Mel, There are plenty of zen quotations to the effect of killing Buddha. One of them, 'when you meet Buddha on the road, kill him.' To a lesser degree, 'when you utter the word Buddha, wash your mouth completely.' To a more degree by Unmon Zen Master, 'Too bad I wasn't there when Buddha made his 7 steps in each direction, and exclaimed, 'in heaven and on earth I am the most worthy of honor', as soon as he was born. If I had been, I would have struck him death and fed his body to hungry dogs.' You are right that no Middle Eastern religions ever come close as that statement. IMO, those remarks are aimed at ridding you of all attachments, including the most sacred ones. Anthony
--- On Sat, 9/7/11, Mel <[email protected]> wrote: From: Mel <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [Zen] Zen and Christianity are incompatible To: [email protected] Date: Saturday, 9 July, 2011, 10:45 PM With my lack of interest in too much ritual and ceremony, I doubt that I could be described as a Zen Buddhist. As far as I'm concerned, you bow once when you enter the room, and then once on your way out. The Soto group I was with also had these naming ceremonies and robes which I never really took to. However, I have stuck to(well, sort of) the Soto way of things as I never liked this Rinzai obssession with koans. Unlike Bill, I use 'zen' and Zen whichever one fits my mood at any given moment, but neither wording changes what I do Urged to kill the teacher? I may be misunderstanding your wordings here, but morals and compassion in the Hebrew sense is not where I am here. I'm not sure I understand your question completely in Buddha's grace Mel --- On Sun, 10/7/11, Anthony Wu <[email protected]> wrote: From: Anthony Wu <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [Zen] Zen and Christianity are incompatible To: [email protected] Received: Sunday, 10 July, 2011, 12:09 AM Mel, Then how can you be a zen Buddhist while you are urged to kill your teacher? Anthony --- On Sat, 9/7/11, Mel <[email protected]> wrote: From: Mel <[email protected]> Subject: [Zen] Zen and Christianity are incompatible To: [email protected] Date: Saturday, 9 July, 2011, 7:53 PM Being a devout Christian and a practitioner of zen is basically an impossiblity. One has an actual god that one obeys without question, and the other one which is zen/Zen, doesn't in Buddha's grace Mel
