Friday, 25th July 2008 3:07am. Home
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| The Jhanas and the Brahma Viharas by Lloyd Burton | ||||
| Lloyd Burton has written a paper entitled The Jhanas and the Brahma Viharas which discusses Brahma Vihara practice in relation to the Jhanas. detail...2008-07-04 | ||||
| The Jhanas in Theravadan Buddhist Meditation by Leigh Brasington | ||||
| There is very little actual instruction on how to "do" Jhana practice in the suttas. One probable reason for this is that the Jhanas were a well-known practice among serious spiritual seekers 2500 years ago. Just like today, when giving someone directions to your house, you don't include information on how to start the car, shift gears, etc., so it wasn't considered necessary to explain how to enter the Jhanas. detail...2008-07-03 | ||||
| Jhanas at the Forest Refuge by Leigh Brasington | ||||
| The initial instructions for Anapanasati from Sayadaw were to learn to follow the breath for half an hour without getting distracted. Since I have been practicing Anapanasati for over 20 years in one form or another, this was not a difficult thing for me to do. When I reported that I could do so at my second interview, Sayadaw asked me to sit longer - like 3 or 4 hours per sitting. detail...2008-07-03 | ||||
| Instruction for Entering Jhana by Leigh Brasington | ||||
| These instructions have been taken from a nine-day retreat offered by Leigh Brasington at the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies in April of 2002. The Pali word jhana (Sanskrit dhyana) is sometimes simply translated as "meditation," but more accurately refers to an "absorption" into a very focused, very stable state of concentration. In the classical tradition there are several stages of jhana, each one more focused than the previous. detail...2008-07-03 | ||||
| Travelogue to the four jhanas by Brahmavamso, Ajahn | ||||
| Now what these jhanas actually are - I'll just talk about the four jhanas this morning and I'm going to carry on from what I might call the launching pad of that second stage of meditation which I've been talking about a lot while I've been teaching meditation during this retreat. The second stage of meditation in my scheme of things is where you have full continuous awareness of the breath. detail...2008-07-03 | ||||
| The Basic Method of Meditation by Brahmavamso, Ajahn | ||||
| During this meditation retreat there will be some hard work at the beginning, but be willing to bear that hard work knowing that it will lead you to experience some very beautiful and meaningful states. They will be well worth the effort! It is a law of nature that without effort one does not make progress. Whether one is a layperson or a monk, without effort one gets anywhere, in meditation or in anything. detail...2008-07-03 | ||||
| The Case of the Missing Simile (An essay on aspects of the practice of breath meditation) by Bhikkhu Sona | ||||
| Since the Visuddhimagga is so influential and so widely quoted by modern teachers, it would seem critical that it is reliable and, if in certain aspects it is not, then, with supporting evidence, to show clearly why it is not. detail...2008-07-03 | ||||
| THE FIRST WESTERN CONFERENCE ON JHANA PRACTICE IN THERAVADA BUDDHISM by Lloyd Burton | ||||
| Over a four-day period ending on the Summer Solstice of 2001, a group of Asian monastic and western lay teachers and students gathered at a retreat center in the mountains above Santa Fe, New Mexico. The occasion was a unique event: the first known conference in a Western country on the significance of the Jhanas (meditative absorptions) in relation to other Theravada meditation techniques, as taught and practiced in both Asia and the West.
detail...2008-07-03 | ||||
| DON'T THROW THE BABY OUT WITH THE BATH WATER by Leigh Brasington | ||||
| [The following essay was written in response to an paper that argued that the jhanas are not an important aspect of the Pali Canon. Unfortunately I do not have a copy of that paper to put up; however, I hope the essay standing by itself will be of some interest. lnb] detail...2008-07-03 | ||||
| Interpretations of the Jhanas by Leigh Brasington | ||||
| The first broad categorization would be into "Sutta Jhanas" and "Visuddhimagga Jhanas". The Jhanas as discussed in the suttas are accessible to many people. The suttas seem to indicate that they were just part of the monastics' training program; thus they were not a big deal and were accessible to many. detail...2008-07-03 | ||||