• Filial Piety: Filial piety plays a central role in Buddhism and Confucianism, which acknowledge the respect and devotion of a person for his/her parents and teachers. It is regarded as a primary merit to promote world peace.
• Education: In Buddhism and Confucianism, it refers to the realization of the meaning and the value of human life. Confucian teaches speech, virtue and skills for living and arts. Confucian and Buddhist virtue teaches morality and proper conduct.
• Peace: Buddhism advocates unconditional compassion that surpasses space and time for all living beings, stating that the universe is an entity. Confucianism is similar in that it teaches filial piety which is a foundation of the world peace.

Buddhist Practice and Confucian Practice

• Human beings are superior to animals by advocating human relationships and moral principles. Confucianism teaches sincere and proper thoughts, correct conduct and a well-organized society. Buddhist enlightenment is identical to this.
• The basic Confucian moral principles include loyalty, compassion, love, filial piety, trust-worthiness, peace, equality and responsibility. There are equally important in Buddhist belief.
• Buddhist karma teaches the cause and effect of one’s deeds. It is similar to Confucianism in that the latter suggests that one’s happiness is based on one’s good deeds.

Among all the insightful teachings of the Buddha, discipline, meditation and wisdom are three major aspects.

• Discipline through following the Five precepts, is the way to achieve meditation. The ability of self-discipline takes time and energy to practice. However, a person with insight to the importance of it will definitely endeavor to be disciplined.
• Deep meditation is the critical process toward gain wisdom and insight. Discipline helps a person concentrated on objects.
• Wisdom will be attained naturally once one has the ability of self-discipline and deep meditation.

What Are the Four Current Types of Buddhism?

It is said that there are four types of Buddhism being practiced all over the world.

• Religious Buddhism. It refers to the religion practiced in Buddhist temples. The Asian countries witness numerous Buddhist monasteries, especially in Taiwan, but it is not the real Buddhism. What people do in those temples and monasteries are giving offerings and incense to the monks and the paying reverence to the image of the Buddha.
• Academic Buddhism. It can be witnessed in many universities in Japan. As an academic pursuit, Buddhist is taught purely as philosophy but not exactly Buddhist education. It seems that the study of Buddhism is to seek shiny labels to slap on one’s reputation. The knowledge of Buddhism is based on the understanding of the Buddha’s teaching, but not on the purpose of showing off.
• Degenerated Buddhism. Buddhism is degenerated into cult by some in some area. This is the most unfortunate things. Buddhism opens a door for people to attain spiritual freedom and enlightenment, but it is used as cult to confused and distracted people who believe in it. If one wants to gain a promotion or wealth by chanting Buddha’s name.

What to Expect on a Buddhist Retreat

A Buddhist retreat is a place to seek monastic baptism. It is a bad idea to live luxuriously. One may share bathroom with other retreater and do some chores in the monastery. The monks will wake you up with clanging bells before dawn and invite you to a sunrise meditation. Your life in monasteries is simple but high-spiritual.

In a Buddhist retreat, one will be expected to join the Buddhist observances of the temples. Religious ritual is part of the Buddhist experience. If one doesn’t rituals, there are alternatives such as tai chi or communicate with monks.

For a serious person who aims to take the spiritual path through retreating, he/ she may starts with a beginner. During the retreating, one may find a greater depth of spiritual practices.

Where to Find Buddhist Retreats

You are suggested to find the monasteries by sect or location. First search on the websites and then see each monastery’s schedule of retreats. You can also go to Buddhist publications like Tricycle.

Ask help from other Buddhist practitioners who have been some retreats. There are some lovely places that you may be interested in through their accommodations.

A spiritual retreat is a personal adventure and will impact the life of a retreater. It is a space that one can shut out all the trivial of daily life and make a face-to-face communication with yourself.

So, why do you need a Buddhist teacher? As one begins the spiritual trip of practicing Buddhism, one still falls victim to his habitual behaviors. Without the guidance of a master, one cannot walk out of the cycle of wrongdoings. You need a teacher standing outside your inner world and show you the direction to progress.

• Remove Ego
  You might think you are doing well in practice. A complacent person tends to be self-indulged in his/her own practice. However, once challenged by masters, your insight disappears just like a smoke in the breeze. A teacher will pull you out of ego and look yourself with deeper insight.
• Start From Buddhist Centers Nearby
  Figure out whether there is a Buddhist center around where you are living now. It is ideal to start Buddhist practice with teachers in a Buddhist center nearby. This will save lots of troubles and time. Meanwhile, a person will be less distracted by other problems brought about by the commute everyday.
• The Best Teacher is Usually the Most Ordinary One.
  How can you tell a real teacher from a fraud one? Many school institutions will authorize qualified teachers to teach. A good teacher must have some association with authorized institutions. And he will never bagger who he is and will never promise that he can give you a great way to attain enlightenment.

Buddhism and Education

• Buddhist education should teach people to be good people and abandon any animal instincts and bad behaviors. Moreover, it teaches people the path to attain mental freedom.
• One of the way to carry out Buddhist education is to establish the Buddha as the primary philosophy and to derive an educational philosophy from that. The other way is to teach Buddhism in schools and institutions so as to enrich the youth with Buddhist teachings. This is a good way to train the youth to be good person and purify their mind with moral merits. But it doesn’t mean that we will make Buddhism as the basis of the system of education, but to reinforce the existing education system.

The Goal of Buddhist Education

• The critical goal of Buddhist education is to attain wisdom. Buddhism believes that the ultimate of wisdom is inherent in each person’s nature, stating that everyone has the potential to achieve wisdom. However, the majority are distracted by misunderstanding and misconceptions, therefore, are incapable of being aware of this kind of potential. In this sense, Buddhism aims to teach us recognize the intrinsic part of human nature.
• Buddhist wisdom varies from individual to individual. It is related to the degree to which one’s delusion is and there is no inherent difference among all human beings. Buddhism helps us remove delusion and regain the wisdom to remove confusions of individual potential and achieve happiness.
• Buddhism considers deep meditation and concentration as the crucial factors in order to attain wisdom. Buddhism teaches the way of meditation and the mindfulness of concentration.