Vietnam’s first Buddhism Museum in Vietnam opens in Da Nang

VietnamNet, Dec 15, 2015 Hanoi, Vietnam -- More than 500 Buddhist antiquities, including artifacts rated as national treasures, are on display at the Museum of Buddhist Culture in the central city of Da Nang. The museum, located in Quan The Am Temple in Ngu Hanh Son District, was licensed by the municipal government at the end of 2014. This is the first Buddhist Culture Museum in Vietnam.

Sayadaw Agganna’s Dhamma Talk “The Origin of Kathina Ceremony”

at Kathina 2015 DMC dated 8th November 2015.

At the end of rain retreat, Buddhist devotees celebrate offering kathina robe ceremony of which is one of the significant Buddhist traditions. This ceremony is celebrated from full moon day of October to full moon day of November every year. This ceremony has been celebrated from the Buddha’s time to present day, according to the allowance of the Buddha.

THE ORIGIN OF KATHINA CEREMONY
How does the kathina ceremony happened in our Buddhasasana? This is mentioned in the Mahavagga, the 3rd book of Vinayapitaka.

When the Buddha was staying at the Jetavana monastery, Anathapindika’s park in Savatthi. At that time, thirty bhikkhus (Buddhavaggi thirty brothers from Pava) came from Paveyyaka to pay respect to the Buddha. These Bhikkhus took Dutinga practices that stayed in forest, going for alms-food, wearing three robes and robes are also rag-robes (Pansukula).

However they were unable to reach in time of their rain retreat in Savatthi and the rain retreat (vassa) also was approaching, so they decided to stay at Saketa city which is six yojana (one Yojana = 12 miles) away from Savatthi.

They felt disenchanted because they had to spend their rain retreat at Saketa city which was not far from Savatthi. Although they felt disenchanted in that place they still spend their rain retreat over there. They did pavarana (invitation ceremony) immediately at the end of vassa and continued their journey to Savatthi to see the Buddha.

On the way, they encountered heavy rain and when they reached their destination, their robes were drenched and heavy. So they became exhausted and tired when they reached before Buddha. Also they had carried the double robes with them, those double robes were soaked up by rain water and they became too heavy.

If it is possible for the bhikkhu to leave these double robes in one of the monasteries or one of the villages on the way, it would be much easier to travel. Due to the asamadanacara rule where three determined robes must be in allowable distance at the dawn time. There thirty bhikkhus have to carry their double robes with them. These robes were soaked with water and like water bags. Thus, the bhikkus were too tired when they reached Savatthi. 

When they reached before the Buddha, having paid respect to the Buddha, the Buddha asked about their condition in vassa and on the way. They reported about their condition of vassa and their experiences on the way to Savatthi.
Then the Buddha realized how they had felt, carrying the three Robes on the way. So to get the freedom from this asamadanacara sikkhapada (rule) and according to the previous Buddhas’ tradition, the Buddha allowed to hold the Kathina robe spreading ceremony. The monks who spread the kathina robe will gain five privileges (benefits) from vina (rules) also allowed by the Buddha.
[Monks, I allow monks who have completed the vassa to spread the kathina.
(Five Privileges) monks, will be allowable to you who have spread the kathina]
From that time onwards, kathina robe offering and spreading ceremony happened in the Buddha sasana.

Loving Kindness Wins The Race

Bhikkhu Subhuti's Blog

(Adventures in Going for Alms in Hawaii)

Last week we encountered a disturbing event while we were going for Alms in village in Kauai. There was a lady on a bicycle who approached us and asked us what we were doing. Her tone of voice was not so happy, but we enjoy telling people what we are doing because it does not happen so often and that is one of our goals when we stand in front of each house. So I replied with my canned response, mentally noting the cross around her neck by saying, “We are Buddhist monks, and we do not touch money. We are doing many things and one of those things we do is to collect food for our daily meal.” I usually then start to tell them about how we are wishing loving kindness to each house to keep our minds’ pure while we are waiting for people to figure the food thing out. However, this lady started to butt in with negative comments, like ,”Why don’t you get a job?” When I told her “spiritual practice” was our job. She sarcastically replied, “Oh, now isn’t that convenient?”

World-Famous Buddhas of Bamiyan Resurrected in Afghanistan

Press Trust of India, June 15, 2015 Kabul, Afghanistan -- Fourteen years after the Taliban dynamited the world-famous Buddhas of Bamiyan, the giant statues were resurrected with 3D light projection technology in the empty cavities where they once stood in Afghanistan. The projected image of a Buddha statue in Bamiyan that had been destroyed by the Taliban in 2001. (AFP Photo) The project was undertaken by a Chinese couple who used 3D laser light projection technology to fill the empty cavities in the cliff in the Bamiyan Valley in Hazarajat with Buddha's virtual images, 230 km northwest of Kabul. The couple - Janson Yu and Liyan Hu - were saddened by the destruction of the two statues which were carved during the 6th century and decided to undertake the project.

The benefit of volunteering in service of the Dhamma.

"When you sit a course you deal only with yourself, but when you serve you learn how to deal with others and how to live properly in the outside world. You may have practised Vipassana diligently and maintained equanimity towards all sensations, but you are not supposed to live in a glass house. You have to apply Dhamma in the world outside, and that is not easy. In a centre you are in a protected, healthy, wholesome atmosphere and that gives you the strength to apply Vipassana to face the vicissitudes of life.

"I know from my own experience and also from that of others who have started giving Dhamma service, that meditation improves after serving. The meditation is deeper, the equanimity is stronger, and there is more metta. This is because the paramis have increased by giving Dhamma service. In every way Dhamma service gives wonderful results." ~ S N Goenka

Is Meditation The Best Medicine? – Analysis

By Murray Hunter  January 1, 2014

Millions of people in ‘the developed world’ visit therapists for all sorts of emotional and psychological problems they find difficulty in coping with by themselves. People who visit psychiatrists are usually very quickly diagnosed with some form of psychosis and treated with a mixture of cognitive therapies and antipsychotic medications. Various health insurance schemes around the world have greatly encouraged this growing practice.

One major question that should be asked is whether the enormous growth in psychology based therapies are just a case of supply to meet a demand, and more importantly, should anxiety and alienation always be treated with psychiatric intervention, without looking at alternatives where individuals take on more self-responsibility for coping with their own emotions.

Meanwhile over the new year break, hundreds of thousands of mainly women took time to attend prayer and meditation retreats in Buddhist temples across 
Thailand. In a prayer hall one could hear the anticipatory silence while waiting for the monk to take his place in front of the congregation. This air of serenity would occasionally be interrupted by the ring of a mobile phone which would prompt a lady to dash out of the hall and answer a call.

New Year Message by Bhikkhu Sanghasena

Kek Lok Si temple, Penang, Malaysia

The Kek Lok Si Temple (simplified Chinese: 极乐寺; traditional Chinese: 極樂寺; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Ki̍k-lo̍k-sī; Penang Hokkien for "Temple of Supreme Bliss" or "Temple of Sukhavati" or "Jile Si") is a Buddhist temple situated in Air Itam in Penang facing the sea and commanding an impressive view, and is one of the best known temples on the island. It is said to be the largest Buddhist temple in Malaysia.This entire complex of temples was built over a period from 1890 to 1930, an inspirational initiative of Beow Lean, the Abbot. The main draw in the complex is the striking seven-storey Pagoda of Rama VI (Pagoda of Ten Thousand Buddhas) with 10,000 alabaster and bronze statues of Buddha, and the 30.2 metres (99 ft) tall bronze statue of Kuan Yin.

In 1930, the seven storey main pagoda of the temple or the Pagoda of "Ban Po Thar", the Ten Thousand Buddhas, a 30 metres (98 ft) high structure, was completed. This pagoda combines a Chinese octagonal base with a middle tier of Thai design, and a Burmese crown (spiral dome); reflecting the temple's amalgam of both Mahayana and Theravada Buddhism.It represents syncretism of the ethnic and religious diversity in the country. There is a large statue of Buddha donated by King Bhumibol of Thailand diefied here. King Rama VI of Thailand laid the foundation for the pagoda and it is hence also named as Rama Pagoda.

Tim Parks on meditation’s pros and cons: ‘This is more than medicine’

Mindfulness, it was reported this week, can have harmful side effects. But for novelist Tim Parks, meditation offered an escape from pain – after an initial struggle. Here is his advice to beginners, and an account of his first ‘buzz’

 Tim Parks The Guardian, Saturday 30 August 2014

I came to the practice of breathing relaxation out of desperation. It was 2008. A book had suggested that the constant abdominal pain and urinary problems I had been experiencing were due to chronically tense muscles in the pelvic floor. I needed to learn deep relaxation. The book gave instructions for achieving this, but warned me it was hard to do alone. At the time I didn’t connect the practice with mindfulness or meditation, about which I was extremely sceptical. I was hardly confident about this approach either. On the other hand, my problems had been going on for years and official medicine had got me exactly nowhere. Anything was worth a whirl.

We all live together

Mindfulness therapy comes at a high price for some, say experts

Much-hyped therapy can reduce relapses into depression – but it can have troubling side effects. MBCT courses are proliferating across the UK – but research in the US found some who practised were assailed by traumatic memories and impairment in social relationships

By Robert Booth The Guardian, Monday 25 August 2014

In a first floor room above a gridlocked London street, 20 strangers shuffle on to mats and cushions. There's an advertising executive, a personnel manager, a student and a pensioner. A gong sounds softly and a session of sitting meditation begins. This is one of more than 1,000 mindfulness courses proliferating across the UK as more and more people struggling with anxiety, depression and stress turn towards a practice adapted from a 2,400-year-old Buddhist tradition.

Enthusiasm is booming for such mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) courses, which an Oxford University study has found can reduce relapses into depression by 44%. It is, say the researchers, as effective as taking antidepressants. It involves sitting still, focusing on your breath, noticing when your attention drifts and bringing it back to your breath – and it is surprisingly challenging.

Why the Future of Religion Is Bleak

Religious institutions have survived by controlling what their adherents 
know, argues Tufts Prof. Daniel C. Dennett, but today that is next to 
impossible
By DANIEL C. DENNETT April 26, 2015
Religion has been waning in influence for several centuries, 
especially in Europe and North America. There have been a few 
brief and local revivals, but in recent years the pace of decline has 
accelerated.

TODAY ONE OF THE LARGEST CATEGORIES OF RELIGIOUS AFFILIATION  IN THE WORLD—WITH MORE THAN A BILLION PEOPLE—IS NO RELIGION AT ALL, THE “NONES.” ONE OUT OF SIX AMERICANS IS ALREADY A NONE; BY 2050, THE FIGURE WILL BE ONE OUT OF FOUR, ACCORDING TO A NEW PEW RESEARCH CENTER STUDY. CHURCHES ARE BEING CLOSED BY THE HUNDREDS, DECONSECRATED AND REHABILITATED AS HOUSING, OFFICES, RESTAURANTS AND THE LIKE, OR JUST ABANDONED.

If this trend continues, religion largely will evaporate, at least in the 
West. Pockets of intense religious activity may continue, made up of 
people who will be more sharply differentiated from most of society 
in attitudes and customs, a likely source of growing tension and 
conflict.

Could anything turn this decline around? Yes, unfortunately. A global 
plague, a world war fought over water or oil, the collapse of the 
Internet (and thereby almost all electronic communication) or some 
as-yet unimagined catastrophe could throw the remaining population 
into misery and fear, the soil in which religion flourishes best.

That life as you understand.....

"That life as you understand, it really is uncertain that where you are putting your certainty may well one day let you down..

"So we start with seeing yes the body is uncertain, it’s not sure. We see that people get old and sick and although we know it’s going to happen to all of us, but we don’t know when.

Dhammapada 42

Beyond true and false

Western philosophers have not, on the whole, regarded Buddhist thought with much enthusiasm. As a colleague once said to me: ‘It’s all just mysticism.’ This attitude is due, in part, to ignorance. But it is also due to incomprehension. When Western philosophers look East, they find things they do not understand – not least the fact that the Asian traditions seem to accept, and even endorse, contradictions. Thus we find the great second-century Buddhist philosopher Nagarjuna saying:

The nature of things is to have no nature; it is their non-nature that is their nature. For they have only one nature: no-nature.One can hear similar sentiments, expressed with comparable ferocity, in many faculty common rooms today. Yet Western philosophers are slowly learning to outgrow their parochialism. And help is coming from a most unexpected direction: modern mathematical logic, not a field that is renowned for its tolerance of obscurity. An abhorrence of contradiction has been high orthodoxy in the West for more than 2,000 years. Statements such as Nagarjuna’s are therefore wont to produce looks of blank incomprehension, or worse. As Avicenna, the father of Medieval Aristotelianism, declared:

Malay language vs Sanskrit

Is it sinful to be rich. by Ven. Dr Khammai Dhammasami

Published on Apr 19, 2012

Ven. Ajarn Dr Khammai Dhammasami, the abbot of the Oxford Buddha Vihara, the Buddhist philosopher preaching at the Thai Stock Exchange in Bangkok.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZInm_kdzJs

Losar - the biggest Tibetan Buddhist Festival - begins in Ladakh

by Shravan Nune, Jagrandosh, 14 Dec, 2015

Ladakh, India -- Losar, the biggest Tibetan Buddhist Festival began on 12 December 2015 in Ladakh region of Jammu and Kashmir. The festival marks the beginning of New Year for Buddhists.

The annual festival is celebrated by people of the area with traditional and religion fervor. The festival begins with illumination of religious and residential places.

Buddhists of Ladakh celebrate Losar as their new year.

 Before the rule of Jamiang Namgyal (1555 to 1610) this day was celebrated on the first day of Ladakhi Buddhist Year which is based in the moon and sun (quite similar to Hindus).

However, the day was advanced by two days after Jamiang Namgyal decided to invade Skardu before the New Year.

Since then, Losar is celebrated on the last two days of the 10th Bodhi month that coincides with December of Christian calendar.

During this, people of Ladakh specially remember ancestors of their family. On this day, people visit graveyards of their family members and pray for peace of the departed soul. Apart from this, people also visit each other houses for exchange of Losar greetings.

Respect in Buddhist Thought & Practice ~ Ajahn Thanissaro

If you’re born into an Asian Buddhist family, the first thing your parents will teach you about Buddhism is not a philosophical tenet but a gesture of respect: how to place your hands in añjali, palm‐to‐palm over your heart, when you encounter a Buddha image, a monk, or a nun.

Obviously, the gesture will be mechanical at first. Over time, though, you’ll learn the respectful attitude that goes with it. If you’re quick to pick it up, your parents will consider it a sign of intelligence, for respect is basic to any ability to learn.

As you get older, they may teach you the symbolism of the gesture: that your hands form a lotus bud, representing your heart, which you are holding out to be trained in how to become wise. Ultimately, as you grow more familiar with the fruits of Buddhist practice, your parents hope that your respect will turn into reverence and veneration.

Early Buddhist Paths that Lead to Liberation

by Josh Korda, The Huffington Post, Oct 20, 2015

San Francisco, CA (USA) -- In the Buddhist practice awakening, or sambodhi (in pali), is the achievement of inner peace that sustains itself regardless of conditions beyond our control. In verse 154 of the great dhammapada, when the Buddha announces his awakening, he refers to lasting happiness as 'the unconditioned.'

Transcendence is a a state of witnessing as experiences unfold in a state of constant flux and upheaval without taking the universal events of life personally; we are all subject to the ravages of aging and sickness, the grief of separation from loved ones, financial instability, frustrations, loss.

Additionally, our peace of mind is sabotaged by our default settings: remaining constantly vigilant for threats even while we are perfectly safe, dwelling obsessively on negative experiences while overlooking the positive,, our predilection for addictive, short-term sensual pleasures (consumerism, escapist entertainment, meaningless hook ups and on). Alas, no matter how much we accumulate, we feel that underlying awareness that the sugary sweetness of sensory pleasures will end and we'll once again realize how exposed we are to inevitable losses and separation.

Advice for someone who is dying

BY AJAHN CHAH JANUARY 1, 1994

Ajahn Chah’s simple, profound advice to an aging student approaching her 
death.

Today I have brought nothing material of any substance to offer you, only
Dhamma, the teachings of the Buddha. Listen well. You should understand 
that even the Buddha himself, with his great store of accumulated virtue, 
could not avoid physical death. When he reached old age, he relinquished his 
body and let go of its heavy burden. Now you too must learn to be satisfied 
with the many years you’ve already depended on your body. You should feel 
that it’s enough.

You can compare it to household utensils that you’ve had for a long time—
your cups, saucers, plates and so on. When you first had them they were 
clean and shining, but now after using them for so long, they’re starting to 
wear out. Some are already broken, some have disappeared, and those 
that are left are deteriorating: they have no stable form, and it’s their nature 
to be like that. Your body is the same way. It has been continually changing 
right from the day you were born, through childhood and youth, until now it 
has reached old age. You must accept that. The Buddha said that conditions 
(sankharas), whether they are internal conditions, bodily conditions, or external conditions, are not-self—their nature is to change. Contemplate 
this truth until you see it clearly.

Verses on Aspiration - Uddisanadhitthana gatha

Bhutan's dark secret to happiness

By Eric Weiner, BBC, 8 April 2015 Citizens of one of the happiest countries on Earth are surprisingly comfortable contemplating a topic many prefer to avoid. Is that the key to joy? Thimphu, Bhutan -- On a visit to Thimphu, the capital of Bhutan, I found myself sitting across from a man named Karma Ura, spilling my guts. Maybe it was the fact that he was named Karma, or the thin air, or the way travel melts my defences, but I decided to confess something very personal. Not that long before, seemingly out of the blue, I had experienced some disturbing symptoms: shortness of breath, dizziness, numbness in my hands and feet. At first, I feared I was having a heart attack, or going crazy. Maybe both. So I went to the doctor, who ran a series of tests and found... “Nothing,” said Ura. Even before I could complete my sentence, he knew that my fears were unfounded. I was not dying, at least not as quickly as I feared. I was having a panic attack.

Video featuring Ajahn Brahm on Korean TV

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/k7xBMLeWV6CcRCbikKs?start=966

How Mindfulness Changes the Brain

The Harvard Business Review outlines key research on the neural 

mechanisms underlying meditation. [01/15/15]

There's some research behind all that mindfulness hype. Sara Lazar, an associate researcher in the psychiatry department at Massachusetts General Hospital and an assistant professor in psychology at Harvard Medical School, along with her colleagues, outlines key neural mechanisms underlying meditation.

The whole world belongs to you

Meditation sweeps corporate America, but it's for their health. Not yours

Oliver Burkeman 7 April, The Guardian

Companies from Goldman Sachs to Target are discovering that zen employees are more productive. Get your yoga mats out and take a long, deep breath...

As a fairly regular meditator, I naturally responded with only a slight smile and a deep sense of imperturbable inner peace to the latest crop of articles asserting that mindfulness has conquered the highest levels of American corporate life.

This most recent coverage has been triggered by Mindful Work, a new book by the New York Times reporter David Gelles, which documents – and largely celebrates – the discovery of meditation by hedge fund managers, health insurers, Ford, Target, Goldman Sachs and the Bank of America as a way to reduce stress and boost employee productivity. Arianna Huffington is thrilled by the news; the Wall Street Journal is excited; even the Marine Corps is interested. Now, obviously, I wouldn’t want to suggest that Goldman Sachs, Bank of America or the US military don’t always have humanity’s best interests at heart in everything they do. But we should probably pause – mindfully, of course – to ask if the corporate mindfulness revolution is something to be entirely happy about.

George Takei: Buddhism ‘Made A Lot Of Sense For Me'

By Carol Kuruvilla, The Huffington Post, Jan 24, 2015

San Francisco, CA (USA) -- George Takei is an actor, a social media star, and a gay rights activist. He’s also a longtime Buddhist whose faith has helped him get through the rough patches in his life -- like coming to terms with his sexual orientation and making sense of his Japanese family’s internment during World War II.

Takei, best known for his role as Hikaru Sulu on “Star Trek,” remembers studying Buddhism at a local temple under his Sunday School teachers Roy and Terry Nakawatase. He shared his life story on the Buddhist blog Lion’s Roar.

"I remember Roy using the metaphor of the vastness of the ocean: we are all part of it, we belong to this vast oneness, and that made a lot of sense for me—that I am really one with everybody, with the whole, and that we can play a part in making that whole healthier and more understanding."

With Guggenheim, Strong to study Western views of Buddhist relics

By Doug Hubley, Bates Univ, June 11, 2015 Lewiston, Maine (USA) -- With the Shroud of Turin perhaps the most widely known example, religious relics are a familiar aspect of Christian worship. But relics play important roles in many faiths, and understanding those roles can afford insight into how a faith is regarded by both adherents and observers. John Strong, Charles A. Dana Professor of Religious Studies at Bates and 2015 recipient of a prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/Bates College) Buddhism is such a religion. And a Bates professor of religious studies has received a prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship to support research into ways in which Westerners, Buddhist and otherwise, have responded to relics — objects venerated as physical remains of the Buddha and of enlightened Buddhist teachers. John Strong, Charles A. Dana Professor of Religious Studies and chair of the Asian studies program at Bates, is one of the 175 scholars, artists, and scientists to receive John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowships in 2015. (Two joint fellowships were awarded, making the total number of grants 173.) There were more than 3,100 Guggenheim applicants. “Guggenheim Fellowships are reserved for scholars with exceptional creative ability,” says Matt Auer, vice president for academic affairs and dean of the faculty at Bates. “John Strong checks that box with a bold penstroke.” Strong, Auer says, “has long been an intellectual leader in the field of Buddhist studies, and the project that he’ll undertake is a logical sequel to his pathbreaking 2004 book, Relics of the Buddha, which considers Buddhist attitudes towards Buddhism’s own relics. The timing for the new project is perfect considering a surge of Western interest in Asian religions generally, and Buddhism specifically.”

METTA is the Buddhist word for universal benevolence

M-Magnanimous
E-Empathetic
T-Thoughtful
T-Tender
A-Altruistic

May suffering ones be suffering free, the fear-struck fearless be;
May grieving ones shed all grief, may all beings find peace & relief.

Push to make Buddhism state religion

by Nanchanok Wongsamuth, The Bangkok Post, Oct 25, 2015

Several Buddhist groups are again hoping the constitution drafters will include Buddhism as the official state religion.

Bangkok, Thailand -- Supporters have declared that this time proposals to the drafters would be made peacefully, after a previous attempt failed during the coup-installed Gen Surayud Chulanont government in 2007.

At that time the Constitution Drafting Assembly rejected a proposal to make Buddhism the state religion in the draft charter, drawing an angry response from monks and laymen who demonstrated outside parliament.

“No government has ever taken an interest in Buddhism, resulting in a decline in the religion,” said Korn Meedee, the secretary of a committee to promote Buddhism as the state religion.

Myanmar Buddhist radicalism fuels Thai push for state religion

The Bangkok Post, 4 Nov 2015

Bangkok, Thailand -- A campaign to enshrine Buddhism as Thailand's state religion has been galvanised by a radical Buddhist movement in neighbouring Myanmar that is accused of stoking religious tension, the leader of the Thai bid said.

A monk prays at a Nov 1 ceremony to move Lord Buddha’s relics from Mahiyangana Raja Maha Viharaya in Sri Lanka to Buddha Monthon monastery in Nakhon Pathom. A campaign to enshrine Buddhism as Thailand's state religion has been galvanised by a radical Buddhist movement in neighbouring Myanmar that is accused of stoking religious tension. (Photo by Pattarapong Chatpattarasill)

Experts say the campaign could appeal to Thailand's military junta, which is struggling for popularity 18 months after staging a coup, and tap into growing anti-Muslim sentiment in a country that prides itself on religious tolerance.
While Buddhists form an overwhelming majority in both countries, Thailand has avoided the nationwide religious violence that has killed hundreds of people in Myanmar, most of them Muslims.


Now, Thai campaigners want Buddhism to be made the country's official religion in a new constitution.

They draw inspiration from Ma Ba Tha, a powerful monk-led group that pushed Myanmar's government to pass a raft of pro-Buddhist legislation.

UW-Madison helps students learn through well-being exercises

Mindfulness in an elementary classroom, brought 

to you by the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds

and...hip-hop?

https://www.facebook.com/UWMadison/videos/10153555518128114/?fref=nf

You are your only salvation