Commentary on Summary of Faith and Practice
TEXT: Faith & practice cannot be differentiated
COMMENTARY
Differentiating
"Cannot be differentiated" means that one cannot tell one from the other. You can see a person's real faith in their practice. Prac
Read more…In my post: Principles Against Some Common Fallacies...
5. 'Oneness' and 'interdependency' are mutually contradictory ideas and neither is central to Buddhism.
Interdependency exists, but is a special case, not a universal one.In the Abhidhamma secti
Read more…In my post: Principles Against Some Common Fallacies...
4. The idea of 'interbeing' was not taught by Buddha.
This item is close to that of yesterday. However, we can address the matter from a different angle. One often hears these days that the esse
Read more…In my post: Principles Against Some Common Fallacies...
3. It is not true that believing that all people are part of one another will necessarily make somebody a better person. People are often careless of themselves.
Advocacy of the idea that we are
Read more…In my post: Principles Against Some Common Fallacies...
2. It is not necessary to create a 'self' before you abandon it.
The attempt to square Western psychology with Buddhist psychology sometimes yields useful ideas, bit it also often leads to confu
Read more…In my post: Principles Against Some Common Fallacies...
1. Buddhism only values 'self-awareness' insofar as it cultivates humility and compassion.
The point here is that 'self-awareness' is not, in Buddhism, a goal in itself. Buddhism is not about de
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There is a passage...
銀碗盛雪 明月藏鷺 類而不斉 混則知處
“A silver bowl full of snow / a white egret hidden in the moonlight / these are not the same / comparing them we can appreciate [our own] place”
This comes from the Jewel Mirror Samadhi, a medieval Chinese
Saigyo and Dogen were both independent Buddhist monks. Saigyo was, perhaps, even more independent than Dogen in that he seems never to have been strongly identified with one sect, although he clearly did have a great respect for Kukai and, therefore,
Read more…Nangaku & Baso
There is a story about two monks, Nangaku and Baso. Baso has been practising meditation for ten years. Nangaku comes along.
Nangaku: What is the use of meditation?
Baso: To make a Buddha!
Nangaku picks up a tile. He starts to rub the t
Read more…Here are another two poems by Saigyo. During his lifetime, the political situation gradually deteriorated until the most awful civil war broke out between the Taira and the Minamoto factions. Saigyo had himself been a warrior in his youth and had bec
Read more…1. Buddhism only values 'self-awareness' insofar as it cultivates humility and compassion.
2. It is not necessary to create a 'self' before you abandon it.
3. It is not true that believing that all people are part of one another will necessarily make
Read more…Honen Shonin has been one of the ancestral teachers most important to me. I love his humanity. He talks about how he learnt Buddhism and learnt that pure contempation depended upon pure moral conduct and that wisdom depended on pure contemplation. he
Read more…Thank-you Dharmavidya. That is such an important truth for me.I would love to share that with my Shin Sangha.
Read more…This is out of context, but it contains some points that others might find interesting or might like to comment further upon thus enriching the conversation.
Correspondent: I never asked myself the question why fundamentalism exists. You are right,
Read more…This morning I gave a talk at Oasis. I spoke about Shantideva and his famous text on the Way of the Bodhisattva. In particular, the text, like most Mahayana texts, begins with a homage to the Buddhas and bodhisattvas. It is possible that many western
Read more…Dear Dharmavidya, thank-you deeply for your commentary series on the Summary of Faith and Practice.it's bringing it much more broadly alive for me.the Summary has become my daily reading before my period of formal Nembutsu practice and prayer. Namo A
Read more…During the last couple of days I’ve been corresponding with a couple of the students taking the Introduction to Pureland Buddhism course on Amida Academy on the subject of creativity, specifically, their own creative endeavours.
We all have ideas of
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Read more…A week is a long time in politics
There has been a torrent of words since last week’s UK Referendum vote to leave the EU. Changes upon changes to unstabilised political parties. Our newspapers and TV screens are filled with news of behind the scenes
Read more…Today, like a huge number of people, I am reeling from the result of the referendum whereby the UK will leave the EU. This will have huge repercussions far beyond the shores of the island on which I live. Millions of people will be affected, includin
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