Expert: Laurie McLauglin - 7/18/2010

Question
I have followed Matthieu Ricard lectures and book.
But fpmt.org and various other sources makes me think there are competing forces here trying to attract interested people. What's the truth? Have been following your answers, need an honest comment

Answer
Hello Chitranshu

Thank you for letting me answer your question but sorry it took so long.

The Buddhist religion traditionally does not proselytize. So no Buddhist group should be out actively seeking interested people to convert.

That said, if I am interpreting your question correctly, just as Buddha himself taught 84 thousand teachings because he geared each one to the specific needs of the students he was teaching, so too there have arisen many, many different teachers.

Buddhism itself migrated from India to places like Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, into Southeast Asia, Japan, China Tibet and then into the West. As it migrated, it adapted to the various cultures in which it came into contact.  Various schools grew. Eventually it became divided into two major parts, Theravaden and Mahayana. Within Mahayana, (with which I am more familiar) there are a wide diversity of ways to practice, Zen, Nichiren, and Tibetan, to name just three.  Among Tibetan there are four Schools, Gelugpa, Sakya, Kagyu and Nyingma (which I believe is the school that Matthieu Ricard belongs to. His Holiness, the 14th Dalai Lama belongs to the Gelugpa.  The FPMT is also Gelugpa.

If I am interpreting your question correctly, I would have to answer that Buddha himself seemed to understand that there are many paths one can take to reach the top of a mountain. Each person is in a certain place in their lives based on the karma that brought them there.  No two people are alike so no two people can have the same experience and learn the same way.

So, there are many paths up the mountain to Enlightenment and which teacher one resonates with depends on ones own karma.

If a Buddhist group is practicing correctly, they are not out to compete with any other Buddhist group.  They simply have different ways of seeing and explaining Buddhism that resonate with people who have the karma to resonate with that path.

The FPMT is Gelugpa and so they use Gelugpa teachers to teach Buddhism. I believe Matthieu Ricard is Nyingma so he would hang out mostly with Nyingma centers.  The reason for this is that there are enough small differences in the way Gelugpa's and Nyingma's teach the dharma that to combine the two can be confusing to students, so generally it is suggested that once one finds a path that works for them they stick with it.

Is Matthieu Ricard genuine. From what I have learned, he translates for His Holiness the Dalai Lama, so I would suspect he is genuine.  Plus his teachers and his root guru are very well known teachers, themselves. So at least from reading about him on the Internet, he seems genuine.  If I wanted to know for certain, I would go to Nyingma groups and ask about him. From listening to him, he sounds to me like he is teaching the true dharma.

We are not supposed to take our teachers on blind faith.  Even the Buddha himself said (paraphrasing) "Do not belive everything simply because I said it or you heard someone say that I said it, but try it out for yourself and it if resonates for you, then adopt it, if not, let it go". We are to question our teachers until we find one or ones in whom we have unquestioning faith because what they teach helps us become better people. So, seek out others in the Nyingma lineage and ask them questions and find out for yourself if he is a true teacher of dharma.
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And if you find that you can rely on what he says and trust it and if he resonates with you, that is fabulous - I rejoice.

If he does not resonant with you after significant study, then let him go and find a teacher that does.  This is not, or from my nine years as a practicing Buddhist, a competition between groups or between teachers for who can get the most converts. No one has the slightest desire to convert anyone or compete for anyone. It is the person themselves who must find that path that works for them.

And fortunately because there are so many of us and our karma makes all our paths unique, there are also a great number of paths up the mountain to Nirvana and Enlightenment.

I hope that answered your question at least a little bit.  If you have any further questions, don't hesitate to ask.

resonate - Laurie