Case #69: Gudō’s Teapot

A long time ago in a galaxy far away… Zen master Gudō and his students from the village had just finished their weekly zazenkai and were enjoying some tea and biscuits. A student asked the master: “Master, I have a problem. I want to help sentient beings by working to improve society. But my mind […]

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Nondominational Buddhism

Several years ago I wrote a post about the expected scope of this research project. I wanted to clarify what kind of operation I was performing in studying the intersection of Buddhism and anarchism. In that post, out of a healthy abundance of skepticism, I concluded that a reasonable outcome would be to find an […]

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White lotus, red turbans, black flags: revolutionary buddhist heretics

“The bodhisattva practices emptiness, but he does not realize emptiness…He considers peacefulness but does not seek extreme peace.” – Vimalakirti Sutra By way of (re)introduction Hello, my patient readers. Believe it or not, the work continues behind the scenes. It took me some time to come back around, but I am back on this project […]

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Venerable Nyar Na: The Monk in Sky Blue Robe & His Censored Buddhist Anarchism in Burma

Hein Htet Kyaw has been doing some much needed research and translation into contemporary Buddhist Anarchism in Myanmar. Ven. Nyar Na is an inspiring figure. The privileges many Western Buddhists take for granted (free-thought, atheism, scientific materialism, anti-clericalism, anti-authoritarianism, etc), the Ven. Nyar Na has been harshly persecuted by the Sangha for advocating. I would […]

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Quotations fromm Lin Qiuwu

These quotations come from the article Buddhism and Marxism in Taiwan: Lin Qiuwu’s Religious Socialism and Its Legacy in Modern Times By Charles B. Jones, published in the Journal of Global Buddhism 1 (2000): 82-111. Lin Qiuwu’s ideas on the synthesis of revolutionary socialist and Buddhist ideology display a clear coherence which goes beyond mere […]

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