That was your last silly contribution to this thread. You don’t know anything about Buddhism, baby boomers, or the society described in the article cited, but that didn’t stop you from sneering at what you imagine to be the shallowness of others, thus demonstrating your own shallow understanding of the world. I would conclude, if I thought as you, that a Swiss German resident in Spain cannot imagine anything but ignorance in the world outside his swollen head. But, in truth, I don’t think you represent anybody but one arrogant fool.

Buddhist texts have been more intensively translated over longer periods than the texts of any other universalist religion. The spread of Buddhism throughout Asia led to the spread of literacy, the development of vernacular orthographies, and huge investments in translation from the languages of the texts to the languages of the new or prospective converts. And the spread of Buddhism to the rest of the world has incited many others to invest much time and effort in mastering Asian languages in order to understand the texts of translations and commentary on translations and commentary.

No, you cannot call that a superficial view of Buddhism, since I do not know anything about it. I have never met any Buddhist of any kind. Lots of people online say they are Zen Buddhists. This is where you’ll find strange words used to define mental concepts served in a context that does not otherwise show much intellectual training of any kind.

However, it is simply impossible for me to believe that you can understand a concept of a language that you don’t speak really well. A Spaniard does not understand what “cool” means. An American cannot imagine “pardo” as a colour.

And, though this is minor, I can’t accept the obligation to spell certain foreign words in a way that is not English and only distorts the foreign word as in “Quran” and “Buddhism”. It looks like a cheapie make-belief of the kiosko folk type.

I take quite a few ideas from http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/ where on the left there is a link for “online texts” and there are three chapters on Buddhism that would surely be a great read. The writer is qualified as evidenced by his texts on the Greeks.

Your impressions of Americans don’t ring true to me at all. Everybody thinks the same (at bumper-sticker levels of depth, according to your earlier post) and everyone is too polite to disagree? Not the country I’m familiar with. How then would you characterize Japan? How much time have you actually spent talking to a wide variety of Americans, especially American Buddhists, including immigrant families from Japan, Korea, Thailand, Vietnam, and elsewhere? Have you read any of the huge literature on Buddhism published by American academics of my generation who are often intellectually fascinated by Buddhism?

My impression is that you have formed shallow impressions from shallow experience.

Not Buddhism, but those terminologies that these people find necessary to put some depth into their discourse …. And I remember that day, some years ago, when an American blogger had trouble with his computer and angrily bitched in terms of ying and yang.

I don’t believe people can pick up a religious concept, but not the language where it was born and brought to life.

“HH the Dalai Lama who is the most authentic moral authority on planet earth today”

I realized you’re just another person who’s drunk the Kool Aid, so I don’t have to really worry about anything you’re saying.

I’m a 26 year old white convert to Islam. When I was younger I studied Buddhism and saw many genuine points of value but something was missing to me; but to a large extent, too, I simply couldn’t relate to most Buddhists I met. I’ve found that American Buddhism in general seems to be very closely tied with a culture specific to middle aged white boomers, and to have a new age tinge in even the most serious of environs. This makes it seem irrelevant and even silly to most people who aren’t white, middle-class psuedo-hippies; I attended Buddhist gatherings where people sing cute little songs about keeping anger away or talk about projecting love outward over the room, and this makes a lot of people cringe (this is also true, incidentally, with Sufism much of the time). I’ve been to China and observed the practice of Buddhism there and it seems like it’s a different ball game, for better or for worse. I have no stake in Buddhism’s survival in America but also have no animus towards it; but I personally think that its long term propagation would involve a harder, for lack of a better word, more orthodox approach to it; serious answers to hard questions, as opposed to now, when it seems to be (forgive the presumption) often just a feel-good philosophy. Buddhism contains some very difficult and challenging ideas and practices, and these would attract serious people. As it stands now, I think a lot of people who get involved with Buddhism are often the flaky types who just want something “without rules” that won’t make them change, and correctly or not they perceive Buddhism this way. I have met younger converts to Buddhism, including some very serious people (one of my friends, two years younger than me, is 6 months away from taking precepts and becoming a monk) but here in Northern Arizona, where I live, Buddhism is almost synonymous with crystals, expensive organic goods, and shallow syncretism.