Expert: Alex Wilding - 2/25/2008

Question
1).  What exactly is the point of reincarnation? I've heard various explanations but what is your understanding?

2). What is the goal of meditating and using koans?

3).  Obviously Buddhism and other eastern religions have had a huge impact on Asian life.  What do you think eastern religions have that western religions lack that make them able to be integrated into the society?  Or, is it just the people and other aspects of the society that make the difference?

Answer
Dear Theo,
For what my answers may be worth:
1).  What exactly is the point of reincarnation? I've heard various explanations but what is your understanding?
* Because we are in the grip of things in our own minds that are not always helpful - craving, hatred, willful stupidity and so on - our minds do not find peace when we die. Just like when we have gone to sleep, the habitual patterns in our mind may stir up dreams, or will reassert themselves when we wake up, so, after we have died, our mind is still grasping for some chance to exist and to play out its old habits. As soon as we get a chance, we are therefore reborn in one form or another.

2). What is the goal of meditating and using koans?
* "Meditation" is really quite a broad word, and in Buddhism it refers to all sorts of ways of training our minds and getting them used to one thing or another. It might involve getting really familiar with things that, on the surface, are quite obvious, like the fact that nothing is permanent (including ourselves). It might involve focusing on much more subtle things about the nature of reality and the nature of our mind. Or it might involve things like visualization and mantras in order to tune ourselves in to energies deep within ourselves. Generally speaking, meditation should help us get a bit more grip on our minds, but after that the various details depend on what each individual most needs to encourage.
Koans are not part of any of the traditions that I have real experience of - you would be better to ask a Zen Buddhist about that.

3).  Obviously Buddhism and other eastern religions have had a huge impact on Asian life.  What do you think eastern religions have that western religions lack that make them able to be integrated into the society?  Or, is it just the people and other aspects of the society that make the difference?
* If I may say so, and I don't know what your own religious adherence is so I hope this doesn't offend you, I think that Buddhism takes a much broader, more generous attitude to other people's religions than some of the religions from the Middle East do. It does not view people as "dammed" or "lost" just because they are not Buddhists!
It is perhaps easier to find living traditions of intense spiritual cultivation within Buddhism than within Christianity, where they have become very much a minority finger over the centuries.

I hope these answers help a little bit!
All the best
Alex Wilding