Comment by graemep
1 day ago
> to principles of buddhism like "be nice, be compassionate, to both yourself and others"
Principles shared with most religions and most non-religious people are hardly a mrk of Buddhism.
Buddhism is not a theistic religion, but it still requires a lot of religious beliefs (reincarnation, enlightenment, nirvana) and a lot of concepts such as detachment.
There is a BIG difference between "not monotheistic" and "not religious".
There is an extremely wide spectrum of how buddhism is practiced and I'd argue most ways are "wrong" and violate things the buddha very specifically said not to do (e.g. don't worship him).
There are no "requirements" in buddhism. there is no hell for you to go to if you do it "wrong". take from it what you want and leave the rest behind.
It depends a lot on the variant of Buddhism.
There are plenty of us who do not believe in those things. In particular, we see rebirth as a way of framing what Rawls called the Veil of Ignorance