Home › interview

interview
  • Tricycle Community 0 comments

    Surviving the Dragon Paid Member

    Arjia Rinpoche was born in 1950, the same year Mao Zedong’s People’s Liberation Army invaded Tibet. His early years were ones of geographical and political isolation. His nomadic family herded their yaks across the high plains of the Tibetan-Mongolian border, their camp never far from the vast blue waters of Lake Kokonor. At the age of two, he was recognized by the Tenth Panchen Lama (the second-ranking figure in Tibet after the Dalai Lama) as the reincarnation of the father of Tsongkhapa (the founder of the Gelug sect of Tibetan Buddhism). At the age of seven, he was sent to live in Kumbum Monastery, one of Tibet’s six great monastic universities. More »
  • Tricycle Community 6 comments

    The Wise Investigator Paid Member

    Can you say something about the title of your book, Don’t Look Down on the Defilements, They Will Laugh at You? I never intended to write a book. One of my yogis had taken a lot of notes during interviews and wanted to make them available to others. Those notes were then edited and expanded by me and some other yogis. We picked the title because it is important not to underestimate the power of the defilements. When I teach meditation I emphasize the importance of watching the mind. While doing this you will see a lot of defilements. In their grosser manifestations, the defilements are anger, greed, and delusion. And they have plenty of friends and relatives, who often show up as the five hindrances: desire, aversion, torpor, restlessness, and doubt. More »
  • Tricycle Community 0 comments

    Found in Translation Paid Member

    Dr. Peter Masefield belongs to that rare breed of scholars who thrive on translating ancient Buddhist texts into English. An Englishman from Birmingham who has spent much of his adult life in Asia and Australia, Dr. Masefield has translated a number of texts for the Pali Text Society, the Oxford-based organization that pioneered the study and translation of Theravada Buddhist texts in the West over a hundred years ago. More »
  • Tricycle Community 0 comments

    Good Soldier Paid Member

    In February 2004, Army Specialist Benjamin Thompson's unit was rushed into Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison. They were assigned to replace the unit that would soon find itself at the center of a worldwide media scandal with the release of photographs documenting the assault and sexual humiliation of prisoners under their guard. But what Thompson, who was recently given his honorable discharge, wants people to know is that the crimes exposed by the Abu Ghraib photos were not isolated incidents but symptoms of the system-wide inhumane policies of U.S. detention facilities in Iraq. More »