Reply #16: Zen, not Zen

[leebert]

Well, I come from a stock of hard-core Western atheist intellectuals so my knowledge of Buddhism is mostly leftover hippy Zen from my ditchweed days.

Atheist or anti-theist? :-)

Well, a lot of what goes around passing itself off as Buddhism or Zen ... well, tends to miss the point. I've met lots of people who walked away from some personality-driven meditation group wondering ... "WTF? Groovy nonsense!"

Buddhism is one of those big tent conglomerations with lots of semi-theistic gobbledygook tacked on it, but the core canon of Buddhism is actually nontheistic. The beauty of Buddhism is that it's experiential and pragmatic, no faith required, just give it a try. Even Gotama said that nibbana is optional and belief in reincarnation isn't required. It's helped me take a good look at my own propensities toward nihilism and let go of some worst-case conclusions.

Form is emptiness, emptiness form.