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> Another explanation is the country’s deeply felt Buddhist beliefs, especially that of reincarnation. If you know you’ll get another shot at life, you’re less

> Another explanation is the country’s deeply felt Buddhist beliefs, especially that of reincarnation. If you know you’ll get another shot at life, you’re less likely to fear the end of this particular one. This is a common oversimplification of reincarnation. I had the opportunity to study with a Buddhist scholar in India a year ago who corrected a lot of my misconceptions. Reincarnation is neither reward nor punishment. It's a long cycle with the end goal not being immortality but escape (or exit) from the cycle through moksha[1]. A possibly more accurate oversimplification is "do good, increase karma until you win the game, and stop being reincarnated." If there's any link between belief or interaction with death and happiness, it's most likely due to simply increasing daily gratitude[2] which does have scientific benefit. I'm headed to Bhutan in a month and will report back if I learn anything interesting on this topic. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moksha http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moksha [2] http://www.health.harvard.edu/healthbeat/giving-thanks-can-make-you-happier http://www.health.harvard.edu/healthbeat/giving-thanks-can-m...

nickbauman 12y ago
Well that's one specific interpretation of Buddhism common to a few schools. Samsara (reincarnation) can also be interpreted as an illustration of the problem of not learning from experience. A general way of ending the cycle (that works across different schools of Buddhism) is that the Buddha was trying to teach us to focus on understanding human suffering. And only by understanding suffering can we ultimately dislodge it and move forward. You don't even have to be Buddhist to believe in that!
- drieddust 12y ago
  I think you are spot on here. Ironically Buddhism has now come very far from original teaching of Buddha.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
  - greggyb 12y ago
    >Ironically Buddhism has now come very far from original teaching of Buddha. Which one?
  - bunderbunder 12y ago
    I fail to see the irony. It seems entirely appropriate to me. I'm admittedly no proper scholar of the subject, just a former armchair enthusiast, but when I read texts from the Pali canon it seems clear to me that from the earliest recorded times Buddhism has considered itself a living tradition. In the stories it tells, Gautama Buddha often refuses to weigh in on those sorts of matters. Fast forward a couple thousand years and you've got things like a letter in which a major Zen patriarch explicitly refuses to offer any opinion on a point of "theological" disagreement between Pure Land Buddhism and his own sect. And in between, plenty more stories of leaders encouraging flexible thinking on these kinds of matters. It's really not like Abrahamic religious traditions where there's this tendency toward obsessing over orthodoxy.
  - qb45 12y ago
    Unless they were originally meant as metaphors and later misunderstood by people who only heard their literal text. One may wonder if this isn't the origin of most "paranormality" found in religions.
sanmon3186 12y ago
Isn't it nirvana (and not moksha) in Buddhism?
mikeash 12y ago
I don't understand what you're saying they got wrong. They're just saying that you'll be more content with a crappy life if you think you have another one coming up. You seem to be saying that the Buddhist belief in reincarnation includes the probability of another life coming up (unless you've managed to "win the game") which meshes with what you've quoted.

nickbauman 12y ago

Well that's one specific interpretation of Buddhism common to a few schools. Samsara (reincarnation) can also be interpreted as an illustration of the problem of not learning from experience. A general way of ending the cycle (that works across different schools of Buddhism) is that the Buddha was trying to teach us to focus on understanding human suffering. And only by understanding suffering can we ultimately dislodge it and move forward. You don't even have to be Buddhist to believe in that!

drieddust 12y ago
I think you are spot on here. Ironically Buddhism has now come very far from original teaching of Buddha.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- greggyb 12y ago
  >Ironically Buddhism has now come very far from original teaching of Buddha. Which one?
- bunderbunder 12y ago
  I fail to see the irony. It seems entirely appropriate to me. I'm admittedly no proper scholar of the subject, just a former armchair enthusiast, but when I read texts from the Pali canon it seems clear to me that from the earliest recorded times Buddhism has considered itself a living tradition. In the stories it tells, Gautama Buddha often refuses to weigh in on those sorts of matters. Fast forward a couple thousand years and you've got things like a letter in which a major Zen patriarch explicitly refuses to offer any opinion on a point of "theological" disagreement between Pure Land Buddhism and his own sect. And in between, plenty more stories of leaders encouraging flexible thinking on these kinds of matters. It's really not like Abrahamic religious traditions where there's this tendency toward obsessing over orthodoxy.
- qb45 12y ago
  Unless they were originally meant as metaphors and later misunderstood by people who only heard their literal text. One may wonder if this isn't the origin of most "paranormality" found in religions.

sanmon3186 12y ago

Isn't it nirvana (and not moksha) in Buddhism?

mikeash 12y ago

I don't understand what you're saying they got wrong. They're just saying that you'll be more content with a crappy life if you think you have another one coming up. You seem to be saying that the Buddhist belief in reincarnation includes the probability of another life coming up (unless you've managed to "win the game") which meshes with what you've quoted.