In message <19990223133641.AAA18633@[128.103.125.215]>, Wade T.Smith
<wade_smith@harvard.edu> writes
>>and [Buddhism is]
>>perfectly (I mean *perfectly*) compatible with rationality.
>
>I'm not at all sure anything adopted as a 'gloss' over rationality is
>ever compatible. It may well only be benignly parasitic....
It's not so much a gloss over rationality. Recalling that we are talking about its "pure form", I'd say that Buddhism is to subjective experience as science is to energy and matter.
>After all, grasshopper, is not Buddha not needing Buddha?
Certainly not. It is said that if you meet the Buddha on the road, you should kill him. "Meeting the Buddha" is penetrating to the core of Buddhism. "Killing the Buddha" is leaving Buddhism behind. It is, after all, only a means to an end, a thief set to catch a thief, an anti-viral agent in the form of a virus. I expect Sue Blackmore's book due out next month (I think) to be very good on this.
-- Robin