Orthodoxy and Buddhism: attitudes and opinions about religion

Buddhism is a famous Hindu religion that has spread throughout the world today. It has more than a million followers, and its historical area is concentrated in Asia. Today, thanks to globalization, there are also quite a lot of followers in Russia.

How should Christians react to the followers of this movement and what is the attitude of Orthodoxy towards Buddhism? This can only be understood after a deep study of what kind of religion it is and what are the main differences between it and Orthodoxy.

Buddhism is a religion without God, unlike Christianity

We know and talk enough about Orthodoxy, but let’s get to know Buddhism better. The first thing to say is that Buddhism is not a religion, but a way of life.

A distinctive feature of religious traditions is the presence of an object of worship. Usually it's God. In Christianity - God the Father, among Muslims - Allah, in Zoroastrianism - Ahuramazda, etc. But not in Buddhism!

Siddhartha Gautama - Buddha and founder of Buddhism. Photo: budsvetomprod.s3.amazonaws.com

Buddhism does not claim that there is no God. He simply doesn't address the issue at all. This teaching is aimed at human development, at his attitude towards himself and the world around him.

This is a set of moral, spiritual and sometimes esoteric rules, but not religious dogmas. Buddhism is a practice, not a set of theories. Therefore, the following statements are popular:

• Buddhism is a way of life, not a religion;
• Buddhism is an atheistic religion.

All this is true and false at the same time. The correct thing to say is this: Buddhism is Buddhism. There is nothing to compare it with, it cannot be defined in Christian theological terms.

Interfaith relations: what should an Orthodox talk about with a Buddhist?

Buddha is not a god or even a specific person

People who are far from Buddhism often ask a clarifying question: “Isn’t Buddha a god?” No, Buddha is only the level of development of a living being. Buddhist teachings tell us that we all have a spiritual nature invisible to us.

But you can really feel it during your lifetime. We can say that all people are in a material dream: they are attached to habits, things, emotions. All this controls a person. Likewise, the sleeper is not able to understand in a dream that his pursuer is only a product of the subconscious, and not a real threat.

Entrance to the Golden Abode of Buddha Shakyamuni. In such temples one does not pray, but purifies oneself, makes wishes and asks for advice from elders. Photo: cs8.pikabu.ru

A Buddha is one who has awakened to consciousness in the world of matter and remembered his true spiritual nature. The physical world is no longer the only one for him, not scary, not threatening, but only a dream, a temporary form into which the eternal soul briefly looked.

Accordingly, there is nothing significant, terrible, deadly or final.

Buddha is freed from illusions. And every person can become a Buddha. If we continue the comparison of Buddhism and Christianity, then Buddha is a kind of saint in Buddhism, but, of course, completely different, Buddhist.

Table

So, to summarize, what is the difference between Buddhism and Christianity. The table below presents only the most general provisions for your attention. For those who are seriously interested in the topic, we can recommend turning to specialized literature, since many books have been written about this.

The most famous Buddha is Siddhartha Gautama

When we talk about Buddha, we most likely mean a man named Siddhartha Gautama. For Buddhism, this is a key figure, the same as Jesus Christ for Christianity.

He was born into the family of a raja of a small Indian principality in 563 or 623 BC. This was a period of decline of Vedic Hinduism, a stupor from which a way out was required. According to legend, Siddhartha Gautama could become either a great king or a saint.

563

possible year of birth of Siddhartha Gautama, founder of Buddhism

The father chose the first option for his son, imprisoned the boy in the palace and made sure that all his life he was surrounded only by positive information, luxury and comfort.

But fate decreed otherwise - the rajah’s son ended up on the street, where he saw four sights:

• an old beggar;
• sick person;
• decaying corpse;
• hermit.

Siddhartha Gautama felt shocked, because what he saw turned his ideas about the world upside down. He gave up everything, left home and indulged in ascetic practice. He spent many years in severe asceticism, from which he almost died, but was not satisfied with these searches.

There was no truth in either them or the luxury. This is how the idea of ​​the middle path appeared: to live without extremes.

Interior of the Temple of the Emerald Buddha (Bangkok). Photo: s3.travelask.ru

Then Siddhartha Gautama sat under a tree, where he meditated for 3 days (or 49) and finally, at the age of 35, became Buddha, that is, he achieved enlightenment.

He was not the first Buddha in history, but he became the founder of Buddhism. Siddhartha Gautama had many students who have preserved to this day the knowledge that their teacher shared - what he tried himself,

Vegetarianism of Buddhists and Christians has different motives

Why religion is needed
Not all Buddhists are vegetarians. But still this idea prevails in this tradition. A person who eats a living creature is a murderer or an accomplice (customer) of this murder.

Buddhism has chosen a virtuous path for itself - not to cause suffering to any living thing. Accordingly, any living creature that has nerves and can experience pain, value life, etc., cannot be offended.

This is the function of man, because he is able to limit himself. Of course, no one says that such a principle should be observed by a predatory animal like a tiger. But tigers are not Buddhists, right?

Although there is an idea that next to the saint, animals become ennobled and cease to be predators.

The place where Buddha Mahasattva, out of compassion, fed himself to a tigress and her cubs. Photo: storage.yvision.kz

By the way, about tigers. One day, Buddha Mahasattva came across an emaciated tigress with cubs. He sympathized with them and, to help the unfortunate, sacrificed himself: he jumped from a cliff and crashed, giving the tiger family the meat they needed to live. This is the level of beneficence that Buddhists have towards the world.

In Orthodoxy it is more difficult. Monks do not eat meat, but they do eat fish. A number of Christian saints did not kill or eat any animals, but they exist as exceptions. The Bible shows us that before, not even wild animals killed anyone in the world.

This is a normal, healthy state of our world. So there is such an idea, but it is on the periphery, and vegetarianism of the Orthodox is more a tribute to tradition and self-restraint than an act of compassion.

How is Orthodoxy different from Buddhism?

The main doctrinal difference between Christianity and Buddhism is the absence in Buddhist doctrine of the concept of God the Creator and, moreover, Buddhism’s denial of the possibility of the existence of God. Christian saints also paid attention to this, for example, the Hieromartyr Andronik (Nikolsky), who wrote: “Buddhism is atheism, for it has no God”1.

This is the most fundamental difference between Orthodoxy and Buddhism. " We know that there is no other God but one

"(1 Cor. 8:4). For Orthodoxy, faith in God is the most important foundation. The Bible already in the very first verse recognizes God as the first cause of everything that exists (see Gen. 1:1); Moreover, the existence of God is assumed as an undoubted and immutable truth. This truth is so important that the Church, in the rite of the Triumph of Orthodoxy, proclaims as the first paragraph: “Those who deny the existence of God... are anathema.”

There will be nothing left of Orthodoxy if you remove faith in God from it, just as there will be nothing left of the Buddhist worldview if you try to introduce faith in the One, good and loving Creator God.

Buddhism is very tolerant of various cults. He readily acknowledges the existence of many gods and spirits, and moreover, does not forbid his followers to turn to them with prayers, make sacrifices, and so on. Buddhism adopted the Indian pantheon, and then in all the countries where it spread, it absorbed local cults and local deities.

If an ancient Christian missionary, having come to a pagan village, often went to the temple and smashed the idol, after which he delivered a sermon to the indignant villagers about the futility of worshiping false gods and about Christian teaching, which frees them from slavery to demons, then the ancient Buddhist missionary acted differently. Arriving at such a village, he also went to the local temple, but in order to defiantly pay homage to the local idol, and after a while he began to tell stories about how their revered deity was supposedly one of the incarnations of Buddha, or that he had received Buddhism - after all, “all the gods and asuras (spirits) of this world accepted with great joy everything preached by the Buddha, believed in this teaching and began to follow it” (Diamond Sutra, 32).”

The pagan gods did not in any way contradict the Buddhist worldview, which was quite ready to recognize, along with the many visible suffering beings, the many invisible suffering beings, which were also declared the object of Buddhist preaching.

“All the gods spoken of in Buddhism are the same beings as all others and even lower ones of man who has achieved the Buddhist ideal. “Whoever wants to believe in gods,” says the Buddhist catechism, “can do so, but let him not forget that gods, like all living beings, are subject to decay and rebirth, and that a saint who has achieved deliverance, especially Buddha, is much higher than all gods.” "^2. And Buddha himself did not reject the ordinary gods worshiped by his contemporaries, but only noticed that an enlightened Buddhist ascetic (arhat) is higher and more powerful than the supreme deity himself, since he is free from the bonds of samsara (see Anguttara Nikaya III.37) ^3.

The Christian attitude towards false gods is clearly seen from the words of St. Nicholas of Serbia: “India can no longer remain with its countless gods, who are just as weak as people and are subject to the same human troubles, as Gautama saw and expressed it.” Buddha. “I want to save both people and gods,” said Buddha. Well, if a person talks about gods like that, then there are no gods here at all. And indeed there are none. Indian gods do not exist... There is only one God - holy, eternal, immortal, most pure, all-powerful, all-wise, all-merciful. Besides Him there is no other God, neither in heaven, nor on earth, nor under the earth. Indian gods are demonic ghosts, hellish ghosts who have no mercy and love for people. There are no Indian gods. They exist not as gods, but as demons under the name of gods” ^4. “All the gods of India are demons, keeping people bound in the networks of their lies and in the shackles of their ruthless dominion” ^5.

From this ruthless dominion, because of which in some parts of India human sacrifices are still made to such “gods,” Christ frees man. Therefore, ancient Christian missionaries destroyed idols as a visible symbol of this liberation. Buddhism does not free ordinary believers from the power of various “gods” and spirits. Anyone who has been to the countries where this religion is spread knows that the refined speculative schemes known from books about Buddhism are, at best, the lot of advanced monks. And the overwhelming majority of ordinary Buddhists live in the same way “in the world of spirits,” like the pagans of those countries that Buddhist missionaries have not reached.

So, Buddhism is very tolerant of a wide variety of deities. To Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Burmese, Vietnamese, Tibetan, Kalmyk and other “gods”. Buddhism accepts all of them and makes peace with them all.

He is not tolerant of only God - the One who is spoken of as the all-perfect, good, omnipotent and omniscient Creator. Buddhism does not accept Him and does not want to put up with Him. Here are the words of a learned Buddhist, recorded a hundred years ago:

“If Buddhism is called a religion without God and without a soul, or simply atheism, its followers will not object to such a definition, since the concept of a supreme being standing above his creatures and arbitrarily interfering in human affairs seems extremely offensive to Buddhists.” ^6.

In Buddhist texts aimed at Western readers, authors often smooth out the harshness of their judgments, saying that the question of the existence of a single Creator God is not fundamental for Buddhism. A story is often told about how Buddha responded with silence to the question of whether there really is a supreme God. However, the oldest texts of the Buddhist canon show that the Buddha spoke on this issue much more often than he was silent.

But before considering these statements, it should be recalled that, of course, the Buddha grew up and was formed in the Hindu religious and philosophical environment, and was familiar only with what this environment had to offer him. But she could not offer him knowledge about the True God, because she did not have this knowledge.

This is how Saint Nicholas of Serbia speaks about it: “The concept of faith does not exist among Indians. There is no concept of sin, no repentance, no Kingdom of Heaven, no single God as Father, no love for God, no redemption, no end, as well as the beginning of the world, no resurrection of the dead, no universal Judgment of God, no just reward in the eternal Kingdom of God. So, these basic ten concepts, as well as others similar to them, do not exist at all in India, that is, those concepts that the Lord Jesus announced to the world as His Gospel, as His Good News. These concepts - all ten - are new to India. And nothing turns one away from Indian “knowledge” more than these ten concepts” ^7.

Of course, these concepts did not exist among Indians even at the time of Buddha.

Hinduism knew the idea of ​​​​the existence of a Supreme Being, a good Creator of all things, but it itself was not sure of it, it was a kind of controversial opinion. Of the six classical schools of ancient Hinduism, half accepted that the world has a single divine Creator and ruler, while the other half denied.

This probably largely determined the Buddha’s attitude. After all, if within the framework of one religion both the assertion that God exists and the assertion that He does not exist can “legally” coexist, then it is not surprising that a person with a rationalistic mindset will come to the conclusion that adherents of the first statement were unable to prove it to their fellow believers. Buddha's atheism really grew out of Hindu atheism - Buddha's teachers were representatives of the atheistic Sanghya school, and he apparently became acquainted with Hindu ideas about the Supreme Being through the prism of their criticism.

That supreme divine being, about whom representatives of the theistic direction of Hinduism spoke, was usually called “Great Brahma.” In Western translations, translators often replace this name with the word “God,” which is incorrect, since ancient Indian ideas about the Great Brahma are very different from the Christian idea of ​​God.

The Great Brahma is not at all a “ zealous God”

"(Exodus 20:5), Who says: "
I am the Lord your God... let you have no other gods before Me
" (Exodus 20:2-3).
There are many other gods in front of Brahma, he is not the only God, but only the first and main one of the pantheon - “Brahma arose first of the gods... And from him numerous gods are born” (Mundaka Upanishad, 1.1: 1, 2.1: 7). The true “ God is a righteous judge... and strictly exacting every day
” (Ps. 7:12) and at the same time “
a merciful God
” (Rom. 9:16), and the Great Brahma is not a Judge and a rewarder, these functions are performed as if “by themselves”, according to the inexorable law of karma.
And although Hindu theists believed that this law was launched by Brahma, nevertheless, it acted autonomously, impersonally and “mechanically”. This same idea of ​​karma excluded the understanding of God’s providence, and, accordingly, the concept of God as the One who personally cares for each person, as is revealed in the Bible: “The Lord looses prisoners, the Lord opens the eyes of the blind, the Lord raises up those who are bowed down, the Lord loves righteous.
The Lord protects the stranger, supports the fatherless and the widow ” (Ps. 146:7-9). Due to these circumstances, the Great Brahma was not thought of in the full sense of the word as a personal God, but rather as an impersonal, perfect and good first cause of the world.

Another misconception of the ancient Hindus regarding the Supreme Being, which does not agree with the biblical truth and which caused the fair disagreement of the Buddha, is the idea of ​​​​Brahma as the source of both good and bad: “You are the creator of all beings, you are the protector, you are the destroyer” (Vishnu- Purana 4.15). In addition, the Hindus did not know about the transcendence of God, and therefore confused Brahma with the created world, saying that he is “the one of whom the world consists” (Vishnu Purana, 2.4), “hidden in all beings, in the body of everyone” (Svetashvatara Upanishad, 3.7).

In other words, “Great Brahma” is far from the same as “ the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”

"(Exodus 3:6).

But at the same time, if somewhere in the ancient Indian ideas of the time of the Buddha there were grains of memories of the true Creator God, characteristic of all the descendants of Adam, then you can only look for them in the ideas of the Great Brahma.

Among these ideas there were also quite true ones, to which St. Theophan the Recluse drew attention, saying that “among the eastern peoples, the Persians and Indians have more sublime concepts of God... The Greeks and Romans crushed, so to speak, God... The Indians delved deeper into the comprehension of God , but, retaining the concept of His invisibility, omnipotence and omnipotence, when they decided to more accurately define His creative and providential actions, they confused a lot of things that were untenable and wrote many fabulous stories” ^8.

Buddhist canonical texts describe that, according to the faith of Brahmanists, the Supreme Creator is a good being, all-perfect, all-knowing, all-powerful, and that salvation from suffering lies in uniting with him.

It is precisely this God that the creators of the Buddhist canon imagine, and it is Him that they deny. It is impossible not to admit that these attributes attributed to the Great Brahma coincide with the attributes of the True God, therefore modern Buddhists often transfer the arguments of the Buddha and his followers, directed against the doctrine of the Great Brahma, to the Christian doctrine of God.

Buddhist atheism is more complex than the banal denial of “militant atheists.” Buddha does not argue that there is a divine being who calls himself omnipotent, omniscient, omniperfect and eternal creator of all things, Buddha argues that this being is simply mistaken and is not who he claims to be. He does not argue that this being is stronger than any ordinary person, that it is capable of performing miracles, that it lives much longer, and lives a much more blissful life. He argues “only” with the fact that it really is the omnipotent, omniscient and eternal creator of all things.

In a conversation with the monks, the Buddha explains how this being fell into such delusion: “From time to time, monks, a time comes when after a long period this world collapses... and after a long period it unfolds. When the world unfolds, the empty palace of Brahma appears. And then this or that creature... is born again in the palace of Brahma. There it remains for a long, long time, consisting of intelligence, feeding on joy, emitting radiance, moving through space, abiding in glory. [Then] other beings... are reborn in the palace of Brahma as the companions of that being.... Then, monks, that being who was the first to be born again says to himself: “I am Brahma, the great Brahma, victorious, invincible, all-seeing, omnipotent, lord, creator, creator, best organizer, ruler, father of the past and the future! These beings were created by me”... And those beings who were born again after [him] also say to themselves like this: “After all, he is the venerable Brahma, the great Brahma, victorious, invincible, etc.” (Digha Nikaya, 1. Brahmajala Sutta, II, 2–6).

In the cultures of the Asian region, there were specific forms of polemics with opponents. For example, Taoists often put their polemical attacks against Confucianism into the mouth of Confucius himself, who on the pages of their works (such as Chuang Tzu and Le Tzu) willingly admitted his ignorance and limitations in comparison with the Taoist sages.

The authors of Buddhist sacred texts clothed their polemics against the idea of ​​the Divine Creator in a similar form. Thus, in the Kevaddha Sutta, the Great Brahma admits that he cannot answer the question that a Buddhist monk asked him and advises him to address this question to the Buddha. The form in which he does this is noteworthy: “The Great Brahma took this monk by the hands, took him aside and said: “Here, monk, these gods belonging to Brahma’s retinue consider this: “There is nothing that is not visible to Brahma; there is nothing that is not known to Brahma; there is nothing that has not been experienced by Brahma.” That's why I didn't answer in their presence. And I also don’t know, monk, where the four great elements of earth, water, fire and air are destroyed without a trace. Therefore, monk, you acted badly that you ignored the Blessed One [Buddha] and went to another place in search of an answer. Go, monk, and approach the Blessed One, ask him this question, and as the Blessed One answers you, consider it so” (Digha Nikaya, 11. Kevaddha Sutta, 83).

All such stories pursue one goal - to prove that an omnipotent, omniscient and good Creator does not exist, and the one who is considered such is actually not such ^9. Of course, it is impossible to perceive such fantasies as a serious argument.

Objections in Buddhist texts are often formulated in a form more familiar to us. And in them one can no longer see either the “dispassion” or “tolerance” that is so often attributed to Buddhism.

Thus, the following lines from the Bhuridatta Jataka are devoted to the polemic with the idea of ​​one God:

“If there is a Creator of the whole world, whom they call Brahman, the Lord of everything, then why did he create such disorder, and not create harmony? Why do deceit, lies and ignorance prevail, and why has he created such inequality and injustice? If there is a Creator of the whole world, whom they call Brahman, the Lord of all things, then he is an evil ruler, for, knowing what is right, he has allowed what is wrong to prevail!”

During a conversation with Anantapindika, the Buddha expresses a more extensive argument against the idea of ​​\u200b\u200bthe One Creator God (Ishvara):

1

. “If Ishvara were a creator, then all living beings would have to silently submit to his creative power, they would be like vessels coming out of the hands of a potter; If this were so, then how is it possible to practice virtue?

2

. “If this world was created by Ishvara, then such things as sorrow, suffering and evil should not exist, for all deeds, both pure and impure, must come from Him.”

3

. “If this is not so, then there must be another cause [of evil and suffering] that is outside of Him, and [in that case] He will not be Self-existent. So, as you see, the idea of ​​Ishvara is refuted.”

4

. It cannot be that the Perfect created us, for that which is perfect cannot be the cause, since through this it will undergo a change and cease to be perfect. Every thing has its cause, then how can we say that God is the cause of all things? Therefore, “one must reject the delusion about Ishvara and prayers to him.”

In another “sacred” text, the Buddha asks the priests: “Is it true that you are of the opinion that ... everything that man knows by experience ... has its cause in an act of creation performed by the Supreme Being?” Having received an affirmative answer, he objects: “Then, in this case, man is a killer of living beings due to the act of creation performed by the Supreme Being. Man is a thief... a libertine... a liar... an instigator... a scolder... a lazy talker... greedy... an intruder... a proponent of false views due to the act of creation performed by the Supreme Being" (Tittha Sutta, 3.61).

All these quotes are given in order, firstly, to show that the question of the existence of the Creator God for Buddhism is not at all as indifferent as it is sometimes attempted to be imagined, and secondly, to show from the analysis of these arguments that Buddhist atheism is This is largely due to the ignorance of the Buddha and his ancient followers of the true teaching about God.

Even a Sunday school student can easily answer the questions that he proposed to the Brahmanists as unsolvable - not because, of course, he is smarter than the Buddha and the authors of the Buddhist canon, but because, unlike them, he knows about the revelation of God, knows what God Himself revealed about Himself.

Judging by these texts, the main stumbling block for the Buddha is the question of the existence of evil in the world. In his opinion, the three most famous attributes of God - omnipotence, omniscience and goodness - are incompatible with the fact of the presence of suffering in the world.

He comes to such a thought because he does not know about the gift of freedom that God has endowed man with, and why He has endowed man with such a gift.

It is noteworthy that Buddha does not deny the fact of human freedom, but considers it an argument against the existence of the Creator, since, in his opinion, if the Perfect Creator existed, he would not give his creatures freedom, but would completely subordinate them to his will, so that they would be the same, like standard pots, and none of them could not only commit sin, but even improve in virtue.

Perhaps such a statement impressed the ancient Brahmanists, but for a Christian it can only cause bewilderment. Because Christians also recognize the obvious fact of human freedom, but consider it precisely a manifestation of that generosity that only the true God can afford.

Saint Basil the Great answered the above questions more than one and a half thousand years ago in his ninth conversation:

“What do they say causes diseases? Why untimely death? Why the destruction of cities, shipwrecks, wars, times of famine? This is evil, they continue, and yet all this is God’s work...

One is considered evil only according to our perception, and the other is [genuinely] evil in itself. [As for] evil in itself, it depends on us [ourselves]: this is debauchery, unreason, cowardice, envy, murder, lies, and all similar shortcomings that, desecrating the soul, darken its beauty. [As for] what we call evil [things] that are painful and painful for us to feel - bodily illness, wounds, lack of necessities, dishonor, damage to property, loss of relatives - then each of these disasters is a wise and good Lord sends for our own benefit. Wealth is taken away from those who use it badly, and thereby crushes the instrument of their unrighteousness. Illness is sent to those for whom it is more beneficial to have bound members than to rush unhindered into sin. Death is sent to those who have reached the limit of life, which was set from the beginning in the righteous judgment of God.

Therefore, as a doctor, although he causes suffering in the body, he is nevertheless beneficial, because he fights the disease, and not the sick; So God is also good, Who arranges for the salvation of the whole through private punishments. You don’t blame the doctor for cutting one thing in the body, cauterizing another, and completely taking away a third; on the contrary, you give him money, call him a savior; because he stopped the disease in a small part of the body until suffering spread throughout the whole body... [So] God... transforms evil and leads to the better, so that it, ceasing to be evil, takes on the property of good...

Therefore, illnesses in cities and nations, the barrenness of the earth, and the disasters encountered by everyone in life, stop the increase of sin. And all “evil” of this kind is sent from God to prevent the generation of true evil. For both bodily suffering and external disasters are designed to curb sin. So, God destroys evil, and evil does not come from God. And the doctor destroys the disease, and does not introduce it into the body. The destruction of cities, earthquakes, floods, the death of armies, shipwrecks, all kinds of [natural] extermination of many people happen in order to bring chastity to those who remain; because God curbs the vices of all the people with the punishments of all the people.

And what is in the proper sense evil, that is, sin, depends on our will; because it is in our will to refrain from vice or to be vicious.

So... having received the concept of the separate types of evil, knowing what real evil is, that is, sin, the end of which is destruction, and what is imaginary evil, painful to feel, but having the power of good, such as, for example, suffering sent to curb sin , whose fruits are the eternal salvation of the soul, stop being upset by the orders of God’s economy, and do not consider God guilty of the existence of evil, and do not imagine that evil has its own special independence... Evil is the deprivation of good. It does not happen on its own, but follows damage to the soul... Read the history of the universe, and you will find that “ everything is fine”

“, and “
very good
” (Gen. 1:31). Therefore, evil was not created together with creatures that are good.

However, there is evil, and the action shows that there is a lot of it in the world. Therefore they say: “Where does evil come from, if it is neither without beginning nor created?” Let us ask those who are looking for something similar: where do diseases come from? where do bodily injuries come from?.. God created the body, not illness... created the soul, not sin. The soul has become damaged by deviating from what is natural to it. What was good for her? Being with God and uniting with Him through love. Having fallen away from Him, she began to suffer from various ailments. Why is there a general acceptability of evil in it? Because of freedom. Having received a free life from the Creator, she knows the good, knows how to enjoy it... but also has the freedom to deviate from the beautiful.

But they say: “Why is it that in the structure itself we are not given sinlessness, so that it would be impossible for us to sin, even if we wanted to?” That is why you do not recognize servants as serviceable when you keep them tied up, but when you see that they are voluntarily fulfilling their duties to you. Therefore, what pleases God is not what is forced, but what is done virtuously. Virtue comes from will, and not from necessity; and will... is free.

So, why is man wicked? Of my own free will. Why is the devil angry? For the same reason; because he also had a free life, and he was given the power to either remain with God or withdraw from the Good. Gabriel is an Angel and always stands before God. Satan is an Angel and has completely fallen from his own rank. And the first was preserved in heaven by will, and the last was cast down by free will. And the first could become an apostate, and the last could not fall away. But one was saved by his insatiable love for God, and the other was made an outcast by his distance from God. So the devil is wicked, having wickedness by will, and not by nature.”

It is worth noting that the truth of the words of St. Basil the Great that other people’s suffering and even death “make those who remain chaste” is perfectly confirmed by the biography of the Buddha himself, who was inspired by the sight of other people’s suffering to leave a carefree life and turn to the search for truth and asceticism. feats.

However, Buddha, and after him all Buddhists, do not distinguish suffering into two fundamental categories indicated by St. Basil, and do not distinguish precisely because they deny God the Creator. True evil is sin, that is, violation of the will of God. An imaginary evil is suffering, that is, a violation of a person’s will. Buddhism denies God, therefore it sees only man, and declares evil only that which causes suffering to man. Therefore, it does not consider as evil any sins directed against God, but those sins that are directed against a person, although perceived as evil, but with a completely different motivation than in Christianity - not because this act violates the will of the Creator, but because it causes suffering to people. Such confusion and the inability to separate true evil from imaginary evil, and, accordingly, to comprehend the mystery of suffering, forced the Buddha to come to the proclamation of all suffering in general as evil, although the benefits of suffering are an obvious fact. Many people testify that the trials, illnesses, troubles and other suffering they experienced made them better, kinder, wiser, more humane.

To become a Buddhist, it is enough to share this worldview and practice

What kind of faith do the Mongols have?

How to become a Buddhist if you are a Christian or a Jew? There is no difference who the person was before. There is no need to go through any ritual like baptism or conversion. It is enough to get to know the Buddhist worldview well and start doing basic practices: meditation and mantra reading.

It is very useful to find a group of like-minded people, some kind of Buddhist temple, where you can communicate and share experiences.

There are a lot of directions in Buddhism, all differ in details. Therefore, they may have their own initiation rituals and requirements. But in general, becoming a Buddhist is easy - just take and start living like a Buddhist: along the middle path, loving and compassionate, not hurting anything living and practicing.

Among Orthodox Christians there are different attitudes towards Buddhism

Orthodoxy does not have a consensus on Buddhism. Everything greatly depends on the position of the particular priest to whom the question was addressed. Someone will tactfully analyze the similarities and differences between Buddhism and Christianity, and then say that all religions have the right to life.

Another will perceive such a question as a personal insult. Many representatives of the Orthodox Church are annoyed that Buddhists do not believe in God the Creator, that they do not recognize the belief in hell and heaven after death, that they consider man to be a being of divine nature.

Orthodoxy has no reason to oppose Buddhism - these are religions of love.

But, as a single tradition, Orthodoxy itself says nothing about Buddhism. Only the Canaanite religion was condemned in the Bible for the fact that they made human sacrifices.

An example of an Orthodox private opinion about Buddhism can be seen in the statement of the Hieromartyr Alexander (Miropolsky):

“Buddhism can be recognized as one of the highest natural pagan religions due to its desire to understand the essence of one’s spirit, while destroying carnal passions and irresistible impressions of the sinful world.

The Buddha's struggle and mortification of the flesh led him to results that were unexpected for him: through deepening into himself, he seemed to know the essence and property of the spirit in the form in which it was embedded in his natural nature by the Creator Himself.

That is, he saw the properties of life of a higher being, the power of love for everything and compassion in suffering...

Only this self-contemplation destroyed the Buddha, for, examining himself and his spirit, he turned his gaze away from the Creator and God, and then lost all idea of ​​Him.”

Alexander Miropolsky

martyr

But at the same time, the saint believed that such a path leads away from Christ.

But in the video below, Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk speaks warmly about Buddhism:

The relationship of Orthodoxy to Buddhism

In general, the relationship of Orthodoxy to Buddhism has no reason to be conflicting, because the characteristic feature of Buddhism is indifference to religious disputes.

Buddhism is a closed, self-sufficient world that does not try to stop other people from believing what they want.

The essence and concept of Buddhism in brief

Buddhism is the largest religion in the East in terms of the number of followers. Now there are its supporters on all continents. There are large Buddhist sanghas in America, Europe and Russia.

Buddhism is also the most widespread non-Abrahamic religion.

At the center of the Buddha's philosophy is a religious teaching - dharma, which deals with spiritual awakening, an attempt to break out of the circles of samsara.

Samsara is a series of continuous rebirths. The only way to break the cycle of rebirth is to achieve nirvana (liberation and achievement of the highest point of development).

Achieving nirvana is possible by following the Eightfold Path.

The path can be divided into three areas, which include the 8 specified moral qualities:

1. Wisdom. These include righteous view and righteous intention, which remind us of the need to know the 4 noble truths and follow the path to achieve nirvana.
2. Moral. Mentioned here are righteous speech (refusal of lies, rudeness, false accusations), righteous behavior (prohibition of betrayal, violence, theft) and righteous lifestyle (resistance to violence against any living beings, injustice and oppression).
3. Spiritual discipline. It includes righteous effort (directing one's strength towards concentration, calmness), righteous mindfulness (careful observation of one's emotions, self-awareness), righteous concentration (meditation).

Spiritual practices occupy an important place in the Buddhist religion.

It is fashionable to look for the origins of Christianity in Buddhism, but there is no basis for this

Many enthusiasts look for the roots of Christianity in Buddhism. The Jesus Prayer is their mantra; Jesus lived and studied in Tibet until the age of 30, and in general all His abilities are like those of a typical yogi.

None of these statements are based on facts. The similarity of practices is logical, because in general religious systems, to one degree or another, cannot but overlap with each other.

Images of Jesus meditating appeared due to rumors of a "Tibetan Gospel". The gross contradictions and errors in the story about this text reveal that it is a hoax. Photo: oursociety.ru

As for the story of Christ’s visit to India and Tibet, it has two sources:

1. Rumors about the “Tibetan Gospel”, which have long been crushed by counterarguments.
2. Bhavishya Purana, in which at the end of the 20th century a character similar to Jesus Christ was added, but until then there was no theme.

So, of course, there are parallels, but there is a lot of artificiality in them. The idea that all religions are from God has the right to life. But it does not mean at all that Christianity should be the heir of Buddhism.

We know that Eastern teachings influenced the Gnostic tradition to some extent, but it never achieved an influential position in Christendom.

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Directions of Buddhism

Over the course of thousands of years, from ancient Buddhism to modern Buddhism, many movements have formed around the original religious movement.

The main ones include the Hinayana, Mahayana and, which is part of the latter, Vajrayana.

Hinayana

Hinayana (lesser vehicle) mainly describes the tradition of the southern countries, where the ancient religion has undergone the least changes.

The 4 Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path are revered here as they are written about in sacred texts. The main sacred text is considered to be the instructions of Prince Gautama, given by him before he became Buddha and achieved nirvana.

Buddha in the Hinayana tradition is considered an ordinary person, albeit a highly revered one. This view is most widespread in the homeland of Gautama Buddha.

Some researchers exclude Hinayana from modern directions of Buddhism, considering it an old, outdated tradition.

Mahayana

Mahayana (great vehicle) is the most widespread tradition of Buddhism. This is what is followed in Russia, Europe or America. But even in eastern countries, Mahayana enjoys the greatest authority.

The main difference from the Hinayana is that the Buddha is not a separate person, but is a metaphysical divine essence, incomprehensible to the human mind. It is necessary to strive for this state in order to achieve nirvana and become a Buddha yourself.

Vajrayana (diamond chariot, a type of Mahayana). This includes so-called Tantric Buddhism.

The peculiarity of this direction is in the methods of achieving nirvana. It is assumed that already during his lifetime a person can achieve perfection in long-term tantric practices, achieving a state of complete freedom, which will be a way out of the circles of samsara.

Vajrayana also in some way represents Buddhism in Russia. The popularity of the trend is due to its attractive mysticism, the abundance of mysterious practices and traditions of shamanism, which are close to the northern peoples.

All directions of Buddhism converge only on the veneration of the authority of Sidhartha Gautama (Buddha), as well as on the recognition of the need to achieve nirvana.