Right and what were we disagreeing over earlier regarding interpretation? — Janus

I didn't read it as a disagreement.

I told you already, there is an old dispute about the two truths doctrine in Buddhism
— baker
So what? I haven't said that Batchelor's position is entirely novel or original.

You were approaching the conversation from the perspective that we're disagreeing. I wasn't.

If the most reliable testament we have as to what Gotama actually said is the Pali Canon, and translator's interpret that freely, according to their own prejudices, then the only way you could possibly assess the accuracy of Batchelor's translations would be to be able to read Pali (and even then how would you free yourself from your own prejudices)?

You might get a sense of where he's coming from from "a few words" but you won't know anything of his arguments for holding the position he's coming from.

Even if, due to your own entrenched commitments, you are bound to disagree with someone's position, and you know that from "a few words" it pays to familiarize yourself with the arguments of those whose positions do not agree with yours, even if only to have a coherent understanding of just why you disagree with them.

I'm not interested in a scholarly analysis of an author's work, nor in painting an objective picture of Buddhism.

What drives me is the question whether the Buddha of the Pali Canon as I know him was in fact not trying hard enough to find satisfaction in "life as it is usually lived" (and that such satisfaction can indeed be found, by everyone) and that his teaching on dependent co-arising is wrong. This is a matter of great importance to me. I address it with people who say or imply that he didn't try hard enough and that he was wrong. Batchelor is an author who quickly proved himself irrelevant to my quest. This is all that matters to me as far as he is concerned.

What drives me is the question whether the Buddha of the Pali Canon as I know him was in fact not trying hard enough to find satisfaction in "life as it is usually lived" (and that such satisfaction can indeed be found, by everyone) and that his teaching on dependent co-arising is wrong. This is a matter of great importance to me. I address it with people who say or imply that he didn't try hard enough and that he was wrong. Batchelor is an author who quickly proved himself irrelevant to my quest. This is all that matters to me as far as he is concerned. — baker

Batchelor seems to me to be asserting that the view of Buddha as life-denying is mistaken and that satisfaction is to be found, if at all, only in "life as it is usually lived". Perhaps you should read his work first and then decide whether is irrelevant to your question. Or not...

I acknowledge that an enlightened person could know ("know" in the biblical sense of "familiarity") an enlightened disposition, a presence, openness and freedom from attachment that I don't, just as a great pianist knows a presence, openness and freedom I, as a pianist, cannot. — Janus

These are those dhammas, bhikkhus, that are deep, difficult to see, difficult to understand, peaceful and sublime, beyond the sphere of reasoning, subtle, comprehensible only to the wise, which the Tathāgata, having realized for himself with direct knowledge, propounds to others; and it is concerning these that those who would rightly praise the Tathāgata in accordance with reality would speak. — Brahmajāla Sutta

In the context in which those texts are memorised and handed down, the monastic orders, and some of the laity, devote themselves to realising just these states. That is their raison d'etre. It's in that context that the idea of 'higher knowledge' (Abhijñā) is meaningful.

I think the lurking problem behind many of these debates are the stereotypical ideas of religion - that religion means such and such, it's 'faith' not 'knowledge', and so on. A lot of that is deeply culturally conditioned by Western history in particular where 'religion' was defined in a particular way, and then modern culture defining itself to exclude that. That is behind such sentiments as 'all religions are the same' when really Buddhism is based on radically different principles and ideas to other religions.

As a consequence secular Buddhism tends to favour scientific realism, but that is a long way from traditional Buddhism.

[Traditional] Buddhism sees human existence as embedded in the condition called samsāra, understood literally as the beginningless chain of rebirths. From this standpoint, humans are just one class of living beings in a vast multidimensional cosmos. Through time without beginning all beings have been roaming from life to life in the five realms of existence, rising and falling in accordance with their karma, their volitional deeds. Life in all these realms, being impermanent and fraught with pain, is inherently unsatisfactory—dukkha. Thus the final goal, the end of dukkha, is release from the round of rebirths, the attainment of an unconditioned dimension of spiritual freedom called nibbāna. The practice of the path is intended to eradicate the bonds tying us to the round of rebirths and thereby bring liberation from repeated birth, aging and death.

Secular Buddhism, in contrast, starts from our immediate existential situation, understood without bringing in non-naturalistic assumptions. Secular Buddhism therefore does not endorse the idea of literal rebirth. Some Secular Buddhists regard rebirth as a symbol for changing states of mind, some as an analogy for biological evolution, some simply as part of the dispensable baggage that Buddhism drags along from Asia. But Secular Buddhists generally do not regard rebirth as the problem the Dharma is intended to resolve. Accordingly, they interpret the idea of samsāra as a metaphor depicting our ordinary condition of bewilderment and addictive pursuits. The secular program thus reenvisions the goal of Buddhist practice, rejecting the ideal of irreversible liberation from the cycle of rebirths in favor of a tentative, ever-fragile freedom from distress in this present life itself. — Bhikkhu Bodhi, Facing the Great Divide

Of course the concept of saṃsāra is remote not only from secular culture but even from Western culture as a whole, so I don't suggest that anyone should believe it. But in interpreting Buddhism, if that is lost sight of, then Buddhism really becomes not much more than a form of therapy or means of adaptation to a comfortable life (which is what many critics of Western Buddhism say it is).

I've read Stephen Batchelor's 'Buddhism without Belief' - actually I remember that when I bought it, one of the last books I bought at the Adyar Bookshop, the guy who sold it to me remarked semi-humorously that Batchelor was 'too Protestant for my liking'. I've heard Batchelor speak a couple of times and he reminds me a lot of faculty at a Comparative Religion department. He's a thoroughly decent chap, but I think his overall interpretation is shallow. I prefer one of his slightly older English contemporaries, David Brazier, who provides a good counter to Batchelor's secular interpretation. But on the other hand, Batchelor's approach lends itself to many of those who otherwise would be driven away by the implications of belief in saṃsāra and rebirth and the other supposedly supernatural aspects of Buddhism.

I read the article and, sorry to say, I found no counterargument to Batchelor's interpretation there. The states you say that some Buddhists devote their lives to realizing are states of non-attachment. I can't sustain that and nor can you, but I've tasted enough to know that such states are at the same time radically different to ordinary states and yet the same. As I said this is knowledge of a kind, but it is not any form of 'knowing-that'- it is instead a radical 'know-how'.

I wonder what makes you think that belief in Karma or rebirth would be necessary to the practice of Buddhism? Soto zen consists in 'just sitting' and that is understood to be no different than enlightenment. Vipassana relies on not dogma, but just on the stages of 'calming' and 'insight'. I think you are clinging to outworn ideas; and I think they are just another form of attachment.

I wonder what makes you think that belief in Karma or rebirth would be necessary to the practice of Buddhism? — Janus

It is a matter of fact that Buddhism incorporates those elements. They're obviously impossible to reconcile with what is normally called 'realism' hence a lot of people will simply ignore them or reject them, but it remains the case that they are inextricably part of the tradition. So in other words, I don't agree with the OP. And the reason is, that 'realism' in our everyday sense is actually built on assumptions, many of which or most of which are not obvious or may not even be discernable. So Buddhism goes further than realism, in discerning those assumptions which underpin the attitude that is normally called realism.

According to Batchelor there is little or no evidence in the Pali texts to suggest that Gotama was concerned with ontology or the question of truth. His argument is that Gotama was a pragmatist who discouraged metaphysical speculation and answered metaphysical questions differently depending on what he saw as the needs of the questioner. Buddhism, at least in some of its forms, has incorporated those elements, but from that it does not follow that the transformative potential of practice is at all reliant upon them.

Wright, like his Bay Area and Boston predecessors, is delighted to announce the ways in which Buddhism intersects with our own recent ideas. His new version of an American Buddhism is not only self-consciously secularized but aggressively “scientized.” He believes that Buddhist doctrine and practice anticipate and affirm the “modular” view of the mind favored by much contemporary cognitive science. Instead of there being a single, consistent Cartesian self that monitors the world and makes decisions, we live in a kind of nineties-era Liberia of the mind, populated by warring independent armies implanted by evolution, representing themselves as a unified nation but unable to reconcile their differences, and, as one after another wins a brief battle for the capital, providing only the temporary illusion of control and decision. By accepting that the fixed self is an illusion imprinted by experience and reinforced by appetite, meditation parachutes in a kind of peacekeeping mission that, if it cannot demobilize the armies, lets us see their nature and temporarily disarms their still juvenile soldiers. — Adam Gopnick's review of Why Buddhism is True

Definitely worth the read. He discusses Batchelor too.

Can we really tiptoe past the elaborate supernaturalism of historical Buddhism? Secular Buddhists try to, just as people who are sympathetic to the ethical basis of Christianity try to tiptoe past the doctrines of Heaven and Hell, so that Hell becomes “the experience of being unable to love,” or Heaven a state of “being one with God”—not actual places with brimstone pits or massed harps. Batchelor, like every intelligent believer caught in an unsustainable belief, engages in a familiar set of moves. He attempts to italicize his way out of absurdity by, in effect, shifting the stresses in the simple sentence “We don’t believe that.” First, there’s “We don’t believe that”: there may be other believers who accept a simple reward-and-punishment system of karma passing from generation to generation, but our group does not. Next comes “We don’t believe that”: since reincarnation means eternal rebirth and coming back as a monkey and the rest of it, the enlightened Buddhist tries to de-literalize the “that” to make it more appealing, just as the Christian redefines Hell. In the end, we resort to “We don’t believe that”: we just accept it as an embedded metaphor of the culture that made the religion.

Wish I could write like that (or, like that.)

Gotama was a pragmatist who discouraged metaphysical speculation — Janus

Buddhism nevertheless embodies a profound metaphysic, that of śūnyatā, however it is an experiential quality, not 'a doctrine' or 'a proposition'.

Buddhism nevertheless embodies a profound metaphysic, that of śūnyatā, however it is an experiential quality, not 'a doctrine' or 'a proposition'. — Wayfarer

I agree with that. I interpret śūnyatā to mean that things have no stable identity. If the idea of stable identity is due to our attachments to things then, releasing that attachment, we might see things as they are, in all their particularity, and not as stable generalized identities.

So, I'm not sure we are disagreeing about enlightenment being a radical shift of how we see things, but not in any doctrinal or propositional sense. I believe that such a shift of being is possible, to be sure.

When it comes to

Can we really tiptoe past the elaborate supernaturalism of historical Buddhism? Secular Buddhists try to, just as people who are sympathetic to the ethical basis of Christianity try to tiptoe past the doctrines of Heaven and Hell, so that Hell becomes “the experience of being unable to love,” or Heaven a state of “being one with God”—not actual places with brimstone pits or massed harps.

I would ask why we would need to tiptoe at all. Of course we must acknowledge that such super-naturalist beliefs have been an integral part of Buddhism in the past, but why would we be constrained to include them in our thinking now, any more than a good Christian would be constrained to believe in the literal existence of hell and damnation?

I would ask why we would need to tiptoe at all. — Janus

I think the gist is, that Stephen Batchelor and Robert Wright have to 'tiptoe' because they're both purportedly teaching Buddhist principles but are not able to endorse it's so-called 'supernatural' aspects. But as Adam Gopnick points out:

All secularized faiths tend to converge on a set of agreeable values: compassion, empathy, the renunciation of mere material riches. But the shared values seem implicit in the very project of secularizing a faith, with its assumption that the ethical and the supernatural elements can be cleanly severed—an operation that would have seemed unintelligible to St. Paul, as to Gotama himself. The idea of doing without belief is perhaps a bigger idea than any belief it negates. Secular Buddhism ends up being . . . secularism.

why would we be constrained to include them in our thinking now — Janus

I'm not so much 'constrained' as 'impelled', on the basis that I think the taken-for-granted 'naturalist' attitude is itself mistaken, in ways which its denizens, and I include myself, find hard to discern. As David Loy, another Buddhist writer, says, 'The main problem with our usual understanding of secularity is that it is taken-for-granted, so we are not aware that it is a worldview. It is an ideology that pretends to be the everyday world we live in. Most of us assume that it is simply the way the world really is, once superstitious beliefs about it have been removed.' And among those 'superstitious beliefs' are the fundamental principles of Buddhism.

As David Loy, another Buddhist writer, says, 'The main problem with our usual understanding of secularity is that it is taken-for-granted, so we are not aware that it is a worldview. It is an ideology that pretends to be the everyday world we live in. Most of us assume that it is simply the way the world really is, once superstitious beliefs about it have been removed.' And among those 'superstitious beliefs' are the fundamental principles of Buddhism. — Wayfarer

Yes, I've been struck by this aspect of modern secular Buddhism too. Do you consider what Wright et al practice to be Buddhism or is it simply secularism inspired by some Buddhist principles?

I met an earnest Liberal Catholic some years ago who insisted that he was a practicing Christian. Except he thought Jesus did no miracles, died on the cross, was not resurrected and that much of the New Testament was 'an insult to the intelligence'. (shades of the Jefferson Bible) I told him that I considered him to be a secularist with some handpicked Christian cultural values, but not a Christian. This irritated him greatly.

When do calculated changes and omissions made to a belief system transform that system into something else?

These are difficult questions, they're only easy for those who see them in black-and-white terms - either straightforward believers or out-and-out sceptics. I respect both Wright and Batchelor, even though I don't necessarily agree with their approach, but I'm more in favour of David Loy who strikes a better balance between the Buddhist and Western conceptions of enlightenment in my view.

When do calculated changes and omissions made to a belief system transform that system into something else? — Tom Storm

It happens continuously. If you take an historical view of Buddhism it has changed tremendously over the millenia - first the emergence of the Mahāyāna, then the Yogācāra , then Tantra. Buddhism has a way of dealing with that in terms of calling them the 'second' and 'third' turnings of the wheel of dharma. It managed to retain the core principles through otherwise massive changes. But everything is massively impacted by modernity.

(Strangely, perhaps, I have realised that I really do believe in the resurrection/. You may remember in the mid-teens, a rogue archeologist claimed to have found an ossuary containing the mortal remains of Jesus (very quickly dismissed by other experts). We had a rather heated dinner-table argument about that, with me saying that it would fundamentally and irrevocably change Christianity forever, and the others saying they couldn't see why it would be a 'big deal'. I ended up with a cup of tea thrown over me. )

Interesting, thanks. So often people are fixated by identifying a practice in its purity or as originally intended. Hence pietist movements like Hasidism or Islamic State (not that the two are comparable).

Buddhism has a way of dealing with that in terms of calling them the 'second' and 'third' turnings of the wheel of dharma. It managed to retain the core principles through otherwise massive changes. — Wayfarer

Would you contend that Buddhism has incorporated this ongoing dialectic or evolution in its approach? Do you have a view about phenomenology and how it might resonate with Buddhism?

I think all that matters is whether the practice of the so-called secular Buddhists is as effective as the practice of traditionally oriented adherents. I see no reason why it shouldn't be if the same levels of commitment are in place. In other words, I see no need to consider questions about rebirth or karma in order to practice zazen or insight meditation. The important element is single-minded commitment.

Whether we call secular Buddhism "real" Buddhism or not is not a matter of much importance; it will remain a matter of opinion..

So often people are fixated by identifying a practice in its purity or as originally intended. Hence pietist movements like Hasidism or Islamic State (not that the two are comparable) — Tom Storm

It's not simply an "obsession with purity", but a matter of efficacy. Can the newer developments that are occuring under the banner of Buddhism deliver, or at least promise what the older one(s) did?

Some of them don't even say that they can deliver the complete cessation of suffering, but offer only the minimizing or managing of suffering.

I think all that matters is whether the practice of the so-called secular Buddhists is as effective as the practice of traditionally oriented adherents. I see no reason why it shouldn't be if the same levels of commitment are in place. In other words, I see no need to consider questions about rebirth or karma in order to practice zazen or insight meditation. The important element is single-minded commitment. — Janus

But have you attained the complete cessation of suffering?

I think all that matters is whether the practice of the so-called secular Buddhists is as effective as the practice of traditionally oriented adherents. I see no reason why it shouldn't be if the same levels of commitment are in place.

No amount of commitment to the wrong practice can lead to the right results.

When do calculated changes and omissions made to a belief system transform that system into something else? — Tom Storm

In my view it's the core principles of practice and ethical principles which matter; the rest is disposable furniture. If the guy you spoke about follows the moral principles as given in the sermon on the mount, then he is a Christian in my book.

Does someone have to believe in hell and everlasting damnation to be a Christian? Does someone have to believe in the literal biblical story of creation and the fall as described in the story of Adam and Eve?

No amount of commitment to the wrong practice can lead to the right results. — baker

Secular Buiddhists, as far as I am aware, practice the same core way as traditionalists.

It's not simply an "obsession with purity", but a matter of efficacy. Can the newer developments that are occuring under the banner of Buddhism deliver, or at least promise what the older one(s) did? — baker

I think that's right too. What do you think of contemporary Wester secular Buddhism in its various expressions?

What drives me is the question whether the Buddha of the Pali Canon as I know him was in fact not trying hard enough to find satisfaction in "life as it is usually lived" (and that such satisfaction can indeed be found, by everyone) and that his teaching on dependent co-arising is wrong. — baker

This is more or less the question that preoccupied me 30 years ago. I personally have never felt dissatisfied by life, even though it has often been difficult, so the question lost urgency. A different question if you live in more dire or horrific conditions, no doubt.

If the guy you spoke about follows the moral principles as given in the sermon on the mount, then he is a Christian in my book. — Janus

I can't get there.

So, what beliefs exactly do you think are indispensable for one to hold in order to qualify as a Christian?

Secular Buiddhists, as far as I am aware, practice the same core way as traditionalists. — Janus

No. Secular Buddhists don't try to realize dependent co-arising. Traditionalists do.


Kamma and rebirth are actually implied in dependent co-arising, it's strange to try to consider them separately, on their own.

I think that's right too. What do you think of contemporary Wester secular Buddhism in its various expressions? — Tom Storm

They are religion/spirituality for rich people. They are an expression of (upper) middle class mentality, as is typical for any secularism. (Although not that its adherents would all actually be members of said class; mostly, they aren't, just aspire to be.)

What drives me is the question whether the Buddha of the Pali Canon as I know him was in fact not trying hard enough to find satisfaction in "life as it is usually lived" (and that such satisfaction can indeed be found, by everyone) and that his teaching on dependent co-arising is wrong.
— baker

This is more or less the question that preoccupied me 30 years ago. I personally have never felt dissatisfied by life, even though it has often been difficult, so the question lost urgency.

Then how come that it preoccupied you?
You said there was a time when you slept in phone booths -- and still, you did not feel dissatisfied by life?

But as Adam Gopnick points out:

All secularized faiths tend to converge on a set of agreeable values: compassion, empathy, the renunciation of mere material riches. But the shared values seem implicit in the very project of secularizing a faith, with its assumption that the ethical and the supernatural elements can be cleanly severed—an operation that would have seemed unintelligible to St. Paul, as to Gotama himself. The idea of doing without belief is perhaps a bigger idea than any belief it negates. Secular Buddhism ends up being . . . secularism. — Wayfarer

And whatever feel-good-feelings these secularists have in their "spiritual practice" come from their relatively good socioeconomic status, not from their "spiritual practice", and if anything, they have those feel-good-feelings _despite_ their "spiritual practice".

It's so easy to underestimate the religious/spiritual effects of a good socioeconomic status.

But on the other hand, Batchelor's approach lends itself to many of those who otherwise would be driven away by the implications of belief in saṃsāra and rebirth and the other supposedly supernatural aspects of Buddhism. — Wayfarer

Do you know if any of those people later move on to the more traditional forms of Buddhism?

No. Secular Buddhists don't try to realize dependent co-arising. Traditionalists do. — baker

Not true according to my reading; they just interpret the idea differently.

Kamma and rebirth are actually implied in dependent co-arising, it's strange to try to consider them separately, on their own. — baker

Do you have an argument to support that?

And whatever feel-good-feelings these secularists have in their "spiritual practice" come from their relatively good socioeconomic status, not from their "spiritual practice", and if anything, they have those feel-good-feelings _despite_ their "spiritual practice". — baker

Your pompous generalizing pronouncements are impossible to take seriously.

Start a new thread, to give this proper attention. Or better yet, just read the sequences on dependent co-arising.

Your pompous generalizing pronouncements are impossible to take seriously. — Janus

It's so easy to underestimate the religious/spiritual effects of a good socioeconomic status.

As I thought; you have no argument.

It's so easy to underestimate the religious/spiritual effects of a good socioeconomic status. — baker

So instead of argument you just repeat your assertion?

I read the article and, sorry to say, I found no counterargument to Batchelor's interpretation there. The states you say that some Buddhists devote their lives to realizing are states of non-attachment. I can't sustain that and nor can you, but I've tasted enough to know that such states are at the same time radically different to ordinary states and yet the same. As I said this is knowledge of a kind, but it is not any form of 'knowing-that'- it is instead a radical 'know-how'.

I wonder what makes you think that belief in Karma or rebirth would be necessary to the practice of Buddhism? Soto zen consists in 'just sitting' and that is understood to be no different than enlightenment. Vipassana relies on not dogma, but just on the stages of 'calming' and 'insight'. I think you are clinging to outworn ideas; and I think they are just another form of attachment. — Janus

It's so easy to talk about non-attachment when your life situation is such that you're in a flow of new things coming to you, with no end in sight. It's easy to detach yourself from this piece of cake when you see the next piece coming, or have so far had no trouble obtaining one.

According to Batchelor there is little or no evidence in the Pali texts to suggest that Gotama was concerned with ontology or the question of truth. His argument is that Gotama was a pragmatist who discouraged metaphysical speculation and answered metaphysical questions differently depending on what he saw as the needs of the questioner. — Janus

Ah yes, turning Buddhism against itself. As if the Buddha ever said, “Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and common sense.”

Look, what do you want in this conversation? Clearly, your spiritual practice is not bringing you non-attachment, or you wouldn't be here arguing for it.

The whole thing is even more ironic, given your earlier reference to Batchelor's rendition:

The priest without borders doesn’t seize on what he’s known or beheld. Not passionate, not dispassionate, he doesn’t posit anything as supreme. One who dwells in “supreme” views and presents them as final will declare all other views “inferior”— he has not overcome disputes." — Janus

If you don't posit anything as supreme, then what are you doing here?
To posit the view "nothing is supreme" as supreme?