Comments on “Is Vajrayana hacking the West?”

Kyabje Thinley Norbu Rinpoche wrote very clearly about this in his book MAGIC DANCE , chapter : Lineage . Very recommended study for everyone , be it from the East, West, North, South or center :)

That’s an excellent book—I too recommend it highly!

Here are some relevant excerpts:

Some easterners, or westerners who think like easterners, believe that westerners cannot have lineage because they have no tradition. If we believe that westerners are too materialistic to have any spiritual lineage, we are disrespectful to pure Buddhist lineage. If we are not concerned with true spiritual qualities but are superficially seduced by eastern customs and manners because we associate the east with Buddhist lineage, we are also disrespectful to pure Buddhist lineage. If we think that only priests, lamas and gurus have lineage, then we have title lineage conception and padlock and key lineage conception which is disrespectful to pure spiritual lineage. ...the Buddha said that real teaching never depends on race. ... easterners and westerners are making Dharma factories, trying to bargain with substance lineage for power and gain. Like capitalists who want prestige and wealth in order to have the respect of others, we want gain that is touchable and useful and are afraid of poverty, anonymity and loss of worldly power. We think that lineage must be exclusive, only for those who accumulate spiritual prestige. We think that lineage is found only through associating with conspicuously high people, well-known Dharma centers, and teachers who have been recognized by the public as traditional lineage holders. ... some easterners believe that westerners cannot have lineage because they are not linked from birth to a spiritual teacher. Unless we are nihilists and believe only in the visible, we cannot judge the spiritual qualities of someone who has no visible teacher in this life.

Rin’dzin,

Amazing post. I don’t have nearly enough experience to properly comment on this, but I find the entire topic fascinating, so I’m going to dive in anyway.

Vajrayana shouldn’t work better for some cultures than others

This seems to imply that the principle and function behind Vajrayana is independent of culture, while also using culture as a means of expression. So if Vajrayana does less well in contemporary society than traditional ones, does it make sense to apply the same principles and functions, but adapting to (and taking advantage of) the vast ‘cultural code’ of contemporary culture?

Can you allow change yet remain the same? Or am I completely confused?

My (limited) understanding of how Vajrayana provides transformation through the use of symbol is based on the view that we are symbols of ourselves. Our identities are symbolic in nature, and happen to incorporate cultural patterns and norms circulating in society. Could symbols prevalent in contemporary society have a role in Vajrayana? How would that relate to yidam practice?

Maybe contemporary society also provides other opportunities for expression – even in the form of cognitive toolkits and frameworks which are not available in traditional societies, like your use of the language of code and hacking with cultural software. Some contemporary worldviews based on interpretations of modern physics like the multiverse can be particularly disruptive to consensual concepts of identity, and may be useful in pointing in the right direction.

If we understand culture as the raw material Vajrayana uses to transform individual neurotic behaviour into compassionate, heroic action, we can’t blame Western cultural conditioning for Vajrayana not working.

That makes sense, and gives us the opportunity of seeing the time and place we are in is as a huge space, open to innovation.

cheers,
Cristiano

I’m not suprised that vajrayana isn’t more readily available, the reason being that I think it is somewhat at odds with current trends; there doesn’t appear to be much of a demand for it, and so it follows that supply dwindles.

Modern economics promote self advancement and with that comes hierarchy. These trends seem increasingly global, and so more and more people are thinking in these terms, and seem to see this as a good thing.
As Vajrayana requires a vajra master, individuals with self advancing aspirations may be less likely to be interested as they will not necessarily see themselves as being where they would like to be in what will probably look like a hierarchy.

Ultimately, entropy is considered unavoidable, and evolution/adaptability may be thought of as changes that could defer it’s inevitability.
In which case it may be useful for both Vajrayana teachers and their students to be flexible and at least open, to change.

Incidentally, I also like Magic Dance! Three cheers for Magic Dance!

Another issue- one we are discussing in our sangha- a Dudjom Tersar and Longchen Nyightig lineage- is the issue of training lineage teachers. Traditionally in the Nyingma, as I guess in the other lineages, nobody would teach until they become a Khenpo. This training takes 9 years full time in a monastery. How the heck is that supposed to happen here? In zen you keep showing up and doing retreats and then at some point you are appointed as a teacher- but that’s a far cry from 9 years of full time university style training. We are playing with streaming internet classes, downloadable audio, etc.. Maybe then a student shows up 4 times per year for retreat or face time. Still, I don’t know how this is supposed to happen. Westerners don’t support monks who could then live as full time monastics, and it certainly wouldn’t be wise for a student to spend that many years not coming up with a skill to pay the bills (they are even having to solve this problem in Asia). Even though Tantra is ideal for us the logistics present an immense challenge. My lama, as well as most of my sangha, likes the fact that we are being taught the real thing, unwatered down, unnewageified, and studying authentic texts. How do we make this work? We are in West Los Angeles and this is not an inexpensive place, We need to come up with a way for this to work, but it’s a serious challenge.