Patheos Watermark


Religion Library: Buddhism

Historical Perspectives

Written by: Julia Hardy

In both the Japanese and Southeast Asian cases, meditation for lay Buddhists was encouraged for worldly reasons: to ease stress, promote psychological well-being, improve one's personal life, and so on. According to critics, these are the values that were extended to the West along with the new Buddhist meditation movements. The potential for psycho-spiritual peak experiences was also touted along with these new Buddhist practices. Robert Sharf, one of the most vocal critics of the "Protestantization" of Buddhism, does not deny that unusual experiences may occur for Western practitioners of meditation, but he does question those who equate these experiences to those described in the ancient texts.

Sharf also points out that the elaborate visualizations of deities, which some Westerners consider to be central to Tibetan and other Tantric Buddhist practices, are quite different from what some have been led to believe. Usually the practice consists of recitation of texts that describe these deities in great detail. The texts are recited very quickly, and often without comprehension or conscious thought. Sharf argues that there is no time or inclination to visualize within this context, and adds that his personal inquiries have confirmed his opinion.

Romanticized descriptions of Tibet have been another target of scholarly criticism. Portrayals of Tibet are often reminiscent of Lost Horizon, the 1933 novel by James Hilton that was turned into a 1937 film by Frank Capra. Lost Horizon depicts Shangri-la, a utopian land in the Himalayas (populated primarily by Caucasians, rather than Asians) run by "lamas," where the occupants never seem to age. While sensitive to the many cruelties associated with the Chinese invasion of Tibet, Donald Lopez and others have criticized a Western tendency to romanticize Tibetan culture and religion, pointing out that Tibet was never the utopian world that some have portrayed it to be. Even the former head of the Tibetan theocracy, the Dalai Lama, while objecting to the Chinese takeover, has also been clear in stating that there was a need for many reforms in Tibet.

All of these scholarly criticisms are vital to contemporary understandings of Buddhism, but critics must always be wary of seeming to continue Western attempts at intellectual dominance, as Western-influenced interpretations of Buddhism within Asia are, in turn, criticized by new generations of Western scholars. They must also be careful to avoid seeming to criticize all forms of Buddhism that have been exported to the West, potentially casting aspersions on the legitimate and sincere along with the spurious. It is also important to recognize that Buddhism has changed and adapted to different historical times and different cultural contexts many times in the past. Both the changes, and the criticism of the changes, are necessary and compelling aspects of the evolution of tradition — a process that is itself a worthy and often neglected object of study.

Study Questions:
1.     What is meant by the “Protestantization" of Buddhism?
2.     How has the hegemony of Western religious thought change Buddhism?
3.     What about Buddhism has become popular in the West? How does this differ from the emphases of Buddhist monks?