Stephen Batchelor– Buddhism Without Beliefs Buddhist Agnosticism

Stephen Batchelor

-British Author, Scholar

of Buddhism

- Ordained novice monk

in 1974

- Meditation Leader

- “Agnostic Buddhism”

Pragmatism

“Poisoned Arrow” Parable (Buddha)

Buddhism as Religion?

- wat (Thailand); gompa (Tibet)

-Nuns, Monks, theologies, schisms, reforms, “churches”

The Buddha’s own

“agnosticism”

- “Silent” on all

questions of

metaphysics.

- Did not use the word

“God”

- Did not appoint a

spiritual successor.

SENSIBLE MODERATION

- Advocated a practical “Middle Path”: Between Indulgence

and Mortification

- Only after 500 years, considered a “quasi-divine figure”;

Metaphysics becomes important.

T.H. Huxley (“Darwin’s

Bulldog”)

Definition of

“agnosticism”:

- POSITIVE: “Follow your

reason as far as it will

take you.”

- NEGATIVE: “Do not

pretend that conclusions

are certain which are not

demonstrated or

demonstrable.”

“Method” not “Belief

System”

- Batchelor: The Buddha

gave us no set of facts

to believe it. Only a

method.

- Dharma = Practice

DHARMA METHOD

- Starts by facing up to “the

primacy of anguish”

 “Anguish” comes from

craving PERMANENCE in a

changing, unreliable

IMPERMANENT world.

- Only thing certain in life: We

die.

- Empirical

“CONFRONTATION,” not

religious “CONSOLATION”

- (Promise of a better afterlife

for doing good deeds,

reciting mantras, or chanting

the name of Buddha.)

NOT KNOWING

Where does this method

lead?

1) “There is neither

something nor nothing

at the core of

ourselves.”

2) An “intense perplexity

that leaves the

certainty-seeking mind

nowhere to rest.”