Removing The Sheen From Buddhism

[Husky]

[quote name='Husky' date='10 July 2010 - 10:05 PM' timestamp='1278779252' post='107392']First, Buddhism tried to persecute local religions to extinction - for example, even later, it consciously and systematically attempted this in Tibet and succeeded (a decent book on the subject is better, but www.buddhistchannel.tv/index.php?id=40,5769,0,0,1,0 hints at a little on the Bon case, even though it also brushes over the difficulties and the extent of what has been lost).[/quote]Just going to paste stuff from that link:

Bon: Then and now

by Sonam Ongmo, Kuensel Online, Jan 18, 2008



B L Bansal, author of Bon: Its encounter with Buddhism in Tibet, says that Buddhist promoters in Tibet were very cautious seeking permission and patronage from the kings. But it was forthcoming as Buddhism “was a more humanizing force for an otherwise rough and warlike people.” Buddhism also seemed to be more egalitarian than Bon, which at that time subscribed to animal and human sacrifice. As a result, Bon practitioners suffered discrimination and even persecution. While some fled to other regions in the Himalayas, including Bhutan, others were banished to eastern Tibet. Those who remained were forced to convert. This led to an era where Bonpos hid their texts to save them from destruction. Karmay says that there is a difference between the Bon and the Nyingmapa tradition of hiding these termas. “Padmasambhava and his disciples are said to have hidden religious texts because their followers were not yet spiritually mature to understand them,” while “Bonpos had no choice but to conceal them.”

[color="#800080"](Read between the lines to gauge the extent of the persecution. For people to flee requires serious persecution. As in: Islam caused Buddhists of India to flee for countries to the north and south of India.)[/color]



The famous Dunhuang manuscripts, Buddhist texts that were discovered in a cave along the silk route in the 1900’s, contained some information about this era. According to Karmay, one of these was an attempt to “incite non-Buddhists to take up Buddhism.”



The text, he says, warns ordinary men against mu stegs, non-buddhist or Bonpos, and advises them not to believe in the mo bon, Bon priest. The text also warns against worshipping certain categories of beings like dre, srin, bdud, and bgegs.

[color="#800080"](Reminiscent of this.)[/color]



After its entry into Tibet during King Sontsen Gampo’s tenure, Buddhism continued to be challenged by Bon as the people’s belief in rituals and spirits were deeply entrenched. But by the time King Trisong Detshen came to power, Buddhism would gain a stronghold in Tibet with his invitation of great Indian saints like Santaraksita and Padmasambhava. He also built many Buddhist monasteries including Samye.



[color="#0000FF"]Padmasambhava, it is said, played a crucial, if not political, role bringing religious order to Tibet by subduing the dres, srins and bduds. Bansal says: “The Tibetans, who were steeped in superstition and felt themselves besieged on every side by malignant devils, welcomed the Guru in the fervent belief that he had brought them deliverance from their terrible tormentors.”[/color] Padmasambhava is also credited with leaving a special mark on Tibetan Buddhism, especially the Nyingmapa sect. Buddhism, which had already been assimilating practices and rituals from Bon, and vice versa, was now influenced by these new Tantric teachings.

[color="#800080"](Sounds like the usual self-promotion and painting the rival religion as having oppressive, superstitious and even inhumane beliefs and practices. Else no one would feel the need to buy the new religion.)[/color]



Bon adherents were not to be outdone though. They began discreetly translating Bon texts from the Shangshung language to Tibetan. They also began laying down their philosophical beliefs, by then already influenced by Buddhism, into writing. Some of these were also hidden.

[color="#800080"](Seems like the Bonpo weren't quite so bad as Buddhists made them appear. No retaliations of a similar nature from their end, let alone any violence: when they are described as "not to be outdone", all they did was translate their own texts into the current local language. So maybe the 'dangerous evilness' of Bon was all just the usual propaganda by organised Buddhism against other established and popular religions.)[/color]



When King Lang Darma came to power (836-42), Karmay says, Buddhism began to suffer a decline because the Buddhist clergy became hungry for more political power so the king reacted by persecuting them. It seems that the religious and political struggles eventually weakened the powerful country and both religions suffered setbacks when the king was murdered. What followed was a Tibet fragmented into principalities and into different sects of Buddhism.



By the eleventh century, as different sects of Buddhism grew, so did Bon which, by then, had become a fully organized religion with its own works of kanjur and tenjur. According to Per Kvaerne, a professor of History of Religions and Tibetology at the University of Oslo, the life of Tonpa Shenrab echoed similarities with that of Buddha Shakyamuni and even with that of Ling Gesar. But social discrimination against them persisted.



In 1679, the fifth Dalai Lama became the first ruler to embark on a “policy of reconciliation,” between Bon and Buddhists, says Karmay. A decree made Yungdrung Bon, Everlasting Bon, an essential esoteric teaching. [color="#0000FF"]After the Fifth Dalai Lama’s rule, however, “the Gelug theocracy gradually fell into the hands of fundamentalists and joined the cult of Shugden.” The reconciliation process reverted to where it was before, with hostility towards Nyingmaps and Bonpos. This attitude and situation remained unchanged until 1959.[/color]



Some time in 1988, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama visited the Bon Menri monastery in India, where the Bonpos had relocated to promote religious tolerance. “On this occasion, he graciously put on the Bon religious hat and held the sceptre of Tonpa Shenrab Miwo to show that he embraces the religion as did his predecessor,” writes Karmay.

[color="#800080"](So it's not enough to have repeatedly persecuted Bonpos in their homeland in Tibet and then driven them to India, now Tibetan Buddhists have to missionise them in India as well. Can't they leave these overtures well alone? These "reconciliations" seem merely to periodically swing back to the old Buddhist suppression of Bon.)[/color]

And interesting that the very religion (Hindu) always accused of persecuting Buddhism, Jainism etc. by dubious hysterians is not just the one that's actually been on the receiving end, but also the one that accepts persecuted populations of all sorts into the land and lets them exist in peace.

So India welcomed the Bonpos - who were persecuted out of Tibet by Buddhism - and gave them room to be. How very Hindu. And I bet Hindus didn't missionise among the Bonpos, just like Hindus don't missionise among the Tibetan Buddhists who have refuge in Bharatam either. It's called Live And Let Live. So what was all this about "compassion" that Buddhism/... "invented" and "introduced"? Seems like the Hindu Dharmic religion is the more innately compassionate in practice and outlook and didn't require the alleged lessons in this from other Indic traditions. Perhaps other Indic traditions are not necessary to explain the existence of compassion in old traditional religions? Excess violence against other creatures is not condoned and even discouraged in traditions outside India also. (It's a miracle! Or rather, seems like common, humane sense to me.)



This again:

The Buddhist notion of non-injury and compassion toward all living beings

Yet it seems to have remained at a notion - when it came to leaving other legitimate religions alone at any rate.





Related to #27 or #28 - about this ridiculous segment:

Why did the Chinese not follow Hinduism but follow Buddhism.

The obvious answer is that they're civilizationally too dumb to understand the intricacies and the depth of the philosophy of Hinduism.

(a) Enough with reducing Hindu religion to "philosophy" - when the latter refers to a *part* of Hindu religion.



Like the west did in the late 20th century, today's armchair Indians like to imagine that "philosophy" is the culmination of religion. But it is not. That is not what attracts people to religion either. (Besides, "philosophising" comes naturally to all heathens and requires no exertion.)

Religion is ever popular because the unconverted, unsubverted laity *like* their ancestral Gods. Christianism and the post-christian west groping for self-identity (and thus latching onto 'reconstructionisms of polytheisms') realise this. Even the fundamentally non-theistic Buddhism has had to reconcile with this.

But modern Indoos simply can't fathom it.



(b.) There is nothing "dumb" about the Chinese or their civilisation or their indigenous systems of thought. E.g. Daoist thought says things that Vedanta also says. It independently came to some of the same conclusions. <- Not hard to come upon (Hindus and Taoists weren't the only ones, one could point out at least one other non-'IE' religio-tradition with independently-derived, yet similar, understanding). Any later points of contact with this aspect of Hindu Dharma would have merely confirmed it for them.

People who know nothing about Daoism really should stop displaying their ignorance. I'm not claiming I "know" Daoism, I'm just saying that they *obviously* don't.



(c.) "Why did the Chinese not follow Hinduism but follow Buddhism."

The question by the Thai is all wrong.

Buddhism proliferated in far E and SE Asia precisely because Hindu Dharma had unintentionally paved the way: as I already stated, Buddhism had learned to spread atop a Hindu base, which is why Buddhism automatically used it again.

Previously - before Buddhism - Hindu religion (Hindu Gods and the views of them) had been easily incorporated into the local religions by these other Asians precisely because they are attracted to (their own, ancestral) Gods in a similar manner. <- The way Hellenismos spread easily in the non-GrecoRoman regions of the Mediterranean and in the ME for the same reasons.



(d) One more thing, but it is not trivial:

Philosophy is particularly a GrecoRoman religious concept belonging to Hellenismos. There are intentions to reclaim this religiously-important word from the way English and other christianised languages have abused the word by generalising/universalising it, and restore its (true) Hellenistic meaning. Best of luck to them.

In any case, access to the word 'philosophy' should certainly be denied to all the uppity people - incl. Indoos - who deny Gods or else sideline the Gods by making 'philosophy' into a major show and the Gods themselves into a minor one. Because Philosophy is intimately associated with the Gods of l'Olympe, from whom it derived. (Note how I didn't make the rules.)