Hello and welcome to another episode of the Secular Buddhism Podcast.

This is episode number 90. I am your host Noah Rosheta and today I'm talking about the ultimate authority.

Now I think this is an interesting topic to bring up because I usually start the podcast with

this snippet of advice where I say keep in mind the Dalai Lama's advice to not use what you learn

from Buddhism to be a Buddhist, use it to be a better whatever you already are. I've mentioned this

quote roughly 90 times once per episode and I've mentioned it on several different occasions

and it was recently brought to my attention that this isn't actually a verifiable quote by the Dalai Lama

and I did a little investigating and research and someone shared some links to some articles

and when I first heard this I came across this quote while reading a book by Gerald Benedict

and he has it quoted in his book a book called Buddhist Wisdom and it has the phrase just like I've

always used it with the quotations and naturally I assumed if it's in a book and it's got quotes it's

the it's the right quote and then if you search for it online you'll find the same thing.

Dozens of people have used this quote including myself including Robert Wright and his book

why Buddhism is true. A lot of us have used this quote because we really like the message but

apparently the the the actual quote can be found anywhere but it does look like there is a source for

where this quote to this thought originated and that's from a book called Amazing Grace by Kathleen

and in that book it's relating an interfaith dialogue that happened a few years before she wrote

the book and and here's how it's worded I'll read it to you so this is coming from her book

where she's saying quote a young man I know was stunned when he went to Thailand and we and tried

to join a Buddhist monastery go back home and become a Christian monk first they told him

learn your own tradition at an interreligious conference of Buddhist and Christian monastics held

not long ago at a trappist monastery a reporter asked the Dalai Lama what he would say to Americans

...