The eightfold path, the noble path, enlightenment, simplicity, no god. Ah yes, its all so simple some may think. Buddhism is the way forward.
Yes they think, lets create a society of what is essentially buddhists, an atheistic society, and surely this will eradicate the nonsense in the world the religions with a god in them seem to create.
Poor wretches! If only they had the first clue about what buddha actually believed, what dalai lama believes, then they would not have such a stupid idea that they pass off as a phycological/spiritual panacea.
Buddha was a clever man, but what can I say, if you do not know the way then what im putting forward may sound obscure. Buddha,s greatness lies in the fact that the path he created was for those who needed simply to get on with life, without all the drawbacks of an intellectual mind.
And those needing to do this may well be at this stage through their own karmic creations.
He stripped his philosophy of all mentions of god for this purpose. Because God is a complicated subject. And not everyone in this life is here to uncover the secrets of heaven.
Some people must learn to act altruistically without hoping for a reward. Must learn the basics of charity, magnanamity and rectitude without falling back on a god as an excuse.
Heaven wants to see quality people being made. So as to materialize heaven on earth. It does not want clowns who act only because they believe they will be rewarded or punished. Do you see?
Buddhism is truly remarkable for this reason.
This is an in depth topic requiring some explanation. But for now I just want to make it clear that Buddha was not an atheist.
If you read anything about zen, or the dao, or any other form of buddhism, you will see that emphasis is put on having a mind void of intellectual clutter.{the sort of clutter most philosophers i know love and enjoy}
This is the clutter I mentioned before in my other posts. The greatness of Religion , or rather heaven in creating them i should say, is that it seeks to cater for everyone, no matter where they are karmically. So you see buddhism is right, all religions are right.
It,s only their followers who get it wrong. There are so many religions exactly because it is heavens intention to help everyone no matter what country they are in.
And heaven celebrates the diversity amongst humans, why do we not?
Why cant some people see the beauty in how hinduism suits the indian mindset, druidery suits the celts, buddhism the orientals,judaism the jews,islam the arabs.
Of course, heaven does not intend things to be confined. And the world is full of people reincarnating with different karmic destinys. What they learned in one life may well be remembered in their soul the next. So a european may well lean towards, and find comfort in Sikhism.
He or she may have been a sikh in their last life. Remember we are free. We can be what we want to be.
So although the original idea was to create a diversity that people would find interesting amongst themselves, it was never heavens intention that only the people of one country or another remain under the faith which was given to them to suit their mentality.
But nonetheless, this was heavens original purpose. And what a great plan i say. We have a world which is interesting,full of different peoples , and religions. Only thing is we were all meant to get on with one another.
Forget silly questions like if god is all knowing then he would have known it would happen like that. This is a valid question. But for now let me tell you that it is a mistake to imagine the society of the future should be an atheistic one.
And that we should look to buddhism as an example. If you think this way, you know nothing of buddha, nothing of what buddhism is.