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    The Buddha and the Dream of America
    The Buddha and the Dream of America
    The Buddha and the Dream of America
    Ebook58 pages48 minutes

    The Buddha and the Dream of America

    By James Hilgendorf

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    About this ebook

    The Buddha is coming to America.

    An extraordinary perspective on the real roots of America, from the time of Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Walt Whitman to the present, when Buddhism, and the ideals which it espouses, is paving the way for the founding of a great new spiritual civilization.

    The author writes:

    "There is a revolution coming.

    "And as it reveals itself in the mind of each man and woman, the mountains will fall and shift, chasms will open, the deserts will run with rivers, beautiful blooms will burst from dry dust, suns will sprout in the sky, animals and birds dance, the nuclear force of ten million stars will break forth with light, and the minds of men and women will reflect in every aspect of their lives the halls and mirrors of Eternity."

    From one reviewer:

    "For most Americans, Buddhism conjures exotic images of faraway lands, mysterious statues and monks in colorful robes. But with his excellent new book, James Hilgendorf proves Buddhism also reflects the American experience. Tracing the emergence of Buddhism in America to the 1844 publication of a Henry David Thoreau essay, "The Buddha and The Dream of America" is a great read for all Americans, Buddhist or not. Although clearly rooted in Buddhist philosophy, Hilgendorf's small-press paperback is at least as much a cultural commentary as it is a religious tract. Written from an often deeply personal perspective, Hilgendorf's prose frequently reads more like poetry."

    James Hilgendorf is a 40 year member of the SGI, or Soka Gakkai International, the largest Buddhist lay organization in the world, with 13,000,000 members in 192 countries. He is the author of seven other books: "Life & Death: A Buddhist Perspective"; "The New Superpower"; "The Great New Emerging Civilization"; "A New Myth for America"; "Handbook for Youth in a Muddied Age"; "Poems of Death: Time for Eternity"; and "Forever Here".

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherJames Hilgendorf
    Release dateJul 4, 2011
    ISBN9781929159383
    The Buddha and the Dream of America
    Author

    James Hilgendorf

    James Hilgendorf is the author of nine books - "Life & Death: A Buddhist Perspective", "The Great New Emerging Civilization", "The New Superpower", "The Buddha and the Dream of America", "A New Myth for America", "Poems of Death: Time for Eternity", "Handbook for Youth in a Muddied Age", "Maybe We Need a New Religion", and "Forever Here". He is also the producer of The Tribute Series, a series of highly-acclaimed travel films that are in homes, libraries, and schools all across the United States, several of which have appeared on PBs and international television.

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      Book preview

      The Buddha and the Dream of America - James Hilgendorf

      The Buddha and The Dream of America

      by

      James Hilgendorf

      *****

      Published by

      James Hilgendorf at Smashwords

      The Buddha and The Dream of America

      Copyright 2011 James Hilgendorf

      This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

      *****

      The Buddha and The Dream of America

      *****

      Chapter One

      America's Roots

      The roots of America go back farther and deeper than anyone has heretofore imagined.

      Many modern-day Americans argue that the foundation of this country was laid in bedrock by our Christian forefathers. Yet many of our founding fathers, such as Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine and others, argued strongly for the separation of church and state; and, although subscribing to basic moral principles, denied the divinity of Jesus, and even held the doctrines of organized Christianity in disdain.

      Others see the true progenitors of our race in our native Indians, whose trail stretches back twelve or thirteen thousand years, when they crossed over to present day Alaska from Siberia, and slowly moved down an opening in glaciers to reach present day America.

      The vision of the Indians differed profoundly from our Pilgrim founders.

      They loved the land, they loved this world. They saw themselves reflected in the animals and trees and the sun and moon and stars, and the fish and bison and the wind that blew over the prairies, and the rain and waters that fell from the skies and moved down roaring rivers from the mountains.

      Their world was all of one piece.

      The pilgrims fractured the world into opposites, straight-jacketed people into good and evil, saw this lovely land as only a temporary abode, a place of temptation, and looked forward to and longed for another home beyond this veil of tears, where their real life would finally begin.

      Our Founding Fathers, in 1776, collaborated on one of the great documents of all time:

      We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

      This was the high vision penned by our Founders.

      Yet one of the most respected of our Christian forefathers, no less a man than Thomas Jefferson, fathered children with one of his slaves, Sally Hemings, and personally held hundreds of slaves in his possession.

      He put forth high ideals, lofty passions, and yet in 1814 he wrote:

      ...the amalgamation of whites with blacks produces a degradation to which no lover of his country, no lover of excellence in the human character, can innocently consent.

      All of this too was the foundation of our country.

      But all has not been said even then about the founding of America.

      There are records of men and women on this continent even predating the Siberian exodus of the Indians. Another race was here before them, and DNA evidence has shown indications that the source of these people could even perhaps have been from present day areas of France - at a time when humanity's ancestors were composing utterly remarkable artistic paintings on the sides and ceilings of subterranean caves in places like Lascaux 17,000 or so years ago.

      What did these people believe? How did they view this universe? Did they look out upon the stars and wonder at their connection to the infinite?

      Even then the truth about our founding past has not been uncovered.

      Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Walt Whitman - these were the writers and bards who laid the foundations of the

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