Thank you. My usual dodge is that I’m not a very good Buddhist.

Buddhism can START as a practice only. Belief is a function of experience (in my flavor, anyway…). If all you’ve ever known is theistic religion, I can see how you’d be confused.

That’s my experience also, although I might say “understanding” or even “postulation” instead of “belief.”

As to the religion vs. philosophy thing: My religion is Buddhism, but my philosophy is Atheism. As an atheist, I see belief in gods and such as somewhat silly; as a Buddhist, I see the enlightened nature in everyone. A religion is a practice (IMHO), whether you believe it requires a God or not. Belief is not the only prerequisite. Also, Buddhism can START as a practice only. Belief is a function of experience (in my flavor, anyway…). If all you’ve ever known is theistic religion, I can see how you’d be confused.

One last thing: I’ve been studying and practicing Buddhism for thirty-some years, and have been known to be prickly on occasion. As I recall, even the Buddhas have their moments!

Maybe it’s just me, but I’d have thought someone who spent twenty years studying Zen would be a little less prickly, defensive and condescending towards people who didn’t share her views.

Herm.

Either you’ve studied Zen for 20 years, and know what it’s like, and are a bit prickly yourself, or you haven’t, and are speaking in ignorance.

I can help you with that. It’s a methodology, or a program, to enable an individual to realize [undefinable thing]. Bodhidharma said, “Zen is a special transmission outside the scriptures, with no reliance on words and letters.” As I recall, the poet Gary Snyder called it a way of working with your mind. Serious students work with a teacher, but the teacher is a teacher, not a guru, as in some other spiritual disciplines. The primary tool is a particular meditation discipline called zazen, plus some academic and liturgy study (sometimes you need words and letters), and it often incorporates some traditional art or body practice (e.g., flower arranging, ink painting, martial arts). And, of course, there’s the whole Buddhist Eightfold Path thing as well.

I hope that clears it up.

Sometimes people confuse Zen with the undefinable thing, but that is not accurate. Zen is just a path of practice. It has no copyright on truth or reality. It’s always possible that staring at a lava lamp for 30 years would get you to the same place, but I don’t know anyone who’s ever tried that.

I used “worldview” precisely because I don’t know any better word and it seemed appropriately vague.

The more you know of it, the less you can speak of it.

The shame with Dawkins is that much of what is says is very true, but when he blows it, he blows it big. For that reason his criticisms of religion don’t hit religious people where they feel it. This is mostly because he doesn’t “get” religion or appreciate the nature of faith and belief as religious people understand faith and belief. Much of what he says is every bit as exasperating as the straw man nonsense the creationists come up with to criticize evolution.

But, as exemplified in this thread, you CANNOT explain this to a Dawkins groupie. Their minds are sealed shut. Note that I’m not trying to convert anyone, just trying to explain that religion isn’t what they think it is. If they could grasp what Dawkins is getting wrong it would make their arguments against religion more focused and more effective. But since (in their minds) all religious people are ignorant, deluded twits, they don’t listen. And this makes me crazy.

You are presuming the unstated. Neither I nor my friends, who – I hope – are representative of a more reflective subset of Zen tyros than those you correctly castigate, would ever say “Zen is a philosophy, not a religion”. We don’t know what Zen is and consider that part of the “Zen worldview” is considering any statement that starts “Zen is …” probably isn’t going to be very helpful. I used “worldview” precisely because I don’t know any better word and it seemed appropriately vague.

Neither would any say “only an ignorant fool adheres to a religion, so that if you follow Zen and think it a religion you must be an ignorant fool” – that would indeed be condescending and worse. (Besides, one of them is a major maha fan!) However to suggest that your criticisms of Dawkins aren’t convincing and your comment responses sometimes appear arrogant and unnecessarily hostile wasn’t intended to be.

- Charles

If someone is going to be condescending to me, as Michael and Charles are, then I intend to shovel it right back at ‘em. I am not your monkey.