There is a rather interesting sutta in the Samyutta in which the Buddha illustrates the meaning and significance of the term sankharo in a straightforward manner: Idha bhikkhave, assutavā puthujjano ariyānaṃ adassāvī ariyadhammassa akovido ariyadhamme avinīto, sappurisānaṃ adassāvī sappurisadhammassa akovido…
Imagine you just planted an apple tree. Well, you actually took one little apple seed and found a nice spot for it to grow. Then you covered it with some earth and sprinkled water over the spot. Every day you…
What is the difference between a Buddha and an Arahant? Before “deciding” which way to go, lets hear what the Buddha has to say on this topic: At Savatthi… “Monks, the Tathagata — the worthy one, the fully enlightened one,…
In the Samyutta Nikaya we find this famous saying by King Pasenadi who – being physically in a bad shape – is surprised as to how much the Buddha was able to help in his wordly affairs: Indeed the Buddha…
Found all the differences? Maybe now you know why there is no English translation of the Phusso Theragatha? v. 949 – 980. Hmmm…. The online versions of the Theragatha seem to ignore this interesting gatha. Seems like every monastic translator…
…was Ayya Khema‘s noble intention. Let us all walk in her footsteps. From an email thread: better i respond now, before letting this lie around too long…so short answers. if not clear enough, give me a call 🙂 I’m glad we…
A story from the pali canon: “The wise teachers of old, however, used manual work to break strong obsessions. This is how the story goes: A young monk called “Tissa” lived together with his preceptor in the Tissamahavihara monastery. It…
Normally, when we talk about the world, we think of mountains, oceans, rivers, valleys, towns, transportation, globalisation, earth, planets, the universe. When the Buddha spoke about “the world” he had something else in mind: As he was sitting there, he…
If you are a monk, i guess you do not read (online). But if you do, this text was written exactly for you 🙂 In 100 BC Buddhist monks faced a tough question: “Should we preferably memorize and thus keep…
There are a couple of instances in the Pitaka, where the Buddha compares our moment to moment experience (zoom out and you would call it “life”) with a swift river. In some similes he compares our journey from Samsara to…