Archived Posts
Contemplating Disease – Part 7 – Shijo Kingo and Managing Illness – September
In Chih-I’s time, and in fact for most of the time humans have been around until more recent times, the idea of living with long term illness didn’t exist much. You either recovered or you died in most cases. With the advances of modern medicine people are living longer, dying at later ages, and living with illnesses that would previously meant death. This is a wonderful benefit of modern medical science. We have much to…
Contemplating Disease – Part 6c – Medicine King Bodhisattva – September 15, 2018
“I shall be able to obtain the golden body of the Buddha because I gave up my arms.” I think of the many golden body Buddhas I witnessed over the years who through their passion not only gave up their arms, their legs, their minds, their lives doing the compassionate acts of caring for the sick. “If my words are true and not false, I shall be able to have my arms restored.” And these…
Contemplating Disease – Part 6b – Medicine King Bodhisattva – September 14, 2018
Returning again to Medicine King Bodhisattva chapter where the Buddha says: “Star-King-Flower! Anyone who aspires for, and, wishes to attain Anuttara-Samyak-Sambodhi, should offer a light to the stupa of the Buddha by burning a finger or a toe.” As I consider this I kept wondering about how it would be possible to burn oneself without catching fire? The fire and burning I come up with is that of passion. When I think about the work…
Thursday’s Five Book Recommendations – September 13, 2018
Thursday’s regular weekly feature, here are a few books I recommend. The books will not always be directly about Buddhism however they will relate to the greater truths found in Buddhism and also to things I’m interested in. Sometimes ideas from my outside reading I use as I process the complex theories we study in Buddhism. Please note that the temple will receive a small percentage of any purchase made from Amazon through the links…