Discovering Buddhism at Home -FAQ
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What are some good English translations of Dharmakirti's work?
What is the best way to approach the Doing Buddhism at Home program? Is it best to completely understand one module before going onto the next?
What are some good English translations of Dharmakirti's work?
- A student asks:
- I was also wondering if anyone knows of an english
translation of Dharmakirti's work?
Pende responds:
- Dharmakirti wrote a number of works but the one most
often quoted in Tibetan texts that I've studied and
the one that is a principal text in the curriculum of
Geshe Studies, is the Pramanavarttika. A literal
translation of this text would probably not be of much
use to you, as it is extremely terse, by employing
contractions of terms to obtain a verse style.
I would suggest the following texts for your interest:
Recognizing Reality: Dharmakirti's Philosophy and Its Tibetan Interpretations (S U N Y Series in Buddhist Studies) by Georges B. J. Dreyfus
Is Enlightenment Possible?: Dharmakirti and Rgyal Tshab Rje on Knowledge, Rebirth, No-Self and Liberation (Textual Studies and Translations in Indo-) by Roger R. Jackson
Foundations of Dharmakirti's Philosophy by John D. Dunne
Dharmakirti's Pramanavarttika : An Annotated Translation of the Fourth Chapter (Pararthanumana) Author: Dharmakirti, Tom J. F. Tillemans
Pende
What is the best way to approach the Doing Buddhism at Home program? Is it best to completely understand one module before going onto the next?
-
Nick observes:
-
Those of us who have been around these teachings for a
while would recommend going through the whole course fairly quickly,
that is a couple of months per module, as I think even DB@H
preliminary materials mention.
The reason is that answers to questions that come up in earlier modules may be found in later ones. The whole lam-rim fits together beautifully and you can only get an appreciation of that once you've seen the whole thing.
So if you get stuck, don't get mad, keep going. Then, when you reach the end, start over, going more slowly, if you like.
An important part of everybody's practice--even that of high lamas-- is the glance meditation. We're encouraged to review the entire lam- rim in abbreviated form every day, to leave imprints of the whole path on our consciousness. Think of your first pass through DB@H as a more than somewhat extended, two-year glance meditation.
The thing is, when you get to the end, you won't know everything...you'll just have a better idea of what you don't know.
And of course, the purpose of undertaking study of the lam-rim is not just to gain an intellectual understanding of what the Buddha taught but to achieve realizations of it. The seed of realization is, of course, intellectual understanding, but those seeds then need to be nurtured by purification, creation of merit, constant meditation, further study and so forth. It's not just a life's work; it's the work of many lives.
But it has to be done and if we don't start now, when will we? When will we find this precious opportunity again?
At the fifth meditation course, November 1973, Lama Zopa Rinpoche surveyed the 200 students in the tent behind the Kopan Gompa and said, "If just one person here receives realization of the perfect human rebirth in this life it will be a wonderful thing."