Post: #76

Quote:Almost every home in South Korea now contains a Korean-translated Talmud. But unlike in Israel, the Korean mothers teach the Talmud to their children. In a country of close to 49 million people who believe in Buddhism and Christianity, there are more people who read the Talmud – or at least own their own copy at home – more than in the Jewish state. Much more.

You guys believe in anything. Yeah that's def not true.

http://mostlykosher.blogspot.com/2011/03...story.html

http://mostlykosher.blogspot.com/2011/03...story.html

Also I'm a little tired of the glorification of Japan. They have their problems (like men being addicted to the syrupy sweet pop culture of anime, jpop and porn among other things). Also while I respect that they haven't been infected by feminism and other "progressive" ideologies yet its not because they are redpilled but because a combination of things that the ruling elites in Japan had no control over. So in other words its like the difference between a man who washes his hands, eats properly and exercises not getting sick vs a man who does none of those things but because of a genetic quirk and random dumb luck that they haven't gotten sick yet. I mean the Japanese government still spouts all the cliches and virtue signaling that the UN requests like everyone else.

I doubt Japan is immune to feminism and all the other SJW-isms and kinda like the creatures of the Galapagos they'll basically be sitting ducks when it does. As painful as the struggle here in the west is at least its a sign that there's immune response.

Post: #77

(01-13-2019 12:26 PM)SamuelBRoberts Wrote:  

(01-13-2019 12:11 PM)BaatumMania Wrote:  China in their history was always dysfunctional. A big Empire that will last for decades or centuries and then breakup into warlord factions. Japan is obviously eyeing into that.
Then other places to expand (or turn into puppets / spheres): Pacific Islands, Philippines and possibly even Africa.
Korea and Taiwan can't be taken over by anyone because both places are way too militarized at the moment.
If US pulls out of Australia then China / Japan will have to woo Australia to their sphere.

Japan is waiting for China's government to collapse, and then the whole country to go back to Romance of the Three Kingdoms style warlords, at which point it will sweep in with its army and start taking over. But it can't take over Taiwan, because Taiwan is too militarized.

Is that right?

Wut?

Post: #78

(01-14-2019 09:26 AM)SamuelBRoberts Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 02:43 AM)Caduceus Wrote:  SamuelBRoberts offering nothing here except throwaway one line contrarian rebuttals, without any backup or reasonable counter arguments.
It's very clear who's the person who doesn't know anything about Japanese culture or religion.

Well, okay, since you asked...

(01-13-2019 03:17 PM)Sherman Wrote:  The world may have been better off if Japan had won the war.

Absolutely not. The Japanese were brutal monsters to the people they colonized. The Rape of Nanking was already pointed out, but there's a giant stack of similar atrocities that took place all across Asia. Here's one. Here's another in Singapore. My personal favorite was a naval general named Kakuta Kakuji, whose last message to command during the battle of Tinian before he died was "老人婦女子を爆薬にて処決せん" ("I'm going to use explosives to deal with the women, children, and old people.")

Quote:A Japanese Empire would have spread Buddhism and peace around the world.

A Japanese Empire most certainly would not have spread Buddhism around the world, for the simple reason that the Japanese Empire was nativist Shinto, not Buddhist. (The official word for it is 国家神道, or "State Shinto".) They didn't even like Buddhism. One of the very first things the modern government did when it came to power was tear down all the buddhist temples.

The government derived its entire legitimacy from the supposedly divine persona of the Emperor, which was the core of State Shinto. The first article of the Japanese constitution reads "大日本帝国ハ万世一系ノ天皇之ヲ統治ス". "The Empire of Japan is ruled by the Emperor, whose lineage is eternal." Abandoning Shinto to spread Buddhistm would've meant undermining the legitimacy of their entire system. It would be like expecting the Saudi royal house to convert to Christianity.

Quote:Buddhism being an Indo-European religion very compatible with European thought.

Buddhism isn't remotely compatible with European thought. That's why there are no Buddhists in Europe. Hell, there are barely any buddhists (In the sense that they actually believe the buddhist worldview, not "go to the local temple for funerals and pray at it once in a while") in Japan.

Quote:During that era, the Japanese philosopher Kitaro Nishida studied German philosophy and integrated it with Zen Buddhism, creating a religous synthesis that the Empire could export to Europe.

'cause if there's one thing that the European masses are crying out for, it's a syncretic fusion of zen buddhism and German philosophy. The Europeans couldn't be persuaded to follow Christianity, which can be explained in something like two paragraphs and has been an integral part of their culture for something like two millennia. The idea that they'd start believing some complicated religion from another side of the planet is silly. It's cool that you can name a guy from a book you read, though.

Quote:A reconstructed Imperial Japan may be the solution to the degeneration of the West.

There will be no reconstructed Imperial Japan. The age of colonialism is over. Even the Japanese far-right isn't calling for a restoration of an expansionistic Japanese Empire. They've put out tons of books justifying the war, with titles like 大東亜戦争肯定論 (A justification for the Great East Asian War) and 大東亜戦争の大義 (The Righteous Cause Behind the Great Asian War), but all of them simply attempt to justify the war from an anti-colonialist perspective, and none of them are calling for a restoration of the Greater East-Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere. (A buddy of mine who's a member of the Japanese far right once said to me, "All you westerners had colonies, how come Japan is the only who gets blamed for trying to have colonies of its own?" Guy honestly had a point. He's in no mood to bring back a Japanese empire either, for what it's worth.)

Japan has been, for 99.9% of its existence, tremendously inward focused. Getting them to even admit there's a world outside of their island chain is sometimes almost impossible. It's one of the least expansionistic countries on the planet. It was only a freakish series of coincidences that lead to it trying to take over Asia and fight the US. Shintaro Ishihara, in his book それでも「NO(ノー)」と言える日本 (The Japan that Can Still Say No) chalks it up to a single line in the Meiji Era constitution which accidentally gave the military far more power than anybody at the time realized. Take that away, or change the outcome of the 2-26 Incident and history might have proceeded very differently.

No Japanese people want to bring back military rule. Nobody wants to invade Korea. Nobody is signed up to go take Philippine oil fields. It's not going to happen.

This whole thread is very silly.

Great post, agreed with everything except...

Quote:"All you westerners had colonies, how come Japan is the only who gets blamed for trying to have colonies of its own?" Guy honestly had a point. He's in no mood to bring back a Japanese empire either, for what it's worth.)

The West gets blamed for colonialism all the time, it was the birthplace of half the grievance industry.

Post: #79

(01-15-2019 06:32 AM)Fortis Wrote:  

(01-13-2019 12:26 PM)SamuelBRoberts Wrote:  

(01-13-2019 12:11 PM)BaatumMania Wrote:  China in their history was always dysfunctional. A big Empire that will last for decades or centuries and then breakup into warlord factions. Japan is obviously eyeing into that.
Then other places to expand (or turn into puppets / spheres): Pacific Islands, Philippines and possibly even Africa.
Korea and Taiwan can't be taken over by anyone because both places are way too militarized at the moment.
If US pulls out of Australia then China / Japan will have to woo Australia to their sphere.

Japan is waiting for China's government to collapse, and then the whole country to go back to Romance of the Three Kingdoms style warlords, at which point it will sweep in with its army and start taking over. But it can't take over Taiwan, because Taiwan is too militarized.

Is that right?

Wut?

Yeah, that's in the realm of goofy speculative fiction. This thread is bringing out the oddballs.

Post: #80

[quote='DarkTriad' pid='1922849' dateline='1547553898']
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[quote]
Buddhism being an Indo-European religion very compatible with European thought.
[/quote]

Buddhism isn't remotely compatible with European thought. That's why there are no Buddhists in Europe. Hell, there are barely any buddhists (In the sense that they actually believe the buddhist worldview, not "go to the local temple for funerals and pray at it once in a while") in Japan.

[quote]

[/quote]


Actually, No. Buddhism is compatible with European thought because it is Indo-European and derives from the same spirit. Both Plato and Pythagoras believed in something like reincarnation. Also, scholars believe that several of the important Greek Philosophers were directly influenced by Buddhism, most notably Heraclitus and Pyrrho, the founded of the school of skepticism.

The goal of skepticism was to achieve "ataraxia", a state of equanimity, well known in Buddhism. Through skepticism you would consider every point of view as being equally possible, and as a result you wouldn't invest your energy in any one point of view, and by this method achieve ataraxia. The goal of skepticism was to achieve a Buddhistic peace of mind. Skepticism became the foundation of western science. A scientists starts out with an open mind and considers all point of view possible, eliminating points of view through experimentation.

Several of the Greek philosophers accompanied Alexander the Great and encountered what they called "gymnosophists", who were either Buddhist or Hindu ascetics. Alexander the Great and his philosophers were impressed by them and their knowledge.

If that isn't enough, the picture we are all familiar with of the Buddha is a Greek model from the Greco-Bactrian kingdom and was sculptured by Greeks. That's right. The image of the Buddha is Greek, not Indian. Indian Buddhists never made icons of the Buddha. They would make representations of his footprint.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Buddhist_art

The Greco-Bactrian kingdoms formed after the death of Alexander the Great converted to Buddhism. Some scholars believe that if Alexander the Great hadn't died young, we would all be Buddhist now instead of Christian.

Post: #81

(01-15-2019 12:47 PM)Sherman Wrote:  If that isn't enough, the picture we are all familiar with of the Buddha is a Greek model from the Greco-Bactrian kingdom and was sculptured by Greeks. That's right. The image of the Buddha is Greek, not Indian. Indian Buddhists never made icons of the Buddha. They would make representations of his footprint.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Buddhist_art

And so I finally learnt something new from this thread.

Touché!

Quote:Sometime between the 2nd century BC and the 1st century AD, the first anthropomorphic representations of the Buddha were developed. These were absent from earlier strata of Buddhist art, which preferred to represent the Buddha with symbols such as the stupa, the Bodhi tree, the empty seat, the wheel, or the footprints. But the innovative anthropomorphic Buddha image immediately reached a very high level of sculptural sophistication, naturally inspired by the sculptural styles of Hellenistic Greece.



Many of the stylistic elements in the representations of the Buddha point to Greek influence: the Greek himation (a light toga-like wavy robe covering both shoulders: Buddhist characters are always represented with a dhoti loincloth before this innovation), the halo, the contrapposto stance of the upright figures, the stylized Mediterranean curly hair and top-knot apparently derived from the style of the Belvedere Apollo (330 BC), and the measured quality of the faces, all rendered with strong artistic realism (See: Greek art). Some of the standing Buddhas (as the one pictured) were sculpted using the specific Greek technique of making the hands and sometimes the feet in marble to increase the realistic effect, and the rest of the body in another material.

Foucher especially considered Hellenistic free-standing Buddhas as "the most beautiful, and probably the most ancient of the Buddhas", assigning them to the 1st century BC, and making them the starting point of the anthropomorphic representations of the Buddha.

Post: #82

To be honest, I've always respected Christianity, but I can't help seeing how it ultimately led to the Marxism of today. Faith and spiritual is crucial, and Christian teaching created a lot of good, but something about its theology just seemed artificial and overwrought, like it unwittingly carried the seeds of socialism and political correctness.

Post: #83

(01-15-2019 04:11 PM)Lunostrelki Wrote:  To be honest, I've always respected Christianity, but I can't help seeing how it ultimately led to the Marxism of today. Faith and spiritual is crucial, and Christian teaching created a lot of good, but something about its theology just seemed artificial and overwrought, like it unwittingly carried the seeds of socialism and political correctness.

It is because most of modern Christianity have this doctrine of "Scripture exegesis according to our times". On the other hand you have Christ words "My kingdom is not of this world". Unfortunately, Church is of this world.
It cannot be undone, in my opinion, since Christanity expanded into the entire notion of Christian civilization, thus annexing European civilization as such. And since modern age became so materially affluent, naturally Christian exegesis shifted to all kinds of social justice positions, like liberation theology etc.

As a juxtaposition you have islam which closed exegesis (closed so called ijtihad gate) already in 10th century and refuses any change.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ijtihad

In the middle of spectrum there is judaism, where everything essentially depends on a given rabbi.

And Buddhism in Europe is just a Lifestyle Buddhism, especially as one of pillars of Buddhism is sangha, community. This Western sangha is all about lifestyle too, not about being a monk as it originally was intended by Buddha and Ananda. And it is really fun that even those few Europeans who became monks, later have often tried to set up their own Buddhist branch.
Deep in their hearts, Europeans are born heretics.

Post: #84

Thanks, the problem of exegesis explains a lot. It's kind of like in the US where liberal judges consider the Constitution to be a "living" document, so they can interpret it to justify whatever crazy thing they want.

Post: #85

Yes, exactly, it goes according to this pattern of "Living Document" etc. I think it is the single biggest negative influence of Protestantism upon Christianity. Prior to Luther the only valid Bible was the Latin (Vulgate) or the Greek (Septuaginta) text, after Luther everyone could make a translation and thus, an exegesis. And so floodgates were opened. Finally, even Catholic Church abandoned the Latin Bible as a canonical text. Some Protestants are already closer to Paganism than Christianity. For example, in the original, Greek Christianity imagination, God was acting in the world through his "energies", but Protestants left all subtleties behind and decided for crude "Rapture", when God shall simply lift his Christians into Heaven toys likewise.
A kind of exception is Orthodox Christianity since they do not allow for valid new translations of Scripture, similarly like Islam does not allow for theologically valid translations of Quran, officially everything must be decided on the basis of the original Arabic text. Translations are just descriptions, summaries etc but not the real Holy Word.

Judaism is a kind of fun here, since it has two Talmuds: Babylonian Talmud and Jerusalem Talmud, the first concerning life in the Diaspora, the second concerning life in Israel. Obviously the Babylonian Talmud is more popular. Jews, like Muslims, do not translate the original text, it stays Hebrew, but, unlike Muslims, and like Christians, allow for unlimited commentary, essentially you get a commentary upon a commentary upon a commentary...

Post: #86

(01-15-2019 04:11 PM)Lunostrelki Wrote:  To be honest, I've always respected Christianity, but I can't help seeing how it ultimately led to the Marxism of today. Faith and spiritual is crucial, and Christian teaching created a lot of good, but something about its theology just seemed artificial and overwrought, like it unwittingly carried the seeds of socialism and political correctness.

Western christianity, being schismatic, lended itself towards this for reasons stated above. It also brought forth the possibilities of atheism, which was something unheard of for all times and all places before the schism and its daughter schisms.

As you rightly recognize, what is now called orthodox christianity is the one, true ("holy, catholic and apostolic" in the words of the creed) church.

Please note that ancient christianity (of the east, since that's where it started) was no stranger at all to divisions. For this reason, it was known and taught by St. Paul at the time that there "must be divisions among you so that those who are genuine may be evident"

In this sense it is always built into the world, so to speak, that people will be in error --- but this does not mean the truth [or the truth path] doesn't exist. On the contrary ... it paradoxically is a proof that it in fact does exist, and much more than that as well. It stands out.

Post: #87

One of the reasons Christianity has never taken a hold in Japan is that to the Japanese the images of Christianity are ugly and violate the principles of Japanese art which values simplicity, tranquility, and nature, like in a tea ceremony or calligraphy. I personally don't think it is healthy to expose boys to pictures of criminals being executed. Contrast peaceful Japan with Latin America where boys are exposed to these violent images. This doesn't teach them anything useful and distorts their minds.

Contrast this with the Greco-Buddhist statute below of Buddha and Hercules. Buddha represents control of the mind and Hercules represents developing strength. What a great image for teaching boys today. Lesson: develop your mind and body. This was the Buddhism created by the soldiers of Alexander the Great.

   

Post: #88

∆Couldn't agree more. Christianity celebrates death. I mean, the image of a corpse on a cross isn't very positive.

Post: #89

It's a brutal image compared to other religions I'll give you that. But there's no celebration of death.
Christianity celebrates victory over death and the promise of afterlife. It's about God giving his only son to die for our sins. The image of Jesus on a cross is supposed to make you sad but also happy.

Post: #90

(01-17-2019 11:06 AM)Sherman Wrote:  One of the reasons Christianity has never taken a hold in Japan is that to the Japanese the images of Christianity are ugly and violate the principles of Japanese art which values simplicity, tranquility, and nature, like in a tea ceremony or calligraphy. I personally don't think it is healthy to expose boys to pictures of criminals being executed. Contrast peaceful Japan with Latin America where boys are exposed to these violent images. This doesn't teach them anything useful and distorts their minds.

That's not even close to correct.

Japanese people routinely go to temples with this sort of art in them, and have for almost as long as the nation's existed.






These are called "Jigoku-ezu", "Scenes from Hell", and you can find them all over the place. As you can see, they're far more gorey than the image of Christ on the cross.
They're scenes depicting the buddhist hell, essentially similar to a picture bible, and intended to warn sinners of the torments that awaited them.

Would you please stop pretending you know the slightest thing about Buddhism, Asia, or anything beyond the few books you've read?