Religious marketing.
 

On the one hand - Happy fat guy.

On the other - Dead Jew onna stick.

Why aren't we all Buddhists?

This is Disney Corp vs. Cut-me-hand-off Dhabala. It ought to be a forgone conclusion.

Please don't say that it's because one (either one) is true and the other is just demons/maya. So far as I can tell they're both wrong. For the record, I am a semantic pantheist with psycological deistic leanings and an individualist spirituality. Only sin in my world is denying your responsibility for your share of the godhead.

Just needed to get that out. See the "I had a rethuglican in my house..." thread over in Tilted Politics for why.

perhaps, just perhaps...some people are there for reasons deeper than the initial marketing appeal. ;)

(This is overly simplified reason)

Fear of the consequences. Christianity teaches that if you are not a Christian you go to hell (big bad place of no escape) but with Buddhism it says you get to come back again and again until you get it right.

Which one would you chose. if Christianity is right, and you are not Christian you pay for it until the end of time. if it was the other way around you get to come back until you get your life perfect.

chavos.
Yes, I know. There are some people who aren't hooked by marketing. They are a minority. A dreadfully elitist viewpoint but I am dreadfully elitist.

Personally, If this "God" of the christians is so petty as to condemn me to unending pain simply because I dont know his name, I really dont want to have anything to do with him anyway.
As for the"jew on a stick", seemed like a pretty cool guy.....maybe he DID get it right and that is why he hasn't come back.

Oh, don't get me wrong. I think Jesus may have been onto something, but after Paul hijacked Christianity, it's almost impossible to tell.

Indeed, Jesus was way cool, but if he was God, it was only in the sense that you and I are also God.

Some people feel that, in order to do justice to the evil in the world, it is necessary for a religion to have a God that shows some concern about it, rather than merely teaching that it's all illusion. Christianity teaches that God cared enough about pain and suffering in the world to come down and do something about it himself, and teaches that Christians also need to work to alleviate suffering in the world. I don't mean to deny that Christians are often very bad at this, but they are often also very good. For every Torquemada, there's also a Martin Luther King Jr.

"Step right up! I got fresh salvation right here! Get your steaming hot fresh salvation!"
I'm happy to be part of a religion that doesn't proselytise. Your soul is your own business, as far as I'm concerned, and it's not up to somebody else to decide what you do with it.

For the record, I've always been curious about the whole "Jesus-died-for-our-sins" bit. What exactly do you have to fear from pain and death if you're the Son of God?

OK, I was in a confrontational state of mind last night. Let me try to restate this with more emphasis on my point and less attempted cleverness.

Of all the main religious symbols, I picked the two that seem most opposed, the Buddha at meditation on the one hand, and Christ on the Cross on the other.

Let's start with the most similar thing about them: They're both men. Human and male. That they are both humans show that the religions are largely concerned with humanity. That they are both male I am mostly inclined to discount as indicative of the cultures in which they originated, where to be male and to be fully human meant pretty much the same thing.

The Buddha is at meditation. He is denying self, and thus connecting with the whole of the world. Christ is dying, his self is being denied him, and thus he is transcending the world.

Buddha is serene. Christ is in agony.

Now, there are much deeper levels to both of these, but most of humanity doesn't look any deeper than that.

So here's what really busts my nuggets:

The dying, pained, emaciated fellow, is being tortured for basically saying that folks ought to be nice to one another. The religion is ostensibly about love of all. (Another argument is how much this tortured symbol played into the obvious thirst for flame, blood, and pain in Christian history, but it is just that: another argument.)

The peacful, smiling, portly fellow is happy because he's figured out that none of this is real. It's a religion of detachment from all things. (This is a pretty highbrow concept, which probably explains why the most popular forms of Buddhism are those least like what Buddha preached. Again, not really part of this.)

So on the one hand, a religion of love that has a symbol of anguish, and on the other a religion of denial that has a symbol of joy.

One wonders why there are any Christians at all, or why they didn't come up with some other symbol. Check that, they did. Most popular cult in Catholicism is the cult of Mary. We all love mom (or, to be fair, wish we could).

Well, that petered out to not much. I hope it makes my earlier statement a little clearer, but I figure it doesn't. C'est la vie.

People are afraid. People like to be led by the hand and told if they follow these simple rules, then they will be safe. Buddhism places much more responsibility on the self, and to many may not be the fast road to 'salvation'.

It would require a pardigm shift in thinking for this to change, though I'm not sure how that change is going to occur in this society of dominators where fear is bred into the population's hearts.

christians are christians because they saw that the portley buddah fellow ate his dead jew on a stick and it tasted good. so now they're just trying to get some of the delicious desert that is buddy J.

really though, i think most people that are christian have never really put much thought into why they are xtian and why they believe what they do. most people are born and tought one thing from birth, and that's their religion. some end up questioning it, others don't. those that do often come back to jesus because they're comfortable with it. they've managed to think things through and explore other options, and in the end, what they know is comfortable and they choose that path.

also, once you get past the surface, buddism is hard, compartively at least, and most people don't want "hard" in their religion. give 'em god and heaven and wrap it to go.

Do you really think that it's just Christianity that's this way? It's true for all religions. There are plenty of Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, et al, who are members of their religion just because they were born into it, and I'd be surprised if the proportions were any different than that within the Christian faith. Moreover, there are plenty of people who are in religion just because they weren't born into it. Think of pagans who are just pagans to piss off their parents/society. Being born into a religion isn't the only bad reason to believe in it.

And if you think Christianity isn't hard, if you think it's just a matter of following simple rules, you need to study the faith again. There are plenty of religions that are just a matter of following rules -- in fact, insofar as I understand it, Buddhism happens to be one of them. Christianity is about being faithful to a savior, and no one has ever come up with a set of simple rules for doing that. Or can you explain why Paul is so adamant that Christianity is not about following the Law?

my gods' bigger than yor god

But mine is smarter, faster, and looks better in a tux.

Following rules is one thing but being spoon fed how to live and what to believe with no room for your own thoughts is another. At least Buddhism can afford you a little bit there.

Eveerybody does nearly everything for an emotional reason. That's why marketing works so well.

The christian religions really hit emotions hard, along with the fear angle. Then they tie in enough morality that is basically good stuff and you have the perfect marketing vehicle. Fear, goodness and emotion.

Re: Religious marketing.
 

Just to clarify some misconceptions, Buddha was a hermit for years and was hungry as hell the whole time so he lost a shit load of weights, therefore he is supposed to be skinny, as a matter of fact I've read somewhere that he is so skinny that one can gently press one's finger against his belly and feel his spine (sick!!). I dont think he'd be very happy given the situation. Yes, this time blame the chinese for the wrong immage of the great "enlightened one"

well..what i wanted to say has pretty much been said by others already so i'll stop here.

True enough, Buddha got conflated with Hong Tay, the Chinese luck God, who really is a happy fat guy, and a lot of Buddhas took that appearance thereafter. I have seen an emaciated buddha statue, where one can clearly see every bone, and you know what? He's smiling that little smile he always smiles. I could have pointed this out, but 1) The first post was about being clever and shocking, 2) The Second post was about clarifying the first, and 3) They're both about marketing, where complete information is less than desirable most of the time.