Sadao Intranet

This book explores an important concept within the Buddhist Mahayana tradition, bodhicitta. This term appears frequently in Sanskrit literature relating to the spiritual practices of the bodhisattva in Mahayana Buddhism and has been variously translated as "thought of enlightenment" or "desire of enlightenment". Francis Brassard offers a contextual analysis of bodhicitta based on the presuppositions underlying the spiritual practice of the bodhisattva. Since the understanding that emerges involves how one ought to view the process of spiritual transformation, this work contributes to Buddhist psychology and soteriology in particular, and to comparative religions in general. The book surveys the various interpretations of the concept of bodhicitta, analyzes its possible functions in the context of the spiritual path of the aspirant to enlightenment, and discusses an understanding of bodhicitta in the context of the Santideva's Bodhicaryavatara.

This book demonstrates how popular ritual texts and story narratives have shaped the religious life and culture of the only surviving South Asian Mahayana Buddhist society, the Newars of Kathmandu. It begins with an account of the Newar Buddhist community's history and its place within the religious environment of Nepal and proceeds to build around five popular translations, several of which were known across Asia: the Srngabheri Avadana, the Simhalasarthabahu Avadana, the Tara, the Mahakala Vratas, and the Pancaraksa.

Dudjom Rinpoche was one of the seminal figures in Tibetan Buddhism in the twentieth century, yet very few of his religious writings have been translated into English. This volume contains a generous selection of his inspiring teachings and writings, the core of which is a lengthy discussion of the entire path of Dzogchen, including key instructions on view, meditation, and conduct, along with direct advice on how to bring one's experiences onto the path.

This text, the Bequeathed Teaching Sutra (Fo chui ban nie pan liao shuo jiao jiejing, or Yijiaojing for short), was translated into Chinese around 400 C.E. and became an influential text often cited and commented on among Chinese Buddhists in the Tang, Song, and Ming dynasties. In Chan (Zen) communities in particular, it was considered a basic reference, taught and studied through the ages.

Valuable companion work to the Abhidharmakosa, re-translated from the French work of the master scholar Lamotte, and dealing with a variety of philosophical problems connected with the law of karma.

Originating in India, Mahayana Buddhism spread across Asia, becoming the prevalent form of Buddhism in Tibet and East Asia. Over the last twenty-five years Western interest in Mahayana has increased considerably, reflected both in the quantity of scholarly material produced and in the attraction of Westerners towards Tibetan Buddhism and Zen.

.One of the most popular Asian classics for roughly two thousand years, the Vimalakirti Sutra stands out among the sacred texts of Mahayana Buddhism for its conciseness, its vivid and humorous episodes, its dramatic narratives, and its eloquent exposition of the key doctrine of emptiness or nondualism. Unlike most sutras, its central figure is not a Buddha but a wealthy townsman, who, in his mastery of doctrine and religious practice, epitomizes the ideal lay believer.

In the early part of this century, the discovery of a walled-up cave in northwest China led to the retrieval of a lost early Ch'an (Zen) literature of the T'ang dynasty (618-907). One of the recovered Zen texts was a seven-piece collection, the Bodhidharma Anthology. Of the numerous texts attributed to Bodhidharma, this anthology is the only one generally believed to contain authentic Bodhidharma material. Jeffrey L. Broughton provides a reliable annotated translation of the Bodhidharma Anthology along with a detailed study of its nature, content, and background.

The Jewel Ornament of Liberation is a masterwork of Tibetan Buddhism. For more than eight centuries, this text has provided a complete foundation for Buddhist study and practice - covering the initial entry into the path and continuing through to the achievement of Buddhahood. It includes teachings on Buddha-nature, finding a spiritual master, impermanence, karma, the cultivation of bodhicitta, the development of the six perfections, the ten Bodhisattva bhumis, Buddhahood, and the activities of a Buddha.

The Indian philosopher Acharya Nagarjuna (c. 150-250 CE) was the founder of the Madhyamaka (Middle Path) school of Mahayana Buddhism and arguably the most influential Buddhist thinker after Buddha himself. Indeed, in the Tibetan and East Asian traditions, Nagarjuna is often referred to as the 'second Buddha.' His primary contribution to Buddhist thought lies is in the further development of the concept of sunyata or 'emptiness.' For Nagarjuna, all phenomena are without any svabhaba, literally 'own-nature' or 'self-nature', and thus without any underlying essence.

Middle Beyond Extremes contains a translation of the Buddhist masterpiece Distinguishing the Middle from Extremes. This famed text, often referred to by its Sanskrit title, Madhyantavibhaga, is part of a collection known as the Five Maitreya Teachings. Maitreya, the Buddha's regent, is held to have entrusted these profound and vast instructions to the master Asanga in the heavenly realm of Tushita.

The main book is divided into two parts. The first part is mainly devoted to a full discussion of the terms Hinayana and Mahayana from various points of view. In the second part the different applications of the terms Hinayana and Mahayana in the two periods of the making of Mahayana Buddhism and of Mahayana teachers are discussed.

In this book an attempt has been made to expound the metaphysics of the Yogacara school of Buddhism in all its aspects and bearings. Chapters are devoted to a critical and constructive discussion of its idealistic core as well as its spiritual discipline. According to Prof. T.R.V. Murti who occupied a conspicuous place in the galaxy of Indian philosophers, the author 'has utilized nearly all the sources available on the subject and has given a faithful and persuasive account of this system of thought'.

The Buddhist saint Nagarjuna, who lived in South India in approximately the second century CE, is undoubtedly the most important, influential, and widely studied Mahayana Buddhist philosopher. His many works include texts addressed to lay audiences, letters of advice to kings, and a set of penetrating metaphysical and epistemological treatises. His greatest philosophical work, the Mulamadhyamikakarika—read and studied by philosophers in all major Buddhist schools of Tibet, China, Japan, and Korea—is one of the most influential works in the history of Indian philosophy.

Aiming to overcome the limitations of our biographical knowledge about one of the most famous Indian philosophers, Joseph Walser's ambitious Nāgārjuna in Context seeks to locate the progenitor of the Madhyamaka school of Buddhist thought (generally taken to have flourished around 150 CE) with historical precision. Nāgārjuna's influential but enigmatic works were composed, Walser argues, “in a Mahāsāṅghika monastery in or near an urban center in the Lower Krishna River Valley in [what is now] modern Andhra Pradesh” (14), probably between 175 and 204 CE (86–87).