Comments on: Shin and Zen: two sides of Japanese Buddhism

By: Doug

Doug — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 02:17:06 +0000

Hello and welcome to the JLR. I’ve heard of this folk story before in various incarnations from other sources, so it’s well-known.

By: stillhere4u

stillhere4u — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:44:40 +0000

I think Zen can be contrasted with the modern culture of presumption. You might enjoy the short Zen tale I just posted at http://deligentia.wordpress.com/2009/11/10/empty-your-cup/

By: Doug

Doug — Sat, 02 May 2009 22:13:38 +0000

Senshin: Thank you. Of course, one man’s garbage is another man’s treasure, as we say in English. I suppose it’s all empty anyways.

Slingword: Due to the details of your question, I thought it best to make a separate post on the subject. I hope it addresses some of your questions. As for your blog post, yes, I’ve enjoyed reading some of the comments. I might have shared some of them at one point, but that was a while ago.

By: slingword

slingword — Sat, 02 May 2009 10:53:48 +0000

Follow up question:
I get that some forms of Buddhism are at least not based on some, well, nonsense, like the existence of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
But I’m back in the same old place here.

Above you talk about how many different forms of Buddhism there are. But you have chosen one, or some combination of them. Why your choice?

If it’s all just philosophy, and there is no truth to any of it, making the choice purely personal (just believe what has been handed down to you, or what feels good, or what is convenient, etc) then why even bother with just Buddhism? Why not just pick this passage of the Bible, that writing of this “expert”, and what your friends tell you that you want to hear?

Truth is what is real. And there is only one of those. There aren’t an infinite number of possibilities, there is only one. That makes truth unique. Not just another of an endless number of possibilities of things to believe to be true when they aren’t, or things that make you feel good (or worse, sometime perverted like “my personal truth”, which is a distortion of the definition of truth).

What do you have that is truth?
You have some writing of opinions of how to live your life. Which is great! There are a lot of poets who do the same thing, except they don’t call themselves religions.
A little help?

Thanks again,
Slingword.

PS. There are lots of comments on my article:
http://slingword.wordpress.com/2009/04/30/an-open-question-to-the-religious/
which are interesting….

By: Senshin

Senshin — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 12:00:50 +0000

And sometimes others think your “garbage” is gold

By: Doug

Doug — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 10:51:38 +0000

Kendall: Yeah, someone else already pointed out the Google Reader issue. Ah well. I usually do keep things in draft for some time (like this post), but occasionally I shoot from the hip. Sometimes it goes well, sometimes it’s garbage.

Slingword: Welcome to the JLR. I’ve replied your question on your blog. Best of luck.

By: slingword

slingword — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 08:31:37 +0000

I have a serious question that may be related to this thread:

http://slingword.wordpress.com/2009/04/30/an-open-question-to-the-religious/

And I would love to hear replies….

By: Kendall

Kendall — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 22:23:17 +0000

Just remember, just because you delete it, doesn’t mean it no longer exists. It’s still sitting in my Google Reader. You may not have thought it was a great post, but it wasn’t a bad one either. I’m very far from the average on that topic, on the low end, not high end .

In the future, you might want to keep a post as a draft if you’re doubting whether or not to put it out.