Sunday Sermons
Buddhism
Buddhism has been growing in popularity in the United States and the West, and many American celebrities, including Steven Seagal, Richard Gere, Martin Scorsese, Tina Turner, Oliver Stone, Phil Jackson and Courtney Love, have embraced Buddhism. Added to this, many liberal “Christian” theologians have sought to find fundamental similarities between Buddhism and Christianity, and there are ongoing attempts on the part of Buddhists to convince Christians that there are few or no essential differences between the two faiths.
Tolerance or Intolerant?
While it is claimed that the differences between Buddhism and Christianity are insignificant compared to what they have in common, in order to make this claim, the Bible must be discredited. “Buddhist Rev. Ronald Y. Nakasone claimed that Jesus and Buddha taught basically the same things and that Jesus was ‘close to Buddhahood’. Like many other Buddhists, Nakasone based his rejection of the Christ of the New Testament on the highly questionable findings of liberal theologians, in particular, Burton L. Mack of the so-called Jesus Seminar. Those who disagreed with his assessment of Jesus were said to be intolerant and narrow-minded” (Encyclopedia of Cults and New Religions, John Ankerberg, p. 53). In the best selling book,Living Buddha, Living Christ, by Thich Nhat Hahn, the author believes that Christians who teach that Jesus is the only Way are potential murderers who foster “religious intolerance and discrimination”, yet Jesus did claim to be the only way (John 8:24; 14:6; Acts 4:12). Buddhism claims to be very tolerant, but then attacks Christianity and the Bible at the same time. Ankerberg rightly notes, “Yet one can only say, aren’t Buddhists who argue this way being intolerant of Christianity? Aren’t they discriminating against Christianity when they distort it and make it teach things it does not?” (p. 53). “Rely upon yourself; do not depend upon anyone else. Make my teachings your light. Rely upon them: do not depend upon any other teaching” (The Buddha, The Teaching of the Buddha, p. 18). So much for tolerance! Compare the “rely upon yourself” attitude with such passages as Proverbs 3:5; 16:25; 28:26; Jeremiah 10:23; 17:5). Notice the contradictory nature of this “wise teaching”. If we are to rely upon self, then why do we need the Buddha? Notice this quote from a Buddhist monk: “Buddhism and Christianity are forever irreconcilable—one is based on enlightenment, the other on delusion” (p. 54). It truly has been noted that Buddhism is nothing more than humanism or atheism. Buddhism appeals to prideful self-sufficiency. “For the modern man one of the most attractive things in this scheme is that in it he is entirely cast back upon himself. In the Maha-Parinibbana-Sutta, one of the most famous of Buddhist classics, the Buddha attained to enlightenment by his own intense concentration; he called in no help from any god or savior. The last thing modern man desires is to be told that he needs to be saved, or that he requires the help of a savior, so naturally Buddhism has attractive power” (pp. 57-58).
Buddhism and the Scriptures
The Buddhist view of the Bible is that it contains both true and false teachings, that Jesus was a wise sage, perhaps enlightened, but His teachings were distorted by Christian myths. In previous lessons we have answered the claim that the Bible has been corrupted, and we have also dealt with the claims of such liberal and unbelieving theological groups as theJesus Seminar, and that the Bible is the best-attested and documented book of the ancient world. The manuscript evidence for the accuracy of the Scriptures is overwhelming, indicating that 99.9 percent of our present text is genuine and pure. In addition, the manuscript evidence is very early. We have portions of the New Testament that date within thirty years from when the last book was written, and entire New Testaments that date within two hundred years. We need to deal with their attacks upon the Bible, they typically bring up the same arguments and supposed contradictions unbelievers and atheists have attempted over the centuries, yet we need to go on the offensive as well. “Buddhism encompasses both the teachings ascribed to Gautama Siddhartha (the Buddha) (563-483? B.C.) And the subsequent if questionable development of his thoughts by Buddhists in later centuries. Theravadin monks wrote down the first Buddhist scriptures about 400 years after the Buddha lived. These scriptures were written on palm leaves and became known as the Tipitaka or Pali Canon. The hundreds of millions of Buddhists worldwide can be divided into two broad schools, Theravada and Mahayana. While the Mahayanist is by far the largest, the Theravada is generally held to be the original, true Buddhism” (Ankerberg pp. 48-49). One needs to realize that a number of scholars argue that the late nature of the manuscripts, and other factors, make it virtually impossible to know what the Buddha actually taught. Countless forms of Buddhism exist, some 200 sects can be found in Japan alone, many of them oppose each other in doctrine and practice. In contrast, the teachings of Jesus were recorded by those who personally witnessed His teachings, like Matthew, John, and Peter, and those who lived within the first century (Luke 1:1-4) who spoke by inspiration (John 14:26; Ephesians 3:3-5; 2 Peter 3:1-2; 1 Corinthians 14:37). Christians reject and expose those who corrupt and twist the Scriptures (Galatians 1:6-9; 2 Peter 3:16; 2 Corinthians 4:2), in contrast, “almost all Buddhists sects, even those Buddha himself would probably or certainly not accept, are considered Buddhist by Buddhists today” (Ankerberg p. 48).
“One of the most fundamental problems in Buddhism is that no one is certain what ‘true Buddhism’ is. For one thing, the manuscript evidence is far too late and unreliable. Buddha’s words were never recorded, which makes it impossible to ascertain if what we have are the genuine words of Buddha or merely those of his disciples centuries later. Second, the manuscripts we do possess are so contradictory that one despairs of ever finding truth. Buddha told his disciples they could ‘abolish all the lesser and minor precepts’. Unfortunately, he never identified what these precepts were” (p. 59).
Buddhism and Reality
“This whole world of delusion is nothing but a shadow caused by the mind….there is no world….outside the mind…..To Buddha every definitive thing is illusion…things have no reality in themselves but are like heat haze” (The Buddha). “It is a mistake to regard this world as either a temporal world or as a real one. But ignorant people of this world assume that this is a real world and proceed to act upon that absurd assumption. But as this world is only an illusion, their acts, being based on error, only lead them into harm and suffering. A wise man, recognizing the world is but an illusion, does not act as if it were real, so he escapes the suffering” (The Teaching of Buddha p. 112). Thus Buddhism rejects the reality of the world that God has created and calls good (Genesis 1:1,31; Psalm 19:1; Romans 1:20). Notice also the contempt and intolerance in the above quotations. Those who believe that the world is real are ignorant and absurd. Now, in reality, who is the ignorant person, the person who accepts all the evidence that the world is real, or the person who does not? And who really avoids more suffering, the person who acts like the world isn’t here, or the person who knows it is?
Buddhism and Self
Not only is the world an illusion, but self is an illusion as well. Buddhism teachings that all things do not exist long enough to be real. Existence is the delusory creation of our minds, thus even the perception of the individual self is a delusion. Separate individual existence is really an illusion. “One Buddhist scripture complains that the ‘foolish common people do not understand that what is seen is merely (the product of) their own mind” (p. 52). The goal of Buddhism is to eliminate individual suffering, which is done by attaining to a state in which you realize that reality does not exist (nirvana). In attaining this goal one does not look to God for help, but only to the illusionary, to man himself. “From the delusory mind, the illusory world appear but from this same mind, the world of enlightenment appears. One wonders how a mind so deluded and disordered that it creates a world of illusion could ever discover enlightenment from that delusion?” (p. 52). In contrast, man is not an illusion, but rather one created in the image of God (Genesis 1:26). Suffering is not removed by denying reality, but rather suffering is often the result of sin. Buddhism makes the mistake of attacking the symptom and not the real root problem. When Buddha sought to answer to the question “why do people suffer?” He falsely concluded that personal existence itself was the cause of all suffering and therefore the goal must be to eliminate personal existence. Another error of the Buddha was to assume that suffering is wholly evil, thus the Buddha demonstrated his own lack of enlightenment concerning the benefits of suffering (Psalm 119:71; Romans 5:3-5; James 1:2-4; 1 Peter 2:20; Hebrews 5:8). Please note that God does not see this world as a place of constant suffering and heartache (1 Peter 3:10; Acts 14:17; Ecclesiastes 3:12-13; Psalm 33). “Whenever there are problems or tragedies in life and God does not seem to be kind and good, we should not suspect that God lacks goodness. In fact, the Bible tells us people intuitively know God is good despite the evil in the world (Romans 1:18-21). If God were truly evil, there would be no hope and the conditions of life and our sense of things would be quite different. This is why we never ask, ‘Why is there so much good in the world?’ It’s always, ‘Why is there so much evil in the world?’ We know that evil is the aberration in a universe whose Ruler is good and righteous” (p. 62)
Buddhism and Sin
In many Eastern religions like Buddhism the greatest “evil” is to admit the existence of evil. Buddhism views Christianity as spiritually dangerous, because according to Buddhism Christianity perpetuates the myth that this world is real, that there is a soul to save. There is no room in Buddhism for a Savior who died on the cross (John 3:16). Ankerberg rightly notes that Buddhism only increases evil by denying that evil has any reality and by maintaining that the disciple must go beyond good and evil to find enlightenment.
Buddhism and Jesus
“As a whole, Buddhism has little directly to say about Jesus Christ. It does acknowledge what most men do: that He was a great person. For the most part, however, His Gospel teachings are largely ignored and a more convenient Jesus is accepted. Although ecumenically minded people would find it difficult to accept, the Jesus Christ of history is not merely un-Buddhist but anti-Buddhist. If we could bring Jesus and Buddha together for a discussion, neither Jesus nor Gautama would find the other’s worldview acceptable. According to Christ, Buddha would certainly not have been spiritual enlightened—far from it. His rejection of a creator God would classify him as a pagan unbeliever, however adept he was at philosophical speculation” (p. 57). In contrast to the claims of Buddhism, Jesus taught that He is the only way (John 17:3); the Scriptures, including His words, would not be corrupted (Matthew 5:17-18; Matthew 24:35); moral absolutes exist (John 12:48); the suffering in this world is real (Luke 13:3); He is the true light (John 1:9; 8:12; 12:46); He utterly rejected polytheism and paganism (Matthew 6:7; 22:37; Luke 4:8); there is no reincarnation or second chances (Luke 16:26); the goal in life is not apathy but involvement(Matthew 25:41ff); He did not claim to be a mere good person or teacher but God in the flesh (John 1:1). In addition, He taught the existence of a personal Creator who makes moral demands and judges (Luke 12:5), and completely Jesus rejected the idea that man by his own efforts can save himself without any outside help (John 8:24; Matthew 20:28; 26:28; John 6:29,47).
