Investigation of the Live Word, by Taego Pou

Posted on 1 August 2015 by Buddhism Now

Son (Zen) Master Taego Pou (1301-1382)

Translated from the Korean by Stephen and  Martine Batchelor

HUA-T’OU: (Lit. ‘head of speech’). Has a twofold meaning: (i) the essence of the kung-an, a shortened version of the story or situation; (ii)the source of thought; that which exists before one thought has arisen (thoughts being the mind’s external manifestations — the ‘tail of speech’).

A monk asked Chao Chou [Jap. Joshu], ‘Does a dog also have the Buddha nature, or not?’ Chao Chou replied, ‘Mu (No).’ This Mu is not the Mu of yes or no; it is not the Mu of true nonexistence. Ultimately what is it? To reach that place from where Chao Chou said Mu one must straightaway lay down the entire body.

Do not do anything (good or bad) and do not even do this not-doing; then straightaway one reaches that place where there is no concern for external affairs, that vast and peaceful place where there are absolutely no obstructing thoughts.

There, all thoughts of the past are, extinguished, all thoughts of the future do not arise, and all present thoughts are void.

Works on Buddhist Circuit begins formally

eKantipur.com, July 19, 2015 KATHMANDU, Nepal -- The government has formally started work to develop the Greater Lumbini Buddhist Circuit to promote Buddhist tourism. The plan aims at fostering tourism growth and offering better facilities to pilgrims to help boost tourist traffic and length of stay. According to the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation, the planned 160-km Buddhist Circuit will incorporate 10 major Buddhist sites, including Kapilvastu, Devdaha and Ramgram. Lumbini is seen as a potential world-class tourist destination for 500 million Buddhists in Asia. It hosts the birthplace of the Buddha and over 100 related archaeological sites scattered within a 50km radius.

Australia’s second-largest religion is being ‘ignored’

July 6, 2015, Jackson Stiles

Australia's half-a-milion Buddhists are largely ignored, its adherents have claimed. This faith is larger than Islam, Judaism and Hinduism, yet receives far less attention from governments and the media,

Federation of Australian Buddhist Councils president Kim Hollow refuted Agricultural Minister Barnaby Joyce’s claim that south-east Asians would view the legalisation of gay marriage as ‘decadent’.

On most other social issues, Buddhists are ignored, he told The New Daily.

“Population-wise, we are bigger than the Islamic community, but the Islamic community is always talked about,” he said.

“Nobody ever talks to Buddhists about anything much, but we do have a point of view.”

Buddhism is the nation’s second-largest religion, and formerly its fastest growing. (It has been superseded in that regard by its parent, Hinduism.

Its founder, the Buddha, was a Hindu prince thought to have lived some 2400 years ago in Nepal or India)

At the last census in 2011, there were 528,977 Buddhists, outnumbering Muslims (476,291), Hindus (275,534) and Jews (97,300).

Buddhism in Thailand: deeply engrained spirituality

Buenos Aires Herald, Aug 2, 2015 Bangkok, Thailand -- Thailand is over 95 percent Buddhist while its diverse population is nowhere near 95 percent pure Thai ethnically (around 40 percent are descended from other South-East Asian nations while the Chinese component is 14 percent) — in that sense at least Buddhism can claim to be the defining feature over any cultural trait. In historic terms church can also be considered older than state - whereas Buddhism was firmly established in Thailand over a millennium ago, there was no statehood until the Sukhothai kingdom founded in 1238 (even if the cultivation of rice had already been mastered 6,000 years ago with human population many millennia beforehand).

Mystery over the decomposed Buddhist monk body in Vietnam

VietNamNet Bridge, July 27, 2015 Quang Ngai, Vietnam -- Vietnamese scientists were surprised to discover that the body of Venerable Thich Minh Duc was not decomposed after 26 years of burial. Mystery over the decomposed Buddhist monk body in Vietnam, venerable thich minh duc, mummy The body of Venerable Thich Minh Duc did not need any form of preservation. He was naturally buried but after nearly 30 years, the body remained unharmed.

The Buddhist and the Neuroscientist

By Kathy Gilsinan, The Atlantic, July 5, 2015 Dharamsala, India -- In 1992, the neuroscientist Richard Davidson got a challenge from the Dalai Lama. By that point, he’d spent his career asking why people respond to, in his words, “life’s slings and arrows” in different ways. Why are some people more resilient than others in the face of tragedy? And is resilience something you can gain through practice? The Dalai Lama had a different question for Davidson when he visited the Tibetan Buddhist spiritual leader at his residence in Dharamsala, India. “He said: ‘You’ve been using the tools of modern neuroscience to study depression, and anxiety, and fear. Why can’t you use those same tools to study kindness and compassion?’ … I did not have a very good answer. I said it was hard.”

Who belong to this land?