Among the many books I’m currently enjoying is Secular Buddhism by Stephen Batchelor. It led me to study a discourse of the Buddha from the Sutta Nipata, one of the oldest collections of Buddhist discourses in the Pali Canon.
The discourse in question is the Kalahavivada-sutta wherein the Buddha explained to an interlocutor how arguments and quarrels, tears and anguish, arrogance and pride and grudges and insults arise from having preferences, holding things dear and precious; which in turn stems from the impulse of desire arising from seeing one thing as pleasant and another as unpleasant. Feelings of pleasant and unpleasant in turn stem from contact or mental impression, a result of the compound of mind and matter (namarupa): our being-in-the-world. The element of form, of matter, underlies all contact. And perception, consciousness of form is the source of all ensuing obstacles. The good news is: there is a state where form ceases to be, a state that is not ordinary perception or non-perception or disordered perception or annihilation of perception—seemingly pointing to a free unfettered non-clinging awareness clearly cognisant of how all things are contingent, fluid, and processual in nature.
Batchelor incisively points out that this empirical description of the arising of craving and quarrels from mind-body contact differs strikingly from traditional Buddhist formulations of the twelve links of dependent arising, a formulaic grid that contains metaphysical assertions of kamma and rebirth. Such metaphysics are absent from this discourse. Batchelor links this empirical presentation to what he sees as the earliest presentation of the famous “four noble truths” which in his view (following philologist K. R. Norman) are stated in terms of “the four.” In other words, the terms “noble truths” were interpolated into the first discourse of the Buddha at a later date, perhaps as an exercise of polemical rivalry and assertion of superiority against competing schools (in my view). Batchelor’s argument then shows how the Dhamma as taught by the Buddha was not so much a system of religious belief and practice but an existential and empirical approach to life in all its fragility, perplexity, messiness, anguish, and uncertainty.
For me, I’ve read several of Batchelor’s books including Confessions of a Buddhist Atheist, The Faith to Doubt, and After Buddhism. I must say I am persuaded by much of his argumentation, which in many ways echoes my own line of thinking. I concur with Batchelor on the need to shift from a belief-based Buddhism (version 1.0) to a praxis-based Buddhism (version 2.0), which in my estimation may well be closer to what Gotama Buddha, an unequivocally human teacher, taught originally. The secular Buddhist movement has a vibrancy and impetus that speaks to many in contemporary society. Like Batchelor, I’ve come to see secular Buddhism not as the degeneration or banalization of the Buddha’s teaching but as a sign that religious orthodoxies and authorities that have been dominant over the past two millennia or so have now waned. Quoting Batchelor: “Secularization might indeed mark the collapse of Buddhism 1.0 but it might also herald the birth of Buddhism 2.0.” I could not agree more.

Chris, I just arrived at your site for the first time yesterday. I'm aware that I know little of your perspective and am taking seriously the caution you advocated in another post to take a humble, not-knowing approach to what you write. Our journey has been similar in some ways, as I struggled in my early 20s (close to 50 years ago) between an attraction to nondual teachings such as those of Dzogchen and Ramana Maharshi, and more devotional teachings such as those of Ramakrishna, St. Teresa of Lisieux, etc. All along the way, I've been fascinated to see how physicalist beliefs, conditioned into modern society (the world over, not just the "west") have infiltrated into presentations from Burmese meditation (Mahasi Sayadaw) to Stephen Batchelor. The whole modern idea of dividing "interpretation" and experience, ontology and epistemology, seems to be associated with physicalist beliefs. In any case, I don't mean to present this in an argumentative manner, and appreciate this space for sharing reflections. Beautiful website, by the way.