Posts Tagged ‘Brahmaviharas’
Kindness Towards Everyone?
When we practice loving kindness, are we really supposed to direct kindness towards everyone? Does everyone really deserve kindness? We will look at the early texts as well as a recent article in Tricycle Magazine by scholar Andrew Olendzki. We will also consider some of the teachings of Socrates and the ancient Greeks. The Sutta…
Read MoreMeditating With and For Each Other
While meditation retreats have always been challenging, rewarding, and in some ways, deeply moving experiences for me, I believe that they don’t sufficiently foster two key aspects of our practice: our ethical, socially-conscious engagement in the world and our active participation in sanghas. In a previous blog post I raised concerns about the negative effect…
Read MoreLovingkindness Now and in the Past
In contrast to the dominant role that mettā (lovingkindness) and the other Brahmavihāras (compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity) play in contemporary Buddhist practice, they seem to have played a relatively minor role in the earliest tradition. One looks in vain for much elaboration on mettā’s dhammic role; largely it seems to have been seen as…
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