(Edited for grammar.)
Quite tangential, but of interest to me, is that Buddhism as interpreted by American sensibilities is hardly the same creature as that native to the Asian cultures whence it arose.
In America, we are in the midst of a long-running cultural development reminiscent of a teenage rebellious streak. Mistrust of traditional authorities runs high. People caught up in this kind of thinking; let's call them sociorebels; perceive their society to be bleak, cynical, and antisocial—a message which has been continually reinforced by the mass media (which I do not use as an epithet in this case). However, their respect and craving for authority itself is undiminished, as likewise is their belief in a higher moral truth which attributes meaning to their other beliefs. Thus the solution, for most of them, is to reexamine their views—or perhaps to examine them for the first time—and excise all that which is deemed harmful or unhelpful, while embracing new viewpoints. In this process, most people arrive at some variation on the same conclusion as to the state of Western society: good ideas, bad implementation. The sociorebels affirm democracy but excoriate “politics.” They affirm education and science but excoriate “elitism.” They affirm business and enterprise but excoriate “corporations.” Most significantly (to this discussion), they affirm spirituality but excoriate “religion.”
I do not want to sound entirely dismissive. These people get a lot farther, philosophically speaking, than do the more numerous ones who never outgrow their childhood indoctrinations. They are sincere in their evaluations, even though some of their criticisms are inaccurate, incomplete, or outright wrong. And some of their criticisms are spot on; that's worth saying. The problem is that these people don't go far enough. They question the world, but not themselves. Throughout their participation in society's collective, countercultural rebellious streak, their fundamental premises change little if at all. That's how they can, inordinately to the point of irony, arrive at the same, not-so-foregone conclusion (“good ideas, bad implementation”): It is a conclusion charged with self-validation. It implies that the individual who draws it is essentially correct and virtuous, and therefore not in need of major reconstruction. (Fascinatingly, by lack of self-awareness, conscious knowledge of this bias eludes them.) Love, freedom, mercy, family, faith...a conviction in these principles survives. By corollary, it means that most of such a person's outward attitudes about society can remain intact, sheathed with a protective layer of the very cynicism they lament. Most of the time, it is a declaration which ends with “The world is screwed up.” That is easily said, technically correct...and totally useless as a finale.
Disappointing, isn't it? Even sad: People who manage to escape the lowest levels of human thinking, often through much personal discomfort, end up scarcely any more in possession of the truth than when they began. For that to change they would have to examine their core premises too; then they might be in the position to actually get somewhere. But in that case they would have a profoundly higher challenge to meet, which is why most of them never do it: Even to perceive the possibility is difficult. This is the road which leads to J, and not relevant here.
Instead, I point out that, because of its origins in and similarities to what you might know as the “hippie” movement of forty years ago, I see the current phenomenon as a nephew to that hour in our recent history. That too was an era of erosion of the regard in which traditional authorities had been held, and, although the actual power of those authorities would resist degradation for some years, their long-term decline is not discountable. We are in the midst of something similar now...all because a relatively thin slice of our society is questioning the greater pie.
It is easy to see how Buddhism would fit into all of this. Where religion is concerned: Among these sociorebels, the vast majority—having been brought up in Christianity—begin their criticisms at home. Many of them are ready and able to dissociate themselves from doctrinal belief in the Christian god in particular, without abandoning their underlying impulse to believe in something divine, and even in many cases without abandoning their fondness for Jesus and his teachings. It helps that Jesus himself can legitimately be interpreted as, if not a libertarian, at least a revolutionary, who was as interested in building his own, “righteous” power as dismantling that of others. (And I remind you that the rebellion against authority here is situational; not elemental.) Why not take the best of Christian teaching and dispense with the actual religion? That is the question which ultimately leads some of these social rebels to a favorable impression of Buddhism. For some others, it is disillusionment with the Christian god altogether. Christianity is an extremely hierarchical, submission-driven religion. Buddhism is not without these characteristics, but, in large part because the divinity proposed by Buddhism is so distinct from the personified, anthropomorphic god of the Abrahamic tradition, many disillusioned souls are apt to look at Buddhism and see—you guessed it—spiritual truth. Among both groups—the ones who leave Christianity with amity and those who leave with enmity—sociorebels are still allured by what they perceive as spiritualism, but are wary of organized religion as they know it.
These people aren't invariably going to flock to Buddhism. With so many avenues of resort, only a few wind up at Buddhism's door. (I should mention at least once, for the truly obtuse among you, that, in turn, the overall populace in America is much larger than the sociorebels with whom I am concerned in this discourse.) Many will remain Christian, choosing simply to dissociate themselves from the church scene—that is unless they join a church specifically (and hypocritically) premised upon spurning organized religion in favor of individual interpretation. Others ditch their Christian affiliation and go through a period of spiritual wandering, but do not wind up associating with Buddhism. There are many alternatives, the neopagan religions being a significant alternative. Some do not choose to affiliate with any religion; they go “non-religious” in self-description and express their faith in a custom fashion (and thereby remain religious, regardless of the word they use to describe it: faith in the divine is religious; spirituality is religious). Some truly do go nonreligious, in their mindset if not by declaration. Even so, it needs to be pointed out that these people share an essential quality in common: They regard their faith in spiritual terms and disavow “organized” religion—and are often quite passionate about the distinction between spirituality and religiosity, even though the distinction is trivial in philosophical terms. This much is not so essential, but is a valuable preamble: In common, they are in rebellion against many of the same perceived imperfections in our society, and thus their solutions, while diverse, are essentially similar in purpose. It is not a coincidence that the newer religions mostly espouse peace and non-interference, for Christianity is highly frenetic, invasive, exclusive, humiliating, and domineering. This is crucial: The major artery in these alternative religions, including Buddhism as practiced in America, is to implicitly rebel against Christianity, not only by not following it, but by disavowing its central premises. This is occurring much in the same way that early Christianity was a rebellion against the excesses and abuses of those days long gone. On a personal note, I do not think Christianity's decline in the developed world will reverse itself more than temporarily, for Christianity as we know it can only be carried so far into the future with us as our emergence from the medieval world evolves in complexity from the industrial to the informatic. Buddhism itself would not fare much better; therefore if it survives in America it will be in name only.
In keeping with our nation's glorious tradition of using unreliably simplistic labels to describe massive cultural movements with an offensively low degree of accuracy, I think I'll call the sociorebels who go Buddhist the “nirvanists.” That way I won't have to call them “the people who have questioned their society and have lost their respect for traditional authorities, consequently discovering Buddhism and reshaping it to their will.” Armed with Vocabulary, let me make state the major premise of my argument. I needn't be complicated:
The defining characteristic of the nirvanists is that they look at Buddhism from an outside perspective, and see what they want to see, and relate to it, and embrace it. In Buddhism, the nirvanists see a system which validates their own beliefs and contains none of the baggage associated with more familiar institutions, and that is all.
Think of it: The Far East has long been our favorite source of all things exotic, and our country's current infatuation with Buddhism is just one more highly-romanticized fixation with questionable underpinnings. To a cynic, alternativeness itself is a virtue. It is the opposite of a democratic impulse—in this case the thinking is that society is imperfect, and therefore those who consciously disavow the mainstream have a greater insight. Buddhism is an alternative to the mainstream religion in America. It is different enough from the Abrahamic traditions so as to be seen as free from the barbarism of Islam, the mendacity of Christianity, and the stigma of Judaism. The West has had very little interest in Buddhism in the past, and thus our customs and language do not implicitly invalidate Buddhism by virtue of having shown it attention. Some people like that foreignness, that mystery—especially among the sociorebels. In contrast to the thickness and degree absolute with which Christianity informs the United States cultural landscape, our concept of Buddhism is limited to a stereotype of a happy fat guy and some pseudo-philosophical language more at home on a fortune cookie. In other words, anyone who directs even the slightest scrutiny toward Buddhism would discover knowledge not generally in circulation in American culture, and thus would feel as though they had unearthed some secret wisdom. I induce that to be a very compelling emotion, which would suit them to identify as Buddhist or, perhaps more in keeping with our times, Buddh-curious. At the same time, these initial investigations may quell their curiosity, because—and this is important—the purpose of a nirvanist is not actually to plumb the depths of Buddhism. Sociorebels are often different in temperament than those who remain dogmatically affiliated with their home religion. Their passion is oriented toward novelty, not purity. Oh, sure, the nirvanists adopt some of the language and rites and postures of Buddhism, but that's superficial...even fake. And even if if these decorations are really quite elaborate and involved, they are still just as fake, so long as their underlying motivation is to use Buddhism as a vessel to contain and manifest their own, preexisting ideas. Actually, it reminds me of the city of Las Vegas, which I recently visited. Few of these people are truly interested in the depths of Buddhism or in its goals; a nirvanist almost by definition is unlikely to appreciate or even recognize Buddhism for what it really is. As I suggested, most of the ones who would be likely to do that, do not leave their home religion in the first place. Full theological conversions away from Christianity and in to Buddhism are rare, and are not a part of the sociorebellious streak under discussion here.
I understand American Buddhism pretty well, because it is scarcely Buddhism at all. It is sociorebellion, and, yes, it will produce the occasional genuine Buddhist, but for most the outcome is what I have called nirvanism. It is a new skin for old ideas, a skin that is untarnished by negative associations...at least for a while. Now, if you were to ask me the extent of my knowledge of “true” Buddhism, you would come away disappointed if I were to have implied here that I am an expert in the subject. I am not. I am an amateur. (I'm not even an expert in Judaism, a much smaller religion and one in which I was actually raised.) However, I do understand Buddhism well enough about it to perceive that it is not the same creature as that which goes by a common name and is now becoming so popular in America. I know something about the three marks, about enlightenment, about karma. I also know something about the social ramifications of Buddhism, discouraging inquiry, promoting sexism, romanticizing poverty, and most importantly that essential faith-based mindset which informs people's actions so unreasonably. Buddhism is not nearly as virulent or violent a religion as Christianity, but it is no less obsolete in the modern world, and is quite susceptible to Western-style corruption. I hope that many nirvanists either embrace the docile side of Buddhism or else disabuse themselves of religion once and for all. Indeed, in my guidance of ZeaLitY, wary that his newfound passions against Christianity might not expand to include all religion, years ago I preemptively discouraged him from taking comfort in the deceptive appeal of American Buddhism, whose temptations are ideally suited to left-wing elitists. Why? Because people like ZeaLitY are dangerous, but that danger should not likely be activated so long as it is checked by wisdom and spared from radicalizing influences. As religion is often a wisdom-free zone, and simultaneously as radicalizing as any force yet invented, my concern was that this newly sprung adult could become an enemy, more to my enterprise than to me personally. Thankfully, it would seem my word of caution was well-taken, because here we are.
I hope others take note, too. Nirvanism is an incorrect reaction to the throb of religious disaffection, and while most remain inconsequential—and some benign—the fact remains that ignorance's sustainment is never wise and rarely safe. If our society is at a point where nirvanists could come into being, then we are already at a point where nirvanism is no longer necessary, and, with just a little more concerted effort, we really could open some people's eyes to the challenges which pave what I called the road which leads to J, or, more simply put, Illumination. Not enlightenment. Not nirvana. Not faith. No, the genuine article.
Perhaps if I were a Buddhist I would say that it is cute of me to use the letter J like that, because it (inadvertently?) carries a very Buddhist implication. I might make the observation anyway; indeed, I just did. Anyway...
I hope you will take a moment to unclench your fists and grapple with the possibilities before you.
