Month: November 2021
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Zen Master Bankei And European Intellectuals On The Unruly Passions
In his magisterial essay The Passions and the Interests: Political Arguments for Capitalism before Its Triumph (1977), the late intellectual historian and economist Albert Hirschman canvasses three strategies that seventeenth and eighteenth century European intellectuals entertained for dealing with the unruly passions: 1. Repress: push down this unruly passion 2. Harness: sublimate the unruly passion…
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A Very Brief Summary Of Zen Master Bankei’s Exquisite Teaching
Proposition #1: All beings are essentially the Unborn Buddha Mind. Teaching: Just abide in the Unborn. Evidence: “When you dwell in the Unborn itself,” Bankei states, “you’re dwelling at the very wellhead of the Buddhas and patriarchs” (The Unborn:The Life and Teachings of Zen Master Bankei, 1622-1693, p. 53). Proposition #2: The Unborn has a…
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The Buddha Was Right About The Dental Clinic
The Buddha was right. Yesterday my wife and I went to a dental clinic for a routine checkup and cleaning. While I was sitting in the lobby, I overheard one older woman who, upon checkout was told that she had a payment, exclaim about how the treatment was supposed to be covered; she’d spoken with…
Andrew Taggart, Ph.D. 