Buddhist Exegesis: The Christian Path to God

K.S.Chow

Introduction

Obviously, the external or exoteric dimension of Christianity and that of Buddhism are dissimilar. Having examined the esoteric dimension of the Christian Path to God,  I rejoice exuberantly to have discovered that the communal Truth of soteriological Wisdom is  identical esoterically for Buddhism and Monotheism. Consequently, I have decided to compose an essay on the comparative study of these two great world’s religions to promote and foster interfaith understanding to construct a spiritual  bridge between Buddhism and Monotheism.

Faith

Like all major world’s religions, a Christian can only commence his or her Christian life with pure faith. When belief and actions according to the divine commandments  are integrated, this is genuine pure faith. Consequently, the genuine believer adheres to the Ten Divine Commandments because he or she has full conviction in their Lord. The Ten Commandments are Christian Ethics of moral restraints and virtues. They are parallel to the Buddhist moral restraints of the Five Precept (Pañca Sīlas) and the Buddhist Ten Wholesome Course of Actions of Ten  Superior Precepts  (Dasasīlas).

The Christians’ Commandments and Buddhist Precepts are communal in the first principle. The first principle is : Avoid evils and do good. Avoiding evils is the practice of moral restraints; doing good is the practice of virtues of righteousness. Having adhered strictly to the Divine Commandments, a Christian is said to be have undergone an adult baptism. An adult baptism is consonant  with a completely sincere  repentance.

Completely sincere repentance demands a believer to abandon the old way and enter the new way. True repentance is a very strict demand. The demand requires the believer to die before one dies. To die before one dies is the soteriological requirement of the annihilation of self centric ego. The annihilation of self-centric ego requires the knowledge of gnosis. Gnosis is the direct knowledge of God. The direct knowledge of God is the discernment of Attributes and Essence of God by a man in man. Jesus says, “The Kingdom of God is within.” Jesus also affirms thus, “ Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God.” (Matt. 5:8).  The pure and infinite human consciousness is the Essence of God or  Buddha.

With the direct knowledge of God , one dies before one dies. Before one’s demise in this present life, one’s false self or carnal self dies and the True Self is resurrected. The True Self is designated as Holy Spirit in Christianity. The Holy Spirit is God. It is parallel to the  Buddha-mind or Truth Spirit (Dharmakāya) in Mahāyāna Buddhism.

Truth of God

The annihilation of self centric ego replaces the carnal self or lower self with one True Self. The carnal self or lower self is parallel to Buddhist designation of false self or false mind – the defiled mind. The True Self is the Holy Spirit of Christ. The Spirit of Christ is the Mind of God. The Mind of God is the inner Heart of Man. Buddhistly put, the inner Heart of Man is the pure and infinite human consciousness. The pure and infinite consciousness is the Buddha–mind. Thus, the Mind of God and the Buddha-mind are synonymous philosophically and theosophically. The Truth of God is the Truth of the Buddha. The communal Truth is Insubstantiality, Selflessness or Egolessness (Anattā).  Thus, Christianity and Buddhism are reconciled ontologically in terms of Insubstantiality, Selflessness or Egolessness.

Main Commandments

 The entire Christian Ten Commandments are constructed upon the first  two primary Commandments, namely the knowledge of the Truth of God and the selfless or non-discriminative love of neighbour. Buddhistly put, the love of God is the love of Truth of Non-discriminative  Wisdom. The love of neighbour is the exercise of compassion towards others. The first two Commandments are promulgated by Jesus Christ thus :

You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your
soul, and with all your mind (fully committed) . This is the great
and first commandment. And  the second is like it. You shall love
your neighbour  as yourself. On these two commandments  depend
all the laws and the Prophets (matt.22; 37-40).

Love of the Lord or God is the love of the Truth or knowledge of God and living in the Truth of God. Love of neighbour is perfectly harmonious human relationship through friendliness and altruism. Buddhistly put, the love of Buddha is taking refuge in the Buddhadhamma. The Knowledge of God and Buddha is the discovery of  communal Truth of Wisdom of dependently co-arisen Unity or Non-duality.  The  selfless love of neighbour is parallel to the Buddhist four sublime virtues (brahmavihāras) of non-discriminative lovingkindness, compassion, appreciative joy and equanimity.

 Buddhistly put, the knowledge of the Truth of God  is the intuitive discernment of the dependently co-arisen Unity of contigent conditions or Non-duality between the perceiver and the perceived . The multiplicity of forms or myriad things or beings are the contigent condition. The unity of the multiplicity is the Truth of God. The perceiver and the multiplicity are one but not two. Therefore , Non-duality is Unity of Existence. The Unity of Existence is God or Emptiness. Thus, God equals Emptiness.

Buddhistly put, the unity of multiplicity is the Unity of Existence. Unity of Existence is Emptiness (‘Sūnyatā) of inherence existence. Unity of Existence devoid of individualities is the Truth of God. Thus, Emptiness and God are ontologically synonymous. Besides, being devoid of individualities is the Truth of Insubstantiality or Selflessness or Egolessness (Anattā). What is  insubstantial, selfless or egoless is the Attribute or Essence of God . Thus, God and Anattā are synonymous. Thus , it evidences that the Attributes and Essence of God and Buddha are identical. This communal Truth of Wisdom bridges interfaith understanding. Interfaith understanding is the only way to resolve religious and ethnic discriminations or distinctions which fuel national, regional and global conflicts or tensions.

God Equals Buddha

From the Sufi perspective, God is Ḥaqq. Ḥaqq means  Truth. God is the Truth of Emptiness (‘Sūnyatā) or Selflessness (Anattā). Sufi Ibn ‘Arabī defines God as the Truth (Ḥaqq) of Unity of Existence or Being (Waḥdat al Wujūd). Whoever intuitively discerns ‘Sūnyatā or Anattā sees the Buddha . Parallelly , whoever sees the Buddha sees God. Whoever sees God sees the Buddha.  To see the Buddha or God is to annihilate one’s self centric ego in the cosmic or universal Self . All major world’s religions shepherd every believer to efface his or her  self-centric ego so that the right bipolar relationship between the world and God or Buddha are insightfully penetrated into. God and Buddha are congruent theosophically or perennially.

Ascending Virtue

The Ten Commandments are strategically designed  to enable an unsaved Christian to move from the station of illusion to the final station of salvation. A Christian must undergo an ascending ladder  of virtues according to the commitment to the Ten Commandments. His or her development and self-cultivation of the Ten Commandments will culminate in the complete obliteration of  the self-centric ego. The receipt of God occurs only after the effacement of the self-centric ego. The effacement of self-centric ego does not originate substantially from prayer of the head. The self-centric ego is obliterated through the Jesus prayer – the prayer of the Heart. The Jesus prayer is the complete silence of the mind known as Hesychasm (Source : Philokalia). Hesychasm is synonymous with Buddhist state of Nirvāṇa – the complete appeasement of the human mind.  It is the complete silence of the chatter of the ordinary mind. The root cause of the chatter of the ordinary mind is self-centric ego. Buddhistly put,  self-centric ego is grasping or clinging upon the five aggregates. 

 The effacement of self-centric ego  occurs only when one knows one’s True Self. The True Self is God.  God is only received after the illusory self-centric ego is replaced with the resurrected True Self. The True Self is the Holy Spirit of God. Only then the Holy Spirit pervades the believer’s body, speech and mind. He acts as God acts; he speaks as God speaks ; he thinks as God thinks. God is his hearing,  with which he hears, his sight with which he sees, his hand with which he seizes, his foot with which he walks. Buddhistly put, he executes his application of the four establishments of mindfulness (satipațțhāna) and clear awareness both internally as externally  without grasping upon the five aggregates as this is I; this is mine; this belongs to me. In Sufism, such a state of Godly mind is known as the Rememberance (Dhikr)  of God after the destruction  (al-fanā’) of self-centric ego. Rememberance is the reunion with God. Buddhistly put, it is entrance into the door of Non-duality or the Mind of Pure Land.

 Thus, dwelling in the inner Heart, he or she is said to be born of God. Being born of God, he or she  acts through the body, speech and mind of God. The fruit of the Spirit of God  or Holy Spirit of Christ is manifested in terms of love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, faithfulness , gentleness,  and  self-control. Buddhistly put, his or her exercise of sublime virtues of lovingkindess, compassion, appreciative joy and equanimity is consummated. Most importantly, his or her moral flaws are completely removed because the three poisons of life have been eradicated. The three poisons of life  are greed, hatred and delusion .

Borderless Ocean

The Vedas and Vedānta or Unpanisads, which are major origins of  present-day  Hinduism, corroborate that there are many noble paths. All paths like the rivers lead to a common destination - the borderless Ocean. The borderless Ocean is metaphorically compared to  the cosmic Unity or Non-duality. All human beings, irrespective of any religious denomination, are waves of the borderless Ocean. Being religiously wise  is the recognition that we are never alienated from the Ocean.

Love,  Wisdom and Morality

Ontologically, we are all brothers and sisters in a single global village. Before salvation or liberation, we should radiate brotherly or sisterly love and affection to all our neighbours . After having known God  or Buddha, the love is purified and becomes universally selfless. It becomes more natural to treat others as brothers and sisters. Universally selfless love is designated by Gotama Buddha as non-discriminative great compassion (mahākaruṇā). Buddhism teaches wisdom (paññā) and compassion (karuṇā). Wisdom is the knowledge of the Buddha; compassion is the love of all sentient beings. Parallelly, Christianity teaches the Knowledge of God and selfless Love  of neighbour.

The Buddhist and Christian religious agendas are identically esoterically though they differ exoterically or outwardly. Islam accepts all Prophets’ though they differ in their exposition of exoteric dimension of Islam.  The central tenet of Islam differs esoterically  not from the core of  Christianity. Hinduism advocates  the universality of religions. Therefore, there is actually only one and only Truth for all – the Unity of Existence or cosmic Unity or universal Self.

Conclusion

 All esoteric religions expound the same process or perennial Reality of the Unity in the multiplicity and  the multiplicity in the Unity.  All religious discriminations and conflicts erupted epicly in the world today because of  wilful ignorance and wishful thinking. They worship only the half truth of the multiplicity which veils the other half truth of Unity or the One. The One is dissimilarly designated as Brahman, Tao. Buddha, God and Allah. The One is the cosmic Unity or cosmic Self  in terms of process Reality of dynamic process becoming (sanātana dharma). The sole purpose of loving the Lord is the discovery of the communal Truth of dependently co-arisen Unity or Non-duality. The purpose the discovery of Truth is aimed at  consummating  harmonious human relationship. Without knowing  the Truth of God, one’s human relationship with others  is flawed. Knowing the Truth, one’s relationship with others is consummated. Human accomplishment and happiness are contigent upon harmonious interrelationship. To be religious is to develop the art of harmonizing good human relationship with others.