"Accepted Buddhism"? This is a very intriguing phrase, with a lot of inbuilt assumptions. Note that you are taking an "all or nothing" approach, which isn't very nuanced. Faith and rational deliberation are the two approaches, yes, but they don't necessitate "in for a penny, in for a pound", and the practices which lead to stream-entry and conviction are themselves amenable to motives grounded in critical analysis as well as faith, however one wants to investigate.greenjuice wrote:This sounds a little hypocritical to say. I don't think anyone has accepted Buddhism by giving a try and then trough practice achieving arahantship, thereby seeing with the eye of the mind one's all previous incarnations and directly acquiring knowledge of the nature of reality, at least I've never heard of such an example, but all accept Buddhism based on faith and/or rational deliberation.daverupa wrote:One shouldn't accept soteriological claims based solely on reasoning, but on knowing and seeing for oneself.
But the trick is to reserve judgment about those things for which one hasn't got evidence. You can say "the texts say X" or "I heard Y from someone" or "I experienced Z" and protect the truth at all stages of discussion, for example. One then doesn't accept the claims one hasn't verified for oneself, as I said above, even as one investigates various claims and various practices, Dhamma among them.
I'd like you to point out any hypocrisy here, for our scrutiny, as long as this remains within the scope of the inquiry...