"Buddhist country" Lay practice as a model for the rest?

[zavk]

It is entirely possible to distinguish between (1.) the cultural values of a society, and (2.) the behaviour of the people caused by social circumstances which may contravene those values. In this instance, what some of us are pointing to is (1.). The useful things we could learn from traditional Asian Buddhist cultures are the values of communality, hospitality, and so forth.

As for (2.), things like alcoholism, adultery, and other kinds of questionable behaviour--well, I don't think it is unreasonable to say that these could be prompted by the living conditions of those places. It is very easy for those of us who have the privilege of coming online to chat about things--i.e. those of us living under very different conditions--to attribute their behaviour to moral or intellectual deficiency. This is not to say that some of the behaviour are not morally wrong but that they have to be situated within their context. The fact is that they are living under much more difficult conditions than those of us in developed, late-capitalist societies.

To overlook their circumstances and attribute those behaviour to 'individual or cultural failings' is at best to risk slipping into a kind of patronising attitude/arrogance/smugness, and at worse to risk slipping into all sorts of 'isms', racism, sexism, nationalism, etc. All these attitudes contravene the principles of karuna, metta, mudita, and uppekha orientating the path.

[chownah]

It is entirely possible to distinguish between (1.) the cultural values of a society, and (2.) the behaviour of the people caused by social circumstances which may contravene those values. In this instance, what some of us are pointing to is (1.). The useful things we could learn from traditional Asian Buddhist cultures are the values of communality, hospitality, and so forth.

As for (2.), things like alcoholism, adultery, and other kinds of questionable behaviour--well, I don't think it is unreasonable to say that these could be prompted by the living conditions of those places. It is very easy for those of us who have the privilege of coming online to chat about things--i.e. those of us living under very different conditions--to attribute their behaviour to moral or intellectual deficiency. This is not to say that some of the behaviour are not morally wrong but that they have to be situated within their context. The fact is that they are living under much more difficult conditions than those of us in developed, late-capitalist societies.

To overlook their circumstances and attribute those behaviour to 'individual or cultural failings' is at best to risk slipping into a kind of patronising attitude/arrogance/smugness, and at worse to risk slipping into all sorts of 'isms', racism, sexism, nationalism, etc. All these attitudes contravene the principles of karuna, metta, mudita, and uppekha orientating the path.

zavk,
To specifically consider Thailand (as is suggested in the original post) I think that it is probably incorrect to think that in Thailand people live "under much more difficult conditions". The people in my village by and large do not have alot of physical things. In their homes for instance it is not uncommon for their to be almost no furniture in the "living room"...usually a TV, a few floor mats, some cushions, and perhaps a small low table...meals are usually served on mats on the floor with people sitting on the mat around the food...if you walk into some homes here you might think the house is abandoned!!! But this does not (in my view) mean that conditions here are much more difficult than in more developed countries. Most of the people here are not tied to their jobs and take time off whenever they want since most of them have a house with no payments to make on it and a small plot of rice which provides their basic staple....other foods are grown in small plots or can be bought very cheaply because so many people are raising small plots and additionally there is naturally alot of food that can be gathered hither and yon by anyone with some time to spend...so...if you decide to not work for awhile you don't have to pay rent, you've probably got a stockpile of rice from your harvest, and you have time to walk around add collect the foods that nature offers which include an abundance of vegetables and greens most of which a westerner has never seen and also fish, crabs, snails, snakes, rats, roots of various kinds and fruits. If you are sick there is gov't subsidised medical care at very low cost....a hail storm struck our village a couple of years ago and broke some roof tiles on most of the houses in the village and within 24 hours the local gov't had distributed free tiles to replace half of the amount which you claim were broken(free...and within 24 hours!!!...I couldn't believe it!!!) and everyone pretty much didn't go to work that day and instead everyone helped each other repair roofs....
All in all I would say that a good case could be made that the wage slaves who flip the burgers and wash the dishes in developed countries live "under much more difficult conditions" than the people in my village.

On the other hand I think that one can describe the vises prevelant here without having any kind of patronising attitude/arrogance/smugness, the people here simply are how they are...let the one that who has never indulged in any vice cast the first stone....certainly it is not me....but....didn't the Buddha say that to evaluate whether some practice is a good one we should look at those who practice it and see if their practice has created detachment etc. etc....? IF this is what the Buddha taught then for me it seems that the Buddhist practices prevelant here are not the ones for me to follow since they seem to lead to attachment and aversion...
chownah

[Kim OHara]

Chownah wrote something very like this:

Maybe it would be good to view Carolina village social things keeping the "Christian community" idea in mind. ...is this the model... that eastern Christians should be impressed with?
Chownah [did not, of course, write this. Please be careful attributing what is said to whom. Mod edit]

...

Sorry, Chownah! I didn't mean to leave your name at the end of the twisted quote.
I'll try to be more careful in future.

Kim

[zavk]

Hi Chownah

Yes, you're right, Thailand should definitely NOT be painted in one brushstroke as a 'poor country. It's been several years since I last visited the region, but there is definitely a range of different socio-economic demographics in the country, from very rural villages to the kinds you described to huge urban centres. As for Bangkok.... I'd say that on any given day it would make Melbourne (the second largest city in Australia) seem pretty 'dead'!

To qualify what I was saying: it seems to me then that in rural areas like the ones you're in or even the poorer ones, the lives of the people are not oriented by the kind of economic model of progress that governs the cities and indeed the advanced capitalist global societies which (I assume) most of us hail from. This means then that the lifestyles of these people cannot be unambiguously evaluated on the same terms of 'productivity/efficiency' that we are accustomed to.

YET, it could also be argued that the situation in these rural areas are the 'shadow' effects of the economic impulse of the city centres and globalisation more generally. So there's a certain tension here which makes it difficult to say that these people are living a 'complacent' or 'unproductive' lifestyle, just as it is difficult to say that the people living in the margins of developed societies ought to get a 'real job'.

This was more or less what I was trying to get at: that we ought to be mindful of the frames of reference we use to view other lifeworlds, because while 'frames' help us to see things better, to view something through a framework is inevitably to bracket something out.

However, you're absolutely right. Regardless of circumstances, individuals everywhere are susceptible to indulging in vices. In the case of the village you're in, it certainly appears that people are indulging in various vices. But there's nothing particularly Buddhist about these habits, even if these people have a certain collective Buddhist identity.

I'm confident that anyone looking to understand or learn 'Asian Buddhist values' would be able to sift through these behaviours and not mistake those contravening sila as 'what the Buddha taught'--well, at the very least I'm sure those who have the ability to read and study Buddhism independently would be able to tell them apart from the admirable aspects of traditional Buddhist societies.

[Freawaru]

I

Non-Buddhist Country Laypeople
--------------------------------------

Not raised Buddhist
large amounts of Judeo Christian Baggage
"Book" Buddhists
not much access to monasteries, monks
not typically superstitious, not devotional, suspicious of "religion"
slow, hesitant, or unwilling to accept the notion of rebirth
intellectual Buddhism - highly questioning
very literal and technical reading of suttas
influenced by multiple schools of Buddhism and often new age notions- picking and choosing
entry point into Buddhism is usually meditation
somewhat frantic pursuit of meditation and attainment goals

Goal: full enlightenment or bust
Common questions: Should I ordain or not? Should I be celibate? Should I stop eating candy/listening to music/going out to clubs/watching TV/eating meat? Is getting married going to totally screw up my practice even if I do not plan on ordaining anyway? (pseudo monasticism)

Buddhist Country Laypeople
---------------------------------
Buddhist upbringing taken for granted
More "merit" based understanding - good kamma bad kamma
Access to monasteries and monks a given
more prone to ritualistic ideas in Buddhism
notion of rebirth not a big deal
Single School of Buddhism based on region
More relaxed attitude towards practice
meditation not a given

goal: Better rebirth? Awakening at some point.

-M

Hi meindzai,

I can only speak for myself. From my personal point of view the merit-making, ritualistic kind of Buddhism is not interesting. The reason is that I think this kind of religious practice as interchangeable. Each religion has it's own "holy days" and specific rituals and ways to make merit - but I consider them to be no different in essence. I don't think rituals as superfluous in general but they can be changed without changing the meaning. For example: each culture has developed it's own ritual of greeting someone. Wether bowing or shaking hands or rubbing noses or kissing each others cheeks or saying hello - the meaning is always the same: greeting each other.

Merit making and rituals can be found in every religion. I don't see the Buddist (or even more precisely the Theravadan way) as anything better than the rest. If I felt a desire for religious rituals and merit making I would probably choose the Catholic for rituals and devotion and the Lutheran for merit making for they already excel in that and are part of the culture I live in.

The reason I am interested in Buddism and especially Theravada is meditation and meditation alone. This cannot be found in Christianity nowadays even though the scriptures of Christian mystics and desert fathers suggest that this has not always been the case. But Christian scripture is less technical and more flowery than Buddhist one and I am no poet. The Christian scriptures are more difficult to understand from my point of view because of this.

I do not think it necessary to change one's lifestyle in general for meditation. One can watch TV and have sex and all that and still practice both samatha and vipassana. Thus - for me - all those changes of lifestyle and rituals are irrelevant. If someone wants to bow as greeting it is okay and if someone else wants to say hello it is okay, too. If someone wants to live celibate it is okay and if someone else does not it is okay, too. IMO, it makes no difference to the practice of vipassana because one can learn to observe the mind during a state of sexual arousal or watching TV (or whatever) just as well as during every other state.

I don't mind others lighting candles and doing prostrations and elaborate rituals if they want to. But, myself, I want to stay out of it as much as possible - not because of the rituals themselves but because I think most people give religious rituals a meaning and importance that is not there.

I guess I am an example of your first kind of practitioners and that is fine with me.

[Annapurna]

I hope I can get out the thought that's bouncing in my head without sounding too strange or overly stereotypical or ignorant. I apologize for the latter two. (The first I can't help).

I can speak only for my experience, as an American and a person whose knowledge of Buddhist America comes from message boards (tah dah) and some amount of retreat practice, but really message boards.

It seems that Lay people, espeically theravada lay people, are still trying to figure out exactly what being a lay practitioner entails. I am going to try to make this clearer by some examples of how I see lay practitioners here vs. my understanding of lay practitioners in an imaginary example that we will call Thailand I'm thinking mostly theravada. I am not qualifying these characteristics as good or bad.

Non-Buddhist Country Laypeople
--------------------------------------

Not raised Buddhist
large amounts of Judeo Christian Baggage
"Book" Buddhists
not much access to monasteries, monks
not typically superstitious, not devotional, suspicious of "religion"
slow, hesitant, or unwilling to accept the notion of rebirth
intellectual Buddhism - highly questioning
very literal and technical reading of suttas
influenced by multiple schools of Buddhism and often new age notions- picking and choosing
entry point into Buddhism is usually meditation
somewhat frantic pursuit of meditation and attainment goals

Goal: full enlightenment or bust
Common questions: Should I ordain or not? Should I be celibate? Should I stop eating candy/listening to music/going out to clubs/watching TV/eating meat? Is getting married going to totally screw up my practice even if I do not plan on ordaining anyway? (pseudo monasticism)

Buddhist Country Laypeople
---------------------------------
Buddhist upbringing taken for granted
More "merit" based understanding - good kamma bad kamma
Access to monasteries and monks a given
more prone to ritualistic ideas in Buddhism
notion of rebirth not a big deal
Single School of Buddhism based on region
More relaxed attitude towards practice
meditation not a given

goal: Better rebirth? Awakening at some point.


I guess I've been thinking about this since I got married. It may appear I've typified the second group as lax, and in some cases this may be true, but I also have met some of these imaginary people and I have always appreciated their more down to earth and fairly healthy attitude. The reason I say we can learn from this is that I see a lot of Theravada laypeople just beating themselves up over practice and going to a lot of extremes, which I'm not sure is helpful.

Of course, our intense curiosity to find out just what the Buddha is getting at (our literal and questioning attitude) is probably a good thing, yet at the same time it can lead to a lot of frantic questioning and overly technical discussions. (Which I am super guilty of).

It's possible also that I am talking about Americans and that other countries are not having the same complications. The American attitude of "Consume/master/conquer" shows up in our Buddhist practice pretty quickly.

Hope I didn't come off sounding too like a fool, but I'm interested in any comments.

-M

Perhaps this IS an American experience, becaseu so little is true for me


Green: True

Red not true

Orange: partially true

Not raised Buddhist
large amounts of Judeo Christian Baggage
"Book" Buddhists
not much access to monasteries, monks
not typically superstitious, not devotional, suspicious of "religion"
slow, hesitant, or unwilling to accept the notion of rebirth
intellectual Buddhism - highly questioning
very literal and technical reading of suttas
influenced by multiple schools of Buddhism and often new age notions- picking and choosing
entry point into Buddhism is usually meditation
somewhat frantic pursuit of meditation and attainment goals

Goal: full enlightenment or bust
Common questions: Should I ordain or not? Should I be celibate? Should I stop eating candy/listening to music/going out to clubs/watching TV/eating meat? Is getting married going to totally screw up my practice even if I do not plan on ordaining anyway? (pseudo monasticism)

I'm seing all this very relaxed.

European...?

[rowyourboat]

Clearly differentiating between Asian vs Western cultures is not straightforward as it might seem at first look. I would propose that we differentiate between what the Buddha would call a 'aryan' (noble) and putajjana (uninstructed) community. Then it doesn't matter which country you live in, the turning of the Wheel of dhamma and Wheel of samsara becomes evident.

with metta

Matheesha

[Annapurna]

If I say that my goal is to eliminate desire, then I end up feeling like a hypocrite. Romantic evening with wife? Oops, here we go with the lobha. Should I pretend not to enjoy it? That's not very sweet to the missus, and it's a strain. Or my kid comes to me with her preschool painting and, wow, she's my daughter and so cute. Ooops. Got some serious attachment happening there. Bad Buddhist. Ya know?

I'm always very interested to hear the experiences of serious lay practitioners who have managed to work around such conflicts, but until I can find my way through them.

Hi, Lazyeye,

It's interesting to hear what considerations are at times going through your mind.

I don't think I could function, if I lived so much through my "head" , instead of spontaneous impulses from the heart/mind .

Perhaps it is because I spend most of my day working, and most of it as an artist.

I NEED to follow spontaneous insights, and so- that's what I do.

I don't even have the time to stop and reflect,-I just do.

It doesn't lead to an increase of desire-it doesn't make me squash insects.

That is a structure within...

I'm not sure if my entry is useful, but it seems so useless to me to worry about all this.

Just be, just do good, just learn a bit more each day, and if that's not possible, every other day, week, month.

Work. That should surely be enough.

In short:

Don't overthink, don't overanalyse.

Hope I'm not misunderstanding you or putting your experience down.

You just asked you wonder how people get around such conflicts.

I don't. They arise, they come and go. Normal. Acceptance of what is. No worries, no avoiding.

[rowyourboat]

Hi Lazyeye

Start with keeping the precepts and meditating. Don't go too much into removing defilements that are too hard to remove right now. Then work on hindrances- ie defilements that arise when meditating. Then work on developing samadhi (concentration) to a deep level. After that, work on vipassana and seeing insights into the true nature of phenomena. Than become a stream entrant. Then start working on your cravings

with metta

Matheesha

[Lazy_eye]

Anna, Matheesha, thanks for your observations -- they are very helpful. Overanalysis is a hard habit to break. And it's a common "beginner's problem" to be obsessing about the finish line before you are even out of the starting gate.