Xin Ling Fa Men 心灵法门 - New "Buddhism"?

Question

I've seen Master Lu live, i noticed this but not all agreed and their services are everywhere in the town

So, i visited few temples and many of their members to understand more about this and the culture.

Some feedbacks as below from the Temple lead and senior members (including high wisdom and high compassion Doctor). They knew exactly what are they doing (can and cannot).

1. There are many critical illness been cured including Doctor himself

2. There are too many free thinkers here and difficult to access or understand Buddhism. This concept can be easily accepted and easily spread Buddhism. To get a good and genuine Monastery/Temple in town is really difficult Limited of Buddhism Sharing.

3. Doc asked me, If you are diagnosed with critical illness then do you still have time to practice Four Noble Truths ?

Q) Can this teaching accepted as something "like" prescribed pain killer/drugs in Medical practices. One must told what Buddhism allowed and disallowed then should practice the right path upon almost recovery? One should not addicted with this prescribed drugs ?

Answer 1

There are a lot of people like this 'Master Lu' in the world, in every faith and religion, with small groups of followers or large. Most are honest, many are indifferent, some are charlatans, a few are deluded, a very few are dangerous... Just on the face of it, it feels as though the Xin Lin Fa Men Institute is importing some of the operating principles of the Christian, faith-healing, revivalist mindset into Buddhism. Personally I find it a bit distasteful, but it isn't something I'd be likely to condemn outright without more information.

However, I will point out that (like most groups of this sort) the teachings of the Xin Lin Fa Men Institute — as far as I can tell from a quick look — leverage excited mental states as a tactic to acquire followers. If we look at what you presented in your question:

• The promise to cure illness and disease
• The assertion that knowledge should be hidden from people not ready for it
• The 'hurry, hurry' mentality that sick people do not have time to study the Four Noble Truths

We see a group (or a person) who wants people to accept its teachings prima facie, and with a fair degree of desperate obedience. This is antithetical to the typical Buddhist path, which aims at calm, clear, experiential understanding. What Master Lu is offering may in fact be 'new' — I'd have to dig in and see what substance lies behind the smoke — but it is clearly not a new Buddhism. It is something else entirely, and should be evaluated on its own merits.

It's extremely difficult for a novice to distinguish between wisdom and folly. What we must always do in such cases is take our eyes away from the main group and its leader (who will always be energetically and inspirationally driving themselves forward), and look in the wake. Are there people by the wayside of the group who feel cheated, hurt, abused; who are angry or frightened or desperate? Does the group have a trailing of people with the gleam of fanaticism in their eyes, or the dull, moist eyes of unthinking obedience? If we look in the wake, we see the karmic essence of the group. A group that leaves a trail of suffering behind it is not heading anyplace we (as Buddhists) want to go.

I do not wish to be involved with the Xin Lin Fa Men Institute. I credit it (for the moment) as being mostly harmless, but it has nothing useful to teach me. Obviously they will be heartbroken... I will neither recommend nor discourage you from engaging them. But if you engage them, use it as a platform to understand. See the web they weave and the karmic threads they use for bindings. Draw out their essential truth, no matter how many layers of falsehood you must dredge through. See them for what they are (whatever that might be) and that 'seeing' will enlighten you.