Multiple Buddhisms in Ladakh: Strategic Secularities and Missionaries Fighting Decline

During fieldwork in Ladakh in July–August 2018, three authors from Asian studies, anthropology, and religious studies backgrounds researched “multiple Buddhisms” in Ladakh, India. Two case studies are presented: a Buddhist monastery festival by the Drikung Kagyü Tibetan Buddhist sect, and a Theravada monastic complex, called Mahabodhi International Meditation Center (MIMC). Through the transnational contexts of both of these case studies, we argue that Buddhist leaders adapt their teachings to appeal to specific audiences with the underlying goal of preserving the tradition. The Buddhist monastery festival engages with both the scientific and the magical or mystical elements of Buddhism for two very different European audiences. At MIMC, a secular spirituality mixes with Buddhism for international tourists on a meditation retreat. Finally, at MIMC, Thai Buddhist monks learn how to fight the decline of Buddhism through missionizing Theravada Buddhism in this land dominated by Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhism. Paying attention to this multiplicity—to “multiple Buddhisms”—we argue, makes space for the complicated, ambiguous, and at times contradictory manner in which Buddhism is positioned in regards to secularism and secularity.

Compassion in Buddhist psychology

This chapter examines compassion in three leading traditions of Buddhism. In early and Theravada Buddhism, compassion is a power for deep mental purification, protection and healing that supports inner freedom. In Mahayana Buddhism, compassion becomes the primary means to empower and communicate a non-conceptual wisdom in which self and others are sensed as undivided. In Vajrayana Buddhism, unconditional compassion radiates forth all-inclusively as a spontaneous expression of the mind’s deepest unconditioned nature. Within this discussion, John will give examples of techniques from these traditions for cultivating compassion.

THE MAIN CHARACTERISTICS OF VAJRAYANA BUDDHISM IN CHINA DURING THE TANG DYNASTY

В центре исследовательского внимания буддизм ваджраяны в период правления династии Тан (618–907). Будучи не самым популярным направлением буддизма в Китае, именно в танскую эпоху эзотерический буддизм в Китае занял особые позиции и обладал рядом особенностей, не характерных для последующих династийных периодов в истории Китая. В статье рассмотрены и обозначены основные характеристики буддизма ваджраяны в Китае в период Тан. В частности, рас-смотрены аспекты организационного оформления школы ваджраяны Мицзун, переводческая и организационная деятельность основных патриархов школы, появление монастырских центров Мицзун, покровительство императоров школе Мицзун и ее деятелям.

Автопортрет и Будда Ваджрасаттва у Дзанабазара

Introduction. Jebtsundamba Khutuktu Öndör Gegeen Zanabazar was Mongolia’s first ruler to hold both secular and spiritual power. In the late 17th century, the country witnessed dramatic internecine wars, and his overriding goal was to unify the nation and increase the educational level. Virtually all his self-portraits discovered depict Zanabazar as a real priest with iconographic markers of Buddha Vajrasattva. The selected Buddhist symbol is supposed to deliver a deepest nonverbal sermon and mysterious testament of the prominent Buddhist master. Goals. The paper seeks to further reveal, examine, and describe objects of artistic heritage authored by Öndör Gegeen Zanabazar and currently stored in state, public, administrative, and private collections of Mongolia and Russia. Results. The work is a first attempt to examine Zanabazar’s self-portraits — both sculptural and graphic ones (including tiny elements of different thangkas) — in their structural unity in the context of his meditative practices. The descriptions of the pictures compiled with due regard of Buddha Vajrasattva-related tantric texts and facts of Öndör Gegeen’s biography may be viewed as sources for historical and art studies in Vajrayana Buddhism. The analysis of textual and graphic materials attempts to interpret Zanabazar’s unique position as both a spiritual and Buddhist arts master.

Prefiguring 1921

The literature that formed the basis of Mongolia’s revolutionary writing was based upon the traditional shamanic nomadic herding culture of the steppe and upon the vajrayāna Buddhism that the population had practiced since the late sixteenth century. The themes that occupied these pre-revolutionary writers – social relationships, love, religious observance, the impact of the weather on livestock – were later adapted to fit with socialist ideology. In this way, the prayers and humor, the observations of how Mongolian society was changing, and the lyrics inspired by traditional Indo-Tibetan literature reveal both the thematic and stylistic contexts that would influence writers’ responses to the new society and the expectations of their readers.

Deity Citadels: Sacred Sites of Bio-Cultural Resistance and Resilience in Bhutan

Consistent with the pan-Himalayan tendency to see the landscape as lively and animated, protector deities and local spirits are perceived to inhabit various features of the landscape in Bhutan, causing these places to be treated with reverence and respect. Local spiritual beliefs are prized as central to the cultural identity of the Kingdom, making their way into government planning documents, town planning negotiations, and the 2008 Constitution. This elevation of local spiritual belief has been central to the maintenance and preservation of Bhutanese culture in its encounter with globally hegemonic social, economic, and political norms. Spirits and deities are believed to be the original owners of the land predating the introduction of Buddhism from Tibet. According to terma texts—spiritual treasures hidden by great Buddhist teachers to be discovered later—the initial introduction of Buddhism into Bhutan occurred in the seventh century. At that time, the Tibetan king Songtsen Gampo, the 32nd king of the Yarlung dynasty, built two temples in western and central parts of Bhutan as part of a strategy to pin down a demoness who was ravaging the Himalaya. About a century after the construction of the temples, Padmasambhava, known throughout the Himalayas as Guru Rimpoche, or “Precious Teacher,” arrived in Bhutan, subjugated eight classes of local spirits and made them sworn protectors of the Dharma. In this way, local deities and spirits became incorporated into Bhutan’s Vajrayana Buddhism to the extent that images of them are found at Buddhist temples and monasteries. Vajrayana Buddhism and local deities and spirits twine together in Bhutan to shape a cosmology that recognizes a spectrum of sentient beings, only some of whom are visible. The presence of deities and spirits informs local land use. Deity abodes or “citadels” (Dz.: pho brang) are restricted from human use. The presence of a deity citadel is sufficient in some locales to cause the diversion or reconsideration of human construction and resource use. By grounding spiritual beliefs in specific sites of the landscape, the citadels of deities sanctify the landscape, becoming nodes of resistance and resilience that support the Bhutanese in inhabiting their own internally-consistent cosmology, even as the pressures of global integration seek to impose hegemonic Western norms.

Mengapa Seniman Memahatkan Figur Raksasa Menari Pada Batur Biaro Bahal I ? (Sebuah Tinjauan Semiotika Piercian)

In the Piercian Semiotics, a reliefs can be seen as a system of signification that consist of, an object (called sign in Saussurean Semiotics), representamen (reference of an object), and interpretan (a new object (sign) as a result of the relation between an object and its representamen based on iconical, indexical or symbolical ground). By means of that, in order to understood why Sumateran arthist were sculpted the rakshashas figure in a dancing gesture on the base-feet of Biaro Bahal I, is by connected that reliefs with the iconical, indexical or symbolical ground that exist in their people. For example, a relation with the Vajrayana Buddhism doctrine.