Telling Buddhists about Jesus, by Kanishka Raffel
(The Briefing, June 28, 2000, http://matthiasmedia.com/briefing/2000/06/telling-buddhists-about-jesus/ )
Introduction
The first person to attempt to talk to me about the Lord Jesus was a young American woman who was part of a team of missionaries visiting the university at which I was studying. I was sitting on my own at a table in one of the cafeterias when she came over, sat down and said that she was interested in talking to people about what they believed. I explained to her briefly that I was a Buddhist and what that entailed. Her response? “Well, that’s ridiculous!” Out of pity, I resolved to indulge her for as long as she wanted to hang around. I hoped that it would not be long, and it wasn’t.
Seeing the person
In God’s kindness, my American interlocutor was not the only Christian person I knew, nor was she typical of the Christians I knew. But she was the first Christian to speak to me about Jesus. What would have helped her to help me?
It would certainly have helped if she had treated me as a person. Paul says, “Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders” (Col 4:5). I take it that he means that we cannot expect outsiders to know what they need to know. We are to be the wise ones. We know that any unsaved person is made in God’s image. We know that their sin has alienated them from the God who made them and that they face his just punishment. We know that they are a person to whom God’s gospel is a gracious invitation to forgiveness, reconciliation and adoption into God’s family.
We should regard any person with whom we seek to share God’s good news about Jesus as a guest invited by God to his banquet.
Seeing the gap
There are many aspects of Christianity that sharply contradict the Buddhist worldview:
GOD
Buddhism is explicitly atheistic. The Buddha eschewed all claims to divinity or to the inspiration of God. According to Buddhism, man is supreme. Buddhism recognizes the existence of deities or devas, but there is no concept of God as creator or judge. The devas lag behind humans on the road to enlightenment because of their attachment to pleasure.
SIN
There is no doctrine of sin. Actions are simply actions, and inexorably produce their effects according to the law of karma. This does not mean that there is no recognition that some actions are evil; anything that causes harm is to be avoided. But the root of evil is seen to be ignorance rather than the rejection of God. The remedy is the pursuit of wisdom and compassion, not repentance. The human heart, though fettered by ignorance, is thought to be essentially good.
SALVATION
The practice of the Eightfold Path, a program of rigorous ethical and mental self-discipline and self-exertion, is the means by which the individual achieves nirvana (literally, ‘extinction’). The Buddha said, “I am not your refuge; I only show the way. You must be your own refuge; who else could be your refuge.” Jesus said, “Come to me all who labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matt 11:28). The Buddhist path of self-salvation and responsibility for one’s own destiny is thought to be noble, admirable and profound. (It is also acknowledged to be very difficult. Even the Buddha is said to have had more than 500 ‘lives’ before achieving enlightenment.) Reliance on another for salvation is thought to be ignoble, weak and foolish.
Seeing Jesus
What turns a self-reliant, atheist moralist into a trinitarian monotheist who confesses a crucified Jew saviour and king? No amount of human persuasion! Buddhism describes its own preoccupation as the personal apprehension of reality. Evangelism aims at an accurate presentation of Jesus as he really is. The rest, of course, is up to God.
Jesus challenges the Buddhist worldview in two particular spheres. Firstly, he reveals God. Secondly, he reinterprets suffering.
REVEALING GOD
The Buddhist sees the God of the Bible as unknowable, capriciously determining the lives of humans and demanding ‘blind faith’. This is in stark contrast to Buddhist notions of the potential of every human to achieve enlightenment and control their own destiny through striving for knowledge.
The Christian can readily agree with the Buddhist that a capricious god, or one who manipulates human beings or demands subservience and cowering, is a god not worth worshipping. From this point of agreement, the Christian may then describe the generosity and love of the God of the Bible for his creation, and supremely, for mankind.
We can speak of God’s love in creation—that all things were created good and then entrusted to humanity, who themselves were made in God’s own image. We can speak of God’s love in redemption—God’s extraordinary commitment, which goes to the extent of incarnation and atonement in order to guarantee eternal blessing for his people. And the Christian may speak of God’s offer of salvation as a matter of grace, a free gift!
A Buddhist will readily admit that the pursuit of the Eightfold Path is extremely burdensome. The offer of free salvation, when heard, will be breathtaking!
But above all, it is Jesus who determines the Christian’s knowledge of God. The most effective means of engaging the Buddhist with the claims of Christianity is to present him or her with the Jesus of the Gospels. John’s Gospel has certain poetic affinities with Buddhist scripture, and I would recommend inviting your Buddhist friend to read John with you.
Where the Buddhist scriptures record the Buddha’s wise sayings and answers to questions, the Gospels provide a picture of Jesus himself. Buddhist truth is bound up in ideas and theories—often complex and impenetrable; Christian truth is concerned with knowing Jesus. The directness of the Gospels and their distinctive historical character make the person of Jesus a real issue. He is by far the most compelling reason for belief in God and “makes known the One whom no one has seen” ( John 1:18).
REINTERPRETING SUFFERING
The existence and universality of suffering is Buddhism’s First Noble Truth. It is the primary fact of life. The ‘problem of suffering’ is a Christian dilemma, not a Buddhist one.
Intimately related to the doctrine of suffering in Buddhism is the law of cause and effect, or karma. Karma explains why there is discrepancy between individuals in the extent to which they experience suffering in life. Since it is a law that good results in good and evil results in evil, it can be said that nothing happens to an individual that he does not deserve, or that he did not bring about himself.
Existentially, this is extremely repugnant or at least morally ambiguous. It trivializes ‘humanness’ in that those who are afflicted in this life must console themselves only with the belief that in a past life that they cannot remember, they acted in such a way as to deserve their present suffering. It may also induce complacency toward fellow human beings in that it makes it permissible to attribute the deprivations of the disadvantaged to their own evil behaviour in a past life. Nevertheless, for the Buddhist, karma is said to provide consolation, self-reliance and moral courage. It prompts the Buddhist to kindness and compassion without being tempted by reward or frightened by punishment, and it teaches individual responsibility.
The Buddhist regards the doctrine of karma as superior to the Christian view of a benevolent and almighty God who nevertheless ordains and/or permits suffering. What reply can the Christian make?
To begin with, we can acknowledge the great profundity of the Buddhist comprehension of suffering in the world. And we can agree that much of the suffering we experience is the result of our own sin. But we can also note that much of the suffering of the world is caused by other people, rather than by those who suffer it. We can also point out some of the moral ambiguity arising from the doctrine.
But consistent with the main ‘strategy’ of confronting the Buddhist with the person and claims of Jesus, we can introduce a critique of karma that comes from Jesus’ lips. In Luke 13:1-5, Jesus’ reference to the 18 people killed by the collapse of the Tower of Siloam operates as an almost explicit denial of karma. Not only so, but Jesus represents their suffering as a warning to those not affected that they stand convicted of sin and in need of forgiveness. In this context, suffering serves as a reminder of the urgency of the call to repentance given humanity’s universal failure to live up to God’s expectations.
Lastly, while admitting the complexity of the ‘problem of suffering’, we can engage our Buddhist friends with the paradoxical but indispensable reality of the God who suffers, the crucified Messiah. Here, the Buddhist is truly confronted by Jesus. He will have to decide whether Jesus’ suffering on the cross was merely the inevitable result of his karma, or whether Jesus’ explanation of his death as a ransom for many is to be accepted.
Conclusion
The presence of Buddhists in large numbers in Australia is a blessing from God. It creates a wonderful opportunity for Buddhists—many from countries where there is little Christian missionary activity—to hear and consider the invitation of the gospel of Jesus Christ to abundant life in the knowledge and service of the living God.
If you have a Buddhist buddy, grab a Bible and introduce them to Jesus!