(Post-) Buddhism without Rebirth
Traditional Buddhists tend to believe that rebirth and karma are essential parts of the Buddhist worldview and that one, therefore, cannot be a Buddhist without accepting those. For example, the 14th Dalai Lama has written that βas long as you are a Buddhist, it is necessary to accept past and future rebirthβ, which means that you canβt be a Buddhist without believing in rebirth. Many Buddhist modernists, on the other hand, consider the doctrine of rebirth and karma unimportant, or radically reinterpret it in an attempt to bring it in line with a more or less Western, βmaterialistβ worldview, or...
A Buddha Land in This World (New Book)
My new book, A Buddha Land in This World: Philosophy, Utopia, and Radical Buddhism, has just been published. Here is the abstract/back cover blurb: In the early twentieth century, Uchiyama GudΕ, Senoβo GirΕ, Lin Qiuwu, and others advocated a Buddhism that was radical in two respects. Firstly, they adopted a more or less naturalist stance with respect to Buddhist doctrine and related matters, rejecting karma or other supernatural beliefs. And secondly, they held political and economic views that were radically anti-hegemonic, anti-capitalist, and revolutionary. Taking the idea of such a βradical Buddhismβ seriously, A Buddha Land in This World: Philosophy,...