Expert: Joe McSorley - 1/27/2009

Question
QUESTION: Hi, why does belief in Buddhism preclude a belief in God?  Please explain, thank you

ANSWER: Zen, preclude belief in god

 I think there are many Western Buddhists who would argue that a belief in Buddhism does not preclude a belief in a god.  Some of them write me and chastise me for my characterizations of Zen as being non-theistic while giving very weak arguments for a belief in a god. I disagree with the idea of a deity in Buddhism on many levels and have yet to hear a sound argument to support it.
  I have to be specific here because I write about Zen Buddhism and some of the other schools are quite different in their structure.   The Zen school is not a belief system but a way to attempt to actualize awakening.  You don’t believe in Zen and for the most part, Buddhism in general, you attempt to achieve the same awakening the historical Buddha had.  Western religions have great reliance on belief and will kill one another over their belief systems which can never be proven or substantiated yet wars are fought over them.
  Faith is not a part of Buddhism like it is in the religions of the West.  Faith is contingent upon self-reflection and the mental process.  If one is not exposed to a faith or belief system one does not spontaneously come upon it out of nowhere.  If one is raised in the Jewish, Christian or Islamic faith that is what one generally believes.  It is an accident of birth on which faith many of us will follow.  For others it is something we are taught or learn about later and it makes sense to us but all of it is contingent upon being taught the faith.  What was there before religion?  Is there a religious awakening that is prior to faith?  Is there a religious experience that transcends all faiths?  An experience that is trans-historical and trans-cultural?  I would say that there is.  Many in history have come to a religious or existential awareness that was beyond their faith and generally when they expressed this were then ostracized by their faiths for blasphemy or heresy.  It is the awareness of self as the Universe and the Universe as self.  Meister Eckhardt may have experienced this when he proclaimed “I think the thoughts of God before creation” or Chuang tzu when he said, “ Heaven, earth and I arise simultaneously”.  There is a thread of this type of experience throughout history.
   A problem that I see with faith is that while one who believes expects others to respect his faith rarely do they give this respect to others faiths.  If what I believe is right simply because I believe it to be right then how can I criticize another’s faith?  That would give them the ground to criticize my faith.  It’s a circular argument, I know, but it is the problem that faith based religions do have.  Just because we believe it doesn’t make it a reality.  Many children believe in Santa Claus but that does not make him real.  What does matter is true religious experience.  If a native who had never been exposed to a religion comes to a religious awakening shouldn’t he then see the religion that is supposed to be true.  Shouldn’t he see ‘Jesus’ or ‘Allah’ or Krishna?  Has this ever happened that an isolated tribe has a belief in a faith they have never been exposed to?  Not to my knowledge although there are these terribly anecdotal stories of missionaries coming to tribes and being told that ‘they knew this already’ only to find they had been approached years earlier by different missionaries.  So you don’t find someone coming to this type of experience but you do find those that have come to the trans- historical/cultural experience with no knowledge of other cultures.  These experiences are recorded in Islam, Christianity, Taoism, Buddhism, Shamanism and many other traditions and the experience flies in the face of the system the individual has been raised in.
     Buddhism is not a matter of faith but a matter of realizing what the historical Buddha realized; the interpenetration of all things and co- origination.  There is no worship of the Buddha or a faith to follow but the arduous work of the individual to overcome their dualistic consciousness to realize themselves as an expression of the Universe, here and now.  To cling onto a belief system, an idea of a god, or anything else would be an impediment to awakening.  You can come to Zen with a belief system but if you really get the marrow of it that system will collapse.  Reality is not a mental construct but an existential fact not contingent upon belief or any other mental form.  Our minds clinging to forms and thought as true reality is what separates us from true reality.
   I am one of many people who came to Zen with a very strong belief in a deity.  It was years of deep inquiry that caused that system to be untenable and collapse.  My hanging on to it itself was exacerbating the problem.  I was never told to give it up or not to believe; it was an existential realization on my part that dissolved it.  So one can come to Buddhism with a belief in a deity but that will ultimately dissolve if one inquiries thoroughly enough.
 I hope this helps you.
        Take care,
         Joe



---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Dear Joe, my computer went down before I could send out my follow up so I'm not certain it was received.  I only wanted to ask two things, One, there's nothing I've read in the 4 noble truths that preclude the existence of god, and two, aren't there devas in buddhism that are based on faith and not experience?  Will you please address these two issues and thank you.  Marc

Answer
Hi Marc,
  When I last wrote you I mentioned that I was speaking about the Zen school’s view specifically because of those practices in common Buddhism that might include things like devas and other things that seem like deities. Many will explain these devas/deities as just being metaphors for reality and not considered real beings, having been remnants from other religions that have been incorporated over the years in different cultures. I have written in the past, and been much criticized for, that common Buddhism does have these practices in it regardless of whether or not it is part of the original teachings.  I have spent years with the Chinese community and many there will refer to the historical Buddha as “God” and living in nirvana.  This might be a mischaracterization of Buddhism but it is nonetheless a fact of common practice.  I also see this in the Thai and Vietnamese communities I deal with.  You can liken this to Christian practice today and what it might have originally been intended as.  I don’t think the historical Christ would in any way recognize today’s tele-evangelists as anything he was talking about and at the same time you cannot dismiss them as not being Christians.  I do think that the ideas of devas, arhats and the modern understanding of Bodhisattva’s are not in line with the historical Buddha’s intentions.
  You are right the Four Noble Truths do not preclude a belief in God but that omission does not mean it concludes a belief in God or anything else.  I often answer this question with ‘it does not preclude a belief in leprechauns either, so what’s the point?’.  In general it is a very specious argument to say that since something does not preclude something than it might be able to include it.  I have found over the years that those who want to include God in Buddhism will do so for many different reasons though in the East there has never been a question whether or not a God should be included in the teachings.  Like I said earlier I have received scathing emails from Westerners trying to prove this point by saying “well, he didn’t specifically say there isn’t a God” and again, he didn’t specifically say there are no leprechauns or unicorns………so their point is?
 In the Eightfold Path or the Four Noble Truths the historical Buddha does not say ‘believe this” or “believe that”, he talks about actualization and the way to end suffering.  His awakening is considered the grand ultimate realization of his life and the way to ultimate or true reality for everyone and he tried to convey that in his teachings.  If he had seen God, Brahma or Thor don’t you think he would have said so?  There is a clinging to the belief in God in the West that I think hinders many from grasping the heart of Buddhism.
 Again, you will find those who vehemently argue against me here but I suggest you read the Buddhist masters of the past to see if there is any mention of this. Bodhidharma did not tell Hui ka to believe or to look toward God, he went for the heart of his suffering, his self.
 Take care,
         Joe