I liked the previous punchline better, but this is still pretty great. Have you read Brian Victoria’s Zen at war? A fascinating and scary book that shows how Japan’s Buddhist establishment would say completely non sequitur shit to support Japan’s imperial tendencies. The first Buddhist precept is not killing, so Zen master Kodo Sawaki would say that the true spirit of not killing was in killing the Chinese. Just total, Orwellian reversal of principles to sell war as a Buddhist religious duty. And Victoria is himself a zen priest.
I liked the previous punchline better, but this is still pretty great. Have you read Brian Victoria’s Zen at war? A fascinating and scary book that shows how Japan’s Buddhist establishment would say completely non sequitur shit to support Japan’s imperial tendencies. The first Buddhist precept is not killing, so Zen master Kodo Sawaki would say that the true spirit of not killing was in killing the Chinese. Just total, Orwellian reversal of principles to sell war as a Buddhist religious duty. And Victoria is himself a zen priest.
Kind of off subject, but I’d be curious for your take on my latest piece;http://parallelsidewalk.wordpress.com/2008/09/10/post-modern-irony-just-got-post-moderner/