Help with Basic Buddhism, please? :)

[AnnieeBubble]

This is my first post so hello everyone!

I have been quite annoyed about people's prejudices against other religions, which oh so often leads to suffering Therefore, I decided to do something about it and try and write a book, briefly educating children and adults about the major religions, and importantly showing the links that all the religions share!

I have read a few books on Buddhism, but I am certainly no expert! Therefore it would be greatly appreciated if you could briefly look over the document below and tell me if there is anything wrong or if anything about basic Buddhism should be added or subtracted..
https://skydrive.live.com/view.aspx?res ... UB7YDPMM9Q

Thanks you very much in advance!

[Prasadachitta]

Hi Annie,

I have two thoughts on what you have put together.

1)You Refer to "Clergy" as only monks and Nuns. This is not correct. There are a wide variety of official designations within the various traditions of Buddhism even within the Theravada which this chat board is aligned with.

2) I think it is misleading to put the twelve links exposition of dependent arising as an "origin" story. It is only a description of "origin" in as much as it describes the origin of suffering and not the origin of the world or of existence.

I hope this helps. I expect there is the potential for a lot of misunderstanding but that is par for the course as I see it.

Be well

Prasadachitta

[AnnieeBubble]

Hi Annie,

I have two thoughts on what you have put together.

1)You Refer to "Clergy" as only monks and Nuns. This is not correct. There are a wide variety of official designations within the various traditions of Buddhism even within the Theravada which this chat board is aligned with.

2) I think it is misleading to put the twelve links exposition of dependent arising as an "origin" story. It is only a description of "origin" in as much as it describes the origin of suffering and not the origin of the world or of existence.

I hope this helps. I expect there is the potential for a lot of misunderstanding but that is par for the course as I see it.

Be well

Prasadachitta

Thank you very much for you reply!

Ok, I shall certainly add more. And I think I shall take out the bit about origin because it probably won't help understanding, and as I think most Buddhists don't even believe that there really was 'a beginning'?

[Prasadachitta]

One other thing I noticed was this.

o Buddhists allow negative thoughts to flow, but are mindful not to act on them so as to break bad habits and increase good karma.

This is not necessarily the case. Buddhist also make an effort to avoid and stop "negative" thinking. Allowing negative thoughts would also be a kind of negative karma.

Im not sure if this is true of all schools but there you go.

Kindly


Prasadachitta

[Gaoxing]

This is my first post so hello everyone!

I have been quite annoyed about people's prejudices against other religions, which oh so often leads to suffering Therefore, I decided to do something about it and try and write a book, briefly educating children and adults about the major religions, and importantly showing the links that all the religions share!

I have read a few books on Buddhism, but I am certainly no expert! Therefore it would be greatly appreciated if you could briefly look over the document below and tell me if there is anything wrong or if anything about basic Buddhism should be added or subtracted..
https://skydrive.live.com/view.aspx?res ... UB7YDPMM9Q

Thanks you very much in advance!

Gaoxing sent you a PM.

Firstly Buddhism is found in almost every country in the world. There seem to be a lot of mistakes in your paper.

[AnnieeBubble]

Ok thanks for the help everyone! I have made quite a few changes here now
https://skydrive.live.com/view.aspx?res ... UB7YDPMM9Q