It has come to my attention that the Dalai Lama, who is considered to be Buddhism’s spiritual leader, is coming to Canada soon. I did a quick search on the internet to find out when. It appears that his tour starts in Vancouver from April 18 to April 20, 2004 and then on to Ottawa from April 21 until the 24th, ending in Toronto from April 24 until May 5th. Now this should be of some interest to those of us living in these cities because not only will his visit boost tourism and bring a much needed boost to our local economies, but these visits will also bring rise to a public forum on spirituality just as we have seen Mel Gibson’s movie The Passion do.
While estimates vary between 200-500 million adherents, the generally agreed number of Buddhists world wide is 350 million (about 6% of the world’s population). This makes Buddhism the world’s fourth largest (in terms of adherents) religions[1]. The Stats Canada figures I found put the number of Buddhists in Canada at 300,300 in 2001. That’s an increase of 84% since 1991.
I am no “well read student of world religions” so whenever I encounter an opportunity to meet with and discuss spiritual matters with someone from a world religion other than Christianity, I will refer to The Compact Guide to World Religions (edited by Dean Halverson, Bethany House Publishers, 1996, ISBN 1-55661-704-6).
Beliefs
Knowing that our cities will be flooded with visitors that are not only adhering Buddhists, but spiritual seekers as well, I eagerly took this book from my shelf to see what I could find. After reading through the beliefs of Buddhism I could see why Buddhism would be a very attractive religion to the spiritual seeker. Even the spiritual seeker who comes from a Christian background would be attracted to Buddhism after learning about the “Eight fold Path.” These are eight points that are paths to enlightenment and are categorized according to three major sections:
WISDOM (Panna)
1. Right Understanding
2. Right Thought
ETHICAL CONDUCT (Sila)
3. Right Speech
4. Right Action
5. Right Livelihood
MENTAL DISCIPLINE (Samadhi)
6. Right Effort
7. Right Awareness
8. Right Meditation
Who among us would argue that these are noble goals? In fact it wouldn’t take many of us very long to find corresponding Christian scriptures that share the same sentiments. These disciplines are shared by most world religions which also makes Buddhism attractive. Even the agnostic and atheist would claim that these are values that they try to live by. “Universal Truths,” is what many would call these goals. The above list is in fact part of “The Fourth Noble Truth” of Buddhism. Once attracted to Buddhism, the adherent will be introduced to the “Four Noble Truths” of Buddhism:
The First Noble Truth: Life consists of suffering. This concept of suffering includes the experience of pain, misery, sorrow, and unfulfillment.
The Second Noble Truth: Everything is impermanent and ever-changing including the ’self.’ We suffer because we desire those things that are impermanent.
The Third Noble Truth: The way to liberate oneself from suffering is by eliminating all desire. We suffer because we desire those things that are impermanent.
The Fourth Noble Truth: Desire can be eliminated by following the aforementioned Eight fold Path.
Now most people, regardless of religious upbringing or cultural background would have no problem accepting the first and second “Noble Truths,” but the third and fourth do require some level of commitment and work on our part to attain the ultimate goal of Buddhism. “And just what is the ultimate goal of Buddhism?” you may ask.
On the surface it would seem that the goal of Buddhism is to eliminate suffering. The Dalai Lama is so welcomed in foreign countries because of his promotion of world peace and ending suffering. Most North Americans attracted to Buddhism would stop right there in their exploration of Buddhism and that would be good enough for them. They can now consider themselves “spiritual” and “noble” at the same time without the trappings of what they consider “antiquated, hypocritical, North American Christianity.” Buddhism is void of a God that we must answer to.
Even Hollywood is cashing in on the popularity of Buddhist thought with movies like Seven Years in Tibet and Tomb Raider with the character of Lara Croft learning from Buddhist monks. A short list of Hollywood celebrities that would call themselves Buddhists are: Richard Gere, Keanu Reeves, Brad Pitt, Leonardo Dicraprio, Harrison Ford and Steven Segal. The list could go on to include popular musicians as well like Tina Turner, Sting and Ricky Martin.
North Americans will see snippets of interviews with the Dalai Lama on television promoting world peace and harmony and an end to world hunger and disease. What we don’t hear very much about however is what the “ultimate” goal of Buddhism is. The “ultimate” goal of Buddhism is to break the cycle of death and rebirth (reincarnation as also taught in Hinduism) by following the Eight fold Path, eliminating desire which removes the effects of karma, allowing the Buddhist to achieve “enlightenment.” At the moment of enlightenment, the Buddhist achieves the state of “nirvana.” Nirvana is the “ultimate” goal and is the Buddhist equivalent of salvation.
So just what exactly does the Buddhist ’salvation’ of nirvana look like? Buddha described nirvana like this:
“There is a sphere which is neither earth, nor water, nor fire, nor air, which is not the sphere of the infinity of space, nor the sphere of the infinity of consciousness, the sphere of nothingness, the sphere of perception, or non-perception, which is either this world, neither sun nor moon. I deny that it is coming or going, enduring, death, or birth. It is only the end of suffering.”[2]
So, according to Buddhist teachings, everything is impermanent (The Second Noble Truth) which would include us as persons, as individuals. We do not have immortal souls according to Buddhism. The only goal we have to look forward to as Buddhists is an end to suffering. Nirvana ends the cycle of rebirth and thus ends suffering. Now if we draw these teachings to a logical conclusion, we must realize that the only reward offered to us in Buddhism for all our “works” (the Eight fold Path) is annihilation.
The interesting paradox in Buddhism is the teaching of self-denial. That is, denying all desires, including love and anger. Buddhists see emotions as evidence of a person still being attached to the ego, the self. This creates bad ‘karma’ which would hinder one on the path to ‘nirvana.’ So the paradox is that in order to attain ‘nirvana’ one must deny oneself yet at the same time, one must be self-reliant to achieve this. It would seem that to be constantly working ‘the Eight fold Path’ in order to ‘deny the self’ to achieve ‘nirvana’ a person would have to be constantly performing a series of checks and balances in examining their own life that they would have to become very ’self-centered’ in the process thus defeating the whole purpose of following ‘the Eight fold Path’ in the first place! We are expected to deny ourselves yet we are also expected to work toward ending our own suffering.
There is much more that could be said about Buddhist teachings (read The Compact Guide to World Religions) but suffice it to say in summary that in Buddhism there is no personal God, no heaven, no hell, no rewards and no punishment.
The Apologetic Response to Buddhism
The Dalai Lama will come to Canada and flocks of Buddhists and spiritual seekers will gather to hear him teach how we can achieve world peace and end suffering in our world through the teachings of Buddhism. So how should we as Christians respond? What is our ‘apologetic response’ to Buddhism?
It has been said, “Most Buddhists have never heard the Gospel because they have misheard it.”[3] Those who have experience in sharing the Gospel with Buddhists will tell you that it often takes several attempts to learn how to effectively communicate the Gospel message to them. This is because Christianity is so ‘personal’ and built on a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Buddhists see this as holding on to a thirst for ‘personal existence’ after death which they don’t believe in. The Buddhist considering life after death would be adopting bad karma thus hindering their path to nirvana.
When the person from a Buddhist background rejects your message, ask them why they are rejecting it. It may be that they have ‘misheard the Gospel’ message and not really ‘heard’ it. It may also be that they are really only ‘cultural’ Buddhists, that is, they are Buddhists because their families are Buddhists but they have never really thought about it or considered Buddhist teachings in contrast with any other other religion.
Often Christians will just offer a tract to someone and pray that the Holy Spirit will reach this person through the reading of the tract. I don’t discourage this method of evangelism by any means and have even practiced it myself. The Holy Spirit can and indeed has prodded many to accept the claims of Christ this way. I would however, like to offer that spending time in conversation with Buddhists, asking a lot of questions and genuinely getting to know them as individuals is probably more effective in the long run. God can and does use tracts but while most of them end up in the garbage, the memory of a Christian spending time with them and being concerned about their spiritual well-being will last a lifetime.
Most Buddhists will claim that are many paths to God. What they really mean however is that there are may ways to nirvana. Remember the Eight fold Path? We see these as universal truths as do the Buddhists, so as far as they are concerned, anyone following the Eight fold Path, regardless of religious affiliation, will eventually reach nirvana. The North American confusion lies in the fact that many conceive nirvana to be the same as being with God in heaven. As we have seen, this is not the case.
So our response to the Buddhist adherent who offers us this claim should be to offer them in return a comparison between the Buddhist teaching of works on our own merit and the Christian teaching of Christ’s accomplished work on the cross on our behalf. Which of these two options is ‘good news:’ working and striving, hoping to end our own suffering by entering into ‘nothingness’ or accepting the free gift of salvation offered to us by a loving God who embodies the Eight fold Path and spending an eternity with Him without suffering? This should give any spiritual seeker cause for consideration.
There are many other tips and topics of discussion available to us in The Compact Guide To World Religions. I don’t want to give them all away, so you’ll have to pick up a copy and read for yourself. In the meantime, you can also refer to the online resource pages I’ve provided below.[4]
Notes:
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1. Buddhanet
2. Living Buddhism, by Andrew Powell (Harmony Books, New York, 1989), pg. 28
3. “Concepts of Salvation in Buddhism” by Tissa Weerasingha, (Evangelical Review of Theology. Exetor, Devon, U.K.: Paternoster Press; January 1991, pg. 62)
4. Check out these pages for further helps:
Witnessing to Buddhists
Belief Bulletins
Sharing Your Faith
Probe on Buddhism
Index on Buddhism
Buddhism Interview
Buddhism Mission
Midnight Call on Buddhism
Oracle on Buddhism
My interest in missions began when I attended a missions conference in Urbana Illinois in 1987. The theme of the conference was taken from Jonah 4:11, “Should I not be concerned?” As you may recall, Jonah was upset with God about the dead plant that had previously sheltered him from the elements. God rebuked Jonah by reminding him that he should be more concerned about the more than 120,000 Ninevites who were more valuable than the plant that Jonah was so concerned about.This inspired me more to be concerned about those who had been led astray by false teaching about Christianity. My sister had been led astray by the Jehovah’s Witnesses so I knew first hand what effect that kind of loss had on a family. I became concerned about others who had experienced this kind of loss and about those who were being led astray. It didn’t take me long however to discover that I could not help anyone if I didn’t first understand what I believe and why. I was forced to perform a self-examination using the Word of God as my guide.
