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From: walsh@ihuxi.UUCP (B. Walsh)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: Buddhist texts
Message-ID: <850@ihuxi.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 11-Apr-84 12:49:27 EST
Article-I.D.: ihuxi.850
Posted: Wed Apr 11 12:49:27 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 13-Apr-84 06:10:17 EST
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In my previous reply to Ralph Johnson, I neglected some of his
statements and will now address those:

R. J.: "...westerners have a hard time understanding eastern religions.
This is because the central premise of many of them is that life is
bad, and must be escaped. ...we tend to think that life is wonderful
and worth living..."

I think here you're referring to Buddhism; the first of the Four
Noble Truths in Buddhism is that life is filled with suffering.
But, the other three noble truths go on to say what causes that
suffering, suffering can be overcome, and how to overcome it.
This is clearly not the same as saying "Life is bad." 

Don't all religions say there exists a problem, here's the cause,
and here's how to overcome that problem? I mean, if life was
perfectly wonderful without religion, we wouldn't need it.

In the Bible, life is not depicted as a bed of roses. There is sin
and suffering, but they can be overcome. In Hinduism, the everyday
life can be unfulfilling to those who've reached a certain level;
this causes suffering but can be overcome. In Buddhism, not seeing
reality causes suffering, but can be overcome.

If life was not worth living, these religions would not go about
giving people means to overcome their problems. They would just
have everyone kill themselves. But according to most religions,
life becomes more wonderful if you prescribe to the religion.

B. Walsh