Buddhist Encounters: Finding a Home in the Human Condition | 誠品線上

Buddhist Encounters: Finding a Home in the Human Condition

內容簡介

內容簡介 The human condition affects us all. As we journey through life, we face birth, aging, sickness, and death, each bringing significant challenges. How can we better understand our human condition? What can we learn from it? In Buddhist Encounters: Finding a Home in the Human Condition, Dr. Lewis R. Lancaster explores the essence of our existence, addressing the internal conflicts and external pressures exacerbated by the post-pandemic and AI era. Through the lens of Buddhist teachings, he seeks answers to these timeless issues, reflecting on the very dilemma that concerned the Buddha himself.

作者介紹

作者介紹 Dr. Lewis R. Lancaster ● Emeritus Professor, Department of East Asian Languages, University of California, Berkeley, USA● Emeritus Professor, Department of Religious Studies, University of the West (UWest)● Member of the Board of Directors, Nan Tien Institute, Australia● Founder and Former Director, the Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative (ECAI)● President of UWest, 2004–2006A pioneer in the digitization of Buddhist texts, which has become an essential practice in contemporary Buddhist scholarship. Over his illustrious six-decade career, he has published over 75 research articles and reviews, and authored or edited numerous books on Buddhism, including Prajnaparamita and Related Systems, The Korean Buddhist Canon, Buddhist Scriptures, Early Ch’an in China and Tibet, and Assimilation of Buddhism in Korea. His significant contributions include the creation of a descriptive catalog and digitization of the Korean Buddhist Canon, for which he received the Jogye Order’s Grand Award in 2014.Fo Guang Shan Institute of Humanistic BuddhismFounded in 2013 by Venerable Master Hsing Yun, the Fo Guang Shan Institute of Humanistic Buddhism pursues the objectives of propagating the Buddha’s teachings and the Venerable Master’s thoughts on Humanistic Buddhism. The Institute endeavors to recruit experts and nurture scholars of Buddhism, gather ancient and contemporary editions of the Buddhist Canons, as well as compile the Complete Works of Venerable Master Hsing Yun. Through the Center of International Affairs, the Institute translates the works of the Venerable Master and holds the annual Symposium on Humanistic Buddhism, in addition to other international academic forums, welcoming outstanding scholars and youths from around the world to study Buddhism.

產品目錄

產品目錄 ContentsAcknowledgmentsForewordPrefaceIntroductionPart 1 Understanding the Human Condition1. Human Condition: Earthly and Cosmic2. Human ConditionPart 2 Learning from the Four Great Messengers3. The Persistent Message of Illness4. The Future of Old Age5. Death: The Last Moment of a Human6. Learning to Respond to the Human ConditionPart 3 Living with Reality7. Cause8. Emptiness: Not Nothing9. Behavior: Acts of Consequence10. Personal SelfPart 4 Confronting Challenges11. Desire12. Racism13. Buddhism in the Time of COVIDPart 5 Journeying Toward Enlightenment14. Enlightenment: A Distant Beacon15. Reincarnation16. Detachment17. CompassionConclusionAppendices● How a Buddhism Teacher Deals With His Own Pain● Surprising Ways of Dealing with Adversity and Hopelessness● On Personal Life, Academic Journey, and Research

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Preface
Over the years, there have been many who helped lead me to the point of giving the lectures contained in this volume. Technology has transformed our way of communication. My first attempt at giving online talks came with the encouragement and help of Tom Nickel when he was in charge of setting up the early internet on the University of the West (UWest) campus. Howie Lan from U.C. Berkeley for the past three decades has kept me aware of the fast moving world of the digital age. On another level, my reluctance to share personal information was deeply embedded in the idea that scholars only deal with textual resources. Objectivity in research was the goal and subjective data had no place in publications. During the COVID-19 pandemic, I moved to Pacific Palisades to be with my sister during the lockdown. As I took daily walks for exercise, I became acquainted with Tomas Harlan, a filmmaker. He challenged me to be more open about my personal thoughts and I began to explore how to talk with him about this side of my life that had remained mute throughout my academic career. One of the breakthroughs happened during a previous visit to and long walk with SienaDune Buchanan along the beaches and shoreline of Sydney, Australia. She led me into a deep discussion of how important it is to have gratitude for the gifts and assistance I have had during my academic life. President Ta of UWest and Professor Miroj Shakya, Chair of the Religious Studies Department asked me to give this series of lectures online when the campus was under closure due to COVID. Later, Venerable Abbot Hui Dong of Hsi Lai Temple arranged for me to give online talks for the lay organization of Fo Guang Shan, the BLIA (Buddha’s Light International Association). Both the President and Abbot urged me to include my personal information and thoughts in the lectures. Up to this point, I had never ventured to do so. Many of the doctrinal issues have for more than six years been discussed with the translation team of the Fo Guang Dictionary of Buddhism project in my role as an editor. Led by Venerable Miao Guang and Venerable Zhi Yue, the English translation of this eight-volume Dictionary will soon be published. Those conversations have allowed me to explore Buddhist thought at a deep level. As I prepared the talks, my sister Ora Pelton was always the first reader and I relied on her to tell me if my talks were understandable. She was an invaluable assistant with years of group and therapy experience. After receiving her approval, I felt at ease about presenting each talk. Having to give the talks from my bedroom at Pacific Palisades presented a barrier. There would never be a live audience in a classroom. Fong Sam took over the logistics of publicity and contact with other staff members at UWest campus. Professor Shakya presided over the sessions and made introductions. A great deal of work fell on the shoulders of Chris Johnson, who did all the Zoom setup and I was left free to give each talk without distraction. Now, the final stage of publication is in the hands of Fo Guang Shan in Taiwan. The team from Fo Guang Shan Institute of Humanistic Buddhism took on the task of putting the texts of my talks into some order and then edited the final version. My thanks to all these friends who have made this volume possible.

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內文 : Introduction
When I started to work on these lectures, I was not prepared for what I would find and the changes that are occurring right now as you read these words. Much of what I expected to say, had to be abandoned or rewritten. What this means is that by the time I wrote a lecture and finally gave it or prepared it for publication, developments in society had shifted and within a short period of time, the reality moved away from the words that I was saying.
It is a daunting task to try to comprehend what is happening in our world, much less give guidance for how to deal with the staggering events that seem so overwhelming. James Baldwin reminds us that “history is not the past, it is the present.” We are in the midst of history-making at this very moment. The Coronavirus not only affected human bodies, it infected economies, production of goods, and education. The pandemic that has created such havoc in the world came at a time when we already had major issues of human life: inequality where less than ten percent of the population had over ninety percent of the world’s wealth; migration of millions of people from underdeveloped economies were on the move into the wealthier regions; population was growing rapidly adding over one billion five hundred million in three decades; life expectancy averages increased from sixty-five to seventy in the new century; people over sixty years of age doubled from the number in 1990. Population increase was not universal: the birthrate of North American, Europe, and Japan is not sufficient to maintain current numbers of citizenry. At the same time, large-scale growth, in Sub-Saharan Africa and Western Eurasia births, are shifting population density and even in the face of lower birth rates in some regions, the overall number of humans on our planet continues to increase at a rapid rate.
This is not the first time that humans have faced such disruption of normal life. As a child, I listened to stories about the issues of a pandemic. My mother in her late teen years was in training to become a nurse in 1918 when the last major pandemic occurred—the flu—that is estimated to have killed fifty million people. Her children remember how she insisted on lots of hand washing and not touching our eyes or face, seen by us to be inconvenient and unnecessary. Only now that we have experienced a similar outbreak and understand her concerns, all of us wish she was still alive so we could apologize to her for being so resistant to her wise advice.
In 1947, Albert Camus wrote a fictional account titled Plague, of an epidemic in a mythical Algerian town that eventually killed all of the inhabitants because the population was too slow to change their habits of living. It became a best seller because people could identify with the message. They had just suffered through a second World War that had killed millions and leveled many of their great cities. Just as we still try to comprehend the destruction of World War II and continue to ask the question of what went wrong that society could be so self-destructive, so too will people look back to this present time. They will judge us, asking the question of who handled the crisis in the best way. They may well ask the question “What did Buddhists do during that moment in history?”
Does Buddhism have teachings that can be relevant to our extraordinary history of today? I believe it does.
In many ways the pandemic that has changed the course of human history, reminds me of the story told about the young Siddhartha when he took a journey into the world and saw four striking examples of life. Just as we were forced to acknowledge illness, especially among elderly people, with subsequent death for many, so Siddhartha saw: a person suffering from disease; old people bent with age and weakness; the most disturbing of all, a corpse surrounded by mourners. It has been said to be a metaphor for the stages of life, but in our present experience, illness, old age, and death became realities, suddenly affecting the global human population in unprecedented fashion.
At first Siddhartha riding through the crowded city streets, was certain that what he witnessed happened to others not to him or his family, and like the people in Camus’ novel, was resistant to a full acceptance of the world before him and its implications. Fortunately, he was not alone in the chariot, his driver was there to give him help and over and over repeated the news that what he was witnessing was the destiny of all humans. It was shattering to the youth to realize this unexpected and unwanted knowledge of reality.
No longer a metaphor, the Three Great Messengers of Illness, Old Age, and Death lurk as shadows. Let me not be too grim, I have had a full life and many of you who are reading this have helped to make it so. The Three Great Messengers are in fact wonderful teachers and keep us from such destructive behavior as arrogance and feeling entitled to have exactly what we want and demand. They show us that we are all brothers and sisters in this life and what we share can be far greater than our differences. It is the ultimate intimacy to share illness, old age, and death with every living being, every human contact.
Now, there was a fourth sighting for Siddhartha. In the passing dramas of the Three Great Messengers, he also saw an observer, a participant. A person stood in calm demeanor seemingly unaffected by all the aspects of life that were so disturbing to the youth. Seeing this amazing stillness in the posture of the person, Siddhartha was told that this lone figure was one who saw it all and had through practice and inner development, reached a level of calm acceptance of life’s experiences. It was crucial to give the full scope of reality to the young prince, to assure him that while there is suffering there is also hope that we can learn to deal with it. We are provided with the ability to know and fully comprehend the nature of life and all its changes and suffering, and yet have the experience of inner peace. How is it possible to see these realities and inevitable stages of discomfort and even death, and just stand by in calm repose? Perhaps the greatest lesson that Siddhartha had to learn was that calm acceptance of the realities of existence is not indifference.
I once gave a lecture in prison about the way in which I set about trying to deal with long delays in traffic on freeways, not a daily issue for that particular audience. Nonetheless, I described my thoughts and actions to the inmates and my attempt to practice what I often taught. The Six Perfections of Wisdom include patience or perhaps better translated calm acceptance. So I described the anxiety that I felt when I was in a mass of cars stopped and creeping along. I practiced being aware of my breathing and was able to calm down and manage my anxiety and near anger about the traffic. But, as I was soon to see, my smugness about having calmed myself and reaching some degree of acceptance of the situation was far from wisdom and perfection. One of the prisoners raised his hand at the end of the description of my successful mastery of impatience on the freeway and asked me, “Professor, when you are sitting in your car on the freeway with calm acceptance of the problem, do you at the same time have a sense of compassion for all the other people in those cars around you who are anxious and worried about being late?” I felt as if he had nailed me to the wall and taken away my breath. For a moment or two, I was silenced and had to admit to him and the audience, “No, I was not giving them any thought.” After the class, I asked him how he was so insightful that he spotted the gaping flaw in my actions. He said that he had been in the prison for eighteen years and slept every night in a large room with two hundred inmates. It was torment for him to have the lights on all night, to hear his fellow inmates snoring, sometimes shouting out in a bad dream, grinding their teeth in tension while asleep, moaning, and often weeping. One night, after he had been meditating for some years, he suddenly was overcome with a feeling of deep compassion for everyone in the room. He realized that they were like him, they were all suffering from the noise and the environment, and in that moment, he forgave them and decided to try his best to help them when he could. He said, “Professor, you had a traffic jam of cars, I had a traffic jam of people.” What a teacher! What a teacher! A person imprisoned perhaps for his whole life, bereft of any possessions, no family contacts for more than a decade, but one who could access both calm acceptance and compassionate empathy for those in his life.
When Siddhartha saw the calmness of the fourth sighting, it was not an indication of indifference, he was seeing compassion in action. Several of the other prisoners, on that day when I was so severely challenged, said that they had been attracted to the meditation classes with the Buddhist visitors, because they saw my questioner sitting on his bed day after day in calmness. Finally, one by one they approached the meditator and asked about what he was doing. Having the presence of a calm and contented person in their midst turned out to be compassion in action. Just like the calm person seen by Siddhartha, my questioner taught by example. We are faced with unparalleled changes in our world and people are reacting in many different ways. There is a need for these centered and aware persons to provide the introduction to a way of life that can bring peace and kindness to awareness.
Our new century is marked by stress and alienation in the social fabric. The nation is split into divisions that separate the citizens of our country and it is reflected in broken relationships between neighbors, friends, and family. Differences have hardened into immovable positions where neither side is able to make

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最佳賣點 : The human condition affects us all. As we journey through life, we face birth, aging, sickness, and death, each bringing significant challenges. How c

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