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Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation

guernicamag.com

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Re: Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation

#51

Post by CPLX »

Sure and the corporation has so mangled Christianity that it is now most associated with massive mandatory shopping sprees every December.

So what? Corporatism fucks up and subverts everything it can get its hands on. Buddhism remains a powerful and compelling religious practice.

Like most religious practices most people dip their toes in or only take the parts they like the best. It’s not like most Catholics are running around washing the feet of the poor.

Not sure exactly what insight this story thinks it’s conveying.

This article basically says Buddhism has two key elements, the more important devotional worship that westerners are ignoring, and meditation, which is sort of a fringe practice.

That’s pretty confusing as I think most people would say the main concept of Buddhism is the teachings of the Buddha. This article appears silent on the concept of dukkha, enlightenment, the eightfold path, the four noble truths, and so on and so forth.

As such it is utterly and completely missing the point.

Re: Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation

#52

Post by odiroot »

eurasiantiger wrote: post #41
bigpeopleareold wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True - frankly, I can find my God or my gods elsewhere (unless it is a religious organization!). It's the same as treating your job like a job and not a social club.

Buddhism explicitly denies the existence of gods.

I don't think Chinese Buddhists seem to care.

Re: Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation

#53

Post by coldtea »

omarfarooq wrote: post #24
nabla9 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who has spend long time meditating in Buddhist monasteries, I would say they don't care. Sutras are just teachings. You may learn from them and value them, but Buddhists are not "people of the book" like Abrahamic religions are. You don't have to parse everything Buddha and ponder it endlessly. Sometimes he just wondered about the future of the discipline. He also changed his mind when others presented arg…

> but Buddhists are not "people of the book" like Abrahamic religions are. You mean modern Buddhists aren't. Early Muslims considered the Buddhists they encountered as "people of the book." Source: https://www.shs-conferences.org/articles/shsconf/pdf/2018/14...

I don't think parent meant that Buddhist's aren't "people of the book" with the muslim meaning of the term.

Given the context, he probably meant they aren't "by the book", not strict about their scripture.

Re: Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation

#54

Post by omarfarooq »

meotimdihia wrote: post #50
omarfarooq wrote: post #4

How would these people react if they learned that the Buddha said his teachings were to last only 1000 years* if women were not included in the Sangha? And will only last 500 years after women were included?: > “But, Ānanda, if women had not obtained the Going-forth from the home life into homelessness in the Dhamma & Vinaya made known by the Tathāgata, the holy life would have lasted long, the true Dhamma would have…

I don't know how to explain it in English. But he didn't say his teachings were to last only 1000 years. Buddha said it is super hard or impossible to achieve Nirvana or became Arahant after 1500-2000 years. But if you never practice, you'll never achieve anything. Even Buddha needs 4 Asaṃkhyeya to become a Buddha. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asa%E1%B9%83khyeya

> Buddha said it is super hard or impossible to achieve Nirvana after 1500-2000 years.

Well, that I can agree with. Also according to the Buddha, there are signs that an enlightened being can display to prove their enlightenment. A simple one is that fire does not affect them. To prove his enlightenment, "Ānanda performed a supernatural accomplishment by diving into the earth and appearing on his seat at the council (or, according to some sources, by flying through the air.)"

This is the only modern evidence of anyone meeting the criteria: https://allthatsinteresting.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads...

Re: Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation

#55

Post by coldtea »

TedShiller wrote: post #27

> LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner calls his leadership style “compassionate management,” which he describes as “putting yourself in another person’s shoes and seeing the world through their lens or perspective,” and claims it is inspired by teachings of the Dalai Lama. It’s good corporate marketing but only skin thin: He’d still fire your ass in a millisecond if he needs to or wants to, regardless of your personal predicame…

Unless you're also willing to forego maximizing profits for this, it's just a BS for-show "putting yourself in another person's shoes".

Re: Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation

#56

Post by brodo »

mudita wrote: post #38
nabla9 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who has spend long time meditating in Buddhist monasteries, I would say they don't care. Sutras are just teachings. You may learn from them and value them, but Buddhists are not "people of the book" like Abrahamic religions are. You don't have to parse everything Buddha and ponder it endlessly. Sometimes he just wondered about the future of the discipline. He also changed his mind when others presented arg…

My own personal experience differed from yours. In a retreat in Burma I observed a lot of traditions, which made it very clear that men had a higher standing than women. When forming a line for going to lunch, the monks were first, then the laymen, then the nuns and then the laywomen; only the monks ate on a raised platform, but not the nuns or laypeople etc. This was not just old books, which nobody cared about, but…

There is sexism in Buddhism. I stayed at a Buddhist temple in Germany and there where way more rules for the nuns than the monks.

> "It is extremely important to note that world religions [...] are, naturally and inevitably, in large part compendia of rules for managing daily life." - John A. Hall, Ideas and the Social Sciences, 1993

This is why I think it's a good thing that western Buddhism exits. It gets rid of all the bad stuff. And there are really interesting insights in Buddhism, like the concept of non-self or the four noble truths.

Re: Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation

#57

Post by Lutzb »

eurasiantiger wrote: post #41
bigpeopleareold wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True - frankly, I can find my God or my gods elsewhere (unless it is a religious organization!). It's the same as treating your job like a job and not a social club.

Buddhism explicitly denies the existence of gods.

False. Even with a cursory understanding of buddhist tradition you should know that the many schools accept the existence of god-like beings, but differ on their influence of the buddhist practitioner.

You could start to increase your understanding by reading https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhist_deities or https://www.learnreligions.com/atheism-and-devotion-in-buddh...

Re: Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation

#58

Post by soulofmischief »

TedShiller wrote: post #27

> LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner calls his leadership style “compassionate management,” which he describes as “putting yourself in another person’s shoes and seeing the world through their lens or perspective,” and claims it is inspired by teachings of the Dalai Lama. It’s good corporate marketing but only skin thin: He’d still fire your ass in a millisecond if he needs to or wants to, regardless of your personal predicame…

Amazing. Weiner discovered the Golden Rule thought it was his own creation, repackaged it in corporatespeak.

"Compassionate management" should be the norm, and I'm suspicious of anyone who considers their own brand of management to be special for adhering to such a principle

I understand that Weiner has probably dealt with a lot of uncompassionate managers, but that should be treated as the exception to the definition of management and not the rule.

Re: Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation

#59

Post by unmole »

robinsoh wrote: post #23
amriksohata wrote: post #6

For Hindus, Buddha was just one of the 10 avatars of Vishnu and he came for a time and purpose. It was never meant to be a separate religion but just took Hindu teachings on meditation and enlightenment and got adapted into another "ism". All the core teachings lie in Hindu scriptures, including Yoga, Meditation etc.

> All the core teachings lie in Hindu scriptures What does "scripture" mean in this context? Scripture normally means messages 'directly' from the 'Abrahamic God' received by certain 'special individuals' (prophets, etc), such as the Bible, Quran, Torah. I thought Hinduism did not have any belief in any messages being sent from "God" to humans. So could you give some examples on what would be Hindu scripture and othe…

> What does "scripture" mean in this context? Scripture normally means messages 'directly' from the 'Abrahamic God'

Oxford disagrees: https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/definition/englis...

And Hindu scriptures is the example the lexicographers chose. Besides, the Old and New Testaments are traditionally attributed to specific authors. Only the Quran qualifies as scripture by your definition, not even the Hadith.

> I thought Hinduism did not have any belief in any messages being sent from "God" to humans.

The Vedas are considered revelation from the ultimate reality. There are other scriptures considered apauruseya i.e. of non-human origin.

Re: Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation

#60

Post by soulofmischief »

shp0ngle wrote: post #8

I’m a Catholic (so I have … my own view on Buddhism) but I lived in SEA for a long time. I want to say, this article is very good. The buddhism as practiced in the west has very little to do with actual practices in the east. But, Buddhism is also very confusing, and it’s hard to say “what is the true buddhism” (mahayana, therevada, vajrayana and zen buddhism in Japan (formally mahayana) are all very different)

To be fair, Catholicism has seen many branches over the year and only skirts by this "it's confusing" stuff by claiming it's the OG Christian sect, despite having massive shifts in policy over the years.
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