fandomhigh | World Religions, Wednesday, 2nd Period [10/11]

Another night making friends with Mr. Miller and Mr. Daniels has left Jesse a bit less than exuberant this morning. He's standing by an open window when the first student enters and might possibly have flicked a cigarette away like a guy caught smoking in the boys room.

The handouts are waiting with the sign-in sheet and Jesse starts up as soon as everyone has taken a seat.

"When you think about religions, you probably think about a god or gods. Thing is, we've talked about more than one religion in this class that doesn't have that. Buddhism¹ is another one. Buddha's not a god, he's an enlightened person. Anyone has the potential to be a Buddha, if they just wake up and see existence for what it really is. You could argue that Jesus was a Buddha. And Mohammed.

"Siddhartha Gautama² is the guy most folks are probably thinking of when they say 'Buddha.' He's a Buddha, but he's also the Buddha, since he's the guy behind the religion we currently call Buddhism."

"Buddha said, 'I teach one thing and one thing only: suffering and the end of suffering.'

"Unlike religions that want you to go strictly on faith, Buddhist teaching encourages individuals to practice and verify the Buddha's teachings based on their own personal experience, and also after consulting with 'the wise'. If they find the teachings are true - leading to more happiness and less suffering - they can apply these teachings in a practical form into their daily life if they so wish. There's no hellfire and brimstone in the teaching and no insistence that there's only one way to get from here to there."

Jesse then goes on to discuss the various sects and approaches within Buddhism, concluding with Zen Buddhism³.

"Today I want y'all to have a look at koans⁴. Get together with a partner and either talk about one of the example koans. Or, and I'll give extra credit to anyone who does this, come up with a koan of your own."

Handout links:
¹Buddhism at Wiki
²Gautama Buddha
³Zen Buddhism
⁴Koans

Syllabus

[ooc: My thanks to wikipedia for the parts I cribbed verbatim.]

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Nadia looked up and nodded slowly. "Thanks. I'm sorry, too."

"Things got a little out of hand," Cally said. "But hey, we should probably be doin' the assignment, right?"

"Yeah. Probably. Any koans stick out to you?"

"Mostly? These just look like gibberish," Cally said.

". . . I think that's actually kind of the point."

"The point is that they make no sense?" Cally scratched her head. "That doesn't make any sense."

"The point is, you can't look at them and know immediately what they mean. You have to think about it. And when they do make sense, you've learned something."

"But they don't make any sense," Cally said.

Nadia raised an eyebrow. She was pretty sure she'd just explained that.

"How can they make sense if they don't make sense? Even after thinking about them?"

Nadia raised her other eyebrow and looked expectantly at Cally.

And made a mental note of that, because it probably counted as a good koan.

"What?" Cally said. "Am I being too stupid and blind to see the 'obvious' again?"

"How long have you been thinking about the koans?"

"Not long enough, apparently," Cally said. "You probably figured them all out already, huh?"

"Not even close." Nadia shrugged. "I mean, I understand what they're for, which is to get you thinking in a different way. But I don't know what they mean yet."

"I just... I dunno. It's too... impractical, for me," Cally said.

Nadia nodded. "It's probably nice, to not have anything better to think about than what sound it makes if one hand claps."

Cally held up a hand, and proceeded to do that one handed clapping thing people can do (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8Q1nLwYK6E).

"Not that interesting, either."

Nadia grinned, despite that Cally had probably completely missed the point. "Okay, but what about the dog having Buddha nature?"

"Okay, that, I have no idea. Though that's mainly because I only learned about this Buddha guy today for the first time," Cally said.

"Fair enough. Do you guys have any religions like this where you're from?"

"We really only have the one," Cally said. "And we're kinda all 'yay lots of gods' about it."

"Nobody believes anything different?"

"Well, you either believe the scrolls or you don't," Cally said. "That's about it."

"See, that seems weird to me."

Re: Koans

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