Theravada Buddhism is often criticized for being selfish. We’re not here to save all beings, we’re here to save our own skin: That’s what they say. But Theravada rejects the idea that there’s a clear line between your well-being and the well-being of others.
"Theravada Buddhism is often criticized for being selfish. We’re not here to save all beings, we’re here to save our own skin: That’s what they say. It is true that we recognize that we each are making ourselves suffer and we have to work on putting an end to that suffering ourselves. Each of us has his or her own karma. You can’t take your karma and give it to somebody else. So it looks like we’re just working on our own goodness, our own happiness, and forgetting about everyone else. But when you think about goodness, you realize that it’s not the sort of thing that’s limited just to you. The goodness you do has to spill out into the lives of other people. There’s that image the Buddha gives of the two acrobats. One acrobat is standing on the top of a bamboo pole. Another acrobat, his female assistant, is standing on his shoulders. He says to her, “You look out after me, and I’ll look out after you, and that way we’ll maintain our balance and come down safely from the pole.” An...