buddhism research paper thesis

258 Buddhism Essay Topics & Examples

Looking for Buddhism essay topics? Being one of the world’s largest and most ancient religions, buddhism is definitely worth exploring!

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In your Buddhism essay, you might want to focus on the history of the religion or Buddhist attitude to controversial social issues. Another option would be to write about Buddhist philosophy or practices. Whether you need to write a short Buddhism essay or a more substantive paper, this article will be helpful. Here you’ll find a collection of 241 Buddhism topics for essays and research papers together with Buddhism essay examples.

🏆 Best Buddhism Essay Examples & Topic Ideas

• Japanese Buddhism vs. Chinese Buddhism: Differences The introduction and spread of Buddhism in Japan depended on the support that was offered by the Japanese rulers. Japanese Buddhist art has relied heavily on the Chinese art since the introduction of Buddhism in […]
• Buddhism and Hinduism: Similarities and Differences The most conspicuous similarity is the origin of the two religions in sub-continent India. Some worship and religious practices are similar but there is a profound difference in the style and purpose of life in […]
• Buddhism and Sikhism Comparison: Four Noble Truths The four are dukkha, the origin of dukkha, the cessation of dukkha, and the path to the cessation of suffering. He forsook the luxuries and other benefits associated with life in the palace to join […]
• Judaism and Buddhism: Overview and Comparison If reform Judaism is on one side of the spectrum and orthodox Judaism is on the other one, conservative Jews are in the center.
• The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism In the third Noble Truth, the Buddha identified a cure to the problem and in the fourth Noble Truth, he identified the prescription to end suffering.
• ”The History of God” by Karen Armstrong: An Overview of the History of Judaism, Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, and Hinduism “The History of God” by Karen Armstrong is a comprehensive overview of the history of the development of Judaism, Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, and Hinduism.
• Dharma in Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and Sikhism This essay aims to describe the ideas of dharma in the religions of Jainism, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Sikhism in terms of their doctrines, rituals, origin tales, and modes of worship.
• Four Noble Truths as Buddhism Fundamentals The first noble truth in Buddhism teachings is the truth of suffering that is frequently referred to as Dukkha. The last interpretation of the Dukkha is the expression of suffering that is inevitable.
• Buddhist Allegories in “The Monkey and the Monk” The Monkey and the Monk is not an ordinary story with a list of characters with the ability to develop particular relationships, grow in their specific ways, and demonstrate necessary lessons to the reader.
• The Idea Salvation in Buddhism Religion Focusing on the discussion of the concept of salvation in Buddhism, it is important to state that salvation is the emancipation of a person from the attachment to the reality and from the person’s focus […]
• History: Women in Hinduism and Buddhism For instance, one of the main problems that arise when examining the situation of women in Karimpur is the fact that there is a considerable level of disparity in the survival rates between male and […]
• Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism Elements Hindus, the last power is discovered in the Vedas and the writing of the religious leaders willing to view the fact nature of reality.
• Comparison of Buddhism and the Baptist Religions The other structure in the Temple is the vihan which is the place where the members of the Temple assemble for prayers.
• Comparison of Hinduism and Buddhism Rituals Buddhism and Hinduism are some of the popular religions in the world with their origins dating back to the Common Era in India.
• Reflection on Self in Buddhism and Hinduism The specificity of the Buddhist concept of the human self lies in the acceptance of the distinction between self and general in a spiritual aspect.
• Buddhism: The Concept of Death and Dying Life is permanent but death is the transition of a human soul to either one of the six Buddhist realms. The purpose of this paper is to explain the concept of death from the Buddhist […]
• Shinto and Its Relationship With China and Buddhism As such, those who identify with the two religions have continued to engage in practices of the Buddhist and Shinto faiths either knowingly or unknowingly.
• Religion in Japan: Buddhism, Shintoism, and Daoism Unlike in different European and American nations, the citizens of this country uphold unique ideas informed by the concepts of Buddhism and Shintoism.
• Buddhism in ‘The World’s Religions’ by Huston Smith Although in his The World’s Religions, Huston Smith identifies speculation as one of the religious constants, Buddhism views humans’ endeavors to ascertain the truth as meaningless and fruitless pursuit: It is not on the view […]
• Philosophy of Confucius Compared to That of Buddhism This due to the fact that only the aspect of ethics in the Buddhist philosophy can be significantly likened to the Confucian philosophy.
• Death and Dying in Christianity and Buddhism Birth and death are part of everybody’s life: birth is the beginning of living, and death is the end of it.
• Buddhism and Christianity The privileged persons of society such as presidents and the rich have similar chances in comparison to the destitute persons. Contrary to this, Christians appreciate the existence of God and acknowledge Him as their path […]
• The Confluence of Buddhism and Hinduism in India The basis of Buddhism is found in the answers to two questions that Gautama attempted to answer. Buddhism was spread to other parts of the world with different doctrines and beliefs.
• Religious Studies: Hinduism and Buddhism Samsara refers to the processor rebirth whereby the individual is reincarnated in a succession of lives. This is what has led to the many differences that arise, causing Buddhism to be viewed as a religious […]
• Buddhism in China: Origin and Expansion One of the most fascinating cultural histories is the existence and the expansion of Buddhism in China. However, it is worth noting that one of the most significant factors, which favored the flourishing of Buddhism, […]
• Concepts of Buddhism At the age of twenty-nine, he left the comforts of the palace and went out to seek the real meaning of life.
• Buddhism: Analysis of the Religion’s Faith and Practices This includes the name of the religion followers, the history and origins of the religion including the founders, the name of the Supreme Being or God, as well as the name of the place of […]
• Anatman and Atman Concepts in Buddhism and Hinduism Rendering to the Atman notion, Atman is eventually in the custody of people’s reactions to what happens in the outside world. The idea of the self in assembly to God is where Hinduism and Buddhism […]
• Hinduism and Buddhism: Comparative Analysis One of the basic concepts in Indian philosophy: the soul, drowning in the “ocean of samsara,” seeks liberation and deliverance from the results of its past actions, which are part of the “net of samsara”.
• Buddhism and Christianity: Comparison and Contrast The principal teachings of the religion are on enlightenment which is thought to be attained through a life of self-deprivation. Christianity is evident in the existence of one supreme being who is the creator of […]
• The Feminine Aspect of Tibetan Buddhism One of the inspiring stories of the first of enlightened females in the literature is of Princess Yeshe Bawa who was a follower of the Buddha of her time and was determined to become enlightened.
• Three Jewels of Buddhism and Their Role The three jewels of Buddhism which are the main ideals at the heart of Buddhism are together identified as the Three Jewels, or the Three Treasures.
• Wu Wei in Daoism and Zen Buddhism Therefore, the original ideas and thoughts of Taoism are believed to have influenced the development of Zen Buddhism in China. This discussion shows clearly that emptiness in Buddhism points to dependent origination as the true […]
• Buddhism: Religion or Philosophy Buddhists believe in a higher power and life after death, they have a moral code of ethics, and they perform rituals; these things are the definition of established religion.
• Role of Brahmanism in the Decline of Buddhism In addition to this, the persecution of Bramanical Kings together with the anti-Buddhism propaganda was a heavy hit to the Buddhists.
• Buddhism: The History of Development 3 Perception of the world among Buddhists One of the staunch belief systems of the Buddhists is attached on the notion that solution to problems can be caused through suffering.
• Four Noble Truths in Buddhist Teaching The Buddha said that there is dukkha, there is an origin of dukkha, there is an end of dukkha and there is a path that leads to the end of dukkha.
• Myanmar Buddhism: Between Controversy and Ecumenism Firstly, the formation of a Buddha through the ritual performance by placing and identifying within a person’s body the traits of the Buddha that, in turn, become the Buddha.
• Buddhist Meditation’s Impact on Health My goal is to determine whether Buddhist meditation can help an individual find a sense of mental, emotional, and spiritual balance in their life.

👍 Good Essay Topics on Buddhism

• Hindu Pathways and Buddhist Noble Truths The Buddha relates life suffering in the Four Noble Truths to that of a physician who identifies the symptoms of the suffering, finds out the causes, identifies ways to stop, and finally administers treatment.
• Paths to Enlightenment in Hinduism and Buddhism This paper will compare the paths to moksha with the Four Noble Truths and argue that raja yoga would best utilize the Buddhist method of the Eightfold Path.
• Mahayana Buddhism: Growth and Development of Buddhism The Mahayana elaboration of this concept is unusual in that it uses the term “bodhisattva” to refer to anyone who has the desire to become a Buddha and does not require that this desire be […]
• Distribution Features of Confucianism and Buddhism Confucianism is more a philosophical doctrine than a religion, and its connection with the East is strong due to the specifics of the Asian mentality.
• Buddhism and Christianity: Similarities and Differences While Buddhists see suffering as an integral part of life, in Christianity people can put a stop to it finding unity with God, a notion that may cause misunderstanding on the part of Buddhist adepts.
• Ethics in the Buddhist Tradition The concept of ethics and morality is one of the perfection followers of Buddhism must strive to achieve enlightenment. Techniques include entering into the flow and control of the senses, understanding the practice of return, […]
• Health Beliefs in Buddhist Religion Moreover, the body and mind are interdependent; thus, Buddhists consider greed, anger, and ignorance as the main aspects affecting the deterioration of human well-being.
• Indigenous Religions, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism For example, Confucianism is one of the modern national religions of China, which was formed at the turn of the new era based on the ethical-philosophical teachings of Confucius and his followers.
• Analysis of Buddhism Idea and Paradox The most important aspect that attracted me to this film was the authentic depiction of the traditions of old Ceylon and the excellent atmosphere of the festival.
• Buddhism and the Definition of Religion On the one hand, the concepts of ‘laukika’ and ‘lokottara,’ which can be roughly translated as ‘of the world’ and ‘not of the world,’ more or less corresponding to Western ideas of profane and sacred.
• Why Was the Silk Road So Important in the Spread of Buddhism The fundamental importance was the spread of Buddhism from India to the rest of the world. Trade development along the Silk Road resulted in the expansion of Buddhism to Eastern Asia and China.
• Karma and Other Concepts in Buddhism The afflictions that propel rebirth in the wheel of existence are the teachings of new reality after death in a circumstance known as samsara.
• Buddhism and Hinduism: A Comparative Study While in the case of Hinduism, samsara is the cyclical rebirth of the soul that remains unchanged, Buddhism teaches that samsara is the transformation of a person into something else.
• Hinduism, Buddhism, the Bhagavad Gita, and the Ramayana in the News Media It also implies that the government of the country where Hinduism is the predominant religion is concerned because of the mistakes revealed by mass media.
• Architeture and Function in Buddhism, Christianity, and Islamic Religion In Buddhism religion, various architectural structures like Stupas which are oldest in Buddhism and Pagodas which are major form of architectural structures in Buddhism have been used for long time up to date.
• An Introduction to Buddhism The doctrines of suffering and rebirth are contained in dharma which is also the teachings of Buddhism. It is celebrated to remember a historical and important event that took place in the life of Budha.
• A Conversation With a Buddhist The biggest role when discussing Buddhism is often given to the ability to see the light and become one of the sources of it.
• Buddhism: Ancient Wisdom and Modern Times The problem of wanting more and more is often the main reason why people fail to follow the Five Precepts of Buddhism, resort to violence, get lost in indulging themselves, and defy moral principles.
• Healthy Grief: Kübler-Ross, Job, and Buddhist Stages of Grieving The author also recognizes the fact that the five phases of grieving do not necessarily manifest in the same order in everyone. In the ‘anger’ stage, people begin to comprehend the reality of the situation.
• Comprehending Heart Sutra in Mahayana Buddhism The sutra is chanted in Chinese, but the general message is the same regardless of the language or even the version of the verses.
• Buddhism and Sexuality: Restraining Sexual Desires for Enlightenment It is considered to be more honest to refuse to stick to the aforementioned rules than to be a hypocritical member of the community, who consciously violates the codes.
• Buddhist Arts and Visual Culture In contrast, the Gandhara sculptures were usually made of grey sandstone, whereas the ones found in Sarnath are in the buff one.
• Soul Concept in Islam and Buddhism And since this pursuit is ever continual, the soul is therefore eternal.’The Soul’ in Buddhism: One of the most distinct concepts of Buddhism is the assertion that there is no soul.
• Religion. How Buddhism Views the World Evaluating the general information about this religion, it appears that Buddhism is seen as one of the most popular and widespread religions on the earth the reason of its pragmatic and attractive philosophies which are […]
• Animal Ethics From the Buddhist Perspective In biomedical research and ethics, one of the most frequently debated issues regarding the use of animals in healthcare research is the concept of animal rights.
• Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism in America: A Country of Many Religions This paper aims to explore the impact of Islam, Hindu, and Buddhism on the diversity in America today and answer the question what role they are playing in the society.
• Buddhism in China: Yogācāra Buddhism However, the logical structure of the Yogak ra was not mere speculation, and the ultimate scopes of tradition remained the attainment of the Buddhahood and liberation from the Sams ra.
• The Emergence of Tibetan Buddhism According to modern historians, it is widely believed that the religion based on the Buddha’s teachings first came to Tibet in the seventh century of the Common Era, with the period of its most active […]
• China Impact on Transformation of Buddhist Teachings The unique Chinese Buddhist tradition was formed under the impact of the long-established worldview of the Chinese culture on the original ideas of Buddhism.
• No-Self or Anatman Concept in Buddhism In his teachings, the Buddha used the idea of no-self to disprove the logical consistency of seeing people as creatures that are independent in terms of perception and knowledge.
• The Unexamined Life and the Buddhist Four Noble Truths One is happy to see healthy grandkids playing in the green backyard of the beautiful house because the life goals are met and this brings happiness because there have been so many questions and uncertainties […]
• Buddhism: Definition and Origins of Buddhism However, there is admittance to the existence, reality and truth that in one general conscious awareness, Buddhism is man’s inclination to support or be loyal to and to agree to an opinion of the Teaching […]
• Comparing Early Christian and Buddhist Sculpture During his reign, the territory of the Byzantine Empire expanded significantly, having become the largest during the whole history of the Byzantine Empire; it is possible to say that the cult of Justinian existed in […]
• The Place of Buddhism Among Other Religions The purpose of this paper is to analyze the eight fold path in Buddhism and its similarities with other religion. Buddhism is one of the major religions in the world and shares a lot in […]
• Hindu and Buddhism: Concept of Karma Indeed, the teachings tend to create a balance between spirituality and ordinary human life in the sense that, by following the path of attaining knowledge and the quest to understand the oneself as human through […]
• Nature of Self, Death, and Ethics in Buddhism The state of ultimate reality is pervasive and it builds the foundation of being and the source of energy in every atom and the life of every creature.
• Vedic Hinduism, Classical Hinduism, and Buddhism: A Uniting Belief Systems The difference between Vedic and Classical Hinduism is fundamentally approach towards life rather than beliefs or reformation and the progression from the former to latter is not clear in terms of time.
• The Comparison of Buddhism and Taoism Philosophies In Taoism the aim is attain Tao while the Buddhists strive to reach the nirvana and adhere to the four noble truths.
• Nirvana in Buddhism and Atman in Hinduism The Mantras which is the text of the Vedas are the personification of the Brahman and are divided into two forms which are the karma-Kanda and the Jnana-Kanda.

💡 Easy Buddhism Essay Topics

• Buddhist Religion, Its Past and Its Present The first and the foremost form of Buddhism that has long been practiced is known as the Theravada Buddhism, which is also known as Southern Buddhism; sporadically spelled as Therevada has been the governing discipline […]
• Thailand’s Social Investment Project and Buddhist Philosophy According to the World Bank, the first priority area of the Social Investment Project was to respond to the economic and financial crises through the provision of vital social services to the poor and unemployed […]
• World Religions. Buddhism and Its Teaching As per the teachings of this religion, happiness and contentment is possible. The Fourth Noble Truth is all about Noble eightfold path, as being the path leading to the end of suffering.
• Buddhism and Hinduism: A Comparison Both of Hinduism and Buddhism have shared beliefs but they are different in the practice of duties, worshipped, the founders of the religions.
• How Tibetan Buddhism Is Represented by Hollywood LITTLE BUDDHA is a well-represented film by Hollywood that tells the story of Jesse Conrad and has a major parallels story of a prince Siddhartha in which the story talks about the birth of Buddhism.
• The History of Buddhism in Korea: Origin, Establishment, and Development The Koryo dynasty’s era witnessed the creation of the Korean Tripitaka, this is a collection of all of the Buddhist sacred books or the scriptures and era of the spread of Buddhism also the period […]
• Buddhism. “The Burmese Harp” Drama Film When the Japanese troops are supposed to surrender and a soldier is sent to other Japanese troops to tell them to drop their guns, they deny the orders and continue to fight and thereby, continue […]
• Ways in Which the Hindu and Buddhist Philosophy Criticize the Body as a Source of Suffering Yet Use It as Path to Enlighten The level of how weakness and sensibility to pain, adversity is discouraged is shown when the lord Krishna makes it a point to elaborate to Arjuna, that in his position as a warrior he has […]
• Buddhism and Greater Peace: Conflict, Visions of Peace The main reason for this Buddhism teaches is that by encouraging people in the communities to live in peace with neighbors, chances of conflicts would greatly be diminished.
• Middle Path’ in Chinese Buddhism and Zen Buddhism Followers of Mahayana tradition consider their doctrine as the finding of the truth about the nature and teachings of the Buddha in contrast to the Theravada tradition, which they characterize as Lesser Vehicle, known as […]
• Dualism, Ignorance, and Clinging in the Buddhism Writings To understand the truth of life, the essence of objects, and the meaning of existence, it is necessary to set yourself aside from fixed thoughts.
• Existence Viewed by Modern America, Buddhism, and Christianity Humans of all generations and historical periods seek to find the answer to the cause about the cause of life, the destiny and the role of each human in the life of others.
• Karuna Part of Spiritual Path in Buddhism and Jainism The purpose of this paper is to study the concept of karuna in Buddhism and its relevance to the two major sects in that religion namely Theravada Buddhism and Mahayana Buddhism.
• Buddhism Studies: A Visit of the Jade Buddha Temple The teachings of the Buddhist are essentially meant to change ourselves and not others like a Christian believer and in the teaching the change occurs when we are “filled with” or we are awaken to […]
• Buddhism: Brief History of Religion From Origin to Modern Days The faith of Buddhism was shaped by a man by the name of Siddhartha Gautama who is supposed to have been imagines by a miraculous conception “in which the future Buddha came to his look […]
• Buddhism in Koryo Analysis Although some of the concepts similar to the teachings Buddhism had spread to Paschke and Koguyo, the places inhabited by the Koryo people, the religion preached by Buddha could not be firmly established in two […]
• Meeting of Buddhist Monks and Nuns The stupa became a symbol of the Buddha, of his final release from the cycle of birth and rebirth – the Parinirvana or the “Final Dying,” the monk explained. He explained that the main Buddha […]
• Teachings of Buddhism as a Means to Alleviate Sadness Buddhism, one of the major religions of the world, provides valuable teachings on how to alleviate sadness in life, among others specifically advocating Contentment, Peace of Mind and Love, all of which lie at the […]
• Presenting Christianity to Buddhism A Buddhist can therefore relate to the phrase ‘kingdom of God’ as the process of living and discovering the heaven that is located within a person’s heart.
• Buddhism and William James’ Theory of Religions It can also be learned from the theory that philosophy is the head of emancipation, and the proletariat is its heart.
• Salvation and Self in Hinduism and Theravada Buddhism The accomplishment of the elevating state of ‘Moksha’ is the final goal of Hinduism, whereas Buddhism aspires to attain the elevating state of ‘Nirvana’ as its final aim.’Moksha’, the final outcome of which is ultimate […]
• Formation and Development of Tibetan Buddhist Canon Kangyur means “translations of the word” of the Buddhas and consists of sutras, tantras, and the root texts attributed to the Buddhas Buddha Shakyamuni and later enlightened beings, like Guru Padmasambhava.
• Buddhist Teachings Allegory in “Monkey” by Lamport The Monkey is one of the masterpieces of literature that contains the ethics, morality, religion, and culture of the Eastern world.
• Monkey Novel as an Allegory of Buddhist Teachings The purpose of this paper is to explain why Monkey is an allegory of Buddhist teachings in the selected novel. The reader also observed that Tripitaka is a representation of the physical outcomes and experiences […]
• Buddhism. Allegory in “The Monkey and the Monk” In The Monkey & the Monk: an Abridgment of the Journey to the West, the Monkey is one of the main protagonists of the book, as is apparent from its title.
• Buddhism Spread as Globalization of Knowledge Modern Buddhism has been integrated as a key part of the globalization movement, and it explains why the faith has spread throughout different parts of the world.[3] The correlation between Buddhism and globalization stems from […]
• Buddhism in Different Historical Regions He became Buddha and gathered disciples in the valley of the Ganges who spread the knowledge and contributed to the scripture.
• Buddhism in Taiwan Then and Now The origin and development of Buddhism is attributed to the life experiences and achievements of the Buddha. 1 The Dutch colonialists and settlers from China presented the teachings of the Buddha to the people.
• Nirvana and Other Buddhism Concepts Different regions have adopted specific ways of being religious that have been influenced by the cultural attributes of the people, influence from other religions, and the ideas associated with various Asian philosophies.
• Buddhism in the 19th and 20th Centuries The 19th and 20th centuries brought challenges and opportunities for Buddhism, as a religious sect, which underlined the need for change from an amorphous and disorganized outfit to the formation of institutions of governance and […]
• Changes to Buddhism in Modern Times Buddhism originated in the middle of the first millennium BC in northern India as an opposition to the religion of Brahmanism that dominated in those days. Tolerance of Buddhism undoubtedly contributes to its attractiveness in […]
• The Tibetan Buddhism Lecture On the journey to Nirvana, traditions of donation of money and donation of the body are important, as charity is said to benefit those around you and make the journey easier. Tibetan Buddhism is very […]
• Buddhism in China, Its Spread and Sinification The lack of material concerning the early spread of Buddhism into China and the appearance of a dignified form of Buddhism has suggested a series of factors that contributed to filtering the original Indian doctrine […]
• World Religions: Confucianism and Buddhism Birth as the first stage of human life is supported by rituals that have to protect the woman and her child.
• Religions: Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity and Islam In the Bhagavad Gita, three yogas, or paths to liberation, are outlined: jnana yoga, which liberates one via knowledge; karma yoga, which liberates one via actions; and bhakti yoga, which liberates one via devotion.
• Hinduism and Buddhism: Definition and Comparison The only technique required in this context is wouldevotion.’ The followers of this religious group are required to demonstrate outstanding devotion as they strive to serve their religious faiths.
• Buddhism and Christianity: Comparative Religious Analysis The wiremen’s interpretation of the dream was that there was going to be born a son to the royal family. Christ was born of the Virgin Mary, Siddharta was a son to the Queen.
• Jainism and Theravada Buddhism The cause of this violence, according to Jainism, is greed and so for a person to attain the ultimate goal, which is bliss or liberation from karma.
• Buddhism Practices, Theories, Teachings, Rituals The author provides the evolution of Buddhism and the main religious figures that influenced the formation of the Buddhist vision of the world.

⭐ Buddhism Research Paper Topics

• Religious Rituals in Judaism and Buddhism This whole process causes the religious follower to learn that the sacred or the spiritual is a vital part of the human world.
• The Key Features of Buddhist Thought and Practice These three characteristics are always connected with existence as they tend to illuminate the nature of existence as well as helping the faithful to have knowledge of what to do with existence.
• Asian Philosophy: Veddic Period and Early Buddhism In the creation hymn of the Rg Vega, Aditi is acknowledged to be the god of all gods because he is the creator and has equally been granted the status of five men.
• Death of the Historical Buddha in Zen Buddhism The hanging scroll Death of the Historical Buddha is a perfect example of an idiosyncratic subgenre of the nirvana images, which permeated Japanese art in the sixth century after the adoption of Buddhism.[4] The composition […]
• Filial Piety in Zen Buddhist Discursive Paradigm Nevertheless, there appears to have been a phenomenological quality to the development in question, because during the initial phase of Buddhism’s expansion into China this concept used to be commonly regarded contradictory to the religion’s […]
• Daoism’s Influence on Chan Buddhism in China To comprehend the connection between Daoism and Buddhism and the possible influence of the former on the latter, it is expected to identify the main concepts of Taoism in Chinese philosophy and culture first.
• Buddhism and Confucianism in Modern China In the article “Concepts and Institutions for a New Buddhist Education: Reforming the Sa gha between and within State Agencies,” Stefania Travagnin discusses the opposition between Buddhist education and Western education in China the beginning […]
• The Role of Meditation in Indian and Tibetan Buddhism Some of the claims in the article sound farfetched, but it is apparent that one of the characteristics of the Tibetan Buddhists is the mystical powers possessed by some of the individuals.
• How Enterprises Appropriate the Vocabulary of Buddhism? This popular association that has been created by advertisers for the purposes of commodification has transformed Buddhism into a resource of imagery and concepts for vendors within the context of a modern marketplace.
• Purpose of Meditation in Buddhism One of the key roles of meditation in the Buddhist faith is the relaxation of the mind and the improvement of mental alertness.
• Confucianism and Daoism Influence on Zen Buddhism The concept of “emptiness” and “nothingness” is often mentioned and discussed in Zen philosophy. Together with the concept of ephemerality, Zen and Daoism explain that reality is conceived rather than seen.
• Buddhism and Hinduism: Religious Differences In Hinduism, only representatives of higher varnas, Brahmins, can attain moksha with the help of gods. Hinduists believe in the multitude of gods who can be the manifestations of one Great God.
• Philosophy of Science: Approaches on Buddhism In this view, this research paper aims at understanding the Tibetan monks’ practice of feeding the remains of one of their own to vultures, upon their demise, based on the Durkheim and Wittgensteinian’s approaches to […]
• Denver Buddhist Temple: Cultural Outing In this connection, the paper aims at identifying Buddhist religion that is prevalent in Vietnam focusing on three paramount concepts I learned in class such as the moral policy of the Denver Buddhist Temple, symbolic […]
• Descartes’ and Buddhist Ideas of Self-Existence It is the assumption of this paper that Descartes’ perspective and the teachings of Buddha on the self are inherently incompatible due to their different perspectives on what constitutes “the self”.
• How Does Buddhism Explain the Nature of Our Existence? One of the largest world religions, Buddhism is based on the teaching of Siddhartha Gautama who emphasized a significant role of nature in our lives and the importance of personal harmony with nature.
• Nagarjuna’s Buddhist Philosophy Investigation Additionally, it is possible to say that it is not just a religion, however, it is the way of life and philosophy.
• Buddhist Traditional Healing in Mental Health To understand the traditional healing in Buddhist culture in mental health, it is important to start by understanding the origin of Buddhism as a religion.
• Buddhism as the Most Peaceful Religion He is mainly spread on the East of our planet, that is why it is not surprising that it is one of the most popular and recognized religions all over the world, as the majority […]
• Buddhism Revitalization in China and Japan The comparison stems from the idea of general similarity between the theological traditions that are valued by the citizens of two countries.
• Buddhism and Hinduism Differences One of the main differences between Buddhism and Hinduism is the fact that Theravada Buddhism has no gods, as Buddha is not a god, he is an enlightened being that has reached and realised the […]
• Zen Buddhism Religion in Japanese Culture The uniqueness of Zen is in rejecting the importance of doctrines and emphasizing the role of the spiritual growth of the person through the practice of meditation.
• The Highest Good of Buddhism: Arahantship This state of awakening is the highest good that a human being can achieve, and all Buddhists are urged to aspire to achieve it.
• Religious Studies Discussion: Hinduism and Buddhism It is believed that Hinduism evolved and later spread to other areas in India. In conclusion, the objectives and practices of Hinduism and Buddhism are similar in many ways.
• Buddhism Studies in the Far East This emanates from the fact that the religion is only popular in one part of the world. Woo writes that it is possible to have many misconceptions about a belief, a religion and a practice […]
• Asian Religions in Practice: Buddhism, Islam and Sikhism This school of thought claims that salvation is possible through believing in the power of Amitabha and the desire to be reborn in a gracious place. This means that it advocates for people to be […]
• Religious Teachings of Buddhist Doctrine To substantiate the validity of his opinion, in this respect, Nagasena came up with the ‘parable of the lamp.’ According to the monk, just as it is the case with the flame of a burning […]
• Religious Teachings: Jainism vs. Buddhism and Hinduism The Jains believe in the existence of a divine being, and they attribute the forces that govern their fate in life to the Supreme Being.
• Religion Comparative Aspects: Hindu and Buddhism The similarities and differences in the ethical teachings of Hinduism and Buddhism include the following. Fourth, the act of lying is unacceptable in both Hinduism and Buddhism.
• Bhagavad Gita: Buddhism and Ancient Indian Philosophy First of all, it should be said that Bhagavad Gita is a part of the great epic of Mahabharata, which is known to be one of the greatest literary works of Ancient India.
• History of Buddhism and the Life of Buddha Buddha took the opportunity of being a member of the loyal family to influence the development of Buddhism. One of the factors that contributed to the speedy development of Buddhism was its inspirational teachings.
• David Hume’s and Buddhism Self Concepts Correlation Hume’s philosophy is based on the ideas that all the knowledge of the world is gained from the interaction of human’s experiences and the thoughts.
• Women and the Buddhist Religion According to Arvandi Sharma, ancient Indian women chose to become Buddhists nuns purely due to the influence of Buddha’s positive ways, teachings and the Buddhism doctrines.
• What Brings Women to Buddhism? Once establishing the source that has the greatest influence on the women and the ways which are most typical of women to be converted into Buddhism, whether it is the doctrinal one, or the one […]
• India’s Women in Buddhism’ Religion Regarding the place of women in Buddhism, it is interesting to note that Buddhism is not attached to any gender despite the fact that Buddha himself has historically been a man.
• Buddhism and Christianity Comparison In Buddhism, the ultimate goal is the acquisition of the Nirvana state, a state in which one is relieved of egos, desires, and cravings and saved from the suffering experienced due to reincarnations.
• Buddhism Religion History in China The differences between the two regions of China led to the advancement of the northern and southern disciplines hence the emergence of the Mahayana Buddhism.
• To What Extent Was China a Buddhist Country? The religion was associated with super powers and the potential to prosper, and thus many people were challenged to learn and experience it since it had compatible aspects with the Chinese Daoism.
• Buddhism Religion in the East Asian Societies This paper explores an argument whether Buddhism was a change for better or worse for the East Asian societies and concludes that even though Buddhism created a lot of discomfort during the period of introduction, […]
• Religious Studies: Morality in Buddhism
• Buddhism Characteristics and Attributes
• The Comparison of Buddhism and Daoism Principles
• Dalai Lama and Buddhism Tradition
• Anapanasati: As a Method for Reading the Buddhist Goal
• Buddhism in a Post- Han China
• Buddhism Believer’s Practice: Meditation
• The Main Aspects of Buddhism
• Exploring Buddhism: An Introduction to the Chinese Philosophy. In Search for the Enlightenment
• Buddhism Psychology in Changing Negative Behaviors
• Buddhism on Animal Treatment
• Sustainability of Buddhism in the Health System
• How Zen Buddhism Has Influenced the Development of Tea Ceremony
• Thich Nhat Hanh’s Engaged Buddhism
• Christianity vs. Buddhism
• The Journey of One Buddhist Nun: Even Against the Wind
• Comparison Between Hinduism and Buddhism
• Siddhartha Gautama and Buddhism
• Asian Studies: Confucianism and Buddhism in China
• Morality in Buddhism
• Tibetan Buddhist and Christian Symbols of Worship
• Buddhism, Sikhism and Baha’ism
• The Zen Temple as the Place of Worship in Japanese Zen Buddhism
• Buddhism in Canada
• Zhong Kui, the Keeper of Hearth and Home: Japanese Myth With Buddhist Philosophy
• Buddhism and Its impact on Japan
• Newspaper Response on Buddhism
• How Does Mahayana Differ From Early Buddhism?
• Religion of Christianity and Buddhism – Similarities and Difference
• Anger Emotion and Buddhism
• Padmasambhava’ Effects on Buddhist Beliefs
• Buddhism as a Sacred Tradition
• Buddhism’s Things and Ideas
• The Origin of Buddhism
• Zen Buddhism’s Religion
• Misconceptions About Buddhism
• Zen Buddhism and Oneida Community
• Dialogue Over the Interfaith Christian and Buddhist Perspectives
• Buddhism & Hinduism: Comparisons and Contractions
• Buddhism and Hinduism

🥇 Most Interesting Buddhism Topics to Write about

• A Brief Comparison of Native American Religions, Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Confucianism, and Taoism
• A Biography of Buddhism Born From a Single Man Siddhartha Gautama the Buddha in Factors in Achieving Enlightenment
• A Comparative Study between the Teachings of Two World Religions: Islam and Buddhism
• Affirmative Action Confucius Buddhism And Taoism
• An Analysis of Buddhism in Women and World Religions
• A History of Buddhism and an Analysis of the Teachings of the Buddha
• A History of the Influence of Buddhism and Hinduism on the South Asian Culture
• An Analysis of Buddhism First Sermon Which Should be Treated With Circumspection
• The Concept of Buddhism and the Figure of Buddha as a Central Symbol and Reality for Buddhist Monks
• Convergence of Ideas About Christianity and Buddhism in Living Buddha, Living Christ by Thich Nhat Hanh
• Early Life of Buddha, His Enlightenment, Founding of Buddhism and the Buddhist Literature
• An Analysis of Impermanence, Selflessness and Dissatisfaction on Buddhism as a Religion Nor a Philosophy
• Life and Teachings of Siddhartha Gautama (Buddha), the Founder of Buddhism
• An Argument in Favor of the Quote Life is Dukkha and Explanation of My Opinion on the Goals of Buddhism
• An Examination of Asian Philosophy and the Different Philosophical Schools: Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism and Confucianism
• An Overview of the Selflessness in Buddhism and the Works by Buddha in Contrast to the Monks
• Buddhism And Pop Culture Details The Comparison Between The Movies The Matrix And Fight Club And Buddhists Beliefs
• Buddhism: The Discipline and Knowledge for a Spiritual Life of Well-Being and the Path to Awakening the Nirvana
• Enlightened Revolutionary How King Asoka Entrenched Buddhism into Indian
• Reincarnation as an Important Part of the Teachings of Tibetan Buddhism
• Religion and Homosexuality: Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity and Islam
• The Growing Popularity of the Tibetan Buddhism and the Suspicion of the Non-Believers
• Zen Buddhism And Its Relationship To The Practical Psychology Of Daily Living

✅ Controversial Buddhism Topics for Essay

• How Buddhism Reflect The Human Understanding Of God?
• How Does Buddhism Relate And Help To Formulate A Local Understanding Of Transsexuals In Thailand?
• How Climate Change is Affecting Human Civilization and the Relationship Between Buddhism and Climate Change in Today’s Society?
• How Buddhism Has Interacted With Nature And Environment?
• What Role Does Karma Play in Buddhism? Who Does It Affect, and How Does It Affect Them in This Life, the Afterlife, and the Next Life?
• What do Buddhism and Christianity Teach About the Significance, Purpose And Value of Human Life?
• What Are The Core Beliefs Of Buddhism? How Do Buddhists View Craving?
• Why Are Experiences of Stillness and Reflection (Meditation) Important to Buddhism?
• Why A Key Part Of The Beliefs Of Tibetan Buddhism Is Reincarnation?

❓ Research Questions about Buddhism

• How Applied Buddhism Affected Peoples Daily Activities?
• What Is the Influence of Shen Hui on Chinese Buddhism?
• How Buddhism and Hinduism Share a Belief That Life Suffering Is Caused by Desire?
• What Are the Similarities and Differences Between Buddhism and Jainism?
• How Has Tibetan Buddhism Been Incorporated Into Modern Psychotherapy?
• What Are the Key Differences Between Christianity and Buddhism?
• How Is Japanese Culture Related to Buddhism?
• What Parallels and Deviations Can Science Learn From Buddhism?
• Precisely How Zen Buddhism Gives Influenced the Progress of Tea Services?
• Why Did the Rise of Buddhism in Britain Come About?
• What Are Buddhist Beliefs and the Role of the Dalai Lama in Tibetan Buddhism?
• How Did Chinese Culture Shape a New Form of Buddhism?
• What Significant Overlap Between Buddhism and Neuroscience Research Work?
• How does Buddhism Affect Chinese Culture History?
• What Is the Middle Way According to Mahayana Buddhism?
• How Did Buddhism Appear and Spread?
• What Are the Similarities Between Buddhism and Christianity?
• How Did Buddhism Spread in Southeast Asia?
• What Are the Differences Between Hinduism and Buddhism?
• What Is the Impact of Buddhism on Western Civilization?
• What Are the Beliefs and Values of Buddhism?
• How Do Buddhists View Craving?
• What Are the Core Beliefs of Buddhism?
• What Does Buddhism Teach?
• Why Did Buddhism Become So Powerful in Ancient History?
• What Role Did Zen Buddhism Play in Shaping the Art of Japan?
• What Role Does Karma Play in Buddhism?
• When Buddhism Was the Dominant Tradition in India?
• Who Were the Founders of Buddhism in Japan?
• Why Did Buddhism Fail To Take Hold in India?
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Buddhism as Philosophy: Fundamental Themes

Haidy Geismar et al (eds.), Impermanence: Exploring Continuous Change Across Cultures (2022)

Roger R. Jackson, Rebirth: A Guide to Mind, Karma, and Cosmos in the Buddhist World (2022)

Harrison J. Pemberton, The Buddha Meets Socrates: A Philosopher's Journal (2022)

Rick Repetti (ed.), Routledge Handbook on the Philosophy of Meditation (2022)

Avram Alpert, A Partial Enlightenment: What Modern Literature and Buddhism Can Teach Us about Living Well without Perfection (2021)

Bhikkhu Analayo, Superiority Conceit in Buddhist Traditions: A Historical Perspective (2021)

Zane M. Diamond, Gautama Buddha: Education for Wisdom (2021)

C.W. Huntington, What I Don't Know about Death: Reflections on Buddhism and Mortality (2021)

Jianxun Shi, Mapping the Buddhist Path to Liberation: Diversity and Consistency Based on the Pali Nikayas and the Chinese Agamas (2021)

Mark Siderits, How Things Are: An Introduction to Buddhist Metaphysics (2021)

Peter D. Hershock & Roger T. Ames (eds.), Human Beings or Human Becomings? A Conversation with Confucianism on the Concept of Person (2021)

Y. Karunadasa, The Buddhist Analysis of Matter (2020)

Mark Siderits et al (ed.), Buddhist Philosophy of Consciousness: Tradition and Dialogue (2020)

Jan Westerhoff, The Non-Existence of the Real World (2020)

Graham Priest, The Fifth Corner of Four: An Essay on Buddhist Metaphysics and the Catuskoti (2019)

Vajragupta Staunton, Free Time! From Clock-Watching to Free-Flowing: A Buddhist Guide (2019)

David Burton, Buddhism: A Contemporary Philosophical Investigation (2017)

Steven M. Emmanuel (ed.), Buddhist Philosophy: A Comparative Approach (2017)

Bryan W. Van Norden, Taking Back Philosophy: A Multicultural Manifesto (2017)

Mark Siderits, Studies in Buddhist Philosophy, ed. Jan Westerhoff (2016)

Marcus Boon, Eric M. Cazdyn, & Timothy Morton, Nothing: Three Inquiries in Buddhism (2015)

Jay L. Garfield, Engaging Buddhism: Why It Matters to Philosophy (2015)

JeeLoo Liu & Douglas Berger (eds.), Nothingness in Asian Philosophy (2014)

Steven M. Emmanuel (ed.), A Companion to Buddhist Philosophy (2013)

Cyrus Panjvani, Buddhism: A Philosophical Approach (2013)

Mark Siderits, Evan Thompson, & Dan Zahavi (eds.), Self, No Self? Perspectives from Analytical, Phenomenological, and Indian Traditions (2013)

Robin Cooper (Ratnaprabha), Finding the Mind: A Buddhist View (2012)

John Danvers, Agents of Uncertainty: Mysticism, Scepticism, Buddhism, Art and Poetry (2012)

Louis de La Vallée Poussin, The Way to Nirvana: Six Lectures on Ancient Buddhism as a Discipline of Salvation (2012)

Musashi Tachikawa, Essays in Buddhist Theology (2012)

Johannes Bronkhorst, Karma (2011)

Alf Hiltebeitel, Dharma: Its Early History in Law, Religion, and Narrative (2011)

Dhivan Thomas Jones, This Being, That Becomes: The Buddha's Teaching on Conditionality (2011)

Erich Frauwallner, The Philosophy of Buddhism [Die Philosophie des Buddhismus], trans. Gelong Lodro Sangpo & Jigme Sheldron (2010)

William Edelglass & Jay Garfield (eds.), Buddhist Philosophy: Essential Readings (2009)

Dan Arnold, Buddhists, Brahmins, and Belief: Epistemology in South Asian Philosophy of Religion (2008)

George Grimm, Buddhist Wisdom: The Mystery of the Self (2008)

Stephen J. Laumakis, An Introduction to Buddhist Philosophy (2008)

Sangharakshita, The Meaning of Conversion in Buddhism (2008)

Dharmachari Subhuti, Buddhism and Friendship (2008)

Sangharakshita, The Buddha's Noble Eightfold Path (2007)

Mark Siderits, Buddhism as Philosophy: An Introduction (2007)

Lama Shenpen Hookham, There's More to Dying Than Death: A Buddhist Perspective (2006)

Bruce Matthews, Craving and Salvation: A Study in Buddhist Soteriology (2006)

Sangharakshita, The Three Jewels: The Central Ideals of Buddhism (2006)

Jennifer Crawford, Spiritually-Engaged Knowledge: The Attentive Heart (2005)

John Taber (ed. & trans.), A Hindu Critique of Buddhist Epistemology: Kumarila on Perception (2005)

Fernando Tola & Carmen Dragonetti, On Voidness: A Study of Buddhist Nihilism (2005)

David Burton, Buddhism, Knowledge and Liberation: A Philosophical Study (2004)

Richard H. Jones, Mysticism and Morality: A New Look at Old Questions (2004)

Maitreyabandhu, Thicker Than Blood: Friendship on the Buddhist Path (2004)

Nagapriya, Exploring Karma and Rebirth (2004)

Sangharakshita, Buddha Mind (2004)

Sangharakshita, Living with Kindness: The Buddha's Teaching on Metta (2004)

John W. Schroeder, Skillful Means: The Heart of Buddhist Compassion (2004)

Brook Ziporyn, Being and Ambiguity: Philosophical Experiments with Tiantai Buddhism (2004)

Vincent L. Wimbush & Richard Valantasis (eds.), Asceticism (2002)

Rupert Gethin, The Buddhist Path to Awakening: A Study of the Bodhi-Pakkhiya Dhamma (2001)

David J. Kalupahana, Buddhist Thought and Ritual (2001)

Michael C. Brannigan, The Pulse of Wisdom: The Philosophies of India, China, and Japan (1999)

Duncan Forbes, The Buddhist Pilgrimage, ed. Alex Wayman (1999)

Roger R. Jackson & John J. Makransky (eds.), Buddhist Theology: Critical Reflections by Contemporary Buddhist Scholars (1999)

Jamie Hubbard & Paul L. Swanson (eds.), Pruning the Bodhi Tree: The Storm over Critical Buddhism (1997)

Alex Wayman, Untying the Knots in Buddhism: Selected Essays (1997)

Newman Robert Glass, Working Emptiness: Toward a Third Reading of Emptiness in Buddhism and Postmodern Thought (1995)

Kaisa Puhakka, Knowledge and Reality: A Comparative Study of Divine and Some Buddhist Logicians (1994)

Robert E. Buswell & Robert M. Gimello (eds.), Paths to Liberation: The Marga and Its Transformations in Buddhist Thought (1992)

Jan Nattier, Once upon a Future Time: Studies in a Buddhist Prophecy of Decline (1992)

John M. Koller & Patricia Koller (eds.), Sourcebook in Asian Philosophy (1991)

Gail Hinich Sutherland, The Disguises of the Demon: The Development of the Yaksa in Hinduism and Buddhism (1991)

Gregory Darling, An Evaluation of the Vedantic Critique of Buddhism (1987)

Martin Willson, Rebirth and the Western Buddhist (1987)

Alphonse Verdu, The Philosophy of Buddhism: A "Totalistic" Synthesis (1981)

John r. carter, dhamma: western academic and sinhalese buddhist interpretations: a study of a religious concept (1978).

W.H. Weeraratne, Individual and Society in Buddhism (1977)

David J. Kalupahana, Buddhist Philosophy: A Historical Analysis (1976)

William M. McGovern, A Manual of Buddhist Philosophy (1976)

David J. Kalupahana, Causality: The Central Philosophy of Buddhism (1975)

Francis Story, Rebirth as Doctrine and Experience: Essays and Case Studies (1975)

Junjiro Takakusu, Wing-Tsit Chan & Charles A. Moore (eds.), The Essentials of Buddhist Philosophy (1975)

John E. Blofeld, Beyond the Gods: Taoist and Buddhist Mysticism (1974)

Herbert V. Guenther, Buddhist Philosophy in Theory and Practice (1972)

Daigan L. Matsunaga & Alicia Matsunaga, The Buddhist Concept of Hell (1971)

Ven. nyanaponika & maurice walshe (eds.), pathways of buddhist thought: essays from the wheel (1971).

T. Stcherbatsky, The Central Conception of Buddhism and the Meaning of the Word "Dharma" (1961)

This book is a collection of essays by Mark Siderits on topics in Indian Buddhist philosophy. The essays are divided into six main systematic sections, dealing with realism and anti-realism, further problems in metaphysics and logic, philosophy of language, epistemology, ethics, and specific discussions of the interaction between Buddhist and classical Indian philosophy. Each of the essays is followed by a postscript Siderits has written specifically for this volume, which make it possible to connect essays of the volume with each other, showing thematic interrelations, or locating them relative to the development of Siderits’s thought. New works have been published, new translations have come out, and additional connections have been discovered. The postscripts make it possible to acquaint the reader with the most important of these developments.

This book is the most comprehensive single volume on the subject available. It offers the very latest scholarship to create a wide-ranging survey of the most important ideas, problems, and debates in the history of Buddhist philosophy. Encompasses the broadest treatment of Buddhist philosophy available, covering social and political thought, meditation, ecology and contemporary issues and applications Each section contains overviews and cutting-edge scholarship that expands readers understanding of the breadth and diversity of Buddhist thought. Broad coverage of topics allows flexibility to instructors in creating a syllabus. Essays provide valuable alternative philosophical perspectives on topics to those available in Western traditions.

This book examines how the Brahmanical tradition of Purva Mimamsa and the writings of the seventh-century Buddhist Madhyamika philosopher Candrakirti challenged dominant Indian Buddhist views of epistemology. Arnold retrieves these two very different but equally important voices of philosophical dissent, showing them to have developed highly sophisticated and cogent critiques of influential Buddhist epistemologists such as Dignaga and Dharmakirti. His analysis—developed in conversation with modern Western philosophers like William Alston and J.L. Austin—offers an innovative reinterpretation of the Indian philosophical tradition, while suggesting that pre-modern Indian thinkers have much to contribute to contemporary philosophical debates.

Buddhism is essentially a teaching about liberation - from suffering, ignorance, selfishness and continued rebirth. Knowledge of 'the way things really are' is thought by many Buddhists to be vital in bringing about this emancipation. This book is a philosophical study of the notion of liberating knowledge as it occurs in a range of Buddhist sources. Burton assesses the common Buddhist idea that knowledge of the three characteristics of existence (impermanence, not-self and suffering) is the key to liberation. It argues that this claim must be seen in the context of the Buddhist path and training as a whole. Detailed attention is also given to anti-realist, sceptical and mystical strands within the Buddhist tradition, all of which make distinctive claims about liberating knowledge.

Ecology, Economics, Globalization, and the Environment

Trine Brox & Elizabeth Williams-Oerberg (eds.), Buddhism and Waste: The Excess, Discard and Afterlife of Buddhist Consumption (2022)

Jeanine M. Canty, Returning the Self to Nature: Undoing Our Collective Narcissism and Healing Our Planet (2022)

Daniel Capper, Buddhist Ecological Protection of Space: A Guide for Sustainable Off-Earth Travel (2022)

Daniel Capper, Roaming Free Like a Deer: Buddhism and the Natural World (2022)

David Hinton, Wild Mind, Wild Earth: Our Place in the Sixth Extinction (2022)

Joel Magnuson, The Dharma and Socially Engaged Buddhist Economics (2022)

Christoph Brumann et al (eds.), Monks, Money, and Morality: The Balancing Act of Contemporary Buddhism (2021)

Josep M. Coll, Buddhist and Taoist Systems Thinking: The Natural Path to Sustainable Transformation (2021)

Sallie B. King, Buddhist Visions of the Good Life for All (2021)

Gábor Kovács, The Value Orientations of Buddhist and Christian Entrepreneurs: A Comparative Perspective on Spirituality and Business Ethics (2021)

Shantigarbha, The Burning House: A Buddhist Response to the Climate and Ecological Emergency (2021)

Trine Brox & Elizabeth Williams-Oerberg, Buddhism and Business: Merit, Material Wealth, and Morality in the Global Market Economy (2020)

Alex John Catanese, Buddha in the Marketplace: The Commodification of Buddhist Objects in Tibet (2020)

Ernest C.H. Ng, Introduction to Buddhist Economics: The Relevance of Buddhist Values in Contemporary Economy and Society (2020)

Geoffrey Barstow (ed.), The Faults of Meat: Tibetan Buddhist Writings on Vegetarianism (2019)

Geoffrey Barstow, Food of Sinful Demons: Meat, Vegetarianism, and the Limits of Buddhism in Tibet (2019)

Candi K. Cann (ed.), Dying to Eat: Cross-Cultural Perspectives on Food, Death, and the Afterlife (2019)

Gergely Hidas, A Buddhist Ritual Manual on Agriculture: A Critical Edition (2019)

Stephanie Kaza, Green Buddhism: Practice and Compassionate Action in Uncertain Times (2019)

Belden C. Lane, The Great Conversation: Nature and the Care of the Soul (2019)

Clair Brown, Buddhist Economics: An Enlightened Approach to the Dismal Science (2018)

Shravasti Dhammika, Nature and the Environment in Early Buddhism (2018)

Karine Gagné, Caring for Glaciers: Land, Animals, and Humanity in the Himalayas (2018)

Willis J. Jenkins, Mary Evelyn Tucker, and John Grim (eds.), Routledge Handbook of Religion and Ecology (2018)

Vajragupta, Wild Awake: Alone, Offline and Aware in Nature (2018)

Whitney Bauman, Richard Bohannon, and Kevin O'Brien (eds.), Grounding Religion: A Field Guide to the Study of Religion and Ecology, 2nd ed. (2017)

Caroline Brazier, Ecotherapy in Practice: A Buddhist Model (2017)

J. Baird Callicott & James McRae (eds.), Japanese Environmental Philosophy (2017)

David E. Cooper & Simon P. James, Buddhism, Virtue and Environment (2017)

Simon P. James, Zen Buddhism and Environmental Ethics (2017)

Bodhipaksa, Vegetarianism: A Buddhist View (2016)

Padmasiri De Silva, Environmental Philosophy and Ethics in Buddhism (2016)

Todd LeVasseur et al (eds.), Religion and Sustainable Agriculture: World Spiritual Traditions and Food Ethics (2016)

Daniel P. Scheid, The Cosmic Common Good: Religious Grounds for Ecological Ethics (2016)

J. Baird Callicott & James McRae (eds.), Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought (2015)

Ugo Dessì, Japanese Religions and Globalization (2015)

Vaddhaka Linn, The Buddha on Wall Street: What's Wrong with Capitalism and What We Can Do About It (2015)

Joan Marques, Business and Buddhism (2015)

James Stewart, Vegetarianism and Animal Ethics in Contemporary Buddhism (2015)

Whitney A. Bauman, Religion and Ecology: Developing a Planetary Ethic (2014)

James Mark Shields (ed.), Buddhist Responses to Globalization (2014)

Susan M. Darlington, The Ordination of a Tree: The Thai Buddhist Environmental Movement (2013)

Tariq Jazeel, Sacred Modernity: Nature, Environment and the Postcolonial Geographies of Sri Lankan Nationhood (2013)

Bhikkhu Nyanasobhano, Landscapes of Wonder: Discovering Buddhist Dhamma in the World Around Us (2013)

Leslie E. Sponsel, Spiritual Ecology: A Quiet Revolution (2012)

Pragati Sahni, Environmental Ethics in Buddhism: A Virtues Approach (2011)

David M. Engel & Jaruwan S. Engel, Tort, Custom, and Karma: Globalization and Legal Consciousness in Thailand (2010)

Roger S. Gottlieb (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Ecology (2010)

Lin Jensen, Deep Down Things: The Earth in Celebration and Dismay (2010)

Richard Payne, How Much is Enough? Buddhism, Consumerism, and the Human Environment (2010)

Thomas Berry, The Sacred Universe: Earth, Spirituality, and Religion, ed. Mary Evelyn Tucker (2009)

Peter D. Hershock, Buddhism in the Public Sphere: Reorienting Global Interdependence (2009)

John Stanley et al (eds.), A Buddhist Response to the Climate Emergency (2009)

Ananda W. P. Guruge, Buddhism, Economics and Science: Further Studies in Socially Engaged Humanistic Buddhism (2008)

Stephanie Kaza, Mindfully Green: A Personal and Spiritual Guide to Whole Earth Thinking (2008)

Bhikkhu Basnagoda Rahula, The Buddha's Teachings on Prosperity: At Home, At Work, in the World (2008)

Lloyd Field, Business and the Buddha: Doing Well by Doing Good (2007)

Bhikkhu Nyanasobhano, Available Truth: Excursions into Buddhist Wisdom and the Natural World (2007)

Lisa Kemmerer, In Search of Consistency: Ethics and Animals (2006)

Kirkpatrick Sale, After Eden: The Evolution of Human Domination (2006)

Paul Waldau & Kimberley Christine Patton (eds.), A Communion of Subjects: Animals in Religion, Science, and Ethics (2006)

Sulak Sivaraksa, Conflict, Culture, Change: Engaged Buddhism in a Globalizing World (2005)

Stuart Chandler, Establishing a Pure Land on Earth: The Foguang Buddhist Perspective on Modernization and Globalization (2004)

Linda Learman, Buddhist Missionaries in the Era of Globalization (2004)

Roger S. Gottlieb, This Sacred Earth: Religion, Nature, Environment, 2nd ed. (2003)

Joanna Macy, World As Lover, World As Self: Courage for Global Justice and Ecological Renewal (2003)

Paul Waldau, The Specter of Speciesism: Buddhist and Christian Views of Animals (2001)

Stephanie Kaza & Kenneth Kraft (eds.), Dharma Rain: Sources of Buddhist Environmentalism (2000)

Tony Page, Buddhism and Animals: A Buddhist Vision of Humanity's Rightful Relationship with the Animal Kingdom (1999)

Laurel Kearns & Catherine Keller (eds.), Ecospirit: Religions and Philosophies for the Earth (2007)

Mary E. Tucker & Duncan R. Williams (eds.), Buddhism and Ecology: The Interconnection of Dharma and Deeds (1997)

Christopher Key Chapple, Nonviolence to Animals, Earth, and Self in Asian Traditions (1993)

Martine Batchelor & Kerry Brown (eds.), Buddhism and Ecology (1992)

Allan Hunt Badiner (ed.), Dharma Gaia: A Harvest of Essays in Buddhism and Ecology (1990)

Arne Naess, Ecology, Community, and Lifestyle: Outline of an Ecosophy, trans. David Rothenberg (1989)

In this study of the place of vegetarianism within Tibetan religiosity, Geoffrey Barstow explores the tension between Buddhist ethics and Tibetan cultural norms to offer a novel perspective on the spiritual and social dimensions of meat eating. Barstow offers a detailed analysis of the debates over meat eating and vegetarianism, from the first references to such a diet in the tenth century through the Chinese invasion in the 1950s. He discusses elements of Tibetan Buddhist thought, but also looks beyond religious attitudes to examine the cultural, economic, and environmental factors that oppose the Buddhist critique of meat, including Tibetan concepts of medicine and health, food scarcity, the display of wealth, and idealized male gender roles. Barstow argues that the issue of meat eating was influenced by a complex interplay of factors, with religious perspectives largely supporting vegetarianism while practical concerns and secular ideals pulled in the other direction.

Clair Brown, professor of economics at UC Berkeley and a practicing Buddhist, has developed a holistic model, one based on the notion that quality of life should be measured by more than national income. Brown advocates an approach to organizing the economy that embraces rather than skirts questions of values, sustainability, and equity, and incorporates the Buddhist emphasis on interdependence, shared prosperity, and happiness into her vision for a sustainable and compassionate world. Buddhist economics leads us to think mindfully as we go about our daily activities, and offers a way to appreciate how our actions affect the well-being of those around us. By replacing the endless cycle of desire with more positive collective activities, we can make our lives more meaningful as well as happier. This book represents an enlightened approach to our modern world infused with ancient wisdom, with benefits both personal and global, for generations to come.

This book reflects the growing interest and research in this field. Drawing on a diversity of experience from the counselling and psychotherapy professions, but also from practitioners in community work, mental health and education, this book explores the exciting and innovative possibilities involved in practising outdoors. Brazier brings to bear her experience and knowledge as a psychotherapist, group worker and trainer over several decades to think about therapeutic work outdoors in all its forms. The book presents a model of ecotherapy based on principles drawn from Buddhist psychology and Western psychotherapy which focuses particularly on the relationship between person and environment at three levels, moving from the personal level of individual history to cultural influences, then finally to global circumstances, all of which condition mind-states and psychological well-being. This work will provide refreshing and valuable reading for psychotherapists and counsellors in the field, those interested in Buddhism, and other mental health and health professionals working outdoors.

This work explores alternative ways of leading in the aftermath of the Great Recession and the many stories of fraud and greed that emerged. The book explores shifts in business perspectives as more value is placed on soft skills like emotional intelligence and listening, and introduces the reader to the principles in Buddhist philosophy that can be applied in the workplace. Marques explores the value of applying the positive psychology of Buddhism to work settings. She outlines the ways in which it offers highly effective solutions to addressing important management and organizational behavior related issues, but also flags up critical areas for caution. For example, Buddhism is non-confrontational, and promotes detachment. How can business leaders negotiate these principles in light of the demands of modern day pressures? The book includes end of chapter questions to promote reflection and critical thinking, and examples of Buddhist leaders in action. It will prove a captivating read for students of organizational behavior, management, leadership, diversity and ethics.

Andy Rotman, Hungry Ghosts (2021)

Eric Huntington, Creating the Universe: Depictions of the Cosmos in Himalayan Buddhism (2019)

Rebecca Redwood French, The Golden Yoke: The Legal Cosmology of Buddhist Tibet (2002)

Akira Sadakata, Buddhist Cosmology: Philosophy and Origins (1997)

Jamgon K.L. Taye, Myriad Worlds: Buddhist Cosmology in Abhidharma, Kalacakra, and Dzog-chen (1995)

Randy Kloetzli, Buddhist Cosmology: From Single World System to Pure Land: Science and Theology in the Images of Motion and Light (1983)

Frank E. Reynolds & Mani B. Reynolds (trans.), Three Worlds According to King Ruang: A Thai Buddhist Cosmology (1982)

Jay L. Garfield, Buddhist Ethics: A Philosophical Exploration (2021)

Daniel Cozort & James Mark Shields (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Buddhist Ethics (2018)

Jake H. Davis (ed.), A Mirror Is for Reflection: Understanding Buddhist Ethics (2017)

The Cowherds, Moonpaths: Ethics and Emptiness (2015)

Dharmachari Subhuti, Mind in Harmony: A Guide to the Psychology of Buddhist Ethics (2015)

Charles Goodman, Consequences of Compassion: An Interpretation and Defense of Buddhist Ethics (2014)

Christopher W. Gowans, Buddhist Moral Philosophy: An Introduction (2014)

Alexus McLeod, Understanding Asian Philosophy: Ethics in the Analects, Zhuangzi, Dhammapada, and the Bhagavad Gita (2014)

Subhadramati, Not About Being Good: A Practical Guide to Buddhist Ethics (2013)

Dale Wright, The Six Perfections: Buddhism and the Cultivation of Character (2011)

Charles S. Prebish (ed.), Destroying Mara Forever: Buddhist Ethics Essays in Honor of Damien Keown (2010)

Susanne Mrozik, Virtuous Bodies: The Physical Dimensions of Morality in Buddhist Ethics (2007)

Hari Shankar Prasad, The Centrality of Ethics in Buddhism: Exploratory Essays (2007)

Pamela Bloom, The Healing Power of Compassion: The Essence of Buddhist Acts (2006)

Karma Lekshe Tsomo, Into the Jaws of Yama, Lord of Death: Buddhism, Bioethics, and Death (2006)

Damien Keown, Buddhist Ethics: A Very Short Introduction (2005)

Sangharakshita, Know Your Mind: The Psychological Dimension of Ethics in Buddhism (2004)

Jeffrey Hopkins, Cultivating Compassion: A Buddhist Perspective (2002)

Gananath Obeyesekere, Imagining Karma: Ethical Transformation in Amerindian, Buddhist, and Greek Rebirth (2002)

Peter Harvey, An Introduction to Buddhist Ethics: Foundations, Values, and Issues (2000)

Damien Keown (ed.), Contemporary Buddhist Ethics (2000)

Damien Keown (ed.), Buddhism and Abortion (1998)

Hammalawa Saddhatissa, Buddhist Ethics (1997)

Peggy Morgan & Clive Lawton (eds.), Ethical Issues in Six Religious Traditions (1996)

Damien Keown, Buddhism and Bioethics (1995)

Phillip Olson, The Discipline of Freedom: A Kantian View of the Role of Moral Precepts in Zen Practice (1993)

Damien Keown, The Nature of Buddhist Ethics (1992)

William R. LaFleur, Liquid Life: Abortion and Buddhism in Japan (1992)

Charles W. Fu & Sandra A. Wawrytko (eds.), Buddhist Ethics and Modern Society (1991)

Bruce Reichenbach, The Law of Karma: A Philosophical Study (1990)

Russell F. Sizemore & Donald K. Swearer (eds.), Ethics, Wealth and Salvation: A Study in Buddhist Social Ethics (1989)

Toshiichi Endo, Dana: The Development of Its Concept and Practice (1987)

G.S. Misra, The Development of Buddhist Ethics (1984)

Robert Aitken, The Mind of Clover: Essays in Zen Buddhist Ethics (1982)

Roderick Hindery, Comparative Ethics in Hindu and Buddhist Traditions (1978)

Michael Pye, Skilful Means: A Concept in Mahayana Buddhism (1978)

Unto Tahtinen, Ahimsa: Non-Violence in Indian Tradition (1976)

Shundo Tachibana, The Ethics of Buddhism (1975)

Winston King, In the Hope of Nibbana: An Essay on Theravada Buddhist Ethics (1964)

All the varied forms of Buddhism embody an ethical core that is remarkably consistent. Articulated by the historical Buddha in his first sermon, this moral core is founded on the concept of karma--that intentions and actions have future consequences for an individual--and is summarized as Right Speech, Right Action, and Right Livelihood, three of the elements of the Eightfold Path. Although they were later elaborated and interpreted in a multitude of ways, none of these core principles were ever abandoned. This work provides a comprehensive overview of the field of Buddhist ethics in the twenty-first century. It discusses the foundations of Buddhist ethics, focusing on karma and the precepts for abstinence from harming others, stealing, and intoxication. It considers ethics in the different Buddhist traditions and the similarities they share, and compares Buddhist ethics to Western ethics and the psychology of moral judgments. The volume also investigates Buddhism and society, analysing economics, environmental ethics, and Just War ethics. The final section focuses on contemporary issues surrounding Buddhist ethics, including gender, sexuality, animal rights, and euthanasia.

Here is a lucid, accessible, and inspiring guide to the six perfections--Buddhist teachings about six dimensions of human character that require "perfecting": generosity, morality, tolerance, energy, meditation, and wisdom. Drawing on the Diamond Sutra, the Large Sutra on Perfect Wisdom, and other essential Mahayana texts, Dale Wright shows how these teachings were understood and practiced in classical Mahayana Buddhism and how they can be adapted to contemporary life in a global society. What would the perfection of generosity look like today, for example? What would it mean to give with neither ulterior motives nor naiveté? Devoting a separate chapter to each of the six perfections, Wright combines sophisticated analysis with real-life applications. Buddhists have always stressed self-cultivation and the freedom of human beings to shape their own lives. For those interested in ideals of human character and practices of self-cultivation, this work offers invaluable guidance.

This book explores the Buddhist view of death and its implications for contemporary bioethics. Writing primarily from within the Tibetan tradition, Tsomo discusses Buddhist notions of human consciousness and personal identity and how these figure in the Buddhist view of death. Beliefs about death and enlightenment and states between life and death are also discussed. Tsomo goes on to examine such hot-button topics as cloning, abortion, assisted suicide, euthanasia, organ donation, genetic engineering, and stem-cell research within a Buddhist context, introducing new ways of thinking about these highly controversial issues.

With this work, Obeyesekere embarks on the very first comparison of rebirth concepts across a wide range of cultures. Exploring in rich detail the beliefs of small-scale societies of West Africa, Melanesia, traditional Siberia, Canada, and the northwest coast of North America, Obeyesekere compares their ideas with those of the ancient and modern Indic civilizations and with the Greek rebirth theories of Pythagoras, Empedocles, Pindar, and Plato. His groundbreaking and authoritative discussion decenters the popular notion that India was the origin and locus of ideas of rebirth. As he compares responses to the most fundamental questions of human existence, the author challenges readers to reexamine accepted ideas about death, cosmology, morality, and eschatology. Obeyesekere's comprehensive inquiry shows that diverse societies have come through independent invention or borrowing to believe in reincarnation as an integral part of their larger cosmological systems. The author brings together into a coherent methodological framework the thought of such diverse thinkers as Weber, Wittgenstein, and Nietzsche. In a contemporary intellectual context that celebrates difference and cultural relativism, this book makes a case for disciplined comparison, a humane view of human nature, and a theoretical understanding of "family resemblances" and differences across great cultural divides.

Gender, Sexuality, Reproduction, and Children

Jacoby Ballard, A Queer Dharma: Yoga and Meditations for Liberation (2022)

Ute Hüsken, Laughter, Creativity, and Perseverance: Female Agency in Buddhism and Hinduism (2022)

Elisabeth A. Benard, The Sakya Jetsunmas: The Hidden World of Tibetan Female Lamas (2022)

Darcy Flynn (ed.), Buddhism and Women: In the Middle Way (2022)

Kodo Nishimura, This Monk Wears Heels: Be Who You Are (2022)

Rachael Stevens, Red Tara: The Female Buddha of Power and Magnetism (2022)

Stephanie Guyer-Stevens & Françoise Pommaret, Divine Messengers: The Untold Story of Bhutan's Female Shamans (2021)

Alice Collett, I Hear Her Words: An Introduction to Women in Buddhism (2021)

Wendy Garling, The Woman Who Raised the Buddha: The Extraordinary Life of Mahaprajapati (2021)

Carola Roloff, The Buddhist Nun´s Ordination in the Tibetan Canon: Possibilities of the Revival of the Mulasarvastivada Bhiksuni Lineage (2021)

Vanessa R. Sasson, Yasodhara and the Buddha (2021)

Mayumi Oda, Sarasvati's Gift: The Autobiography of Mayumi Oda - Artist, Activist, and Modern Buddhist Revolutionary (2020)

Karma Lekshe Tsomo, Women in Buddhist Traditions (2020)

Matty Weingast, The First Free Women: Poems of the Early Buddhist Nuns (2020)

Jan Willis, Dharma Matters: Women, Race, and Tantra (2020)

Sokthan Yeng, Buddhist Feminism: Transforming Anger Against Patriarchy (2020)

Anne Cushman, The Mama Sutra: A Story of Love, Loss, and the Pain of Motherhood (2019)

Martin Seeger, Gender and the Path to Awakening: Hidden Histories of Nuns in Modern Thai Buddhism (2018)

Karma Lekshe Tsomo (ed.), Buddhist Feminisms and Femininities (2019)

Gendun Chopel, The Passion Book: A Tibetan Guide to Love & Sex, trans. Donald S. Lopez, Jr. (2018)

Pamela Ayo Yetunde, Object Relations, Buddhism, and Relationality in Womanist Practical Theology (2018)

Amy Paris Langenberg, Birth in Buddhism: The Suffering Fetus and Female Freedom (2017)

Karen Muldoon-Hules, Brides of the Buddha: Nuns' Stories from the Avadanasataka (2017)

Bhikkhu Analayo, The Foundation History of the Nuns' Order (2016)

Anna Andreeva & Dominic Steavu (eds.), Transforming the Void: Embryological Discourse and Reproductive Imagery in East Asian Religions (2016)

Wendy Garling, Stars at Dawn: Forgotten Stories of Women in the Buddha's Life (2016)

Kamalamani, Other Than Mother: Choosing Childlessness with Life in Mind (2016)

Ashley Thompson, Engendering the Buddhist State: Territory, Sovereignty and Sexual Difference in the Inventions of Angkor (2016)

Pascale Engelmajer, Women in Pali Buddhism: Walking the Spiritual Paths in Mutual Dependence (2015)

Rosemarie Freeney Harding & Rachel Elizabeth Harding, Remnants: A Memoir of Spirit, Activism, and Mothering (2015)

Jennifer McWeeny & Ashby Butnor (eds.), Asian and Feminist Philosophies in Dialogue: Liberating Traditions (2014)

Andrea Miller (ed.), Buddha's Daughters: Teachings from Women Who Are Shaping Buddhism in the West (2014)

Karma Lekshe Tsomo (ed.), Eminent Buddhist Women (2014)

Kathryn R. Blackstone, Women in the Footsteps of the Buddha: Struggle for Liberation in the Therigatha (2013)

Florence Caplow & Susan Moon (eds.), The Hidden Lamp: Stories from Twenty-Five Centuries of Awakened Women (2013)

Nirmala S. Salgado, Buddhist Nuns and Gendered Practice: In Search of the Female Renunciant (2013)

Bardwell L. Smith, Narratives of Sorrow and Dignity: Japanese Women, Pregnancy Loss, and Modern Rituals of Grieving (2013)

Reiko Ohnuma, Ties That Bind: Maternal Imagery and Discourse in Indian Buddhism (2012)

Vanessa R. Sasson (ed.), Little Buddhas: Children and Childhoods in Buddhist Texts and Traditions (2012)

Paula Arai, Bringing Zen Home: The Healing Heart of Japanese Women's Rituals (2011)

Hsiao-Lan Hu, This-Worldly Nibbana: A Buddhist-Feminist Social Ethic for Peacemaking in the Global Community (2011)

Lori Rachelle Meeks, Hokkeji and the Reemergence of Female Monastic Orders in Premodern Japan (2010)

Thea Mohr & Jampa Tsedroen (eds.), Dignity and Discipline: Reviewing Full Ordination for Buddhist Nuns (2010)

Mohan Wijayaratna, Buddhist Nuns: The Birth and Development of a Women's Monastic Order (2010)

Christina Feldman, Woman Awake: Women Practicing Buddhism (2009)

Rita M. Gross, A Garland of Feminist Reflections: Forty Years of Religious Exploration (2009)

Grace Schireson, Zen Women: Beyond Tea Ladies, Iron Maidens, and Macho Masters (2009)

Andrea Whittaker, Abortion, Sin and the State in Thailand (2009)

Frances Mary Garrett, Religion, Medicine and the Human Embryo in Tibet (2008)

Sara Burns, A Path for Parents: What Buddhism Can Offer (2007)

Peter N. Gregory & Susanne Mrozik (eds.), Women Practicing Buddhism: American Experiences (2007)

Maura O'Halloran, Pure Heart, Enlightened Mind: The Life and Letters of an Irish Zen Saint (2007)

Sallie Tisdale, Women of the Way: Discovering 2,500 Years of Buddhist Wisdom (2007)

Martine Batchelor & Son'gyong Sunim, Women in Korean Zen: Lives and Practices (2006)

Sandy Boucher, Dancing in the Dharma: The Life and Teachings of Ruth Denison (2006)

Wei-Yi Cheng, Buddhist Nuns in Taiwan and Sri Lanka: A Critique of the Feminist Perspective (2006)

Alexandra David-Néel, My Journey to Lhasa: The Classic Story of the Only Western Woman Who Succeeded in Entering the Forbidden City (2005)

Kim Gutschow, Being a Buddhist Nun: The Struggle for Enlightenment in the Himalayas (2004)

Karma Lekshe Tsomo, Buddhist Women and Social Justice: Ideals, Challenges, and Achievements (2004)

Bernard Faure, The Power of Denial: Buddhism, Purity and Gender (2003)

Beata Grant, Daughters of Emptiness: Poems of Chinese Buddhist Nuns (2003)

Hugh B. Urban, Tantra: Sex, Secrecy, Politics, and Power in the Study of Religion (2003)

Martine Batchelor, Women on the Buddhist Path (2002)

Susan Murcott, First Buddhist Women: Poems and Stories of Awakening (2002)

Sid Brown, The Journey of One Buddhist Nun: Even Against the Wind (2001)

Rita M. Gross & Rosemary Radford Ruether, Religious Feminism and the Future of the Planet: A Christian-Buddhist Conversation (2001)

Ranjini Obeyesekere (trans.), Portraits of Buddhist Women: Stories from the Saddharmaratnaavaliya (2001)

Tsültrim Allione, Women of Wisdom (2000)

Sandy Boucher, Discovering Kwan Yin, Buddhist Goddess of Compassion: A Path Towards Clarity and Peace (2000)

Mandakranta Bose (ed.), Faces of the Feminine in Ancient, Medieval, and Modern India (2000)

Karma Lekshe Tsomo, Innovative Buddhist Women: Swimming Against the Stream (2000)

Karma Lekshe Tsomo, Buddhist Women Across Cultures: Realizations (1999)

Sandy Boucher, Opening the Lotus: A Woman's Guide to Buddhism (1998)

Alan Cole, Mothers and Sons in Chinese Buddhism (1998)

Bernard Faure, The Red Thread: Buddhist Approaches to Sexuality (1998)

Chamindaji gamage, buddhism and sensuality: as recorded in the theravada canon (1998).

Rita M. Gross, Soaring and Settling: Buddhist Perspectives on Contemporary Social and Religious Issues (1998)

Lenore Friedman & Susan Moon (eds.), Being Bodies: Buddhist Women on the Paradox of Embodiment (1997)

Helen Hardacre, Marketing the Menacing Fetus in Japan (1997)

Karma Lekshe Tsomo, Sisters in Solitude: Two Traditions of Buddhist Monastic Ethics for Women (1997)

Martine Batchelor, Walking on Lotus Flowers: Buddhist Women Living, Loving and Meditating (1996)

Marianne Dresser (ed.), Buddhist Women on the Edge: Contemporary Perspectives from the Western Frontier (1996)

Liz Wilson, Charming Cadavers: Horrific Figurations of the Feminine in Indian Buddhist Hagiographic Literature (1996)

Anne C. Klein, Meeting the Great Bliss Queen: Buddhists, Feminists, and the Art of the Self (1995)

Karma Lekshe Tsomo (ed.), Buddhism Through American Women's Eyes (1995)

L.p.n. perera, sexuality in ancient india: a study based on the pali vinayapitaka (1993).

Rita M. Gross, Buddhism after Patriarchy: A Feminist History, Analysis, and Reconstruction of Buddhism (1992)

Susan Murcott, The First Buddhist Women (1992)

José Ignacio Cabezón (ed.), Buddhism, Sexuality, and Gender (1991)

I. B. Horner, Women under Primitive Buddhism: Laywomen and Almswomen (1990)

John Stevens, Lust for Enlightenment: Buddhism and Sex (1990)

Janice Willis (ed.), Feminine Ground: Essays on Women and Tibet (1989)

Sandy Boucher, Turning the Wheel: American Women Creating the New Buddhism (1988)

Karma Lekshe Tsomo (ed.), Sakyadhita: Daughters of the Buddha (1988)

Lenore Friedman, Meetings with Remarkable Women: Buddhist Teachers in America (1987)

Deborah Hopkinson, Not Mixing Up Buddhism: Essays on Women and Buddhism (1987)

Diana m. paul, women in buddhism: images of the feminine in the mahayana tradition (1985), diana m. paul, the buddhist feminine ideal (1980).

Recent decades have seen a transnational agitation for better opportunities for Buddhist women. Many of the main players in this movement self-identify as feminists, but other participants in this movement may not know or use the language of feminism. In fact, many ordained Buddhist women say they seek higher ordination so that they might be better Buddhist practitioners, not for the sake of gender equality. Eschewing the backward projection of secular liberal feminist categories, this book describes the basic features of the Buddhist discourse of the female body, held more or less in common across sectarian lines, and still pertinent to ordained Buddhist women today. The textual focus of the study is an early-first-millennium Sanskrit Buddhist work, the "Descent into the Womb Scripture" or Garbhāvakrānti-sūtra. Drawing out the implications of this text, the author offers innovative arguments about the significance of childbirth and fertility in Buddhism, namely that birth is a master metaphor in Indian Buddhism; that Buddhist gender constructions are centrally shaped by Buddhist birth discourse; and that, by undermining the religious importance of female fertility, the Buddhist construction of an inauspicious, chronically impure, and disgusting femininity constituted a portal to a new, liberated, feminine life for Buddhist monastic women.

Based on extensive research in Sri Lanka and interviews with Theravada and Tibetan nuns from around the world, Salgado's groundbreaking study urges a rethinking of female renunciation. How are scholarly accounts complicit in reinscribing imperialist stories about the subjectivity of Buddhist women? How do key Buddhist "concepts" such as dukkha, samsara, and sila ground female renunciant practice? Salgado's provocative analysis questions the secular notion of the higher ordination of nuns as a political movement for freedom against patriarchal norms. Arguing that the lives of nuns defy translation into a politics of global sisterhood equal before law, she calls for more-nuanced readings of nuns' everyday renunciant practices.

Consideration of children in the academic field of Religious Studies is taking root, but Buddhist Studies has yet to take notice. This book brings together a wide range of scholarship and expertise to address the question of what role children have played in Buddhist literature, in particular historical contexts, and what role they continue to play in specific Buddhist contexts today. The volume is divided into two parts, one addressing the representation of children in Buddhist texts, the other children and childhoods in Buddhist cultures around the world. The ground-breaking contributions in this volume challenge the perception of irreconcilable differences between Buddhist idealism and family ties. This work will be an indispensable resource for students and scholars of Buddhism and Childhood Studies, and a catalyst for further research on the topic.

Rita M. Gross has long been acknowledged as a founder in the field of feminist theology. One of the earliest scholars in religious studies to discover how feminism affects that discipline, she is recognized as preeminent in Buddhist feminist theology. The essays in this book represent the major aspects of her work and provide an overview of her methodology in women's studies in religion and feminism. The introductory article, written specifically for this volume, summarizes the conclusions Gross has reached about gender and feminism after forty years of searching and exploring, and the autobiography, also written for this volume, narrates how those conclusions were reached. These articles reveal the range of scholarship and reflection found in Gross's work and demonstrate how feminist scholars in the 1970s shifted the paradigm away from an androcentric model of humanity and forever changed the way we study religion.

Enlightenment & Enlightened Beings

Dale S. Wright, What Is Buddhist Enlightenment? (2016)

Soon-il Hwang, Metaphor and Literalism in Buddhism: The Doctrinal History of Nirvana (2012)

Alan Sponberg & Helen Hardacre (eds.), Maitreya: The Future Buddha (2011)

Bhikkhu Analayo, The Genesis of the Bodhisattva Ideal (2010)

Steven Collins, Nirvana: Concept, Imagery, Narrative (2010)

Guang Xing, The Concept of the Buddha: Its Evolution from Early Buddhism to the Trikaya Theory (2010)

Jan Nattier, A Few Good Men: The Bodhisattva Path According to the Inquiry of Ugra (2005)

Sangharakshita, Wisdom Beyond Words: The Buddhist Vision of Ultimate Reality (2004)

Steven Collins, Nirvana and Other Buddhist Felicities: Utopias of the Pali Imaginaire (1998)

Ulrich Pagel, The Bodhisattvapitaka: Its Doctrines, Practices and Their Position in Mahayana Literature (1995)

Cheng Chien, Manifestation of the Tathagata: Buddhahood According to the Avatamsaka Sutra (1993)

Sallie B. King, Buddha Nature (1991)

David Seyfort Ruegg, Buddha-Nature, Mind and the Problem of Gradualism in a Comparative Perspective (1989)

Sung Bae Park, Buddhist Faith and Sudden Enlightenment (1983)

Nathan Katz, Buddhist Images of Human Perfection: The Arahant of the Sutta Pitaka compared with the Bodhisattva and the Mahasiddha (1982)

Leslie Kawamura (ed.), The Bodhisattva Doctrine in Buddhism (1981)

Theodor Stcherbatsky, The Conception of Buddhist Nirvana. With Sanskrit Text of the Madhyamaka-karika, 2nd rev. ed. (1977)

Har Dayal, The Bodhisattva Doctrine in Buddhist Sanskrit Literature (1970)

Rune E. A. Johansson, The Psychology of Nirvana: A Comparative Study (1970)

G.R. Welbon, The Buddhist Nirvana and Its Western Interpreters (1968)

Robert L. Slater, Paradox and Nirvana: A Study of Religious Ultimates with Special Reference to Burmese Buddhism (1951)

Julius Evola, The Doctrine of Awakening: The Attainment of Self-Mastery According to the Earliest Buddhist Texts (1943)

Law, Politics, War, and Violence

Stephanie Balkwill & James A. Benn (eds.), Buddhist Statecraft in East Asia (2022)

Tom Ginsburg & Benjamin Schonthal (eds.), Buddhism and Comparative Constitutional Law (2022)

William J. Long, A Buddhist Approach to International Relations: Radical Interdependence (2021)

George Yancy & Emily McRae (eds.), Buddhism and Whiteness: Critical Reflections (2019)

Michael Jerryson, If You Meet the Buddha on the Road: Essays on Buddhism, Politics, and Violence (2018)

D. Christian Lammerts, Buddhist Law in Burma: A History of Dhammasattha Texts and Jurisprudence (2018)

Padmasiri de Silva, The Psychology of Buddhism in Conflict Studies (2017)

Hiroko Kawanami (ed.), Buddhism and the Political Process (2016)

Matthew J. Moore, Buddhism and Political Theory (2016)

Wayne R. Husted & Damien Keown (eds.), Buddhism and Human Rights (2015)

Rebecca Redwood French & Mark A. Nathan (eds.), Buddhism and Law: An Introduction (2014)

Hiroko Kawanami & Geoffrey Samuel (eds.), Buddhism, International Relief Work, and Civil Society (2013)

Vincent Eltschinger, Caste and Buddhist Philosophy: Continuity of Some Buddhist Arguments against the Realist Interpretation of Social Denominations (2012)

Melvin McLeod (ed.), Mindful Politics: A Buddhist Guide to Making the World a Better Place (2012)

Vladimir Tikhonov & Torkel Brekke (eds.), Buddhism and Violence: Militarism and Buddhism in Modern Asia (2012)

Michael K. Jerryson & Mark Juergensmeyer (eds.), Buddhist Warfare (2010)

Carmen Meinert, Hans-Bernd Zöllner (eds.), Buddhist Approaches to Human Rights: Dissonances and Resonances (2010)

Brian D. Victoria, Zen at War (2006)

Susan Moon, Not Turning Away: The Practice of Engaged Buddhism (2004)

Brian D. Victoria, Zen War Stories (2003)

Tessa J. Bartholomeusz, In Defense of Dharma: Just-War Ideology in Buddhist Sri Lanka (2002)

Andrew Huxley, Religion, Law and Tradition: Comparative Studies in Religious Law (2002)

Daisaku Ikeda, For the Sake of Peace: Seven Paths to Global Harmony: A Buddhist Perspective (2002)

Ian Harris (ed.), Buddhism and Politics in Twentieth Century Asia (2001)

Jan E.M. Houben & Karel R. Van Kooj (eds.), Violence Denied: Violence, Non-Violence and the Rationalization of Violence in South Asian Cultural History (1999)

David R. Loy, The Great Awakening: A Buddhist Social Theory (1997)

Kenneth Kraft (ed.), Inner Peace, World Peace: Essays on Buddhism and Nonviolence (1992)

Glenn D. Paige & Sarah Gilliatt, Buddhism and Non-Violent Global Problem-Solving: Ulan Bator Explorations (1991)

Unto tahtinen, non-violent theories of punishment: indian and western (1983).

Burma and neighboring areas of Southeast Asia comprise the only region of the world to have developed a written corpus of Buddhist law claiming jurisdiction over all members of society. Yet in contrast with the extensive scholarship on Islamic and Hindu law, this tradition of Buddhist law has been largely overlooked. In fact, it is commonplace to read that Buddhism gave rise to no law aside from the vinaya, or monastic law. In this book, Lammerts upends this misperception and provides an intellectual and literary history of the dynamic jurisprudence of the dhammasattha legal genre between the thirteenth and nineteenth centuries. Based on a critical study of hundreds of little-known surviving dhammasattha and related manuscripts, the work demonstrates the centrality of law as a crucial discipline of Buddhist knowledge in precolonial Southeast Asia. Lammerts argues that there were multiple, sometimes contentious, modes of reckoning Buddhist jurisprudence and legal authority in the region and assesses these in the context of local cultural, textual, and ritual practices. Over time, the foundational jurisprudence of the genre underwent considerable reformulation in light of arguments raised by its critics, bibliographers, and historians, resulting in a reorientation from a cosmological to a more positivist conception of Buddhist law and legislation that had far-reaching implications for innovative forms of dhammasattha -related discourse on the eve of British colonialism. Lammerts' book shows how, despite such textual and theoretical transformations, late precolonial Burmese jurists continued to promote and justify the dhammasattha genre, and the role of law generally in Buddhism, as a vital aspect of the ongoing effort to protect and preserve the sāsana of Gotama Buddha.

As the first comprehensive study of Buddhism and law in Asia, this interdisciplinary volume challenges the concept of Buddhism as an apolitical religion without implications for law. This collection draws on the expertise of the foremost scholars in Buddhist studies and in law to trace the legal aspects of the religion from the time of the Buddha to the present. In some cases, Buddhism provided the crucial architecture for legal ideologies and secular law codes, while in other cases it had to contend with a preexisting legal system, to which it added a new layer of complexity. The wide-ranging studies in this book reveal a diversity of relationships between Buddhist monastic codes and secular legal systems in terms of substantive rules, factoring, and ritual practices. This volume will be an essential resource for all students and teachers in Buddhist studies, law and religion, and comparative law.

Though traditionally regarded as a peaceful religion, Buddhism has a dark side. On multiple occasions over the past fifteen centuries, Buddhist leaders have sanctioned violence, and even war. The eight essays in this book focus on a variety of Buddhist traditions, from antiquity to the present, and show that Buddhist organizations have used religious images and rhetoric to support military conquest throughout history. Buddhist soldiers in sixth century China were given the illustrious status of Bodhisattva after killing their adversaries. In seventeenth century Tibet, the Fifth Dalai Lama endorsed a Mongol ruler's killing of his rivals. And in modern-day Thailand, Buddhist soldiers carry out their duties undercover, as fully ordained monks armed with guns. This work demonstrates that the discourse on religion and violence, usually applied to Judaism, Islam, and Christianity, can no longer exclude Buddhist traditions. The book examines Buddhist military action in Tibet, China, Korea, Japan, Mongolia, Sri Lanka, and Thailand, and shows that even the most unlikely and allegedly pacifist religious traditions are susceptible to the violent tendencies of man.

The "golden yoke" of Buddhist Tibet was the last medieval legal system still in existence in the middle of the twentieth century. This book reconstructs that system as a series of layered narratives from the memories of people who participated in the daily operation of law in the houses and courtyards the offices and courts of Tibet prior to 1959. The practice of law in this unique legal world, which lacked most of our familiar sign posts, ranged from the fantastic use of oracles in the search for evidence to the more mundane presentation of cases in court. Buddhism and law, two topics rarely intertwined in Western consciousness, are at the center of this work. The Tibetan legal system was based on Buddhist philosophy and reflected Buddhist thought in legal practice and decision making. For Tibetans, law is a cosmology, a kaleidoscopic patterning of relations which is constantly changing, recycling, and re-forming even as it integrates the universe and the individual into a timeless mandalic whole. This work causes us to rethink American legal culture. It argues that in the United States, legal matters are segregated into a separate space with rigidly defined categories. The legal cosmology of Buddhist Tibet brings into question both this autonomous framework and most of the presumptions we have about the very nature of law from precedent and res judicata to rule formation and closure.

The Literature of Buddhism

Michihiro Ama, The Awakening of Modern Japanese Fiction: Path Literature and the Interpretation of Buddhism (2021)

John Brehm, The Dharma of Poetry: How Poems Can Deepen Your Spiritual Practice and Open You to Joy (2021)

Karen Derris, Storied Companions: Cancer, Trauma, and Discovering Guides for Living in Buddhist Narratives (2021)

Ven. K.L. Dhammajoti, Reading Buddhist Sanskrit Texts: An Elementary Grammatical Guide, 4th ed. (2021)

Natalie Gummer (ed.), The Language of the Sutras: Essays in Honor of Luis Gómez (2021)

Stefan Larsson & Kristoffer af Edholm, Songs on the Road: Wandering Religious Poets in India, Tibet, and Japan (2021)

Eviatar Shulman, Visions of the Buddha: Creative Dimensions of Early Buddhist Scripture (2021)

Chunwen Hao, Dunhuang Manuscripts: An Introduction to Texts from the Silk Road (2020)

Rafal K. Stepien (ed.), Buddhist Literature as Philosophy, Buddhist Philosophy as Literature (2020)

Dominique Julien, Borges, Buddhism, and World Literature: A Morphology of Renunciation Tales (2019)

Naomi Appleton, Shared Characters in Jain, Buddhist and Hindu Narrative: Gods, Kings and Other Heroes (2016)

Hildegard Diemberger et al (eds.), Tibetan Printing: Comparison, Continuities, and Change (2016)

Naomi Appleton, Narrating Karma and Rebirth: Buddhist and Jain Multi-Life Stories (2015)

Jae-Seong Lee, Postmodern Ethics, Emptiness, and Literature (2015)

Lawrence Normand & Alison Winch (eds.), Encountering Buddhism in Twentieth-Century British and American Literature (2015)

Agnieszka Helman-Wazny, The Archaeology of Tibetan Books (2014)

Kurtis R. Schaeffer, The Culture of the Book in Tibet (2014)

Jinah Kim, Receptacle of the Sacred: Illustrated Manuscripts and the Buddhist Book Cult in South Asia (2013)

Richard S. Cohen, The Splendid Vision: Reading a Buddhist Sutra (2012)

Stephen C. Berkwitz et al (eds.), Buddhist Manuscript Cultures: Knowledge, Ritual, and Art (2011)

John Whalen-Bridge & Gary Storhoff (eds.), Writing as Enlightenment: Buddhist American Literature into the Twenty-First Century (2011)

John Whalen-Bridge & Gary Storhoff (eds.), The Emergence of Buddhist American Literature (2009)

Ralph Flores, Buddhist Scriptures as Literature: Sacred Rhetoric and the Uses of Theory (2008)

Richard F. Gombrich & Cristina Scherrer-Schaub (eds.), Buddhist Studies: Papers of the 12th World Sanskrit Conference, Vol. 8 (2008)

Deborah Klimburg-Salter et al (eds.), Text, Image and Song in Transdisciplinary Dialogue (2007)

Jeff Humphries, Reading Emptiness: Buddhism and Literature (1999)

Milton C. Winternitz, History of Indian Literature, Volume II: Buddhist and Jaina Literature (1999)

Kogen Mizuno, Buddhist Sutras: Origin, Development, Transmission (1989)

Donald S. Lopez (ed.), Buddhist Hermeneutics (1988)

Roy C. Amore & Larry D. Shinn (ed. & trans.), Lustful Maidens and Ascetic Kings: Buddhist and Hindu Stories of Life (1981)

Shinsho Hanayama, Bibliography on Buddhism (1961)

Buddhism and Jainism share the concepts of karma, rebirth, and the desirability of escaping from rebirth. The literature of both traditions contains many stories about past, and sometimes future, lives which reveal much about these foundational doctrines. Naomi Appleton carefully explores how multi-life stories served to construct, communicate, and challenge ideas about karma and rebirth within early South Asia, examining portrayals of the different realms of rebirth, the potential paths and goals of human beings, and the biographies of ideal religious figures. Appleton also deftly surveys the ability of karma to bind individuals together over multiple lives, and the nature of the supernormal memory that makes multi-life stories available in the first place. This original study not only sheds light on the individual preoccupations of Buddhist and Jain tradition, but contributes to a more complete history of religious thought in South Asia.

In considering medieval illustrated Buddhist manuscripts as sacred objects of cultic innovation, this book explores how and why the South Asian Buddhist book-cult has survived for almost two millennia to the present. A book "manuscript" should be understood as a form of sacred space: a temple in microcosm, not only imbued with divine presence but also layered with the memories of many generations of users. Kim argues that illustrating a manuscript with Buddhist imagery not only empowered it as a three-dimensional sacred object, but also made it a suitable tool for the spiritual transformation of medieval Indian practitioners. Through a detailed historical analysis, she suggests that while Buddhism’s disappearance in eastern India was a slow and gradual process, the Buddhist book-cult played an important role in sustaining its identity. In addition, by examining the physical traces left by later Nepalese users and the contemporary ritual use of the book in Nepal, Kim shows how human agency was critical in perpetuating and intensifying the potency of a manuscript as a sacred object throughout time.

This work explores how religious and cultural practices in premodern Asia were shaped by literary and artistic traditions as well as by Buddhist material culture. This study of Buddhist texts focuses on the significance of their material forms rather than their doctrinal contents, and examines how and why they were made. Collectively, the book offers cross-cultural and comparative insights into the transmission of Buddhist knowledge and the use of texts and images as ritual objects in the artistic and aesthetic traditions of Buddhist cultures. Drawing on case studies from India, Gandhara, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Mongolia, China and Nepal, the chapters included investigate the range of interests and values associated with producing and using written texts, and the roles manuscripts and images play in the transmission of Buddhist texts and in fostering devotion among Buddhist communities. Contributions are by reputed scholars in Buddhist Studies and represent diverse disciplinary approaches from religious studies, art history, anthropology, and history.

This work connects ancient Buddhist attitudes and ideas with postmodern theory and aesthetics, concluding that the closest thing in Western culture to the Middle Way of Buddhism is not any sort of theory or philosophy, but the practice of literature. The book draws on scholarship and criticism in literary theory, philosophy, and science to speculate about the possible common ground between literary and Buddhist practices, aiming not so much to elucidate the ancient traditions of Buddhism as to seek ways in which literature might be integrated into a truly Western practice of Buddhism that would remain philosophically true to its Eastern roots.

Language, Logic, and Semiotics

Eun-Su Cho, Language and Meaning: Buddhist Interpretations of the "Buddha's Word" in Indian and East Asian Perspectives (2020)

Manel Herat (ed.), Buddhism and Linguistics: Theory and Philosophy (2017)

Sangharakshita, Metaphors, Magic, and Mystery: An Anthology of Writings and Teachings on Words and Their Relation to the Truth (2015)

Koji Tanaka et al (eds.), The Moon Points Back (2015)

Youxuan Wang, Buddhism and Deconstruction: Towards a Comparative Semiotics (2015)

Jayant Burde, Buddhist Logic and Quantum Dilemma (2012)

The Cowherds, Moonshadows: Conventional Truth in Buddhist Philosophy (2010)

Jay L. Garfield et al (eds.), Pointing at the Moon: Buddhism, Logic, Analytic Philosophy (2009)

Jin Y. Park (ed.), Buddhisms and Deconstructions (2006)

Alex Wayman, A Millennium of Buddhist Logic (1999)

Asanga tilakaratne, nirvana and ineffability: a study of the buddhist theory of reality and language (1993).

R.S.Y. Chi, Buddhist Formal Logic: A Study of Dignaga's Hetucakra and K'uei-chi's Great Commentary on the Nyayapravesa (1990)

Joan Stambaugh, The Real Is Not the Rational (1986)

G.M. Sprung (ed.), The Problem of Two Truths in Buddhism and Vedanta (1973)

T. Stcherbatsky, Buddhist Logic, 2 vols. (1962)

Meditation, Mindfulness, and Insight

Bhikkhu Analayo, Developments in Buddhist Meditation Traditions: The Interplay Between Theory and Practice (2022)

L.S. Cousins, Meditations of the Pali Tradition: Illuminating Buddhist Doctrine, History, and Practice, ed. Sarah Shaw (2022)

Paul Dennison, Jhana Consciousness: Buddhist Meditation in the Age of Neuroscience (2022)

Geshe YongDong Losar, Calm Breath, Calm Mind: A Guide to the Healing Power of Breath, ed. Bernadette Wyton (2022)

B. Alan Wallace, The Art of Transforming the Mind: A Meditator’s Guide to the Tibetan Practice of Lojong (2022)

Karen O'Brien-Kop, Rethinking 'Classical Yoga' and Buddhism: Meditation, Metaphors and Materiality (2021)

Vajradevi, Uncontrived Mindfulness: Ending Suffering Through Attention, Curiosity, and Wisdom (2021)

B. Alan Wallace, Minding Closely: The Four Applications of Mindfulness (2021)

Bhikkhu Analayo, Introducing Mindfulness: The Buddhist Background and Practical Exercises (2020)

Bhikkhu Analayo, Mindfulness in Early Buddhism: Characteristics and Functions (2020)

Will Johnson, The Posture of Meditation: A Practical Manual for Meditators of All Traditions (2020)

Sarah Shaw, Mindfulness: Where It Comes From and What It Means (2020)

Bhikkhu Analayo, Mindfulness of Breathing: A Practice Guide and Translations (2019)

Tullio Giraldi, Psychotherapy, Mindfulness and Buddhist Meditation (2019)

Michal Pagis, Inward: Vipassana Meditation and the Embodiment of the Self (2019)

Paramananda, The Myth of Meditation: Restoring Imaginal Ground through Embodied Buddhist Practice (2019)

Ronald Purser, McMindfulness: How Mindfulness Became the New Capitalist Spirituality (2019)

Bhikkhu Analayo, Satipatthana Meditation: A Practice Guide (2018)

John Blofeld, Gateway to Wisdom: Taoist and Buddhist Contemplative and Healing Yogas (2018)

Ratnaguna Hennessey, The Art of Reflection: A Guide to Thinking, Contemplation and Insight on the Buddhist Path (2018)

Hyun-soo Jeon, Samatha, Jhana, and Vipassana. Practice at the Pa-Auk Monastery: A Meditator's Experience, trans. HaNul Jun (2018)

Jack Kornfield & Joseph Goldstein, The Path of Insight Meditation (2018)

Jaime Kucinskas, The Mindful Elite: Mobilizing from the Inside Out (2018)

Lenart Skof & Petri Berndtson (eds.), Atmospheres of Breathing (2018)

Henry Vyner, The Healthy Mind: Mindfulness, True Self, and the Stream of Consciousness (2018)

Bhikkhu Analayo, Mindfully Facing Disease and Death: Compassionate Advice from Early Buddhist Texts (2017)

Keren Arbel, Early Buddhist Meditation: The Four Jhanas as the Actualization of Insight (2017)

Guy Armstrong, Emptiness: A Practical Introduction for Meditators (2017)

Peter Doran, A Political Economy of Attention, Mindfulness and Consumption: Reclaiming the Mindful Commons (2017)

Halvor Eifring (ed.), Meditation and Culture: The Interplay of Practice and Context (2017)

Paramabandhu Groves & Jed Shamel, Mindful Emotion: A Short Course in Kindness (2017)

Bhikkhu Phra Khantipalo, Calm and Insight: A Buddhist Manual for Meditators (2017)

Erik Braun, The Birth of Insight: Meditation, Modern Buddhism, and the Burmese Monk Ledi Sayadaw (2016)

Bob Chisholm & Jeff Harrison (eds.), The Wisdom of Not-Knowing: Essays on Psychotherapy, Buddhism, and Life Experience (2016)

Mahasi Sayadaw, Manual of Insight, trans. Steve Armstrong (2016)

Bhikkhu Analayo, Compassion and Emptiness in Early Buddhist Meditation (2015)

Richard P. Boyle, Realizing Awakened Consciousness: Interviews with Buddhist Teachers and a New Perspective on the Mind (2015)

Leigh Brasington, Right Concentration: A Practical Guide to the Jhanas (2015)

Bhikkhu Analayo, Perspectives on Satipatthana (2014)

Manu Bazzano (ed.), After Mindfulness: New Perspectives on Psychology and Meditation (2014)

Amanda Ie et al (eds.), The Wiley Blackwell Handbook of Mindfulness, 2 vols. (2014)

Sarah Shaw, The Spirit of Buddhist Meditation (2014)

Lama Dudjom Dorjee, Stillness, Insight, and Emptiness: Buddhist Meditation from the Ground Up (2013)

J. Mark G. Williams & Jon Kabat-Zinn (eds.), Mindfulness: Diverse Perspectives on Its Meaning, Origins and Applications (2013)

Jinananda, Meditating: A Buddhist View (2012)

Kamalashila, Buddhist Meditation: Tranquillity, Imagination and Insight (2012)

Joe Loizzo, Sustainable Happiness: The Mind Science of Well-Being, Altruism, and Inspiration (2012)

Sangharakshita, The Purpose and Practice of Buddhist Meditation: A Sourcebook of Teachings (2012)

Shaila Catherine, Wisdom Wide and Deep: A Practical Handbook for Mastering Jhana and Vipassana (2011)

Judith Simmer-Brown & Fran Grace (eds.), Meditation and the Classroom: Contemplative Pedagogy for Religious Studies (2011)

Cynthia Thatcher, Just Seeing: Insight Meditation and Sense-Perception (2011)

Bodhipaksa, Wildmind: A Step-by-Step Guide to Meditation (2010)

Arinna Weisman & Jean Smith, The Beginner's Guide to Insight Meditation (2010)

Thomas Cleary, Minding Mind: A Course in Basic Meditation (2009)

Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, Beyond Mindfulness in Plain English: An Introductory Guide to the Jhanas, ed. John Peddicord (2009)

Maitreyabandhu, Life with Full Attention: A Practical Course in Mindfulness (2009)

Stephen Snyder & Tina Rasmussen, Practicing the Jhanas: Traditional Concentration Meditation As Presented by the Ven. Pa Auk Sayadaw (2009)

Alexander Wynne, The Origin of Buddhist Meditation (2009)

Richard Shankman, The Experience of Samadhi: An In-Depth Exploration of Buddhist Meditation (2008)

Sarah Shaw, Introduction to Buddhist Meditation (2008)

Ajahn Brahmavamso, Ajahn Nyanadhammo, & Dharma Dorje, Walking Meditation: Three Expositions (2007)

Gregory Kramer, Insight Dialogue: The Interpersonal Path to Freedom (2007)

Toni Packer, The Silent Question: Meditating in the Stillness of Not-Knowing (2007)

Paramananda, The Body: The Art of Meditation (2007)

Ajahn Brahm, Mindfulness, Bliss, and Beyond: A Meditator's Handbook (2006)

Paramananda, Change Your Mind: A Practical Guide to Buddhist Meditation (2006)

Sarah Shaw, Buddhist Meditation: An Anthology of Texts from the Pali Canon (2006)

Vessantara, The Heart: The Art of Meditation (2006)

Kathleen McDonald, How to Meditate: A Practical Guide (2005)

Vessantara, The Breath: The Art of Meditation (2005)

Bhikkhu Analayo, Satipatthana: The Direct Path to Realization (2004)

Frits Koster, Liberating Insight: Introduction to Buddhist Psychology and Insight Meditation (2004)

Nagabodhi, Metta: The Practice of Loving Kindness (2004)

Larry Rosenberg, Breath by Breath: The Liberating Practice of Insight Meditation (2004)

Sangharakshita, Living with Awareness: A Guide to the Satipatthana Sutta (2004)

Daniel Odier, Meditation Techniques of the Buddhist and Taoist Masters (2003)

John Daishin Buksbazen, Zen Meditation in Plain English (2002)

Bhante Gunaratana, Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness: Walking the Path of the Buddha (2001)

Lewis Richmond, Work as a Spiritual Practice: A Practical Buddhist Approach to Inner Growth and Satisfaction on the Job (2000)

Mitchell Ginsberg, The Far Shore: Vipassana, the Practice of Insight (1999)

A. Charles Muller (trans.), The Sutra of Perfect Enlightenment: Korean Buddhism's Guide to Meditation (1999)

Chih-i, Stopping and Seeing: A Comprehensive Course in Buddhist Meditation trans. Thomas Cleary (1997)

Donald K. Swearer, Secrets of the Lotus: Studies in Buddhist Meditation (1997)

Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, Mindfulness in Plain English (1996)

Sayadaw U. Silananda, The Four Foundations of Mindfulness, ed. Ruth-Inge Heinze (1995)

Claude F. Whitmyer (ed.), Mindfulness and Meaningful Work: Explorations in Right Livelihood (1994)

Johannes Bronkhorst, The Two Traditions of Meditation in Ancient India (1993)

Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom (1993)

Amadeo Sole-Leris, Tranquillity and Insight: An Introduction to the Oldest Form of Buddhist Meditation (1992)

Charles Luk, Secrets of Chinese Meditation: Self-Cultivation by Mind Control As Taught in the Ch'an, Mahayana and Taoist Schools in China (1991)

Chögyam Trungpa, Meditation in Action (1991)

Geshe G. Lodro, Walking Through Walls: A Presentation of Tibetan Meditation (1990)

Joseph Goldstein, The Experience of Insight: A Simple and Direct Guide to Buddhist Meditation (1987)

Peter N. Gregory (ed.), Traditions of Meditation in Chinese Buddhism (1986)

Paul Griffiths, On Being Mindless: Buddhist Meditation and the Mind-Body Problem (1986)

Bhikkhu Nanamoli, Mindfulness of Breathing: Buddhist Texts from the Pāli Canon and Extracts from the Pali Commentaries (1982)

Nyanaponika Thera (ed. & trans.), The Heart of Buddhist Meditation (1973)

Bhikkhu Soma (ed. & trans.), The Way of Mindfulness: English Translation of the Satipatthana Sutta and Its Commentary (1967)

Edward Conze, Buddhist Meditation (1956)

Western society has never been more interested in interiority. Indeed, it seems more and more people are deliberately looking inward—toward the mind, the body, or both. Pagis’s book focuses on one increasingly popular channel for the introverted gaze: vipassana meditation, which has spread from Burma to more than forty countries and counting. Lacing her account with vivid anecdotes and personal stories, Pagis turns our attention not only to the practice of vipassana but to the communities that have sprung up around it. This work is also a social history of the westward diffusion of Eastern religious practices spurred on by the lingering effects of the British colonial presence in India. At the same time Pagis asks knotty questions about what happens when we continually turn inward, as she investigates the complex relations between physical selves, emotional selves, and our larger social worlds. Her book sheds new light on evergreen topics such as globalization, social psychology, and the place of the human body in the enduring process of self-awareness.

Mindful meditation is now embraced in virtually all corners of society today, from K-12 schools to Fortune 100 companies, and its virtues extolled by national and international media almost daily. It is thought to benefit our health and overall well-being, to counter stress, to help children pay attention, and to foster creativity, productivity and emotional intelligence. Yet in the 1960s and 1970s meditation was viewed as a marginal, counter-cultural practice, or a religious ritual for Asian immigrants. How did mindfulness become mainstream? Kucinskas reveals who is behind the mindfulness movement, and the engine they built to propel mindfulness into public consciousness. Drawing on over a hundred first-hand accounts with top scientists, religious leaders, educators, business people and investors, Kucinskas shows how this highly accomplished, affluent group in America transformed meditation into an appealing set of contemplative practices. Rather than relying on confrontation and protest to make their mark and improve society, the contemplatives sought a cultural revolution by building elite networks and advocating the benefits of meditation across professions. But this idealistic myopia came to reinforce some of the problems it originally aspired to solve. A critical look at this Buddhist-inspired movement, this book explores how elite movements can spread and draws larger lessons for other social, cultural, and religious movements across institutions and organizations.

This book offers a new interpretation of the relationship between 'insight practice' (satipatthana) and the attainment of the four jhanas (i.e., right samadhi ), a key problem in the study of Buddhist meditation. The author challenges the traditional Buddhist understanding of the four jhanas as states of absorption, and shows how these states are the actualization and embodiment of insight (vipassana). It proposes that the four jhanas and what we call 'vipassana' are integral dimensions of a single process that leads to awakening. This book demonstrates that the distinction between the 'practice of serenity' (samatha-bhavana) and the 'practice of insight' (vipassana-bhavana) – a fundamental distinction in Buddhist meditation theory – is not applicable to early Buddhist understanding of the meditative path. It seeks to show that the common interpretation of the jhanas as 'altered states of consciousness', absorptions that do not reveal anything about the nature of phenomena, is incompatible with the teachings of the Pali Nikayas. By carefully analyzing the descriptions of the four jhanas in the early Buddhist texts in Pali, their contexts, associations and meanings within the conceptual framework of early Buddhism, the relationship between this central element in the Buddhist path and 'insight meditation' becomes revealed in all its power. This book will be of interest to scholars of Buddhist studies, Asian philosophies and religions, as well as serious practitioners of insight meditation.

Dharma practice comprises a wide range of wise instructions and skillful means. As a result, meditators may be exposed to a diversity of approaches to the core teachings and the meditative path--and that can be confusing at times. In this clear and accessible exploration, Dharma teacher and longtime meditator Richard Shankman unravels the mix of differing, sometimes conflicting, views and traditional teachings on how samadhi (concentration) is understood and taught. In part one, Richard Shankman explores the range of teachings and views about samadhi in the Theravada Pali tradition, examines different approaches, and considers how they can inform and enrich our meditation practice. Part two consists of a series of interviews with prominent contemporary Theravada and vipassana (insight) Buddhist teachers. These discussions focus on the practical experience of samadhi, bringing the theoretical to life and offering a range of applications.

Monasticism

Stephen J. Davis, Monasticism: A Very Short Introduction (2018)

Susan Andrews et al (eds.), Rules of Engagement: Medieval Traditions of Buddhist Monastic Regulation (2017)

Bhikkhu Khantipalo, Banner of the Arahants: Buddhist Monks and Nuns from the Buddha's Time Till Now (2016)

Jeffrey Samuels, Attracting the Heart: Social Relations and the Aesthetics of Emotion in Sri Lankan Monastic Culture (2016)

Malcolm Voyce, Foucault, Buddhism and Disciplinary Rules (2016)

Bhikkhu Nyanatusita, Analysis of the Bhikkhu Patimokkha (2014)

Bhikkhu Nyanatusita (ed. & trans.), The Bhikkhu Patimokkha: A Word by Word Translation (2014)

Tim Ward, What the Buddha Never Taught (2013)

Jonathan A. Silk, Managing Monks: Administrators and Administrative Roles in Indian Buddhist Monasticism (2008)

Jotiya Dhirasekera, Buddhist Monastic Discipline: A Study of Its Origin and Development in Relation to the Sutta and Vinaya Pitakas (2007)

Li Rongxi & Albert A. Dalia (trans.), Lives of Great Monks and Nuns (2006)

Koichi Shinohara & Phyllis Granoff, Speaking of Monks: From Benares to Beijing (2006)

William Bodiford (ed.), Going Forth: Visions of Buddhist Vinaya (2005)

Pierre Pichard & Francois Lagirarde, The Buddhist Monastery: A Cross-Cultural Survey (2003)

Ann Heirman, Rules for Nuns According to the Dharmaguptakavinaya: "The Discipline in Four Parts" (2002)

Venerable Bhikshuni Wu Yin, Choosing Simplicity: A Commentary on the Bhikshuni Pratimoksha, ed. Bhikshuni Thubten Chodron, trans. Bhikshuni Jendy Shih (2001)

W. Pachow, A Comparative Study of the Pratimoksa: On the Basis of its Chinese, Tibetan, Sanskrit, and Pali Versions (2000)

Charles S. Prebish, Buddhist Monastic Discipline: The Sanskrit Pratimoksa Sutras of the Mahasamghikas and Mulasarvastivadins (1996)

Charles S. Prebish, A Survey of Vinaya Literature, Volume One (1996)

Thanissaro Bhikkhu, The Buddhist Monastic Code, 2 vols. (1994)

Charles Wei-hsun Fu & Sandra A. Wawrytko (eds.), Buddhist Behavioral Codes and the Modern World (1994)

Gunaratne Panabokke, History of the Buddhist Sangha in India and Sri Lanka (1993)

Sunanda Putuwar, The Buddhist Sangha: Paradigm of the Ideal Human Society (1991)

Mohan Wijayaratna, Buddhist Monastic Life, according to the Texts of the Theravada Tradition (1990)

Walpola Rahula, The Heritage of the Bhikkhu (1987)

Heinz Bechert & Richard Gombrich (eds.), The World of Buddhism: Buddhist Monks and Nuns in Society and Culture (1984)

John C. Holt, Discipline: The Canonical Buddhism of the Vinayapitaka (1983)

Nandasena ratnapala (ed. & trans.), the katikavatas: laws of the buddhist order of ceylon from the 12th century to the 18th century (1971).

Nalinaksha Dutt, Early Monastic Buddhism, 2 vols. (1960)

Sukumar Dutt, Early Buddhist Monachism (1960)

Erich Frauwallner, The Earliest Vinaya and the Beginnings of Buddhist Literature (1956)

Recent years have seen heightened interest in the ritual, juridical, and generally practical aspects of the Buddhist tradition. The contributions to this edited volume build on this trend while venturing beyond the established boundaries of discourse in specialized academic disciplines, presenting state-of-the-art research on the vinaya in all of its breadth and depth. They do so not only by tracing Buddhist textual traditions but also by showcasing the vast variety of practices that are the object of such regulations and throw a new light on the social implications such protocols have had in South, Central, and East Asia.

Vinaya, one of the three main categories of Buddhist scripture, functions not only as a type of canon law, but also as a founding charter for Buddhist institutional practice in East Asia. In its role as a scriptural charter, vinaya has justified widely dissimilar approaches to religious life as Buddhist orders in different times and places have interpreted it in contradictory ways. In the resulting tension between scripture and practice, certain kinds of ceremonial issues acquire profound social, psychological, doctrinal, and soteriological significance in Buddhism. This collection focuses on these issues over a wide sweep of history--from early fifth-century China to modern Japan--to provide readers with a rich overview of the intersection of doctrinal, ritual, and institutional concerns in the development of East Asian Buddhist practices. Despite the crucial importance of vinaya, especially for understanding Buddhism in East Asia, very little scholarship in Western languages exists on this fascinating topic. The essays presented here, written by senior scholars in the field, address how actual people responded to local social and cultural imperatives by reading scripture in innovative ways to give new life to tradition. They place real people, practices, and institutions at the center of each account, revealing both diversity and unity in Buddhist customs.

This work discusses the precepts and lifestyle of fully ordained nuns within the Buddhist tradition. The ordination vows act as guidelines to promote harmony both within the individual and within the community by regulating and thereby simplifying one's relationships to other sangha members and laypeople, as well as to the needs of daily life. Observing these precepts and practicing the Buddhadharma brings incredible benefit to oneself and others. Since the nuns' precepts include those for monks and have additional rules for nuns, this book is useful for anyone interested in monastic life. As a record of women's struggle not only to achieve a life of self-discipline, but also to create harmonious independent religious communities of women, this volume is a pioneering work.

This book provides a vivid and detailed picture of the daily life and religious practices of Buddhist monks and nuns in the classic period of Theravada Buddhism. The author describes the way in which the Buddha's disciples institutionalized and ritualized his teachings about food, dress, money, chastity, solitude, and discipleship. This tradition represents an ideal of religious life that has been followed in India and South Asia for more than two thousand years. The introduction by Steven Collins describes Theravada Buddhist literature, discusses the issue of the historical reliability of the texts, and offers extensive suggestions for further reading. The book will be of interest to scholars and students in Asian studies, religious studies, anthropology, and history.

Medicine & Health

C. Pierce Salguero, A Global History of Buddhism and Medicine (2022)

C. Pierce Salguero & Andrew Macomber (eds.), Buddhist Healing in Medieval China and Japan (2020)

C. Pierce Salguero (ed.), Buddhism and Medicine: An Anthology of Modern and Contemporary Sources (2019)

Katja Triplett, Buddhism and Medicine in Japan: A Topical Survey (500-1600 CE) of a Complex Relationship (2019)

Thomas N. Patton, The Buddha's Wizards: Magic, Protection, and Healing in Burmese Buddhism (2018)

C. Pierce Salguero, Buddhism and Medicine: An Anthology of Premodern Sources (2017)

C. Pierce Salguero, Traditional Thai Medicine: Buddhism, Animism, Yoga, Ayurveda (2016)

Jan Chozen Bays, Jizo Bodhisattva: Modern Healing & Traditional Buddhist Practice (2015)

Janet Gyatso, Being Human in a Buddhist World: An Intellectual History of Medicine in Early Modern Tibet (2015)

C. Pierce Salguero, Translating Buddhist Medicine in Medieval China (2014)

Andrew E. Goble, Confluences of Medicine in Medieval Japan: Buddhist Healing, Chinese Knowledge, Islamic Formulas, and Wounds of War (2011)

Paul Brenner, Buddha in the Waiting Room: Simple Truths about Health, Illness, and Healing (2007)

Michel Strickmann, Chinese Magical Medicine (2005)

Sharon Cameron, Beautiful Work: A Meditation on Pain (2000)

Raoul Birnbaum, The Healing Buddha (1980)

Pluralism & Tolerance: Buddhism & Other Religions

C.V. Jones (ed.), Buddhism and Its Religious Others: Historical Encounters and Representations (2022)

R. Michael Feener & Anne M. Blackburn (eds.), Buddhist and Islamic Orders in Southern Asia: Comparative Perspectives (2021)

Jijimon Alakkalam Joseph, Christian-Zen Dialogue: Sacred Stories As a Starting Point for Interfaith Dialogue (2021)

Yongho Francis Lee, Mysticism and Intellect in Medieval Christianity and Buddhism (2021)

Monica Sanford, Kalyanamitra: A Model for Buddhist Spiritual Care, Volume 1 (2021)

Douglas S. Duckworth, J. Abraham Vélez de Cea, & Elizabeth J. Harris (eds.), Buddhist Responses to Religious Diversity: Theravada and Tibetan Perspectives (2020)

Pehr Granqvist, Attachment in Religion and Spirituality: A Wider View (2020)

Harold Coward, Word, Chant, and Song: Spiritual Transformation in Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, and Sikhism (2019)

Peter Harvey, Buddhism and Monotheism (2019)

S. Mark Heim, Crucified Wisdom: Theological Reflection on Christ and the Bodhisattva (2018)

J. Abraham Velez de Cea, The Buddha and Religious Diversity (2017)

Kristin Beise Kiblinger, Buddhist Inclusivism: Attitudes Towards Religious Others (2017)

Anh Q. Tran (ed. & trans.), Gods, Heroes, and Ancestors: An Interreligious Encounter in Eighteenth-Century Vietnam (2017)

Gavin D'Costa & Ross Thompson (eds.), Buddhist-Christian Dual Belonging: Affirmations, Objections, Explorations (2016)

Hugh Nicholson, The Spirit of Contradiction in Christianity and Buddhism (2016)

Corinna Nicolaou, A None's Story: Searching for Meaning Inside Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, and Islam (2016)

John Raymaker, Bernard Lonergan's Third Way of the Heart and Mind: Bridging Some Buddhist-Christian-Muslim-Secularist Misunderstandings with a Global Secularity Ethics (2016)

Perry Schmidt-Leukel, Buddhism, Christianity and the Question of Creation: Karmic or Divine? (2016)

Alan Cole, Fetishizing Tradition: Desire and Reinvention in Buddhist and Christian Narratives (2015)

Gavin Flood, The Truth Within: A History of Inwardness in Christianity, Hinduism, and Buddhism (2015)

Jan van Bragt, Interreligious Affinities: Encounters with the Kyoto School and the Religions of Japan, ed. James W. Heisig et al (2014)

Donald S. Lopez, Jr. & Peggy McCracken, In Search of the Christian Buddha: How an Asian Sage Became a Medieval Saint (2014)

Paul Gwynne, Buddha, Jesus and Muhammad: A Comparative Study (2013)

Michael Pye & Robert Morgan (eds.), The Cardinal Meaning: Essays in Comparative Hermeneutics. Buddhism and Christianity (2013)

John Ross Carter, In the Company of Friends: Exploring Faith with Buddhists and Christians (2012)

Kari Storstein Haug, Interpreting Proverbs 11:18-31, Psalm 73, and Ecclesiastes 9:1-12 in Light of, and As a Response to, Thai Buddhist Interpretations (2012)

Peter D. Hershock, Valuing Diversity: Buddhist Reflection on Realizing a More Equitable Global Future (2012)

Kazuo Muto, Christianity and the Notion of Nothingness: Contributions to Buddhist-Christian Dialogue from the Kyoto School, ed. Martin Repp, trans. Jan van Bragt (2012)

Perry Schmidt-Leukel (ed.), Buddhism and Religious Diversity: Critical Concepts in Religious Studies (2012)

Amos Yong, Cosmic Breath: Spirit and Nature in the Christianity-Buddhism-Science Trialogue (2012)

Amos Yong, Pneumatology and the Christian-Buddhist Dialogue (2012)

Rose Drew, Buddhist and Christian? An Exploration of Dual Belonging (2011)

Daniel Dubuisson, Wisdoms of Humanity: Buddhism, Paganism, and Christianity (2011)

Eileen Rizo-Patron & Richard Kearney (eds.), Traversing the Heart: Journeys of the Inter-religious Imagination (2010)

Jin Baek, Nothingness: Tadao Ando's Christian Sacred Space (2009)

B. Alan Wallace, Mind in the Balance: Meditation in Science, Buddhism, & Christianity (2009)

Winston L. King, Buddhism and Christianity: Some Bridges of Understanding (2008)

Paul O. Ingram, Buddhist-Christian Dialogue in an Age of Science (2007)

Rita M. Gross & Terry C. Muck (eds.), Christians Talk about Buddhist Meditation, Buddhists Talk about Christian Prayer (2003)

John Raymaker, Empowering the Lonely Crowd: Pope John Paul II, Lonergan, and Japanese Buddhism (2003)

John Raymaker, A Buddhist-Christian Logic of the Heart: Nishida's Kyoto School and Lonergan's "Spiritual Genome" as World Bridge (2002)

J.P. Williams, Denying Divinity: Apophasis in the Patristic Christian and Soto Zen Buddhist Traditions (2001)

Rita M. Gross & Terry C. Muck (eds.), Buddhists Talk about Jesus, Christians Talk about the Buddha (2000)

Sallie B. King & Paul O. Ingram (eds.), The Sound of Liberating Truth: Buddhist-Christian Dialogues in Honor of Frederick J. Streng (1999)

Fritz Buri, The Buddha-Christ As the Lord of the True Self: The Religious Philosophy of the Kyoto School and Christianity, trans. Harold H. Oliver (1997)

Robert R. Magliola, On Deconstructing Life-Worlds: Buddhism, Christianity, Culture (1997)

Donald W. Mitchell & James Wiseman, O.S.B., eds., The Gethsemani Encounter: A Dialogue on the Spiritual Life by Buddhist and Christian Monastics (1997)

Denise Lardner Carmody & John Tully Carmody, In the Path of the Masters: Understanding the Spirituality of Buddha, Confucius, Jesus, and Muhammad (1996)

John Tully Carmody & Denise Lardner Carmody, Serene Compassion: A Christian Appreciation of Buddhist Holiness (1996)

David Loy (ed.), Healing Deconstruction: Postmodern Thought in Buddhism and Christianity (1996)

Masao Abe, Buddhism and Interfaith Dialogue, ed. Steven Heine (1995)

Russell H. Bowers, Someone or Nothing? Nishitani's "Religion and Nothingness" as a Foundation for Christian-Buddhist Dialogue (1995)

John b. cobb, jr., & christopher a. ives (eds.), the emptying god: a buddhist-jewish-christian conversation (1990).

Donald S. Lopez & Steven C. Rockefeller (eds.), The Christ and the Bodhisattva (1987)

Hajime Nakamura, Buddhism in Comparative Light (1986)

Hans waldenfels, absolute nothingness: foundations for a buddhist-christian dialogue, trans. james w. heisig (1980).

Lynn A. De Silva, The Problem of the Self in Buddhism and Christianity (1979)

D.T. Suzuki, Mysticism: Christian and Buddhist (1976)

James W. Boyd, Satan and Māra: Christian and Buddhist Symbols of Evil (1975)

J. Estlin Carpenter, Buddhism and Christianity: A Contrast and Parallel (1922)

Though a minority religion in Vietnam, Christianity has been a significant presence in the country since its arrival in the sixteenth century. In this volume, Tran offers the first English translation of the recently discovered 1752 manuscript Tam Giao Chu Vong (The Errors of the Three Religions). Structured as a dialogue between a Christian priest and a Confucian scholar, this anonymously authored manuscript paints a rich picture of the three traditional Vietnamese religions: Confucianism, Buddhism, and Daoism. The work explains and evaluates several religious beliefs, customs, and rituals of eighteenth-century Vietnam, many of which are still in practice today. In addition, it contains a trove of information on the challenges and struggles that Vietnamese Christian converts had to face in following the new faith.

The cognitive science of religion has shown that abstract religious concepts within many established religious traditions often fail to correspond to what the majority of their adherents actually believe. Yet the cognitive approach to religion is largely silent on the question of how the doctrinal views developed in the first place. Nicholson aims to fill this gap by arguing that such doctrines can be understood as developing out of social identity processes. He focuses on the historical development of the Christian doctrine of consubstantiality, the claim that the Son is of the same substance as the Father, and the Buddhist doctrine of no-self, the claim that the personality is reducible to its impersonal physical and psychological constituents. Nicholson argues that that these doctrines were each the products of intra- and inter-religious rivalry, in which one faction tried to get the upper hand over its ingroup rivals by maximizing the contrast with the dominant outgroup. Thus the theologians of the fourth century developed the concept of consubstantiality in the context of an effort to maximize, against their rivals, the contrast with Christianity's archetypal "other," Judaism. Similarly, the no-self doctrine stemmed from an effort to maximize, against the so-called Personalist schools of Buddhism, the contrast with Brahmanical Hinduism with its doctrine of an unchanging and eternal self. In this way, Nicholson shows how religious traditions can back themselves into doctrinal positions that they must retrospectively justify.

Diversity matters. Whether in the context of ecosystems, education, the workplace, or politics, diversity is now recognized as a fact and as something to be positively affirmed. But what is the value of diversity? What explains its increasing significance? This book is a groundbreaking response to these questions and to the contemporary global dynamics that make them so salient. Peter D. Hershock examines the changes of the last century to show how the successes of Western-style modernity and industrially-powered markets have, ironically, coupled progressive integration and interdependence with the proliferation of political, economic, social, cultural, and environmental differences. Global predicaments like climate change and persistent wealth inequalities compel recognition that we are in the midst of an era-defining shift from the primacy of the technical to that of the ethical. Yet, neither modern liberalism nor its postmodern critiques have offered the resources needed to address such challenges. Making use of Buddhist and ecological insights, Hershock's book develops a qualitatively rich conception of diversity as an emerging value and global relational commons, forwarding an ethics of interdependence and responsive virtuosity that opens prospects for a paradigm shift in our pursuits of equity, freedom, and democratic justice.

Based around an interview with Tadao Ando, this book explores the influence of the Buddhist concept of nothingness on Ando’s Christian architecture, and sheds new light on the cultural significance of the buildings of one of the world’s leading contemporary architects. Specifically, this book situates Ando’s churches, particularly his world-renowned Church of the Light (1989), within the legacy of nothingness expounded by Kitaro Nishida (1870-1945), the father of the Kyoto Philosophical School. Linking Ando’s Christian architecture with a philosophy originating in Mahayana Buddhism illuminates the relationship between the two religious systems, as well as tying Ando’s architecture to the influence of Nishida on post-war Japanese art and culture.

Clinical Psychology & Psychotherapy

Mark Epstein, The Zen of Therapy: Uncovering a Hidden Kindness in Life (2022)

John Davis, The Diamond Approach: An Introduction to the Teachings of A.H. Almaas (2021)

Hyunsoo Jeon, Buddhist Psychotherapy: Wisdom from Early Buddhist Teaching (2021)

Arnold Kozak, The Buddha Was a Psychologist: A Rational Approach to Buddhist Teachings (2021)

Joseph Bobrow, Zen and Psychotherapy: Partners in Liberation (2020)

Michal Barnea-Astrog, Psychoanalytic and Buddhist Reflections on Gentleness: Sensitivity, Fear, and the Drive Towards Truth (2019)

Ira Helderman, Prescribing the Dharma: Psychotherapists, Buddhist Traditions, and Defining Religion (2019)

Wakoh Shannon Hickey, Mind Cure: From Meditation to Medicine (2019)

Itai Ivtzan (ed.), Handbook of Mindfulness-Based Programmes: Mindfulness Interventions from Education to Health and Therapy (2019)

Christian U. Krägeloh et al, Mindfulness-Based Intervention Research: Characteristics, Approaches, and Developments (2019)

Paul C. Cooper, Zen Insight, Psychoanalytic Action (2018)

Yorai Sella, From Dualism to Oneness in Psychoanalysis: A Zen Perspective on the Mind-Body Question (2018)

Manu Bazzano, Zen and Therapy: Heretical Perspectives (2017)

Pilar Jennings, To Heal a Wounded Heart: The Transformative Power of Buddhism and Psychotherapy in Action (2017)

Peg LeVine, Classic Morita Therapy: Consciousness, Zen, Justice and Trauma (2017)

Joseph Loizzo et al (eds.), Advances in Contemplative Psychotherapy: Accelerating Healing and Transformation (2017)

Padmasiri de Silva, Emotions and the Body in Buddhist Contemplative Practice and Mindfulness-Based Therapy: Pathways of Somatic Intelligence (2017)

Itai Ivtzan & Tim Lomas (eds.), Mindfulness in Positive Psychology: The Science of Meditation and Well-Being (2016)

Richard W. Sears, The Sense of Self: Perspectives from Science and Zen Buddhism (2016)

Erik van den Brink & Frits Koster, Mindfulness-Based Compassionate Living: A New Training Programme to Deepen Mindfulness with Heartfulness (2015)

Mark Epstein, Going to Pieces Without Falling Apart: A Buddhist Perspective on Wholeness (2015)

Padmasiri De Silva, An Introduction to Buddhist Psychology and Counselling: Pathways of Mindfulness-Based Therapies (2014)

Anthony Molino (ed.), Crossroads in Psychoanalysis, Buddhism, and Mindfulness: The Word and the Breath (2013)

Jeffrey B. Rubin, Psychotherapy and Buddhism: Toward an Integration (2013)

Cheryl A. Giles & Willa B. Miller (eds.), The Arts of Contemplative Care: Pioneering Voices in Buddhist Chaplaincy and Pastoral Work (2012)

Barry Magid, Ordinary Mind: Exploring the Common Ground of Zen and Psychoanalysis (2012)

Jeremy D. Safran (ed.), Psychoanalysis and Buddhism: An Unfolding Dialogue (2012)

B. Alan Wallace, The Taboo of Subjectivity: Toward a New Science of Consciousness (2011)

Maurits G.T. Kwee (ed.), New Horizons in Buddhist Psychology: Relational Buddhism for Collaborative Practitioners (2010)

Andrew Olendzki, Unlimiting Mind: The Radically Experiential Psychology of Buddhism (2010)

Anne Maiden Brown et al, The Tibetan Art of Parenting: From Before Conception Through Early Childhood (2009)

Paul C. Cooper, The Zen Impulse and the Psychoanalytic Encounter (2009)

Marvin Levine, The Positive Psychology of Buddhism and Yoga (2009)

Dale Mathers et al (eds.), Self and No-Self: Continuing the Dialogue Between Buddhism and Psychotherapy (2009)

Mark Epstein, Psychotherapy Without the Self: A Buddhist Perspective (2008)

Maurits Kwee et al (eds.), Horizons in Buddhist Psychology (2006)

Robert Langan & Robert Coles, Minding What Matters: Psychotherapy and the Buddha Within (2006)

Dinesh Kumar Nauriyal, Michael S. Drummond, & Y.B. Lal (eds.), Buddhist Thought and Applied Psychological Research: Transcending the Boundaries (2006)

Padmasiri de Silva, An Introduction to Buddhist Psychology, 4th ed. (2005)

Harvey B. Aronson, Buddhist Practice on Western Ground: Reconciling Eastern Ideals and Western Psychology (2004)

Seth Robert Segall (ed.), Encountering Buddhism: Western Psychology and Buddhist Teachings (2003)

David Brazier, The Feeling Buddha: A Buddhist Psychology of Character, Adversity, and Passion (2002)

Radmila Moacanin, The Essence of Jung's Psychology and Tibetan Buddhism: Western and Eastern Paths to the Heart (2002)

Mark Epstein, Going on Being: Buddhism and the Way of Change: A Positive Psychology for the West (2001)

John Welwood, Toward a Psychology of Awakening: Buddhism, Psychotherapy, and the Path of Personal and Spiritual Transformation (2000)

Gay Watson, The Resonance of Emptiness: A Buddhist Inspiration for a Contemporary Psychotherapy (1998)

David Brazier, Zen Therapy: Transcending the Sorrows of the Human Mind (1997)

Christopher deCharms, Two Views of Mind: Abhidharma and Brain Science (1997)

Mark Epstein, Thoughts Without a Thinker: Psychotherapy from a Buddhist Perspective (1995)

John R. Suler, Contemporary Psychoanalysis and Eastern Thought (1993)

Nathan Katz (ed.), Buddhist and Western Psychology (1983)

Mindfulness and yoga are widely said to improve mental and physical health, and booming industries have emerged to teach them as secular techniques. This movement is typically traced to the 1970s, but it actually began a century earlier. Hickey shows that most of those who first advocated meditation for healing were women: leaders of the "Mind Cure" movement, which emerged during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Instructed by Buddhist and Hindu missionaries, many of these women believed that by transforming consciousness, they could also transform oppressive conditions in which they lived. For women - and many African-American men - "Mind Cure" meant not just happiness, but liberation in concrete political, economic, and legal terms. In response to the perceived threat posed by this movement, white male doctors and clergy with elite academic credentials began to channel key Mind Cure methods into "scientific" psychology and medicine. As mental therapeutics became medicalized and commodified, the religious roots of meditation, like the social-justice agendas of early Mind Curers, fell by the wayside. Although characterized as "universal," mindfulness has very specific historical and cultural roots, and is now largely marketed by and accessible to affluent white people. Hickey examines religious dimensions of the Mindfulness movement and clinical research about its effectiveness. By treating stress-related illness individualistically, she argues, the contemporary movement obscures the roles religious communities can play in fostering civil society and personal well-being, and diverts attention from systemic factors fueling stress-related illness, including racism, sexism, and poverty.

Drawing from original source material, contemporary scholarship, and Wilfred Bion’s psychoanalytic writings, this book introduces the Zen notion of gūjin, or total exertion, and elaborates a realizational perspective that integrates Zen Buddhism and psychoanalysis. Developed by the thirteenth-century Zen teacher and founder of the Japanese Soto Zen school, Eihei Dogen, gūjin finds expression and is referenced in various contemporary scholarly and religious commentaries. This book explains this pivotal Zen concept and addresses themes by drawing from translated source material, academic scholarship, traditional Zen kōans and teaching stories, extensive commentarial literature, interpretive writings by contemporary Soto Zen teachers, psychoanalytic theory, clinical material, and poetry, as well as the author’s thirty years of personal experience as a psychoanalyst, supervisor, psychoanalytic educator, ordained Soto Zen priest, and transmitted Soto Zen teacher. From a realizational perspective that integrates Zen and psychoanalytic concepts, the book extends the scope and increases the effectiveness of clinical work for the psychotherapist, and facilitates deepened experiences for the meditation practitioner.

This collection brings together the latest thinking in these two important disciplines. Positive psychology, the science of well-being and strengths, is the fastest growing branch of psychology, offering an optimal home for the research and application of mindfulness. As we contemplate mindfulness in the context of positive psychology, meaningful insights are being revealed in relation to our mental and physical health. The book features chapters from leading figures from mindfulness and positive psychology, offering an exciting combination of topics. Mindfulness is explored in relation to flow, meaning, parenthood, performance, sports, obesity, depression, pregnancy, spirituality, happiness, mortality, and many other ground-breaking topics. This is an invitation to rethink about mindfulness in ways that truly expands our understanding of well-being. The work will appeal to a readership of students and practitioners, as well as those interested in mindfulness, positive psychology, or other relevant areas such as education, healthcare, clinical psychology, counselling psychology, occupational psychology, and coaching. The contributors explore cutting edge theories, research, and practical exercises, which will be relevant to all people interested in this area, and particularly those who wish to enhance their well-being via mindfulness.

Immersed in Buddhist psychology prior to studying Western psychiatry, Dr. Mark Epstein first viewed Western therapeutic approaches through the lens of the East. This posed something of a challenge. Although both systems promise liberation through self-awareness, the central tenet of Buddha's wisdom is the notion of no-self, while the central focus of Western psychotherapy is the self. This book, which includes writings from the past twenty-five years, wrestles with the complex relationship between Buddhism and psychotherapy and offers nuanced reflections on therapy, meditation, and psychological and spiritual development. A best-selling author and popular speaker, Epstein has long been at the forefront of the effort to introduce Buddhist psychology to the West. His unique background enables him to serve as a bridge between the two traditions, which he has found to be more compatible than at first thought. Engaging with the teachings of the Buddha as well as those of Freud and Winnicott, he offers a compelling look at desire, anger, and insight and helps reinterpret the Buddha's Four Noble Truths and central concepts such as egolessness and emptiness in the psychoanalytic language of our time.

Philosophical Psychology & Philosophy of Mind

John Peacock & Martine Batchelor (eds.), The Definition, Practice and Psychology of Vedana: Knowing How It Feels (2019)

Philip J. Ivanhoe et al (eds.), The Oneness Hypothesis: Beyond the Boundary of Self (2018)

Rick Repetti, Buddhism, Meditation, and Free Will: A Theory of Mental Freedom (2018)

Padmasiri de Silva, The Psychology of Emotions and Humour in Buddhism (2018)

Gert Hofmann & Snježana Zorić (eds.), Presence of the Body: Awareness in and beyond Experience (2016)

Irina Kuznetsova et al (eds.), Hindu and Buddhist Ideas in Dialogue: Self and No-Self (2016)

Rick Repetti (ed.), Buddhist Perspectives on Free Will: Agentless Agency (2016)

Mark Siderits, Personal Identity and Buddhist Philosophy: Empty Persons, 2nd ed. (2016)

Christian Coseru, Perceiving Reality: Consciousness, Intentionality, and Cognition in Buddhist Philosophy (2015)

Zhihua Yao, The Buddhist Theory of Self-Cognition (2014)

John Pickering, The Authority of Experience: Essays on Buddhism and Psychology (2013)

Miri Albahari, Analytical Buddhism: The Two-Tiered Illusion of Self (2006)

Stephanie Kaza (ed.), Hooked! Buddhist Writings on Greed, Desire, and the Urge to Consume (2005)

Joan Stambaugh, The Formless Self (1999)

R. S. Khare (ed.), The Eternal Food: Gastronomic Ideas and Experiences of Hindus and Buddhists (1992)

David J. Kalupahana, Principles of Buddhist Psychology (1987)

Yasuo Yuasa, The Body: Toward an Eastern Mind-Body Theory, ed. & trans. Thomas P. Kasulis & Shigenori Nagatomo (1987)

E.R. Sarachchandra, Buddhist Psychology of Perception (1958)

The idea that the self is inextricably intertwined with the rest of the world―the “oneness hypothesis”―can be found in many of the world’s philosophical and religious traditions. Oneness provides ways to imagine and achieve a more expansive conception of the self as fundamentally connected with other people, creatures, and things. Such views present profound challenges to Western hyperindividualism and its excessive concern with self-interest and tendency toward self-centered behavior. This anthology presents a wide-ranging, interdisciplinary exploration of the nature and implications of the oneness hypothesis. While fundamentally inspired by East and South Asian traditions, in which such a view is often critical to their philosophical approach, this collection also draws upon religious studies, psychology, and Western philosophy, as well as sociology, evolutionary theory, and cognitive neuroscience. Contributors trace the oneness hypothesis through the works of East Asian and Western schools, including Confucianism, Mohism, Daoism, Buddhism, and Platonism and such thinkers as Zhuangzi, Kant, James, and Dewey. They intervene in debates over ethics, cultural difference, identity, group solidarity, and the positive and negative implications of metaphors of organic unity. Challenging dominant views that presume that the proper scope of the mind stops at the boundaries of skin and skull, this work shows that a more relational conception of the self is not only consistent with contemporary science but has the potential to lead to greater happiness and well-being for both individuals and the larger wholes of which they are parts.

Since the publication of Mark Siderits' important book in 2003, much has changed in the field of Buddhist philosophy. There has been unprecedented growth in analytic metaphysics, and a considerable amount of new work on Indian theories of the self and personal identity has emerged. Fully revised and updated, and drawing on these changes as well as on developments in the author's own thinking, the second edition explores the conversation between Buddhist and Western Philosophy showing how concepts and tools drawn from one philosophical tradition can help solve problems arising in another. Siderits discusses afresh areas involved in the philosophical investigation of persons, including vagueness and its implications for personal identity, recent attempts by scholars of Buddhist philosophy to defend the attribution of an emergentist account of personhood to at least some Buddhists, and whether a distinctively Buddhist antirealism can avoid problems that beset other forms of ontological anti-foundationalism.

What turns the continuous flow of experience into perceptually distinct objects? Can our verbal descriptions unambiguously capture what it is like to see, hear, or feel? How might we reason about the testimony that perception alone discloses? Coseru proposes a rigorous and highly original way to answer these questions by developing a framework for understanding perception as a mode of apprehension that is intentionally constituted, pragmatically oriented, and causally effective. By engaging with recent discussions in phenomenology and analytic philosophy of mind, but also by drawing on the work of Husserl and Merleau-Ponty, Coseru offers a sustained argument that Buddhist philosophers, in particular those who follow the tradition of inquiry initiated by Dignaga and Dharmakirti, have much to offer when it comes to explaining why epistemological disputes about the evidential role of perceptual experience cannot satisfactorily be resolved without taking into account the structure of our cognitive awareness. This work examines the function of perception and its relation to attention, language, and discursive thought, and provides new ways of conceptualizing the Buddhist defense of the reflexivity thesis of consciousness--namely, that each cognitive event is to be understood as involving a pre-reflective implicit awareness of its own occurrence. Coseru advances an innovative approach to Buddhist philosophy of mind in the form of phenomenological naturalism, and moves beyond comparative approaches to philosophy by emphasizing the continuity of concerns between Buddhist and Western philosophical accounts of the nature of perceptual content and the character of perceptual consciousness.

Gathering and interpreting material that is not readily available elsewhere, this book discusses the thought of the Japanese Buddhist philosophers Dogen, Hisamatsu, and Nishitani. Stambaugh develops ideas about the self culminating in the concept of the Formless Self as formulated by Hisamatsu in his book The Fullness of Nothingness and the essay "The Characteristics of Oriental Nothingness," and further explicated by Nishitani in his book Religion and Nothingness. These works show that Oriental nothingness has nothing to do with the 19th- and 20th-century Western concept of nihilism; rather, it is a positive phenomenon: enabling things to be.

Science: Mind & Universe

Thupten Jinpa (ed.), Science and Philosophy in the Indian Buddhist Classics, Volume 2: The Mind, trans. Dechen Rochard & John D. Dunne (2020)

David Presti et al, Mind Beyond Brain: Buddhism, Science, and the Paranormal (2019)

Robert Wright, Why Buddhism Is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment (2018)

Dusana Dorjee, Neuroscience and Psychology of Meditation in Everyday Life: Searching for the Essence of Mind (2017)

Arri Eisen & Yungdrung Konchok, The Enlightened Gene: Biology, Buddhism, and the Convergence that Explains the World (2017)

Wendy Hasenkamp & Janna R. White (eds.), The Monastery and the Microscope: Conversations with the Dalai Lama on Mind, Mindfulness, and the Nature of Reality (2017)

Thupten Jinpa (ed.), Science and Philosophy in the Indian Buddhist Classics, Volume 1: The Physical World (2017)

David L. McMahan & Erik Braun, Meditation, Buddhism, and Science (2017)

Matthieu Ricard & Wolf Singer, Beyond the Self: Conversations Between Buddhism and Neuroscience (2017)

Francisca Cho & Richard Squier, Religion and Science in the Mirror of Buddhism (2015)

Erik J. Hammerstrom, The Science of Chinese Buddhism: Early Twentieth-Century Engagements (2015)

Evan Thompson, Waking, Dreaming, Being: Self and Consciousness in Neuroscience, Meditation, and Philosophy (2014)

David P. Barash, Buddhist Biology: Ancient Eastern Wisdom Meets Modern Western Science (2013)

Dusana Dorjee, Mind, Brain and the Path to Happiness: A Guide to Buddhist Mind Training and the Neuroscience of Meditation (2013)

Owen Flanagan, The Bodhisattva's Brain: Buddhism Naturalized (2013)

B. Alan Wallace, Meditations of a Buddhist Skeptic: A Manifesto for the Mind Sciences and Contemplative Practice (2013)

Donald S. Lopez, Jr., The Scientific Buddha: His Short and Happy Life (2012)

Donald S. Lopez, Jr., Buddhism and Science: A Guide for the Perplexed (2011)

Vic Mansfield, Tibetan Buddhism and Modern Physics: Toward a Union of Love and Knowledge (2008)

B. Alan Wallace, Hidden Dimensions: The Unification of Physics and Consciousness (2007)

B. Alan Wallace, Contemplative Science: Where Buddhism and Neuroscience Converge (2006)

His Holiness the Dalai Lama, The New Physics and Cosmology: Dialogues with the Dalai Lama, ed. Arthur Zajonc & Zara Houshmand (2004)

B. Alan Wallace, Choosing Reality: A Buddhist View of Physics and the Mind (2003)

B. Alan Wallace (ed.), Buddhism and Science: Breaking New Ground (2003)

Richard J. Davidson & Anne Harrington (eds.), Visions of Compassion: Western Scientists and Tibetan Buddhists Examine Human Nature (2001)

Matthieu Ricard & Trinh Xuan Thuan, The Quantum and the Lotus: A Journey to the Frontiers Where Science and Buddhism Meet (2001)

Daniel Goleman & Robert A.F. Thurman (eds.), MindScience: An East-West Dialogue (1999)

Buddhadasa P. Kirthisinghe, Buddhism and Science (1999)

Robin Cooper, The Evolving Mind: Buddhism, Biology, and Consciousness (1996)

Joanna Macy, Mutual Causality in Buddhism and General Systems Theory: The Dharma of Natural Systems (1995)

Luang suriyabongs, buddhism in the light of modern scientific ideas, rev. ed. (1960).

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Thinking About the Study of Buddhist Texts: Ideas from Jerusalem, in More Ways Than One

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• Published: 30 August 2022
• Volume 50 , pages 753–769, ( 2022 )

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Many issues are raised by thinking about “The Idea of Text in Buddhism.” This paper concentrates on scriptures of Indian Buddhism, and considers some of the questions raised or inspired by the papers presented at the 2019 Jerusalem conference on “The Idea of Text in Buddhism.” Consideration is given among other topics to multilingualism, in which context a comparison is offered with the traditions of the Targums in Jewish literature.

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Buddhist texts form a corpus almost endlessly interesting, and offer a fertile field for explorations both broad and deep. Footnote 1 At a conference held in December 2019, a number of scholars gathered on the campus of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem to discuss “The Idea of Text in Buddhism.” Happening to be in Israel at the time, thanks to the openness of the conveners, and especially to the gracious invitation of Eviatar Shulman, I was able to join the conference and to share some thoughts on a topic that has been at the center of my scholarship for at least three decades. Some of the papers offered during the conference are published here in this issue of the Journal of Indian Philosophy , and having been kindly offered the opportunity to reflect on them, what follows are some notions of my own, mixed with reactions to some of the published studies, although for the most part reference to the papers is tacit. To be clear, my small contribution is not intended as either a summary of those studies or a response to them as such. Footnote 2 In this light, much of what is proposed by my colleagues I pass over in silence, a silence which, however, has no necessary implications either of consent or dissent; on the whole, it points simply to differences in foci. I would also mention here at the outset that if in my partial use of the work of my colleagues I have in any way misrepresented their work or their intentions, this is an unintentional side effect of my pursuit of my own agenda, and nothing in the following should necessarily be construed, therefore, as an accurate portrayal of the position of those whose work is adduced.

In referring to “The Idea of Text in Buddhism,” the first parameter to catch my attention was the scope of the notion, and in particular the narrowness with which the idea of “text” has been engaged in the papers published here. Footnote 3 Leaving aside the paper of Morris, which deals with a very different domain, and with the exception of one contribution (by Wu) that deals with Vinaya materials and their relation with a Chinese travelogue, all offerings focus on scriptures as sūtra s, whether those belong to the earlier phases of the Indian Buddhist tradition as preserved principally in Pāli, and also in Gāndhārī, Footnote 4 or are Mahāyāna sūtras, originally composed in either Middle Indic or Sanskrit and often preserved only in translations into, chiefly, Chinese and Tibetan. Footnote 5 Some readers might be misled into concluding that for the participants “texts” are commonsensically equivalent to scriptures, or even assume that this was the intention of the conference organizers. This, however, was clearly not the case for either, and while I cannot speak for others, such a restriction is not what the word “text” would mean to me, for surely minimally, restricting ourselves of course to Buddhism, and even to Indian Buddhism, we would want to include commentaries, śāstra s, stotra s and so on—that is, we would want to give the word a quite significantly broader signification. In view, however, of what we do have presented in the papers here, we might be led to ask a question: what do we—what might we—learn by restricting our focus in considering “text” (in “the idea of text”) to one particular genre of Buddhist literature, that attributed traditionally to the Buddha, to his “authorship,” even if we consider that attribution fictive? Could it be meaningful to consider results of inquiries limited to scriptures as directly relevant to the manifestly much broader “idea of text”? Pulling our focus back further still, or focusing from another angle, we might wonder: is there any way that we can, perhaps, imagine “text” as an emic category? In other words, might it be that a limitation to scripture is, or somehow could be, validated by an emic restriction of “text” to scripture. Footnote 6 I think not. I have, in fact, the strong impression that the division between works attributed to the Buddha and those considered to have human authorship was fairly clear in Indian Buddhist contexts, although certainly there was also some (perhaps considerable) porosity. In the opening section of Vasubandhu’s Abhidharmakośabhā⋅ya , for instance, he holds (or reports the Vaibhā⋅ikas as holding) the orthodoxy of the Abhidharma, the systematic reorganization of the doctrines propounded by the Buddha, as buddhavacana , authentic “Buddha-word,” since, as he tells us ( ad I.3), the Abhidharma was created by Kātyāyanīputra and others (solely) from what the Buddha taught. This Vasubandhu directly compares to the manner in which Dharmatrāta compiled the Udānavarga out of utterances of the Buddha; Dharmatrāta (in this understanding) did no more than place the udāna s into varga s, that is, he did not compose, did no more than organize what was authentically, again, buddhavacana ( Ejima, 1989 , pp. 3.10–14. ) . There are further examples of works considered as inspired (and thus scriptural) that we might classify differently, and these borderline cases are indeed opportunities to clarify our thinking on such definitions. But the fact remains that in so far as we can think that Indian Buddhists had an idea that might map roughly onto “text,” this idea was not coextensive with “scripture.” Footnote 7

Be this as it may, it is perhaps a rather different question (or for us, challenge) how Buddhists living centuries after the death of Śākyamuni could have nevertheless believed that Mahāyāna sūtras were to be accorded the same status of buddhavacana as texts that (the tradition informed them) had been handed down since the days Gautama walked the earth. What is however clear is that, no matter whether—to refer to a possible counter-example—some held that key Yogācāra śāstric works were inspired, or even dictated, by the future Buddha Maitreya (see Delhey, 2019 ), the mainstream view and assumption was that śāstric works such as the Mūlamadhyamakakārikā were authored by humans. These texts belonged, therefore, to a different category than did scriptures. The closest term here for “authoritative text” in terms of category might be āgama , and this cannot help but remind us of the two bases upon which valid arguments may be offered: namely they may find their support in reasoning, yukti , or in authoritative text, āgama , distinct from any other form(s) of text, and this, if nothing else, makes clear that the latter is not equivalent to “text” as such.

A very important question of the reception of Buddhist scriptures concerns the relation of the audience to the presenter of the text. In the first place, whom should we imagine as present in an Indian audience of a scripture recitation? In what language was the scripture recited? Were a few/some/many audience members expected to understand (even basically, in a literal sense) what was being proclaimed aloud? Were the scriptures recited in the Sanskrit in which they (that is, as we have them, Mahāyāna sūtras on the whole) present themselves (when we have them in Indic form at all)? Did audience composition—in terms of linguistic competence or social or monastic/lay status—change? Was there one (kind of) audience in the days in which (some early) Mahāyāna scriptures were composed in Gāndhārī, and therefore at least theoretically understandable to persons for whom this was a daily language, and another in later periods in which the language of the texts (and perhaps one of the languages at least of the monastic community) was (whether grammatically classical or not) Sanskrit? Just how widespread was knowledge of Sanskrit within Buddhist communities? Aside from brahmin and perhaps some other converts, are we justified in thinking that ordinary monks (much less nuns, for that matter) could have understood a text recited in Sanskrit? Or should we rather think, as a default, as it were, that the recitation of a text in Sanskrit held a power somewhat closer to that conveyed by the recitation of the Hebrew Bible in a congregation that does not generally understand Hebrew, or the Latin Mass in the Catholic tradition? Footnote 8

Perhaps we might learn something suggestive from a (seemingly) comparable case. The way in which a Sanskrit text (in casu, the Bhāgavatapurāṇa ) is recited in Sanskrit to an audience that does not understand the language is discussed by M. Taylor. Footnote 9 In his examinations of the practice of Bhāgavata-saptāha , the seven day ritual of “recitation” of the holy text, what is mostly offered orally is a type of translation-cum-rephrasing/glossing-cum-interpretation that I will discuss below in a different cultural matrix. We do not know whether similar practices existed in Buddhist India, but it would be naive to assume that they did not, if there were indeed public recitations or presentations of Buddhist texts which were performed with any goal other than that of exposing the audience to the sacred sounds. Footnote 10 Naturally, there is a sort of continuum evident in attitudes toward translation both within traditions and across them. Islamic tradition generally prohibits the translation of the Quran (at least for religious purposes), Footnote 11 Jewish tradition has complex attitudes which nevertheless primarily maintain the centrality and priority of the Hebrew text, Footnote 12 while the Buddhists freely translate most varieties of their literature (the case of dhāraṇī s is somewhat different in this regard, and will be left aside here). Footnote 13

Leaving aside questions of language for a moment (I will return to them below), what of the reciter? N. Gummer sees the dharmabhāṇaka as an empowered individual, a virtual buddha in the flesh in a post-Buddha world, capable through his recitation of the Buddha’s words of making buddhahood present. While there is much that remains unclear to me in Gummer’s vision, and I may therefore not correctly understand all of her points, I believe that we have no evidence that scriptures were received in this fashion. Let us try to exercise our imaginations: Should—even, can—we imagine that the dharmabhāṇaka was seen as an embodied buddha if the audience meant to perform this act of conception consisted of the fellow monks of this reciter? I mean this as a human question: Let us stipulate for the moment that, in view of the question of language addressed above, as well as the highly technical content of many of the texts in question, the intended audience of the scripture recitation was monastic. I suggest this because, most especially, the content of a great many (though certainly not all) Mahāyāna sūtras includes quite complex and encoded ideas which would almost certainly have been little more than gibberish to anyone not very familiar indeed with Buddhist doctrine. Now, at least some monks in the imagined monastic audience might well have entered the community as novices together with, or even known as a boy, the individual who had become the dharmabhāṇaka . Given this, would—even could—they have subsequently conceived of him as a virtually supramundane entity in his role as reciter? This is, quite obviously, nothing more than a doubt of mine based on the limitations of my own imagination, something I would not dream of denying. But while I do understand that, for example, it is possible to see a person known to one, even known well, as divinely inspired—when he is in trance, for instance—it seems difficult (to me!) to imagine that the recitation of a text, the author of which was felt (or: known) to be the Buddha, would confer onto the reciter of that text the same holy and transcendent charisma and status. I am not suggesting that this was not an aspiration of the authors of the text, which I understand to be Gummer’s position; I remain agnostic about this. My doubt is rather in the way of a “sociological” speculation, and does not venture into the territory of what the sūtra expects.

But let us briefly unpack this last expression: the sūtra itself expects nothing. The expression, if meaningful at all, must be a shorthand for “the authors of sūtras,” and refer thus to their intentions. This obviously brings up the question of what the authors may have thought, but I fear that we are ill-equipped to answer such a question. In this regard, we might recall the useful articulation offered by Sheldon Pollock ( 2014 ). For Pollock, one may seek to understand the meaning of a text to, first, its author, second to (elements of) the tradition which receives the text, and finally one may—or must—consider one’s own subjective position. These three “planes” are for Pollock the historicist, the traditionist ( sic ), and the presentist modes of interpretation, as he denotes them. My own feelings about this breakdown, as someone almost exclusively interested in the history of the tradition (rather than, for instance, living innovations: I cannot and do not want to speak as an insider) is that the third mode is one entirely foreign to me. I am not, I hope needless to say, naively claiming that my own subjectivity plays no role in my reading, for it quite obviously does; this is unavoidable. Rather, I am saying that there is no particular reason for me to feel, as a historian of Buddhism, that my individual understanding of a text should be of interest to anyone. Neither do I imagine that anyone else thinks that either. Each reader will be entitled to their subjective reactions to a text, but I do not see an etic stance that could value that subjectivity in a scholarly framework: only insiders amongst themselves will be interested in such contemporary readings, and again, I am not an insider. Footnote 14 For entirely different reasons, I do not think that we can by any stretch of the imagination recover the meaning(s) of any Buddhist scripture intended by its author(s). We know nothing, or next to nothing, whatsoever of where, when and by whom any Buddhist scripture was composed (as long as we, again, limit ourselves to India). This means, I believe, that we are entirely and inevitably cut off from access to some putative originary (or historicist, in Pollock’s vocabulary) meaning. This leaves us with what is actually our (my) only object of interest in any event, the ways—always multiple—that a text has been interpreted traditionally, which is to say by Buddhists (and by this I mean almost exclusively Buddhist communities, rather than individuals) in the past. This is what we must, and all that we can, aim to recover.

I think that in one way this leads us back to our question: to whom were the texts recited (and were they recited? When? Where? On specific occasions?)? Footnote 15 The recitation of Vinaya texts appears to have been prohibited to laypersons (or at least the Prātimok⋅a , minimally); what then of all of the narrative content of the Vinaya literature? Was this not shared with the lay community, or was this done only when the stories were extracted, as evidenced by a text like the Divyāvadāna ? Is the limitation meant to pertain only to the rules embedded (in the case of the Mūlasarvāstivada Vinaya, very impressively) in mountains of narrative? The plain answer is the one that we are forced to offer repeatedly: we do not know. I will return to the dharmabhāṇaka in a moment, but first I will consider briefly a contribution that led me to what I feel could be a productive examination of thematically or phenomenologically similar or even parallel phenomena.

T. Walker in his paper discusses, as he has elsewhere (e.g. Walker, 2020 ), what he calls bitexts, bilingual texts. Walker examines the environment and textual sources for materials prepared for the presentation of Pāli texts in a cultural matrix in which Pāli was unknown to all, aside from (some) monks. The consequent necessity for translation—if the texts were to be understood “literally” at all, by which I mean not simply consumed for their sound value, for instance—is a situation not at all uncommon also in other Buddhist realms, perhaps especially in Central Asia. Footnote 16 Walker himself refers to East Asian situations, in which for instance Japanese glossed Chinese texts with kakikudashi readings (though Walker does not mention it, the Uighurs did something very similar as well), Footnote 17 but there are a number of other intriguing Central Asian materials which also speak to this challenge of understanding. Footnote 18 Walker mentions the ways in which the nature of his bilingual documents offers opportunities for an examination of the written and the oral, the nature of a receptive audience, and interpretive avenues. This immediately reminded me of the Jewish tradition of the Targums, Aramaic translations of the Bible text, the complexity of which has been concisely characterized as follows: “A Targum is a translation that combines a highly literal rendering of the original text with material added into the translation in a seamless manner.” Footnote 19 The similarities between the experience described by Walker in the Pāli-Khmer context and the Hebrew-Aramaic interface are striking. Even the typologies are similar. Since the reader can turn to Walker’s paper here, I will not summarize it, but instead consider what interpretive inspirations might be obtained by a brief look at the situation of the Targums.

It is a commonplace that (Stec, 2000 , p. 184), “The Targums probably arose in a bilingual setting, and were intended to be used in conjunction with the Hebrew original, as either an exegetical aid or an educational aid to introduce Aramaic speakers to the world and language of Biblical Hebrew.” This description is useful precisely because it is misleading in several ways, the first of which is that it is much better to say “multilingual” in place of “bilingual.” Footnote 20 What is more, the aim of the Targums is itself not simple; there is a continuum from what we are probably compelled to call a “literal” rendering (fully aware of the highly problematic nature of this notion) to the exegesis mentioned in the quotation. Emanuel Tov clearly articulates the issue, first acknowledging its complexity, and clarifying that, “Of course, it cannot be defined objectively what constitutes the plain sense or what qualifies as a deviation. What one scholar (or translator) considers a move away from the original meaning of the text may be defined by another as a reflection of its true sense.” He then states (Tov 2017 , 40n12 and 41):

In spite of these problems of definition, scholars usually agree on the general profile of a given version's style and techniques. All translations include a layer of information beyond the original content of Scripture. The scholarly approach to translations considers this layer an added value that was not a necessary part of the translation enterprise. Translations could be produced with only a minimal amount of exegesis, involving merely linguistic exegesis. All elements beyond the linguistic exegesis may be considered content exegesis visible in various forms. Phrased differently, translations involving merely linguistic exegesis are typically described as literal, and those involving content exegesis are often understood as free, with various gradations in between. However, the notion of freedom in the translation process is complex. If it was the translator's intention to transfer to the target language the spirit of the source text, small changes, omissions, and additions possibly should not be considered exponents of freedom. Therefore, the definition of what is a free rendering needs to be analyzed in greater detail. Both translation styles were acceptable in antiquity. A faithful (i.e., literal) approach to the act of translating was considered respectful to the word of God, but there was also room for contextual, free, and paraphrastic renderings. Such translations were also conceived of as presenting the spirit of the word of God, even if from a formal equivalence point of view free renderings deviated from the plain sense of Scripture.

The most important difference that Buddhist scholars will need to take into account in (what I hope will be future) efforts to learn from studies of the Targums is that the Hebrew Bible text (the Masoretic text, MT) had long been (virtually) completely static, and thus there is little, and often even no, question of the precise shape of the Vorlage of a given translation. Footnote 21 This is most manifestly not the case with Indian Buddhist literature, and thus de facto we cannot ask some of the most fundamental questions asked by scholars of the Targums, namely whether a given rendering is “literal” or “interpretive.” Given the vibrant fluidity of Indian Buddhist textual composition and transmission, we have no touchstone against which to test the fidelity of any translator or translation team to its source text. Footnote 22

Thinking more about the short passage cited at the outset of this discussion, above, a further question is whether the Targums were genuinely intended “to introduce Aramaic speakers to the world and language of Biblical Hebrew,” to which I think the answer is rather that their purpose was to make accessible the meaning of the Bible text, but not to make the Hebrew itself more intelligible to those audience members (often the vast majority) ignorant of the language. The parallels here to Buddhist cases are also clear: I know of few cases in which Buddhist translations (in premodern times) were intended as guides to language acquisition or improved understanding of the original being glossed or rendered. (This is not to say that they could not more often have been used in this way, which of course is quite possible; I speak here only of basic intent. Footnote 23 ) It is clear that Rabbinic traditions recognized both the existence of communities in which knowledge of Hebrew was not common, or even absolutely non-existent, and the felt need for comprehension of the text (see inter alia Smelik, 2007 ). All of this raises, of course, the issue of “Church language” (though we should perhaps rather prefer “Synagogue language” in this context!). Attention has of course been given to questions of translation in Buddhist traditions, but to the best of my knowledge, for further inspiration and to help us pose better questions no advantage has yet been taken of the quite substantial Jewish reflection on scriptural language, translation, community practices and authority as found both in primary sources (including in the first place the Talmuds and related literature) and in modern scholarship. It is striking that in contrast to Buddhist traditions (even in Tibet and to a lesser extent in China), Jewish sources devote considerable attention to theorizing translation and its dynamic relation with interpretation. It is possible that, as noted above, this difference can be attributed to the fact that the Vorlagen of Jewish translations (referring here to books of the Bible) were both settled in their wording and also, and perhaps equally as important, textually limited. It may be that alongside its textual fluidity the very vastness of the Buddhist canons worked to discourage theoretical reflection on issues of translation and interpretation. What is also important, however, is that the bi- or multi-lingualism characteristic of Jewish communities was rarely a feature of Buddhist communities, at least of non-monastic communities. Leaving aside communities of Southeast Asia, such as those engaged with by Walker, with which I am not very familiar, I know of no evidence for any significant multilingualism among possible audiences in China or Tibet. Footnote 24 It is worthwhile noting here that, most generally, the basic question prompting translation is the (perceived or imagined) desire of an audience to understand the text. However, it is very clear that at least outside the Indian Buddhist world—and let it be stressed that for India we have close to no evidence, and thus no idea of whether comprehension was valued or not—understanding of texts was not always a requirement. Many text practices from Tibet (where Kanjurs can be publicly recited, but in a cacophony with multiple volumes of texts being read out simultaneously) to Japan (where in the practice of tendoku 転読 texts are not even vocalized, but the volumes merely flipped through in a pantomime of rapid reading) illustrate the lack of interest in the content of texts which are, nevertheless, publicly performed.

Returning for a moment to the dharmabhāṇaka and his role, on the one hand, and the intermediary interpreters in, for instance, Southeast Asia, on the other, it is most interesting to consider Jewish views, especially as these relate to the meturgemanim . These were the interpreters whose role it was in the synagogue service to translate from Hebrew into Aramaic the bible passages being read out from the Torah scroll, this translation ultimately constituting the Targums. This is outlined by S. Fraade, who wrote ( 1992 p. 266):

The practice of Targum as it mediates the reading of Scripture in the synagogue is compared in several texts to what is rabbinically understood to have occurred at Mt. Sinai, of which, in a sense, it is a performative reenactment. Just as God’s word was ‘given in reverence and fear,’ and just as it was ‘given by way of a middleman ( sirsur ),’ being Moses, so, too, the public reading of Scripture must be reverently mediated by a meturgeman .…A similar tradition relates that just as God’s voice and Moses’ voice complemented each other at Sinai, so, too, the voices of Torah-reader and translator must accommodate one another so that neither rises above the other. Thus, both at Sinai and in the synagogue it is by a dialogical combination of voices that revelatory communication is effected.

A further notion is also of interest. After explaining the tradition that the initial revelation of the Torah on Mt. Sinai took place in four languages, which later sources expand to (all the) seventy languages (of the world), Fraade observes ( 1992 , p. 268), “Thus, to translate a text of Scripture into one of these languages may be thought of not so much as a distancing from Sinai as a return to it.” The thematic parallelism to the role of the dharmabhāṇaka is intriguing. Footnote 25 As I said above, while I am reluctant to accept (what I understand to be) Gummer’s portrayal of the way the dharmabhāṇaka would have been received in communities, it could well be fruitful in this process of imagination, despite all the many cultural and contextual differences between the situations, to think as a point of comparison about how the meturgemanim and their role were understood.

These are not the only possible reflections on roles. For M. Allon, there were two main functions of early scriptures (he does not share with us how he knows this): to record the teachings of the Buddha, and to attract converts and supporters. Allon further seems, at least rhetorically, to accept that the ultimate author (or perhaps we had better write “author”) of the sermons recorded in the scriptures was the Buddha. He suggests that the teaching career of the Buddha necessitated editing to eliminate repetitions. I believe that we can imagine, hypothetically taking the tradition’s narratives as historically factual for the moment, that as the Buddha wandered from place to place he indeed, as Allon suggests, returned time and again to the same theme. For me, this would imply, first, that there were multiple authoritative and authentic versions of a given sermon or on a given theme, and second that there was inherent variability in the corpus. But I do not see that it follows that this called for any authoritative culling and editing, any felt need for which would imply that the editors had at their disposal multiple records of the variant sermons. It further would require that those editors acknowledged these multiple versions—variant texts—as witnesses, out of which—precisely like a modern editor, assuming a stemma codicum and with a Lachmanian bent of mind—they sought to establish the Ur-text. Is this plausible? Is it not rather more likely that from the beginning there were multiple sermons and that only later with the attempt to compile an authoritative collection (when and where did this take place?) those who created what was to become the Pāli canon selected—for reasons at this remove entirely unknowable—some transmitted version, which they “canonized.” Footnote 26 It is of course entirely plausible that in some cases—again, for reasons unknowable—they preserved as “separate” sermons what may appear (to us) as (mere) parallels or variant versions. The picture sketched by Allon sees the versions preserved elsewhere (and paid little attention by Allon, or by Shulman), for instance in Chinese, or in Sanskrit (fragmentarily) or Tibetan (for instance as preserved in the translation of the Abhidharmakośopāyika of Śamathadeva) as of lesser validity than the sources in Pāli; and if this is indeed their view, I do not understand it. If our goal as philologists is to uncover as much of the textual history of Buddhist literature as possible, I think that full consideration of all preserved evidence is essential, and in this regard the Sanskrit, Chinese and Tibetan sources must be fully utilized. Furthermore, unless and until some rigorous and convincing evidence can be provided that one version is more original than all others, I remain unwilling to grant the priority to Pāli sources that at least Allon seems to assume. Footnote 27

In fact, I would go further: we know precisely nothing of the original or initial context of any Buddhist scripture in India, and this has an undeniable impact on what we can say about intertextuality and even reception history. Likewise, we know precious little more about the reception history—at least the earlier such history—of any Indian Buddhist scriptural text. What we do know about is the modern reception history. But I would maintain that the study of the latter belongs to a domain other than that of what we—what I—term Buddhist Studies. Footnote 28 We must therefore carefully examine how our assumptions frame our thinking about Buddhist texts in India, most particularly in light of the fact—and I think it is a fact—that we cannot test those assumptions against any touchstone of historical data. One thing I think we can safely assume—but it is an assumption—is that in India (as elsewhere) traditionally texts were read (whether that means through writing or through aural reception), when they were read for understanding, backwards, as it were, through commentaries, whether those commentaries for their part were written or presented by a teacher. Now, it is a very curious fact that the only Buddhist tradition for which we have evidence of a comprehensive (written) commentarial tradition is that of the so-called Theravādins. While it is true that the textual traditions of other lineages are preserved in a fashion much less complete than that of the canon preserved in Pāli, there is no evidence among the remains of what once were the canons of the Sarvāstivādins, Dharmaguptakas or others of the existence of the sort of exhaustive commentarial literature found in the Pāli tradition. In addition, while commentaries on Mahāyāna sūtras do exist, they are relatively few (in India; I am again not considering the productivity of the Chinese tradition, since it clearly belongs to an entirely different sphere). For the Mahāyāna sūtra literature, the role of commentary appears to have been usurped in two different ways: first, the tradition produced an extensive śāstric literature, which to some extent did fill a role close to that of commentary (and in this respect some śāstras perhaps less closely parallel the Abhidharma tradition, to which the Mahāyāna śāstras are normally compared). But the second is that Mahāyāna sūtras sometimes give the impression of serving as commentaries themselves on other Mahāyāna sūtras, a hypothesis yet to be properly explored.

The role of the commentary in Indian Buddhism is not fully appreciated for other reasons as well. Modern scholars generally seek a mode of understanding that approaches what the original meaning is imagined to have been, despite the recognition that in fact we know nothing of the original/initial state or context of any given scripture (Pollock’s first dimension, as above). Without knowledge of such circumstances, one may naturally turn to contemporary materials in an effort to (re)create a context. But, for ancient India we have no idea what was contemporary or co-local, so we cannot imagine an originary context. Scholars (such as Shulman, if I read him correctly) therefore take the canon as transmitted as the context. A question we should then ask ourselves is whether we labor under a tyranny of received corpora. The Pāli canon may well represent—almost certainly does represent—an “official” corpus (though how old this status may be seems to remain unclear), but we know that our picture of other Āgama, Vinaya and Mahāyāna materials from India is radically partial and fragmentary. Nevertheless, we attempt to paint murals of the scriptural landscape on this basis, rarely acknowledging the poverty of our sources (and this leaves aside the sad fact that all too many scholars pay attention only to materials with preexisting modern translations; few venture into the oceans of the Kanjur or Dazangjing or even the Pāli commentarial literature on their own). Yet we know from all sorts of sources that the organized materials we have, that is, the collections, are not necessarily representative of anything. We know that various Tripiṭakas of Indian sects, in so far as we can recover them, had differing structures and contexts. The Sthaviravāda and Mahāsāṁghika Vinayas differ radically in structure, and so on. We have, moreover, Sammelhandschriften the existence of which demonstrates that the combinations of the Mahāyāna scriptures we see now in, for instance, the 49 sūtras of the Mahāratnakūṭa or the 17 of the Mahāsaṁnipāta were far from the only collections in circulation (and we do not have evidence for the existence of either of these collections in India in any case!). Footnote 29 If we acknowledge that we do not know the reasons for the preservation of the materials available to us, some of which we certainly know to have been randomly preserved (for instance the texts recovered from the sands of Central Asia), should not this temper our confidence in our reconstructions of the intellectual environment of ancient Indian Buddhism?

This also brings to my mind one issue raised on occasion, that of a putative distinction between local sources and, presumably, translocal sources. I do not understand this distinction, or at least, not in the sense in which it seems to be intended. I cannot imagine a scenario in which the creation of a text is anything other than local; the distinction between local and translocal texts, then, can be nothing other than a difference along a spectrum of popularity. Texts which were more popular, and which found audiences outside the regions of their creation, transitioned from local to translocal. However—and this is a point we should never forget when studying ancient India—our available evidence is drastically partial. Absence of evidence, in the old adage, is not evidence of absence. That we have no evidence for something means nothing more than that: we do not have evidence. Now, our lives, no doubt, revolve around ourselves, and what is available to us may well claim the lion’s share of our attentions. But as long as we play-act as historians, we must force ourselves to remain aware of our limitations. Footnote 30 In fact, in a related point, we often speak of texts as “obscure,” but we must certainly acknowledge that no text was obscure to its author(s) or to his/their community. It is a repudiation of our scholarly responsibility not to judge to relegate some works into categories such as “obscure” or “minor,” unless the latter is used to indicate size. Footnote 31

The few considerations offered above certainly constitute no comprehensive consideration of the multiplicity of vital and fascinating issues raised by the quest to think carefully about Indian Buddhist texts: they are in fact little more than ramblings. I do, however, perhaps not without some hope, believe that at least some of what I have wondered about here—much in the manner of thinking aloud—can be of use to others as they continue to engage with these absorbing and provocative sources.

This work was supported by the European Research Council (ERC) under the Horizon 2020 program (Advanced Grant agreement No 741884). I am grateful to Péter-Dániel Szántó, Chaim Milikowsky and Emanuel Tov for corrections and comments.

For most of the papers I had access only to unedited drafts; I therefore refrain from quoting directly from any of the contributions. Moreover, it should be noted that in some cases the papers are effectively summaries of longer published work, e.g. in the cases of Mark Allon and Eviatar Shulman, which are sure to prompt their own further conversations. In the case of the latter, the discussion has already been begun by Bhikkhu Anālayo ( 2021 ), written in response to Shulman ( 2021 ).

Not all participants at the conference actually publish their contributions here, and of those whose work is absent not a few in fact did deal with the scope more broadly than do the papers here presented. For instance, Jan-Ulrich Sobisch spoke about “Mobility and Plasticity of Divination Texts,” Matthew Kapstein asked “Just what is the Yogācārabhūmiśāstra ?” and Roy Tzohar addressed himself to the topic “On the Language, Authority, and the Role of Commentaries: Sthiramati's Use of Etymology as a case study.”

Chinese translations are, in this regard, largely or even almost entirely left out of consideration.

I must mention that huge portions of the Indian Buddhist scriptural corpora are hereby ignored, namely those of the tantras! The identification of Buddhist scripture solely as sūtra is, to say the very least, highly misleading, omitting, as it does, what is beyond doubt the most influential tradition of the later period of Indian Buddhism, a period at least half a millennium long, if not substantially longer.

In the following, once again, I restrict myself to speaking about South Asian Buddhism.

I resist the temptation here to saunter off in another direction and give attention to the fluidity of “our” idea (singular idea?!) of “text,” a notion that, needless to say, has been the source of much navel-gazing. Suffice it to say that so long as we cannot pin down what “we” mean by “text,” we are ill-prepared to examine what ancient Indians thought about it. While I think this problematic has been skirted by the topic title of the conference, no good alternative comes to mind.

It is interesting in this regard to recall the widely reported information that when Pope Benedict XVI resigned in a speech given in Latin (11 February 2013), even many of the clerics present did not understand the text he read out. Knowing what the words of the Latin Mass mean because one has studied its wording seems importantly different from understanding the language as such.

Taylor ( 2012 ). See also Taylor ( 2016 , pp. 181–184). One cannot however overlook Angelika Malinar’s review 2019. Taylor studied modern cases, but there is no good reason to think that the situation was significantly different in the historical past.

Although perhaps not directly relevant to our most central theme, one might with profit see Beck ( 1993 ). The use of the expression “sacred sounds” may not be entirely apt; I make no assertion about how an audience might have conceptualized the sounds they heard, if they did this at all.

Needless to say, however, the matter is complex and contested. See Boulaouali ( 2021 ).

Smelik ( 2001 , p. 207), points out that, of course, “rabbinic views on translation were not monolithic.”

Note a potentially interesting Jewish parallel. According to Smelik ( 2001 , pp. 208–209), “In writing texts for mezuzoth and tefillin , the exact Hebrew wording could not be sacrificed for clarity, because, for exegetical and magical presuppositions, translation would invalidate the text.” Smelik refers here to Veltri ( 1994 , pp. 148–150). While the case requires more attention than we can give it here, the comparison is surely illuminating.

To clarify: I think that insiders, including modern Western Buddhists, are fully legitimate in their interpretations of scriptures. Contemporary Buddhism is Buddhism, pure and simple. However, what I think cannot be of interest to those who study the Asian Buddhist past is what modern Westerners (or Asians, for that matter) extract, existentially so to speak, from texts. As much as the ideas of such persons may be an essential source of energy for ongoing religiosity, the resulting innovative readings shed no light on the Buddhist past. The power of philology is that it, and only it, enables us to approach what people in the past said, and ultimately meant. To understand the human past we must remove ourselves as far as possible from our readings. Therefore, Pollock’s third dimension has no place in research of the past; it is in this sense quite misleading to think of it as a dimension of philology strictly speaking.

I should clarify that I am not by any means suggesting that scholars—philologists, for instance—cannot be insiders, to the Buddhist or indeed to any other tradition. What I mean is that their engagement as scholars and their engagement as insiders must be kept absolutely distinct. Or at least: they cannot permit their insider perspective to influence their scholarly quest for objectivity (as elusive as that may ultimately be, for, as above, no one can escape subjectivity). I feel unable to comment intelligently on the other side of the equation, namely whether one’s scholarly, etic, engagement with, for instance, the Buddhist past can meaningfully influence one’s religiosity. But I have good reason to believe that it does, that there are, for instance, Buddhist scholar-monks in Japan who view Buddhist mythology as metaphor, who believe, for instance, in the existence of Amitābha and Sukhāvatī as non-literal teachings. I find this dynamic fascinating, but feel myself ill-prepared to engage it further here.

Obviously, every text was of existential import at least to the individual(s) who produced it, and to his/their communities. Other than this, we often have very little evidence of further interest in a text. As long as we do not understand much more than we know at present about the translation processes of Buddhist scriptures, we cannot even necessarily conclude that a text having been translated into, chiefly, Chinese or Tibetan was a sure sign of its importance to some group.

I do not refer here to texts that are “bilingual” in the sense that a dhāraṇī might be included in Sanskrit in what is otherwise a translation into Chinese or Tibetan; this is a quite different phenomenon. For some materials relevant to the question, see Wilkens ( 2020 ).

On the Uighurs see for instance Shōgaito ( 2021 ), who concludes (p. 183), speaking of one particular Chinese text with a Uighur comment in the margin, “it must have been read aloud using the Uighur pronunciation of Chinese, and not the pronunciation used by Chinese speakers at that time. In addition, the content of the texts must have been understood solely through the Uighur reading of Chinese characters. Japan was separated from China by an ocean, while the Uighurs were separated by a desert. It may not be a coincidence that both the Japanese and the Uighurs had developed similar methods of reading Chinese characters under similar circumstances within the cultural sphere of Chinese characters.” This sort of implied geographic determinism aside, the similarity is quite interesting.

For instance, Malyshev ( 2019 ). Peyrot ( 2016 , p. 324) says: “The integration of the Tocharian Udānastotra into a Sanskrit Udānavarga manuscript, or even into the Sanskrit Udānavarga text, indicates that speakers of Tocharian preferred the Udānavarga in the Sanskrit original to a translation into their native language.… The fact that the doctrine was valued only in Sanskrit, while the native language was better suited for more popular genres finds a nice parallel in a famous and often quoted passage from the Khotanese book of Zambasta….” Questions regarding this last point are too complex to discuss here.

A good general introduction is Flesher and Chilton ( 2011 ). The quotation here is from p. 22. I should make clear that I do not intend in the following to parade a Jewish learning which I most certainly do not possess. I wish to do nothing more than to introduce from a parallel phenomenon what seems to me a potentially fruitful source of questions for those who study Buddhist literature. Everything I know of this subject is based on secondary scholarship. Beyond the Targums, themselves a vast subject, when one considers the other classical translations of the Bible, such as the Greek Septuagint, Syriac Peshitta, and so forth, one instantly recognizes that to gain even a superficial overview would require considerable effort. Needless to say, the literature on the Septuagint itself is more than enormous, and questions of the multilingualism of its world likewise have produced volumes to fill libraries. Fortunately, in stark contrast to the situation in the study of Buddhism, for such matters, in addition to mountains of specialized monographs there are more than enough excellent, accessible and reliable surveys available. In contrast, no one has dared (or would dare) venture a Buddhist parallel to a work such as Emanuel Tov’s magisterial 2012 book. I learn from the author that a 4th edition is now forthcoming.

Fraade speaks of ancient Jewish society as “dynamically multilingual” at ( 2012 , p. 3).

Tov ( 2017 , p. 53), wrote: “The Vorlagen of the known Targumim were presumably very close to the proto-MT text, but it is usually assumed that the text of the Targumim was adapted to MT from an early period onwards, especially since the Targumim were conceived of as the ‘official Jewish translations.’ … Furthermore, from an early period onwards the text of the Targumim was juxtaposed in the manuscripts with MT, verse after verse. This proximity increasingly brought the text of the two closer together.” In personal correspondence, Prof. Tov kindly clarified: “I don’t know whether the static state of the Vorlage or the length of that stage is the issue. Rather, in the case of T[argums], these translations were created in a Jewish environment where they accepted and adhered to MT. That was not the case with the LXX translated at an earlier stage.”

The broader situation is, once again, very complex, and certainly, for instance, there no question that the Vorlage of the Septuagint was not precisely identical with the MT. See the detailed study by Tov ( 1997 ). We should note that some sources consider the Septuagint to have been divinely inspired. This claim was sometimes articulated in an apparent attempt to explain (away) deviations from the received Hebrew text. See for instance the very interesting Simon-Shoshan ( 2007 ), esp. in this regard pp. 20–21, and, from a different perspective, Tov 2015 . Simon-Shoshan’s paper pays particular attention to Philo, on whom, in this regard, see also Rajak 2014 ).

Let us further note that Tov ( 2017 , p. 45), observed: “[A]ncient translation projects were not organized, but undertaken as translations of individual scriptural books without an overall plan or program for translating larger collections. There were no organizing sessions in which the content of the translated corpus was determined, and there was no central organizing board that compiled a set of instructions or determined a guiding philosophy for how to approach the translation activity. It is also not known whether more than one translation of a given book in the LXX [Septuagint] or Peshitta was prepared in different circles or localities. …. Alternatively, the many parallel Targumim were created in different milieus, so that they are not typical cases of parallel versions.” This characterization of the translation activities of the Bible broadly parallels those of Buddhist scriptures; certainly a more nuanced investigation would be welcome.

This is a severe and indeed intractable problem with scripture; with authored works, we can sometimes get closer to the Indic original, if we have an extant Indic language text. Such authored works, whether they be poetic or technical, then do offer us opportunities to carefully study translation processes. This has sometimes been essayed but not, so far as I know, in any manner at all comparable to the detail in which Targums have been subjected to scrutiny. The same general problem applies to cases of possible text reuse; we cannot know how such reuse was imagined since we cannot know in what form the prior text was encountered by the subsequent author who reused it.

Regarding the absence of touchstones, it should be noted that increasing access to Sanskrit manuscripts from Tibet has already yielded, and in future will almost certainly continue to yield, the actual manuscripts used by Tibetan translators. Péter-Dániel Szántó mentions to me for instance the Advayasamatāvijaya , for which we have the exact Sanskrit manuscript used by Bu ston for his Tibetan translation.

It is perhaps worthwhile to at least make mention of the efforts most importantly of Seishi Karashima to study the translation efforts of Dharmarak⋅a, something he was able to do by, to oversimplify, imagining the Gāndhārī forms behind seemingly deviant Chinese renderings. See for instance Karashima 1992 . This is not the place to engage with these very important researches. It may perhaps suffice to say that while there are similarities between the approaches taken to the Targums and their Hebrew Vorlagen, there are also extremely significant differences between the two cases.

Regarding the process of the Targums, Polliack ( 2015 ) makes clear that “Targum Onkelos gained semi-sanctified status through the authority of the Babylonian rabbis since it enabled them to exert their authority and relative control in directing the populace’s understanding of the Torah’s meaning in accordance with their theological principles, especially when it came to understanding the law and the commandments.” It is not possible here to enter further into the complexities of the matter, but such a venture would, I feel, be sure to be profitable also for Buddhist scholars.

Certainly some bilingual manuscripts appear to have been used as sources of what was once called “transvocabulation,” for which see Silk ( 2014 , p. 433 and n. 19). Peyrot ( 2016 , p. 315) speaks of “a system in which the Udānavarga was read in the original Sanskrit version, partly with the help of a prose bilingual,” and in his 2014 study, without explicitly theorizing the process Peyrot investigates how Tocharian glosses would have guided reading of the Sanskrit text.

I am not as well informed about Central Asia as about China or Tibet. Moreover, while certainly the liminal regions of Dunhuang was a multilingual environment, it was so only in the sense that Chinese and Tibetan (predominantly) were widely known, and I do not think that there was any appreciable presence of Indic language sources there. I certainly do not think that there were any Buddhist communities anywhere in China or Tibet in which Indic languages had any meaningful presence. (I do not know much about the Pāli-using Dai communities of Yunnan, but perhaps culturally speaking these should be located in Southeast Asia rather than in China.)

However, any connection to Buddhist translation practices is significantly less suggestive.

This scenario must of course be further nuanced, especially since we know that whatever the exact textual form of the first Pāli canonization(s) may have been, transmissions over the centuries have led to changes, something evident even in modern times with the Tipiṭakas established in the recent Southeast Asian councils. On the theme of canonization see my remarks in Silk ( 2015 ).

Lest this seem too extreme, I hasten to clarify that of course, as one of the leading scholars in the field, Allon is more than cognizant that Gāndhārī sources are older than Pāli sources as we have them. But I think that all serious philologists (inluding Allon here as well, needless to say) would agree that—whether the words of the Buddha are recoverable in any way, shape or form at all—he certainly spoke neither Gāndhārī nor Pāli.

I am aware that in this I place myself at odds with some who consider Buddhist Studies also to focus on modern (almost entirely Western) Buddhism. I am also aware that this is a politically fraught issue, but I think it is very important, indeed essential, to differentiate the Buddhisms of the historical past from those of modern times, and for me it is important to preserve the denomination Buddhist Studies for academic efforts to approach the former (when these need to be distinguished). There are fundamental linguistic, social, cultural and other differences between traditional (pre-modern) Asian Buddhisms and those which have been emerging for some time now in the West. All forms of Buddhism since the days of the Buddha represent evolutions (not in the modern sense of the word as “getting better” but simply in the meaning of developments), and Western Buddhisms in this light are absolutely no different from, for instance, Japanese Buddhisms vis-a-vis Chinese Buddhisms. The advent of modernity, however, seems to me to mark such a significant cultural transformation that different methods and disciplines are necessary for its study. Traditional Asian Buddhism is the domain chiefly of the philologist and the historian (of course, among a number of other specializations), while modern Buddhisms are best studied by anthropologists, sociologists and the like. There is no value judgement here, only a difference in focus, and I think that there should be a clear way to indicate this difference.

Of course, some complexes do have an Indic origin, such as that collected as the Buddhāvataṁsaka , though we do not know the precise form(s) this collection had in its Indian guise(s).

As the philosopher Harry Callahan said in 1973, “a man’s got to know his limitations.”

As was done by Giuseppe Tucci in his series ( 1956 , 1958, 1971), a choice which, however, has led to some confusion.

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Silk, J.A. Thinking About the Study of Buddhist Texts: Ideas from Jerusalem, in More Ways Than One. J Indian Philos 50 , 753–769 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10781-022-09515-3

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• The History of Tibetan Buddhism The history of Buddhism is rich and full of interesting nuances. There are different schools of Tibetan Buddhism, their development, and the influence they had.
• Non-christian World Religions: History, Concepts, and Beliefs of Buddhism Buddhism is one of the widespread non-Christian religions in the world today. This paper discusses the history, beliefs, ethics, people and subdivisions of Buddhism.
• King Asoka Spreading Buddhism Along the Silk Road King Asoka’s commitment to Buddha’s Four Noble Truths and the encouragement of missionary work substantially facilitated the transmission of Buddhism to distant states.
• The Pragmatic Theory of Truth in Buddhism and Christianity Pragmatically, the Buddha belief and the Christians’ beliefs are true as believers tend to achieve their desired effects.
• Christianity and Buddhism: Religion Comparison Christianity only became a religion, in full sense of this word, when materialistic spirit of Judaism was being transformed into something opposite to what it originally used to be by European mentality.
• Karma and Reincarnation in Buddhism Karma presumably is among the primary associations with Buddhism; a non-professional individual, who does not have a complete understanding of the notion.
• Buddhism: The Concept of Mahayana The Mahayana is believed to be the largest Buddhist section worldwide, and its practice is extreme compared to other Buddhist movements.
• Foundations of Buddhism and Meditation Different religions illustrate the diversity of philosophies, customs, many different communities in the world are inspired by similar truths and purposes.
• Buddhist Culture in Thailand In Thailand, Buddhism is the official religion of the state based on century-old traditions and principles.
• Tibetan Buddhism, Scottish, and Mexican National Cultures The paper discusses Tibetan Buddhism, Scottish, and Mexican national cultures. They place such a strong focus on serenity and freedom.
• Aspects of Buddhist Monasticism The paper discusses Buddhist monastic orders. They are the oldest types of institutionalized monasticism and Buddhism’s essential organizations.
• Discussion of History of Buddhism The discussion describes the short history of Buddhism from the 19th century and how it overcame some of the challenges arising from Christianity.
• Tibetan Buddhism and Zen Buddhism Comparison The Five Tibetan rituals are considered to be life changing which helps the Tibetan’s in the spiritual and religious obligations they desire. It’s also actually great for your body
• Zen Buddhism: Brief Giude The major point of Zen Buddhism is single – every human being is a Buddha and he or she needs only to realize this by reaching enlightenment.
• The Christian and Buddhist Perspectives in Healthcare This paper purposes to conduct a comparative analysis on the Christian and Buddhist perspectives regarding healthcare provision and its implications for healthcare practice.
• Buddhism’ Religion: The Life and Teaching of Siddhartha The paper studies the teaching of Buddhism according to the Four Noble Truths and dependent origination and reveals spread of Buddhism and upheaval of democracy in India.
• Death and Dying Rituals in Buddhism The Buddhist perspective on death is undeniably positive as it helps in relieving pain and grief and preparing the living for eventual death.
• Buddhism vs. Christianity: Studying Religions Buddhism and Christianity are both of the most popular religions. The followers of Buddhism are primarily concentrated in the Asian region, with India being its birthplace.
• Gender Roles in the Buddhist Culture In the Buddhist culture, women are considered weak beings and require men to provide them with protection. Furthermore, men are considered to be the strong and family breadwinners.
• Tea in the Prism of Zen Buddhism and Health The tea ceremony is connected with Zen Buddhism not only in its actual development but mainly in preserving the spirit with which it is imbued.
• Religion and Architecture: Christian Church, Buddhist, Islamic Mosques Religious architecture is mainly concerned with design and building of houses of reverence or holy deliberate places such as stupas, mosques, churches and temples.
• Buddhism, Caring and Moral Obligations This paper argues that the Buddhist account of the personality and the self provides an applicable approach to caring as well as moral obligations.
• Theravada and Mahayana Buddhist Teachings Theravada and Mahayana are both schools of Buddhism. The primary differences that exist between the two came into existence after Buddha’s death.
• Euthanasia in Christianity and Buddhism This paper provides a discussion on a case study on euthanasia of a man, who finds out he has a severe disease that will disable him within several years.
• Buddhism and Classical Hinduism Each religion of the East teaches separate principles from one another. This paper compares and contrasts the fundamental concepts and values of Buddhism and Classical Hinduism.
• Mahayana Buddhism’s Beginnings Some components of Mahayana Buddhism, in its older Indian incarnations, are conservative, especially concerning monastic morality.
• The History and Beliefs of the Theravadan Buddhism
• Biblical Worldview and Buddhism Worldview
• Parallels, Departures, and What Science Can Gain From Buddhism
• Buddhism: The Role Desires Play in Our Everyday Lives
• Doctrinal and Philosophical Sizing of Buddhism
• Basic Philosophical Differences Between Zen, Buddhism, and Taoism
• Buddhism as Religion That Offers Peace, Wisdom, and True Enlightenment
• The History and Evolution of Buddhism Across the World
• Bodhisattvas and the Evolution of Buddhism
• The Noble Eightfold Path of Buddhism
• Buddhism and the Vietnamese Buddhist Association
• Key Differences Between Christianity and Buddhism
• Korean Development and the Influences of Shamanism, Confucianism, and Buddhism
• Buddhism: The Four Noble Truths
• The Dalai Lama and the Spiritual Leader of Buddhism
• Comparing Buddhism and Shinto in Japan
• Buddhism, the Noble Eightfold Path, and the Four Noble Truths
• Ancient Greek Philosophy, Buddhism, and Vedanta Hinduism
• Beliefs and Practices: Judaism, Buddhism, and Hinduism
• Buddhism: Seeing the Familiar in the Strange
• Hinduism and Buddhism’s Influence of Indian Culture in Southeast Asia
• The Political and Religious Impact of Buddhism in Thailand
• Role of Buddhism in World Culture and the Formation of Worldviews The relevance and scientific significance of the study of the social aspects of Buddhism is determined by the interest in studying the heritage of Buddhist thought.
• Christianity and Buddhism Comparison Christianity is a more pragmatic religion than Buddhism. It is due to more realistic principles and practices. In addition, Christianity is based on real historical events.
• Buddhism and Denver Zen Center Experience For the purposes of learning more about different traditions and writing this assignment, the author visited the Denver Zen Center and found out more about Buddhism.
• The Importance of the Dalai Lama in Buddhism The paper discusses the significance of the Dalai Lama in Buddhism as an authority figure who unites the Tibetan people, a teacher of the religion, and a promoter of compassion.
• World Religions: Researching of Buddhism Buddhism will be examined from the perspective of the crucial concepts within the philosophy, namely the Four Noble Truths, the wheel of birth and death, karma, and Nirvana.
• Secularism and Buddhism: Rise of Violent Buddhist Rhetoric Since the dawn of civilization, the paradigm of religion has been one of the central narratives for a national community and its value system.
• Hinduism vs. Buddhism: Similarities & Differences The differences and similarities between Buddhism and Hinduism do not reveal their weaknesses or strengths but prove how diverse and critical human beliefs can be.
• The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism in Personal Life Buddha spent time learning the basic teachings of the Four Noble Truths, dealing with human suffering, which he had fully understood.
• Principles and Values of Buddhism The paper states that it is challenging for people of other confessions to understand Buddhism. It is essential to communicate with Buddhism followers.
• God Concept in Christianity and Buddhism Religions The core purpose of Christianity is to love God, forgive others, and repent for one’s sins. The key beliefs in Buddhism revolve around nirvana and Four Noble Truths.
• Buddhism and Hinduism: Differences and Comparisons Buddhism and Hinduism are two ancient world religions, which have their origins in India. These religions share many similar concepts and terminologies.
• Buddhism in the Novel “Siddhartha” by Hermann Hesse In “Siddhartha”, Hermann Hesse presents the theme of enlightenment as a quest for the truth, which he considers essential for a connection with the world.
• Buddhism, Islam, and Christianity in Society This paper analyses three of the most common religions: Buddhism, Islam, and Christianity, in order to identify their role in the life of society.
• Christianity, Buddhism, and Hinduism: The Afterlife Concepts The purpose of this paper is to compare the afterlife, as presented in Christianity, Buddhism, and Hinduism, through an examination of both primary and secondary sources.
• Religion Research: Hinduism and Buddhism The paper describes and compares two religion: Hinduism and Buddhism from aspects of history, popularity and areas of rerligion.
• Christianity and Buddhism: Interreligious Relations There are many similar points between Christianity and Buddhism, but the differences are likely to outweigh them.
• Basic Beliefs of Hinduism and Buddhism This paper gives an insight into how the concepts of Karma and Rebirth are practiced in the religious traditions of both Hinduism and Buddhism.
• The Dukkha Concept in Buddhism Dukkha is a traditional element of the religious philosophy of Buddhism, aimed at describing the prevailing situation in the surrounding material world.
• Buddhism: New Religions and Human Balance The paper indicates that Buddhism, one of the fundamental world religions, has been introduced in a series of new forms over the past years.
• Buddhism’s Resilience from Western Ideologies This paper addresses how believers of the Buddhism faith have been initiating and planning various methods to make the religion resilient from western ideologies and Christianity.
• Healthcare Provider and Faith Diversity: Native American Spirituality, Buddhism, and Sikhism This paper outlines an explicit view on the following diverse faiths in regard to healthcare provision: Native American spirituality, Buddhism, and Sikhism.
• What Are the 4 Main Beliefs of Buddhism?
• Is Buddhism a Belief System or Ideology?
• How Has Buddhism Impacted the World?
• What Are the Differences Between Mainstream Buddhism and Mahayana Buddhism?
• Does Anything Survive Death in Buddhism?
• How Did Early Buddhism Impact Western Culture?
• What Are the Two Main Branches of Buddhism?
• Who Were the Founders of Buddhism in Japan?
• Are Women Allowed to Practice Buddhism?
• How Has Buddhism Interacted With Nature and Environment?
• What Are the Gender Roles in Buddhism?
• Does Neuroplasticity Relate to Buddhism?
• How Does Buddhism Reflect the Human Understanding of God?
• Are There Similarities Between Buddhism and Islamic Religion?
• How Does Dalai Lama Exemplify the Ultimate Meaning of Buddhism in His Life and Works?
• What Is the Link Between Mahayana Buddhism and Chinese Culture?
• How Did Buddhism Spread Through China?
• What Does Buddhism Teach About Human Life?
• How Does Buddhism Treat Its Women?
• Is There Social Conflict Between Buddhism and Catholicism?
• How Does Geoffrey Samuels Portray Tibetan Buddhism?
• What Are the Origins, History, and Beliefs About Evil in Buddhism?
• How Does Samsara Work in Buddhism?
• Does Buddhism Believe in Equality?
• What Are the Similarities Between Buddhism and Other Eastern Religions?
• Buddha as a Leader of a Buddhism Religion This essay will analyze the reasons behind Buddha’s teachings, events, and ideas that shaped the views during his time and the relevance of Buddhism presently.
• Description of “Buddhism in America” by Seager This paper covers the first seven chapters of the book “Buddhism in America”. The author starts by giving background information concerning the American Buddhist landscape.
• Buddhism in China and Japan Buddhism is one of the major religions in the world, and it is now practiced in various countries, including China and Japan.
• Environmental, Social or Political Conflict in Buddhism There is a simple fact which is known to every Buddhist: although Buddha was beyond routine, still, he gave guidelines concerning good government.
• Buddhism and Christianity: Understanding of Religions This essay is intended to help bring out the Buddhist’s understanding of Christianity and correct the wrong perceptions through pointing out relevant scriptures.
• How Buddhism do not believe in Gods? Our research focuses and defends the basic concept of how and in what manner Buddhists do not stick to the existence of the Omnipotent.
• Cosmogony: Catholic and Buddhist Approaches This paper presents a dialogue between two believers- a Catholic and a Buddhist concerning creation of the world.
• Zen Buddhism: Main Features Zen Buddhism can safely be considered as a philosophy due to its lack of a “god” aspect. It is a religion that is based on basically the act of meditation.
• Zen Buddhism: Basic Teachings The principles and beliefs of Buddhism is what has given it popularity and a vast fellowship. These beliefs are founded on human experience.
• Personality Psychology and Zen Buddhism Zen Buddhism is a movement that occurred in the 1960s and involves monks, their feats and their monasticism, and the study of doctrines.
• The Religious Position of Women and Men in Buddhist Countries: Sri Lanka The position accorded to women in all spheres of activity has been a subject of considerable interest in recent decades.
• Death & Dying Ethics in Buddhism and Christianity The paper describes the ethical challenge the patient with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis is facing and the best approaches to support him using religious values or ideas.
• Incurable Disease in Christianity and Buddhism This paper examines Christianity and Buddhism in regards to views on life and death and applies the concepts to the case study of a patient with an untreatable illness.
• Death & Dying Ethics in Christianity and Buddhism The paper will discuss the attitude toward the deliberate ending of life from the viewpoint of Christianity and Buddhism.
• Zen Buddhism in America Zen Buddhism is a separate school of Mahayana Buddhism that emphasizes mindfulness and meditation practices as the path to achieving enlightenment.
• Buddhism and Life: Living the Principles of the Buddhist Religion Contrary to the popular thought that suggests that the Buddhist belief seeks to view the world from a negative perspective, the religion conceives life from its imperfect face.
• Buddhist Religion and Western Psychologies Buddhists believe that any conception of “self” is an illusion; no separate “self” exists, only a collection of parts.
• Beliefs in Buddhism and Classical Hinduism This paper shows that Buddhism progressed from Hinduism, with the main difference being that they do not share similar beliefs.
• Spiritual Philosophy: Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism Hinduism, Buddhism, and Taoism as spiritual philosophies stress on the acceptance of things the way they are, overcoming desires and humility.
• Buddhism and Classical Hinduism Concept and Values Buddhism and classical Hinduism are the oldest religions in the world. It is worth to note that both religions originated from India.
• Medical Ethics: Christianity and Buddhism Perspectives Ethical concerns are present in any working conditions. However, ethics in medicine is particularly important, and it has many complicated issues.
• Human Life and Death in Christianity and Buddhism Illness often leads to agony and prompts the search for the meaning of life as people try to understand the reasons behind their predicaments.
• Christianity and Buddhism for Terminally Ill Patient The patient with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis has been thinking about euthanasia. Christianity and Buddhism offer different answers to death-related questions.
• Death and Dying in Christianity and Buddhism Using Christianity and Buddhism as two diverse religious perspectives, this discussion explores how patient’s health demands can be met by healthcare practitioners.
• Self-Concept in Buddhist Reductionism This paper investigates the idea of self in its relation to the Buddhist perception of suffering and discusses the notion of objectual and intentional properties.
• Buddhist Spirituality: Contribution to Psychological Well-Being Buddhist Spirituality is based on the principles that can enhance one’s psychological well-being significantly. Buddhism teaches people how to avoid negative emotions and harmful mental states.
• Deities in Hinduism and Buddhism This paper dwells upon the differences in roles of Hindu and Buddhist deities from mythological and scientific perspectives.
• Buddhist Meditation Practices The paper looks at the differences between acalminga (samatha) and ainsighta (vipasana) Mahayana teachings of Buddhist meditation.
• What Is Buddhism? History of the Religion, Beliefs, and Rituals This paper will set out to elaborate on what Buddhism is by providing a history of the religion and underscoring some of the beliefs and rituals practiced in this religion.

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Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Buddhism'

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Konik, Adrian. "Buddhism and transgression : the appropriation of Buddhism in the contemporary West /." Leiden : Brill, 2009. http://opac.nebis.ch/cgi-bin/showAbstract.pl?u20=9789004178755.

Shields, James Mark. "Critical Buddhism : a Buddhist hermeneutics of practice." Thesis, McGill University, 2006. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=102172.

Smith, Buster G. Bader Christopher D. "American Buddhism a sociological perspective /." Waco, Tex. : Baylor University, 2009. http://hdl.handle.net/2104/5310.

Jantrasrisalai, Chanida. "Early Buddhist Dhammakāya its philosophical and soteriological significance /." Connect to full text, 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/2123/4130.

Eddy, Glenys. "Western Buddhist experience the journey from encounter to committment in two forms of western Buddhism /." Connect to full text, 2007. http://hdl.handle.net/2123/2227.

Vignato, Giuseppe. "Chinese transformation of Buddhism the case of Kuan-yin /." Theological Research Exchange Network (TREN), 1993. http://www.tren.com.

Kotas, Frederic John. "Ojoden : accounts of rebirth in the pure land /." Thesis, Connect to this title online; UW restricted, 1987. http://hdl.handle.net/1773/11074.

Saitanaporn, Phramonchai. "Buddhist deliverance a re-evaluation of the relationship between Samatha and Vipassanā /." Connect to full text, 2009. http://hdl.handle.net/2123/5400.

Saitanaporn, Phramonchai. "BUDDHIST DELIVERANCE: A RE-EVALUATION OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SAMATHA AND VIPASSANĀ." Thesis, The University of Sydney, 2009. http://hdl.handle.net/2123/5400.

Nichols, Michael David. "Malleable Māra the transformations of a Buddhist symbol of evil /." Oxford, Ohio : Miami University, 2004. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc%5Fnum=miami1086204203.

Fernandes, Karen M. "Transforming emotions : the practice of lojong in Tibetan Buddhism." Thesis, McGill University, 2000. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=31105.

Li, Xin Jie. "Weituo : a protective deity in Chinese Buddhism and Buddhist art." Thesis, University of Macau, 2012. http://umaclib3.umac.mo/record=b2585607.

Qin, Wen-jie. "The Buddhist revival in post-Mao China women reconstruct Buddhism on Mt. Emei /." online access from Digital dissertation consortium, 2000. http://libweb.cityu.edu.hk/cgi-bin/er/db/ddcdiss.pl?9972494.

Karmay, Samten Gyaltsen. "Origin and early development of the Tibetan religious traditions of the Great Perfection (Rdzogs Chen)." Thesis, SOAS, University of London, 1986. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.368854.

Weldon, John F. "Buddhism and Nichiren Shoshu Buddhism a critique /." Theological Research Exchange Network (TREN), 1987. http://www.tren.com.

Schmid, David Neil. "Yuanqi medieval Buddhist narratives from Dunhuang /." online access from Digital dissertation consortium, 2002. http://libweb.cityu.edu.hk/cgi-bin/er/db/ddcdiss.pl?3043951.

Jameson, Derry. "Curating Buddhism: Reimagining Buddhist Statues in a Museum and Temple Setting." Thesis, University of Oregon, 2016. http://hdl.handle.net/1794/19658.

Chen, Jinhua. "The formation of early Esoteric Buddhism in Japan, a study of the three Japanese esoteric apocrypha." Thesis, National Library of Canada = Bibliothèque nationale du Canada, 1997. http://www.collectionscanada.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk2/ftp02/NQ30080.pdf.

Eddy, Glenys. "Western Buddhist Experience: The Journey From Encounter to Commitment in Two Forms of Western Buddhism." Thesis, The University of Sydney, 2007. http://hdl.handle.net/2123/2227.

Daisley, Simon Francis Stirling. "Exorcising Luther: Confronting the demon of modernity in Tibetan Buddhism." Thesis, University of Canterbury. Social and Political Sciences, 2012. http://hdl.handle.net/10092/7329.

Eddy, Glenys. "Western Buddhist Experience: The Journey From Encounter to Commitment in Two Forms of Western Buddhism." Arts, 2007. http://hdl.handle.net/2123/2227.

Surendran, Gitanjali. ""The Indian Discovery of Buddhism": Buddhist Revival in India, c. 1890-1956." Thesis, Harvard University, 2013. http://dissertations.umi.com/gsas.harvard:11168.

Twist, Rebecca L. "Patronage, devotion and politics a Buddhological study of the Patola Sahi Dynasty's visual record /." Columbus, Ohio : Ohio State University, 2007. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc%5Fnum=osu1197663617.

Chiu, Angela Shih Chih. "The social and religious world of northern Thai Buddha images : art, lineage, power and place in Lan Na monastic chronicles (Tamnan)." Thesis, SOAS, University of London, 2012. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.617604.

Liu, Yading. "Fo jiao ling yan ji yan jiu yi Jin Tang wei zhong xin /." Chengdu Shi : Sichuan chu ban ji tuan Ba Shu shu she, 2006. http://catalog.hathitrust.org/api/volumes/oclc/71742325.html.

Lingley, Kate Alexandra. "Widows, monks, magistrates, and concubines social dimensions of sixth-century Buddhist art patronage /." Click to view the dissertation via Digital dissertation consortium, 2004.

au, Aung Myint@correctiveservices wa gov, and Aung Myint. "Theravada Treatment and Psychotherapy: An Ecological Integration of Buddhist Tripartite Practice and Western Rational Analysis." Murdoch University, 2007. http://wwwlib.murdoch.edu.au/adt/browse/view/adt-MU20071130.121741.

English, Elizabeth. "Vajrayogini : her visualisation, rituals, and forms." Thesis, University of Oxford, 1999. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.313185.

Suen, Hon-ming Stephen, and 孫漢明. "Methods of spiritual praxis in the Sarvāstivāda: a study primarily based on the Abhidharma-mahāvibhāṣā." Thesis, The University of Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Hong Kong), 2010. http://hub.hku.hk/bib/B44404980.

Wang, Youxuan. "Madhyamaka Vijnanavada and deconstruction : a comparative study of the semiotics in Kumarajiva, Paramartha, Xuanzang and Derrida." Thesis, Bath Spa University, 1999. http://researchspace.bathspa.ac.uk/1440/.

Suzuki, Satona. "Japanese Buddhist missionary activities in Korea, 1877-1910." Thesis, SOAS, University of London, 2000. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.368045.

Liang, Juily Jung Chuang Mobley Michael. "The process of decentering a phenomenological study of Asian American Buddhists from the Fo Guan Shan Temple Buddhist order /." Diss., Columbia, Mo. : University of Missouri--Columbia, 2009. http://hdl.handle.net/10355/6177.

Yogo, Rinako. "Jung and Buddhism : a hermeneutical engagement with the Tibetan and Zen Buddhist traditions." Thesis, University of Kent, 2001. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.365210.

Pham, Van Minh, University of Western Sydney, of Arts Education and Social Sciences College, and School of Social Ecology and Lifelong Learning. "Socio-political philosophy of Vietnamese Buddhism : a case study of the Buddhist movement of 1963 and 1966." THESIS_CAESS_SELL_Pham_V.xml, 2001. http://handle.uws.edu.au:8081/1959.7/382.

Harrysson, Axel. "Buddhism i Läroböcker : Presentation av buddhism i läroböcker för religionskunskap 1." Thesis, Umeå universitet, Institutionen för idé- och samhällsstudier, 2019. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:umu:diva-162054.

Henry, Philip Michael. "Socially engaged Buddhism in the UK : adaptation and development within Western Buddhism." Thesis, University of Liverpool, 2008. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.504227.

Vasi, Shiva. "Conversion to Zen Buddhism." Monash University, School of Political and Social Inquiry, 2004. http://arrow.monash.edu.au/hdl/1959.1/9601.

Tachibana, Shundō. "The ethics of Buddhism /." Richmond : Curzon press, 1994. http://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb37486806d.

Dawacairen. "Dang dai Xizang de huo fo : xin tu ren tong, zheng zhi jiao se yu she hui ying xiang = Living Buddhas in contemporary Tibet : believers' identifications, political roles and social influence /." click here to view the abstract and table of contents click here to view the fulltext, 2004. http://net3.hkbu.edu.hk/~libres/cgi-bin/thesisab.pl?pdf=b18515599a.pdf.

Rawlings-Way, Olivia M. F. "Religious interbeing : Buddhist pluralism and Thich Nhat Hanh." Thesis, Department of Indian Sub-Continental Studies, Faculty of Arts, 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/2123/13156.

Bayle, Beatrice. "Conserving mural paintings in Thailand and Sri Lanka : conservation policies and restoration practice in social and historical context /." Connect to thesis, 2009. http://repository.unimelb.edu.au/10187/7144.

Primprao, Disayavanish Strand Kenneth H. Padavil George. "The effect of Buddhist insight meditation on stress and anxiety." Normal, Ill. Illinois State University, 1994. http://wwwlib.umi.com/cr/ilstu/fullcit?p9510422.

Niderost, Heather I. (Heather Isabel). "The myth of Maitreya in modern Japan, with a history of its evolution /." Thesis, McGill University, 1992. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=56655.

Hei, Rui. "Hariti, from a demon mother to a protective deity in Buddhism : a history of an Indian pre-Buddhist goddess in Chinese Buddhist art." Thesis, University of Macau, 2010. http://umaclib3.umac.mo/record=b2537050.

Chan, Ngan-che. "A study of Yogãcãra theory of the ten causes." Click to view the E-thesis via HKUTO, 2007. http://sunzi.lib.hku.hk/hkuto/record/B38864071.

Zhu, Wenguang. "Fo xue yan jiu dao lun /." Taibei Shi : Wen jin chu ban she, 2008. http://www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/chi0901/2008542767.html.

Wang, Shaofeng. "Chu Tang fo dian ci hui yan jiu." Hefei Shi : Anhui jiao yu chu ban she, 2004. http://books.google.com/books?id=a9w3AAAAMAAJ.

Stevens, Rachael. "Red Tara : lineages of literature and practice." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2010. http://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:27381b38-c580-4d0b-b7d5-f87abcc50afd.

Li, Gregory Kenneth, and 李群雄. "Tantric symbolism in Vajrayogini imagery." Thesis, The University of Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Hong Kong), 2010. http://hub.hku.hk/bib/B45166225.

Sonam, Tenzin, and Tenzin Sonam. "Buddhism at Crossroads: A Case Study of Six Tibetan Buddhist Monks Navigating the Intersection of Buddhist Theology and Western Science." Diss., The University of Arizona, 2017. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/624305.

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This is my thesis I submitted for my MA degree in Buddhist Studies at the Rangjung Yeshe Institute. It was on the soteriological epistemology of the Seventh Karmapa. In particular, it was about how his view on Buddha-nature was a moderate version of Other-emptiness, informed by the practice of Mahāmudrā, in harmony with the view of the Third Karmapa (which combined Madhyamaka and Yogacara), and was uniquely applied to the concept of rang rig (reflexive awareness) in pramāṇa (valid means of cognition) literature.

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Syllabus for seminar (13 students) on Buddhist philosophy, centered on a complete reading of the eighth-century Indian-Tibetan Buddhist treatise Madhyamakalamkara in translation. As a source-text, this treatise provides a good classical survey of several traditions of Buddhist and non-Buddhist Indian philosophy framed in a dialectical Madhyamaka critique. The reading of the primary source served as the basis for further reading in secondary sources and extensive class discussions.

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https://www.istb.univie.ac.at/cgi-bin/wstb/wstb.cgi?ID=93&show_description=1

Martina Draszczyk , David Higgins

This two-volume publication explores the complex philosophy of Mahāmudrā that developed in Tibetan Dwags po Bka’ brgyud traditions between the 15th and 16th centuries CE. It examines the attempts to articulate and defend Bka’ brgyud views and practices by four leading post-classical thinkers: (1) Shākya mchog ldan (1423‒1507), a celebrated yet controversial Sa skya scholar who developed a strong affiliation with the Karma Bka’ brgyud Mahāmudrā tradition in the last half of his life, (2) Karma phrin las Phyogs las rnam rgyal (1456‒1539), a renowned Karma Bka’ brgyud scholar-yogin and tutor to the Eighth Karma pa, (3) the Eighth Karma pa himself, Mi bskyod rdo rje (1507‒1554), who was among the most erudite and influential scholar-hierarchs of his generation, (4) and Padma dkar po (1527‒1592), Fourth ’Brug chen of the ’Brug pa Bka’ brgyud lineage who is generally acknowledged as its greatest scholar and systematizer. The work is devoted to clarifying how each of these authors attempted not only to establish the continuity of Bka’ brgyud Mahāmudrā doctrines and practices with authoritative Indo-Tibetan traditions of exegesis (bshad lugs) and praxis (sgrub lugs) but also to defend them against charges of incoherence and even heresy (chos min, chos log) in an intellectual climate increasingly dominated and riven by sectarian exclusivism and religious conservativism. Against detractors who had raised questions about the Indian provenance of certain Bka’ brgyud Mahāmudrā doctrines such as Sgam po pa’s “White Panacea” (dkar po gcig thub), and also doubts about whether such teachings should even be considered Buddhist at all, the four authors stood united in promoting this tradition as a way firmly grounded in insights and methods of Indian Buddhist third turning sūtras, the tantras, and the spiritual songs (dohā) and instructions (upadeśa) of the Indian mahāsiddhas. Sgam po pa’s Mahāmudrā is presented as a path that distils from these traditions the most direct and effective means of reaching the Mahāyāna goal of spiritual awakening for the sake of oneself and others. Post-classical Mahāmudrā exegetes generally viewed the rapprochement between Mahāmudrā and certain anti-foundationalist strains of Indian Madhyamaka philosophy — specifically, the *Prāsaṅgika (“Consequentialist”) and Apratiṣṭhāna (“Nonfoundationalist”) systems — as central to their philosophical aims. They framed this synthesis in terms of the reconciliation of affirmative (cataphatic) and negative (apophatic) styles of thought and discourse. This is discernable in our four authors’ attempts to reconcile two basic models of truth or reality (satya) that had long been discussed and debated by Indian and Tibetan Buddhist scholars: (1) a differentiation model based on robust distinctions between conventional and ultimate truths (saṃvṛtisatya and paramārthasatya) and their associated modes of cognition and emptiness, and (2) an identification or unity (zung ’jug : yuganaddha) model of the two truths and their associated modes of cognition and emptiness. Whereas the differentiation model was typically aligned with a strongly innatist view of the ultimate (buddha nature, the nature of mind, or the nature of reality) that underscored its “sublime otherness” (gzhan mchog) from all that is conventional and adventitious, the unity model, predicated on the view of a common ground uniting all conditioned and unconditioned phenomena, emphasized the pervasiveness of the ultimate and its immanence within the conventional in order to indicate how the ultimate permeates the mind-streams of individuals in bondage. In a similar vein, these scholars sought to chart a middle way between opposing Indo-Tibetan dogmas regarding the nature of reality which had become aligned with positive versus negative appraisals of the ultimate, as exemplified by the heated inter-sectarian disputes between Tibetan Other-emptiness (gzhan stong) and Self-emptiness (rang stong) views that had erupted in the fourteenth century. If advocating a “middle path beyond extremes” (mtha’ bral dbu ma’i lam) meant avoiding the postulation of a metaphysical absolute beyond time, matter and the entire nexus of dependent arising, a view they attributed to the Jo nang school, it also meant circumventing the kind of unwarranted deprecation of ultimate reality that they saw as the undesirable result of taking the ultimate to consist in sheer emptiness (stong pa rkyang pa) — a complete absence of anything whatsoever — that was the scope of a nonaffirming negation (med dgag), a view they associated mainly with the Dge lugs pa school. It is in light of the shared concern of these post-classical thinkers to ply a middle course between eternalist Gzhan stong-based and nihilist Rang stong-based currents of Buddhist thought within the framework of an affirmative yet resolutely anti-foundationalist approach to goal-realization that we can broadly characterize their primary philosophical orientation as a “Mahāmudrā of the Middle Way”. This work is divided into two volumes: the first offers a detailed philosophical analysis of the authors’ principal views and justifications of Mahāmudrā against the background of Indian and Tibetan Buddhist doctrines on mind, emptiness and buddha nature; the second comprises an annotated anthology of their seminal writings on Mahāmudrā accompanied by critical editions and introductions. These two volumes are the result of research that was generously funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) from 2012 to 2015 under the supervision of Prof. Klaus-Dieter Mathes. The project was entitled “‘Emptiness of Other’ (Gzhan stong) in the Tibetan ‘Great Seal’ (Mahāmudrā) Traditions of the 15th and 16th Centuries” (FWF Project number P23826-G15).

David Higgins

Szymon Bogacz

Ayutthaya: Mahachulalongkornrajavidyalaya University Press

Sanu Mahatthanadull

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