The Body is Theravada Buddhist Monasticism

I had many things to say about this piece, although short, it was dense. Perhaps my thoughts are ill conceived due to the way the text was written. There were a few parts that I did not fully understand. The thought to really get my mind going was that after all this talk of banning sexual desire, both conscious and unconcious, when it comes to other desires (like food) there are exceptions. It is said that Buddha was very lavish in his young life and after seeing 'the other half' he lived a life empty of all valuables. He then realized the road to englightenment is a middle path of moderation. Why is there no sexual middle path? There is a description of moderation in food and aesthetichs but why not desire? Is it that we are unable to handle sex in moderation? Is it the parental or elder thoughts, as my youth adivsior would say, "dating leads to mating". I found this incredibly interesting. To ban sex even in dreams holds this desire so highly not even with the chance of moderation. Which brings the question, how is reproduction seen? Is it work?

A few other things I would like to touch on are the two body's, repulsion of the body, and repulsion of food. The two body's are truth and form. From reading it seems as though the truth is what we do with our bodies, ritually etc and the form is our aesthetic, the holder. If this is correct then the body of truth is the body we have to control. In a literal sense of wordplay, the control of truth and lack of control of form is intriguing.

The text also mentioned the repulsion of food. I honestly felt incredibly nauseous reading and could barely stomach my lunch. IN correlation to food, fat is seen as gross. This is much like our culture in the west. But what do they think of our perception of Buddha as an obese male?

Lastly, the body is gross. We have discussed this very thoroughly in class but in Buddhism this is the focus to emit desire via meditation. In the intense descriptions it is seen that the most desirable parts are incredibly disgusting. Genitals are extremely repulsive in aesthetics and action. While the mouth, also sexually desirable, is gross. It is aesthetically wet and not pleasing and given what we now know is full of germs and many other things. How is this what we desire?

Two thoughts:
If white is pure why are there robes not white? You would assume they would be to symbolize their purity and be able to show impurities so drastically.
Would Buddhist be 'for' artificial insemination?

Thus Spoke Zarathustra

This set of reading presented Zoroastrianism
Overall it seems to be a religion based off the duality and struggle of Order and Chaos, good and evil respectively.
A supporter of the order thinks good thoughts, speaks good speech, and does good deeds while a chaos supporter thinks bad thoughts, speaks bad speech, and does bad deeds.
At death a form of the soul leaves the body to be judged, if the good outweighs the bad the soul continues to heaven if not, to hell. However, at the end of the world all are cleansed and everyone lives in paradise. Perhaps this is because the end of the world is complete chaos that no one can be judged?

I had some trouble focusing on this piece because of the Nietzsche connection to Zarathustra. My mind constantly went back to my previous reading of Thus Spoke Zarathustra and it shed some new light.
In Thus Spoke, Nietzsche presents his nihilistic death of god theory in the form of Zarathustra, the original fighter between good and evil. Zarathustra is almost disgusted by the mediocrity of humanity as depicted with nausea, especially the recurring existence which is also seen in the reading for this class. In short, through Zarathustra Nietzsche says god cannot serve as our morality and until we accept this and lose all faith we will be animalistic in nature. Those who reject faith are called 'the overman' or 'ubermensch' meaning one who finds all meaning in themselves.

What I struggled with in the reading was the hypocritical discussion on success. Those with many cows were seen as blessed or favored by the gods but at the same time possessed by The Lie. In the strife for what seems to be socialism is there no advancement?

The Four Views of the Body

In modern social theory there are four views of the body:
The body is an effect of deeper structural arrangements of power and knowledge
The body is a symbolic system which produces a set of metaphors by which power is conceptualized
The body can only be understood as a consequence of long term historical changes in human society
Analyze the body in context of the lived experience of every day life


These four theoretical views of the body are taken from the book Religion and the Body.
The first three are a historical cognitive view of the body while the last is a constant change with no record of the past.

Socially the body is effected by its surroundings. Our bodies are a way of expressing ourselves, how we dress, how we apply our makeup all are in an effort for how we want the world to perceive us. How we change on the outside changes with society and what is considered respectable and beautiful. Regardless of how we want to be viewed we all strive to be controlled. Even the most 'out of control' people retain a sense of control in their appearance. From the preppy scholar without a crease in their attire to a punk whose Mohawk retains perfect form. "Any loss of control over our bodies is socially embarassing, implying a loss of control over ourselves" says Bryan S. Turner. This can go beyond our outer appearance to our actions. The way we sit, eat, and walk defines ourselves. Tripping is seen as embarrassing because of our loss of composure and therefore ourselves.

As much as the body is effected by society, in western civilization society markets off the body. We live in a world of capitalized self-obsession. In a society of consumers, you cannot do anything without viewing an advertisement that promotes some form of self improvement. We are targets of drugs and plans to help achieve weight loss, have plump lips, long hair, and most recently luscious lashes. All in an effort to not only be perceived as more controlled to the world but more attractive the opposite sex (or whoever you desire the attraction of). As sexual promiscuity rises in our country so does our obsession with our looks. The text explores this connection and the changes inspired by more contraception and the sexual revolution.

Overall. The self is a project which is to be made, constructed, and endlessly refashioned through the life-cycle.

Introduction

This blog is not for educational purposes only. It is a discussion. A discussion between myself, my readings, possibly my professor, and hopefully the reader.

First here is the background of Religion 320: Fascination Disgust and The Body
In this course our main goal is an effort to define disgust as fascination, fear, danger, emotion or feeling through readings and discussions. I am taking this discussion out of the classroom and onto the web to bring in the world and different cultures for insight. Our primary reading material is Millers' Anatomy of Disgust and Mary Douglas' Purity and Danger, we have already covered a lengthy amount of material but I will go back and explain my thoughts further. Along with these two texts there is a large amount of supplementary material most of which concerns religious practices and rituals, many I was unfamiliar with until now.

For the course we have to do a final project. This blog is going to be a supplement to my project, a lengthy report and analysis of Martha Nussbaums' Hiding from Humanity.

I hope you (the reader) can take something from my thoughts, readings, theories and ideas and will take the initiative to contribute.