Because of its emphasis on impermanence, people often think that Buddhism's view of death is that it doesn’t matter and we should just accept it. But that, says Lama Shenpen Hookham, is a crucial misunderstanding. The prospect of death nearly always comes as a shock: we are suddenly faced, at the worst possible moment, with all the fundamental questions about what life is, [...]
San Francisco’s famed Zen hospice closes doors while seeking funding
The Zen Hospice Project guesthouse opened in 1990, during the height of the AIDS epidemic. The guesthouse of the Zen Hospice Project in San Francisco saw its last patient in June. For more than a month, operations at the guesthouse have been suspended due to lack of funding. The project runs largely on donations, which have diminished in recent years as donors have [...]
Life, death, and a DC teen raising awareness of gun violence
Inspired by Buddhist teachings on death, teen activist Lauryn Renford wants to memorialize teen victims of gun violence with art. About thirty days after her boyfriend was shot dead, sixteen-year-old Lauryn Renford sat in a DC Starbucks with her mom and typed into Google: “Buddhist death beliefs.” The first result of her web search was The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying. [...]
Why I Didn’t Attempt Suicide
Zen teacher Brad Warner on the time he considered suicide—and the different kind of death he chose. I didn’t really know Tyler, but a lot of my friends did. And they were pretty sad when he killed himself last year. That led people to ask me—not for the first time—what the Buddhist view on suicide is. I gave the same answer I give when I’m asked about the Buddhist view on [...]
The Tibetan Buddhist View of Death and Rebirth
In the March 1995 Lion's Roar magazine, Professor Robert Thurman explained the Tibetan Buddhist view of death and rebirth. There is a level of subtle energy in the human mind which is not grossly material. It is a subtle pattern of continuity that western scientists have not looked for because they don’t have the instruments to measure it. Eastern science has investigated that [...]
Facing Death, Mindfully
Bhante Henepola Gunaratana — affectionately known as "Bhante G." — had a moment of coming face-to-face with death while on a flight. Here's what he told an audience at Cittaviveka, a Buddhist monastery in the UK, about it. I had received word of my mother's final illness. On the way to Sri Lanka from Washington, DC, I changed planes to a jumbo jet in Hawaii. An hour or two [...]
bell hooks and John Perry Barlow talk “prana in cyberspace”
From the Lion's Roar archives, a 1995 conversation between digital activist and lyricist John Perry Barlow — who died on February 7, 2018 — and social theorist bell hooks. John Perry Barlow: "On paper, you are my polar opposite [bell hooks: iconoclastic feminist, leading African-American intellectual, progressive Buddhist, self-proclaimed homebody], yet I feel none of that [...]
Study suggests Tibetan Buddhist monastics have an above-average fear of death
In a study, researchers were surprised to find that Tibetan monks and nuns showed much more fear of death than other participants. On January 22, the journal Cognitive Science published a paper comparing attitudes toward self and the fear of death between different groups. Participants in the studies included non-religious Westerners, Hindus, Christians, lay Tibetans, lay [...]
Ursula K. Le Guin on Housman’s Classic Poem “From Far”
Ursula K. Le Guin analyzes A.E. Housman's poem, "From Far." From the November 2007 Lion's Roar. A Shropshire Lad: XXXII From far, from eve and morning And yon twelve-winded sky, The stuff of life to knit me Blew hither: here am I. Now—for a breath I tarry Nor yet disperse apart— Take my hand quick and tell me What have you in your heart. Speak now, and I will [...]
Death: The Greatest Teacher
The Buddha said the greatest of all teachings is impermanence. Its final expression is death. Buddhist teacher Judy Lief explains why our awareness of death is the secret of life. It’s the ultimate twist. Whether we fight it, deny it, or accept it, we all have a relationship with death. Some people have few encounters with death as they are growing up, and it becomes [...]
