the Buddha

Well, kidlins, I hope you are still out there and have been pacing the room waiting for my next bible blog entry. I’ll tell you, April has been a ridiculously busy month for me. Good thing I’m retired! Just got back from a week in my favorite city of all, San Francisco, and wouldn’t ya know it, everywhere I go I find material for this blog.

Case in point: our hotel room in the lovely Hotel Nikko right in the heart of the shopping district had the traditional Gideon Bible in the nightstand drawer. My first thought was, well, now I know exactly who Gideon was and his contribution to the Good Book.

However, there was also a book of Buddha. Hmmm, Japanese hotel, yea, that makes sense. And why not broaden guests’ perspectives. So, during some times when my hubby was at his conference and I had exhausted the shopping district and Fisherman’s Wharf and Chinatown, I felt compelled to examine this document, eager to enlighten myself in yet another religious direction.

The book gave detailed background to the Buddha and then went into his many philosophies and mandates. I will share just one observation here.

So many, many, many references deal with the necessity of denying one’s human desires. All of them! One’s discipline on earth is to learn to suppress all sensory passions. Now, this is shared by many other religions. Even Christians will, I think, distort Christ’s entity. Christians are taught that God became Man, and yet Christians will take that to mean we should strive to become godly. That requires us to suppress human, earthly experiences. It just doesn’t seem logical to me that the purpose of having human traits is to learn to reject them. It’s one thing to strive to be the most fulfilled, enriched, developed human one can be. It’s another to define that only as being “un-human” as possible.

A conundrum, to be sure.

Anyway, the Buddha is a fascinating figure, and though he did not proclaim actual divinity, many of his principles and values are worthy to strive for. Maybe my next blog will be “Confessions of a Buddist Virgin.” Stay tuned (if I ever finish this bible thing!).

Confession #77:  I know, I know, I am pretty ignorant about Buddhism, too.  I'll work on it.

Confession #78: I believe in both my divinity and humanity, and I believe the trick is to embrace every bit of being human in this life, learning its lessons for perhaps the next.  

Confession #79:  My Tai Chi instructor is Jewish and I find it amusing every time she "bows" to the Buddha.