Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

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Huseng
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by Huseng »

tobes wrote: I think the problem of assimilation is strongly connected to the problem of robust nationalism.....of precisely the kind emphasised by Ole. Once "French" is defined reductively in terms of uniform culture, anything other to it is immediately rejected as unFrench.
I don't know much about the situation in France, but back home in Canada the issue is not that there are "un-Canadian" peoples amongst us, but that some of them demand special treatments and reforms to common sense rules and laws.

One example is demanding that a public swimming pool segregate boys and girls and have designated swimming times for each. There are also some people in Canada calling for the state to recognize Sharia law and courts as a special judiciary for the Muslim community. That would essentially mean that part of the authority of civil courts would be transmitted to a non-government religious organization.

Objecting to such ideas has nothing to do with "robust nationalism".

The identifications people make to nation-states are constructed and without substance: Buddhists should be well aware of these processes, and the dangers they contain.
It isn't about speaking a different language, wearing foreign garb or having a different religion. Problems and friction in society arise when minorities start demanding preferential treatment and rights.
Malcolm
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by Malcolm »

heart wrote:
Should payback be something we serve on the basis of peoples religion? I find that very frightening and without doubt the reason ChNN is warning against showing our beliefs to openly. The fascist will start with the Muslims but it will not take long before other "strange" religions like Buddhism go the same way.

/magnus

I am not unaware of this. But this does not mean that we need to understand that Islam is our friend.

I agree however with your general idea that civil rights of people everywhere need to be respected, including Moslems. It is a pity that in general this sentiment is not shared by Islamic governments.

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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by Malcolm »

tobes wrote:
Right, the same Enlightenment which lead directly to the genocide of six million Jews? Europe: civilised. Middle East: barbarian.....c'mon, this is nonsense. You know better.

:anjali:

You can hardly blame the Enlightenment for the Holocaust. Instead you can blame a millennia of institutionalized Anti-semitism in Christian Europe.
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tobes
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by tobes »

Huseng wrote:
The identifications people make to nation-states are constructed and without substance: Buddhists should be well aware of these processes, and the dangers they contain.
It isn't about speaking a different language, wearing foreign garb or having a different religion. Problems and friction in society arise when minorities start demanding preferential treatment and rights.
Fine, but I don't see Lama Ole making a subtle argument about the juridical system. He's not saying "sovereign law should be equally applied to all citizens. I am troubled by the friction between the proper functioning of a law and minorities."

Nor are many of the right in Europe, for that matter.

They are, in fact, talking about 'wearing foreign garb.' Legislating to ban it in fact.

:anjali:
Malcolm
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by Malcolm »

tobes wrote:
Well, if Europe was really enlightened in the Kantian sense, wouldn't Europeans be genuinely cosmopolitan in orientation? What about Locke and tolerance?
Compared to US, it was/is. And even the US is more tolerant than any Muslim nation today. Go and try to practice Buddhism in Saudi Arabia, for example. It is illegal to practice any religion in Saudi Arabia other than Islam. But I am sure you know this.

It is the greatest of ironies that this problematic gets catched out in liberal-enlightenment terms, when it is infact profoundly psychoanalytic: irrational to the extreme. The identifications people make to nation-states are constructed and without substance: Buddhists should be well aware of these processes, and the dangers they contain.
My purpose in bring up the Enlightenment was to point out that it lead to the intellectual decline of Christianity, not that it removed people's cultural biases.
Robust nationalism was the core reason for the failure of the Enlightenment as a political project,
As I said above, you missed the point of why I introduced the Enlightenment.
and the failure persists in the present day defence of good civilised, white, Frenchness, Dutchness, Austrianess et al, all of which, can only exist if 'the other' is demonised, made alien, scapegoated.
You forget, for Moslems, all non-Moslems are automatically "others". You would do well never to forget this.

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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by muni »

tobes wrote: compassion, not division.

:anjali:
Agree here with you. Awareness' impartiality.
:anjali:
Malcolm
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by Malcolm »

tobes wrote: Fine, but I don't see Lama Ole making a subtle argument about the juridical system. He's not saying "sovereign law should be equally applied to all citizens. I am troubled by the friction between the proper functioning of a law and minorities."

Nor are many of the right in Europe, for that matter.

They are, in fact, talking about 'wearing foreign garb.' Legislating to ban it in fact.

:anjali:

Look, American Politics is still about the civil war. European Politics is still about the crusades.
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tobes
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by tobes »

Namdrol wrote:
tobes wrote:
Right, the same Enlightenment which lead directly to the genocide of six million Jews? Europe: civilised. Middle East: barbarian.....c'mon, this is nonsense. You know better.

:anjali:

You can hardly blame the Enlightenment for the Holocaust. Instead you can blame a millennia of institutionalized Anti-semitism in Christian Europe.

Fine minds have made the argument: Fromm, Adorno, Agamben.

I agree that it's very reductive, but their point is not that the Enlightenment caused the Holocaust; but more that the Holocaust stands as very compelling evidence that its political idealism (especially Kant's cosmopolitanism) did not prevail in reality.

:anjali:
Malcolm
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by Malcolm »

muni wrote:
tobes wrote: compassion, not division.

:anjali:
Agree here with you. Awareness' impartiality.
:anjali:

There are two kinds of compassion -- one will get you killed.

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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by Malcolm »

tobes wrote:

Fine minds have made the argument: Fromm, Adorno, Agamben.

I agree that it's very reductive, but their point is not that the Enlightenment caused the Holocaust; but more that the Holocaust stands as very compelling evidence that its political idealism (especially Kant's cosmopolitanism) did not prevail in reality.

:anjali:

You still missed the point of my bringing up the Enlightenment.

And you have hoisted yourself on your own petard. Political idealism never prevails in reality.

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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by muni »

Namdrol wrote:
muni wrote:
tobes wrote: compassion, not division.

:anjali:
Agree here with you. Awareness' impartiality.
:anjali:

There are two kinds of compassion -- one will get you killed.

N
Yes indeed. :anjali:
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kirtu
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by kirtu »

Heruka wrote:
heart wrote:
The main point they use to push their brown agenda is hatred against Islam as a religion. Does it rings any bells?
/magnus
having a muslim friend or two, i think you have a romantic view M, i can assure you the clash of civilizations is a multi generational, DNA deep sentiment within muslim world and thought, even so called moderates of non saud influenced/exported Wahhabi islam, will stun you with their kufar distain.

remember that to them, to lie to a fellow muslim is very bad, but to be an open faced liar to a kufar is quite ok in sharia law.

dont be fooled, this is not infidels way, but theirs.
We should not engage in any incitement to hatred. I have had many Muslim aquaitances and some Mulsim friends including a Turkish Muslim ex when I was living in Germany. People come with baggage from many sources, esp. those taught to them by their society and interpretations from their religious tutors and significantly from their fears. We need to work together to build bridges to other people and to not cause harm.

Kirt
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Zen Master Seung Sahn said, “That’s simple. Atomic bombs come from the mind that likes this and doesn’t like that.”

"Even if you practice only for an hour a day with faith and inspiration, good qualities will steadily increase. Regular practice makes it easy to transform your mind. From seeing only relative truth, you will eventually reach a profound certainty in the meaning of absolute truth."
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kirtu
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by kirtu »

Namdrol wrote: Look, American Politics is still about the civil war.
that's true ....
European Politics is still about the crusades.
that's not.... European politics hasn't been about the crusades fro quite a while. European politics since the 1920's is about dealing with "the other" in the preception of potentially confrontational situations (also preceived as zero sum games): the guest worker is taking MY job, the guest worker's son is inpregnating MY daughter, the guest worker's children are drug dealers, the guest worker and family are refusing to speak MY language, the guest worker is taking OUR resources, ect. This has been going on all over Europe in some form since WW I beginning with the Armenian genocide, German-Baltic civil wars in the 20's, the growth of virulent anti-semitism, virulent anti-gypsy feeling, the Holocaust, pogroms's in Poland after WW II and continuing to the present. At multiple points people who actually lived in a cosmopolitian environment thought that these attitudes were a thing of the past - only to be severely disappointed in the end. In the 80's in Germany most of my friends thought that our various countries would finally eliminate discrimination and racism and work for universal peace. Well, it is still somewhere off in the future.

So European politics is about identity .... but where is politics not about identity?

Kirt
Last edited by kirtu on Wed May 18, 2011 1:13 pm, edited 3 times in total.
“Where do atomic bombs come from?”
Zen Master Seung Sahn said, “That’s simple. Atomic bombs come from the mind that likes this and doesn’t like that.”

"Even if you practice only for an hour a day with faith and inspiration, good qualities will steadily increase. Regular practice makes it easy to transform your mind. From seeing only relative truth, you will eventually reach a profound certainty in the meaning of absolute truth."
Kyabje Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche.

"Only you can make your mind beautiful."
HH Chetsang Rinpoche
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kirtu
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by kirtu »

Namdrol wrote:
tobes wrote:
Well, if Europe was really enlightened in the Kantian sense, wouldn't Europeans be genuinely cosmopolitan in orientation? What about Locke and tolerance?
Compared to US, it was/is. And even the US is more tolerant than any Muslim nation today. Go and try to practice Buddhism in Saudi Arabia, for example. It is illegal to practice any religion in Saudi Arabia other than Islam. But I am sure you know this.
Saudi Arabia is an example of a fundamentalist Muslim state. Most Mulsim societies are not fundamentalist.

Indonesia is the world's largest Muslim country and it says it guarantees freedom of religion and generally tollerates freedom of religion for Hindu's, Buddhists, Christians and a very small Jewish community. Iran before the revolution was a good example of a kind of working multiculturalism. India *after* the invasions, under the Mughals was broadly tollerant. Morocco, Tunisia, and Qatar and broadly tollerant (at least they think so - in part because they preceive Americans to be automatically nominal Christians - but they have a history of tollerance and that is progressing).

Kirt
“Where do atomic bombs come from?”
Zen Master Seung Sahn said, “That’s simple. Atomic bombs come from the mind that likes this and doesn’t like that.”

"Even if you practice only for an hour a day with faith and inspiration, good qualities will steadily increase. Regular practice makes it easy to transform your mind. From seeing only relative truth, you will eventually reach a profound certainty in the meaning of absolute truth."
Kyabje Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche.

"Only you can make your mind beautiful."
HH Chetsang Rinpoche
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by mañjughoṣamaṇi »

Huseng wrote:I don't know much about the situation in France, but back home in Canada the issue is not that there are "un-Canadian" peoples amongst us, but that some of them demand special treatments and reforms to common sense rules and laws.
...
There are also some people in Canada calling for the state to recognize Sharia law and courts as a special judiciary for the Muslim community. That would essentially mean that part of the authority of civil courts would be transmitted to a non-government religious organization.
What people are trying to do in Canada (and the US though the process is different) is to get recognition for Islamic Courts under Canadian Alternate Dispute Resolution (ADR) statutes. This recognition has already been granted to Rabbinical Courts, as well as, for-profit arbitrators and mediators.

I don't know what the precedents are under Canadian law, but under US law the civil courts have overruled Rabbinical court decisions.
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Malcolm
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by Malcolm »

kirtu wrote: Saudi Arabia is an example of a fundamentalist Muslim state. Most Mulsim societies are not fundamentalist.

Indonesia is the world's largest Muslim country and it says it guarantees freedom of religion and generally tollerates freedom of religion for Hindu's, Buddhists, Christians and a very small Jewish community.
In practice, however it is different:

http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2010/11/04/i ... us-freedom" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


Iran before the revolution was a good example of a kind of working multiculturalism.
Sort of. It is true that the Shah repatriated Parsees who wanted to return to Iran etc.
India *after* the invasions, under the Mughals was broadly tollerant.
After Buddhism was totally destroyed.
Morocco, Tunisia
Close to Europe. Too much money to lose by being fanatics.

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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by PadmaVonSamba »

there were two thunderstorms happening at the same time, causing a lot of rain.
One was making crops grow and the other was washing away the soil.
So tell me, what is it in rain that makes it good or evil?
EMPTIFUL.
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by gnegirl »

PadmaVonSamba wrote:there were two thunderstorms happening at the same time, causing a lot of rain.
One was making crops grow and the other was washing away the soil.
So tell me, what is it in rain that makes it good or evil?
The aliens, silly. :alien: I read it on the interwebs, so it must be true!
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by freethinker108 »

tobes wrote:
Huseng wrote:
Fine, but I don't see Lama Ole making a subtle argument about the juridical system. He's not saying "sovereign law should be equally applied to all citizens. I am troubled by the friction between the proper functioning of a law and minorities."

Nor are many of the right in Europe, for that matter.

They are, in fact, talking about 'wearing foreign garb.' Legislating to ban it in fact.

:anjali:
Actually, he is saying exactly that. You might want to listen a little more instead of just stereotype the guy or take quotes out of context.

"Buddhists can never be racists because all beings have Buddha Nature"

-Lama Ole Nydahl
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Re: Lama Ole Nydahl, what do you think?

Post by conebeckham »

freethinker108 wrote:
Actually, he is saying exactly that. You might want to listen a little more instead of just stereotype the guy or take quotes out of context.

"Buddhists can never be racists because all beings have Buddha Nature"

-Lama Ole Nydahl

Taking this statement at face value, we can interpret it two ways...first,no sentient being, and not merely only Buddhists, can ever be racist, because any being possesses Buddha Nature (thus all beings are the same, essentially). Or, second, Buddhists cannot discriminate, by the mere fact of recognizing all beings have Buddha Nature. I believe his statement accords with this second option.....the first would be too naive, for anyone.

But, either way, It is one thing to recognize that all beings have Buddha Nature, and quite another to say that all beings, or even all Buddhists (which is what I think he's saying) recognize the essential equality of all sentient beings. It is also wishful thinking to say that merely because one holds a position regarding Buddha Nature inherent in all beings, one's actions, outlooks, and prejudices will change due to holding that position.
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