How Does a Buddhist Monk Face Death?
An e-mail interview in the New York Times between George Yancy and Geshe Dadul Namgyal, a Tibetan Buddhist monk
George Yancy: I was about 20 years old when I first became intrigued by Eastern thought, especially Buddhism. It was the transformation of Siddhartha Gautama to the Buddha that fascinated me, especially the sense of calmness when faced with competing desires and fears. For so many, death is one of those fears. Can you say why, from a Buddhist perspective, we humans fear death?
Dadul Namgyal: We fear death because we love life, but a little too much, and often look at just the preferred side of it. That is, we cling to a fantasized life, seeing it with colors brighter than it has. Particularly, we insist on seeing life in its incomplete form without death, its inalienable flip side. It’s not that we think death will not come someday, but that it will not happen today, tomorrow, next month, next year, and so on. This biased, selective and incomplete image of life gradually builds in us a strong wish, hope, or even belief in a life with no death associated with it, at least in the foreseeable future. However, reality contradicts this belief. So it is natural for us, as long as we succumb to those inner fragilities, to have this fear of death, to not want to think of it or see it as something that will rip life apart.
Again, how is this not just another "general description intellectual/spiritual contraption"? One in which the relationship between life and death is broadly explored only as a factor embedded in the "human condition" as a whole.
In fact, each of us as individuals may well have very different reactions to these words insofar as they seem applicable to our own lives. After all, what does it mean to speak of loving life, "a little too much"? Of looking at "just the preferred side of it"? Of "cling[ing] to a fantasized life, seeing it with colors brighter than it has"?
Will it mean the same thing to you as it does to me?
Instead, each of us as individuals are ensconced in a particular set of circumstances, with more or less to lose in tumbling over into the abyss. And with a greater or lesser capacity to convince ourselves that immortality and salvation await us on the other side.
Sure, if a particular Buddhist is able to think herself into confronting death from a more serene perspective, only a fool would just shrug that off. But, from my frame of mind, they are able to do this only to the extent that "in their head" they have accepted certain assumptions about the existence of karma, enlightenment, reincarnation and Nirvana.
And, in my view, it is not unreasonable for those who are not Buddhists to ask those who are to demonstrate why these things are believable
beyond just being thoughts and feeling in their head. Again, with so much at stake.
We fear death also because we are attached to our comforts of wealth, family, friends, power, and other worldly pleasures. We see death as something that would separate us from the objects to which we cling. In addition, we fear death because of our uncertainty about what follows it. A sense of being not in control, but at the mercy of circumstance, contributes to the fear.
Exactly. So, obviously, to the extent that one is able to think oneself [or are indoctrinated] into embracing one or another religious antidote, how could they/would they not have come to embody a greater sense of comfort and consolation than those who cannot?
It is important to note that fear of death is not the same as knowledge or awareness of death.
That's not the point. The point is how each of us as individuals come to make that distinction given an intertwining of their circumstances and their philosophy of life.
And then the extent to which this is derived more or less from dasein than from an attempt to actually "think it through" to the most rational point of view.
Assuming of course that human autonomy here is an actual factor.
