Contact

In the fall of 2026, Chris Graney, an astronomer at the Vatican Observatory, argued that the universe of at least 2 trillion galaxies (according to a study in 2016 using the orbital Hubble Space Telescope) probably contains few, if any, planets capable of supporting intelligent life. This claim may come as a surprise, given the gargantuan number of possibly habitable exoplanets in the universe and the associated likelihood of alien life out there. The overlay of theology onto science, as if the latter’s criteria were nugatory and thus dismissible relative to religious doctrine, is problematic because the two domains are arguably distinct and even unique, even though they are related. Such a category mistake is highlighted in the film, Contact (1997), in which religious figures (who have related political roles in the White House) impose monotheist criteria in the selection of an astronaut for space travel, which is primarily a scientific enterprise.

The full essay is at "Contact."

Comparing Religions

The subfield of comparative religions can be exciting because the beliefs, values, symbols, myths, and rituals can introduce a person to such different ideas that the rush of making a discovery can even be felt. Jaroslav Pelikan, a twentieth-century historian of Christianity, once said that he had learned so many languages just so he could have access to ideas that were not as of yet available in English. Such ideas could be very different than the historian’s extant knowledge. It is perhaps like the early European explorers in America finding plants and cultures that were so unlike those of Europe because the distance had not allowed for cross-pollination and the influence of cultural exchanges. I contend that one reason why religions can be very difficult to compare is that elements of them in a given topic can be so different in kind as to not be comparable. Religions may even be based on variables that cannot be directly compared because they are so different in kind. The related paradigms also may not be comparable. Therefore, it may be that religious comparison is more fitting to comparing sects (e.g., denominations) within a given religion. Even when continuity exists between an established religion and a new one in the same context, the foundational variables may be so different in kind that they are not comparable. I will look at cosmology (e.g., Creation), ritual (e.g., sacrifices) and divine attributes (e.g., truth and love) below to support my claim.

The paradigm of a creator and creation must seem very foreign to a Buddhist who has been brought up without the notion of a beginning point. Indeed, the Big Bang could be reckoned as one explosion in a series. The underlying cyclical idea differs appreciably from that of linearity. That Creation occurred only once at the beginning and salvation history does not repeat itself assumes that time is linear—a straight line that keeps on going without doubling back. I contend that religions are so difficult to compare because they rest on qualitatively different variables and even paradigms (i.e., basic frameworks).

Shankara’s Hindu metaphysic of truth surrounded by illusion surrounded by ignorance (maya) is so different from the Abrahamic religious notion of a creator and creation that the two paradigms can hardly be compared in that finding a common denominator is necessary. That the Abrahamic deity created all that is may be true, but truth itself is not the same as creation ex nihilo. Truth cannot depend even on the created existence if the Abrahamic deity is the first cause and stands outside of creation as well as being omnipresent within it. Furthermore, truth can be regarded as a divine attribute, whereas creation is a divine function. Truth is what God is, whereas creating the world is something God did (as time is linear in the Abrahamic religions). Conflating the nature of an entity and what it does overlooks the basic difference between the two, and thus can give rise to false comparisons based on an assumed common denominator.

In my first world religions course in college, I was fascinated that I could hold both of the disparate (i.e., essentially different in kind; not allowing of comparison) paradigms of Hinduism and the Abrahamic religions in my head without being able to find a basis on which I could compare the two paradigms; they were so unlike. Put another way, I was intrigued that two paradigms do not allow for comparison and yet seek to explain the same phenomenon (i.e., religious metaphysics). The sheer paradigmatic difference alone amazed me so much that I was convinced that further study in the field would give me ideas and paradigms fascinatingly different from what I already knew (e.g., from my religious upbringing).  In studying ancient Greco-Roman religion and Christianity, I discovered that even though continuities can be found, that the two religions are based on qualitatively different religious variables renders comparison difficult if not impossible outside of the few shared continuities.

Ancient Greco-Roman religion was not just “Greek mythology.” In fact, ritual played the central role as means of appeasing and petitioning one god or another. The ritual sacrificing of animals took place on alters outside of the temples, which were used to store gifts for the gods. Because the Roman emperors considered themselves, or were considered to be divine, they mandated that sacrifices be made. Some early Christians accepted even death rather than sacrifice to a god other than Yahweh.

Christianity carried on the ritual of sacrifice in the Eucharistic liturgy. The bread and wine become the body and blood of Christ when a priest holds them up in the air above an alter (later, table) and recalls the sacrifice that Jesus makes in the Gospels. The Greek and Roman priests consumed the best of the burnt offerings, and the Christian priests consume the body and blood of Christ. Until the Vatican II council of the Roman Catholic Church in the 1960s, the chalices were not extended to the laity. There was thus a continuity between the respective Roman priests.

Lest it be assumed that the two religions are easily comparable, it should be noted that even the importance of Jesus Christ’s vicarious sacrifice (see Anselm) does not mean that Christianity’s most important variable is ritualistic sacrifice. Even more important than the ritual consecration is the variable of love. The relative importance of love over ritualistic sacrifice is particularly evident in Protestantism. Even in Anglicanism and Lutheranism, taking Communion receives less emphasis than in Roman Catholicism. That ritual sacrifice is not the core of Christianity does not downgrade the religious efficacy of the Eucharist in the transforming process of sanctification. Rather, the ritualistic sacrifice is a means to an end that reflects another variable (love). The variables of love and ritual are not only distinct; they are different in kind.

To Augustine, “God is love” is foundational. Calvin agreed. The theologians could have been looking at the following biblical verse, “Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.”[1] Even to say God loves is awkward because God’s very nature is love. Hence no one says, love loves, for what else would love do? This is not to say that the action of loving is synonymous with love itself. By example and preachments, Jesus of the Gospels makes the foundation clear. This is not to say that Jesus’ vicarious sacrifice for the salvation of humans therefore lies at the core of the religion. Just following the biblical passage above ending with “God is love” is this sentence: “In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him.”[2] “In this,” namely that God is love, God became incarnate and willingly allowed that incarnation to be sacrificed for humans. The incarnation, including its sacrifice, presupposes that God is love, so ritually reenacting the sacrifice of the incarnation cannot be foundational over God’s nature as love. Put another way that should now seem familiar, God’s nature exists before, and is thus not contingent on, God sending his Son into the world. Whereas sacrifice can be classified under ritual (as one type), love cannot be so classified as it is not a type of ritual; indeed, love as the deity’s nature and ritual as a human activity are not directly comparable.

Therefore, just because phenomena exist in the same domain does not mean that the underlying core variables that are not shared are directly comparable. To be sure, two religions may be based on the same core-variable, in which case comparison is not nearly as much of a problem, but where the bases are disparate, comparisons can only go so far. For example, we can compare the ritual sacrifices in ancient Roman religion and Roman Catholicism, but once we go deeper, we run into a brick wall because ritual and love are not directly comparable as they are disparate.  Even if two variables can be connected, they may still be disparate. For example, truth and Creation are not directly comparable even though it can be said that it is true that the Abrahamic deity created all that is in Creation. The nature of truth in Hinduism does not recognize this connection. This alone means that truth itself must transcend its particular manifestations. Hence St. Denis (Pseudo-Dionysus) wrote that God transcends the Trinity, so a person clutching to the latter metaphysical idea does not sufficiently transcend beyond the limits of  human cognition in yearning for God. It follows that the nature of God transcends human conceptions of the incarnation, which includes Jesus’ sacrifice and the related ritualistic sacrifices. Only by getting to the core variable of a religion can it be understood as sui generis, or unique, even though other religions are within the same domain.

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[1] 1 John 4:8. English Standard Version.

[2] 1 John 4:9.

The Basis of Christian Faith: Beyond Idolatry

I think perhaps the title of the film, Silence (2016) ought to have been “The last Priest” because the main character, Rodrigues, is the last remaining Roman Catholic priest in Japan. His inner struggle is the core of the narrative, and of the theological/ethical dilemma to be resolved. The movie is set in Japan in 1640-1641. A Buddhist inquisitor, Mokichi, is torturing and killing Christians, who must step on a stove carving of Jesus as proof of committing apostasy (i.e., renouncing their faith). Taking it as proof, Father Rodrigues torments over whether to apostasy in order to save the Japanese Christians whom Mokichi is having killed serially until the priest renounces his faith. I submit that the assumption of proof rests on dubious grounds, so Rodrigues is actually faced with a false dichotomy.

The full essay is at "Silence."

The Bahá’i Religion: Theological Problems

The Bahá’i religion is based on the monotheistic teachings of Bahá’u’lláh, the nineteenth-century prophet whom Bahá’i’s maintain is the prophet even for the twenty-first century. The monotheism dovetails with the religion’s earthly goal of unity even in diversity.[1] At the same time, the religion is universalistic in that it holds that truth can come out of various religions, including non-deism Buddhism and polytheistic Hinduism. Bahá’i aims to be a tolerant religion in principle, although it seems to me that the monotheistic religions would naturally be favored. Although Hindu and Buddhist teachings and prayers are incorporated, Bahá’i does seem to emphasize Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Yet this does not absolve Bahá’iism from the tension in being both monotheist and inclusive of truth from non-monotheist religions. 

Even within Bahá’i’s grasp of the three monotheist religions an underlying tension can be found. Specifically, although Bahá’iism aims to accurately represent all three of the Abrahamic religions, the desire to emphasize what those religions have in common comes at the expense of taking each in its own, distinct terms. In particular, Bahá’i teaching treats Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed similarly even though they are different types in their respective religions. The imposed isomorphism enables Bahá’iism to claim Bahá’u’lláh as the fourth is a series of the same prophet-type. This type stresses the divine-connection of the prophet at the expense of his human nature. Meanwhile, the goal of unity—the Kingdom of God—is also portrayed in distinctly earthly terms, albeit idealized, as the unity possible around the world of different peoples in “a civilization founded on justice, equality and unity in diversity.”[2] Viewing the Kingdom of God in such concrete, even partisan terms can arbitrarily narrow and even skew the divine into terms that are human, even all too human.

According to Bahá’i teaching, a series of prophets has provided mankind with God’s teachings on how to take the next step as religion has progressed through human history.[3] Although the progression has been toward monotheism, a non-deity religious sect such as Theravada Buddhism and a polytheistic religion such as Hinduism are still drawn on in Bahá’i prayer, given the religion’s belief that truth can come from many religions.

Looking back, we see a line of prophets ending with Bahá’u’lláh. “In every era of history, God has opened the gates of grace to the world by providing us with one of His Manifestations charged with providing the moral and spiritual stimulus that human beings need to cooperate and advance.”[4] Although Bahá’u’lláh is “the One Whose teachings will bring the maturation of humanity, ushering in the long-promised time when all the peoples of the world will live side by side in peace and unity,”[5] all of the previous prophets, or Manifestations, are of the same type; or, more to the point, the claim is that Bahá’u’lláh is on par with Krishna, Siddhartha, Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed, but is Moses on par with Jesus?—the former being a man asked by Yahweh to lead God’s people out of Egypt and the latter being the Son of God, fully human and fully divine. Is Siddhartha, the Buddha (enlightened one), on par with Krishna, a Hindu God? The Buddha insists he is not a deity, or even a prophet; he teaches his insight as a way to end suffering. What exactly is Bahá’u’lláh on par with? The capitalization of Manifestation connotes a unique relation to God. In Christianity, the Son of God is qualitatively different that the sons or children of God. What, then, of Siddhatha, Moses, and Mohammed who do not claim to be more than human beings? Is Bahá’u’lláh like them, or is he like the divine Krishna and Jesus Christ? The reference to Manifestations may suggest that every figure in the line is sinless—more divine than merely human.

The 2019 Grassroots Teaching Conference of the Four Corners Region in the U.S. states that the prophets were “social visionaries, stainless mirrors of virtue” who “set out teachings and truth that answered the urgent needs of the age,”[6] which could last hundreds of years until the next prophet comes along even if the teachings have to cover very different contexts from that in which they sprouted. This raises the question of whether teachings from the nineteenth century are readily translatable in even the first two decades of the twenty-first century, which, like the preceding century, was so transformed by technology. If not, then Bahá’u’lláh would not be the final, definitive prophet.

Even the contention of a line of prophets is controversial. To label a Hindu deity as a prophet or even manifestation of God is project the Abrahamic religions onto Hinduism rather than be faithful to the distinctiveness of the latter. So too, the prophet figure is foreign to Buddhism. Even within the Abrahamic line, the claim of a future prophet after Jesus would not be accepted in Christianity, and likewise after Muhammed in Islam. The Bahá’i claim that Bahá’u’lláh is the last of the prophets thus conflicts with the claim that the religion is consistent with Christianity and Islam.

The prophet figure is based in Judaism, where the prophets speak truth to power used as a vice. How well does the Bahá’i notion of prophet fit with the original? Moses is not even considered a prophet in Judaism, though he is portrayed as a social visionary—but his role in freeing the Hebrews is preeminent. Does not a religious vision transcend society? Is it not rather presumptuous to claim that certain social structures are sacred? Also, is Moses a stainless mirror of virtue? Yahweh bars Moses (not a prophet anyway) from entering the promised land for having taken credit for water coming out of a rock even though Yahweh has accomplished the miracle, yet Moses is heroic in going back to Egypt to free the Hebrews enslaved there. In regard to the Hebrew prophets, they are usually pointing out God’s displeasure at another person for not being virtuous rather than being virtuous themselves. When David displays a lack of virtue with regard to Bathsheba and her husband, Nathan, a prophet, informs David that Yahweh is not pleased with David’s lack of virtue. Does this imply or necessitate that the prophet is himself (or must be) virtuous? 

Moreover, are all of the prophets recognized by the Bahá’i religion perfect reflections of virtue? Would they not have to be divine in some special way (e.g., Krishna and Jesus)? The extinct Greek deities show us, however, that to be divine is not necessarily to be virtuous. Siddhartha, Moses and Mohammed do not even consider themselves divine. Is Mohammed virtuous? If so, should we apply the standards of his own time, when he was regarded as quite progressive, or ours?

Five of the Ten Commandments are moral or normative, and God as omnipotent (all-powerful) cannot, by definition, be limited to human moral principles. Can we know that the moral commandments are divine commands rather than projections of a culture’s normativity? Bahá’iism holds that “God is unknowable in His essence and that we cannot understand the nature of God.”[7] If God is unknowable, then how can we be certain that a virtue is divine-sourced and revealed as such? Faith is of belief, and thus falls short of the certainty of knowledge. Moreover, if we cannot understand God, how can we be sure that we understand God’s message in its pristine form? The messenger and subsequent copy-editors, being human, may have their own perspectives and agendas.

God transcends the limit of human cognition (and perception), and thus human concepts, according to pseudo-Dionysus, a Christian theologian and saint of the sixth century. Even the concept of the Trinity is to be transcended. As the twentieth-century religious scholar, Joseph Campbell said, the mask of eternity becomes the final obstruction to the religious experience.[8] The message that reaches us mere mortals may, in Nietzschean coinage, be human, all too human. In David Hume’s theory, the message could be said to be so anthropomorphic (misapplying human characteristics to non-human objects) that the quality of divine simplicity is obscured like a black hole in the middle of a galaxy.

As with the kingdom of God in Christian liberation theology, the societal ending point in Bahá’i can be criticized for being human, all too human, albeit in a good way as far as ideals go. Bahá’u’lláh’s revelation “contains laws, principles and truths which make possible the unification of the human family and the construction of a world which is both materially and spiritually prosperous.”[9] The promise of material riches is rather earthly (as opposed to heavenly). Although Yahweh promises the Hebrews that Israel will have material wealth if the they faithfully keep the Covenant and the Christian Prosperity Gospel maintains that God will reward people who have true belief (i.e., that Jesus Christ is the Son of God) with material (and spiritual) wealth, treasure on Earth has generally been contrasted with spiritual wealth by religions, including Christianity.[10]

Encroachments of religion onto other domains has been endemic since antiquity; bolstering particular political and economic theories, structures, and related ethical principles by christening them in a Kingdom of God can be thought of as self-idolatrous in that certain human artifacts are deemed sacred. A religion espousing such a kingdom can actually exacerbate divisions at the expense of unity because the selection of particular artifacts can have a partisan, or partial, quality. In contrast, a Kingdom of God not of things from our world—an other-worldly Kingdom—can more easily be associated with a divine source.

The Bahá’i goal is a Kingdom of God on Earth that includes a relatively equal distribution of wealth. Both the degree of politico-economic specification and the “leftward” ideological tilt render that Kingdom much like that in Liberation Theology, and thus vulnerable to the same criticism. Although unity is highly valued in the Bahá’i teachings, the religion fails to eschew political partisanship in rendering the religion’s ideal society wherein people can be transformed such that religion is fulfilled. Interestingly, members of the religion are discouraged from discussing and participating in partisan politics because doing so is divisive rather than unifying, whereas discussion of political and economic ideals is actually encouraged under the rubric of a Kingdom of God.

Generally speaking, when a religion extends to other (related?) domains, the unique or distinctive native fauna in the religious garden can easily be overlooked. For example, transcendent experience, which transcends the limits of our concepts, thinking, perceiving and even emotions, can be clouded over by concerns that are properly of other domains, grabbed by religion as if the distinctive element of religion—transcendent experience—were not legitimate or worthy enough in itself.[11] Even within religion, fights about whether a religious founder or prophet is divine or merely human or over the nature of the divine entity, being, or object (which transcends our cognition anyway) can keep us from stepping into religious experience—beyond even the divine masks—even during worship services!

For more, see: God's Gold: Beneath the Shifting Sands of Christian Thought on Profit-Seeking and Wealth and Spiritual Leadership in Business: Transcending the Ethical. Both are available at Amazon.

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1. This is similar to Schopenhauer’s ethical theory of compassion being based on Plotinus’s (a second-century Christian philosopher) notion of the One.

2. From the 2019 Grassroots Teaching Conference of the Four Corners Region.

3. This notion of religion progressing through history is close to David Hume’s theory in The Natural History of Religion. Yet for Hume, the human brain can only go so far in holding onto the pristine, uncorrupted idea of divine simplicity (i.e., pure monotheism) without projecting more comfortable human attributes. Friedrich Nietzsche found a vice—that of vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord—among the other anthropomorphic divine attributes. He argues that vengeance is in conflict with omnibenevolence (perfect goodness), thus the concept of God has been discredited even as news of this has not reached the culprits and their enablers yet. Bahá’iism maintains in contrast to Hume that the last prophet’s teachings can bring mankind to construct the Kingdom of God on Earth, completing the world-historical progression of religion. I contend that even Hume underestimated the ways in which the human brain is incompatible with a fruition of religion here on Earth. Denial, for instance, is a strong force holding internal contradictions within a given religion in place—even hiding them from the culprits themselves!

4. Universal House of Justice, October 2017.

5. Ibid.

6. From the 2019 Grassroots Teaching Conference of the Four Corners Region.

7. Ibid.

8. Campbell makes this statement in the PBS miniseries, The Power of Myth (episode Masks of Eternity).

9. Ibid.

10. On the shift toward accepting wealth in Christianity, I have written the academic treatise, Godliness and Greed, published by Lexington, following which I wrote the non-fiction (i.e., dictionaries not needed) book, God’s Gold. I argue that the Commercial Revolution and the Italian Renaissance as being bench-marks for the transition from a dominant anti-wealth stance to a pro-wealth stance—the latter making the Prosperity Gospel possible. In other words, Christian social ethics were pro-wealth before the Calvinist work ethic came around in the Reformation.
11. On distinguishing the religious domain from stuff grounded in other domains, and on the primacy of transcendent experience, see my book, Spiritual Leadership in Business: Transcending the Ethical. Available at Amazon.

Buddhist Mindfulness and the Self: Milton's Secret

On the surface, Milton's Secret (2016) is a story about a financially-stressed family getting a visit from grandpa, who brings something unusual with him (besides his tea). Because Donald Sutherland really liked the character,  he agreed to play Grandpa Howard. Grandpa has a secret, which he shares with his grandson, Milton. It fundamentally changes not only him, but also his parents. Howard brings Zen Buddhism and alchemy to his family.  That the fictional (narrative) film explains and relates the two and renders both so transparent for the audience says something about the potential of the medium itself to handle abstractions and relate them to life.

The full essay is at "Milton's Secret."

The Essence of Leadership

In The Essence of Leadership, leadership itself is reformulated in such a way that what emerges—the essence of leadership—is distinct from related phenomena, including management, presiding, and mentoring. This is not to say, however, that leadership bears no relation to strategy—hence the complex concept of strategic leadership, which is not without risks. Leadership itself contains risks, which a focus on the essence of leadership, rather than, for instance, taking leadership as simply about having influence, can arguably minimize. Such risks include the cult of the leader, to which charisma and attributions of heroism are especially susceptible, and the distorting impact of ideology, such as in Burns’ version of transformational leadership. Shaking out the risks and distinguishing leadership as a unique phenomenon are ways of pointing back to the essence of leadership, which applies in virtually any culture. That is, the essence is cross-cultural. Taking comparative religion as a stand-in for cultures, I demonstrate that the essence of leadership can be informed by Taoist, Buddhist, and Judeo-Christian principles.

Source: The Essence of Leadership

A Pro-Wealth Buddhist Temple in Thailand and Pro-Wealth Christianity: Is Religion Inherently Weak?

In Thailand, Phra Dhammachayo, the head of the Wat Dhammakaya Buddhist Temple—Thailand’s largest—could be heard, as of 2016 at least, exhorting non-monk meditators, “Be rich, be rich, be rich!”[1] This pro-wealth message, with its “endorsement of worldly comforts,” has attracted worshippers even as it has “unsettled the government and the Buddhist hierarchy.”[2] Indeed, the top body of Buddhism accused him of heresy—a charge you don’t typically hear in that religion—and stripped him of his religious title. Yet his popularity at Wat Dhammakaya was undiminished. It is no wonder the Temple’s popularity continued to grow, with cash machines placed near a meditation room—the machines’ screens declaring, “Shortcut to making merit.” By giving money, and even credit-card points, to the temple, a Buddhist’s merit can be enhanced. Other things equal, the additional good karma results in a better reincarnation in the next life. The worshippers, or more strictly speaking, meditators, at the temple could presumably be rich in this life and be born into a better life next time around simply by practicing Buddhism.

Of course, the Buddha taught that desire is the source of suffering. Clinging to things, such as wealth, can thus be expected to lead to unhappiness. In Christianity, suffering itself is not necessarily to be avoided, as “picking up your Cross” in following Christ involves voluntary suffering. This in turn is based on agape, or self-emptying, love. Were Phra Dhammachayo a Christian rather than Buddhist priest, his vulnerability would be lapsing adherents into the sin of greed. Indeed, as the Christian attitude toward riches swung from anti-wealth to pro-wealth from the Commercial Revolution in the Middle Ages to the Renaissance, the risk was precisely that the religion would redeem the sin of greed itself, essentially incorporating it as a virtue.[3] One priest and theologian in the Italian Renaissance explicitly wrote that love of gain is good. Lest that be thought to be the high-water mark of the pro-wealth position in Christianity, the Prosperity Gospel, which teaches that God rewards true belief (i.e., that Jesus Christ is the redeeming Son of God) with material wealth rather than salvation alone, became popular in pockets of evangelical Christianity in the twentieth century and into the next. Norman Vincent Peale and Joel Osteen are two cases in point; no hint of the camel that could not get through the eye of the needle.

Certainly religions must contend with external, worldly pressures to conform to the convenient in the here and now. Whether a religion’s life-cycle necessarily involves caving into the pressure is a question worthy of scholarly attention. In the case of Thailand’s largest temple, the “economic boom of the 1980s created a well-to-do middle class for whom moneymaking rivaled Buddhist tradition as a core value.”[4] Something was needed to bring the two together. However, the craving for money that moneymaking tends to involve is inimical to the Buddha’s diagnosis of suffering and his prescription—enlightenment. So bringing the proverbial oil and water together can be regarded as an oxymoron at best. Perhaps it can be said that holding a religion to its intrinsic otherness is fraught with human nature.

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[1] Seth Mydans, “Parsing Buddhism in a Shrine to Abundance,” The New York Times, December 21, 2016.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Skip Worden, God’s Gold (Seattle, WA: Amazon, 2016).

[4] Seth Mydans, “Parsing Buddhism in a Shrine to Abundance,” The New York Times, December 21, 2016.

The Dalai Lama’s Reincarnation: By Government Fiat?

Reincarnation is a difficult gig for Buddhists. Being reborn for yet another life is not a good thing; bad karma (i.e., residue from bad choices in life) keeps a soul on the wheel of samsara. Because life-after-life involves suffering, a Buddhist strives for Nirvana, or enlightenment, which releases a soul from the cycle of being reborn yet again. Reincarnation is a difficult gig for Buddhists also because unlike Hinduism, Buddhism denies the very existence of a soul (atman) as an entity. How, then, can something that does not exist go on to be re-clothed in another body for another life? Yet another problem for the devout Buddhist concerns government officials who claim that they can decide whether a certain soul reincarnates, and if so, into which body. In 2014, for example, the Chinese government made it known that it would pick the next reincarnated Dalai Lama—the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists.

In March 2015, Chinese officials declared that the Dalai Lama would indeed reincarnate in spite of the fact that he had announced that his soul might not reincarnate. Zhu Weiqun, a Communist Party official, told reporters that the Dalai Lama had no say over whether he would reincarnate.[1] Zhu said it would be for the Chinese government to decide. “Decision-making power over the reincarnation of the Dalai Lama, and over the end or survival of this lineage, resides in the central government of China,” he said in his capacity as leader of the ethnic and religious affairs committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference.[2] The decision-making power would of course be used to maintain control over the Tibetan region of China. In other words, Chinese government officials intended to install a puppet Dalai Lama after the current Dalai Lama passes; he in turn was considering not reincarnating so the government could not do so. The decision, he said, “is up to the Tibetan people.”[3] In short, the doctrine of reincarnation was at the center of a control battle between a government and a religious leader.

For a government to make such a decision and even claim the ability to find the reincarnated person after the then-current Dalai Lama’s death necessarily involves brazen presumption. Nevertheless, presumptuousness is also in the Dalai Lama’s assumption that whether he reincarnates is up to him or the Tibetan people. Implicit in the assumption is the belief that a person can know one’s own karma. Since the Buddha was aware when he was enlightened, however, the Dalai Lama could have stated that he had become enlightened and would not, therefore, reincarnate. Absent enlightenment, in other words, knowledge of what will happen after death is faulty at best. I must conclude that both Zhu and the Dalai Lama were taking religious liberties for the sake of achieving and maintaining control of an institution, the Dalai Lama. Buddhist enlightenment, in contrast, is a letting go of such a desire, as well as the suffering that undergirds it. From the perspective of a soul between bodies, what would it matter what is going on back here?  A soul in the process of transmigration would presumably be carried on by its own past karmic residue rather than internally-directed forward so as to maintain control among the living.

In short, this case demonstrates that both government and institutional religion can over-reach. From a governmental standpoint, encroaching onto the religious domain is fraught with competency issues as well as a rather blatant category mistake. From the perspective of a religious functionary such as the Dalai Lama, the challenge involves not getting suckered into a government’s obsession—that of control—at the expense of the religious aims, such as enlightenment (i.e., not suffering anymore). In fact, that the Buddha’s orientation to eliminating suffering had been dwarfed by a reincarnation-metaphysic is itself problematic, for that metaphysic can allow for considerable clutching, and thus suffering. For the Dalai Lama to let go, and thus be free of the suffering that prompts a desire to maintain control and even over-reach, he would have to transcend reincarnation and even his belief that he has a soul. Ultimately, he would need to transcend his own institutional religion; it would not even make sense for him to say that he would or would not reincarnate! 

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1. Chris Buckley, “Feud with Dalai Lama Spills into the Afterlife,” The New York Times, March 12, 2015.

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid.

Religion in Ethical Leadership in the Secular Context of Business

In Peter Berger's terms, the sacred and the profane are like oil and water. In Augustine's terms, the heavenly and earthly kingdoms are two distinct realms, a Christian being only a pilgrim passing through the latter, hence not to be "of it" while in it. I contend that such "white and black" dichotomies are artificial, and thus ill-fitting as paradigms in which to situate religion and ethical business leadership. Perhaps a devoutly religious CEO can unabashedly apply ethical elements of his or her religion without severing them from their theological underpinnings, and therefore without the need for subterfuge. I suspect that the legions of the CEO's subordinates would feel more, rather than less, respected. 

I bristle at the notion that Servant Leadership is distinctly or uniquely Christian. Gandhi, for example, intentionally borrowed from Jesus's teachings as well as Jain ethics to forge active non-violent protest. A leader of a business can genuinely be a servant, internally as well as in his or her conduct, without connecting the ethics to the distinctly Christian theological concept of agape--self-emptying love even unto the Cross. By the way, John D. Rockefeller viewed himself as a Christ figure in saving refiners from the destructive competition that had so ravaged the industry in the 1860s and early 1870s. He also likened himself to Noah--his Standard Oil being like an ark. Yet neither Noah nor Jesus killed the people (or animals) unwilling to be saved. "Save me from the followers of the Redeemer!" Nietzsche exclaims.

Interestingly, employees of a business leader who feels deeply the call of his or her faith on Monday rather than merely on Sunday may actually urge the CEO to apply his faith at full-throttle, rather than selectively as Rockefeller did. As distinctively Christian (meaning shaped by distinct theological concepts), though still respecting the otherness of the others rather than trying to convert them, Christian ethics at the helm need not be a threat, whether implicitly or in practice. A well-grounded, distinctive ethics can actually protect rather than threaten secular followers. In other words, I don't think Greenleaf's wan notion of servant leadership goes far enough because the secular exterior is in want of its native theological content. Ironically, the restoration of a vertical alignment would render the ethics stronger, and thus more rather than less in the interest of followers and even exterior stakeholder groups. 

Perhaps the optimal recipe consists of integration not only of word and deed and of interior and exterior, but also of ethics and the undergirding theology (which gives the ethical edifice a more refined shape). Pitfalls do indeed exist; but with respect for both the religious and secular integrities of followers, tension can be obviated. "Be whom you are," similar to the Buddhist preachment of being in the moment, is inherently respect-gathering, I submit, as long as the personal space of others is respected unconditionally too. 

caritas naturalis (seu agape), seu benevolentia universalis

Religious Sources of Business Ethics: How Far Along Are We?

If Business Ethics for Dummies is any indication, the topic of religious sources for business ethics must have gained steam through the first decade of the twenty-first century. Increasing interest in such a topic in the midst of modernity is ironic, or counter-intuitive. For philosophers without any degrees in religion, the temptation might be to dilettante over to this topic in order to proffer an opinion. The result for the rest of us could well be a false sense of the extent of knowledge on the topic.

In Business Ethics for Dummies, Norman Bowie—a philosopher assisted by a journalist who has written other for Dummies books—discusses topics in several religions to demonstrate how they can be relevant to business ethics. With regard to Christianity, Bowie starts out on most solid ground in pointing to how Goldman Sachs has violated the Golden Rule. Specifically, the bank sold mortgage-based bonds (e.g. Timberwolf) that the bankers admitted internally were “crap” and shorted in proprietary trading even as Goldman sales people were selling the securities to clients. It is unlikely that the people at Goldman would have relished being misled on something they were sold.

In terms of the Ten Commandments, Bowie wonders whether it is for Jews only. He concludes that not stealing, lying, or envying others’ possessions is consistent with business ethics. It is questionable how useful such a platitude might be to actual business practitioners.

On the topic of Biblical teachings on wealth, Bowie opines that “the ethical teachings in the [Bible] can and should be consistent with normal business practices” (p. 27). To get to this conclusion, he suggests that Abraham established the concept of private property by purchasing a burial site for his wife, Sarah. Bowie even suggests that the exchanged evinces the essence of all business transactions.

Regarding the rich man getting through the eye of the needle, Bowie discounts the typical conclusion that Jesus was pointing to a dichotomy between being wealthy and being saved by interpreting Jesus’ statement—“With God all things are possible”—as meaning that the rich can indeed enter the Kingdom of God. Bowie will only admit that the Bible “discourages greed and the excessive accumulation of wealth and encourages generosity” (p. 28). The philosopher sidesteps the tension or outright contradiction between the rich man getting through the eye of the needle (a view that was salient in early Christianity) and the virtues of liberality and magnificence (which were salient in the Renaissance). Such tension, which is discussed in my book, God's Gold, assumes that the two virtues require continued wealth (to be given away in on-going philanthropy) rather than simply involving a once-and-for-all getting rid of all of one’s possessions before following Christ. That the “eye of the needle” story and the Christian virtues requiring wealth have each been dominant at different points in the history of Christian thought is missed by Bowie’s blanket statement on a definitive Biblical position on greed, excessive wealth, and generosity.

With regard to polytheistic religions, including Buddhism and Hinduism, Bowie claims that because they “believe in more than one god,” they “place more emphasis on individual actions and thoughts in the quest for enlightenment or elevation to the next plane of existence” (p. 32). Would not having more gods to call on reduce the reliance on the human’s actions and thoughts? I can find no credible basis for Bowie’s assertion.

In terms of Buddhism in particular, Bowie brackets Theravada Buddhism wherein only poor monks can be enlightened and concludes that for the lay Buddhists having wealth sans attachment is consistent with enlightenment. However, by including hoarding in attachment, Bowie implicates wealth itself.

Turning to Hinduism, Bowie contends that the religion is relevant in being reduced to its non-dualist (i.e., monist) Advaita Vedanta school’s “all in one, one in all” principle.  “Hinduism teaches that all beings and things are both themselves and all other beings and things. Thus, the rationale for treating others well is really one of self-interest; if you hurt someone else, you hurt yourself. Because everything is made of the same essence, you are everything in the world and everything in the world is you” (p. 33). Bowie concludes that business and profit-making are not considered bad according to Hindu teachings.

Bowie succumbs to a fallacy, however, in assuming that something else is me just because it has the same substance. A cat and I am both made out of Brahman, but this is not to say that I am the cat or that I’m hurt when the cat is hurt. In other words, everything in the world is made of the same stuff, but that does not mean that the specific entity that is me extends to the world. There is a difference between saying that everything is made of the same thing and that everything is me. Compassion in Hinduism stems from the former rather than the latter. Furthermore, Bowie over-extends the business term of self-interest in applying it to his misconception of the Hindu monist teaching that Atman (soul) is Brahman.

Generally speaking, uncovering possible religious sources of business ethics cannot be made easier by re-casting those sources in business terms, nor should the task be compromised by glossing over religious teachings from the exterior vantage-point of philosophy.

To be sure, dilettantism is not unusual in the field of business ethics. Management scholars tend to become philosophers (sometimes even without a single course in ethical theory) and both management and philosophy scholars may become political scientists as the field of business & government (e.g. regulation) is typically lumped in with business ethics. Furthermore, sociology is often “picked up” on the cuff as social norms are salient in the field of business & society (e.g., CSR), which is also lumped in with business ethics. It is as if getting a doctorate in management, philosophy, political science, or sociology (and now religious studies) gives the holder a pass in any of these other disciplines under the cover of “multidisciplinary.” The proof is in the pudding, however, as evinced in the shoddy writing of “scholars” who venture too far from their native fauna. Perhaps even more than intelligence, self-restraint is necessary for solid scholarship.

Source:

Norman Bowie and Meg Schneider, Business Ethics for Dummies (New York: Wiley, 2011).

See Skip Worden, God's Gold, Christianized Ethical Leadership, and Spiritual Leadership in Business, both available at Amazon.

A Buddhist Temple in Plato's Cave

The lesson behind Plato's cave is perhaps that the puppets' shadows are not "things as they are" (e.g., outside the cave), but are instead mere pale reflections of a fire that is in turn dwarfed by the Sun outside the cave. Enlightenment in Buddhism can be construed in terms of coming to realize this in how we experience the world and realizing that not even the puppets themselves are the whole story; enlightenment fully realized involves being able (and willing) to perceive the cave as part of the world outside; the puppets' shadows on the cave's wall inside do not really exist. In fact, neither does the cave as an entity (i.e., there is no "other shore"). Returning to the cave, the enlightened person thus sees it in a new light--one that situates that of the fire relative to that of the Sun outside. 

A Buddhist temple in a cave. The light streaming in provides one way in which the interior can be viewed in relative rather than absolute terms. (Image Source: Kiomi Moore)