This video is a commercial that came out a few years ago for Mountain Dew. It begins with a guy who was traveling and sees a Buddhist Temple up in the mountains. He walks up the trail and encounters several Shaolin Buddhists training their ‘hand-slapping techniques’. He then joins them to improve his skills. After months/maybe years of enduring tiresome and painful training, he reaches a point where is given the ‘ok/nod’ from the sensei. He then opens a can of Mountain Dew to reward himself after all his hard work until his instructor comes into the scene. The ‘American’ places the open mountain dew in on top of palm and faces his sensei. The sensei goes to grab it but is hand slapped before he can touch the can. The American believing that he ‘out slapped’ his sensei soon notices that his instructor drank the mountain dew so fast that he realized at first.
The first stereotype I noticed was that every one of the Buddhists were ‘training’ to hand slap all night and day as if it was their only priority to reach enlighment. Another thing I noticed about this video was the fact that there was a teacher/sensei teaching everyone to practice their hand slapping abilities. When I going over what Warner said in his book Zen wrapped in Karma Dipped in Chocolate, he mentioned that ‘sensei’ doesn’t necessarily mean teacher or master and can be said to anyone who is respected or well known. He says we ( Westerners) have, “this idea seemed to suggest that the teacher was supposed to be an example of a Christ like spiritual creature…spiritual superman”. I was unaware of this before it really made me realize how ignorant I was about the meaning of the word itself. Plus he also says that “…Zen practice and philosophy provide the only truly rational and realistic way to live a balanced and happy life”. Which reminds me about a point I made before, I don’t think any kind of Buddhist would ‘train’ (physical martial arts) hoping they will reach enlighment through such acts.
After reading your post, I think that you are right in saying that Buddhists don't necessarily focus on physical martial arts in the hopes of achieving enlightenment. I think that this is one of the predominant stereotypes that Westerner's tend to have of Buddhist practioners, as being focused on martial arts. This is a misconception, as you pointed out. I think it is interesting that you said a certain amount of time has passed before he gets approval from his 'sensei', since I think that enlightenment is more of a personal thing, and although you can have a teacher, enlightenment will be internal.
ReplyDeleteI think outside cultures see the physical and mental training Buddhists undergo and equate it to martial arts which is the closest that the average American gets to the same level of discipline. And going off of the point that Yasmin made, this also suggests that with a teacher there is an exact set path to follow. It also doesn't realize that Buddhism is more of a mental path than a physical one.
ReplyDeleteI remember that commercial and think you're right with all the points you're making. I think we as american's see any cultures rituals and tend to over exaggerate them, especially when they're extremely different then ours. So for us to over exaggerate the hand slapping in the commercial proves that point. We also tend to see things very surfacily when we observe something extremely different then us which is why we tend to pick fun at it.
ReplyDelete