171–180 of 195 posts
What's the big deal:"a piece of Asia on the European continent", Europe and Asia are two parts of one continent, Eurasia
It seems weird Buddhism is such a minor religion in Europe while it is so rational, based on individual experience (rather than belief) gained through reproducible applied self-regulation techniques, backed by neuroscience and explained with consistent philosophical logic.
Are you sure? Perhaps you ought to read about Sokushinbutsu[0].
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Surprised this is the top thread and unchallenged. Buddhism arrived in China via the Greek Bactrian kingdom {{citation-needed}}. Buddhism arrived in the geographic region currently encompassed by the modern Chinese state via multiple routes over more than a thousand years including innumerable exchanges through the overall Tarim Basin (Xinjiang) or "silk road" area via modern Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan but…
My apologies for the mistakes in my statement. You seen to know much, much about this topic than me; thank you for adding the nuances this complex topic. My comment was based on my recollection of what I saw at the San Francisco Museum of Asian Arts and some of the descriptions I read there about the various pieces. In all likelihood, my recollection was either incorrect and/or incomplete. I cited the Wikipedia artic…
Most people have never heard of, for example, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanzhao https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Srivijaya https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%E1%BB%B9_S%C6%A1n https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajall_Shams_al-Din_Omar (forbear of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zheng_He ) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paduka_Pahala https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quanzhou#History etc.
After traveling broadly my biggest recommendation is to visit the Museum of World Religions in Taipei, Taiwan. It's a real gem.
It seems weird Buddhism is such a minor religion in Europe while it is so rational, based on individual experience (rather than belief) gained through reproducible applied self-regulation techniques, backed by neuroscience and explained with consistent philosophical logic.
As a child I had a subconscious assumption that Christianity wasn't rational, and maintained that view into my mid-twenties. Thankfully, I had the drive to do research on it, and an open enough mind to accept it, because I was ready to reject Christianity completely for a short period. I know this view isn't popular, but today, I see Christianity as the most rational philosophy/religion out there. I think it's been w…
You mean by 99.9% of the people. I have no doubt there is everything one may need to get enlightened in Christianity also but Christians have seemingly done amazing job obscuring that. And I can't recognize Christianity as rational because it requires you to just believe all the way through (in Buddhism as I know it believing is considered harmful, you are meant to experience it yourself and even then you are considered a fool if you start believing).
It seems weird Buddhism is such a minor religion in Europe while it is so rational, based on individual experience (rather than belief) gained through reproducible applied self-regulation techniques, backed by neuroscience and explained with consistent philosophical logic.
> Buddhism … is so rational … and explained with consistent philosophical logic. Are you sure? Perhaps you ought to read about Sokushinbutsu[0]. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sokushinbutsu
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Has that been continuously practiced? Other wikipedia pages [0][1] on the Sami suggest that they were all converted to Christianity by the end of the 18th century. There are people who practice Norse paganism today but that is a reconstructed faith based on old writings rather than a surviving religion. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianization_of_the_S%C3%A... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%C3%A1mi_peo…
It's unclear to me. The wikipedia article doesn't say, but it seems to refer to it in the present tense as though it is still practiced. I would hope if it died out and was then reconstructed, the entry would mention as much. Here's an article linked to in the entry, which I don't have time to read, but sounds promising: The Decline of the Sámi People’s Indigenous Religion http://www.laits.utexas.edu/sami/diehtu/siid…
I love how their home page has the Doge meme.
was it an ad? I dont see it...
Weird.
I always find it quite embarrassing when right-wing politicians here in Germany come up with this or that does not belong to Europe. In all cases this only shows their geographical and historical ignorance. Kalmykia is a good example. Most of these politicians have never understood that Buddism has been part of Europe for centuries. My favorite example, however, is that they mostly do not know that we have had a perm…
While Kalmyk Buddhism is geographically in Europe, it is in a very peripheral part of the continent with virtually no impact on European culture in general. So, it is still reasonable to claim that Buddhism is something foreign to Europe. After all, Buddhism only began to have a real impact culturally in the 19th century with translated literature coming from India and East Asia, not Kalmykia. With regard to Islam in…
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Indeed, before the Greeks The Buddha would most commonly only be depicted by his absence, an empty chair or foot prints most famously. It's amazing that the iconography of a religion so ancient and "exotic" is so significantly shaped by European culture.
Hellenism is not a strictly European culture. Most of the hellenic world population lived in Africa or the middle east. These were much larger population centers than cities greece, italy, or anywhere else in the European Mediterranean at the time.
It seems weird Buddhism is such a minor religion in Europe while it is so rational, based on individual experience (rather than belief) gained through reproducible applied self-regulation techniques, backed by neuroscience and explained with consistent philosophical logic.
Western/secular Buddhism popularized in the west is generally not the same as Buddhism practiced in Buddhist countries. The actual Buddhist religion teachings can include, depending on the branch: - Hell and heaven realms where you can get reincarnated into if you've lived an especially bad or good life - Various gods and demons - A timeline spanning trillions of years and hundreds of Buddhas - "Celestial Buddhas" th…