Sulak Sivaraksha on 'Engaged Buddhism"

"In America and Europe, everyone is very active. But if you become too active, you lose the essence of Buddhism. You only have the Buddhist labels. One must cultivate peace to be compassionate. Without this, what you do, even as an 'engaged Buddhist' is just a lot of activity with no good purpose."

- Sulak Sivaraksa, “In Exile from Siam”

Essential Buddhism

Chhoje Rinpoche

Felix's article on Dr. Ariyaratne and Sarvodaya movement in Sri Lanka
published in Buddhadharma

Buddhism For Development

"Spiritual and economic development should not be separated into two separate realms. In Buddhism, one is not more important than the other. We have a saying, "Nāma-rupa" which means that mind and matter have to go together. Mind affects matter and matter affects the mind. It is the teaching of the Buddha that economic development and spiritual development need to be done alongside each other."  - Heng Monychenda, founder of Buddhism for Development (BFD)


Buddhism for Development, founded in 1990, has been working to create opportunities for monks to engage in social work activities.  Huffington Post published an article by Katherine Marshall (Georgetown) describing the motivation and impact of the organization over the past 20 years.  Here's the full article from the Berkeley Center at Georgetown. 


Thanks, CL, for sending this article!

Pali Canon - Online

The idea is to go back to the root.  Find the beginning.  Who said what first.  And how do we know.  From a linear standpoint, what is the truth?

I have always had this thought in terms of my own practice - it doesn't matter who said what first, or how authentic it is because what comes your way is what is supposed to come your way.  Now that I am entering into the world of scholarship in Buddhist studies, and I find myself researching different foundational concepts in order to, not only present them to my students who may or may not have had exposure before, understand how ideas developed in a linear way. 

Why?  I am not sure - academia seems to be linearly (historically?) oriented.  Maybe this is my own education speaking, but when one is not presenting proper context (historic or otherwise), the class could be taken as "less serious" or "ungrounded." 

Thus, here is the Pali Canon online - supposidly the original words of the Buddha remembered by his deciples and passed down orally over generations.  Someone wrote it down (i'm not yet sure who) and now it is translated into English.  Lucky Us!

Empowerment

The three yanas, according to Tibetan Buddhism are three stages of one's path to enlightenment. 

Thinking about this, in relation to social engagement and activism, seems one can extract three stages there as well.  When thinking about how social action works with the traditions of Tibetan Buddhism, a context needs to be created to frame 'engagement' effectively. 

Reggie Ray writes the following from a Tricycle article considering the concept of Empowerment:


We talk a lot about “empowerment” in the Vajrayana and it is important to understand exactly what that means. To receive empowerment doesn’t mean that someone grants you the power to escape from your life, or to override and control things you don’t like; rather, they help you tap into the power you inherently possess to surrender utterly to your unique life, which is the only gateway in the entire universe through which you can enter eternity.

Reginald Ray, "The Vajrayana Journey is an experience of love, power, and freedom"

The conversation overlaps in the world of development - it is quite popular to talk about women's empowerment, empowering others to take responsibility for their improvement or education, for example.  One can't deny the agency in this word - empowerment implies someone doing the empowering and someone receiving the empowerment.  Is it possible to empower oneself?  In the Vajrayana tradition, no.  In the conversation about the ethics of development, it has become popular to talk about empowerment as the receiver of resources taking responsibility for their own empowerment. 

I am not sure this concept actually works, but maybe is just something to tell ourselves as we attempt to create what we perceive as a better life for people who we perceive are living in poverty. 

Development remains a touchy issue - I don't pose that there are any solutions, actually, only that there needs to be constant questioning as "development" continues to happen in many parts of the world.  

Sulak Sivaraksa at the Garrison Institute's Satyagraha Event

Sivaraksa as one representative articulating one approach to "Engaged Buddhism."  He has had an interesting life filled with jail time and activism.  In this video, he calls says strongly that, "The West has been thinking too much."  This goes along with what Tsoknyi Rinpoche speaks about in many of his teachings regarding the subtle body problem that seems to be manifest in the western experience - too much thinking creates blocks, cultural blocks, in the body.

This is a good video to show in a discussion about the definition of Engaged Buddhism - what is it?  who is engaged or not engaged and how to we figure that out?  But, best to give some context about Sivaraksa's life and where his motivation arises to do the work he is doing. 

B&D - Course Content Resources - Thailand and Sri Lanka

Articles that may have relevance to course content....
Trying to develop more of a Theravadin perspective as we move along... starting from the begining (8-fold path, establishment of Buddhist Ethics... Maybe I should have started with that rather than jumping in to Ashoka.  But we can do this in a backward-buildup sort of way)

Susan M. Darlington -Rethinking Buddhism and Development: The emergence of Environmentalist Monks in Thailand.   This article might fit well with the book Greg gave: Socially Engaged Buddhism by Sulak Sivaraksa.

Tessa Bartholomeusz - In Defense of Dharma: Just-War Ideology in Buddhist Sri Lanka.
Also possible to draw more and more context - I need some resources on the history of the conflict rather than just throwing these articles out to the students. 

I need more grounding.  :/

Book Reviews: Socially Engaged Buddhsim

Here are some relevant book reviews that might be good for the course.

Buddhist-Muslim Relations in Ladakh

(click the title for the articles)

Something I have always been intrigued by, yet is so difficult to talk with anyone about.  Many deny there is any conflict. .

What EXACTLY did the Buddha say?

The world may never know.  But many scholars thinks he or she know.

Here's an article from an organization that I am not yet familiar with briefly explaining how teachings became text - three months after the Buddha passed away, a First Council happened deciding what should be preserved from his teaching.  The same source talks about how, even though Sanskrit was the language of the educated and priestly caste, Pali is the language of the region at the time when the Buddha lived, his native tongue is said to be closer to a village language called Magadha.

The Pali Cannon is the first collection of the Buddha's teachings, the result of the First Council. 

Good for Practice....

7 Tips for Giving up Gossip

1. Recognize that gossip doesn’t undo the situation you’re talking about. It only puts in motion another situation based on negative feelings.

2. Know that comparing yourself to others is useless. Everyone has his or her own talents. In this way, give up jealousy and the wish to put others down.

3. Be aware of and transform your own thoughts, words, and deeds rather than commenting on those of others.

4. Train your mind to see others’ positive qualities and discuss them. This will make you much happier than gossiping ever could.

5. Forgive, knowing that people do harmful things because they are unhappy. If you don’t make someone into an enemy, you won’t want to gossip about him.

6. Have a sense of humor about what you think, say, and do, and be able to laugh at all of the silly things we sentient beings carry out in our attempt to be happy. If you see the humor in our human predicament, you’ll be more patient.

7. Practice saying something kind to someone every day. Do this especially with people you don’t like. It gets easier with practice and bears surprisingly good results.

-Bhikshuni Thubten Chodron, "The Truth About Gossip"

Looking for a comic/graphic novel version of the Buddha's life story

Here are some good finds, but not exactly what I am looking for.  My target audiences are high school, gap year, and university students who are hearing about/learning about the story of the Buddha's life for the first time.  The aim is to help the students understand from an historical/mythological perspective who the Buddha was and why he is so important to the structure of South Asian history.

As Mary said today, "He must have been a cool dude if we are still talking about him 2600 years after he died."  The same could be said for all the prophets of all religions.  It is the same myth that is perpetuated, though Buddhists differentiate by clarifying the Buddha's teachings did not have the same focus of eternalism that the messianic religions had, or developed.  Nor did the complete opposite nihilistic view encompass what the Buddha said he discovered.  But the myth remains - the story of a prince who gives it all up to find a way out of suffering.

I asked a good buddy who knows comics to help me find what I am looking for.  These were some sites he found:

www.buddhanet.net has great teaching tools for primary and secondary students - I need to do some more digging to find out who these guys are and from where they are pulling their information.  This coloring book of the life story of the Buddha is quite detailed and cleared up a few of my questions and confused other facts I thought I knew e.g. in this book, it says that the first person to give the Buddha food after he fainted during his six years living and practicing as an aesthetic was a young nameless boy.  I had understood that Sudhana gave him rice and milk and this was enough to realize that the way of denial of physical needs was the opposite spectrum and there needed to be a balance to that.  Hm.

Deepak Chopra also has an illustrated book of the life of the Buddha - here's the cover.  I am not sure about this one.  I didn't know that Deepak Chopra was a Buddhist ? ?

Then, there is a famous Japanese graphic novel called Buddha by Osamu Tezuka in eight volumes.  People I talked with seem to know this one best.  I endeavor to read this as soon as possible.  Here's a review of the series.

Other suggestions are most welcome.  I leave you with this found here.

8-Fold Path

A result of Buddha Sakyamuni's first turning of the wheel of Dharma at Sarnath were the four noble truths.  Many have expoused, interpreted, explained, described, meditated upon and put into action these truths.

1. Suffering exits
2. Suffering is caused by desire and attachment
3. Release from suffering is possible
4. The 8-fold path is the way to work to be released from suffering

The 8-Fold Path is the main focus of the Hinayana or Theravada tradition of Buddhism, but the foundation for all other schools and practices.  Here is are two schematics from different schools (not sure which ones yet) that describe and try to quantify the 8-fold path -

This first one I like because its visual shows interaction between the steps on the path that seems to help the viewer understand the progress they might want to take.  I don't yet understand the sanskrit translations of the words, and why it is the format it is in. 

This second one from a transcendental awareness (what?) news journal gives a practical explanation of the path breaking down what I know to be the different categories of practice within each step of the path (from various Tibetan Buddhist sources).

The Path breaks down into three sections (as depicted above in the spiral) as practices of body, speech, and mind.  These aims are to then cleanse, over many many lifetimes, the negative karmic habitual tendencies each human being carries from lifetime to lifetime.

Understanding Tantra

The students this semester have found it difficult to come to an understanding of Tantra - rituals, practice, history, context, meaning - and of course, where it fits in relevantly to their academic study, as well as their developing spiritual lives and belief systems. 

I have been reading from different sources attempting to clarify definitions and construct my own understandings of these traditions from Indian Hindu and Buddhist and Tibetan Buddhist sources.  My knowledge remains limited to my small experience and tiny capacity for understanding, but maybe I can make some sense of these things in order to be a better guide for the students. 
 
What is Tantra?
Today from the Tibetan Buddhist Gelug perspective, there are two - First from Alexander Berzin, who has worked extensively with HH the 14th Dalai Lama on Kalachakra initiation.  Berzin also hosts an opensource website with layers of resources for those looking to study more deeply.  These quotes are from his book, Taking the Kalachakra Initiation, which is written to help the aspirant prepare for receiving the initiation. (1997, Snow Lion Publications: Ithaca, New York)

"Some people have odd notions about tantra and imagine, with great anticipation, that an initiation is an entranceway into a magic world of exotic sex and superpowers.  When they learn that this is not the case, but rather that tantric practice is complex, advanced, and requires seious committment and the keeping of many vows, they become frightened and are put off.  Neither of these reactions, of excitement of fear is appropriate."  (p.17)

"The word tantra means an everlasting stream of continuity... the everlasting stream is our mind - specifically its subtlest level know as primordial clear light - which provides continuity throughout all our lifetimes.  Like a pure laser beam of mere clarity and awareness, unadulterated by the gross oscillations of conceptual thought of disturbing emotions, it underlies each moment of experience, whether we are awake or asleep." (p.18)

Berzin goes on to describe the continuity like a radio that remains on through the process of finding the station to tune in to.  Through the station playing the music, the static between the stations, or how loud the radio is playing, the radio is still a radio - an open receiver for broadcast.  Tapping in to this continuity is the point of the practice - recognizing that it is there within each of us (each a different radio) and we all can recognize this potential. 

Lama Thubten Yeshe, one of the first visitors and teachers to the United State and the "West" from the Tibetan Buddhist Gelug tradition in the 1970s and 1980s, often gave teachings on the meanings and definitions of tantra in order to benefit his students.  He often said that the western mind was ripe for receiving and understanding these teachings and that, "The practice of tantra is so suitable for the modern West because it is 'scientific.'"  (p. xii)

Here are some quotes from his book Introduction to Tantra: The Transformation of Desire. Compiled by Jonathan Landow.  2001: Wisdom Publications, Sommerville, MA. 

(quotes below from Jonathan Landow's preface)

"Tantra, far from being a system of dogma to be accepted on faith or authority, is in fact a practical, step-by-step exploration of the human condition leading to self-discovery, and its results are verifiable through our own observations and experiences." (p. xii)

"The practice of tantra, which is designed to take advantage of this hidden inner resource and utilize it to the maximum extent, offers us the best opportunity to overcome these presures and transform our lives into the meaningful, integrated whole that we desire." (p. xii)

"Tantra is a path of joy and affirmation, qualities so sadly lacking in many of the currently depleted forms of what were once powerful spiritual traditions."  (p. xii)

"According to the Buddhist teachings, no matter how confused or deluded we may be at the moment, the underlying and essential nature of our being is clear and pure.  In the same way that clouds can temporarily obscure but cannot damage the light-giving power of the sun, so too the temporary afflictions of body and mind - our confusion, anxiety, and the suffering they cause - can temporarily obscure but cannot destroy or even tough the fundamentally clear nature of our consciousness." (p. 2)

"And the ultimate purpose of all spiritual practices, whether they are called Buddhist or not, is to uncover and make contact with this essential pure nature." (p. 2)

"When we have developed our own inner purity, inner compassion, and inner love, we can then see the reflection of this purity and loving-kindness in others.  But if we have not contacted these qualities within ourselves, we will see everyone as ugly and limited.  For whatever we see every day in our outer reality is actually nothing more than a projection of our own inner reality." (p. 2)

Lama Yeshe goes on to describe the difference between the two main approaches of Tibetan Buddhism - according to the sutrayana and tantrayana.  Sutrayana refers to the gradual causal path of purifying and cleansing the mind of its faults and limitations and replacing them with beneficial qualities of love and wisdom.  "This path consists of creating specific causes - behaving ethically, developing our powers of concentration, training in meditative insight, and so forth - for the future attainment of full awakening."  (p. 3)

Tantrayana is the faster method because one is trained to utilize the subtle energy of desire and negative emotions in order to more quickly and efficiently cleanse the mind of its faults.  "Although tantric practitioners do not neglect creating the same causes as the followers of sutra, they take the future result of full spiritual evolution as the very starting point in their path.  To put this in other words, the tantric yogi or yogini - as these supremely skillful practitioners are called in Sanskrit - learns to think, speak, and act now as if he or she were already a fully enlightened buddha." (p. 3)

"Speaking generally we can say that all the many practices of tantra involve the principle of transformation.  As modern science has demonstrated, the physical universe with its infinite variety of phenomena - from the smallest subatomic particle to the largest galaxy - is in an unceasing state of transformation and evolution from one form of energy to another.  Our own body and mind are also energy, and whether we are healthy or ill, mentally balanced or berserk, depends on whether our mental and physical energies are harmonious or not.  Through the proper practice of tantra all of our energies, including the subtle yet very powerful energies we are not ordinarily aware of, are harnessed to accomplish the greatest of all transformations.  This is our evolution from an ordinary, limited and deluded person trapped within the shell of a petty ego into a fully evolved, totally conscious being of unlimited compassion and insight." (p.5)

From these quotes we can understand - tantra is about transformation of our deluded mind into the inherent clear and luminous lazer beam that is our primordial nature.  Methods and techniques of tantric practice are of a resultant nature, taking this truth to be, philosophically, all one needs to accomplish enlightenment. 

"Instead of viewing pleasure and desire as something to be avoided at all costs, tantra recognizes the powerful energy aroused by our desires to be an indispensable resource for the spiritual path.  Because the goal is nothing less than the realization of our highest human potential, tantra seeks to transform every experience - no matter how 'unreligious' it may appear - into the path of fulfillment."  (p. 9)

A major feature about the rise of tantrism in India (Hindu and Buddhist) was its reactionary nature to the social taboos of the time - Buddhist tantra emerged from the Hindu tradition being practiced at the time of Sakyamuni, but its base is deep in the Hindu system of religious practice.  We cannot take this out of its context.  Brahmanical Hinduism 2500 years ago (this information needs more understanding.... ) set up a social caste system which supported the civility of the time.  Social taboos such as eating meat, drinking alcohol, and having sex were embraced by tantric practitioners not necessarily in order to transgress social boundaries, but rather to liberate themselves from the social structure.  Social taboos being forbidden became the cause of desire for many.  Using the energy of desire in a proper way was thought to facilitate spiritual enlightenment.

The historical Buddha Sakyamuni took this a step further by developing a philosophy of finding a balance between desire and aversion.  He denied his desires for six years to the extent that toward the end of this time he was not much more than a skeleton. "Instead of bringing him closer to his goal of transcendence, it was only making him too weak to think and meditate clearly." (p.12) 

Lama Yeshe continues to explain the first teaching on tantra by Sakyamuni Buddha was given to a king who requested such a teaching that would allow the king himself to take care of his subjects properly but he would not be able to do as Sakyamuni himself had done and renounce his worldly existence to find spiritual enlightenment.  The Buddha gave the Kalachakra Tantra to the king as a way to balance the responsibilities of a ruler, but also offer the potential of realization on the spiritual level.  This is seen as a noble act; the king is able to fulfill his responsibilities as a ruler but also accomplish personal realization. (p. 13)

Questions remaining: 
Where did the Buddha come up with Kalachakra teachings?  How did they fit into the Hindu context at the time?  How old are Hindu tantra teachings and how are they different than the tantra teachings of Sakyamuni Buddha?  How did Hindu yogis view Siddhartha and his path?  How different are Buddhism and Hinduism, actually?  What is the difference?  How did the teachings at the time of the Buddha change or develop into the teaching we are able to find from different Buddhist traditions today?  Example: Tibetan and Japanese Buddhism.  If Sakyamuni taught different tantric practices during his lifetime, how have they all been preserved and disseminated - who understands these things and how are they taught?  How does one explain all of this subtlety to university students who have misconceptions about tantra based on flashy cultural images of sex and candy?

Right Speech

"The pillar of skillful speech is to speak honestly, which means that we should even avoid telling little white lies. We need to be aware of dishonesty in the forms of exaggerating, minimizing, and self-aggrandizing. These forms of unskillful speech often arise from a fear that what we are is not good enough––and that is never true. Honesty begins at home, so the practice of skillful speech begins with being honest with ourselves."

- Allan Lokos, "Skillful Speech" (Winter 2008)

Using Metaphor as a teaching tool...

As an observation of the students that I am working with this semester, my boss and I have have many chats about the fact that the students don't understand metaphor.  Makes it quite difficult to understand poetry, art, and interpretations of history for that matter.  The students seem to be constantly staring at us with blank looks when we use metaphors to explain concepts in music, dance, and history.

One way I have addressed this in the past is to see it from their shoes - what metaphors make sense in their lives?  There is flat understanding when a teacher uses a metaphor from his/her own life that the students just haven't experienced yet.  Example - having kids, being married, graduating, turning 30, spending 5 years working on a degree that you never end up using in your work.  Is it the teacher's responsibility to come up with the metaphors that work for the students?  Can the teacher know the students' experience well enough to do that?  As the teacher gets older and the students stay the same age, does this process become more and more difficult?

I am looking for some research that my old boss told me about sometime that I always use as an example but can never remember who did the research - that our brains develop fully by the age of 25.  Something about the corpus callosum being the last part of the brain to fully develop?  So juniors and seniors in college still have a difficult time navigating things outside of their worldview - i.e. they process things through their own lens and have a difficult time empathising with others' experiences because some part of the brain is not developed fully yet.  It is a difficult world for them because at the same moment, they are expected to understand how to manage their time, be socially savvy, excellent writers and processors of information, build their resumes with heartfelt humanitarian work, and mind their manners.  That's a lot when you are doing it from one perspective.

That's not to say that holding them to committments and expectations isn't important - if you've been aware of a paper that is due on Friday at 5 pm for three weeks (and it is one of those papers that you have to do a lot of work on for three weeks rather than something you can write in two hours), don't ask for an extension at 2 pm on Friday afternoon!  And teachers, it's our responsibility to say NO to the extension.  Of course, in a skillful way that builds your relationship to the student - asking the right questions (rather than telling them, or putting them on the defensive) to help the student understand how they have been managing their time.

OI - so this come back to metaphor?  somehow.  Nuance.  More than taxonomic understanding.  making connections.  I've always been a visual learner - I notice myself, when a lecturer or facilitator is presenting a metaphor to help me understand some concept, I visualize it in my mind.  I draw the picture in my mind of a cave, a fire, a huge wall, and people looking at the wall and feeling fearful of what they see when someone is describing Plato's allegory.

I do my best when I am the one presenting the metaphor to actually picture it in my head while I describe, or tell stories in hopes that the image comes across through my words. Would the Matrix (Morpheus explaining the matrix to a newly awakened Neo) work better for these guys?

Bringing it Home:
Buddhism is filled with allegory and seemingly mythical stories that one can interpret at many levels - stories and hagiographies telling of powerful beings, manifestations of the compassionate mind, legendary diligence, and boundless wisdom.  These stories serve to inspire us to engage - to search for our own relationship to meaning.  It's our responsibility to figure this out.  (Here are some examples in a recent IDP blog...) The point that these metaphors serve is to wake us up.  To shake us from our habit.  To help us recognize our nature through identifying and then detaching from that identification, for we can see that way how strongly we identify, if we pay attention.

I need a metaphor to explain it.  :)

Candles

Transferring Merit 

When a candle is lit in a dark room, it illuminates the room to some extent, but its power is limited. But if you use the same candle to light another candle, the total brightness increases. If you continue to do this, you can fill the room with brilliant illumination. The idea of transferring merit to others is like this. If we keep our own light selfishly hidden, it will only provide a limited amount of illumination. But when we share our light with others, we do not diminish our own light. Rather, we increase the amount of light available to all. Therefore, when others light our candle, we issue forth light. When out of gratitude we use our candle to light other people’s candles, the whole room gets brighter. This is why we transfer merit to others. This kind of light is continuous and inexhaustible.

- Master Sheng Yen from "Rich Generosity" (Spring 2009)

The Ticket

Abundant Equanimity 

'Equanimity, one of the most sublime emotions of Buddhist practice, is the ground for wisdom and freedom and the protector of compassion and love. While some may think of equanimity as dry neutrality or cool aloofness, mature equanimity produces a radiance and warmth of being. The Buddha described a mind filled with equanimity as “abundant, exalted, immeasurable, without hostility, and without ill-will.”'

- Gil Fronsdal from "A Perfect Balance" (Winter 2005)