Jesus, Mohammad and Buddha

    

     I have never been particularly inclined to thinking religiously.

Don’t know what to ascribe this mine characteristic to. Maybe I was just born and nurtured in the kind of social environment prone to engineer a questioning mind. But, was I? Many in my family were Christians, not orthodox thickheads, but your average church-going Protestant conservatives. These people, obviously, tried their best to instill in me the need to worship, repentance, and redemption. I was supposed, one day, to realize the ultimate significance of what happened around that goddamn Roman cross. Only, I think I never really did. Not in any way they might have wanted, at least.

But my family members were not my enemies or people I abhorred, as some juvenile minds do when they need to entirely liberate themselves from their religious upbringing. Nope, deep down those were simple, but honest people who actually believed they had found the True Path, and who ultimately wanted to convert me because they felt that would ensure my happiness. I never had to live with those close-minded blockheads who can see only two colors, black and white, thankfully. My folks were even open-minded, in their own peculiar ways.

I still remember my conversations with my dear mother on religion, and how I perceived she needed that faith more than any alternative I could possibly offer her. A hard life. Poverty, loss of a husband (my father) very prematurely. Many children to raise on her own. Faith gave her a tool, a means of consolation through what was essentially her lot in life: hardships. And if she interpreted it all too simply, as some kind of magic potion, voilà, drink it and Heaven is soon to come, she never lost her keen mind for most practical things in life. Ie, she was never an alienated blockhead, a head with a decorative brain inside of it. She perceived some essential things about life that would contradict her belief in the supernatural, but she would never be able to voice this incoherence rationally. And it was exactly this incoherence that prevented me from embracing her faith, despite my perceiving we were much closer in our grasp of reality than either could possibly hope to tell the other. One thing she taught me was a need to embrace simplicity in life, a simplicity with has nothing to do with accepting everything in silence, but with being simple, not demanding from life more than it can give us. And she was a shining example of a person doing their utmost to live according to their inner convictions. Jesus told her to be kind, she was kind. Jesus told her to be comprehending, she was comprehending. Jesus told her to be tolerant, she was tolerant. If only Christians would fight to actually live their beliefs to the core. She taught me more about human life than a highly educated person could ever hope to do through their usual pedantry.

Thank you, mother.

Now, I ended up realizing the more a Christian person dives deep into the black or white mindset of orthodoxy, the more (s)he ends up entrapped by a sea of contradictions that is all the more mentally devastating because orthodoxy demands total obedience to totally unquestionable dogmas, and the individual, who has a body which is all too physical, but is living “for the spirit”, becomes this aberration, this living contradiction we call the fanatic. Why a living contradiction? Because he has a body, and his body is living here, and his body must live here, but his mind, his “soul” must exist for somewhere else, somewhere unattainable to his physical body. He lives for dying, ie, only after dying he will truly live. So his life here is a burden, a tragedy, a sin. Convinced of the utter evilness of his earthly life, he easily jumps to the conclusion that nothing he ever does is worth anything, whence he extracts the famous sola fide tenet, ie, you’re saved through faith alone, not deeds, but, helas, you still must act, work, all days, so that your mind is concentrated on atonement for your sinful nature and on the ever-renewed necessity for that faith.

I guess I must be glad my mind was never actually entrapped within such a spiritual dead end. So, I must live for dying, I must live dead? I must be a burden to myself and to others? A living contradiction that is caught, all to often, in outbursts of rebellion against Whom decreed things should be so, materialized in, say, attachment to a person, mourning for their loss, when they should be glad instead, since this is one more person who is now free of this burden called earthly life?

That Christianity turned earthly life into a burden is a fact now emphasized by so many, for such a long time, that it’s a de facto cliché. But again, not all types of Christianity, but rather an orthodox comprehension of Christianity. That’s not restricted to Calvinists or right-wing Bible belt warriors. Catholicism is strictly orthodox, in its own peculiar way. This is summed up in the never abolished nulla salus extra Ecclesiam formula. No redemption outside of the one true Church. If a Pope like Francis or Leo XIV ends up being a charismatic leader thriving on a defense of tolerance, he nonetheless is still a proponent and “summus” defender of the idea that there is only one way for man to be saved, and thus only one way for man to live, ie, according to the strict rules of the Church. You are either Catholic or not, you’re either right or wrong.

The nulla salus tenet is employed by any religious organization in one way or another. The names of the religion may vary, but one thing remains the same, the need for man to accept his essentially sinful nature and to submit to his one Savior, and when we don’t accept that, no matter what our behavior is, no matter how Christian-like our attitude in life may be, we’re lost, ie, we’re denied salvation, our current existence is a glimpse of what’s allotted unto us in eternity: complete darkness, absolute death.

It could be argued Jesus came to liberate mankind from dependence on the power of other men. Ie, you wouldn’t need to submit to other men, only to the One True God. Many see Jesus as a forefather of modern democratic thinking. As I said, there are actually many Christian people who are not orthodox in their acts, despite being so in their thoughts. You can most certainly identify yourself as Christian and not believe in the sola fide or in the nulla salus. Yet, when things are examined thoroughly, as what they are, who is right, who is christianly right, the open-minded, liberal Christian or the orthodox one?

As we all know, Nietzsche wrote the feverishly aggressive Antichrist as his final condemnation of Christianity. It’s open to interpretation what the German polemist had in mind when he used the word Christianity (the de facto religion or a state of mind?), but taking what he says at face value, we can all agree Nietzsche criticized the life denial embodied in the figure of Jesus. That’s what he labelled nihilism, a word since then transformed into a household tag attachable to basically anything. Denial of this here life. Since the essence of the Nazarene’s sacrifice was to give humans, all humans, life, eternal life, meaningful life, which would not end here, rather would actually commence, fruitfully, after death and thanks to (a) death, his is essentially a doctrine of life (body) denial, and the most adequate Christian is really the one who takes this doctrine to its logical extreme, abhorring “the world” and “the flesh”, being a living corpse whose main intent in life is offering others the hope of finding the Path to True Life together with him.

The liberal, open-minded Christian, who says things are not that black or white, actually believes that Christianity is one religion more among many. His being a Christian is accidental, he could use another label with the same practical result. The logical conclusion of a doctrine which insists on the need for dying (physically) to be born again (spiritually, truly) is life denial, and this doctrine, being a radical rejection of the world of man, mundane man, is better emphasized by the interpretation of its most intransigent proponents. Calvin with his sola fide, the Catholic Church with its nulla salus, Bible belt warriors with their vitriolic anti-everything stance: this is the purest Christianity.

“Oh, but you forgot the main thing: love!”, says the new age Christian. I didn’t. And, yes, Jesus can be interpreted, mundanely, as a prophet of Peace and Love. This attitude ignores, however, the core of his own teaching: He came to give us life, a life which we don’t and can’t have without Him. He came to save us from death, and without His supernatural aspect, His words become interchangeable with those of any other preacher of peace, like Gandhi or Bertrand Russell. Nope, sorry, but your beloved Jesus was a martyr of intolerance.

Nietzsche’s Antichrist is also interesting because in it Nietzsche praises Islam and Buddhism in an unexpected way.

Let’s remember his words here.

On Islam:

“Christianity destroyed for us the whole harvest of ancient civilization, and later it also destroyed for us the whole harvest of Mohammedan civilization. The wonderful culture of the Moors in Spain, which was fundamentally nearer to us and appealed more to our senses and tastes than that of Rome and Greece, was trampled down (—I do not say by what sort of feet—) Why? Because it had to thank noble and manly instincts for its origin—because it said yes to life, even to the rare and refined luxuriousness of Moorish life!.. The crusaders later made war on something before which it would have been more fitting for them to have grovelled in the dust—a civilization beside which even that of our nineteenth century seems very poor and very “senile.”—What they wanted, of course, was booty: the orient was rich… Let us put aside our prejudices! The crusades were a higher form of piracy, nothing more! The German nobility, which is fundamentally a Viking nobility, was in its element there: the church knew only too well how the German nobility was to be won… The German noble, always the “Swiss guard” of the church, always in the service of every bad instinct of the church—but well paid… Consider the fact that it is precisely the aid of German swords and German blood and valour that has enabled the church to carry through its war to the death upon everything noble on earth! At this point a host of painful questions suggest themselves. The German nobility stands outside the history of the higher civilization: the reason is obvious… Christianity, alcohol—the two great means of corruption… Intrinsically there should be no more choice between Islam and Christianity than there is between an Arab and a Jew. The decision is already reached; nobody remains at liberty to choose here. Either a man is a Chandala or he is not… “War to the knife with Rome! Peace and friendship with Islam!”: this was the feeling, this was the act, of that great free spirit, that genius among German emperors, Frederick II. What! must a German first be a genius, a free spirit, before he can feel decently? I can’t make out how a German could ever feel Christian…”

On Buddhism:

“In my condemnation of Christianity I surely hope I do no injustice to a related religion with an even larger number of believers: I allude to Buddhism. Both are to be reckoned among the nihilistic religions—they are both décadence religions—but they are separated from each other in a very remarkable way. For the fact that he is able to compare them at all the critic of Christianity is indebted to the scholars of India- Buddhism is a hundred times as realistic as Christianity- it is part of its living heritage that it is able to face problems objectively and coolly; it is the product of long centuries of philosophical speculation. The concept, “god,” was already disposed of before it appeared. Buddhism is the only genuinely positive religion to be encountered in history, and this applies even to its epistemology (which is a strict phenomenalism). It does not speak of a “struggle with sin,” but, yielding to reality, of the “struggle with suffering.” Sharply differentiating itself from Christianity, it puts the self-deception that lies in moral concepts behind it; it is, in my phrase, beyond good and evil.—The two physiological facts upon which it grounds itself and upon which it bestows its chief attention are: first, an excessive sensitiveness to sensation, which manifests itself as a refined susceptibility to pain, and secondly, an extraordinary spirituality, a too protracted concern with concepts and logical procedures, under the influence of which the instinct of personality has yielded to a notion of the “impersonal.” (—Both of these states will be familiar to a few of my readers, the objectivists, by experience, as they are to me). These physiological states produced a depression, and Buddha tried to combat it by hygienic measures. Against it he prescribed a life in the open, a life of travel; moderation in eating and a careful selection of foods; caution in the use of intoxicants; the same caution in arousing any of the passions that foster a bilious habit and heat the blood; finally, no worry, either on one’s own account or on account of others. He encourages ideas that make for either quiet contentment or good cheer—he finds means to combat ideas of other sorts. He understands good, the state of goodness, as something which promotes health. Prayer is not included, and neither is asceticism. There is no categorical imperative nor any disciplines, even within the walls of a monastery (-it is always possible to leave-). These things would have been simply means of increasing the excessive sensitiveness above mentioned. For the same reason he does not advocate any conflict with unbelievers; his teaching is antagonistic to nothing so much as to revenge, aversion, ressentiment (-“enmity never brings an end to enmity”: the moving refrain of all Buddhism…) And in all this he was right, for it is precisely these passions which, in view of his main regiminal purpose, are unhealthful. The mental fatigue that he observes, already plainly displayed in too much “objectivity” (that is, in the individual’s loss of interest in himself, in loss of balance and of “egoism”), he combats by strong efforts to lead even the spiritual interests back to the ego. In Buddha’s teaching egoism is a duty. The “one thing needful,” the question “how can you be delivered from suffering,” regulates and determines the whole spiritual diet. (—Perhaps one will here recall that Athenian who also declared war upon pure “scientificality,” to wit, Socrates, who also elevated egoism to the estate of a morality).”

Of course, one could argue, convincingly, that the Nietzsche who wrote this was the one on his own unavoidable path to insanity, to complete spiritual darkness. And his feverishly exaggerated tone favors such an opinion. Yet, this here is certainly still Nietzsche, the Nietzsche of Beyond Good and Evil and The Gay Science. So we must not simply disregard his words as a lunatic’s drivel. What he says about Islam is specially witty. His take on Buddhism is, apparently, controversial. Buddhism, a religion of egoists? Yet, it also does make some sense when you read it intelligently.

We can notice that Islam, ie, “Mohammedanism”, is praised because, contrary to the Nazarene, Mohammad fully embraces life on this here world. There is a Muslim doctrine of the after life, yes, but life denial is certainly not core to the Muslim worldview. We can see this expressed in actual, everyday Muslim attitude to things: they are men and women entirely concerned with living, in the now, according to the Qu’ranic rules of God. This world, and what they need to do in it, is their main concern. As for Buddha, Nietzsche sees it as nihilism done right, ie, as nihilism taken to its logical and inevitable consequences. Instead of denying the world theoretically and clinging to it nonetheless, the Buddha teaches the way to overcome attachment to the world, to actually make sense of its perception that the world the senses perceive is illusory. One religion is therefore concerned with denial of the world, another with its affirmation, and Buddhism, as a third and less intransigent doctrine, aims at overcoming the world and its illusions.

We could also say Jesus’ teachings are essentially feminine in nature, whereas Mohammad’s are masculine and the Buddha’s are neutral.

Jesus appeals to sensitivity, tolerance, acceptance, forgiveness. Mohammad appeals to violence, imposition, subjugation, domination. And the Buddha appeals to the overcoming of both such extremes, defending instead an attitude of total placidity, total equanimity, practically unattainable by men of flesh and blood. Except when they fully abandon the world, like the Buddha did.

The Path, or rather, the Paths to such a radical overcoming, hard as they may be to tread, lead the enlightened individual (man or woman) to Nirvana. And what’s Nirvana? Nothingness. Or rather, a dive into nothingness, after the individual has freed himself of his attachment to Maya, of his illusion of being an independent Self, when there has never been a Self to begin with, all beings being facets of the one and same thing, “all being one” from the get going, all things and beings being interconnected, life being nothing more than the long, painful process of discovering, making peace with this one truly liberating perception.

We can see then how Jesus bring convergence, conciliation, acceptance, but aiming not at this world and this life, but at the other, true one, whereas Mohammad is pretty much a prophet of and for this world, thriving on the human (male) urge for conquest, for power, for dominance, entirely justifying each and every human (male) action as necessary for assuring man’s dominion over this tired little planet here, leaving Heaven entirely in God’s hands. Inshallah. The Buddha, however, has a powerful, enticing alternative to offer to both, and it’s no surprise he attracts so many, especially those tired of the endless feminine/masculine, submission/violence dichotomies Christianity and Islam invariably entail.

If Mohammad has to be praised for his unrestricted acceptance and defense of life in this “vale of tears” here, I cannot speak the same in behalf of most of his doctrine. Noticing that I know pretty well most Muslims are not radical in applying this doctrine in practice. But the core of the doctrine- the word Islam itself means submission- is a defense of obedience, something I can’t personally endorse. If “Mohameddanism” implies acceptance of life, of joy, of celebration, in contrast to the bitter seriousness of the orthodox Christian, it also entails acceptance of an irrational, aberrant worldview with one single book, a very badly written book by the way, serving as guiding light for every single moment in life. If I myself could come up with something better written than the Qu’ran, I cannot accept it as the “Word” of an all-knowing deity. Even if Mohammad’s defense of masculinity sounds good to my ears, as there’s nothing inherently wrong in being masculine, in fighting for life, ie, for power, his otherwise absolutely obtrusive religion, controlling life 24/7, is definitely not for me. Also, his subjugation of women is entirely contrary to my nature. I do not see how women being entirely subjugated to males is something a rational being would envisage as desirable. That goes against my view of each single human being as unique. Just as Jesus, Mohammad has little to offer me.

As for Siddharta Gautama, he adresses life from a different perspective. The Buddhist term Anattā (no self) is much controversial even among Buddhists. Just like Christianity, Buddhism has many “schools”, many ways of interpreting the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama. Traditionally, Anattā means no-self in the sense that an individual self, the fixed individual self of Christians or Muslims, the individual soul, does not exist. Therefore Buddhism naturally denies the personal salvation of Christianity, for there is no soul to be judged or saved. Straight to the point: the Buddha affirms all things to be impermanent, everything is part of a process, a continuum, everything is in perpetual motion between birth, destruction and rebirth, so the fixed “I” of the Christian who finds God and is thus redeemed, having been destined for salvation from birth, is an illusion, for there could be no salvation for one who wasn’t even beginning to tread the path to revelation, ie, enlightenment.

Buddhism completely redefines the traditional fixed conceptualizations of theistic religions, with their inevitable male-centric dogmas and their subjugation of women to the power of males, being a religion, rather a doctrine, for literally all, men and women are on the exact same foot when it comes to their roles in existence, they both are born to suffer, and, through suffering, to find a way to overcome suffering, ie, to overcome attachment to things and concentrate on finding equanimity, enlightenment. Nirvana.

It must be noted, Buddhism can be both a denial and an affirmation of the self, the ego. A denial of the ego as something permanent. An affirmation of the ego as what it is- a process, a continuous process from birth to death. Obviously, to say an ego is something fixed, akin to the “soul” of Christians, is ridiculous. An ego is something to be known, explored, something that grows, learns, dies. Something that gets sick, gets tired, gets enlightened. It’s something that can die, in the sense that there will be nothing more in the body than a dead shell. When the self is interpreted in this more rational way, it is clear why Nietzsche associated Buddhism with egoism. In order to be truly enlightened, to overcome everything, including the ego, the individual must concentrate all his efforts in this same ego, in his individuality, in his attachment to his body and his mind, therefore becoming entirely egoistic. Just like, for the Marxist, who dreams of overthrowing capitalism, this same capitalism becomes an obsession, for the one who wants to overcome the ego, it becomes an obsession. For all that exists for him in this process of enlightenment is his self and his attachment to his self. When he finally overcomes himself, he becomes a Buddha. The embodiment of equanimity. Then he truly reaches Anattā. No more self. No more attachment. No more egoism. Which is the same as saying: no more life. Nirvana.

As Nietzsche said, Buddhism is incredibly more powerful and deep than Christianity. It puts this religion to shame. But it’s also more powerful than Islam, as it overcomes the need for submission and the male-centric culture of Mohammad. Except for some really preposterous notions, like belief in rebirth (?). I know no convincing evidence that a consciousness could be born again after being erased by death.

However, it’s not for me either. I recognize the advancement that a belief in impermanence represents in comparison to the fixed reality of theistic religions. It’s much closer to life how my senses perceive it: an endless process, always ending and beginning anew, all the time. Also, Buddhism proposes the idea of the interconnectedness of all things, which is reasonable enough, and which entails the sane idea of karma (instead of sin or blasphemy), which is nothing more than another way of saying: every action has consequences. Cause and effect.

The ultimate intent of Buddhism, however, is overcoming of the world. Nirvana. To find total placidity, which entails giving up passion, lust for life, for this is what causes suffering in the first place. I do not need to attach myself unconditionally to life and pain (ie, experiencing life) to be able to appreciate life for what it is. I accept life. I embrace life. I want it as it is. I do not need to endeavor in achieving deep states of mind where everything dissolves, where everything becomes a blur. I want to remain (self) conscious to the very last minute. Also, Nirvana. A beautiful name for nothingness. Why is nothingness desirable rather than what I have? Why run from what I have? It’s like the Buddha observed reality carefully, and devised an admirably clever way of dealing and overcoming it, but by labelling, encapsulating reality in a fixed definition (to live is to suffer) failed to count on those who would not share this same bleak perspective on things. The most famous Buddha admirer amongst philosophers, Schopenhauer, did the same. “All life is suffering”. Yes, but only for you, not for me.

So Jesus talks to my feminine and spiritual side, talks to me about compassion, surrender, expectation for better days to come. Mohammad talks to my masculine and wordly side, talks to me about conquest, dominance and lust for life. And the Buddha talks to my rational side, my pondering side, talks to the part of me capable of looking beyond the appearances of things.

None of them, though, talks to the entirety of myself. None of them talk to me, the independent, thinking, free individual. All each can see is a side of me, but I see the totality, and I want this totality. The irrational, the rational, the spiritual, the mundane, the sexual, the ascetic. Things needn’t be black or white, this or that, affirmation or denial. Life can be a mix of all things.

Above all, life is something no religion seems to fully grasp, and that’s why religion does nothing for me, the living one. 

By Maxx (Homo liber).