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THE BROKEN BUDDHA Critical Reflections on Theravada and a Plea for a New Buddhism

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THE BROKEN BUDDHA Critical Reflections on Theravada and a Plea for a New Buddhism THE BROKEN BUDDHA Critical Reflections on Theravada and a Plea for a New Buddhism by S. Dhammika Preface Most of this book was written in 2001 although I was still tinkering with it three years later. After its completion I hesitated for a long time about publishing it, thinking that it might do more harm than good. Eventually, an a unauthorized draft appeared on the internet without either my permission or knowledge forcing me to publish the finished work. I had hoped that, if and when the book came out, to circulate it only within the Buddhist community. That is no longer possible. As it is, enough people, including a dozen or so Western monks and former Western monks, have convinced me that many of the things I have said need saying. I am fully aware that I am risking my reputation, the friendship of some people and perhaps a lot more by writing what I have and I expect to become the target of some very angry comments. My only hope is that The Broken Buddha will provoke wide-ranging, thoughtful and realistic discussion amongst Western Buddhists about the future of the Triple Gem in the West. Introduction There is no law in history which guarantees that Buddhism will grow roots in the West or advance beyond its present infantile stage. But one would expect that it will grow more conscious of its own difficulties and Buddhists will awaken to the problems which Buddhism itself thrusts upon man as an essential part of its treasure. One would also hope that doubt should appear as the sign of a deeper conviction. Luis O. Gomez In the southwestern suburbs of Mandalay is a temple enshrining one of the most famous and revered Buddha statue in the world, the Mahamuni Image. According to legend, this statue is actually a portrait of the Buddha himself although its real origins are lost in time. For centuries it was kept in Arakhan until King Bodawpaya of Burma invaded the country with the specific intention of getting the statue for himself. Having defeated the Arakhanese and decimated their land the king had the huge statue dragged over the mountains at great loss of life and then enshrined in the temple where it sits today. In 1973 during my first visit to Mandalay I got the opportunity to see this famous statue. I had asked two Burmese I had met if they would take me to see it and they were only too happy to show their new ‘white Buddhist’ friend the country’s most sacred icon. They led me through a hall crowded with devotees and eventually we entered the sanctum sanctorum . It was something of an anticlimax. Rather than the graceful image I had expected, a squat and somewhat ungainly form loomed up before me. The face was pleasant enough but the rest of its body was lumpy and misshapen. It took me a few minutes to figure out the reason for this. Men clamored over the statue (women are forbidden to touch it) placing the small squares of gold leaf on it which devotees passed up to them. Over the centuries the gradual accumulation of this gold has formed a thick uneven crust over the statue so as to obscure its original shape. Since that time I have often thought that the Mahamuni Image could be a metaphor of what has happened to the teaching of the Buddha itself. In 2001 I had been a monk in the Theravadin tradition for twenty five years as well as reaching the conventional halfway point in my life, having also had my fiftieth birthday. It seemed a good time to asses my life and my practice up to then as well as to give some thought to where the two might go in the future. Even before I became a monk I had reservations about some of the things I had seen during my stays in Thai and Laotian monasteries. This didn’t deter me from ordaining though. Corruption and misunderstandings exist in all religions, I thought, and it wouldn’t be too difficult to find those who practiced the true Theravada. As it happened it was quite difficult to find such people. But more disappointing, when I did meet dedicated and sincere Theravadins all too often they seemed to give exaggerated importance to things which, to me at least, appeared to be little more than rituals and formalities. I recall visiting a tea plantation one afternoon with the late Venerable Sivali of Khandaboda, a dedicated monk and skillful meditation teacher. The manager of the plantation walked a quarter of a mile down the steep hillside to welcome us and then asked if we would like a cup of tea. We said yes and he walked back up the hill to his bungalow, prepared our tea and brought it down to us. As I sipped mine I noticed that Sivali was looking rather coy and not drinking his. I looked at the tea, saw that it had milk in it and knew straight away why.* A few minutes later the manager also noticed that Sivali was not drinking his tea and came over to see what the problem was. Sivali gently told him and the solicitous and embarrassed man took his cup, threw the tea out and ran all the way back up the hill to get him another one without milk in it. If an ordinary person were as fussy about not having milk in their tea after midday we would dismiss it as just a silly eccentricity. But why would an otherwise decent intelligent person dedicated to the practice of letting go, being content with what is and developing a kind heart be prepared to cause embarrassment and inconvenience over such a minor thing? To be able to answer this question is to understand the very essence of Theravada but this dawned on me only gradually. As it did I decided to just do my own practice and try to have as little contact with institutional Theravada as possible. But being a monk in a Theravadin land this proved easier said than done. *According to the Vinaya, milk is a food and so to drink tea with milk in the afternoon is to break the rule against eating after midday . Quite understandably, Asian Theravadins expect you to follow their traditions and not question them. You can point out that certain practices or ideas are not in the Tipitaka or are even contrary to it but it will make no difference. Right or wrong, inane or practical, that’s how it has always been done and that’s what you must do. In 1996 I traveled in Europe for the first time thus giving me the opportunity to see how Theravada was understood and practiced there. Theravada in Asia might be hidebound and fossilized I thought but at least Westerners will have been able to separate the fruit from the peel, the gift from the wrapping, the Buddha from ‘the thick uneven crust’ surrounding him. To my astonishment and despair I found that this was not so. Most groups, centers and monasteries I visited adhered to such practices with even more tenacity than in Asia. I finally had to admit that this is Theravada and reluctantly and with some sadness decided that I could not be a part of it any longer. I began telling anyone who might be interested that I did not consider myself or want to be considered by others to be a Theravadin monk. In fact I had probably never really been one anyway, not a good one at least. When I mentioned this to a friend he asked ‘Then what sort of monk are you?’ I wasn’t prepared for this question but after thinking about it for a while I decided that I did not have to align myself with any school. Now I follow the Buddha’s teachings to the best of my understanding and to the best of my ability. What follows are thoughts and observations on the Theravada tradition that I have formed over the last twenty five years, some of the experiences that have led to them and some suggestions about the possible future of the Dhamma in the West. It may be that some will see the following reflections as just an angry parting shot. They are not although it is true that putting them down on paper was to some extent a catharsis. I am convinced that the Buddha’s teachings really are ‘beautiful in the beginning, the middle and the end’ and that they can offer a credible answer to the spiritual crisis in the West. However, I also believe that a major obstacle to the growth of the Dhamma outside its traditional homeland is the highly idealized view most Westerners have of Theravada in Asia. This all too often means that they adopt the Dhamma together with outdated practices and misunderstandings that have built up around it. If this persists the Dhamma will never really take root in the West. Worse, Westerners may just perpetuate many of the problems that plague Theravada in Asia. Consequently these reflections will also attempt to show what Theravada really is, how it got like that and suggests ways of bringing it closer to the spirit of the Buddha’s teachings so that it can become revenant to a non-traditional environment. Few of my observations about Theravada are original, they are the sort of things one often hears about it from former Theravadins, Mahayanists and others.
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