“Windows To Spirituality”
Animal Sacrifice Animal sacrificeis the ritual killing and offering of an animal usually as part of a religious ritual or to appease or maintain favour with a deity. Animal sacrifices were common throughout Europe and the Ancient Near East until the spread of Christianity in Late Antiquity, and continue in some cultures or religions today. Human sacrifice, where it existed, was always much more...
Animals In Buddhism The position and treatment of animals in Buddhism is important for the light it sheds on Buddhists’ perception of their own relation to the natural world, on Buddhist humanitarian concerns in general, and on the relationship between Buddhist theory and Buddhist practice. Etymology In the Pali language, the translation is Tira-acchanā. Tira means against and Acchanā means a being...
Buddhism And Sexuality Although only a limited number of scholarly studies have appeared to date on the topic of Buddhism and sexuality, most concur, explicitly or implicitly, that teachings such as the ‘Sermon on Burning’ (Ādittapariyāya-sutta) from the Saṃyutta-nikāya (35.28) in which the Buddha warns his monks that sense perception...
Lankavatara Sutra The Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra (लंकावतारसूत्र, ལང་ཀར་བཤེགས་པའི་མདོ་) is a prominent Mahayana Buddhist sūtra. This sūtra recounts a teaching primarily between Gautama Buddha and a bodhisattva named Mahāmati, “Great Wisdom”. The sūtra is set in Laṅkā, the island fortress capital of Rāvaṇa, the king of the rākṣasa demons. The title of this text roughly translates as “Scripture of the...
Japanese Zen Japanese Zen refers to the Japanese forms of Zen Buddhism, an originally Chinese Mahāyāna school of Buddhism that strongly emphasizes dhyāna, the meditative training of awareness and equanimity. This practice, according to Zen proponents, gives insight into one’s true nature, or the emptiness of inherent existence, which opens the way to a liberated way of living. History...
Pratityasamutpada Pratityasamutpada or pratītyasamutpāda (प्रतीत्यसमुत्पाद, pratītyasamutpāda; पटिच्चसमुप्पाद, paṭiccasamuppāda), commonly translated as dependent origination, or dependent arising, is a key doctrine of Buddhist philosophy, which states that all dharmas (“phenomena”) arise in dependence upon other dharmas: “if this exists, that exists; if this ceases to exist, that also ceases to exist”. The principle is expressed in the...
Sunyata Sunyata or Śūnyatā (शून्यता, śūnyatā; suññatā) – pronounced in English as (shoon-ya-ta), translated most often as emptiness and sometimes voidness – is a Buddhist concept which has multiple meanings depending on its doctrinal context. It is either an ontological feature of reality, a meditative state, or a phenomenological analysis of experience. In Theravada Buddhism, suññatā often refers to...
Madhyamaka Madhyamaka (“Middle way” or “Centrism”; मध्यमक, 中觀見; Zhōngguān Jìan, dbu ma pa) also known as Śūnyavāda (the emptiness doctrine) and Niḥsvabhāvavāda (the no svabhāva doctrine) refers to a tradition of Buddhist philosophy and practice founded by the Indian philosopher Nāgārjuna (c. 150-250 CE). The foundational text of the Mādhyamaka tradition is Nāgārjuna’s Mūlamadhyamakakārikā (Root Verses on the Middle Way). More...
Suffering Suffering, or pain in a broad sense, may be an experience of unpleasantness and aversion associated with the perception of harm or threat of harm in an individual. Suffering is the basic element that makes up the negative valence of affective phenomena. The opposite of suffering is pleasure or happiness. Suffering is often...
Emptiness Emptiness as a human condition is a sense of generalized boredom, social alienation and apathy. Feelings of emptiness often accompany dysthymia, depression, loneliness, anhedonia, despair, or other mental/emotional disorders, including schizoid personality disorder, post trauma, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, schizotypal personality disorder and borderline personality disorder. A sense of emptiness is also part of a natural process of...
Buddhist Monasticism Buddhist monasticism is one of the earliest surviving forms of organized monasticism and one of the fundamental institutions of Buddhism. Monks and nuns, called bhikkhu (Skt. bhikshu) and bhikkhuni (Skt. bhikshuni), are responsible for the preservation and dissemination of the Buddha‘s teaching and the guidance of Buddhist lay people. Three surviving traditions...
Diwali Diwali, Divali, Deepavali is the Hindu festival of lights, usually lasting five days and celebrated during the Hindu Lunisolar month Kartika (between mid-October and mid-November). One of the most popular festivals of Hinduism, Diwali symbolizes the spiritual “victory of light over darkness, good over evil, and knowledge over ignorance”. The festival...
Namaste Namaste (नमस्ते), sometimes spoken as namaskar and namaskaram, is a customary, non-contact form of Hindu greeting. In the contemporary era, it is found on the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and among the Indian diaspora worldwide. The gesture (but not the term namaste for it) is widely used in the parts of...
Kensho Kensho or Kenshō (見性) is a Japanese term from the Zen tradition. Ken means “seeing”, shō means “nature, essence“. It is usually translated as “seeing one’s (true) nature”, that is, the Buddha-nature or nature of mind. Kenshō is an initial insight or awakening, not full Buddhahood. It is to be followed by further training to deepen this insight, and learn...
Samadhi Samadhi or Samādhi (समाधी, also called samāpatti), in Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism, Sikhism and yogic schools, is a state of meditative consciousness. In the yogic traditions, and the Buddhist commentarial tradition on which the Burmese Vipassana movement and the Thai Forest tradition rely, it is a meditative absorption or trance, attained by the practice...
Skandha Skandhas or khandhas means “heaps, aggregates, collections, groupings”. In Buddhism, it refers to the five aggregates of clinging (Pañcupādānakkhandhā), the five material and mental factors that take part in the rise of craving and clinging. They are also explained as the five factors that constitute and explain a sentient being’s person and personality,...
Middle Way The Middle Way or Middle Path is the term that Gautama Buddha used to describe the character of the Noble Eightfold Path he discovered that leads to liberation. Theravada Buddhism and the Pali canon Dhamacakkappavattana Sutta In the Pāli Canon of Theravada Buddhism, the term “Middle Way” was used in the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta, which the Buddhist tradition regards to be the...
Nikaya Nikaya or Nikāya is a Pāli word meaning “volume”. It is often used like the Sanskrit word āgama to mean “collection”, “assemblage”, “class” or “group” in both Pāḷi and Sanskrit. It is most commonly used in reference to the Pali Buddhist texts of the Tripitaka namely the Sutta Piṭaka, the Vinaya Pitaka and the Abhidhamma Pitaka. It is...
Anatta In Buddhism, the term anattā (Pali) or anātman (Sanskrit) refers to the doctrine of “non-self”, that there is no unchanging, permanent self, soul or essence in phenomena. It is one of the seven beneficial perceptions in Buddhism, and one of the three marks of existence along with dukkha (suffering) and anicca (impermanence). The Buddhist concept of anatta or anatman is one of...
Buddhism And The Body This article covers the relationship between Buddhism and the body. In contrast with many Indian religious traditions, Buddhism does not regard the body and the mind or spirit as being two entirely separate entities – there is no sense in Buddhism that the body is a “vessel” that...
