Posts by Doug Smith
Meditating on the Mud Machine
Ordinarily we begin meditation by focusing on the body, in particular, the breath. This is known as “mindfulness of breathing” and we learn about it at the beginning of the Buddha’s sutta on the Foundations of Mindfulness (Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta, Majjhima Nikāya 10. I use the Ñaṇamoli/Bodhi translation). The Buddha suggests a few other body-oriented meditations,…
Read MoreCrossed Paths in the Dhamma?
An apparent inconsistency lies at the heart of the Buddha’s teachings: his dhamma recommends we follow two paths at the same time, which lead to different destinations. On the one hand, we are to act ethically within the world, so as to build up a kammic bank account which will help us in attaining better…
Read MoreSecular Humanism and Secular Buddhism
Recently I attended a meeting of the Center for Inquiry, a Secular Humanist group, where I got into a discussion about Secular Buddhism. It raised the question of how to distinguish Secular Humanism from its Buddhist counterpart. What were their strengths and weaknesses? What did they each have to learn, and how could they be…
Read MoreAt Naḷakapāna: Did the Buddha "Scheme to Deceive"?
A couple of weeks ago I attended a lecture by jhana-expert Leigh Brasington where he brought up the Naḷakapāna Sutta (Majjhima Nikāya 68; the linked translation is from Bhikkhuni Upalavanna, I use Ñaṇamoli/Bodhi). Brasington cited it as an example of where the Buddha may have opened the kimono a bit on some of his claimed supernormal…
Read MoreThe Buddha's Manifesto on Miracles and Revelation
The Kevaddha Sutta* (Dīgha Nikāya 11) opens with Kevaddha, a householder, who tells the Buddha that there are many potential converts to the Buddha dhamma living nearby in Nāḷandā. He suggests that the Buddha get one of his monks to use miracles to excite and amaze them. This would, he says, be sure to gain many…
Read MoreBook Review: Donald Lopez on Buddhism and Science
With The Scientific Buddha, Donald S. Lopez, Jr., Distinguished Professor of Buddhist and Tibetan Studies at the University of Michigan, has written a book that should be of interest to anyone who finds affinities between Buddhism and the sciences. The book is a reworked series of Terry Lectures that Lopez gave at Yale University in…
Read MoreOn a Belief that Sends You to Hell
To believe there is no rebirth and no law of moral causation is an evil mental act that will lead to confusion and anguish in this life and hellfire in the world to come. And you did not need to say or do anything to commit it. All I had to do was hold an…
Read MoreCankī on Preserving Truth
All paths of practice must begin with a simple question. How do we know where to start? How do we know what is correct to believe? In the Cankī Sutta (Majjhima Nikāya 95; I rely on the Ñāṇamoli/Bodhi translation), the Buddha debates a young Brahmin named Kāpaṭhika, who has faith in the Vedas as his…
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