Equalizing and Exchanging Self with Others We’ve been discussing the Seven Point Mind Training by the Kadam Geshe Chekawa who lived in the twelfth century. So far, we’ve covered the first two points: the preliminaries and the actual training in deepest bodhichitta. Now, we’re...

Examples illustrating the seven ways of knowing, and how to identify and apply them in our daily lives.

Many people, especially idealistic newcomers to Buddhism, would like to believe that Buddhism has been immune to the phenomenon of conversion.

First Contacts with Buddhism After the fall of the Han Dynasty in 220 CE, Buddhism became strong in northern China, which was fragmented and ruled by a succession of non-Han Chinese people and states. The greatest patron of Buddhism among them was the Toba Northern Wei Dynasty...

The Initial Choice of Buddhism The Uighurs used the same criterion for adapting foreign religions as did the Eastern Turks. They first chose Buddhism as their state religion when the Chinese Sui forces had helped them conquer Turfan in 605. They were apparently as impressed as...

The Dalai Lama believes it is wrong to characterize a whole religion as bad because of the actions of a few mischievous people. This is true regarding Islam, Judaism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Buddhism alike.

Relinquishing Nonrevealing Forms of Vowed Restraints Vasubandhu explains how the nonrevealing form of a vowed restraint is relinquished in A Treasure House of Special Topics of Knowledge, Put in Verses (Chos mngon-pa’i mdzod-kyi tshig-le’ur byas-pa, Skt. Abhidharmakośa-kārikā)...

Review of the Three Principal Pathways  Tsongkhapa emphasized that there are three principal paths, meaning three principal pathways of the mind, or ways of thinking, ways of understanding that are the essence of the graded path. These are renunciation or the...

The Sufferings of the Higher Planes of Existence An actual spiritual person, or Dharma practitioner, is someone who is working to be able to benefit future lifetimes and beyond. Such a person then, on an initial level, would follow the ethics of restraining themselves from the...

Verses 9 through 12 Working for Liberation (9) A bodhisattva’s practice is to take keen interest in the supreme never-changing state of liberation, as the pleasures of the three planes of compulsive existence are phenomena that perish in a mere instant, like dew on the tips of...