and obey God with their whole beings, as well as to love their neighbors as themselves (Matt. 22:37–39). Jesus taught that humans possess immaterial souls that persist after death and that will one day be reunited with resurrected bodies (Matt. 12:26–27; John 5:28–29). Jesus, however, also referred to humans as spiritually “lost” (Luke 19:10) and corrupt at their core (Matt. 9:13; Mark 7:21–23).
Buddha did not speculate about human origins but focused on the human condition as (1) suffused with suffering (2) brought about through unfulfilled desires (the first two of the Four Noble Truths, the essence of Buddhism). He taught that people cannot satisfy their souls with anything because they do not have souls. Just as a chariot has no essence, but is only a collection of individual parts, so the human person has no essence or substance; it is only a collection of parts or states called skandas. There is no personal essence or soul, and there is no personal afterlife. Buddha did not deny the Hindu doctrines of transmigration and reincarnation, but he denied that there is any individual soul that comes back in another form.

Two Views of Spiritual Liberation. According to Jesus, salvation is found in Him alone: “The Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost” (Luke 19:10 niv). Jesus viewed Himself as the only way to restore fellowship with the heavenly Father: “All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him” (Matt. 11:27 niv; cf. John 14:6). He claimed, moreover, to be God incarnate (John 8:58.). In light of this, Jesus beckons us to follow Him (Matt. 11:28–30) and to believe in Him for the forgiveness of sins and eternal life (John 3:16; 6:29). These claims, however, were not uttered in a vacuum. Jesus demonstrated Himself to be the divine Messiah through the wisdom of His teaching, His fulfillment of Hebrew prophecy, the unparalleled power of His miracles, His authority over the demonic world, His sacrificial death on the cross, and His own death-shattering resurrection.8

Buddha taught that spiritual deliverance was found by letting go of desire and the quest to satisfy the nonexistent soul, and by detaching oneself from impermanent things. This teaching is the Third Noble Truth. The Fourth Noble Truth is that salvation is achieved through effort, which Buddha called “the eightfold path.” It requires wisdom (right understanding and thought), ethical conduct (right speech, action, and livelihood), and mental discipline (right effort, awareness, and meditation). Those who succeed leave the realm of karma and rebirth and attain nirvana, which is the blowing out of the human personality in a state that supposedly cannot be described in words. Buddha did not claim to bestow this state upon others, he simply pointed toward it. He never claimed to be God moreover; nor did he raise the dead, heal the sick, or cast out demons. At age 80, he died.

According to the New Testament, Jesus came into the world as a supernatural agent of redemption, who accepted suffering at the hands of sinful humans that He might vicariously atone for the sins of a rebellious world estranged from its own Source of goodness and life. He embraced suffering on the cross in order to rescue those suffering from sin and its effects (Isa. 53). As one poet wrote, “No other God has wounds but thee.” The risen Jesus presented His wounds to doubting Thomas as proof of the efficacy of His mission (John 20:26–29).

The oldest accounts of the life of Buddha do not depict him as a supernatural figure but as an illuminated sage. Images of Buddha worldwide show a man sitting in tranquil contemplation with his eyes shut to a world he wants to transcend. How different from this posture was the defining act of Jesus, who, though nailed to a cross, bruised and bloodied, gazed in love on the world He came to redeem. Buddha taught the dharma (the way or teaching) to many others, but he never claimed to overcome death through his own death or to offer life through his own life. He only pointed the way to nirvana whereas Jesus opened the door to heaven.

The essential teachings and ministries of Jesus and Buddha cannot be reconciled or synthesized. No amount of religious tolerance or pluralism can erase the deep and sharp differences between these two identities, their worldviews, and their actions. By accurately defining these differences we do justice to both religious leaders while communicating the truth in love to those who would place them on the same plane.
— Douglas R. Groothuis

NOTES
1.Edward Conze, “Introduction,” in Buddhist Scriptures, ed. Edward Conze (New York: Penguin Books, 1959), 11–12.
2.On the reliability of the New Testament, see Douglas Groothuis, Jesus in an Age of Controversy (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2002), chaps. 2–3.
3.Elmar R. Gruber and Holger Kersten, The Original Jesus: The Buddhist Sources of Christianity (Rockport, MA: Element Books, 1995), 82–83.
4.Geoffrey Parrinder, Avatar and Incarnation (New York: Barnes and Noble, 1970), 135.
5.See J. Gresham Machen, The Virgin Birth of Christ (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1930), 339.
6.Ibid., 340.
7.Ibid., 342.
8.On the claims and credentials of Jesus, see Groothuis, Jesus in an Age of Controversy , chaps. 13-16; and Douglas Groothuis, On Jesus (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Thomson Learning, 2003), chap. 8.