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FAQ of Buddism

1. What does Buddhism say about Abortion?

Buddhism doesn't say anything in particular about abortion. There areBuddhists who no doubt stand on the "Pro Choice" side of the fence andothers who take the "Pro Life" stance.

The important questions to keep in mind are: who is suffering and what canbe done to reduce suffering. The intentionhere is important. There aresome circumstances, no doubt, where an abortion, especially at the veryearly stages of pregnancy, may be the wise thing to do. If the child's lifewould be fraught with suffering, for some reason; or if the parents wouldsuffer greatly as a consequence of having a child.

My personal view is this: bringing a human life into being is a largeresponsibility and needs to be done with consideration and intent. If awoman becomes pregnant and does not want the child, there is, it seemsto me, a period of time before which she can chose to terminate thepregnancy without harming any sentient being (other than herself). Ahuman embryo, at the early stages of development is hardly much morethan a group of quickly differentiating cells in the woman's body.

However, there is a certain stage, between 8 and 12 weeks when the

embryo becomes a fetus and beyond which the harm done to both thefetus and the mother as a consequence of abortion is very great indeedand should be avoided for all but medical (i.e. life threatening) reasons.

You might also wish to consider the response given to this question by theBuddhist monk Ajahn Viradhammo.

2. What is the Buddhist stance on Environmental issues

One of the central tenets of Buddhism is the inter-dependence of all things(the doctrine of interdependent origination).Therefore, Buddhism is at heartan ecological religion. Our very lives, the air we breathe, the water we drinkthe food we eat are all dependent on the environment and to harm theenvironment is to harm ourselves.

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One of the principle Buddhist precepts is the reverence for life and theintent to prevent all suffering. This precept entails a regard for ourenvironment: plants, animals and minerals. If we destroy the environment,we destroy ourselves. If we take care of the environment, we take care ofourselves.

3. How do people become Buddhist, what is the process?

There is no "process". But you need to adhere to the 5 precepts and "takerefuge in the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha" (the "triple gem" as it is called).These are typically things you do with the assistance of a Buddhist monk ornun in a monastery or in a monastic setting but mostly this is an undertaking or a commitment you make with yourself to take a certain outlook onlife. You are not called upon to account to anyone but yourself for this

undertaking except if you become monastic or live in a monastery.

4. If people's souls are reborn into another womb when they die,then what happens to the body at death if there are not enoughbirths at the time of their death? What if there's more births thandeaths (as there actually is)? How do these extra births getsouls?

Personally, I don't believe in reincarnation so I don't worry about the logicalinconsistencies that there might be in this doctrine.

However, if you want to get into details, you should remember thatincarnation and re-incarnation don't necessarily happen from one humanlife to another but can happen from any animal life to another and fromanimal life to a human life. So to do your arithmetic precisely you wouldhave to count every living being.

Furthermore, as evidenced by the movie "Little Buddha" it is possible for abeing to be reincarnated into different bodies simultaneously, so I'm afraidthat there is no law of conservation of souls or anything like that.

Finally, reincarnation is not a Buddhist idea but a Hindu one, which theBuddhists reinvented in the context of the other teachings of the Buddha.

5. Buddhism is converting many people all over the world. Why areso many western people converting?

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I'm not sure I have a good answer to this question. But here's my guess.

There is a lot of wisdom in Buddhism and not a lot of theology. Buddhismdoesn't require any belief in God or angels or anything you can't observefor yourself. In the words of a monk I know" it's a do-it-yourselfreligion".There's a very good book by Stephen Batchelor called "AHistory of Western Buddhism" which may be of use here.

6. I'm looking for information on Judaism and Buddhism

There are two books I know about: "The Jew in the Lotus" by RodgerKamenetz and "Funny you don't look Buddhist" by Sylvia Boorstein.

7. I don't understand 'No Self' in Buddhism?

When a thought arises it arises in this mind-body system and It has acause (might be stimulated by a sight or a sound or something).Now thisthought is observable. The question is what is doing the observing?, A "me"that I can call self?

I think the Buddhist answer is "no". The knowingof the experience or thethought or what have you is not personal; it doesn't have an identity. It is afaculty: the faculty of awareness.

It's like sight. You are able to see the video screen you are looking at in justthe same way as anyone who has the ability of sight is able to see it. Thisability may get clouded with age (cataracts, lens deformation, accidentsetc.) but it isn't imbued with anything like an identity--"my sight". Your abilityto see and my ability to see are in essence the same and indistinguishable(not *indexed* to any particular experience).

Similarly, awareness is not indexed to any particular thought or experience--in that sense it is impersonal.

This character of awareness is very hard to understand, sometimes,because much of the time, what we are aware of is labeled by thought "Ihear... 'a train'"..."I see 'a computer'". Thoughts of "I" and "a train" and "acomputer" keep populating this field of awareness with such frequency andregularity that we end up believing in the permanence and solidity of theseindexes and labels.

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But the reality is quite otherwise. Try awareness of hearing unfamiliarsounds, for example. If you go camping in some strange place somewherein the wilderness, whose sounds are unfamiliar, you may be able to listento the sounds -- as SOUNDS without the thoughts of "this is a so-and-sosound...." On the other hand, you might not be able to do this well at all.You might start worrying "this is a bear coming to get me" or you might startexperiencing fear about the unknown (in that case the thought of" me", "mylife", "my health" will take centre stage). On the other hand, if you are ableto focus single-pointedly (and this is one of the virtues of meditation--that ittrains the mind to do this one-pointed concentration) on the texture of thesound, on it's beginning and ending, on its pitch, on how it changes overtime etc.) then all you will have is "awareness" and its object "the sound".

In reality that's all there is: awareness now of this experience(feeling,

thought, sensation etc.) now. Some of these thought-experiences arehighly dominant "I worry" "I need to do this""my house might be burningdown" etc. have "self" as centre stage. This *is* a reality--the mindconstructs the self as a real, enduring thing. But in fact these are Images.Image of self ("I am the great computer scientist" or "I am the unworthyhusband" or "I am the Buddhist meditation teacher" or whatever)which areeasily destroyed into (for example) their opposites("I'll never be a greatcomputer scientist" or "I am super-husband" or "I'm not a Buddhist"). This

just goes to prove how illusory these thoughts are. They don't reallycorrespond to anything at all, let alone something fixed and unchanging asthey parade themselves as. (Angry feelings are that way too: when you'reangry with someone it's very hard to remember that you are not alwaysgoing to feel that way towards that person, that indeed you have felt andwill again feel tenderness and love for that person--what you think and feelat that moment when you're angry is: "this may not have always been likethat, but by golly, it's going to stay like that now,... I'm not going to forgiveso and so for this.... they're going to get it as soon as I get my hands onthem...." as thought this were the most important and most real thing in theworld).

Once you taste some no-thought awareness, 'bare' awareness, you see theimpermanence of experience-phenomena and the impermanent nature of"I"-thoughts. It becomes very clear.