Last week my World History classes learned about three religions to come out of ancient India: Hinduism, Jainism, and Buddhism. These faiths are very complex—especially Hinduism—so as I stressed to my students, we were just covering the very basic facets of these faiths.
Of the three, Buddhism is perhaps the easiest to grasp, because its foundation is a series of logical propositions. It consists of four basic principles, the Four Noble Truths, which essentially take the form of a logical argument with premises and conclusions:
- Life is suffering.
- Suffering is caused by desire.
- [Therefore], to escape suffering, one must end all desires.
- To end all desires, one must follow the Eightfold Path.
The Eightfold Path consists of obtaining and maintaining the following: right views, right resolve, right speech, right conduct, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration.
Buddhism further offers three ways to pursue the Eightfold Path: right thought, right action, and/or religious devotion (becoming a monk or nun, spending one’s life meditating and contemplating upon the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path).
If that all sounds like a lot of work to Christian readers, it should: we are fairly spoiled, given that our path to salvation comes through faith in Christ alone; it is a Gift freely given, although we do not deserve it in the slightest.
That said, faith without works is dead. There is a certain seductive appeal to the asceticism of classical Buddhism, and it seems to offer a productive way for one to live one’s life. Given that classical Buddhism is inherently atheistic, in the sense that it does not require worship of any particular gods, it theoretically could slot into almost any faith tradition. Indeed, one reason Buddhism had a greater impact outside of its birthplace in India is because Hinduism was able to absorb Buddhist teachings (for the most part—the Buddhists were far more egalitarian than the highly-segregated Hindus with their exceptionally rigid caste system) into its existing spiritual hodgepodge.
Furthermore, in our troubled times, retreat from the world’s obvious sufferings seems like a pleasant, even necessary, choice. That is essentially the argument of Rod Dreher’s influential—and hotly debated—The Benedict Option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation: conservatives have failed to prevent the secularization of culture, so it is time to batten down the hatches and retreat to cloistered religious enclaves. In other words, we must separate from the world [note that the link to Dreher’s book is an Amazon affiliate link; should you make a purchase through that link, I receive a portion of the proceeds, at no additional cost to you. —TPP].
But Dreher’s prescription and the growing influence of Buddhist thought in modern Christianity are not the way forward, as seductive as they may seem. Dreher may or may not be veering into despair, which is a sin (one of which I am frequently guilty); Christians who adopt Buddhist precepts—wittingly or unwittingly—are certainly veering into heresy.
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The Portly Politico 