Word: buddha
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...This all has deep and wide implications for a world that seems as religiously polarized now as it has ever been. Always stressing that the Buddha's own words should be thrown out if they are shown by scientific inquiry to be flawed, the Dalai Lama is the rare religious figure who tells people not to get needlessly confused or distracted by religion ("Even without a religion, we can become a good human being"). No believer in absolute truth-he eagerly seeks out Catholics, neuroscientists, even regular travelers to Tibet who can instruct him-he is also the rare Tibetan...
...Prophet, which is celebrated by some but not all Sunni Muslims and, though officially beginning on Thursday, is often marked on Friday. Small Holi, Hindu, an Indian festival of bonfires, to be followed on Saturday by Holi, a kind of Mardi Gras. Magha Puja, a celebration of the Buddha's first group of followers, marked primarily in Thailand...
...soon as you start talking to the Dalai Lama, as I have been doing for 33 years, you notice that his favorite adjectives are logical and realistic and the verbs he returns to are investigate, analyze and explore. The Buddha was a "scientist," he said the last time I saw him, which means that a true Buddhist should follow the course of reason (recalling, perhaps, that anger most harms the person who feels it). Contact and communication are the methods he always stresses-to this day, he encourages every possibility for dialogue with China and in places even urges Tibetans...
...This makes for a novel way of practicing the art of politics-one inspired, you could say, by the prince called the Buddha more than by the one described by Machiavelli. The central principle of Buddhism is the idea of interdependence-the notion that all sentient beings are linked together in a network that was classically known as Indra's Net. Thus, calling Chinese individuals your enemy and Tibetans your friend, the Dalai Lama might suggest, is as crazy as calling your right eye your ally and your left your adversary; you usually need both to function well...
...last two years or so has been particularly harsh and provocative, says Barnett, who attributes the tone to the Communist Party Secretary for Tibet, Zhang Qingli. "He is the Rottweiler of the Chinese establishment and has been extremely provocative. He even said once that the Communist Party was Buddha, not the Dalai Lama...