
What Kind of Buddhist was Steve Jobs? - shahocean
http://blogs.plos.org/neurotribes/2011/10/28/what-kind-of-buddhist-was-steve-jobs-really/
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virtualwhys
I'm pretty shocked that Jobs sat at Tassajara, that place is no joke, retreats
are 3 months long, and the initiate phase for new comers, 5 days of sitting
without moving (short of bathroom breaks) is pretty insane.

That must have been pre-Apple explosion, back when he was involved there
likely wouldn't have even been a phone line, much less electricity. Tassajara
is way out in the mountains of Carmel valley, literally a few miles from the
closest humans.

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coldtea
The Californian kind of Buddhist.

That is: "I heard about this oriental religion in the sixties and I'll adopt
it because it is currently perceived as cooler than my own. I won't follow
much of what it preaches, nor study it with any seriousness of course, but
it's nice to have a cool pseudo-spiritual thing to lean to while living a
hardly spiritual life in a hardly spiritual environment".

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jmckib
From the article (which I'm doubting you read):

> Isaacson does a fine job of showing how Jobs’ engagement with Buddhism was
> more than just a lotus-scented footnote to a brilliant Silicon Valley
> career. As a young seeker in the ’70s, Jobs didn’t just dabble in Zen,
> appropriating its elliptical aesthetic as a kind of exotic cologne. He turns
> out to have been a serious, diligent practitioner who undertook lengthy
> meditation retreats at Tassajara — the first Zen monastery in America,
> located at the end of a twisting dirt road in the mountains above Carmel —
> spending weeks on end “facing the wall,” as Zen students say, to observe the
> activity of his own mind.

~~~
coldtea
I've actually read both the article and Isaacson's biography.

I don't find "Zen monasteries in America" anything but a novelty, much less
those "lengthy meditation retreats".

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pavelrub
You could have also said the same thing about "Buddhist monasteries in China"
when they first appeared there 2000+ years ago, or about the "Buddhist
monasteries in Tibet" when that happened. Same with Japan and even Sri Lanka.

Buddhism owes its continued existence to the fact that similar opinions were
never taken too seriously.

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matt__rose
Fascinating insight into a bit of Jobs life that is mostly overlooked, except
as a "He used to be a hippy" anecdote. Steve Silberman does a good job of
teasing out the bits and assembling a better vision of Jobs's belief system,
and how it informed his work at Apple and NeXT

~~~
mandeepj
> Steve Silberman does a good job of teasing out the bits and assembling a
> better vision of Jobs's belief system

Could you please post the link ?

~~~
wpietri
Steve Silberman is the author of this article.

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irtefa
Can someone please explain to me this part "The spectators were aghast until
they looked up at Kobun, who gleefully shouted, “Bullseye!”? I have a hard
time understanding why Kobun did what he did.

~~~
purpletoned
Zen philosophy stresses on going with the flow and accepting things as they
are. You could argue that Kobun did hit a target even if it wasn't the one the
audience (or himself for that matter) anticipated.

~~~
Zelphyr
I tend to agree though a part of me also wonders if it wasn't also a little
mischievous humor on his part. :)

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subdane
Jobs pursued spirituality with the same zest as he pursued art and technology.
He was neither a great artist nor a great engineer. Or was he? In the same
way, he was not a great buddhist.

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DrFunke
...A Buddhist of convenience?

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kstop
A shitty one.

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4ccc0f9200a7a
Buddhism stresses compassion and identifies desire and the ego as the causes
of suffering. Steve Jobs was, you could say, "interpersonally abrasive" and
made a fortune by encouraging people to want devices built using slave labor
from raw materials whose extraction harms people living nearby. You need a new
one every year, too.

In that sense, Steve Jobs was about as Buddhist as the "prosperity gospel"
people are Christian.

Richard Stallman was correct that the death of Steve Jobs was a good thing.

~~~
Homunculiheaded
I was interested in Buddhism for awhile, and even spent a fair bit of time
reading through translated segments of the Pali Cannon.

I've seen a critique of Job's "Buddhism" discussed quite a bit, but it's
important to consider that the soteriology of Buddhism and Christianity is
radically different.

A major difference is the time scale and way with which salvation occurs.
Christianity focuses on the realization that Christ is the savior, and
appropriate adjustment in behavior in a single life time. Buddhism on the
other hand is a progress in realizing the dharma over many lifetimes of
effort.

Paul's conversion happens instantly on the road to Damascus, his change in
action is immediate. The salvation of a bodhisattva occurs over the progress
of many lifetimes effort, each new lifetime being shaped by the actions and
desires of the old.

The point being that the binary saved/damned dichotomy used for judgement in
Christian theology (ie X is a bad Christian) doesn't make any sense in a
Buddhist context. A "bad buddhist" makes no sense as each person is simply
working out the consequences of past actions during each successive lifetime
until the dharma is finally realized. (edit: just a note that this 'progress'
itself is a massive over simplification itself)

~~~
4ccc0f9200a7a
Except that Zen is the school of "sudden enlightenment." Suzuki:
"Enlightenment is not some good feeling or some particular state of mind. The
state of mind that exists when you sit in the right posture is, itself,
enlightenment."

It's hard to see how being a capitalist overlord is compatible with any
reasonable definition of "right livelihood," which is part of the Eightfold
Path.

Zen is criticized by other Buddhists for its lack of emphasis on ethics. It's
hard to see how being a samurai is compatible with "right action," either.

I don't think the question of who is or isn't "really" Buddhist is very
interesting. I just think it's annoying to act like Steve Jobs is a good
example of anything spiritual because he made pretty things at great cost to
other people's lives, the planet, human decency, etc.

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andyl
Silicon Valley people - interested in learning more?

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kannon_Do_Zen_Meditation_Center](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kannon_Do_Zen_Meditation_Center)

KD has newbie instruction every Weds eve, and a sitting group every weekday at
noon handy for people working nearby.

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PeterWhittaker
tl;dr? Read the article.

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PeterWhittaker
Huh. I guess the ironic humour of that one was lost on a few people.

