Bad Buddhists, Good Buddhists and True Buddhists

9 Pages Posted: 27 Jun 2018

See all articles by C A Saliya

C A Saliya

Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology

Date Written: June 11, 2018

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to discuss very briefly a few contemporary issues on, preaching interpretations and teaching practices of the Buddha from an expatriate’s point of view. First of all I would like to insist that Buddha never preached Buddhism but expounded Dhamma. Discussing these issues is important due to three main reasons. Firstly, from a religious view point such a debate would arouse our own Buddhist cultural thinking, especially among the migrated young Sri Lankan community that will contribute to protect and sustain our value system. Secondly, in a theoretical sense, the points raised here might help to optimize our understanding on the Buddha’s teaching and therefore, could serve to clear certain misconceptions that act as road blocks for non-Buddhists to become Buddhists. Thirdly, from a philosophical point of view, such discussions could inspire interested persons to engage in for further reading, learning through investigations and to accumulate knowledge towards achieving wisdom and mindfulness to become true Buddhists.

This article is organized and presented as follows. First, it outlines the evolution of religious beliefs and analyses the composition of religious faiths in today’s world as an approach to this discussion. Then it discusses five main issues namely; the peer pressure to the young and the Sinhala Buddhist values; how do we know that we know which we believe as we know? Is chanting five precepts adequate? Westernizing Buddhism and Buddhismizing the West; and finally it provides a brief conclusion.

Keywords: Buddhism, Sri Lanka, Beliefs, Dhamma, Religeon, Islam, Christianity, Hindusm

Suggested Citation

Saliya, C A, Bad Buddhists, Good Buddhists and True Buddhists (June 11, 2018). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3193913 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3193913

C A Saliya (Contact Author)

Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology ( email )

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HOME PAGE: http://www.sliit.lk

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