You've probably heard about the book and DVD The Secret. They're like the biggest thing going right now. Haven't read it (and probably won't) but it seems to be some Normal Vincent Peale action but on a new-agey tip.

One of the main Secret guys was just on Larry King Live and said there would be a sequel about a "new" secret. (He was smug: "Of course there's a sequel! There are many secrets.") Then he said that one of them would be about "The Law of Right Action."

But Buddhists know: Right Action is no secret.

Isn't it nice to know that you don't have to pluck down NINE HUNDRED AND NINETY-FIVE dollars for your "secrets"? Maybe you pay sixteen bucks for a good Dharma book, or throw some money in the kitty at your meditation center. But even that, you don't HAVE to do to get some Dharma. Buddhists usually like to come as close to giving it away as they can. That's cool.

(Speaking of all this, did you see Brad Warner's new column taking shots at another Zen teacher's "enlightenment seminars"? Pretty heavy. You'll find that link in our current Links of the Moment.)

Reader Robert sent this one in. He writes:

PRIOR to my becoming the product manager of the company where I work we actually sold these clocks. This is the last one. It now graces the floor manager station with its burgery charm.

"Burgery charm."

Thanks, Robert.

This shot of Samsara perfume came in from Horse reader Sultan, who writes:

Not sure if y'all caught this one. Apparently a perfume one can become endlessly attached to, I suppose. 

Couldn't have said it better ourselves.

This print-ad for Wasa brand light rye "crispbread" (aka "crackers"), like Sony's Michelle Wie ad (below), evokes a Buddhist scroll painting. Here, though, it's the consumer, rather than the high-paid product endorser, who appears in the central / "deity" role.

One one level, that's not a bad twist. But, on a more immediate level: isn't this just silly, and unintentionally so? Are these crackers are so good, we'll transcend duality?

Okay. They are good crackers. As crackers go. But come on.

Maybe Wasa should consider courting the Jewish market with full-page ads in Tikkun as well. How about a photocollage depicting Jerusalem's faithful praying at a Wailing Wall made entirely of light rye "crispbread"?

This Burger-sighting just in from Horse reader Lyndse:

Thanks much for sending it, Lyndse.

Reader Chris has this to say in response to our Target Dharma-Burgers:

So reads the tagline for this new protein-bar named "Karma Bar."

Every now and then, a Dharma-Burger comes along that is so mindnumbingly stoopid that the Horse is at a loss for words.

Next!

After seeing the ads for this movie, it seemed it had to be commented on, what with all the big lavish Buddhas that kept showing up. Luckily, Horse reader Tim actually went willingly and seems surprised to have liked it. His report:

I just saw this movie called "Music and Lyrics." There is a character, a ditzy celebrity, who grossly misuses religious symbolism and terms.

It's actually pretty good, and I usually hate both Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore. There are several Buddha statues that are all incredibly beautiful, but often used inappropriately. The "Buddhist" character, Cora, is often seen making music videos by writhing seductively in a thong, surrounded by hunky monks with "shiny" orange robes. You will probably like parts of the movie, just brace yourself for any scene with Cora in it.

Thanks, Tim!

Rage Against the Machine, self-titled, 1992.

1. Outside of Howard Beale from the classic film Network, nothing in the popular culture's consciousness conveys "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!" like this (in)famous picture. It shows Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Quang Duc setting himself on fire to protest his government's oppression of his religion.

So it's fitting that Rage Against the Machine, a band whose music embodied large-scale protest -- on the corporation's dime, much like Howard Beale! -- would employ the image for its eponymous debut.

Rage weren't Buddhists, but they knew that this photograph might make their already-long band name worth at least a thousand words.

Cat Stevens: Catch Bull at Four,  1972.

2. If you know his music (even that which he's recorded since converting to Islam and changing his name to Yusuf Islam), then you know that Cat Stevens's songs were intimate and personal, and allowed his fans to track his spiritual ups and downs.

Catch Bull at Four (left), came out two years before Buddha and the Chocolate Box (below), but seems to indicate, like the later album, that old Cat considered himself to be somewhere in the middlin', spiritually. The album's title makes reference to the Fourth of Zen's Ten Oxherding Pictures, in which an ox (the titular "bull") symbolizes the mind of a meditator seeking enlightenment. In stage four, the ox/mind has been "caught" but is hardly under its owner's control.

While some may feel that Catch Bull and Buddha were Cat's last truly great albums, there can be little doubt that his progress as a human being -- he would eventually leave an opulent lifestyle behind for a more contemplative life -- was only getting underway.

Cat Stevens: Buddha and the Chocolate Box,  1974.

3. We've mentioned this album before.

"Back in the early 70's, the Muslim-artist-formerly-known-as Cat Stevens found himself on a plane with a Buddha in one hand, and a box of chocolates in the other. He was so vexed by the seeming duality of his desires that he named an album for the incident: Buddha and the Chocolate Box."

Here we see that album's front cover (inset) and an interior image.

The concept seems to anticipate the eventual creation of the Chocolate Meditating Buddha.

DJ Logic: Zen of Logic.

4. Well, the overall design is nice enough, but a quick look tells you in an instant that there's nothing particularly "Zen" about DJ Logic.

First of all, his wardrobe seems more inspired by a bottle of Frangelico than by the garments of any Zen monk.

And that meditation posture, with the arms and knees up? Clearly he hasn't tried this before. Looks like he's going to fall right over. But then, if you've ever been on a Zen retreat, you know that meditators seem to fall over all the time, usually from falling asleep on the cushion.

Let's hope that Logic's beats don't cause listeners to conk right out in a similar way. If you've heard them, let us know.

Jah Wobble, Mu, 2005.

5. Jah Wobble made the cover-art for his 2005 album, Mu, himself.

Unfortunately, it pretty much looks it.

The graphic amounts to a sort of a working-man's Wheel of Life: images -- of nature, of high-rises, of Buddhas, of cheeseburgers and beer -- all revolve and interplay together around the symbol for Mu (familiar to Zen practitioners as the Zen Master Joshu's response to the famous question, "Does a dog have Buddha-nature?").

Thankfully, the music on the record is much, much better than the cover would suggest.

See our article about it, here.

Earth: Sunn Amps and Smashed Guitars (cd).

6. Earth are known among intellectual metalheads for their brand of unfathomably slow, dirgey, droney, heavy noise. If you like that kind of thing, then you'll love Earth.

But why did they pick this image for the cd and back cover of their live album Sunn Amps and Smashed Guitars?

Honestly? We have absolutely no idea.

Do you?

Target t-shirt, February 2007.

A couple updates back, we told you that Target is currently selling "tee-shirts with Kamakura Buddha-like images on them," and that we'd show you one "once we smuggle a camera into one of the stores. ('Cause we're sure not buying one.)"

So here it is. Granted, not a high-quality image -- it was shot with a camera-phone. But you get the idea.

The funny thing is, if you see it in person, it's actually quite attractive; whoever designed it did a nice job.

Touche, Tar-jay.

Target "housewares," February 2007.

Being that we had the camera-phone, we couldn't not shoot these three Buddha statues found on the Target shelves. (Again, sorry for the cruddy photo.)

It's funny -- on some level, we almost "want" to be offended by their presence in the store, and the same goes for the Buddha tee-shirt pictured above.

But (taking the politics out of it, because these things are almost surely made by workers in, let's say, "less than ideral conditions):

Is it possible that it's maybe cool that just about anyone, 

anywhere, in the States can walk into a "big box" store, be inspired by the image of the Buddha, and take it home and install it on their first altar?

We. Don't. Know.

But we're leaning towards Yes.

A while back, we told you about these new credit cards. This just in from a Horse reader (who wishes to remain anonymous):

i want to share some info with you. first of all, when i saw that ad i almost barfed. it was such a crock! i was at the Green Festival in San Francisco. then i ended up meeting the guy who created it. here's the story: he runs Conscious Englightenment LLC, which produces Common Ground magazine, Whole Life Times, and runs many other socially conscious ventures. He said he started the card b-cuz he is a filmmaker (don't remember his film's name- sorry) and he went into a ton of debt. to which i replied, "yeah, i am familiar with debt, buddy. i am a filmmaker too." then i asked him why make a credit card with those images and call it "enlightenment" when debt is such a huge problem in this country (and certainly for indie filmmakers). he was like, "have you tried getting around without a credit card?" i said that yes, i have stopped using every single one of my cards because they are maxed out - and there's an underlying issue: that is, that Buddhists (and all people on the path to enlightenment) need to deal with money issues directly and not feel through advertisting like they should be spending or creating more debt to "get enlightened." I told him to check out the film "In Debt We Trust" because it gets to the heart of this issue. The film doesn't take a spiritual approach, but i felt more enlightened after watching it. talks about how we are living in a state of economic apartheid.

that's my report. check out the websites and decide what's true.

Thanks to Bodhicitta for the tip.

If you listen to enough rap, or, smoke weed, then you probably know that "Buddha" is slang for the latter.

Here the "fat Buddha" -- he really gets around, doesn't he? -- makes an obligatory appearance on a bong water-pipe. It's surely not the first and just as surely won't be the last.

 But where to get all the other paraphenalia?

That's easy. Here.

Target Global Home packaging insert, January 2007.

Oh, sure, this makes sense: an ancient Buddha face from Angkor Wat, on the packaging for Target's "Global Home" housewares. (Made, of course, in China).

Now the stores are selling tee-shirts with Kamakura Buddha images on them. We'll show you one of those once we smuggle a camera into one of the stores.

('Cause we're sure not buying one.)

Kung Fu. Kill Bill. And now: this?

David Carradine is your go-to guy for Americanized, romanticized, silly semi-mysticism. In a current TV spot, he tells a young accolyte that "the path to enlightenment begins with Yellow Book," the online and printed commercial directory. Funny: we looked in our copy and didn't find anything like enlightenment. Plumbers, pizzerias, and taxicabs,  sure. But where "enlightenment" should be, there was only "Engravers."

Sorry we only have a screencap to show you. We searched for video but found it had been removed from YouTube, apparently by Yellow Book themselves. Perhaps, out of sheer embarrassment. This ad is LAME.

 Thanks to Denise G. for the tip.

Oh, great: a "snack that will tie your life together," "center you," and  "give you inner peace."

Sounds pretty good. We'll throw out our meditation cushion and all our Dharma books, stock up on "Zen Popcorn," and let you know how that goes for us.

 Thanks to Weasel Tracks for the pic.

Of course, "Zen" popcorn isn't hitting on anything new. (If it was, there'd be practically nothing on this site!)

A friend sends this, a photo from 1998, of the Zen Hair Salon in Boston's Kenmore Square, situated above one of the best places on earth to get an onion soup and a heap of fries.

Deli Haus is gone, but Zen Hair is going strong. In fact, if you Google those words you'll find that there are shops with that name all over the place.

 Thanks to Christopher Hall for the use of his beautiful photo.

That's not neon two signs, but one, for a well-loved dive-bar in San Francisco's Chinatown. Quite the juxtaposition of images, no?

Buddha (the bar) is almost literally a hole in the wall. It's dark, as all holes-in-the-wall should be. It has none of the high-style affectation of  so many of the other zillions of "Buddha Bars" and "Buddha Lounges" and so on. (For instance, take a look at the lavish "OM" in Harvard Square.)

Is there anything remotely Buddhist about the Buddha Bar?

Will you find enlightenment in your glass?

Come on now; you know the answer.

Not even if you order a glass of Pyrat. (Next.)

Now, this is a Dharma-Burger.

But of course, it's not a burger. It's a bottle of (very) expensive rum, beautifully packaged -- and that beautiful packaging is just loaded with Buddhas. Or, more specifically, with images of Hotei, the so-called "fat Buddha."

Of course, this flies in the face of Zen's fifth precept, To avoid using intoxicants. But that's okay, right? Because after all, according to the card, Hotei (or Hoti, as the folks at Patron, the manufacturer, spell it) is the Zen patron saint of bartenders. And, apparently, fortunetellers!

And truth be told, the Horse rang in the New Year with a little Japanese teacup-full of the stuff, which a good friend got as a gift. We could say it wasn't anything special, but then, that would be against the Fourth Precept -- Not Lying.

For the record, "Pyrat" is from the Old English and is pronounced "pirate." According to Patron, the bottle is "designed to be reminiscent of the old rum bottles hoarded and traded by pirates and ship captains of the 1800s."

So. . . what do pirates and rum and Zen Buddhism have in common?

Nothing. And that's what makes this one juicy Dharma-Burger.

Extra note: The gold Hotei medallion found on the bottle's neck makes a great keychain. Our good friend bequeathed it, and we wouldn't trade it for anything. (They more inspire hoarding.)

Product shot for the Horse by Gregory Palmer.


Pyrat Rum box insert. Jan 2007.

It's . . .the infamous Yoplait spot!

Buddhists may say that love is their religion, but you'd be hard-pressed to find a single one who doesn't really, really dislike this insipid commercial.

Enlightenment card print ad, Fall 2006.

"Finally, a credit card for people like me."

So reads the copy on the splash page of Visa's new website touting their "Enlightenment cards." What's an Enlightenment card, you ask? Says Visa, in some awkward phrasing:

The Enlightenment Card was founded on the idea that money is energy and if used with positive and integrative intention, can have the power to affect change in our lives and the world. Everyone uses a credit card, so why not have one where people can earn points towards positive products and services that enhances their overall "conscious" life path?

So now, both Visa and MasterCard are utilizing Buddhist imagery  in their ads. (See the Ellen Degeneres ad, below.) Seems the credit card companies are "conscious," too -- at the very least, of how much money you might blow while on the "life path."

Sure, it's good that some of your monthly Visa bill can go to good things. But isn't there something unsettling about these cards?

Perhaps they're examples of one reason that Muslims object to the making of images of the prophet Muhammad -- to help ensure that he never ends up on what is, essentially, money!

"The Buddha Wrangler." From The New York Times, December 3, 2006. It's a great piece on Richard Wolf, of the Tao restaurants in New York and Las Vegas. "In the course of decorating Tao east and west, the 47-year-old Wolf has purchased big Buddhas, small Buddhas, brass Buddhas, stone Buddhas and one of the most striking Buddhas of all: a reclining celestial being carved from a single hunk of wood, painted gold and sporting a red jewel that shines with laser-sharp intensity. 'I pulled my back out opening night, helping the bouncers get that one in.' . . . ”

This Ikea ad from Spain is titled "Zen."

This one's not new, just a new addition, and it's actually kinda cool.

"Elevator meditations." Apparently these folks saw the same issue of Adweek we did. (Scroll down to see what we mean.) You almost have to wonder if these people even know what meditation is. 

This isn't an ad; it's a detail of a magazine cover. (Though a magazine cover, of course, is an "ad," in a way, because it should try to compel you to buy the magazine it's attached to.)

It's from the cover of the Winter 2006 issue of Buddhadharma: The Practitioner's Quarterly (released in November 06). It depicts Zen teacher Harada Roshi having a laugh upon finding one of zillions of Zen-related calendars while browsing a bookstore.

It's a nice moment, and above all, a good reminder: the enlightened way of reacting to the proliferation of Buddhist merchandise probably includes maintaining a sense of humor.

"Cradle of Filth"? "Arch Enemy"? "Extreme vocals"?

What does this have to do with Buddhism? And what the heck is it?

It's an ad for a DVD-video, found in several issues of the "extreme  music" (read: metal, and its many sub-genres) magazine, Decibel. Now, before you decide that metal can't possibly have anything to do with Buddhism, we might direct you to The Worst Horse's feature on the Portuguese death-metal band, The Firstborn.

But back to the ad for now. Is there a Buddhist connection?

No. And, yes.

Aside from the DVD's title and the image shown  and the image shown here,  the image shown here,  there's no real connection. What we have here is really just a playful take on all the "Zen of [insert pastime here]" books and videos that have been flooding the market for years.

The "Buddha" shown here is Hotei, who is commonly mistaken for the historical Buddha by non-Buddhists (who often call him "the fat Buddha" or the "Chinese restaurant Buddha.")

As for the hand-gesture? Metal-heads know this as the "sign of the horns," (meaning, devil-horns) a gesture of allegiance and enthusiasm used within the metal community. It was first put into practice by Ronnie James Dio, who succeeded Ozzy Osbourne as vocalist for the legendary band Black Sabbath.

Dio admits it is in actuality derived from an Italian hand-motion meant to ward off the powers of "the evil eye." And the Buddhist connection?

It's accidental, for sure, but this same gesture  turns out  to be an ancient Buddhist mudra (or way of holding the hands) meant to stave off evil. Really!

Ahem.

"Find your Zen." What does it mean?

Nothing really. Literally, it means: "Find the right electronic toy (made by Creative Labs, of course) with which to listen to and look at your digital media."

It seems, also, to say this: "We don't know what 'Zen' means, and you don't know what it means, either. But we all know that it's a word that makes you buy stuff."

The Worst Horse can't tell you whether or not these are good products. But we might suggest you instead "find your Zen" on a meditation cushion.

Back in the early 70's, the Muslim-artist-formerly-known-as Cat Stevens found himself on a plane with a Buddha in one hand, and a box of chocolates in the other. He was so vexed by the seeming duality of his desires that he named an album for the incident: Buddha and the Chocolate Box. So what are we to make of the CHOCOLATE MEDITATING BUDDHA? Manufactured and sold by Chocolate Deities in Barrytown, NY, this edible Awakened One comes in dark, milk, and white chocolate. Also available are Hotei, Green Tara, and a veritable pantheon of the Choco-Gods. (Chocolate Kuan Yin is "Coming Soon.") The company provides in-depth information about their products, including the basics of each deity's significance and thoughts on how to consume your purchase without attachment -- difficult though that may be.

So you may be a Buddhist, but do you have a set of BUDDHA BALLS? (We're guessing no.) Believe it or not, these golf balls were featured in TIME magazine's web-shopping guide of November 13, 2006. Despite the name -- they're actually called "Buddha Balls" -- they're pretty innocuous: they feature a print of Hotei and supposedly Zen-like sayings like "The self says: I am / The ball says: You are nothing." It's no big surprise that these exist; after all, The Zen of Golf was published to good reviews a couple of years back, and seems to remain a strong seller. But you have to wonder if TIME would run such an item if instead of "Buddha," these novelty gifts instead referenced, say, "Jesus."

Viral Dharma! Non-harming goes commercial in this Fall 2006 spot for Kleenex.

The Dharma connection to this Fall 2006 magazine bind-in for Volkswagen (complete with stickers so that readers will deface cars and other items that betray "high emmissions" of "ego," or likewise brand less ego-emitting items in the same way) is slight: Ego = Something Bad.

Nonetheless, it's clever. The irony, that we are to proudly affix stickers to those things that do not appeal to the baseness of our ego, may or may not be lost. But hey: stickers!

This is a detail from a Fall 2006 full-page ad for Zen Puppy holistic dog treats. It offers a "Zen Puppy Moment" and, of course, is meant to drive you to their website, which includes pseudo-Zen-sounding aphorisms like "Sitting is a command we should all learn" and "If you catch the squirrel, you will not be able to chase it any more." Verdict? Zen Puppy's heart seems to be in the right place: just having a little fun.

Now this is an odd one. It's an October 2006 ad for a Sony digital camera, featuring "seventeen-year-old golf phenom" Michelle Wie.
The oddness resides on a few levels:

1) While the image certainly evokes a traditional Buddhist deity scroll painting, it doesn't do so very explicitly. The reader might have to actually be a Buddhist to make the connection.

2) The copy doesn't make a single reference to, or pun about, Wie as Buddhist, or even as some kind of "goddess." All that's said about her is that she is "known for making extraordinary shots, and now for taking them."

3) A semi-in-depth Googling does nothing to suggest that Wie actually is a Buddhist. While it would be weird if she consented to sit for this shot if she was, what's even weirder is that  --even if she's not-- she's willing to be cast as some Buddhist Golf Deity, just because she's Asian(?!?).

A first-hand view of (Sock)Monkey Mind: Ellen Degeneres' first of three  meditation-centered Amex commercials from Fall 2006. The spot is actually enjoyable and non-offensive. Don't know if Ellen actually meditates, but she seems to know how the ol' mind might wander.

There are now two more Ellen/meditation ads. We'll post them once they've appeared online.

And, lastly:

It doesn't get any lamer than this, does it? From Adweek, Fall 2006.