Open Buddha

Hey Al,

As you know, I was on another list moderated by Namdrol that seems to have shuffled off to a different plane of existence. I got a lot of good and useful information and suggestions from what he posted, but I do tend to look at it all very differently, namely, the way things are is the way things are, which is not the property of any religion or lineage, and what we all, including Shakyamuni Buddha, try to do is realize as much of that as we can in order to make sense of our experience of life and interact constructively with one another. The really good teachers I’ve had have all said that the ultimate nature of things is inexpressible and that’s consistent with my own limited experience on the subject, so when I get home after working for a living all day, I’m a lot more likely to sit down and practice than think about signing on to E-sangha or anything like it.

The reason I read your blog and not something like E-sangha, besides the fact that we’re friends, is that it’s more fun, and we all can use some of that.

All the best!

W.B.

Hi Bill,

Yeah, it is better to focus on practice, by far. I do wish that online communities worked a bit better than they do or that the options were better. E-sangha has the potential to do a lot of good just by the simple number of people on it but monkey politics messes things up.

“I give Malcolm a certain amount of credit for actually being willing to show up and challenge what people were saying in the comments on the post but he did a pretty poor job at presenting a case for how wonderful and neat E-sangha really is and how enlightened (pardon the pun) the moderators are on the site. Most of his responses seemed to really avoid any core criticism of the site.”

My point is that you are misdirecting criticisms of a culture at a person. I guarantee that if I were to step down, the culture at E-sangha would remain the same, and dissatisfactory to you.

The reasons that my posts don’t address your core criticisms is that frankly, your criticisms are irrelevant to the concerns of the founders of the site, of which I was not one.

E-Sangha is heavily moderated because of a group of users’ experience at the old Tricycle boards.

You have permitted the basic message of disapproval of E-Sangha to become conflated with certain ex-members personal bitch fest with me. In that respect, you have become unwittingly involved in the personal grudge match of a couple of users.

In short, you are being used.

But it is your blog, so if you are happy that people are using you for their own ends, that’s your business.

Well, why don’t you step down, Malcolm, and then we’ll all find out? That would defuse the conflation of personal criticism of you with that of E-sangha.

Frankly, I find both to be valid but they are separate issues if you are no longer the main administrator and moderator of E-sangha.

None of this is going to keep me awake at night, in any case. I wrote off E-sangha a while ago. It isn’t like I can’t get on it (I have a spare account even now) but I don’t bother to try anymore. It is a waste of time and a source of the worst kind of meeting of politics and Buddhism at this point. I simply post about things that come up on my blog from time to time and others seem to comment. I’m not going to stop it or worry about it.

“It isn’t like I can’t get on it (I have a spare account even now) but I don’t bother to try anymore. It is a waste of time and a source of the worst kind of meeting of politics and Buddhism at this point.”

Of course you have duplicate account, Al– virtually everyone with any tech savvy can get around our ip blocks and so on.

But the politics are yours, Al, they are not ours.

And you are wrong, people won’t stop criticizing me just because I am not an admin any longer, they will keep bitching and moaning about me until they are bored or dead. So, when I decide I have truly better things to do than ban a user every once in a while for being a jerk, or modifying users accounts, and so on, then I will step down and not until then.

One thing that these sorts of threads do, however, is polarize the staff at e-Sangha, and create solidarity amongst them. All Peter, et al’s comments have done for the moderating team is confirm for them how right it was to let him go.

Peter once had friends among the moderating team. I think it is safe to say feelings are not so warm towards him any longer.

N

Well, anything to help the us vs. them groupthink between the moderator junta and the members of the site, I guess. I mean, the moderators are really the victims in all of this and their draconian and secret policies and methods are all justified, right?

For someone with no interest in what I or others are saying, you’ve sure posted a lot of messages (more than 20) in the last 24 hours here.

“Well, anything to help the us vs. them groupthink between the moderator junta and the members of the site, I guess. I mean, the moderators are really the victims in all of this and their draconian and secret policies and methods are all justified, right?”

This is false, al.We don’t have secret policies, or secret methods. Your complaints are not being addressed because they are misplaced.

“For someone with no interest in what I or others are saying, you’ve sure posted a lot of messages (more than 20) in the last 24 hours here.”

As I said, even my tolerance level for lies, misrepresentation and plain old fallacy has been exceeded.

I suggest meditation, maybe some nice Insight practices. Why don’t we meditate on the Four Immeasurables together, Malcolm?

You’re investing an awful lot of time here but I guess you have it to spare.

He certainly seems obsessed with this Peter doesnt he ?

“He certainly seems obsessed with this Peter doesnt he ?….”

Umm actually, no, since I don’t have a month’s worth of speculative annoyed posts going on and on about him. I would say that you and Peter are the ones with the obsession.

N

And you keep coming back for more, Malcolm. I suggest letting go of your attachment to posts here.

Its like dealing with a child. He cant invisible or ban or suspend so he has to have the last word.
Every post confirming what many of us came to an view about some time ago…
I am tempted to post the emails of support I have received. I wont because I suspect the senders would be too identifiable.

“I suggest letting go of your attachment to posts here.”

I am not particularly attached to the posts here, but since the door is open, people can see for themselves the pettiness, absurdity and lack of substance of the complaints here.

N

Oh you are right there . You are exposed Namdrol. You came out from behind the curtain. There you are with all of your weapons beyond reach apart from bluster. In so doing you have made it impossible for you to be taken seriously again. Your facade wont crumble all at once, but crumble it will. It has been brought out into the light and it turns out you are just a big kid.

“Oh you are right there.”

Yes, I know. Your complaints are petty, absurd, and lack substance.

I am glad you agree.

Later.

N

“At least one Zen priest has been banned, for example, for saying that he did not literally believe in or teach the reality of literal reincarnation as a Buddhist.”

Anyone who has a real interest in Buddhism and doesn’t yet understand the validity of the teachings about reincarnation would spend their time better sitting on the pillow and contemplating on “no-self” than allowing their ego-self to moan about it, as a result of ignorance (which is absence of enlightenment and understanding)…

Reincarnation is real, though not exactly how most people imagine it. Drop the “me” who reincarnates and the understanding will be attained.

Love and Light

James, I’m not sure who you are addressing. Are you suggesting a belief in literal reincarnation as the one and only acceptable interpretation? You are aware, I hope, that a variety of opinions on the matter have been expressed over the last couple of thousand years by a variety of Buddhist teachers.

Hello Al

I am adressing no one specifically and anyone who reads my words and doesn’t yet understand the teachings about reincarnation. And please understand I am not suggesting belief in anything. On the contrary, the word “belief” to me implies accepting something as true without having direct experience and thorough understanding of something, which the Buddha warned against in the Kalama Sutta. At the cost of sounding arrogant, I am talking based on direct experience and not on the words of others, but please don’t take my word for granted since that is precisely what the Buddha warned against. Test it yourself and experience the truth. Have faith but not blind or weak faith, which is belief.

One of our fundamental flaws resulting from and sustaining our ignorance is trying to understand the teachings of a Buddha while looking at themes separately, in a fragmented way, such as “reincarnation”, “no-self”, “impermanence”, “emptiness”, etc. To thoroughly understand Buddha’s teachings, we must connect the apparently separate themes and understand them as a single theme. Consequently, and at least based on my experience, we cannot understand “reincarnation”, until we understand the meaning of “no-self” through experience, which implies absence of a self-identity that reincarnates.

There is much to learn beyond understanding “no-self”, which is still the first stage of enlightenment. Thorough understanding is fundamental to build a practice that is founded on solid ground of direct experience, rather than purely on intellectual shifting sands that carry delusion and ignorance. Hence why talking, as it is done in E-sangha – and as foolish as it is sometimes (not always) – is necessary as well, because the intellect is still necessary to attain understanding.

In the wonderful words of Ryokan Taigu:

“Talk is always easy
Practice always hard
It’s no wonder people try to make up
For their lack of hard practice with easy talk
But the harder they try, the worse things get
The more they talk, the more wrong they go
It’s like pouring oil to put out a fire
Just foolishness and nothing else.”

As much as I admire and understand Ryokan Taigu’s words, which guided me to Buddhism, I feel there is one misperception in this poem, perhaps resulting from his frustration. With all his wisdom, Ryokan seems to have forgotten when writing this poem that talk (and writing) is also practice. Apologies for pointing this out at the cost of showing my own ignorance, but not so different from what I have observed here… Riokan’s last words of “Just foolishness and nothing else” are too extreme a statement to match the Middle Way, which is the only way out of the burning house.

Thorough understanding is an essential step to a solid practice. Hence why I see the value of E-sangha and talk, with all the flaws and risks that it may carry to have thousands of beings suffering from ignorance and delusion discussing such issues. Still, unless we talk, we can hardly understand, even at the risk of our egos disagreeing sometimes.

Lest we forget, only a Buddha is not ignorant and deluded and, as far as we know, there is none around. So – please – don’t take my words personally for they are not directed to anyone specifically, anymore than they are directed to myself.

All the best on everyone’s path.

Hello again

I just wanted to add these words spoken by the Tathagata to my previous comment and add a short comment on my understanding on them:

“Nirvana comes to thee, Kassapa, when thou understandest thoroughly, and when thou livest according to thy understanding, that all things are of one essence and that there is but one law.”
in One Essence, One Law, One Aim

In my mind, it is not possible to have two simultaneously conflictive and thoroughly correct opinions on Buddha’s teachings. At best, two opposing ‘subjective truths’ (or opinions) carry a particle of the ‘objective truth’ each, which is how things really are and how a Buddha perceives things.

According to the Tathagata, understanding “precedes” practice, and I feel this suggests that the Tathagata sees “solid practice” as practice according to an understanding already attained and – consequently – not merely on faith or belief, which is more like a slippery stepping stone at best.

So I would say, neither look down on understanding nor on practice, for ultimately they are one and the same. And don’t look down on thinking, talking, writing and/or reading, for one of them (at least) is necessary to arrive at attaining understanding and ultimately build a solid practice.

Love and Light
James

Serendipity brought me to this site. I have long thought there should be some free discussion about the strange, parallel world of E-sangha. For my sins I have wasted far too many hours idly browsing its forums over the past year or so. It is a nightmare place, at once utterly repellent and bizarrely alluring. There is something almost irresistible about the sheer weirdness of so many of its threads and the mad, tyrannical fundamentalism of its moderators. As the world’s biggest online Buddhist forum it does for Buddhist PR what suicide bombers have done for Islam, presenting Buddhism as a deeply unattractive, even fanatical religion and its followers as disturbed and quite possibly insane. Yet there is no doubting its entertainment value. After all, it’s not everywhere one can find animated discussions revolving around the belief that early humans lived for 84,000 years, with not one post challenging this claim. A brief trawl through the extraordinary musings of E-sangha members reveals a picture of online Buddhists who fantasise about the imagined bliss of selflessness yet whose egos generate enough heat to power a small city, who are preoccupied with such issues as whether ants create karma and how many bodies a bodhisattva can manifest at once, and who positively froth at the virtual mouth if anyone dares to question the literal existence of hell. The moderation team are nothing less than an Inquisition, scouring the boards day and night for the merest hint of heresy and forever screeching about the evils of wrong view, though as often as not they cannot even agree amongst themselves as to what this is since different traditions hold contrary positions on many matters. A sustained and brutal crackdown on limp, liberal views in recent months has sent most of the more intelligent contributors packing, leaving behind a deranged membership of the cowed and the hysterical. But there are still ‘souls’ to be saved. As one kindly member put it, he logs on to ‘flame’ those who propagate wrong views because a good flaming now is so much to be preferred to the unquenchable fire of Avici. I used not to believe in hell. I do now. It’s called E-sangha.

Mike…

I am not sure if we log in to the same e-sangha, for I know not of a single member who holds on to a literal belief in hell, never mind froth at the mouth about it, which isn’t to say there isn’t any who don’t… It’s quite possible indeed. After all, ignorance abounds everywhere – both inside and outside e-sangha – but I am fortunate enough to know from personal experience that there is one place on the internet where we have a true opportunity to do away with ours, thanks to the ever present discussion of Buddhist teachings (ridding of ignorance is part of the goal after all).

On the contrary, I’ve watched many discussions suggesting quite the opposite, that many (if not most) members do not hold on to any literal belief in hell (as a place existing somewhere, where we go after dying), devils and the like and that many members do not hold any beliefs that appear unscientific. So much so that a lot of e-sangha members still have trouble with issues such as “reincarnation”. Unfortunately, liberation of the mind (a.k.a enlightenment) is hardly possible (if possible at all) without attaining understanding of what is literal and what is metaphor.

Equally, there are many non e-sangha members who don’t believe in hell at all, while forgetting the one we create in our minds and in the world, before, when we think and speak and/or act with deceit, anger, greed, envy and/or hate (to name but a few), causing suffering to ourselves before causing suffering to others. What goes around, comes around… We harvest what we seed. It may take time sometimes but – ultimately – it doesn’t fail. That’s Karma for fools, since Karma really is a bit more complicated than that.

As to e-sangha being hell, one thing I have learned there is that whenever I feel in hell or see faults, whether in a place or in this or that person, I should really look inside my mind to find the fault. You may feel different. It’s only natural… Wherever we go, we take our luggage with us.

When I first came across Buddhist teachings, I asked myself why the many Buddhas thought necessary to “liberate the mind”… “Foolish superstitions!”, I thought, “my mind is free!”. But then I remembered some of Albert Einstein’s most famous words. I’ve heard that he stated once that we only use a small percentage of our brains…

1+1=3 (or is it 1?)

Fortunately, many are awakening and learning to connect the missing dots, until there is only one big picture left. Unfortunately, spiritual teachers are the only ones teaching it. Maybe because free minds are not very good for those willing to exploit people’s ignorance about themselves and about the way their minds work…

All the best to you,

name changed to protect the innocent ;-)

hmmm….I’ve often wondered about e-sangha. Now that it is unavailable for some reason (likely technical), I google “what’s wrong with e-sangha” and I find this. Too bad, I have gained insight from some of the posts, but do find many to be repetitive and yes, even weird. But you are correct, it’s like watching a sinking ship. You know how it ends, but you can’t help watching.

I sure wish there were other sites where ideas and insights could be shared and discussed openly and without attack, but then, this is the internet.

I’m sure E-sangha will be back, like the undead, it will rise again if it is put down.

In the meantime, you should try http://buddhistforums.net/, run by some nice people as a new site.

“The censorship method … is that of handing the job over to some frail and erring mortal man, and making him omnipotent on the assumption that his official status will make him infallible and omniscient.” — George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)

The truth is that people pay from their pockets to make e-sangha possible. There is alot of merit in that, and their work and sacrifice deserves to be protected. Nobody would want it to turn into what the Tricycle boards became.

the problem is…

… That there is no intellectual coherence in the moderation of e-sangha. One, while there are clearly stated rules, there is no consistency in the enforcement of these rules. In terms of enforcement, the basis for enforcement extends as far as the tolerance of the most twitchy moderator du jour. There is also an subtext of hypocrisy in the moderation, as moderators and friends of moderators can do as they will as long as it is deemed “for the dharma”. There is also a subtext of extreme bias as the moderators are not dispassionate observers, but rather, they actively promote specific viewpoints like any other user.

Ironically, this could be solved simply by having a time and place for discussing matters of board moderation. This could be a separate forum. I would think it would be better to discuss these issues amongst members *on the board* than across the internet on contra e-sangha sites and blogs.

In my time at e-sangha I would have loved to contribute money or take the responsibility to be a moderator or whatever. It’s a cool idea. Unfortunately, it’s also a little hinky.

yes, it´s not helpful, that they don´t allow discussion about this problems.

Dear Rev. Jigen Billings and everyone else posting here,

I’ve decided to say a few things just in case something I say here helps someone else who chances to read these words.

I first experienced this guy named Malcolm / Namdrol on e-Sangha about 5 years ago. I recognized his personality type immediately. I was not impressed.

I see from the posts here and some other things I’ve looked at that Malcolm / Namdrol has a long and colorful history of insulting people, casting aspersions on other people’s teachers and traditions and basically declaring that he, Malcolm / Namdrol, knows what Dharma is and isn’t.

You have to feel sorry for a guy like that. Because you know he’s heading for a train-wreck. You know that at some point, something is going to happen to him that is going to drive him to his knees in regret and shame.

Maybe it’s already happened. As I write this on April 10, 2010, I see three things that are directly related to Malcolm / Namdrol.

1) e-Sangha appears to be inoperable, non-fucntioning. The very forum in which Malcolm / Namdrol spoke to so many people with utter disdain, no longer works.

2)A priest of the Soto Zen tradition appears to have seriously considered filing a lawsuit against the principle people behind e-Sangha. Which implicitly or explicitly would include Malcolm / Namdrol.

3)And finally, a chorus of people, probably from around the world, representing not just one but several major forms of Buddhist tradition, are clearly voicing their displeasure with how Malcolm / Namdrol has acted on e-Sangha. “voicing
their displeasure”…yes, I am putting it mildly.

These three things, alone, would make anyone I know pause and reflect, at least a little bit, on their behavior, were they in Malcolm / Namdrol’s shoes.

May Malcolm / Namdrol have been doing a lot of
soul-searching lately.

Is there anything to be learned from the experience of this fellow human being named Malcolm / Namdrol ?

I’ve thought about that a little bit and I’ll share what I’ve come up with.

1) If you consistently disparage and insult other people and their teachers, you are going to lose your audience.

2) If you do this often enough and long enough, all sorts of decent-minded people around the world will tire of your antics and find a way to make their voices heard, loud and clear.

3) If you do this often enough and long enough, someone eventually is going to decide that “Enough is enough” and file a lawsuit.

4) Scholarship is not enough. Malcom / Namdrol appeared to have spent some time pouring over Dharma texts. He seemed to have at least a basic intellectual understanding of some of the teachings within the Tibetan Buddhist tradition and a smattering of intellectual understanding of some of the teachings within other forms of Buddhism.

But as you all know, that’s not enough.

Being able to recite “chapter and verse” from some Buddhist scripture is not enough.

If intellectual understanding of some of Buddhist teaching does not start “translating” into how one interacts with one’s fellow human beings, something is wrong.

I am sure that many of you know exactly what I am saying from your own personal experience with practicing Dharma.

I am sure that many of you have felt your heart become softer and more tender towards other human beings as you have tried to practice what you understand as Dharma.

Some people call it “compassion”. Some people would use the word “kindness”. And other people might call it “just plain common decency”.

In fact, I would not be suprised if some of you have reached a point at which you have almost no interest in how much “Buddhist knowledge” someone seems to possess – and constantly notice how people actually treat each other.

Actions rather than Words.

Practice rather than Preaching.

I suspect that many of you have already made a quiet, “invisible” transition in your experience with Buddhism. I suspect that many of you have sort of “graduated” from being a Listener to actually starting to Practice what you have learned.

I bet at least one of you will nod your head in silent agreement when I say that Practice can be a very humbling experience. All sort of things about yourself – things you think, things you say to other people, and things you do towards other people – seem to become very clear. And in
many cases, very disquieting. Troubling. Humbling.

That is one of the many benefits of actually Practicing. You no longer need a teacher to orrect your behavior. You no longer need a jury of your peers to finally explain to you that you’ve been acting like a jerk.

Your own Practice will tell you everything you need to know about how you are doing. And perhaps how far you have yet to go.

After 5 years ago, I came upon a guy named Malcolm / Namdrol saying some really strident, uncharitable and downright offensive things about a Buddhist monk I happen to know, like and respect. He was mouthing-off on a website
called “e-Sangha”.

I’d never heard of this guy before nor had I ever looked at e-Sangha before. So I spent a little time on e-Sangha, reading some other things that this guy was saying.

I was not impressed.

So after thinking about it for a little while, I decided to challenge Malcolm / Namdrol. I decide to challenge him on his own turf – e-Sangha – and to challenge him about a Buddhist subject that he should have at least a passing familiarity with: Emptiness.

I was quite clear with Malcolm / Namdrol. I made it clear to him that I was not interested in some sort of scholarly, pedantic debate about the Defintion of Emptiness. I was not interested in some sort of intellectual review of the
various views of Emptiness.

I flat-out challenged Malcolm / Namdrol to display whether he understood what it means to “Apply Emptiness”.

Many of you probably recognize the term “Emptiness” but do not recall ever hearing the phrase “Apply Emptiness” before.

I had never heard that phrase “Apply Emptiness” in any Tibetan Buddhist teaching, either. I made it up.

But some of you probably understand exactly what I meant when I used that phrase in issuing a challenge to Malcolm / Namdrol.

Granted, this is not a very nice thing to do. Please trust me when I tell you that I do not normally issue this sort of challenge to people.

But on the other hand, I do not normally hear someone on an Internet website being insulting to the other people, other people’s teachers and entire forms of Buddhist practice.

To his credit, Malcolm / Namdrol did actually engage with him. We had what some people seemed to think was a long series of posts, back and forth, over a period of weeks.

Malcolm / Namdrol pulled many of the stunts on me that some of you have rightly complained about. He was sarcastic at times, he deleted some of my posts, and he abruptly turned the current thread into a new thread, with a new name.

I was neither impressed by these silly antics nor was I deterred. I stayed with him because I wanted to give him a chance to start speaking genuinely. Honestly. “Man to man”, down-to-earth.

And to his credit, he did. Towards the end of our
exchanges, Malcolm / Namdrol said some personal things, some things that helped me understand what was driving him, what was troubling him, and perhaps some of what he yearns for.

I’m glad I stayed with him, kept the conversation going for a while. I’m glad that I did not give up on him. I’m glad that I did not mentally toss him aside as just another pompous fool.

Those of you who know Malcolm / Namdrol personally, please keep taking good care of a decent man, who like the rest of us is trying his best, as best he knows how.

Chuck