Greetings, fellow readers.
I had made a similar post but it was locked due to my violation of Rule16 where I had included specific details which were prohibited. This is my revised version.
Not long ago, I came across a number of video clips depicting the founder-master of a ‘Buddhist’ movement/organisation giving ‘totem enquiries’ on stage before a sizeable crowd. According to their website, the founder-master “is able to examine one’s Totem in heaven according to the birth year, Chinese zodiac sign, and gender provided by the inquirer. By referencing the Totem, all information about one’s past, present and future lives can be collected.”
The website also says: “Following the (founder-master’s) Dharma teachings, we can repay our karmic debts by performing recitations. Combined with making Great Vows and performing Life Liberation including releasing fish, we can recover from illnesses and overcome difficulties in life.” The founder-master is also “regarded as a manifestation of Guan Yin Bodhisattva”.
My concerns with the video clips are two-fold: the attitude of the founder-master and the substantive claims made by him. Regarding the former, I find him to be very arrogant. When a lady was talking about her family member’s illness, he struck her down by saying, “don’t bother telling me”, in reference to his predictive capabilities and that he doesn’t need a full story to form the diagnosis. When he gets any guesses right, he would literally ask the spectators to clap for him. He also likes to, what seems to me, fuel people’s fears, by saying “this is very serious, this is troubling, etc”. He’s also unrestrained in his criticisms of the patients’ (or their family members’) bad deeds, e.g., being a fishmonger, running a restaurant which serves animals, running a chicken farm, etc.
On this point, I stumbled upon a blog post of a lady (“the blogger”) claiming to be “a long time Theravada practitioner” and she notes that this particular founder-master’s style of teaching is similar to other “enlightened Masters” that she had met, where they would be “direct and not hesitate to reprimand because they can read our thoughts”.
Regarding the substantive claims, he attributes any and all illnesses and disabilities (autism, epilepsy, cancer, cerebral palsy, etc) to one’s own or other family members’ karma and the presence of spirits in their body. The blogger opines that the founder-master’s reprimandations on the patients in front of a crowd, and the patients remose appeases the spirits, make them feel vindicated and would be more willing to leave the patients. This, she says, is an act of compassion from the founder-master, and also serves as a lesson to other spectators.
The founder-master’s go-to cure for all illnesses is his signature ‘Little Houses’ which is a combination of Great Compassion Mantra, Heart Sutra, Amitabha Pure Land Rebirth Mantra and Sapta Atitabuddha Karasaniya Dharani, to ‘clear off karmic debts’ by ‘transferring merits to his/her karmic creditors’. There are also strict rules governing his methods which I shall not elaborate so as not to waste time.
The blogger says that the organisation continues to grow “because he solved people’s woes and problems” and “if his methods are bogus or fake, he would not have lasted for so many years”. She also addresses the claim that the teachings are a deviation from orthodox Buddhist teachings by saying that different teacher practices different teaching methods. Regarding the ‘Little Houses’, she finds no problem in that because many Buddhist practices today are not written in the scriptures; “when the Buddha was alive, he never allowed to have any statues of him build or carvings of his face done.” “There is no doubt that many established Buddhist rituals, even though they only exist after Buddha’s time, does generate huge merits.”
I wish I could provide the link to the blog because there are many posts written in defence of founder-master and relates to religious topics commonly discussed among South East Asian Chinese (of which I am a member) but that might be in contravention of the rules.
In the premises, I would appreciate it if anyone can clarify my following doubts :-
- Are there ‘true’ Buddhist teachings?
- If No.1 exists, will there ever be situations where the deviation is acceptable?
- Are different interpretations regarded as deviations?
- Is cultural assimilation a form of deviation? E.g., mixing Buddhism with Taoism and practising the product of the mixture.
- Is there transmigration on the effects of karma? E.g. effect of the ancestors’ killing spree on his/her descendants.
- Can a teacher’s behaviour/attitude be judged in the absence of scrutinising his teachings? Would this be an ‘ad hominem’ fallacy? E.g., not wanting to explore the teacher’s teachings based on his arrogant behaviour.
- Are there Buddhist masters who are able to see the unseen? E.g., a person’s past, present & future, reading minds, spirits, etc.
- Are all claims of being a manifestation/reincarnation of any Bodhisattva/Budha bogus?
- Is it possible to divert one’s merits to another?
- Will the deliberate act of doing good deeds rid one of one’s illnesses? (A pretty popular piece of advice by Mahayana practitioners in my country whenever one faces any illness or hardship is to generate more merit by doing good deeds).
- Can we be certain that any hardship/illness that befalls us is due to bad karma?
- Does chanting mantras generate merit if one doesn’t know the meaning of the mantra and if one knows?
- If someone does good deeds because he wants to reap good results, does it make him insincere and thus would not garner merits?
- Is the constant self-reminder to do good deeds a form of attachment?
- Are there specific situations when mantras are not to be chanted? (That founder-master says that certain mantras cannot be chanted at specific hours and weather conditions).
- Is there an easy way to verify Buddhist claims made by Buddhists from various schools without having to pore through voluminous suttas, lectures and/or books on a specific topic that might be hard to find? Is there a (comprehensive) list of FAQs?
As my previous post was locked, Bhante Sujato had PM-ed me with his input which I am grateful. Any further information regarding this topic is greatly appreciated!
Many thanks in advance. May you have a great day ahead