(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Anti-Koans [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2023-07-23 The Awakened One had some trouble, as we have seen, about how to help others wake up from the nightmare of self, when dreamers can’t imagine wokeness, and some consider it the essence of evil. The worst case is people who imagine that karma doesn’t apply to them, as in Hyakujo’s Fox. The fox supposedly said, long ago, that the awakened are free from karma, and was stuck as an evil fox spirit until Hyakujo explained that the awakened are aware of karma. (Background, including Dogen Zenji’s commentary, below.) Anti-koans are worse. They not only get the teaching wrong, not only deny reality, but fortify themselves with bogus anti-religious experiences. We have looked at One Hand NOT Clapping, and there are other fake, bogus, bollixed koans. Then there is everything named Zen or Nirvana, just like everything called heavenly or paradisical. That, at least, is mostly harmless. It just misses the point entirely. The dog in the Mu koan is not an animal, but one who denies karma. The inquiring monk denied the words and intention of the Lotus Sutra, so Joshu tried to snap him out of it. I’m not talking about pretending to understand real koans today. I mean those who have had a sort of religious experience, but in reverse, and are insanely proud of it. There is an excellent example of this in Gone With the Wind, when Scarlett O’Hara has been starving, and digs up a turnip to eat. Then she calls on God as her witness: Whatever evil she might have to do, "I will never be hungry again" scene - GONE WITH THE WIND So Rev. Abbess Jiyu Kennett taught at Shasta Abbey. There are many Christian koans, including being born again of the Spirit. You can read about that in William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, and in John Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress. We will come to those, and to others. There are also vast numbers of Evangelicals who think they are born-again Christians, who are really the exact opposite. Many fall down and worship the tempter devil, thinking him to be Jesus God, in exchange for the promise of Dominion over the Nations. Or they worship Mammon, in the Prosperity Gospel. Or they sell their souls to their own devil, or to the Buddhist Mara, who promises all worldly delights. Or whichever demon of the mind corresponds with any other form of attachment creating suffering for self and other. Hieronymus Bosch, The Garden of Earthly Delights Many are devotees of Bonhoeffer’s Cheap Grace, explained in The Cost of Discipleship, that you need only profess your devotion to Jesus as your Savior once to be forgiven forever, and to be free of all obligations to others. Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves, it is not a gift of God. Cheap grace is baptism without church discipline, it is communion without confession, it is “grace” without the cross. The most extreme version of this is seen in Confessions of a Justified Sinner, recounting a tale of a man who has an anti-kensho, and then goes about murdering “sinners”. It is a novel by Scottish author James Hogg, published anonymously in 1824. This phenomenon occurs in real life in abortion doctor murders and bigoted violence against LGBTQs, Jews, Muslims, law enforcement officers, and others. It was a major factor in the Crusades, during which various Popes offered plenary indulgences to Crusaders. It continues in the vehement, vicious racism, misogyny, nativism, and so on that we see so strongly in Wrong-Wing religion, while they tell us that they are only doing it because they love us so much. Being Born Again at Answers in Genesis Kids Answers: What Does Being Born Again Mean? When I was born again into God’s family, my life changed and my heart changed. I knew I was God’s child now. The things I wanted to do were different. I wanted to learn about God. I learned to trust Jesus and understood that without Him I could never get to heaven. I wanted to go to church and learn more about what the Bible says. I began to love God more and more (as I got to know Him better). I learned that God hated my sins, but that if I was sorry for them and if I believed that Jesus died on the Cross so I could be forgiven, then God would forgive me. Being born again has given me assurance that I will one day be in heaven with God, my Lord and Savior! It can do the same for you. Note the pervasive selfishness, and the lack of concern for anyone else. Presuppositionalists compare their presupposition against other ultimate standards such as reason, empirical experience, and subjective feeling, claiming presupposition in this context is: a belief that takes precedence over another and therefore serves as a criterion for another. An ultimate presupposition is a belief over which no other takes precedence. For a Christian, the content of Scripture must serve as his ultimate presupposition… This doctrine is merely the outworking of the 'lordship of the Christian god' in the area of human thought. It merely applies the doctrine of scriptural infallibility to the realm of knowing.[3] This is a foundational argument for Young-Earth Creationist rejection of all science that contradicts their blinkered view of the Bible, except for a few matters that they deny they ever said. The flat Earth, on pillars, with four literal corners. The planets and stars going around the Earth. Copernicus was condemned by both Martin Luther and the Catholic Church. The solid sky, the firmament, with a vast ocean above it, doors to let the rain through, the stars and planets and all underneath, and a literal, physical Heaven above all of that. They then reject the presupposition of Methodological Naturalism, which is at the foundation of all science. Mainstream Christians accept that that is the method of science, without holding that it contradicts their faith. Trumpism NPR: The White Elephants In The Room No matter what happened over the last four years — Charlottesville, 'sh*thole countries," the disastrous handling of the coronavirus pandemic — about 80 percent of white evangelicals consistently approved of President Trump's performance. While their numbers have dwindled from 21 to 15% of the U.S. population, white evangelicals are a force to be reckoned with in politics, says Robert P. Jones, the author of White Too Long: The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity and the CEO of the Public Religion Research Institute. They make up a little over a third of Republicans, Jones says, and have an outsized impact on elections, making up about a quarter of voters. That's right—15% of Americans account for around 25% of those who turn out to vote. See also Jones’s earlier book, The End of White Christian America. Millions of children of Evangelicals fall away from the bigotry and denial every year, but they vote at a much greater rate than earlier cohorts of young people. Background Dōgen revisits the wild-fox kōan in “Jinshin inga,” a 1250s rewriting of the earlier “Daishugyō” fascicle, to ground his ideas in precedent and explain them in detail. He elaborates upon the significance of cause and effect, setting the stage for criticism of other thinkers and schools of thought. By suggesting that there is a distinction between existing in causality and a state in which causality is no longer in force, Dōgen's newfound view runs, conventional interpretations thus fall victim to "a dualistic contrast between the pure and impure, flux and serenity, and freedom from and subjection to causation."[10] He explains: Those who say "one does not fall into cause and effect" deny causation, thereby falling into the lower realms. Those who say "one cannot ignore cause and effect" clearly identify with cause and effect. When people hear about identifying with cause and effect, they are freed from the lower realms. Do not doubt this. Many of our contemporaries who consider themselves students of Zen deny causation. How do we know? They confuse "not ignoring" with "not falling into." Thus we know they deny cause and effect.[12] Joshu’s Mu Joshu's Dog A monk asked Joshu, a Chinese Zen master: `Has a dog Buddha-nature or not?' Joshu answered: `Mu.' [It does not exist.] Mumon's comment:s To realize Zen one has to pass through the barrier of the patriarchs. Awakening always comes after the road of thinking is blocked. If you do not pass the barrier of the patriarchs or if your thinking road is not blocked, whatever you think, whatever you do, is like a tangling ghost. You may ask: What is a barrier of a patriarch? This one word, Mu, is it. This is the barrier of Zen. If you pass through it you will see Joshu face to face. Then you can work hand in hand with the whole line of patriarchs. Is this not a pleasant thing to do? If you want to pass this barrier, you must work through every bone in your body, through ever pore in your skin, filled with this question: What is Mu? and carry it day and night. Do not believe it is the common negative symbol meaning nothing. It is not nothingness, the opposite of existence. If you really want to pass this barrier, you should feel like drinking a hot iron ball that you can neither swallow nor spit out. Then your previous lesser knowledge disappears. As a fruit ripening in season, your subjectivity and objectivity naturally become one. It is like a dumb man who has had a dream. He knows about it but cannot tell it. When he enters this condition his ego-shell is crushed and he can shake the heaven and move the earth. He is like a great warrior with a sharp sword. If a Buddha stands in his way, he will cut him down; if a patriarch offers him any obstacle, he will kill him; and he will be free in this way of birth and death. He can enter any world as if it were his own playground. I will tell you how to do this with this koan: Just concentrate your whole energy into this Mu, and do not allow any discontinuation. When you enter this Mu and there is no discontinuation, your attainment will be as a candle burning and illuminating the whole universe. Has a dog Buddha-nature? This is the most serious question of all. If you say yes or no, You lose your own Buddha-nature. You can’t actually lose it, but you can certainly lose sight of it. [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/7/23/2182877/-Anti-Koans Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/