This article is excerpted from a workshop offered by Sharon Salzberg at the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies on September 22, 1996. Sharon is writing a book on the subject, to be published by Shambhala. Faith is something very personally meaningful to me. It is something difficult to understand, and it is something that is not often spoken about within the context of a wisdom tradition—especially in the West. The last time I led a program on Faith, I heard people express disquietude, … [Read more...]
Climbing to the Top of the Mountain
You have lived in a forest monastery in Sri Lanka for many years, Bhante. What brings you to America? I originally came to the U.S. to visit my father and sister. But for twenty-five years I have been afflicted with a chronic headache condition, which has resisted every type of treatment I have tried to date. My father suggested I arrange a consultation at The Headache Institute of New York, a clinic in Manhattan. Thus for the past few months I have been taking treatment at this clinic. Is … [Read more...]
Lights Upon the Path: Great Faith, Great Courage, Great Questioning
At BCBS, September 2004 This evening I would like to follow up on what Stephen was saying in the morning about being careful, about energy, and about protecting, but I would like to look at the subject more from the perspective of the Zen tradition. Zen talks about cultivating three great attitudes—great faith, great courage and great questioning—and I think it is here that we find a continuation of the Buddha’s teaching about care, energy and protection. Faith, I think, corresponds to the … [Read more...]
Truth
This sort of structured discourse found in the Pali literature can seem like linguistic sleight-of-hand, but when one examines it closely and works with it in experience it shows itself to be an insightful and practical guide for finding one’s way among the tangle of views and opinions passing for truth in our world. We cannot help but base much of our belief on insubstantial grounds, but we can avoid the pitfall of regarding our knowledge as definitively true until we have verified it directly. … [Read more...]
The Five Spiritual Powers
Sarah Doering has had a long association with the Insight Meditation Society and with the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies. On both boards for many years, she has been a devoted practitioner of insight meditation, and has been teaching at IMS for the past several years. Sarah is currently one of the resident teachers at the newly opened Forest Refuge. Three Month Retreat October 1999 For forty-five years after his enlightenment, the Buddha wandered about northern India teaching. … [Read more...]
Life is a Retreat
Can you tell us something about your jataka, your life story, where you came from and how you got into all this? I grew up in New York, was married when I was 18 years old, graduated from college a year or so later, and had four children in five and a half years (they are all grown, now). I always thought I would die very young because I did everything in such a hurry. I figured I’d be finished with all my things and there wouldn’t be anything else left to do, any people tell a story that … [Read more...]
Natural Buddhism
Note: This article was developed from one of 20 presentations made at the BCBS conference on secular Buddhism held in March of 2013. Gil Fronsdal is the primary teacher for the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California; he has been teaching since 1990. He has practiced Zen and vipassanā in the U.S. and Asia since 1975. He was a Theravada monk in Burma in 1985, was ordained as a Soto Zen priest in 1982, and in 1995 received Dharma Transmission from Mel Weitsman. He received a PhD in … [Read more...]