The Fall 2020 issue of Buddhadharma: The Practitioner’s Quarterly features in-depth teachings for cultivating your Buddhist practice and manifesting those teachings meaningfully in everyday life. Inside, you’ll find thoughtful commentaries, reviews of the latest Buddhist books, Ask the Teachers, and more.
Features
When Sadness Rages Like Fire
Pema Khandro Rinpoche shares the life of the Tibetan yogi Shabkar, whose practice and teachings were inseparable from loss and grief.
The Enduring Teachings of Suzuki Roshi: The 50th Anniversary of Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind
To mark the fiftieth anniversary of Shunryu Suzuki Roshi‘s Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind, we present two teachings from the book, alongside testimonials from Buddhist teachers who were influenced by it.
Turning to the Present Moment of Racism
How do we hold the realities of racism in our hearts, asks Doshin Mako Voelkel, and how do we hold the parts of ourselves that might want to look away?
The Opposite of Grasping Is Intimacy
Where are you stuck? What would it take to get unstuck? Lama Willa Miller explores the idea of “entanglement,” coming to the conclusion that the opposite of attachment isn’t detachment — it’s intimacy.
Waking Up in Dark Times
Ajahn Sucitto reflects on the hopelessness he sometimes feels in the face of climate change, and how practicing in these times is a bit like walking in the dark: intimate, awake, and full of the unknown.
Comparing Mahamudra and Dzogchen
Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche (1920–1996) on the differences between Mahamudra and Dzogchen—and the relationship between them.
Departments
Commentary
No One Wakes Up Until We All Wake Up by Tenku Ruff
Ask the Teachers
“What is the Buddhist view of hope? Is it just another delusion that pulls us out of the present moment and causes suffering, or can it also motivate us to work in a way that creates a better future?”
Oren Jay Sofer, Sister Clear Grace, and Ayya Yeshe respond.
Reviews
Buddhist Magic by Sam van Schaik; Reviewed by Roger R. Jackson
Spacious Minds: Trauma and Resilience in Tibetan Buddhism by Sara Lewis; Reviewed by Katherine King
Book Briefs
Reviews by Joie Szu-Chiao Chen
The Irish Buddhist: The Forgotten Monk Who Faced Down the British Empire by Alicia Turner, Laurence Cox, and Brian Bocking
Love and Rage: The Path of Liberation through Anger by Lama Rod Owens
A Bigger Sky: Awakening a Fierce Feminine Buddhism by Pamela Weiss
Mindfully Facing Climate Change by Bhikkhu Analayo
The Tara Tantra: Tara’s Fundamental Ritual Text (Tara-mula-kalpa) translated by Susan A. Landesman
Mastering Meditation: Instructions on Calm Abiding and Mahamudra by Choden Rinpoche, translated by Tenzin Gache
The Non-Existence of the Real World edited by Jan Westerhoff