Instead of being bored, I decided to take a page out of Professor Raposa's book (literally) and reflect on spiritual things. I've been reading Living Buddha, Living Christ and have found some really interesting ideas in it which I preceded to think about. This probably isn't pure philosophy, and may border on theology. I could probably write a book on the exact same subject, but with my leanings on the Christ side. Let me point out my standpoint is that of a practicing follower of Christ, not Buddhist. However, I think Buddhism can give us a new language to describe the things in the Bible in a new light which can garner deeper understanding.
Some initial points from the book:
God cannot be constrained to a concept or word.
God can only be experienced personally.
If God could be constrained withing the limits of man, we would get Jesus Christ. Jesus is an image of the Father in a way we could understand concretely. God the Father must be greater than the man Jesus, for "No servant is greater than his Master" (John 13:16) This is interesting since Jesus himself makes claims to be the Father, so what does it mean to be greater?
God is nothing, and out of Him came everything.
Perhaps to make it clear what I mean by nothing, it is that which cannot be thought about or described, but only experienced. God is Love, God is Just, God is Gracious and Merciful, God is Nothing, all things which must be experienced to truly understand their meaning. I am not saying God doesn't exist (that is his very nature, "I am" is the simplest expression of existence), rather I am examing the complex fusion of nothingness and somethingness. Like the space between the nucleus and an electron cloud, or the space between the planets. It's definitely there, it exists. This idea that "God is nothing, and out of Him came everything" can be accounted for by both the Big Bang and Genesis accounts of a sort of creation ex nihilo. In order for God to have existed pre-Big Bang, He must have been the emptiness or nothingness beforehand. If we know then that the universe is expanding into this infinite nothingness, than it gives a sort of a Panentheistic worldview. God is the nothingness which contains the universe (the non-nothingness). And perhaps then there are other universes outside ours in his infinite nothingness that we know nothing about. The New Testament makes references to kingdoms and "sheep" (John 10:16) we know nothing about, perhaps it references this. Perhaps we will never see these other kingdoms.
Also if I take into account that God is that than which nothing greater can be conceived, and how the New Testament emphasizes that greatness in the Kingdom of God means to become the least, in order for God in His kingdom to be the greatest, he must be the least. Nothing is less than nothing. Greatness would come from a lack of Self, and thus a lack of Self Awareness. God made Adam and Eve in his image, and you could argue that they had no concept of Self apart from God, that Adam and Eve knew they were the same because they came from the same source (the Rib and ultimately God). It wasn't until they ate the fruit that they became self-aware of their nakedness, and instantly felt shame. Perhaps we were not made to have concepts of our self (Identity, worth, purpose) apart from God.
For God's to be nothing, it gives Him a wild, untamed and unknown nature. He is unpredictable to us, and His ways are not understood by us and could probably look evil at times, but He is benevolent, if what we've seen Jesus to be is actually true. Jesus could not save everyone until He was free of his physical body. His death, and subsequent transition into "nothingness", gave him power to conquer death for others as well. He is now seated at the right hand of the Father, akin in nothingness and greatness. Only Jesus knew the Father, who is unknowable and cannot be thought about, because Jesus experienced the Father in Him, and Him in the Father. He needed no mental concept of God. The ultimate goal is to be close to God, and you can't get any closer than to be in Him and Him in you, to be one. It seems then, to be one with God, one must give up all concepts of the self and of God, because even they divide and separate us from God in our minds. That is sin by it's very definition, an act which separates us from God. Then through this, we all live in sin everyday by asserting our individuality. Perhaps the Buddhists have stumbled onto some truth. Humility becomes the crowning achievement. Humility achieved by seeing that there is nothing outside the self, and nothing within. We are made from the same stuff as rocks and trees, apes and insects. We all have the same Creator. Perhaps we need to take care of the things we have instad of worrying about what we don't? In order to become closer to God, we must see Him in every aspect of our lives so that he may be experienced in the fullest extent. So that He can walk with us in the Garden again. There can be no faith without practice and the experience of God.
Now, the implications of this is essentially we could all be like Jesus. Only Jesus did it perfectly, but since Jesus was human as well, it can be attained by humans. We see some of the apostles even doing some of the things Jesus did, so you don't need divine birth. Just faith, pure unabiding faith. I think that makes sense when Christianity is boiled down to where it came from, to follow in the footsteps of Christ. The first followers literally did that as Jesus set an example for them. To experience ultimate reality ourselves, we must live like Jesus. I think there is where Christianity can learn from Buddhism. Of course I hold that Buddhists can learn that Jesus is the true savior, an enlightened being like no other, but I might be biased. Buddhism centered around Jesus could be called Christianity.
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