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Eating other beings may not seem like the most intuitive choice for those following the Mahayana Buddhist path, but that is exactly what many Buddhists have done for centuries. In Tibetan culture, the consumption of meat has been the norm, yet given the basic Buddhist prohibition against killing, meat-eating has always posed significant ethical problems. How, then, have Tibetan meat eaters justified their actions? And how have vegetarians in Tibet argued their case? In ''The Faults of Meat'', edited by Geoffrey Barstow, we find a rich amalgam of translated works by major Tibetan authors on the topic of meat-eating, from those who vigorously argue for vegetarianism to those who carefully defend meat’s ingestion.
Read this article [https://www.lionsroar.com/the-longstanding-debate-over-vegetarianism-in-tibet/ here]. +
''Bodhicitta'', the "mind of awakening," constitutes the foundational principle of Mahāyāna Buddhism. This essay traces the concept's historical and doctrinal genesis from its pre-Mahāyāna antecedents to its full articulation in the Indian and Tibetan traditions. It explores the main scriptural and scholastic sources in India, the two great Indian lineages of practice—the "Profound View" of Nāgārjuna and the "Vast Conduct" of Asaṅga—and the pivotal role of Atiśa Dīpaṃkara Śrījñāna in transmitting and systematizing these teachings in Tibet. The article further details how Atiśa's Kadam school and its core mind training (''lojong'') teachings influenced the subsequent development of bodhicitta cultivation in the Nyingma, Kagyu, Sakya, and Geluk schools. Bodhicitta is not a static concept but a dynamic, multifaceted principle that functions as the soteriological core of the Mahāyāna path, embodying the indivisible union of universal compassion and the profound wisdom that realizes emptiness. +
No abstract given. Here are the first relevant paragraphs:
Since the Gilgit manuscript of the ''Vajracchedikā'' has already been edited twice, the reasons for another edition may not be altogether apparent. There are, however, several good reasons for a reedition. First of all, the manuscript of the ''Vajracchedikā''—which contains in addition three other texts—is one of the most carefully written of the Gilgit finds. In the introduction to his edition Chakravarti, for example, notes with regard specifically to the text of the ''Vajracchedikā'' that the manuscript "is remarkably free from errors. . . . The few mistakes which occur are mainly orthographical or are due to oversight."[1] The Gilgit text of the ''Vajracchedikā'' is, in fact, a fine example of what a ''Prajñāpāramitā'' text in Sanskrit prose actually looked like in the sixth or seventh century, as opposed to how we—under the watchful eye of Pāṇini and the influence of the expectations derived from much later, mostly Nepalese, manuscript traditions—might think it should have looked. In consequence the manuscript has considerable significance for the history of the "style" of this literature, as well as for the history of the language ''as it was actually written''. This is especially so in regard to syntax and the use of sadhi and sandhi forms.<br> But, if all of this is true, then it is of some importance to have as accurate an edition of the manuscript as is possible, and this brings us to a second good reason for making another edition of the text: both of the previous editions are full of mistakes and distortions. Since all of these will be signaled in my notes, there is no reason to cite them here and we might simply note the broad types of errors that occur in the editions. (Schopen, introductory note, 95) +
In this dissertation I attempt to recreate through thick description a picture of monastic mentorship, i.e. the ''niśraya'' apprenticeship, as it is depicted by the compilers of and commentators on the ''Mūlasarvāstivāda Vinaya'' (''MSV''). I interpret the emerging picture of the ''niśraya'' apprenticeship using a philologically-based post-critical method for reading literary forms and a theoretical language derived from French and American sociology. On a theoretical level, my interest is to better understand how the person of a new Buddhist monk or nun is shaped by the ("obligatory") 5– to 10–year ''niśraya'' apprenticeship and how that shaping process can be understood as a form of self-care, a technology of the self that harnesses discipline as an instrument in a larger project of self-perfection.
In my introduction, I briefly explain how I came to the topic of ''niśraya'' and wonder
whether L.A. Waddell's Lāmaism prejudiced those in his wake to think the guru-disciple relationship was intrinsically Tantric. I then explain the theoretical language and critical lenses that I use in this study before giving a brief social history of ancient and medieval India, with special attention to the ''gurukula'', where the Vedic student serves their ''ācārya'' or guru in exchange for which, the disciple receives the instruction they need to become an ''ācārya'' or guru themself. Interpreting the ''niśraya'' apprenticeship as a Buddhist ''gurukula'', I then consider the Vinaya's intertwined development with the Dharmaśāstric literature, drawing upon recent scholarship to argue that the dharmas early Buddhist monastics were debating are better regarded as "rules" than "laws". In closing, I review previous scholarship on the ''niśraya'' apprenticeship and Guṇaprabha's ''Vinayasūtra''.
In chapter 1, I demonstrate, with a close reading of the extant canonical vinayas in
Sanskrit, Pāli, Chinese, and Tibetan, that all Indian Buddhist monasticisms shared a
model of and vocabulary for monastic training, generally introduced with the ordination rite under the rubric niśraya.
In chapter 2, I introduce Guṇaprabha's first sūtra, consider the claim about the
Vinaya he makes with it, and examine Guṇaprabha's appropriation of the sūtra form
from his Buddhist rivals in medieval India's other philosophico-religious disciplines. I
then attempt a genealogy of śīla, as Guṇaprabha uses it in his own comments on the
first sūtra, first, surveying the opinions of MSV commentators, followed by contemporary opinions on śīla and its relation to the Vinaya, and an examination of the Vaibhāṣika and Sautrāntika takes on śīla with Vasubandhu's Abhidharmakośa and Abhidharmakośabhāṣya as my guide. I reflect briefly on the Vaibhāṣika interpretation of śīla, considering it a reflection of a more fundamental sense of śīla, śīla-as-habitus. To close the chapter, I discuss how Dharmamitra's Vinayasūtraṭīkā demonstrates the exegetical principles stipulated by Vasubandhu in his Vyākhyāyukti and consider Dharmamitra's style as an instance of the Buddhist śāstric or "scholastic" style. The formal and stylistic choices made by Guṇaprabha and Dharmamitra are best understood against the background of Mathurā's contested Sanskrit culture, which I discuss briefly before closing the chapter.
In chapter 3, I focus on Guṇaprabha's digest of the Pravrajyāvastu's niśraya section
(sūtras 70–77) and use thick description—drawing especially upon narratives and rulings from the Kṣudrakavastu and the Uttaragrantha—to construct a picture of the master-apprentice relationship as it is prescribed in the Mūlasarvāstivāda Vinaya. I examine the niśraya master's and the niśrita apprentice's duties to one another, their daily routines and monthly calendars, their environment, and the official curriculum that are to follow, etc. Drawing upon the recent work of Gregory Schopen and in the Dharmaśāstric literature, I argue that the saṅgha functioned as a guild of ascetics whose skills-in-trade were learning and the possession of śīla. I thus consider how the niśraya apprenticeship affords for monastic apprentices to gain the knowledge and practical mastery of saṅgha culture they need to secure independence and become masters themselves. From a theoretical perspective, I consider the structures, forms, rhythms, and hierarchies I discuss in this chapter as instrumental to the monastic's acquisition of practical mastery. In chapter 4, I discuss those ways in which the monastic apprenticeship describes the process of becoming "learned".
In chapter 4, I focus on sūtras 78–102 of Guṇaprabha's Vinayasūtra, which present
21 pentads of qualities that comprise the niśraya master's qualifications. I close read
Guṇaprabha's auto-commentary alongside commentaries by his Indic heirs and the
main Tibetan Vinaya authorities, Tshonawa, Buton Rinchen Drub, the First Dalai Lama,
and the Eighth Karmapa. I examine in these sūtras, patterns of Buddhism's "culture of
oral transmission" and the importance of recitation in the Vinaya's model of learning.
Taken in sum, I notice the 21 pentads emphasize three things, the niśraya's master's
need for knowledge of the Vinaya, practical mastery of saṅgha culture, and ten years of experience under a mentor.
In conclusion, I briefly survey the Tibetan reception of the niśraya, noticing that the
main titles for niśraya masters (i.e. khenpo, lobpon, and geshe) are the very same titles awarded by contemporary Tibetan monasteries in recognition of a monastic completing their scholastic studies.
The religious fervor of the Great Vehicle was a major force in renovating the traditional structure of meditation. The concept of the path was extended to include an entire sequence of bodhisattva stages to enlightenment: the foundation of the path became compassion rather than personal virtue, and compassion led inevitably to the awakening of the thought of enlightenment, the vow to achieve Buddhahood for the sake of all beings.
The sequence of calm and insight remained the same, but insight meditation became the vehicle of the new metaphysics, the basis for the reaffirmation of the value of action in the world. The alert awareness of the meditator turns toward events in the world with a concern for ontology: he achieves his freedom metaphysically rather than psychologically, and in the metaphysics of his freedom lie the seeds of universal salvation. Skillful means must accompany his wisdom, as part of the ever increasing emphasis upon the immanence of enlightenment within the world.
Thus the structure of the path does not change, but rather than labeling events with the labels of suffering and impermanence, reality and unreality, the meditator wanders free in the unlabeled dream of the world. Dedicating himself to the salvation of all living creatures, he plunges into the swamp of the world, rather than letting the world go by. The experiential basis for this return to the world is the same ecstatic mode of intellectual penetration into reality, the same freedom and disentanglement amid events as in our previous selections; but the mood has changed from peace and tranquility to action and concern, from the joys of repose in the torrent of events to the joys of participation in a cosmic drama of redemption. Kamalaśīla's text on meditation, written in the eighth century A.D., remains the standard guidebook on this ordered contemplative process in the Great Vehicle. (Beyer, ''The Buddhist Experience'', 99) +
Western Buddhists often believe and proclaim that metaphysical speculation is irrelevant to Buddhist ethics or practice. This view is problematic even with respect to early Buddhism, and cannot be sustained regarding later Indian Buddhists. In Śāntideva’s famous ''Bodhicaryāvatāra'', multiple claims about the nature of reality are premises for conclusions about how human beings should act; that is, metaphysics logically entails ethics for Śāntideva, as it does for many Western philosophers. This article explores four key arguments that Śāntideva makes from metaphysics to ethics: actions are determined by their causes, and therefore we should not get angry; the body is reducible to its component parts, and therefore we should neither protect it nor lust after other bodies; the self is an illusion, and therefore we should be altruistic; all phenomena are empty, and therefore we should not be attached to them. The exploration of these arguments together shows us why metaphysical claims can matter a great deal for Buddhist ethics, practice and liberation. +
It is a Buddhist view that the highest level of attainment (''pratipatti'') that one can gain by practicing the dharma in a proper way is the middle path (''madhyamapratipad''). It is known as the middle path because, in accomplishing it, one goes beyond all extreme views (''anta''). This paper will attempt to elucidate this central concern of Buddhism in the light of the discussion on the middle path found in the ''Kāśyapaparivarta-sūtra'', a Mahāyāna-sūtra of the Ratnakūṭa class. (Kawamura, introductory remarks, 221) +
No abstract given. Here are the first relevant paragraphs:
Śāntideva is commonly associated with a particular interpretation of the Middle Way philosophy in Tibet, the Prāsaṅgika-Madhyamaka or "Consequence School of the Middle Way." Why might this be the case? Śāntideva's ''Guide'' (''Bodhicaryāvatāra'') clearly does not address a difference between the two types of argument, ''reductios'' and independent probative arguments, that form the etymological basis of what distinguishes a Prāsaṅgika ("one who uses consequences") from a Svātantrika ("one who uses independent probative arguments"). So why is Śāntideva's composition considered by Tibetans to be a Prāsaṅgika text?<br> An answer can be found in how one influential Tibetan author, Künzang Sönam (1823-1905), explains the issue in his nearly 1,000-page commentary on the ''Guide''. In short, he says that "the basis of the debate between Svātantrika and Prāsaṅgika is whether or not there is something that exists on its own" (''rang mtshan kyis grub pa'').[1] This chapter discusses the role and implications of "existing on its own" as the main principle guiding Künzang Sönam's interpretation of Śāntideva's ''Guide''. For him, this particular feature of the Middle Way conveys the thoroughgoing interdependence that is essential for reaching a proper understanding of Śāntideva's text. In particular, he holds that it is through this interpretation of the Middle Way that Śāntideva maintains a view of emptiness that is compatible with an altruistic ethic. (Duckworth, preliminary remarks, 180)
<h5>Notes</h5>
#Künzang Sönam, ''Overview of the Wisdom Chapter'', 788; English trans, in ''The Profound Reality of Interdependence'', 211. For further discussion of this topic, see Duckworth, ''Tibetan Buddhist Philosophy of Mind and Nature'', 84-86. +
No abstract given. Here are the first relevant paragraphs:
In a snake year, 1305-6, the Sa-skya monk Chos-kyi 'od-zer translated the seventh-century Indian Śāntideva's long poem, the ''Bodhicaryāvatāra'' (A Guide to the Path to Enlightenment), from its Tibetan translation into Mongolian prose, and this was one of the very first Buddhist works the Mongols could read in their tongue. The same monk wrote a commentary to the poem, an "appraisal of the way to enlightenment"; and his translation with the commentary was printed in Daidu, the Yuan capital, in 1312. A large fragment of one of the one thousand block-printed copies of this early edition was found in the Turfan basin (it is kept in the Berlin Turfan Collection). Numerous sixteenth-century manuscript fragments were discovered in Olon Süme (Inner Mongolia; they are now in the possession of the Tōyō Bunko, Tōkyō); the 1305 translation is known from seventeenth- or eighteenth-century manuscript copies (the oldest is now in New Delhi, another in St. Petersburg). It was such an old manuscript from which the learned monk, Urad güüsi Biligün dalai prepared his revised text, a modernized version of Chos-kyi 'od-zer's Middle Mongolian ''Bodhicaryāvatāra'' for the
Manchu imperial edition of the Printed Mongol Tanjur (Danjuur; 1748). Boris Vladimirtsov, Erich Haenisch, Francis Woodman Cleaves, Nicholas Poppe, Walther Heissig, Louis Ligeti, and other Mongolists and a non-Mongolist worked on this early
monument of Mongolian Buddhist literature. In his ''Comparative Grammar'', Vladimirtsov stated that the Kanjur and the Tanjur preserved several Middle Mongolian texts revised by the late editors. He published the typeset text of the Kowalewski MS (1929) which proved to be useful for the study of the earlier fragments and the edition of the Tanjur-text. Ligeti gave a preliminary reading of this latter in his ''Mongol Nyelvemléktdr'' (1966); according to him, the Tanjur-text, despite its classical orthography and some modernization of its vocabulary, better represents the version of 1305 than the older Kowalewski MS. He accepted Heissig's evaluation of the New Delhi MS (that was presented to Lokesh Chandra in Ulaanbaatar in 1957), but then he had no access to that text. (Lokesh Chandra edited its facsimile with Heissig's short but essential foreword in 1976). Ligeti could only consult Heissig's first Olon Süme monograph published in 1966. He was working on a revised edition of the text in his last years: once in his home I saw his copy of the transcription, which was full of corrections and notes.<br> Now we have a new transcription of the Tanjur-version with a word-index and a white-on-black facsimile. Like the originally darker, now pale-ochre, print of the Mongol Tanjur, the photo-copy is not always easy to read, and so is the poorly printed facsimile of the precious New Delhi MS. Nevertheless with Vladimirtsov's edition and Ligeti's edition, or now with this new transcription, these "dark" copies can be "deciphered" more easily. Igor de Rachewiltz gives a reliable romanization of the Mongol text written in prose but arranged here in quatrains of the Tibetan version in isosyllabic verses; the quatrains are numbered by chapters (the same way as in Vladimirtsov's text and in Ligeti's transcription). The editor restituted the interpunction of the 1013 quatrains (often distorted in the Tanjur print and in the Delhi MS as well). Though in prose, the Mongol version has some rhythmic passages—maybe due to the strong beat of the original, or to its parallelism—in the texts of the early translation. Several word-order inversions (e.g., X:30b: ''boltuyai tede ere böged'' in the print of 1312) affirm that here and there Chos-kyi 'od-zer, to whom we owe those beautiful stave-rhyme strophes of the postscript, tried to render his prose more rhythmic (cf. my notes on "Mongolian verses without Alliteration," in ''Annales universitatis de Rolando Eötvös nominatae'', sectio linguistica, vol. VII, Budapest [1972]: 161-68). (Kara, "Review," 704–5) [https://doi.org/10.2307/606458 Read more here]
This paper identifies for the first time the Old Tibetan version of the ''Kāśyapaparivarta'' preserved in fragments from Dunhuang. The currently known extant versions of the ''Kāśyapaparivarta'' are in Sanskrit in two Central Asian manuscripts, five Chinese versions, Khotanese fragments, and a ninth century Tibetan version preserved among Tibetan Kanjur collections. The following comparative collation identifies for the first time seven Old Tibetan fragments of the ''Kāśyapaparivarta'' found among the Stein and Pelliot collections from the ancient city-state of Dunhuang. Jonathan Silk previously identified an eighth Tibetan fragment, Pelliot tibétain 676. These fragments comprise a version of the ''Kāśyapaparivarta'' preserved in Old Tibetan that was previously unknown. This article, Part 1, examines and collates the Old Tibetan fragments that correspond to sections §00–63 of the Staël-Holstein (1926) edition. Part 2 consists of the fragments that correspond to sections §98–135. +
This dissertation is a study of the single Buddhist term, ‘bodhicitta’ in which I have attempted to explain the concept, its gradual evolution and development through time. This study, based mainly on 260 treatises from Chinese Buddhist Canon, is divided into six chapters.
The first chapter is an introduction to the origin of the concept of bodhicitta, a summary of the development of the concept of bodhicitta that is explored in the following chapters and the methodological remarks concerning the tools of analysis and interpretation used in this study. The second chapter, “The Development of the Concept of Bodhicitta,” deals with the definition and types of bohicitta, a clarification of the relationship among bodhicitta, Buddha Nature and tathagatagarbha, as well as, their Chinese historical background. The third chapter, “Production of Bodhicitta and its Regression,” discusses the reasons for producing bodhicitta under five categories, the evolution in producing bodhicitta over time, as well as, a comparison and contrast between regression ad non-regressions. The psychological exploration of bodhicitta is concerned with its function associated with consciousness in order to understand how to cultivate the Bodhicitta Way and to attain Buddhahood without regression. The fourth chapter,” Bodhicitta Practice and its Result,” enumerates the practices and the results of bodhicitta, as well as, their significance in Chinese Buddhism in accordance with the time-line between the fourth and teentith centuries CE. In addition bodhicitta and Humanistic Buddhism, bodhicitta and anuttarasammasambodhi, the model of Sakyamuni’s practice and the role of bodhicitta in the achievement of the Buddha’s wisdom, are examined. The sixth chapter concludes all the foregoing chapters with fourteen findings. +
The ''Bodhicaryāvatāra'' or "Way of the Bodhisattva" as it is often translated, is one of the most read texts in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition.* This is hardly surprising, as its author Śāntideva managed the feat of encapsulating the vast expanses of Mahāyāna Buddhism in a single elegantly and often movingly written text. What is surprising is that the text as it has been passed down in the Tibetan tradition, and as it is read in translation today, is not the earliest version, and is quite different from it. We know this largely thanks to the excellent work of Akira Saito, which is undeservedly difficult to get hold of. During the 90s Saito worked on four Dunhuang manuscripts of the ''Bodhicaryāvatāra'', showing how the early version that they contained differed quite radically from the familiar later version. Here I’ll summarize his conclusions and add some of my own thoughts. +
There is an interesting description of the meaning of bodhicitta in this short article in relation to generosity:
While ''dāna'', the typical word for the virtue of generosity, indicates as much the giving of some thing to another as the state of mind with which one gives, ''bodhicitta'' is specifically a mental quality. It is, indeed, the mental quality ''sine qua non''. Literally translated as something like ‘awakened mind’ or ‘enlightenment-mind’, bodhicitta is a mental state of aliveness to suffering (the first Noble Truth) as an active concern to eliminate it. Before one has understood suffering so as to eradicate it, bodhicitta is the firm aspiration to attain this state. Bodhicitta also names this state once fully realized, or perfected. True generosity is the enlightenment-mind dedicated to giving happiness and relief from suffering to all beings. Śāntideva begins by recommending this quality of attention to us as an aspiration, and then describes its benefits – and the harms of its absence – so as to cultivate within the reader a firm commitment to bodhicitta. (Carpenter, page 227)
No abstract given. Here are the first relevant paragraphs:
Like most Buddhist philosophers, Śāntideva (685–763 CE) was also a Buddhist practitioner and teacher. And like many prominent Buddhist practitioner-thinkers, his life attracted a great deal of legend and myth, so that it is difficult retrospectively to distinguish the history from the story. But Śāntideva's story is worth retelling, for it gives us a sense of the spirit in which later readers would pick up his most beloved composition, the ''Bodhicāryāvatāra'' (''Introduction to the Conduct of the Bodhisattva''). (Carpenter, para 1, 224–25) +
No abstract given. Here are the first relevant paragraphs:
The rise of the movement referred to as the Mahāyāna, some four hundred years after the Buddha's death, is sometimes marked by the appearance of new ''sūtras'' that were called the 'perfection of wisdom' (''prajñāpāramitā''). Like many other Mahāyāna ''sūtras'', the perfection of wisdom texts were not systematic treatises that set forth philosophical points and doctrinal categories in a straightforward manner. Instead, they strike the modern reader as having something of the nature of revelations, bold pronouncements proclaimed with certainty, rather than speculative arguments developed in a linear fashion. The perfection of wisdom that the ''sūtras'' repeatedly praised was often identified as the knowledge of emptiness (''śūnyatā''), and it was this knowledge that was required for all who sought to become buddhas. This emptiness was often presented in a series of negations, with statements like 'that which is a world system, that is said by the Tathāgata not to be a system. In that sense [the term] "world system" is used.' The precise meaning of such statements would be explored by generations of commentators in India, East Asia and Tibet.<br> Many of the perfection of wisdom ''sūtras'' came to be known by their length, hence the ''Perfection of Wisdom in Eight Thousand Stanzas'', the ''Perfection of Wisdom in Twenty-five Thousand Stanzas'', the ''Perfection of Wisdom in One Hundred Thousand Stanzas'', the ''Perfection of Wisdom in One Letter''. Others had titles, the most famous of these being what has come to be known in the West as the ''Heart Sūtra'' and the text known as the ''Diamond Sūtra''. Probably composed in Sanskrit sometime between the second and fourth centuries of the Common Era, the latter was to become one of the most famous, and most commented upon, of the Mahāyāna ''sūtras''. Yet much of its meaning remains elusive, beginning with the title. In Sanskrit, it is ''Vajrac-chedikā Prajñāpāramitā''. The Sanskrit term ''vajra'' refers to a kind of magical weapon, sometimes described as a thunderbolt or discus, and which is said to be hard and unbreakable, like a diamond. Thus, the title might be rendered into English as ‘The Perfection of Wisdom that Cuts like a Thunderbolt’.<br> The present selection is from the manuscript of the ''sūtra'' unearthed at Gilgit, in modern Pakistan. It represents roughly the last half of the ''sūtra'', often considered the more difficult half. The ''sūtra'' opens with the Buddha residing in the Jeta Grove with 1,250 monks and a large number of ''bodhisattvas''. After returning from his begging round and eating his meal, the Buddha is approached by the great ''arhat'' Subhūti, who asks him about the practice of the ''bodhisattva''. The Buddha says that a ''bodhisattva'' must vow to lead all beings in the universe into ''nirvana'', with the knowledge that there are no beings to be led into ''nirvāṇa''. 'If, Subhūti, a conception of a living being were to occur to a ''bodhisattva'', a conception of a personal soul, or a conception of a person, he is not to be called "a bodhisattva".' This is one of many famous statements in the ''sūtra'', regarded by commentators as setting forth the doctrine of emptiness (although the term ''śūnyatā'' or emptiness does not appear in the ''sūtra''), that all phenomena are falsely imagined to have a self, a soul, an 'own-being', a reality which they, in fact, lack. Any meritorious deed, from the giving of a gift to the vow to free all beings, is not a deed of a ''bodhisattva'' if it is tainted with the misconception of self. The Buddha asks Subhūti whether the Buddha is to be seen by the possession of the thirty-two physical marks of a superman that adorn his body. Subhūti says that he is not, because what the Buddha has described as the possession of marks is in fact the possession of no marks. This formula of question and response, with the correct answer being ‘A is in fact not A, therefore it is called A’ is repeated throughout the text.<br> But the ''sūtra'' is not simply a radical challenge to the ordinary conception of the world, of language and of thought. It is also a Mahāyāna ''sūtra'', seeking, like others (see chapter 5 and 38), to declare its supremacy and to promise rewards to those who exalt it. It is noteworthy that here, as in many other perfection of wisdom ''sūtras'', the Buddha’s interlocutor is not a ''bodhisattva'', but an ''arhat'', the wise Subhūti, suggesting that even those who have completed the path to ''nirvāṇa'' still have more to learn. The Buddha predicts that this ''sūtra'' will be understood far into the future, into the period of the last five hundred years that his teaching remains in the world. At that time, anyone who has even a moment of faith in this ''sūtra'' will be honoured by millions of buddhas. Indeed, even now, long before this point in the distant future, anyone who would teach just four lines of this ''sūtra'' to others would win incalculable merit. In a statement that appears in other perfection of wisdom ''sūtras'', the Buddha declares, 'on whatever piece of ground one will proclaim this ''sūtra'', that piece of ground will become an object of worship. That piece of ground will become for the world together with its ''devas'', men and ''asuras'' a true shrine to be revered and circumambulated.' Scholars have seen in this statement the possibility that the perfection of wisdom ''sūtras'' were something of a 'cult of the book', in which the ''sūtra'' itself was worshipped, serving as a substitute for more traditional sites of worship, such as ''stūpas''.<br> And the ''sūtra'' suggests that such practices were not always condoned by others; the Buddha goes on to say that those who worship the ''sūtra'' will be ridiculed for doing so, but by suffering ridicule they will destroy the great stores of negative ''karma'' accumulated over many lifetimes. The Buddha's exhortations seem to have been taken to heart. The recitation and copying of the ''sūtra'' was widely practised and miracle tales of the benefits of so doing were told across Asia.<br> The ''sūtra'' is, above all, a discourse on the wisdom that shatters our ordinary conceptions, returning again and again to the negation of the fundamental elements of the ''dharma'', suggesting that it is the very absence of self that is their true nature. (Schopen, "The Perfection of Wisdom," 450 ff.)
In the opening reverence invocation of ''Pramāṇasamuccaya''（PS, to describe the Buddha Dignāga uses four names expressing meritorious qualities, including ''jagaddhitaiṣin''（one who wishes for the benefit of the people of the world.
As noted by scholars, Dharmakīrti’s ''Pramāṇavārttika'' Ⅱ（PV Ⅱ） takes the form of a
commentary on PS’s opening reverence invocation.[1]
Eltschinger 2011 also discusses the relationship between ''jagaddhitaiṣin'' in this
invocation and ''bodhicittotpāda'' in PV Ⅱ. However, that study does not take into account how the two types of ''bodhicitta'' discussed by Kamalaśīla in ''First Bhāvanākrama''（BhK Ⅰ) are related.
In this paper, I will examine the relationship of the PS opening reverence invocation's
''jagaddhitaiṣin'' and ''śāstṛ'' with the two types of ''bodhicitta'' discussed in BhK I. +
This advice on the practice of ''tonglen'' was dictated by Lama Zopa Rinpoche to Kendall Magnussen in 2006. Additional advice given by Rinpoche to Ven. Holly and then to Ven. Sarah Thresher. Edited into this format by Ven. Sarah in April 2012. Chapter Two is a short ''tonglen'' practice compiled by Ven. Sarah on the basis of instructions from Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche.
See also Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s extensive ''tonglen'' practice in [https://www.lamayeshe.com/article/chapter/meditation-seven-seven-techniques-mahayana-cause-and-effect-part-iii-bodhisattvas The Wish-Fulfilling Golden Sun of the Mahayana Thought Training.] For more advice about ''tonglen'', see [https://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/mind-training-lo-jong Rinpoche's Online Advice Book]. +
No abstract given. Here are the first relevant paragraphs:
This latest book from Douglas S. Duckworth is a much welcome contribution to the field of Buddhist philosophy, particularly of the Tibetan brand of Prasangika-Madhyamaka initiated by Tsongkhapa and perpetuated by his Yellow Hat school, the ''dge lugs'' (Gelugs), the most influential figure of which is now undoubtedly the Dalai Lama. Duckworth's translation of Künzang Sönam's Tibetan commentary on the ninth chapter of ''The Way of the Bodhisattva'' (''Bodhicaryavatara''), composed by Shantideva in eighth-century India, is fluid and most accessible, regardless of its technicalities. Sönam (1823–1905), born in ''mi nyag'' (Minyak) in Dokham, student of the eminent Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo and Patrul Rimpoche, among others, ecumenically studied the old and new schools of Buddhism in Tibet at places like Sershul, Sera, and Drepung. He produced the most extensive Tibetan commentary on the ''Way of the Bodhisattva'' ever written. Duckworth eloquently provides us with the first English translation of Sönam's overview of Shantideva's notoriously cryptic ninth chapter on the 'perfection of wisdom' (''prajna-paramita''), crowning the entire text. Duckworth's introduction to the text is an exercise in concision. It manages to offer an historical overview of the study of Shantideva's text in Tibet, to document the life of Sönam in the same country, and to summarize critical points of Sönam's overview of the ninth chapter within a mere eighteen pages, leaving all the room for the text to speak for itself. (Bouthillette, "Review," 323) [https://doi.org/10.1080/0048721X.2021.1877468 Read more here] +
The present study is designed to introduce the previously untranslated middle length Mahāyāna sūtra Aryasatyakaparivarta, an early Mahāyāna work, which was widely cited by many ancient Indian and Tibetan authors. Satyavādin, a non-Buddhist teacher, is the bodhisattva and main hero of the sūtra who expounds the Buddhist teachings.
The text of the sūtra deals with all the major Buddhist subjects on both conventional and ultimate truths as well as integrating these teachings with advice on state policy. The sūtra describes the stages of practice of the path to enlightenment, starting with the ten virtuous and non-virtuous actions and their results, upward to the universal compassion of the bodhisattvas and the Buddha, and includes the six perfections, the skillful means of the bodhisattvas and the Tathāgata, the Buddha vehicle as the ultimate vehicle, the Buddha body adorned with the thirty-two auspicious characteristics and eighty distinctive marks, the thirty-two compassions of the Tathāgata, the thirty-seven wings of enlightenment, the four confidences of the Buddha, and ultimate truth as an inexpressible reality.
Satyavādin gives extensive advice on state policy to the king and discusses the flaws and virtues of some of his contemporaries. At the sūtra's conclusion the Buddha prophesies Satyavādin's future perfectly full enlightenment.
The introduction deals with plausible evidence to date this sūtra prior to other well-known Mahāyāna sūtras. It also discusses the meaning of nirgantha in analyzing Satyavādin's non-Buddhist guise, and contrasts Satyavādin's advice on state policy, in particular on punishments and war, with other ancient Indian non-Buddhist and Buddhist scriptures.
Furthermore, it describes the use and expansion of Satyavādin's ideas by later Indian and Tibetan authors.
The appendices explain the sūtra's teachings on karma, the thought of enlightenment, the meaning of prajñāpāramitā, and other topics based o later Indian and Tibetan sources.
The Reality of Altruism: Reconstructing Śāntideva, A Review of Altruism and Reality: Studies in the Philosophy of the Bodhicāryāvatāra, by Paul Williams +
No abstract given. Here are the first relevant paragraphs:
Paul Williams' new book ''Altruism and Reality: Studies in the Philosophy of the Bodhicaryavatara'' is Buddhology at its best, a masterful blend of two elements seldom successfully combined: a scholarly investigation of the tradition and a critical philosophical interrogation of some of the tradition's more important theories and arguments. The book is made up of five separate studies of some key verses of the eighth and ninth chapters of Santideva's ''Bodhicaryāvatāra''[1] and their interpretation by Indian and Tibetan commentators. One of Williams' aims is to shed some light on the process whereby Tibetan commentarial traditions reshaped Indian Madhyamaka, with sometimes striking results. For instance, his study of Bodhicaryavatara 9.140 (chapter 4, "Identifying the Object of Negation") helps explain how the dGe lugs understanding of Prāsaṅgika Madhyamaka epistemology came to look rather more like the Svātantrika of the Indian Mādhyamika Bhāvaviveka. There is also discussion of a controversy over the nature of nirvāṇa (chapter 1 ), and an argument for ''cittamātra'' or consciousness-only, the view of the Yogācāra school (chapter 3). But it is the subject of his second and fifth chapters, the relation between the practice of altruism and our understanding of the nature of persons, that I shall focus on here. (Siderits, "The Reality of Altruism: Reconstructing Śāntideva," 412)
<h5>Notes</h5>
#The widely available translation by Crosby and Skilton (Śāntideva 1993) is useful and generally reliable. +
The Righteous Vaccinated and the Unrighteous Unvaccinated? How Śāntideva's Bodhicaryāvatāra and the Gospel of John Might Help Us Understand the Ongoing Pandemic +
As the COVID-19 pandemic turns two how should those who feel like we have been responsible neighbors (kept our distance, worn our masks, availed ourselves to the vaccine) respond to those we feel have not been—and specifically toward those who have refused the vaccine as a sign of political loyalty? How might those of us tempted to react from anger cultivate an alternative response? This paper explores the texts of two religions traditions—Mahāyāna Buddhism's ''Bodhicaryāvatāra'' and Christianity's Gospel of John—searching for resources for a response other than anger and blame. +
