This is a revised version of an article with the same title published by the Secular Buddhist Network on July 10, 2025. Revisions include formatting improvements and content refinements, drawing in part on insights gained from translating the article into Japanese; the core thesis and arguments remain intact.
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For most proponents of Secular Buddhism, the Pāli Canon, when relieved of its metaphysical truth claims, serves as the cornerstone for their teachings and practice. For instance, in his 2012 journal article entitled “A Secular Buddhism,” Stephen Batchelor explains how the Canon’s Four Noble Truths can be understood not as ultimate truths meant to alleviate suffering by escaping rebirth, but rather as four lowercase “tasks” for tempering reactivity and realizing “the contingent, fluid and processual nature” of a single life.1 In this way, Batchelor seeks to recover the Buddha’s original intent, long obscured by historical layers of metaphysical “inter-sectarian one-upmanship,” producing a practical ethic for our times.
Twelve years later, in 2024, an essay of mine offering an alternative approach to Secular Buddhism was published in The Indian International Journal of Buddhist Studies.2 Unlike Batchelor’s and other current options, it derives a secular teaching from the Lotus Sūtra, a prominent Mahāyāna text that is notably filled with metaphysical content. Nevertheless, I contend my reinterpretation offers a distinct choice for secular Buddhists.
The project was challenging due to a significant impediment: the Lotus Sūtra’s climactic revelation of an Eternal Buddha. This is the sutra’s defining feature, and for many poses the question of how such a text could possibly form the basis of a secular approach to Buddhism. The scripture portrays the Buddha as an ever-present reality ineffably interacting with everything in the universe: a concept diametrically opposed to the secular preference for a historical Buddha cleared of supernatural traits.
My Secular Approach to the Lotus Sūtra
To reinterpret this revelation and associate it solely with immanence, I apply a three-part hermeneutic. The first part provides a justifiable basis for deconstructing the supernatural elements inherent in a literal interpretation of the Eternal Buddha. This involves examining the Sūtra’s historical and cultural context, recognizing that its doctrinal innovations were intended for a society with a far different worldview. Understanding the Lotus Sūtra as a product of its time and genre allowed me to set aside a literal reading of its extraordinary imagery without dismissing its underlying ethical and philosophical insights.
The second part replaces the Eternal Buddha with synonymous expressions for the benevolent aspects of an ever-changing existence. Namely, I introduce two complementary phrases, each worded in a manner that helps identify its own properties: one in the English version of the article, “The conditional emergence of benevolence as gifted by time, process, and potential,” 3 and the other in the Japanese version, 「融智悲、自然のことわりより縁起す」(Yū-chihi, shizen no kotowari yori engisu: “A blend of wisdom and compassion, dependently arising from the patterns of nature.”) 4
This phrasing is central to my secular interpretation because it places the Mahāyāna concepts of “Buddha-nature” and “enlightenment” not in a transcendent embodiment, but in the inherent, unfolding capacity for goodness and ethical action within the natural world. The notion advanced is not that existence is intrinsically good, but rather that goodness is experienced and can be cultivated within it.
The third part of the hermeneutic validates the phrasing by aligning the underlying principle with both a traditional understanding of Buddhist doctrine and contemporary socio-philosophical conventions. This demonstrates how my secular reading resonates with the past and present and can, in due course, serve as a legitimate extension of the tradition.
Practical Application
Beyond the hermeneutic, another facet of my approach is that it includes companion secular prayer sets and a daily ritual. The prayers, referenced in the essay, emphasize the moral thrust of the above phrase and encourage shaping one’s life in its likeness. They are for inspiring practitioners to improve themselves and align their sphere of influence with a common principle of good. Although a practice based on daily prayer rituals appears significantly different from one relying on mindfulness meditation, it serves a familial-transformative purpose.
The following is an excerpt from the Secular Prayers:
To introduce a grounded principle for divine inspiration, the Lotus Sūtra’s revelation of an ever-present Buddha was interpreted to be a universal ethic established by the temporal realm. The implications are liberating, for the ultimate insight is no longer limited to a mystical union subject to claims of sectarian custody, but observed firsthand in the natural order and open for emulation based on one’s best judgment.5
How my approach represents a novel form of Secular Buddhism that can help the movement appeal to a wider range of people
To assess whether my reinterpretation of the Lotus Sūtra merits acceptance as an alternative form of Secular Buddhism, the essay compares it to the preexisting models of Stephen Batchelor, Gil Fronsdal, and Dr. ‘Babasaheb’ Ambedkar. In the end, it finds consistency with Batchelor’s formulation of a Buddhist ethic divested of metaphysical truth claims, Fronsdal’s Naturalistic Buddhism as without supernatural beliefs, and Ambedkar’s reinterpretation of the early teachings, which strips Buddhism of the dehumanizing cosmology of India’s indigenous past.
The essay then considers whether the teaching it proposes represents not just another form of Secular Buddhism but a truly novel one. While the teachings of Batchelor, Fronsdal, and Ambedkar all primarily derive from the Pāli Canon, they are distinguishable.
- Batchelor advances a pragmatic approach that relies on insight and loving-kindness meditation, a focus on conditioned arising, and release from attachments. His practice is critically tempered by skepticism to challenge reactivity and judgmental small-mindedness.6
- Fronsdal, who utilizes meditation techniques similar to Batchelor’s for much the same ethical purpose, distinguishes his teachings as “religious” in the sense that he embraces the sacredness of simply “being” instead of supernormal constructs.7
- Ambedkar, on the other hand, stressed a radical socio-political reordering inspired by the Buddha’s teachings. Although he was not clear about the role of meditation and his followers now debate the issue, his main emphasis was on reforming society, especially rectifying caste-based injustices.8
The secular version proffered in my essay is the product of a demystified Lotus Sūtra. It proposes a paramount morality sourced in the immanent realm. It also
- articulates an expression for what Batchelor describes as an “everyday sublime” that “outstrips our capacity for representation.”9
- makes explicit the dharma Fronsdal describes as “empirical,” “personally accessible,” and “verifiable by our natural senses.”10
- serves to consolidate the numerous qualities Ambedkar assigns to saddharma in his chapter on the topic,11 while offering an alternative to mindfulness for fostering the egalitarian reality he envisioned.
Mostly, though, my version of Secular Buddhism is distinguishable because it introduces an overarching principle to replace the loss of a Supreme Being–a step that can broaden the reach of the movement. After all, for many today, deities such as God, Allah, Bhagavan, and Brahma remain cherished realities. While those who come to reject these forms of theism already have alternatives from the Pāli Canon to choose from, there is now a replacement from the Lotus Sutra (one both unadorned and affirmative) to serve as a closer fit.
My Project and Stephen Batchelor’s Critique of Beliefs
In conclusion, I address a passage from Stephen Batchelor’s After Buddhism that might lead to rejection of my project as a suitable choice for secular Buddhists.
. . . let me suggest that religious Buddhists tend to base their practice on beliefs. If one believes—pace the second noble truth, that craving is the origin of suffering—then your practice will be motivated by the intention to overcome craving to eliminate suffering. But if your experience of birth, sickness, aging, and death raises fundamental questions about your existence, then your practice will be driven by the urgent need to come to terms with those questions, irrespective of any theory about where birth, sickness, ageing, and death originate. Such a practice is concerned with finding an authentic and autonomous response to the questions that life poses rather than confirming any doctrinal article of faith.12
Given Batchelor’s emphasis on a practice without beliefs, it is important to acknowledge that the practice I endorse is indeed based on a belief: in the benevolent aspects of existence. However, the essay clarifies the meaning of “benevolence” with explanations for benevolent occurrences, contributions, and processes, serving to ground the belief empirically rather than supernaturally.13
While contemplating birth, sickness, aging, and death prompts fundamental questions about the harsh and transient nature of existence, Batchelor emphasizes that cultivating “an authentic and autonomous response” to these very questions should be the impetus for a secular Buddhist practice. He prioritizes direct engagement over confirming the truth of any pre-established doctrine.
My proposed ethic offers an affirmative avenue for that engagement, serving as a guiding principle for building a life of purpose after navigating existential quandaries. In light of Batchelor’s concerns about beliefs in the above passage, it seems likely that he and those who think likewise might find this approach unacceptable.Although my essay was published in an academic journal, its implications are far from merely academic. I encourage readers to consider the article in full to understand how the Lotus Sūtra can serve, at least for some, as a strong option for secular Buddhists moving
1 Batchelor (2012) p. 92.
2 Tate, John R. (2024). “An Ultimate from Immanence: Lotus Buddhism Redefined for a Secular Worldview,” In The Indian International Journal of Buddhist Studies: No. 24, pp. 209-50. https://buddhism.lib.ntu.edu.tw/FT/JA/712651.pdf Revised (2026). Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15362204
3 Tate (2024) p. 228.
4 Tate, John R. (2026).「内在性からの究極：世俗的世界観に向けた法華仏教の再定義」(The Japanese version of “An Ultimate from Immanence”) p. 16. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23362918
5 Tate, John R. (2026). “Secular Prayers,” p. 3. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15362783
6 Batchelor, Stephen (2015). After Buddhism: Rethinking the Dharma for the Secular Age, pp. 23-24. New Haven: Yale University Press.
7 Able, Venessa (2022). “Gill Fronsdal on Immanent and Naturalistic Buddhism.” The Dewdrop. Thedewdrop.org, June 1, 2025. https:/thedewdrop.org/2022/04/18/gil-fronsdal-interview/
8 Hennigar, Mallory (2021). "Boundation & Bindās: Ambedkarite Youth In a Global Buddhist Movement." Syracuse University Dissertations (1301): pp. 12, 125-26. https://surface.syr.edu/etd/1310/
9 Batchelor (2015) p. 250.
10 Fronsdal, Gil (2021). “Naturalistic Buddhism.” In Secularizing Buddhism: New Perspectives on a Dynamic Tradition, edited by Richard K. Payne, pp. 278-79. Boulder: Shambhala Publications.
11 Ambedkar, B. R. (1957). “The Buddha & His Dhamma,” Book Three, Part V. In Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar: Writings and Speeches, Vol. 11. Bombay: Siddarth College Publications. Electronic version: Bombay: Education Department, Government of Maharashtra, 1992. Posted by Pritchett, Francis W. at Columbia University, n.d. Pritchett.com, June 1, 2024. https://franpritchett.com/00ambedkar/ambedkar_buddha/index.html
12 Batchelor (2015) p. 24.
13 Tate (2024) pp. 228-31. Revised 2026 (English version “An Ultimate from Immanence”), pp.13-15.
