Who Precicely are These 'Buddhists' I Keep Reading About?

Spellcheck sheet

I keep reading about what 'Buddhists' like and what 'Buddhists' do and what 'Buddhists' eat and who 'Buddhists' boink and what 'Buddhists' wear and I wonder precisely who the fuck these people are talking about.

Because I think, _I'm_ a 'Buddhist' but most of the time these things don't apply to me. Even when they're written by a 'Buddhist' in a cute little saffron colored robe.

Which is another thing, but I digress...

The problem is that the phrase 'Buddhist' is analogous to 'Western Religion.' There are just so fucking many different kinds of us. Often people compare it to using the phrase 'Christianity' with all it's bazillion little sects but in truth it's broader than that. Soto Zen has about as much relation to Burmese Buddhism as Episcopalianism has to Judaism. Sure, they're related, they have a lot of the same concepts, same holy entity same general view of the universe and creation.

But that's where it all ends. They don't really transplant well or even interact well some times. And it's the same for us. I don't know what the fuck Burmese folks do in there ceremonies or why even. In fact most of the things that Non-Buddhists think that 'Buddhists' do aren't consistent.

Let's explore some shall we.
1) Buddhists are vegetarian.
Well.... no.
I think you will find, in general a higher number of vegetarians amongst Buddhists than non-Buddhists but there's no consistent hard and fast rule. The traditional Mahayana monks weren't really capable of being vegetarian. Because they essentially begged for their food. Part of their life was to get up in the morning and go around town with their alms bowl collecting their meals for the day. Now they weren't allowed to kill 'living beings' (more on that later) nor have something killed for them or even be around when it happens. But when you are relying on other people for the entirety of your foodstuffs you really don't get to be very picky.
I'll have to come back and update this and add more later. It's twelve thirty and I was shooting for being in bed before 10. Various things have prevented that.

2) Buddhists meditate a lot.
OK, this one I think is true. I honestly can't think of a single Buddhist sect that doesn't place an emphasis on meditation. Some (*cough* Zen) Place a REALLY strong emphasis on it. Others like Pure-Land place much more emphasis on chants and less on meditation.

3) Buddhist wear robes.
FALSE!
This is one of my favorites. 'Buddhists' don't wear robes any more than 'Christians' do. MONKS wear robes, priests wear robes. It's the same in both groups. Lay people like myself and probably anyone reading this generally wear.. whatever the hell we want. Work clothes, jeans, dresses. Like any religious event folks tend to dress a little more conservatively, the idea isn't to be provocative. And in Buddhism where we spend a fuck-ton of time sitting in some version of crossleggedness* we often wear something loose fitting. But beyond that most of us wear street clothes.

4) Buddhist pray to the Buddha
Nada,
So most of us chant/pray/pay homage/honor/whatever you'd like to call it, to 'the Buddha' the definition of 'The Buddha' is a little squiffy in this context. First there's the 'Shakyamuni' Buddha who is the Buddha that became enlightened under a tree. Then there's the eternal spiritual Buddha that is essentially the same guy only, magic or something. He's usually called 'Tathagata' in Mahayana but I don't know if that's the case in Theravada. Then there's like 500 other or so Buddhas and Bodhisattvas mentioned in the lotus suttra that various Mahayanaists consider to be just analogies but the esoteric Buddhists may actually be chanting to instead of the Shakyamuni Buddha or the Shakyamuni as the Tathagata or what not.

N) I'm going to collect a few more and update this post.


But you get the idea. My wife keeps asking me 'What does Buddhism say about this' and I'm repeatedly forced to say 'Well that really depends on who you ask.' Which often sounds like I'm picking and choosing things to win arguments but it isn't. And often it doesn't require finding some crack-pot to prove that there's someone who believes a certain thing. The spectrum is broad as hell.

* I'm totally going to try and get that into the dictionary.

Buddhism and Allergies

I don't appear to be allergic to _anything on this earth_. However this topic has become very near and dear to my heart. See I've recently been diagnosed with a condition called Chronic Sinusitis.

It sucks.

In fact my allergist/immunologist had a more specific name for it that I've forgotten. chronic sinusitis which basically means, chronic sinusitis.

During my many conversations with said allergist one of the first things she told me to do was 'minimize exposure to particulate matter' Wash my cat or dog, use a really good vacuum, don't go dusty places, etc. Which got me thinking. In Buddhist ceremonies there's a lot of incense. Incence everywhere.

Even if it's a really mild Japanese incense like the stuff we use at the Zendo. It's still a lot Because we use it every time

Time to meditate - incense.
birthday of the Buddha - more incense
Service, start with incense, do some zazen (more incense) then light up some incence while we do our ceremony.

Heck I couldn't even guess how much incense gets burned at a sesshin or a zazenkai. How the heck do allergy sufferers deal with that.

I'm on a quest to find a nose plug like the kind swimmers use. Problem is that since it's November the swimming sections of the various all in one stores like target and wallmart have diminished considerably. I'm going to have to go to a sporting goods store but I haven't had a chance.

There doesn't seem to be much useful out there. I found an article on someone talking about HOW to make a nose filter. Then I found these freaky (but cool) looking japanese things I can't find in the us or even on a reasonably english speaking website. also these which seem like I'd like to try them but the website looks a bit sketchy and I'm honestly nervous about givin them my money.



UPDATE: I swear on the stupa of the world honored one himself that these did not show up on google when I posted this the first time less than a week ago but now it's at the top of the list. And they use paypal, I'm totally ordering some.

All the little bows

So there's a lot of bowing in Soto Zen. Well in Zen. Ok, in Buddhism.
But at the end of a period of Zazen we all say the Bodhisatva vow and the bow. I never really knew why and I always forgot to ask. I assumed we were bowing to the wall who has been a part of our meditation time. Or do the meditations space or to the other folks who have meditated with us.

But I do most of my Zazen in front of a closed TV cabinet. It's not a great wall nor even a great meditation space. And while I consider the whole world my meditation partners when I meditate There really isn't anyone in the same room with me.

unless the cat has decided it's time for cat tree Zazen.

But the other day I realized. We're bowing to the Dharma.

It sounds cheezy and maybe others won't agree to me but that's the way I see it. We bow to the Dharma because after all that's what is.
that's not a typo.

The Dharma is what is. It's everything. The Dharma while normally translated as Law or the truth or the words of the Buddha is also some times used as essentially 'nouns' the word Dharma also means things. Which only sounds weird until you dig deeper.

Dharma as 'Law' isn't law in the sense of the allmighty bob will smite you for your sins. Remember in Buddhism there isn't any judge. There isn't an old man with a beard that's going to tell you if you did right or not. Dharma is a natural law. It's simple, you do bad shit, bad shit happens to you. Maybe not now, maybe not even in this lifetime but bad shit will happen to you the more bad shit you do. And that goes for everyone and everything. The Dharma is natural law, it's everything. you drop a rock on your foot and it'll screw up your foot. The rock sits there and it will become a home to bugs, it will be worn down by the weather. It just is so it affects and is affected.

The rock is Dhamma, the rock is law, the rock is life.

Who knew rocks where so cool?
-db

The lotus suttra is freaky shiznit

The Wonderful Flower of the Dharma Suttra is no doubt a lovely and important text to modern Buddhism which I have 'always intended' to read but never gotten around to it due to just being busy, reading a ton of other crap and really not focusing on practice in any form for like 10+ years. So now that I'm getting down to brass tacs I've picked it up.

Now early on when I was looking around and trying to figure out where I wanted to go, did I want to stick with Zen, are there other forms of Buddhism that would be more suited to me, will I even be able to _find_ anyone to study zen with, I encountered the website of the Zendo I now attend. On their site they have a number of their Dharma talks posted. Amoungst them is a copy of a session of Dharma study and in it. Apparently nobody had ever read it and so Peter says "since nobody has read it I'll just start by reading it to you. It's probably better that way anyway because it's very repetitious and esoteric and it would probably confuse you anyway."

Now, no offense to Peter that struck me that while it might be true it seemed a bit egotistical. After all don't they have the right to figure out if it's confusing on their own? Maybe they're smarter than he thinks.

I totally agree now. I do NOT recomend reading the lotus suttra if you're relatively new to Buddhism. This thing is fricking wierd. I have no trouble with a lot of this esoteric stuff, people becoming buddhas, Brahma kings seeing the light of the buddha from ten lands away and coming to see him. Even the concepts of emptyness seems perfectly intuitive to me. I'm not having issues with that.

It's not that there are things in there that are hard to understand. It's that there are things in there that are so obscure that I don't even know if I"m supposed to care! There's pages of pages of the buddha reasuring all these bodhisattvas that they'll become buddhas and what the name of the land they will live in will be called. And the ground will be made of lapis lazuli and the roads oped off with gold ropes etc, etc.

Page after page anfter page.

So I've just decided to power through it and glean what I can then come back for it a couple of times. I'm not looking forward to reading it agian. That's a bigassed book. I'm like 1/2 way throuh and I"ve been going for weeks. I no longer look everything up. I keep a notepad handy for important sounding things but I really just feel I won't get it till I've read it a few times so I'm not going to bother to dig deaply. I'm just watering the houseplant. I'm not reaydy to maintain an httpd.conf file this late.

In fact I believe there's even a section at the beginning where he describes people who shouldn't be taugh the lotus suttra because it would just confuse them and push them away from the Dharma. Because it's fricking WEIRD.

And also totally amazing. There's soo much stuff in there I'm going to have to read it like five times. I'm not going to do that all in a row. After I finish this thing I'm putting it on a shelf. I have like 50 other texts on my list to read and then I'm coming back to it. Plus I have like years of meditation that needs to be done before I can understand other parts of it. Then I'll read it again. Eventually maybe I'll be able to understand like 1/10 of what it has to offer but that's going to take a while and I know that I'm going to have to be patient.

The Dharma and my nuts

Ok, really it's Zazen and my nuts.

I don't know about you but in loose fitting clothes sitting down on the little Zafu, turning around and getting situated I almost always end up on my nuts. Or at least on my sack. WTF. Luckily this hasn't happened at the Zendo yet. Only here at home.

But it makes me wonder. I know it's going to happen at the Zendo some day. What really is the proper way to get your nuts out from under you in a Zendo/Temple/etc. When is it ok to lean back and jam your hand deep into the front of your pants so you can pull the little guys out from under you.

Because honestly I really can't concentrate on my breathing at that point.