Western Buddhists

Universality Rather than Authenticity

| arun

Over at the Guardian blog space, Naseem Khan writes about the notion of authenticity with regards to Buddhism in the West.

The question of authenticity is rather more complex, and central to the unfolding path of western Buddhism. But it’s not limited to it, as I indicated at the start. I tangled with the question as a student dancer, and also when I was involved in formulating diversity policy. The past 30 years in which we have come slowly (and painfully) to terms with other cultures have similarities to the issues that are raised over Buddhism’s path. Who do different art forms “belong” to? Clearly the arts must change when they come to the west if they are to express current realities. But it has often been a contentious issue, and not only with native speakers who wish to hang on to heritage. It has also been native Brits who often wanted to corral the arts into ethnic corners and could not see their wider relevance.

Importantly, she’s able to discuss a vision of “western” Buddhism without defining it in contrast with the traditional or eastern. Much appreciated!

Why Buddhism Doesn’t Need the West

| arun

In the Spring 2009 issue of Tricycle, David Loy’s “Why Buddhism Needs the West” predictably whipped up the Angry Asian Buddhist in me (again). When I got down to reading the piece a second time, his words began to appear less provocative and more simple minded.

From a Buddhist perspective, it would be naive to expect social transformation to work without personal transformation. But the history of Buddhism shows us that the opposite is also true: although Buddha-dharma may focus on promoting individual awakening, it cannot avoid being affected by the social forces that work to keep us asleep and submissive. It is the mercy of the West that those social forces need no longer be mystified as natural and inevitable.

These words didn’t explain anything to me, and I had to track down his article “Religion and the Market,” which presents the same notion in a different framework.

The great sensitivity to social justice in the Semitic religions (for whom sin is a moral failure of will) needs to be supplemented by the emphasis that the Asian enlightenment traditions place upon seeing-through and dispelling delusion (ignorance as a failure to understand). Moreover, I suspect that the former without the latter is doomed to be ineffective in our cynical age.

David Loy is simply a philosopher who wants Buddhism to merge with Western social justice to transform society and the world for the better. But he has no empirical argument to show that this can actually happen. He’s a philosopher doing what philosophers do best: enjoying that armchair. Buddhism doesn’t need the West “to realize its own deepest promise,” rather this is Loy’s way of describing how he’d like to make society fit his worldview. That’s great, but I think I’ll pass.

Buddhism Meets Cultural Entitlement

| arun

I write quite a bit about Asians and Asian Americans being marginalized by self-styled Westerners, and today Dr. Scott Mitchell takes on the complaints by these Westerners vis-à-vis discrimination by Asian Buddhists.

First and foremost, when having the racism-in-white-American-Buddhism conversation, invariably someone steps in with the quip that so-and-so Asian Buddhist community routinely excludes white people, routinely keeps white people from ascending the spiritual and/or political power ladder, etc., etc. When I hear this argument, I also hear my mom’s voice in the back of my head: “If all your friends jumped off a bridge, would you?”

I’m not trying to say that self-styled Western Buddhists have no basis for complaint. The post’s discussion is set in a historical framework that I personally wouldn’t be all too sanguine to sign off on, but importantly he explores the interaction of Buddhist identity and personal/cultural entitlement. I wonder if this back-and-forth all boils down to just that.