Digging in the Zen Garden

Statue of Buddha in Laos - Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter

I recently splurged $8 on a bargain book at Barnes and Noble.,  “The Essentials of Philosophy” by James Mannion.  It gives the reader a whirlwind tour of world philosophy – across all of the ages and all parts of the world.  It gives a condensed version of everything from Plato’s Forms to Bertrand Russell’s mathematical Empiricism.  Turns out that various thinkers have been misunderstood or mistranslated through the ages – Epicurus was characterized posthumously as a Hedonistic bon vivante.   In fact, he was more about quality of life and savoring things at a slow, reasoned pace.  In some ways he was the very opposite of his “sensual man” image.

Virtually every person and philosophy has some merit or reasonableness when seen in a particular context, a singular glint in the prism of “deep thought”.   Some of these, when taken out of context can turn into Frankenstein monsters that need to be dispatched with a pitchfork, quickly. Friedrich Nietzsche proposed the idea of a “Super Human” who acted from confident knowledge, and not groupthink.  It’s ironic that his idea, which had academic merit per se, was twisted into a pretzel of death camp rationalizations by none other than Adolph Hitler.   Frequently such bastardizations happen long after a philosopher is dead and he can no longer set the record straight on what he actually thought or said.

Possibly more interesting in “Essentials” than anything were the ideas of Siddhartha Gautama, aka Buddha.  Buddha was a liberal, Hindu, Indian prince who disavowed some of the violence and illogic he saw in Hinduism.  The contrasting religious background reminds me of how Jesus was a Jewish rabbi – who also became the foundation of a whole new religion.   Buddha originated many aphorisms, principles and ideas (The Four Noble Truths) which I won’t detain you with here.   Many of these ideas overlap with similar wisdom that Westerners might glean from the 10 commandments, the beatitudes or the Book of Psalms.    But Buddha suggested something else altogether unsettling … Buddha says that we chose our parents, our current life situations and our gender in a past life.  

Thus, this life with all its problems and nastiness is something for which we voluntarily checked a box!   We asked for it, as if scanning a special Sears Catalog of perverse conditions.    Put me down for “lower middle class, speech impediment and lackluster career.   A big nose, high forehead should certainly round it all out”. Have to say, I'm pretty sure I never asked for my slings and arrows explicitly. Buddha sees these features as the work of a compensating God, not really a lesser God.  

I’m just not sure where to draw the lines.  Did I live before, and my previous life has some spirit-connection here in this life?   Or is that total nonsense …  Are rewards and punishments something that come in a promised afterlife and not realized already?   Even Exodus in the Bible speaks of the father’s sins visited upon his offspring.   I can’t imagine what sins were done by my forbears; I can only hope that bygones will be bygones.  There are so many ideas to mull over in “The Essentials of Philosophy”...    No one particular idea has an iron grip yet (on me anyhow).   I may need to delve deeper than an $8 bargain bin foray to see what actually exists over the rainbow of this spiritual quest.

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