Western Buddhism

The rise in popularity of Buddhism and related practices in the contemporary Western world is well documented. The commonly told story is that several “Asian masters” immigrated to the United States and Europe during the 20th century, bringing with them teachings from various sects of Buddhism that spread into Western culture. And although the West had known of these traditions beforehand, it wasn’t until this era that the seeds of cultural exchange were truly planted on Western soil.

This exchange has been deeply tied to a particular historical period of Western civilization. Various designations include New Age, postmodern, and even post-Christian. These labels point to the assortment of paths that have led so many to “look Eastward.” Nineteenth-century German philosophers like Schopenhauer and Nietzsche referenced Buddhism in a way that hadn’t been done before in the Western intellectual tradition. American philosopher-psychologist William James is famous for having claimed that a Theravadan monk in attendance at one of his lectures at Harvard was a symbol of the future of psychology. And psychotherapy giant Carl Jung wrote highly of Zen, having written the forward to D.T. Suzuki’s books, which were central in the popularization of Zen in the West.

The generation of Boomers and the cultural upheaval of the 1960’s are central to this story, as well. The aforementioned beginnings of Western intellectual attention on Asian traditions, mixed with the concrete presence of the Asian popularizers themselves, manifested in the new generation of Western cultural forms. Young Americans and Europeans took off to Asia in droves. From Tibet to Thailand, from Sri Lanka to Korea, monasteries in Asia witnessed legions of young Westerners knocking at their doors. The inhabitants of such places had varying responses to these newcomers, the likes of which were toting cultural baggage that was extremely foreign. Yet these escapees from Western civilization often brought with them an enthusiasm to learn and develop that outstripped many of the locals. And what they have now brought back to their home civilization (the West) is just the beginning of a massive cultural fusion.