Buddhadharma editor Tynette Deveaux on a "challenging but important" recent article that touched a nerve -- and a highly respected Buddhist monk/teacher's own response to it. Recently we published an article by Funie Hsu titled “We’ve Been Here All Along,” which explores how Asian American Buddhists have historically been marginalized in American Buddhism. The author — an [...]
Between Arhat and Bodhisattva
Ajahn Amaro examines the arguments for and against the arhat and bodhisattva ideals that define and too often divide the Buddhist traditions. He suggests a way out of the polarizing debate. A student of Buddhism asked, “Which do you think is the best path: that of the arahant [arhat] or that of the bodhisattva?” “That kind of question is asked by people who understand [...]
Is Western Psychology Redefining Buddhism?
Jack Kornfield, Judy Lief, and Bodhin Kjolhede examine the influence of Western psychology on Buddhism. Introduction by Ajahn Amaro. Late autumn 1974, I am sitting in a lecture room of the University of London. It is my first term as an undergraduate studying psychology and physiology, and we are being introduced to the teachings of Freud. At a certain point, the lecturer [...]
The Sound of Silence
Ajahn Amaro explains how to practice nada yoga and why this simple act of listening to inner sound can help you realize emptiness. Along with the more well-known methods designed to help practitioners of Buddhist meditation ground their attention in the present moment— such as focusing on the rhythm of the breath, paying attention to the feeling of footsteps, or [...]
Ajahn Amaro heads back to England
From the Ukiah Daily Journal Ajahn Amaro, the founding abbot of California's Abhayagiri Buddhist Monastery in Redwood Valley, will be moving to England this month to fill the role as abbot of Amaravati Monastery near London. Since moving to Redwood Valley in 1996, Amaro has been generous in sharing the teachings of the Buddha with our local community. He has offered many [...]
Like Oil and Water
There is a quality of pure awareness that is not fazed by fleeting thoughts, emotions, or sense impressions, explain Ajahn Amaro and Ajahn Pasanno. Even when they are together, pure awareness and the conditioned realm are always separate. Enlightenment, liberation, depends on the recognition of the radical separateness of awareness—“the one who knows” as Ajahn Chah would [...]
Why We Need Monasticism
A panel discussion with Robert Thurman, Jan Chozen Bays, Bhikkhu Bodhi and Ayya Tathaaloka. Introduction by Ajahn Amaro. Many classical Buddhist texts, of both Northern and Southern traditions, emphasize that monasticism plays an essential role in the health and longevity of the religion and its dispensation. However, in the West, the vast majority of influential dharma [...]
Mind, Matter, or God?
As the so-called new atheists go toe-to-toe with religious literalists, where do Buddhists and other contemplative practitioners stand? Barry Boyce reports on the middle way embracing both reason and the reality beyond it. On January 23, 2002, Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl disappeared in Karachi, Pakistan. He was scheduled to meet with a source, but it turned [...]
Forum: How Does Karma Really Work?
Norman Fischer, Robin Kornman, and Ajahn Amaro get to the bottom of a question that baffles so many of us. Introduction by Andy Karr. Few Buddhist ideas resonate more, yet produce more dissonance for Western dharma practitioners, than karma. It’s easy to feel that the laws of karma are at work when you see the chickens coming home to roost for someone with an outsized ego. [...]
Profile: Forest Sangha
A humble man of small stature, living simply in a kuti (meditation hut) in the remote and impoverished northeast of Thailand, grew to be one of the most influential figures in Buddhism in the West. Ajahn Chah was not only an important teacher for the founders of the Insight Meditation Society, a largely secularized group devoted to vipassana meditation, he also left a legacy of [...]