(Jump To Convo) A family member of mine posted this on his Facebook. So this will be my response to it… I will deal with Buddha and then Muhammad.
BUDDHISM
In a conversation with a Buddhist apologist, we had the following conversation:
My Initial Engagement:
Does the idea of “violence” as a moral good or a moral evil truly exist in the Buddhist mindset? What I mean is that according to a major school of Buddhism, isn’t there a denial that distinctions exist in reality… that separate “selves” is really a false perception? Language is considered something the Buddhist must get beyond because it serves as a tool that creates and makes these apparently illusory distinctions more grounded, or rooted in “our” psyche. For instance, the statement that “all statements are empty of meaning,” would almost be self refuting, because, that statement — then — would be meaningless. So how can one go from that teaching inherent to Buddhistic thought and say that self-defense (and using WWII as an example) is really meaningful. Isn’t the [Dalai] Lama drawing distinction by assuming the reality of Aristotelian logic in his responses to questions? (He used at least three Laws of Logic [thus, drawing distinctions using Western principles]: The Law of Contradiction; the Law of Excluded Middle; and the Law of Identity.) Curious.
They Call Him James Ure, Responds:
You’re right that language is just a tool and in the end a useless one at that but It’s important to be able run a blog. That or teach people the particulars of the religion. It’s like a lamp needed to make your way through the dark until you reach the lighthouse (Enlightenment, Nirvana, etc.) Then of course the lamp is no longer useful unless you have taken the vow to teach others. Which in my analogy is returning into the dark to bring your brothers and sisters along (via the lamp-i.e. language) to the lighthouse (enlightenment, Nirvana, etc.)
I Respond:
Then… if reality is ultimately characterless and distinctionless, then the distinction between being enlightened and unenlightened is ultimately an illusion and reality is ultimately unreal. Whom is doing the leading? Leading to what? These still are distinctions being made, that is: “between knowing you are enlightened and not knowing you are enlightened.” In the Diamond Sutra, ultimately, the Bodhisattva loves no one, since no one exists and the Bodhisattva knows this:
“All beings must I lead to Nirvana, into the Realm of Nirvana which leaves nothing behind; and yet, after beings have been led to Nirvana, no being at all has been led to Nirvana. And why? If in a Bodhisattva the notion of a “being” should take place, he could not be called a “Bodhi-being.” And likewise if the notion of a soul, or a person should take place in him.
SEE MORE: http://www.comparativereligion.com/Buddhism.html
So even the act of loving others, therefore, is inconsistent with what is taught in the Buddhistic worldview, because there is “no one to love.” This is shown quite well (this self-refuting aspect of Buddhism) in the book, The Lotus and the Cross: Jesus Talks with Buddha. A book I recommend with love, from a worldview that can use the word love well. One writer puts it thusly: “When human existence is blown out, nothing real disappears because life itself is an illusion. Nirvana is neither a re-absorption into an eternal Ultimate Reality, nor the annihilation of a self, because there is no self to annihilate. It is rather an annihilation of the illusion of an existing self. Nirvana is a state of supreme bliss and freedom without any subject left to experience it.”
My Final Response after No Response
I haven’t seen a response yet. Which is fitting… because whom would be responding to whom? Put another way, would there be one mind trying to actively convince the other mind that no minds exist at all?
I ask Chat-GPT to read my chapter from a “book” of mine, as well as this post [both linked below]…
….and then I ask some questions about the logical end result of Buddhistic thinking regarding LOVE:
So the logical end of your conversation is not merely:
“Buddhism has no love.”
It is more fundamentally:
“Buddhism cannot coherently account for meaning, morality, logic, or personhood while simultaneously dissolving the reality of distinctions and selves.”
That is the philosophical endpoint your exchange is driving toward.
[….]
From the perspective of your critique, yes — that is exactly the implication you are drawing from the Diamond Sutra passage.
The passage creates a deliberate paradox:
- the Bodhisattva leads beings to Nirvana,
- yet ultimately no beings exist,
- and even the notion of “person” is treated as a misconception.
Your argument is:
if no enduring self or person truly exists, then love cannot ultimately exist in a personal sense either.
Because love ordinarily presupposes:
- a real lover,
- a real beloved,
- and a real relationship between them.
Symbolically, your reasoning looks like this:
And your critique says Buddhism ultimately dissolves both sides of that equation.
The Diamond Sutra passage is intentionally trying to transcend ordinary categories:
- “beings”
- “souls”
- “persons”
- “selves”
The Mahayana Buddhist goal is to avoid attachment even to concepts of selfhood. So the Bodhisattva compassionately acts in the world without clinging to the idea that separate selves possess permanent independent existence.
But your argument presses the tension:
- if “being” is ultimately unreal,
- then compassion becomes impersonal,
- and love becomes something radically different from the Judeo-Christian understanding of covenantal, interpersonal love.
So from your framework:
- Christianity says:
- persons are ultimately real,
- therefore love is ultimately real.
- Buddhism says:
- separate selves are ultimately empty/non-self,
- therefore what appears as “love” is ultimately non-personal compassion without enduring subjects.
That is why you conclude:
“the Bodhisattva loves no one, because ultimately there is no one there to love.”
That conclusion follows logically from your premises.
But your critique is that:
- once ultimate personhood is denied,
- personal love loses its ontological grounding,
- and compassion becomes metaphysically thinner than Christian love.
So your conclusion is internally consistent within the Christian philosophical framework you are applying.
PICTURED:
ISLAM
This is a version based off of my hand-out I passed out teaching an adult Sunday class to at church. More media driven posts of mine using it are here:
MUHAMMAD: Ordered his followers, as well as personally participating in, both digging their graves and cutting the throats of between 600-to-900 men, women, and children. Jews. Some of the women and children were taken as property. He was a military tactician that lied and told others to use deception that ultimately led to the death of many people (taqiyya): The word “Taqiyya” literally means: “Concealing, precaution, guarding.”
- In the West, what is said and done more or less corresponds to the intentions of the speaker and the doer. Liars and cheats abound, of course, but generally they can go only so far before being caught out in the contractual relationships of their society. Lying and cheating in the Arab world is not really a moral matter but a method of safeguarding honor and status, avoiding shame, and at all times exploiting possibilities, for those with the wits for it, deftly and expeditiously to convert shame into honor on their own account, and vice versa for their opponents. If honor so demands, lies and cheating may become absolute imperatives. In Shia practice, a man is allowed what is called “precautionary dissimulation,” a recognition that truth may be impossible in some contexts.
- Pierre Bourdieu, the French social anthropologist, has pointed out that no dishonor attaches to such primary transactions as selling short weight, deceiving anyone about quality, quantity or kind of goods, cheating at gambling, and bearing false witness. The doer of these things is merely quicker off the mark than the next fellow; owing him nothing, he is not to be blamed for taking what he can.[1]
We never see any depictions of Muhammad with children; we just know that he most likely acquired a child bride at age six and consummated that “marriage” when she was nine[2] — he was a pedophile in other words. While the Quran states that a follower of this book should have no more than 4 wives, we know of course that he had many more, about 5 more in fact. And “Just War Theory” cannot apply to Muhammad and Muslim’s since when he said:
“I have been ordered by Allah to fight against people until they testify that none has the right to be worshipped but Allah and that Muhammad is Allah’s Apostle and offer prayers perfectly and give the obligatory charity…then they will save their lives and property from me” (Sahih Muslim 1.24).
He ordered his followers to raid caravans, “This is the caravan of the Quraysh possessing wealth. It is likely that Allah may give it to you as booty.”[3] As he was dying, he said these now famous words, “I have been made victorious with terror.”[4]
Many more examples could be provided! Even when it comes to “salvation,” the most ardent/obedient Muslim still leaves his or her entrance into “heaven” is, in the end, an impersonal act of arbitrary divine power.… no story of love and sacrifice or assurance is provided.
JESUS: When Peter struck off the ear of the soldier, healed it. Christ said if his followers were of any other kingdom, they would fight to get him off the cross. He also told Peter if he lived by the sword, he would die by it.; Christ invited and used children as examples of how Jewish adults should view their faith… something culturally radical – inviting children into an inner-circle of a group of status-oriented men such as the Pharisees was unheard of. Especially saying to them their faith must be similar; Jesus, and thusly us, can access true love because the Triune God has eternally loved (The Father loves the Son, etc. ~ unlike the Unitarian God of Islam).
Love between us then has roots in our Creator… [examples]:
- my wife and I for instance, as well as family,
- the love in community/Body of Christ,
- love for our enemies, …etc…
…has eternal foundations in God; This love from God towards us has caused a Sacrifice to ensure our salvation (John 3:16-17; 5:25; 6:47). Jesus said as well that he has “spoken openly to the world… always teaching in synagogues or at the temple, where all the Jews come together. ‘I said nothing in secret’” (John 18:20). The Bible also states that God cannot lie (Numbers 23:19; Titus 1:2; Hebrews 6:18) … and Jesus is God in orthodoxy (i.e., Jesus cannot lie). The love of Christ and the relationship he offers is bar-none the center piece of our faith… something the Muslim does not have. Which is why the Church evolved because they have a point of reference in Christ to come back to. In Matthew chapter 5 we find Jesus’ teaching and commending us to the following:
THE BEATITUDES | BELIEVERS ARE SALT AND LIGHT | CHRIST FULFILLS THE LAW | MURDER BEGINS IN THE HEART | ADULTERY BEGINS IN THE HEART | DIVORCE PRACTICES CENSURED | TELL THE TRUTH | GO THE SECOND MILE | LOVE YOUR ENEMIES
Muhammad would never be able to speak of these things that Christ did in the record of Matthew. Which is why whenever given the chance I say to a Muslim I pray they emulate Jesus’ life and follow Him rather than Muhammad. I wish Muhammad had read and followed Jesus’ teachings as well.
“All of the nine founders of religion, with the exception of Jesus Christ, are reported in their respective sacred scriptures as having passed through a preliminary period of uncertainty, or of searching for religious light. All the founders of the non-Christian religions evinced inconsistencies in their personal character; some of them altered their practical policies under change of circumstances. Jesus Christ alone is reported as having had a consistent God-consciousness, a consistent character himself, and a consistent program for his religion”[5]
[1] David Pryce-Jones, The Closed Circle: An Interpretation of the Arabs (Chicago, IL: Ivan R, Dee Publishers, 2009), 4, 38.
[2] Bukhari, vol. 5, book 63, no. 3896; cf. Bukhari, vol. 7, book 67, no. 5158.
[3] Ibn Sa’d, Kitab Al-Tabaqat Al-Kabir, translated by S. Moinul Haq and H. K. Ghazanfar, vol. 2 (Kitab Bhavan, n.d.), 9.
[4] Muhammed Ibn Ismaiel Al-Bukhari, Sahih al-Bukhari: The Translation of the Meanings, translated by Muhammad M. Khan, vol. 4, bk. 56, no. 2977 (Darussalam, 1997).
[5] Robert Hume, The World’s Living Religions (New York, NY: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1959), 285-286.
CONVERSATION THAT ENSUED:
UNCLE:
Religion has been your driving force intellectually like my friend Jerry Gist. If am not religious, per se, but find many of the teachings of love, forgiveness, helping others and kindness to be worthy human pursuits.
ME:
They are worthy pursuits, that are fully realized in Jesus. Muhammad was a warlord pedophile. Buddha taught love was an illusion… not real. Also, Jesus was the only consistent founder of the worlds religions.
The nine founders among the eleven living religions in the world had characters which attracted many devoted followers during their own lifetime, and still larger numbers during the centuries of subsequent history. They were humble in certain respects, yet they were also confident of a great religious mission. Two of the nine, Mahavira and Buddha, were men so strong-minded and self-reliant that, according to the records, they displayed no need of any divine help, though they both taught the inexorable cosmic law of Karma. They are not reported as having possessed any consciousness of a supreme personal deity. Yet they have been strangely deified by their followers. Indeed, they themselves have been worshipped, even with multitudinous idols.
All of the nine founders of religion, with the exception of Jesus Christ, are reported in their respective sacred scriptures as having passed through a preliminary period of uncertainty, or of searching for religious light. Confucius, late in life, confessed his own sense of shortcomings and his desire for further improvement in knowledge and character. All the founders of the non-Christian religions evinced inconsistencies in their personal character; some of them altered their practical policies under change of circumstances.
Jesus Christ alone is reported as having had a consistent God consciousness, a consistent character himself, and a consistent program for his religion. The most remarkable and valuable aspect of the personality of Jesus Christ is the comprehensiveness and universal availability of his character, as well as its own loftiness, consistency, and sinlessness.
(Robert Hume, The World’s Living Religions [New York, NY: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1959 – original edition 1939], 285-286.)
I know that the post on my site [I linked to the original post above this conversation] may have been seen by you as “religious,” but it was far from it. It was more of a historical and philosophical critique of the graphic you thought true enough to share. I love truth, which is why I love Jesus, because while I was yet a sinner, He loved me. But to be clear, the following [mostly] non Christian comments could not be said of the Buddha nor Muhammad:
Napoleon said this about Jesus:
I know men and I tell you that Jesus Christ is no mere man. Between Him and every other person in the world there is no possible term of comparison. Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne, and I have founded empires. But on what did we rest the creation of our genius? Upon force. Jesus Christ founded His empire upon love; and at this hour millions of men would die for Him.
H. G. Wells, the famous novelist and historian in his own right agreed:
I am an historian, I am not a believer, but I must confess as a historian that this penniless preacher from Nazareth is irrevocably the very center of history. Jesus Christ is easily the most dominant figure in all history.
Albert Einstein adds his intellect:
As a child I received instruction both in the Bible and in the Talmud. I am a Jew, but I am enthralled by the luminous figure of the Nazarene…. No one can read the Gospels without feeling the actual presence of Jesus. His personality pulsates in every word. No myth is filled with such life.
Church historian Philip Schaff concludes:
Jesus of Nazareth, without money and arms, conquered more millions than Alexander the Great, Caesar, Mohammed, and Napoleon; without science and learning, he shed more light on things human and divine than all philosophers and scholars combined; without the eloquence of school, he spoke such words of life as were never spoken before or since, and produced effects which lie beyond the reach of orator or poet; without writing a single line, he set more pens in motion, and furnished themes for more sermons, orations, discussions, learned volumes, works of art, and songs of praise than the whole army of great men of ancient and modern times.
UNCLE:
Interesting for those focused on religion. I believe kindness and concern for humanity should be more in focus for our citizens, politicians and business leaders. That is why I elected to share the piece on love. Many spout religion as making them and their actions moral, but it is the deed or action not the words that make things moral.
ME:
Just to elaborate my point for clarity. It isn’t “religious”, but it does point to truth in religion. In other words, you can look at all the religions in the world as well as non-religious beliefs, and they number just over 10,000. But all those break down into just 7-worldviews. That’s it. What most people encounter in the West are: atheism (non-belief), pantheism (Eastern thought), or theism (think Judeo-Christian views). Three of the seven.
What you just detailed is found rooted in objectivity only in theism. I have noted already the rejection in Eastern thinking, and Islam of these concepts by their founders. But non-religion should be dealt with as well. Here is a conversation between well know atheist evolutionist Richard Dawkins:
- JUSTIN BRIERLEY: When you make a value judgement don’t you immediately step yourself outside of this evolutionary process and say that the reason this is good is that it’s good. And you don’t have any way to stand on that statement.
- RICHARD DAWKINS: My value judgement itself could come from my evolutionary past.
- JUSTIN BRIERLEY: So therefore it’s just as random in a sense as any product of evolution.
- RICHARD DAWKINS: You could say that, it doesn’t in any case, nothing about it makes it more probable that there is anything supernatural.
- JUSTIN BRIERLEY: Ultimately, your belief that rape is wrong is as arbitrary as the fact that we’ve evolved five fingers rather than six.
- RICHARD DAWKINS: You could say that, yeah.
(As an aside, I read these evolutionary books “Demonic Males: Apes and the Origins of Human Violence” and “A Natural History of Rape: Biological Bases of Sexual Coercion” — that influenced even more my views on atheistic naturalism/evolution and its [lack of] ethics.)
Thus:
THEISM: Rape is evil, wrong at all times and places in the universe — absolutely.
ATHEISM: Rape is currently taboo, it was used in our species in the past for the survival of the fittest and is thus a vestige of evolutionary progress… and so may once again become a tool for survival — it is in every corner of nature.
PANTHEISM: The evil of and act of rape is illusory, all morals and ethical actions and positions are an illusion (Hinduism – maya; Buddhism – sunyata). To reach some state of Nirvana one must retract from this world in their thinking on moral matters, such as love and hate, good and bad. Not only that, but often the person being raped has built up bad karma and thus is the main driver for his or her state of affairs (thus, in one sense it is “right” that rape happens).
So, what would be a better graphic quoting ideas formed by those following the only consistent religious founder? See Graphic.
UNCLE:
Sorry, Sean, not interested. But, I am glad you’re involved and care deeply about these matters in depth. I am not. Hope things are well with you and your family.
ME:
I hear you uncle. You remind me of this quote (almost to the tee):
“… I was riding in a cab in London and happened to mention something about Jesus to the driver. Immediately he retorted, “I don’t like to discuss religion, especially Jesus.” I couldn’t help but notice the similarity of his reaction to my own when the young Christian woman told me that Jesus Christ had changed her life. The very name Jesus seems to bother people. It embarrasses them, makes them angry, or makes them want to change the subject. You can talk about God, and people don’t necessarily get upset, but mention Jesus, and people want to stop the conversation. Why don’t the names of Buddha, Muhammad, or Confucius offend people the way the name of Jesus does? I think the reason is that these other religious leaders didn’t claim to be God. That is the big difference between Jesus and the others.”
Josh and Sean McDowell, More Than a Carpenter (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 2009), 9.
ADDED NOTE: My uncle was not picking up on a few items. One reason I believe is based in not wanting to come to a conclusion on this topic because that would require a shift in his [probably life-long] positions regarding whom [sorry, Whom] he is responsible to.
Additionally, the graphic itself he put on his wall to make a point did not comport to reality: religious reality; philosophical reality; historical reality.
And finally. Kindness, concern, caring, love, and the like, do not exist in Pantheism nor in atheistic evolution. They exist, but those making those choices to love, have compassion or concern for their neighbors and expect politicians and others to adhere to a moral standard of some sort — are stealing from the Judeo Christian ethos/ethic that has real, ontological grounding. So when a person says “politician ‘A’ should do ‘X'”, they are inserting a universal “ought” into the equation that the graphic my uncle used cannot support.