Buddhist Romanticism

with the rest of society. One’s behavior toward all naturally becomes loving
and compassionate.
18) In fact, when one has a genuine appreciation for the infinite organic
unity of the universe, one sees how that unity transcends all ideas of right
and wrong. The infinitude of the universe has more than enough room
to embrace and encompass both right and wrong behavior, and more
than enough power to heal all wounds. Therefore the duties implied
by ideas of right and wrong behavior have no legitimate place in
religious life.
19) Although all religious expressions are valid, some are more evolved
than others. Thus religion must be viewed under the framework of
historicism, to understand where a particular teaching falls in the organic
development of humanity and the universe as a whole. Regardless of what
a particular religion says about its teachings, those teachings are to be
judged by one’s understanding of the place of that religion in the
general evolution of human spiritual activity.
20) Religious change is not only a fact. It is also a duty. Religions are
organic, like everything else in the universe, and so people must
continue to modify their religious traditions in order to keep them
alive. This drive and duty to change—to become—is something to be
celebrated and extolled.
So we have twenty points to apply in identifying the Romantic influence
on modern Western Buddhism. Schlegel’s concept of irony appears in the
list, as one possible interpretation of Points 15–17, but there is a larger,
unintended irony underlying the list as a whole, to which we have already
alluded. Although Points 16–18 insist that no one person’s religious beliefs
about human identity and duties in the universe have any authority over
anyone else’s beliefs, all twenty points derive their authority from the belief
system expressed in the first three. In other words, you are free to believe or
disbelieve what you want, but not free to disbelieve the first three points.
There is also an underlying inconsistency in that Points 17 and 18 deny
any specific duties of right and wrong in the religious life, whereas Points 3
and 20 insist on the duty to trust one’s inner drives and to further the
organic development of the universe as a whole. This inconsistency is
further aggravated by the Romantics’ own conflicting ideas of what duty
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