By stripping ethics from it you would stop all its activism.
Here is a good starting point for understanding what is: http://ftp.budaedu.org/ebooks/pdf/EN074.pdf
It is.
The story of Shakyamuni Buddha achieving enlightenment after 49 days of meditation under the Bodhi tree is pretty well known. There, of course, are a lot more antecedents to contemporary Buddhist thought and ethics than that one incident, but it's fair to say it's a pretty core part of the historical tradition, and precedes essentially everything that came after.
For context in this discussion, I am a practicing Zen Buddhist.
Meditation is for going beyond all that.
> I am a practicing Zen Buddhist
Who?
We cannot just ask Siddhartha Gautama anymore about the practices and his words were mysticized and changed over generations, as were ethical rules and especially the added monastic rules.
Even Pali Canon is suspect in pieces and that's a more reliable source in the practices he reformed.
From Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Th%C3%ADch_Qu%E1%BA%A3ng_%C4%9...)
"Đức calmly sat down in the traditional Buddhist meditative lotus position on the cushion. A colleague emptied the contents of the petrol container over Đức's head. Đức rotated a string of wooden prayer beads and recited the words Nam mô A Di Đà Phật ("Homage to Amitābha Buddha") before striking a match and dropping it on himself."
"Photographs of his self-immolation were circulated widely across the world and brought attention to the policies of the Diệm government. John F. Kennedy said in reference to a photograph of Đức on fire, "No news picture in history has generated so much emotion around the world as that one.""