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Tibetan monks found chanting text by Oxford philosopher
Last week, I blogged about Derek Parfit, an Oxford philosopher featured in a recent issue of The New Yorker. In her article on Parfit, "How to Be Good," Larissa MacFarquhar writes about the apparent affinity between Parfit's view and the Buddhist view of the self. To demonstrate this point MacFarquhar includes a parenthetical anecdote about Tibetan monks chanting lines from Parfit's book, Reasons and Persons. This struck me as fairly remarkable, so I wrote to The New Yorker to try to get the backstory. MacFarquhar put me in touch with Harvard professor of ethics and public health, Dan Wikler, who originally provided her with the story. Quoted below is part of an email that I received from Wikler. More » -
Mahaparinibbana Sutta: Four Places of Pilgrimage
"There are four places, Ananda, that a pious person should visit and look upon with feelings of reverence. What are the four?"'Here the Tathagata was born!' [Lumbini] This, Ananda, is a place that a pious person should visit and look upon with feelings of reverence."'Here the Tathagata became fully enlightened in unsurpassed, supreme Enlightenment!' [Bodhgaya] This, Ananda, is a place that a pious person should visit and look upon with feelings of reverence."'Here the Tathagata set rolling the unexcelled Wheel of the Dhamma!' [Sarnath] This, Ananda, is a place that a pious person should visit and look upon with feelings of reverence. More » -
The Buddha's Original Ideas: Week 2 of Rita Gross's Retreat
Week 2 of Rita Gross's Tricycle Retreat, "Buddhist History for Buddhist Practitioners," starts today. This week, entitled "The Buddha's Original Ideas," explores the questions: How much of what the Buddha taught was original? How much of it was something that other people were already saying as part of the religious teachings of India in his day? There's an excerpt from Gross's teaching below and well of a preview of this week's video. Enjoy! More » -
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The Art of Buddhism: Photograph by Julie Hall
This beautiful image comes our way from photographer Julie Hall. Her work explores art, culture and place. This is from her portfolio "The Art of Buddhism." More » -
Angulimala and Tantric Buddhism
The British scholar of Buddhism Richard Gombrich has a seemingly endless supply of insightful readings of texts that we as Buddhists assume we know through and through. Take Angulimala (please). The standard story is one of the most famous in all of Buddhism. A fierce robber and murderer named Angulimala cuts off the fingers of unwary travelers in his forest. He wants to get 1,000 fingers and already has 999 sewn together in a monstrous necklace (hence his name: anga, finger + mala, garland/necklace). Along comes the Buddha. Angulimala chases him and though the Buddha simply walks at a slow and stately pace and Angulimala runs as fast as he can, the villain can't catch up. Amazed by this and by the Buddha's calm in the face of danger, Angulimala renounces his evil ways and becomes a devoted Buddhist. More » -
Mayadevi and the Birth of the Buddha
The birth of the Buddha was preceded by portents: In a dream, a white elephant holding a lotus circumambulated the Buddha's future mother, Queen Maya, three times before striking her on the right side with his trunk and disappearing inside her. The Buddha was later born in Lumbini, as recounted in our Mother's Day post last year: At the time of the Buddha's birth more than 2,500 years ago, Lumbini was a grove of natural grandeur, bursting with rare and beautiful flowers, where bees of five different colors hummed. Queen Maya Devi was passing through this earthly paradise on the way to her parent's house in Devadaha, capital of the Koliya kingdom, from Kapilavastu when the pangs of labor hit. After bathing in a nearby pond the queen walked 25 paces, took support of a Saal tree branch and gave birth standing up. She died a week later. More »
