Rel Studies 302I

March 27, 2003

In 623 BC, the Buddha was born in India. Now, over 2500 years later, Buddhism is one of the large religions of the world, ranking fourth behind Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism. While the number of Buddhists in America is difficult to pinpoint, some say there are as many as 3 million Buddhists in America. Because Buddhism is not native to America, it has been imported by missionaries, immigrants, and literature. In the late 1800s, many Buddhist Chinese came to the west coast as cheap labor for railroad construction and other manual labor. Translations of Buddhist texts were circulating among the educated on the East coast of America, encouraging interest. During World War II, another surge of Buddhist interest and immigration occurred. At this time, many Zen authors from Asian countries moved to America and England, and English Zen authors migrated to America. This influx of Zen Buddhist ideas contributed to the "hippie" movements after the war, specifically, the beatniks embraced Zen ideas and practices. More recently, a great many Vietnamese Buddhists have made the U.S. their home, bringing their practices with them. Today, the Buddhist population in the United States could be divided into two groups, the converts to Buddhism and the cultural, or traditional, Buddhists.

As was alluded to a moment ago, Zen has a prominent place in American Buddhism. Zen focuses on the concept of "mindfulness", awareness, or emptiness. Mediation is the key to realizing these goals. In the United States, Zen mediation is practiced widely in monasteries, temples, and retreats. It is appealing because it is relaxing for the individual and does not necessarily require the long commitment of becoming a monk or nun.

Buddhism in general is also very appealing to American women in that it treats men and women equally. There are as many nuns as there are monks, and even in the Buddhist texts, female Buddhist nuns are portrayed as wise teachers in numerous tales. Buddhism also regards one’s wealth, class, and education as being totally disconnected with a soul’s potential of obtaining enlightenment. Hence, it is appealing to lower classes by lifting them up to the same esteem as the wealthy or respected. In these senses it also merges well with the American concepts of equal rights and equal opportunity.

In recent times, relativism has also become very popular in America, and Buddhism fits nicely with relativism, while still having religious and spiritual elements. Relativism, simply stated, is the belief that there is no absolute truth and hence no absolute moral standard that all should adhere to, but rather that each person must choose what is right to them. While the Buddha did preach a kind of moral standard of living, he did not teach on many of the philosophical issues that are controversial. Buddhism does not make statements about the origin of the world, how the human condition has come to its present state, exactly when, how, or if the world will end, nor even whether or not the soul is eternal and life exists after death. Because of this, the American convert to Buddhism feels like they can continue to hold many of the ideas they previously did. A Christian, for example, could still believe in miracles and the resurrection of the body, a Muslim could still believe in heaven, and a Hindu could still believe in reincarnation. Even an atheist who believes that everything is destroyed at death could practice Buddhism because he/she feels that the meditative practices make life more enjoyable, longer, etc.

Only .5% of the U. S. population is Buddhist according to the American Religious Identification Survey as cited by Ryuei Michael McCormick in a talk given on March 26, 2002 to some priests of the Nichiren Buddhist International Center gathered for an NBIC meeting, and the same number is given by www.adherents.com/rel_USA.html#religions. http://www.buddhanet.net/amdir_na.htm lists Buddhist temples in every U. S. state.

War and economic opportunity have been the main reasons for immigration to the United States throughout history. For many decades, now, Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, Korean, Tibetan, and other Buddhists have been living in America. Because the percentage of Buddhists is so small, they generally keep a fairly low profile. While Westerners are attracted to $200 Zen retreats in the mountains, these traditional Buddhists practice their religion in their homes much like they did in their home countries. They may keep statues or pictures of one or another Buddha in their home. They may celebrate traditional "feast days" such as the new year or Visakah Puja ("Buddha Day," a celebration of his birth, enlightenment, and death.) Mostly, the family environment is much like that in their native country. A Burmese Buddhist writes:

To promote community among the Buddhists in America, Buddhist "churches" and temples hold festivals. For example, the Buddist Church of Sacramento holds a annual bazaar. "The bazaar is an introduction to Buddhism and Japanese culture. In addition to food, the event features folk dancing, origami displays, calligraphy and more" (http://classic.sacbee.com/news/news/old/local11_20010812.html). As seen here, traditional Buddhists in America learn to adapt to this society while still enjoying their religion and culture.

When using resources on the World Wide Web, it is imperative that one considers the source. Because anyone can write and publish on the internet anything they like, great caution needs to be taken when taking a source as valid. The first thing to look at is the URL address of the page being used. If the addess is a ".gov", it is almost certainly a trustworthy source of information since to have that suffix, the site must be run by a government agency and will not be a personal page. Previously, a site ending in ".org" would also be reliable because it would be run by an non-profit organization. Now, however, ".org" is open to the general public and could be a personal site. This does not mean that the site is not useful; in fact, it is less likely to be garbage than a ".com". A ".com" address should mean that the web site is commercial or personal. These must be carefully critiqued and investigated to make sure the author is reputable. Finally, there is also a ".edu" suffix that signifies the author is a recognized academic institution. While a ".edu" ending will be safer for researching purposes than a ".com", it must be remembered that often a school web site will have the work of students (or professors) that may be erroneous. In the case of ".edu"s, then, it is advisable to find the position held by the author and if available a list of their other accomplishments.

No matter what the source is, the content must also be evaluated. The information should not deviate very far from information already found or known. Really, this should be done for any resource used, not only internet ones. For example, in order to gauge how knowledgeable and even-handed Houston Smith is in his book, The World’s Religions, I made it a point to read his section on my own faith, to see if, and in what ways, he failed to portray it accurately. From this, I discovered that Smith might have a tendency to explain specific cases, ideas, or doctrines well enough, while doing a great disservice to the central basis of the religion. That is, he mistakes a comparatively small component of the religion for the center of belief, and neglects the religion’s true focus. With this in mind, I take his sections on religions I do not know well with a grain of salt.

Another thing to consider when using sources is the year they were written in. Especially when the data could vary greatly year from year, it is helpful to know the general time of publication. For example, www.ship.edu/~cgboeree/buddhahist.html states that there are "more than 300 million Buddhists in the world, including at least a quarter million in Europe, and a half million each in North and South America... other estimates go as high as three million in the U.S. alone." By looking at the bottom of the page, however, I can see that he wrote this in 1999, four years ago, and that his sources are even older. This puts me on my guard against making any strong points based on his data, or perhaps against using it at all.

While teachers often warn against using personal sites, there are times when it is not only appropriate, but preferred. For this paper, I used a personal web site from a Burmese Buddhist family because I wanted a first-hand account of what living as a Buddhist means. In this case, I felt that someone who lived the life a better expert than someone who simply studies the religion but does not practice it, or who is trying to leave out their personal opinion.

Using sources, their really is no set of rules or qualifications to follow. Instead, there is only a need to understand the language, be able to navigate the sites to find pertinent information, and make an educated decision to include or leave out sources based on the need and the source.

Arcata Zen Group. CA, United States. http://arcatazencenter.org/home/.

Boeree, Dr. C. George. The History of Buddhism. 1999. http://www.ship.edu/~cgboeree/buddhahist.html.

Buddhist Ceremonies. Buddha Dharma Education Association Inc. 1992-2003.

http://www.buddhanet.net/festival.htm

Buddhism in America Links. March 26, 2003. http://www.unc.edu/ncbuddhism/page44.html

Introduction to Buddhism. The America Burma Buddhist Association. 1997. http://www.mahasiusa.org/introb.htm

Maung, U Kin, B.A. A Buddhist Family In Burma. http://web.ukonline.co.uk/buddhism/kmaung.htm.

McCormick, Ryuei Michael. Buddhism in America. March 26, 2002. http://campross.crosswinds.net/Ryuei/Buddhism-in-America.html.

The Sacramento Bee. Crump, Gwendolyn. Aug. 12, 2001. http://classic.sacbee.com/news/news/old/local11_20010812.html.