也不知道作者的background,不过看了你的介绍,知道他做过多年的monk,这样讲也还是蛮有意思的。
从你quote的他的一段话中,我感觉到他对institutionalized buddhism有诸多诟病,这些指责我完全同意;只是。。。事情不是那么简单的:people with the same faith sought to band together for reasons that go far beyond what is obvious. 首先,whatever spiritual practice you do, it's much much more powerful if you practice together with other people, the more people there are, the more powerful it becomes. 这个只有亲身体验过才会有体会。不知道这是不是所有的religions都要宣教,尽可能多的recruit members的背后的深层原因。
我记得你以前写过一个 the celestine prophecy的读书笔记。我是二十几年前读的,都忘得差不多了;但是你记得他讲的有关reaching a critical mass? 这讲的就是人数问题,他好像说玛雅人就是reached a critical mass and have risen to such vibrational heights that they were actually raptured into an invisible spiritual state, 就是说突然从这个我们可以看到的物质世界消失了?
越说越远了,不说了:)