A Personal Narrative on the Experience of Visiting the Buddhist Temple Hsi Lai in Hacienda Heights, California Essay

On Saturday, April 26, 2014, I had the pleasure to visit Hsi Lai Temple in Hacienda Heights, California. Hsi Lai is a Buddhist temple that practices humanistic Buddhism, a philosophy mainly practiced by Mahayana Buddhists. Mahayana Buddhism, as explained by David J. Kalupahana, author of A History of Buddhist Philosophy Continuities and Discontinuities, is also called the Great Tradition. This tradition is enshrined in the canonical Buddhist texts, espoused by Buddhist monks, scholars, and intellectuals, and propagated by the seats of higher learning in Buddhist countries. The Mahayana tradition is the largest major tradition of Buddhism that exists today. Enlightenment, which is core to Buddhist teachings, is also an important part of Mahayana Buddhism, specifically referring to the path of the boddhisatva (an enlightened being) who seeks full enlightenment in order to save others and to benefit every sentient being. The Mahayana Buddhism observed by practitioners of Hsi Lai Temple intersects with principles of humanism as defined in one of their informational brochures, claiming that the humanistic orientation works to unite all Buddhist sects. This type of Buddhism places high value on interfaith dialogue and establishing connections between Buddhist sects and other religions.In order to form a modern Buddhism engaged with current social issues affecting the world, humanistic Buddhism developed out of the Chinese Buddhist reform movement. Yinshun Shengzheng, a successor of the reform legacy left behind by a teacher named Taixu, is the Buddhist scholar of modern Chinese Buddhism who coined the slogan Humanistic Buddhism. In his writings, Yinshun proposed various periodization schemes outlining Buddhist doctrinal evolution, and polemically assessed the relevance of the different periods to modern Buddhist spirituality, as well as to what he considered to be the central, defining tenets of Buddhism. Humanistic Buddhism tackles many ethical issues that are related to the first Buddhist precept of not harming other beings. This includes discussions of abortion, war, euthanasia, animal rights, environmentalism,...

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