On Cultural Bias and Ideology in Western Buddhism and Buddhist Modernism
When he was approximately fifteen years old, Tominaga Nakamoto 富永仲基 (1715–1746) was expelled from the merchant academy in Ōsaka, which his father had enrolled him in, for writing an essay that was critical of Confucianism. He may also have been forced to leave home, but little is known with certainty about Tominaga’s life. A few years later, he apparently found employment as a proofreader at Manpuku temple of the Ōbaku Zen sect in Uji. Buddhist monks traditionally copied sūtras by hand, and it was Tominaga’s job to check for copying errors. This allowed him to read very many sūtras, inspiring...
On Secular and Radical Buddhism
In a number of influential books and articles, Stephen Batchelor has proposed, developed, and defended something he has called (among others) “secular Buddhism” and “Buddhism 2.0”. The idea of such a secular or scientific or naturalistic or otherwise not traditionally religious kind of Buddhism isn’t new – it has been especially popular among 20th and 21st Western converts to Buddhism, but there have been Asian precursors as well. Nevertheless, the idea is also somewhat controversial. Adherents of “secular Buddhism” like Batchelor typically consider it a return to the roots of Buddhism and to the original teachings of the Buddha, but...
No, you’re not entitled to your opinion
Nearly everyone seems to believe that they are entitled to their opinion, but it is not exactly clear what that means. This commonly claimed entitlement is some kind of supposed right, but neither the action it is supposed to allow, nor the duties it entails are clear. All rights imply duties. Often these are negative duties – that is, duties not to do something. For example, if you have a right to free speech, then the government has the negative duty not to arrest you for speaking your mind. And if you have a right to life, then everyone else...