The Lotus and the Cross: Jesus Talks with Buddha [Hardcover]

There are deep meanings found in the dialogue, and this book will present the Gospel of Jesus Christ to Buddhists and other interested parties, but I found it slightly amusing that both Jesus and Buddha sounded a lot like Ravi Zacharias. Somehow I cannot imagine Jesus actually talking like a Christian apologetic, "Which means the absolute you posit becomes only relatively true. If it's only relatively true, it can no longer be stated as an absolute.", as He spoke in parables in the Bible to illustrate the same principles. I would recommend instead reading a Bible and looking at the words in red. :-) I would also recommend listening to Dr. Zacharias' radio program www.rzim.org if you want to learn more about different world views between Christianity and other religions and our postmodern culture. Dr. Zacharis also has an excellent book on this subject "Jesus Among Other Gods". Dr. Zacharias does offer an unique point of view having been raised in the East among Hindus (although he himself was never a Hindu), and then immigrating to the West and traveling around the world. In addition, he is well educated on philosophy, comparative religion and cultures and is living an interesting life.

I used to follow Zen before I made a committment to follow Christ. One thing which suprised me was that I met Christians who knew more about Zen than I did.

The point being this. Sometimes you can see things more clearly from the outside than from the inside. When I was involved in Zen I was so focused on those things which were true I was unable to see all that which was false.

There are serious deficiences with Buddhism. It does no good pretending that they are not there. There are some very real differences between what Christ taught and what Buddha taught.

Blindness is characterized by an inability to make distinctions. Distinctions are imporant whether we are trying to understand different concepts or different religions. Teachings about what is right and what is wrong, why people suffer and how one is to please God (if that is their goal) or be saved make a real difference in how people live their lives. Lets be adult enough to admit that different beliefs amount to real differences in how we live and relate to others.

Some, because they cannot see important distinctions, think that there are none. Don't be led by those who are blind.

Read the book for yourself.

"The Buddhist must reach his ultimate goal entirely on his own strength..."

as _his_ words, but they are not. That sentence was a misconception to which he was addressing, which is why 2 sentences later he writes "The idea that we can achieve enlightenment on our own is foreign to Buddhism." He was not being contridictory, he was addressing, refuting, a misconception.

His review is dead-on. The book is good as far as it goes, but it should be realized that it presents one school/sect of Buddhism and of Christianity and thus while some good can still be had from such a book, it also must be kept in mind that it is a large oversimplification.