Buddha

published	September 28th 2004 by Penguin (Non-Classics)
first published	2007
binding	Paperback
isbn	0143034367 (isbn13: 9780143034360)
ebook
pages	240
description	Books on Buddhism may overflow the shelves, but the life story of the Buddha himself has remained obscure despite over 2,500 years of influence on mil...more [close] Books on Buddhism may overflow the shelves, but the life story of the Buddha himself has remained obscure despite over 2,500 years of influence on millions of people around the world. In an attempt to rectify this, and to make the Buddha and Buddhism accessible to Westerners, the beloved scholar and author of such sweeping religious studies as A History of God has written a readable, sophisticated, and somewhat unconventional biography of one of the most influential people of all time. Buddha himself fought against the cult of personality, and the Buddhist scriptures were faithful, giving few details of his life and personality. Karen Armstrong mines these early scriptures, as well as later biographies, then fleshes the story out with an explanation of the cultural landscape of the 6th century B.C., creating a deft blend of biography, history, philosophy, and mythology. At the age of 29, Siddhartha Gautama walked away from the insulated pleasure palace that had been his home and joined a growing force of wandering monks searching for spiritual enlightenment during an age of upheaval. Armstrong traces Gautama's journey through yoga and asceticism and grounds it in the varied religious teachings of the time. In many parts of the world during this so-called axial age, new religions were developing as a response to growing urbanization and market forces. Yet each shared a common impulse--they placed faith increasingly on the individual who was to seek inner depth rather than magical control. Taoism and Confucianism, Hinduism, monotheism in the Middle East and Iran, and Greek rationalism were all emerging as Gautama made his determined way towards enlightenment under the boddhi tree and during the next 45 years that he spent teaching along the banks of the Ganges. Armstrong, in her intelligent and clarifying style, is quick to point out the Buddha's relevance to our own time of transition, struggle, and spiritual void in both his approach--which was based on skepticism and empiricism--and his teachings. Despite the lack of typical historical documentation, Armstrong has written a rich and revealing description of both a unique time in history and an unusual man. Buddha is a terrific primer for those interested in the origins and fundamentals of Buddhism. --Lesley Reed [close]
date added	01-03-07 edit book

find at: Amazon | Half.com | Barnes & Noble | Abebooks | more...

discuss this book

There are no discussion topics on this book yet. Be the first to start one »

groups with this book

friend reviews (0)

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

lists with this book

A Buddhist Reading List

56 books | 31 voters

More...

other reviews (showing 1-20 of 265)

Graham added it

07/15/08

A sensitive introduction for Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike: Religious scholar Karen Armstrong brings her formidable research, writing and analytical skills to bear on the Buddha, contextualizing his life and philosophy, providing an overview of problematic areas of scholarship, and painting a compelling portrait of a person about whom we actually know very little. The book is intended for a popular readership and begins on a moment of high drama - the pampered Indian...more A sensitive introduction for Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike: Religious scholar Karen Armstrong brings her formidable research, writing and analytical skills to bear on the Buddha, contextualizing his life and philosophy, providing an overview of problematic areas of scholarship, and painting a compelling portrait of a person about whom we actually know very little. The book is intended for a popular readership and begins on a moment of high drama - the pampered Indian prince Siddartha renouncing his inheritance and his wife and newly born child for the life of a wandering ascetic. Most writers of an introductory text would hue close to the narrative, with a flashback or two to fill out the story, but Armstrong pulls back the camera to give her audience the bigger picture, exploring the actors, their culture, and the state of the world in the 500 BCE. A modern day Siddartha would, if he quit his job and left his family, be considered something of a weakling, someone who couldn't cut it, someone tying to escape reality. For Siddartha, though, and for many in India, and in fact in many cultures across the world, reality was not to be found in the common work-a-day world. Full of change and impermanence, that world offered only disappointment and suffering. "Reality," as it were, lay behind the everyday world, and to find it required getting as far as possible from the mundane. Siddartha's renunciation was quite a radical departure for his time and place, especially for one so high born, but in leaving home to sit at the feet of sages and to practice meditation and rigorous yoga exercises, Siddartha was but one in the pantheon of great thinkers who made their own quests during this golden age of philosophy: Socrates, Plato, Lao Tzu, Confucius, Zoroaster. Unlike these contemporaries, the Buddha himself left no written record. The first texts, transcribed from oral teachings, weren't composed until nearly 300 years after his death and at the time there was no interest in compiling a chronological sequence of events. Besides the obvious problem of having to piece together a biography from hints and clues scattered throughout volumes of sermons, lectures and rules for monastic life, the modern scholar has also to weigh the value of whether to include stories relating miraculous and supernatural events, of which there are many in the Buddhist canon, to what degree these events describe historical "reality," and how they are to be interpreted. Is Mara, the Buddhist devil, a spirit being or simply a manifestation of the Buddha's psychological state? Was the Buddha truly a "perfect" being, or simply a man who had a vision of the divine? What does one make of the Buddha's penuriously strict rules for nuns? Did the Buddha die from food poisoning, or was he perhaps deliberately poisoned? These issues are presented and exemplified in such a way as to maintain the flow of the narrative, which Armstrong directs to great effect through an imaginative interpretation of the scriptures. This is most obvious in her last chapter on the Buddha's final days, a bleak portrait of a world gone mad: attempted assassinations of the Buddha, a schism in the Buddhist community, the Buddha's two royal supporters killed by their own sons, preparations for a war of conquest against the last remaining republics, and the death of the Buddha's two closest monks. In the months before his death, the Buddha dismisses his monks for the rainy season and alone with his aide Ananda wanders further and further from civilization and closer to his death, "two old men [struggling:] on alone, experiencing the weariness of survival and the passing away of companions which constitutes the true tragedy of old age." About the only time Armstrong stumbles is in her treatment of the Buddha's theory of Dependent Origination, which she admits "is not easy to understand." A more thorough explanation would no doubt be an unwelcome diversion for the general reader, so it is left to those that may be interested to follow up elsewhere. But for a well written introduction touching on most of the major events and issues, it may be hard to find better. For those interested in sampling the source material themselves, you may like to try British monk Bhikkhu Nanamoli's [[ASIN:1928706126 The Life of the Buddha : According to the Pali Canon]], a history based entirely on an original translation of (and resequencing of events from) the Pail texts. # ...less

Like this review? yes

title link
avg rating
small image
med image
large image

Buddha

discuss this book

groups with this book

friend reviews (0)

lists with this book

other reviews (showing 1-20 of 265)

book data (includes all editions)

blog this book

popular shelves

other editions