Scholarly Definition Of Buddhism Essay

Critically discuss the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism, explaining the reasons or arguments given by Buddhism to support these Truths and discussing at least one objection that could be raised against the first Noble Truth and one objection that could be raised against thesecond Noble Truth.

The Buddhist path requires courage, patience, flexibility and intelligence. Compassion includes qualities of sharing, readiness to give comport, sympathy, concern, caring. In Buddhism, we can really understand others, when we can really understand ourselves, through wisdom. Buddhist teachings can be understood and tested by anyone. Buddhism teaches that they solutions to our problems are within us not outside. The Buddha asked all his followers not to take his word as true, but rather to test the teachings for themselves. (Brian White)

As a college student that has lived and grown up in western New York, I do not have too much experience with the other religions of the world. I have grown up a Christian Protestant my whole life, and I am a firm believer in my religion. Soon after reading the chapter on Buddhism in Huston Smith’s book The World’s Religions, I came to understand and respect the Buddhist religion. I came to learn who the Buddha as a man really was, and the steps he took in becoming a religious icon. I know understand that Buddhism is not all meditation and relaxing. There is a strict code of the four noble truths and the prescription of getting through them called the eightfold path. Much like Christianity Buddhism also has many different views

Religious historian Karen Armstrong defines religion as a search for transcendence, going beyond the self. It's said that the only way to understand Buddhism is to practice it. Through practice, one perceives its transformative power. A Buddhism that remains in the realm of concepts and ideas is not Buddhism. The robes, ritual and other trappings of religion are not a corruption of Buddhism, as some imagine, but expressions of it.

How can we begin to understand such a diverse and ancient religion? The width of Buddhism is immense. It is a religion without any written rules. Buddhism is based on self-discovery. Buddhists are born with the quest to find their true form. They believe that they are prisoners of the physical plain until they reach nirvana. Nirvana is the ultimate goal for a Buddhist (Buddhism, 2007). It is the state that saves them from all suffering and evil. They believe that only nirvana can remove them from the never-ending circle of life.

Originating in north - eastern India, the Buddhist tradition has grown to be popular and an intellectually complex religion. With a unique culture, this differentiates Buddhism from other religions. The complexity of Buddhism influenced by Buddhist schools changes an individual 's perspective and attitudes. Interpretation of the stimulus will vary from a Theravada to a Mahayana Buddhist as their core beliefs of Buddhism differ from each other. This essay will analyse the views of a Mahayana and Theravada Buddhist towards the cartoon drawn by an Australian cartoonist and artist, Michael Leunig. While also examining the stimulus’s association towards The First Noble Truth, The Fourth Noble Truth and Eightfold path, Buddhist beliefs and The Five Aggregates; matter, sensation, perception, mental formation and consciousness.

Buddhists believe the world and life have no beginning or end. They do not believe in God or a creator.

Buddhism is a religion that focuses more on the individual and the actions of that individual, which was prevalent to me when I made my way into Portland and set foot in a Buddhist temple. The man I met within the walls of this temple was far from my stereotypical thoughts of Buddhist monks. The man I met looked like your plain old, average Joe, American man. Before I delve into the depths of my visit to this inspiring place, I need to sum up the Buddhist religion and why I chose to study this particular group of people.

The book Buddhism Plain and Simple, by Steve Hagen, caught my attention and became more interesting to me than I thought. I have always heard of the religion Buddhism, but I never knew what it was all about. I never thought that Buddhism was as huge as it is. I knew that it existed in other countries, but I never knew what exact countries. Many of the views in this book surprised me and the book taught me a lot about morals and better ways to live your life. The word “ Awareness” is talked heavily all through this book. For Buddhists, this is probably the most important aspect in their religion.

The Buddhist teachings that Hahn talks about deep listening and being calm. Lucid, compassion and fighting violence with violence is a bad idea. To find the source of suffering will lead you to the source of violence. That ignorance and misunderstanding is the root of all evil. Being peaceful, practice non-discrimination. The Buddhist teachings that are found are carried throughout his work and peaceful movements. He uses these teachings to understand the issue and behaves in a calm and understanding way which makes more people likely to hear him out and understand him. Hahn applies these Buddhist teachings on how the world approach should be to bin Laden. He recommends going in a calm behavior and try to understand why what he did. Once he understands why he would try to understand why and explain his point. Hahn believes that once you develop a little bit of compassion, you will understand better and come up with more concrete ideas to fix the problem. He believes that there is a misunderstanding in-between them and if violence is fought with violence nothing will get done. Everything will become more violent.

Albert Einstein once said, “the religion of the future will be a cosmic religion. It should transcend a personal god, avoid dogmas and theology. Covering both the natural and spiritual, it should be based on a religious sense arising from the experience of all natural and spiritual and a meaningful unity. Buddhism answers this description. If there is any religion that would cope with modern scientific needs it would be Buddhism.”# Many great minds like Albert Einstein have converted or become Buddhists. Many people from the west are turning their attention towards Buddhism because of the Buddha’s simple way to life and the lack of worship or prayer to a divine being.

Buddhism dates back to Nepal, India in the 5th century BCE. The early followers of Buddhism were a community of monks called the sangha. The literal meaning of Buddhism is “those who follow the teachings of Buddha.” The teachings of the Buddha are often referred to as the “dharma”, which also means cosmic law and order.

The journey “home” that Buddhists refer to as the privilege of enlightenment, the ultimate truth, is called the paramattha. The Paramattha is not the same journey as other faiths profess, because other faiths, like the science known as psychology, emphasize outside influence, in one way or another, in the ancient long search for understanding. Understanding life, afterlife, existence, thought, personality, behavior, and the unknown. These latter truth-seekers have overlapping roads of distinction on their charted course that is not an essential part of the

When I accustomed be reading the chosen religion of the book for this chapter, I stumbled on some of things that I found fascinating. In this chapter we learn about Buddhism and we all knew that the foundation of Buddhism is it was started by Siddhartha Gautama. Buddhism, like most various religions, and they do have an originated in a passing specific place at a particular time like many other religion does. The believer and practice in this religion is more in Asian country as I know.

Though Buddhism is commonly labeled as a religion, it fits the definition of a philosophy rather than a religion.