You surely meant "assuming the pose of rattling your cage and fucking with you".

Basically, he just told us how Zen-Buddhists, particularly himself, are the toughest fuckers on the planet, spiritually speaking. But sadly, he failed to present any evidence of that.

What irritates me is that this article is apparently supposed to make me, as an atheist, want to self-examine and rethink things. This is actually one of my favorite ways to spend my free time, and I love being presented with new ideas and philosophies to mull over.

The problem is, I don't feel like I'm actually being presented with anything of substance, and instead am just being criticized for my way of thinking. I'm honestly not sure if I feel this way because the author failed to present me with new and interesting ideas, or if it's just because I tuned out all but the personal attacks. Therein, I think, lies the problem.

The patriarch of Zen Buddhism supposedly stared at a wall in meditation for years and cut off his eyelids when he fell asleep and then only accepted his first disciple after he cut off his own arm to show how badly he needed the Dharma. So I don't know where people keep getting the idea that Zen is about being a jolly fat dude.

I'm also curious as to when the SG News Wire has been about tolerance and respect, particularly on the subject of religion and politics. I mean isn't this site supposed to be "punk". Seriously, grow a nutsack. Insults and all sorts of offensive shit is spewed over it on a regular basis. It just seems that no one gives a fuck until its directed at a major demographic.

I also don't understand why people seem to think that our hardcore Buddhist punk has to be a happy simpleton pouring cotton candy fluff into your heads. Tthat is the
infuriating thing about Buddhism. No one can spoon-feed it to you and if they do then they are full of shit. Its very much a personal journey and even when someone manages to get some aspect of Buddhism across to you it can take years before any actual realization is made.

I think essentially one of the reasons this article was so inflammatory is because there was a lot of assertion that Buddhists are atheists and he wanted to get the point across very clearly that the two are not in fact the same. One might could find them similar seeing as Buddhism never asserts the existence of a god, or at least not in the sense that most people think.

Also, atheism is essentially a religion. Its based solely on the opinion of the existence of a God and in itself requires a leap of faith. Do you honestly believe that we understand the physical world around us enough to be accurately making any assumptions about the world we live in? In a world where quantum physics directly contradicts everything we know about the physical world where the light that bounces off of objects and onto our retinas is not only outdated information, but the simple act of perceiving that information changes what is present. Your senses are flawed and everything you perceive is wrong, based simply on the fact that you have perceived it. Trying to make massive generalizations about the universe is ultimately foolish. Get your head out of your ass and realize that we're all just a bunch of hyper-evolved monkeys living on a rock trying to figure something out that is ultimately beyond our comprehension.

Logic, science and religion are all the same fucking illusion.

Well, I'm both a buddhist and an atheist, and I dislike what I feel is BW's misrepresentation of buddhism. I find myself writing apologies for his column in the atheists' group on behalf of the atheist zone of buddhist thought.

It may be true that BW is trying to rattle our cages and make us self examine, but I think he's taking an exceedingly irritating and wrongheaded tack. It is commendable to want to make people look inward, but he's doing it on the basis of a simple, and elementary but important mistake, in that while he is quite accomplished as a buddhist practitioner, he fell into the snare of putting a name to the unnameable, "God", as a way of dealing with a sort of cognitive impasse where the mind has trouble dealing with the unnameable. How do you deal with what's beyond the reach of thought? BW is showing us one wrong way of doing so, and perhaps we should thank him for that and move on.

I am disposed to regard the labelling of atheists as being a religion is really just a defense mechanism that makes people who practice godthink feel like they're really fucking clever. The way I look at it, buddhism was in origin a philosophy, and remains that, but after 25 centuries and gazillions of people interpreting it, it has in a way become a spectrum of religions and philosophies.

But as I see it, religions are institutionalized frameworks of doctrine that provide answers to people who are not up to the task of dealing with difficult and important questions. Philosophy is the realm of contemplation, for people for whom the plastic jesus on the dashboard isn't enough to answer the questions that nag at them, whatever they happen to be for a given individual. Atheists have a broad range of dispositions toward getting wrapped up in big questions, but they do differ from the average religious person in that they tend to dislike credulity and naivete; they do not consider faith to be a solid basis for belief in anthropomorphised cosmologies, and they have a much stronger tendency to question authority.

In buddhism there are schools like Pure Land buddhism, where the adherents have faith in and believe in the founder of that school, and believe that when they die they will reincarnate in a pure land where conditions are conducive to attaining enlightenment. This is an example of buddhism having become a religion.

On the other hand, there is a saying among zen teachers that they cannot give their students even a drop of rain. When, for example, you are assigned a Koan like One hand clapping, what its purpose is, is to make you completely and utterly fail at understanding it on the basis of your ususal patterns of thought. You mind is a house of cards, and when it falls away you're in an open space where you can see a bunch of stuff that's always been there right in front of your nose, that you coldn't see because you were so obsessively trying to hold up your house of cards. This runs directly against what religion is about. It is about ultimately seeing for yourself.

To regard religion, logic and science as all being the same illusion, is in a way similar to believing in god on the basis of faith, you can argue the point until you're dead, and people will take up the standard for you for centuries thereafter, but it's probably not a good idea to accept that at face value given the available perspectives that strongly indicate just how wrongheaded it is. Unless you don't want to think about it.

And + 1 here too .

No, you're having it backwards. The term atheism is defined solely based on a person's opinion on the existence of a god. That's all atheism is about. You don't believe in a god, you're an atheist. It might have escaped your attention, but we atheists tend to not have atheist churches, atheist holy books or atheist preachers. It's not a "belief system", it's just one single, isolated belief, or, in a broader sense, just simply the absence of belief in a god.

This article comes off as some kind of overblown shadow projection from the weak minded.

"Whoah, look at me, I'm not comfortable with myself and neither are you, let me show you how to be a badass like me! Confront it, you must confront it!"

Used car sales people often have better pitches.

As for all the insulting the Atheist's stuff, that is really hardcore! Woot! I've been waiting for your interpretation of Buddhism since I found out about violent, war crazy Jesus.

Tolerance? Fuck that shit yo. My Buddha wears brass knuckles.

Fine, I'll give you that one. Bad wording @best. But I still stand by my position.

I don't think these words mean what you think they mean.
It seems rather pretentious that you don't think you need to evaluate yourself beyond the argument of God/no-God. I don't think it is intolerant to hold the opinion that people should do some introspection at some point or another. In fact it's quite disturbing that somebody would have a problem with this idea. Also it's clever how you removed the part of the original quote where 'SuperCrunch' cited he was making an example and not necessarily pointing anybody out. Pretentious to assume that people must be referring to you. . .
Are you finished? Good. Then allow me to retort.

First of all, you don't know what I have observed in my life that has shaped my personal beliefs where religion is concerned. So, yes, I'd say assuming any and all Atheists have not had any "self-examining" simply because they are Atheist is quite pretentious.

Second of all, "clever" has nothing to do w/it. I left it out because it was irrelevant to the point he was making (as he even mentioned himself).

Obviously you must not be a Buddhist practitioner else you would have never thought this. Which, in a way, I believe is Brad's point. It seems that the typical Western new-agey point of view of Buddhism is some lovely, jolly, everything-goes, it's-all-cool type dogma; this isn't quite so true.
Buddhism has a history of trying to be a sort of "in your face' albeit throughout time the words used have differed. Popular quotes such as "If you meet the Buddha, kill the Buddha" and "Buddha is shit on a stick" are often used to sort of shock the person into reality. Brad is doing nothing different in this aspect, and in fact one could argue is just carrying on the tradition of, as SuperCrunch mentioned, saying something to " rattle your cage and to fuck with you."
Thank you for reading infinitely into what was, in and of itself, a joke.

-TM

For Buddha's sake, next time would you please check your quoting before your edit time runs out? That'll be $2.95 for fixing your mess. *sagely shakes head*

What do you mean you haven't heard of angry in your face Buddha? The one that goes around killing people and shitting on sticks? I've heard he eats babies too, but that is an unconfirmed rumor. The shitting on sticks part, absolutely true. Don't forget, angry Buddha believes in God, disregard anything you know about Buddhism, because you don't know shit about killing the Buddha next time he rolls into town.

Seriously, you need to sit down and confront yourself, then tell everyone how hardcore you are!! Then tell them to confront themselves because it's edge play man. Kind of like shooting up, bungee jumping and playing sudoku all at the same fucking time, only more intense (and you wear white instead of black)!

So, I'd say peace out, but brass knuckle Buddha doesn't roll that way.

Shit on a big stick and kill it

The check's in the mail, you sexy bitch. I'm rather ashamed, to be honest.

-TM

I don't believe that putting a name on the unnameable makes it any less real or is somehow some great spiritual faux pas. Otherwise you'd just go around calling it "the unnameable". Which is putting a name on it. Getting pretentious over semantics seems to me to be as useless as debating the existence of a god. Many Buddhists have used the term god to define "the unnameable" as you call it. Its simply easier when speaking with lay-people, than discoing around an idea that no human could ever possibly understand.

Well an atheist has essentially resorted to science over religion as a basis for belief. Yesterday's science is todays religion and todays science will become tomorrows religion. Science is based on observation and logic, both of which are constantly changing and innately flawed. Given that our ability to perceive the world is infinitely limited in both quality and scope it is absolutely foolish to use our minute observations to make massive sweeping generalizations about the entire universe.

I'm not saying that having some sort of belief is wrong necessarily. Many people need something to believe in and spirituality is very much an essential part of the human condition. However, it is also very important to remember that our beliefs are based on flawed human logic and observation. So its stupid and arrogant to assume that we have our tiny monkey brains wrapped around such a huge aspect of our universe. And also thats why its fucking stupid to get bent out of shape when someone insults your religion, philosophy, science or whatever you want to call it, because its all just different degrees of the same arrogant, self-important, bullshit mentality that we all suffer from.

Nichiren is the BOMB.........

Thanks for all the comments. I do appreciate them.

You guys might be interested in this e-mail I received from one of my "Dharma Brothers" regarding the article. His name is Jundo Cohen. I'm sure he'd enjoy hearing your opinions on his teachings.

Here's his e-mail to me:

Brad,

You wrote this?

I met a stripper with a Three Stooges tattoo the other night at a bar called Tigress. She bitch slapped one of my companions hard while she gaveher a ferocious lap dance. Threatened my balls with spike heeled platform shoes. Hissed in my face that she was into edgeplay. She got giant fishhooks stuck through her back with which they hung her bleeding body fromthe ceiling till her screams careened off the hard brick dungeon walls. They pierced her labia with five-inch needles.

Ms. Edgeplay stripper wrenched my friend's nipples and stage-whispered to her how wet she was getting. As if I couldn't hear. Humped her leglike a dog in heat. God wasn't far away at all. If I ever doubted Her presence She showed it to me by grabbing my cock and telling me how She wanted to feel it inside Her.

I am going to go public, with every resource I have privately and on the internet to make you a laughingstock, to tell folks what I think of you, to embarrass you. I will speak out (you can fool others but you can't fool me ... you embarrassment to yourself, our teacher, all of us associated with this). It's not "edgeplay, man ... it's a 12 year old who giggles at the graffiti he drew on a bathroom wall. I will do what I can upon my return to Japan next month to stop the September Retreat at Tokei-in.

You are free to to turn your hanging out in nudie bars, getting "lap dance" from strippers into a profound "teaching" (there are fools born every minute who will buy it too. I think you are just a clown). But you are free to do it, and I am free to take the action I think is right.

You are a joke, and it is not a dirty one.

Gassho, Jundo

I cant normally be bothered to reply to articles on here as i'm not that interested in the opinions expressed in the comments and i'm sure no-ones interested in mine either but since there are a lot of negative comments i'm simply put a tick in the "this was a good article" column and leave it at that.