သေခ်ၤေလးရပ္ တသိန္းက ဒုိ႔ဖခင္

သေခ်ၤေလးရပ္ တသိန္ထက္မွစ၍ ပါရမီဆယ္ပါး အျပားသုံးဆယ္တုိ႔ကုိ မနားမေန ျဖည့္က်င့္ ေတာ္ မူျပီးေနာက္၌ ဘုိးေတာ္အဥၨန သကၠရာဇ္ျဖဳိခ်ျပီး ႏွစ္ေပါင္းေတာ္ေတာ္ၾကေသာအခါ လူတုိ႔ သမုတ္အပ္ လူတုိ႔ အေလ့အျမတ္ ျပဳအပ္ေသာ ဘုရင္တဆူျဖစ္ေသာ မင္းသုေဒၶါဒန နန္းတက္ လာခဲ့သည္။ ေနာက္ႏွစ္မ်ားစြာၾကာျမင့္လာေသာအခါ မင္းၾကီး သုေဒၶါဒနႏွင့္ မဟာမယာေဒ၀ီတုိ႔၏ လယ္ယာေျမေကာင္း သဖြယ္ျဖစ္ေသာ ဥယ်ာဥ္တြင္းမွာ သိဒၶတၳကုမာရ ဟုဆုိအပ္ေသာ ကုမုျဒာၾကာ ပန္းကေလးတပြင့္ ျပဳိင္ဘက္မရွိ လွပစြာ ပြင့္ထြန္း ထြက္ေပၚလာခဲ့သည္။ ထုိပန္းကေလး တပြင့္၏ ရနံ႔ တုိ႔ျဖင့္ ဖခင္ ဘုရင္ သုေဒၶါဒနသည္ အရမ္းကုိ ၾကည္ႏူးခဲ့ရသည္။

ထုိကုမုျဒာပန္းကေလး ေမြးဖြားမူေၾကာင့္ အရမ္း၀မ္းသာေနသလုိ အရမ္းလည္း ၀မ္းနည္းမဆုံး ျဖစ္ခဲ့ရသည္။ ၀မ္းနည္းျခင္း၏ အေၾကာင္းမွာလည္း ခ်စ္လွစြာေသာ ၾကင္ယာေတာ္ မဟာမာယာေဒ၀ီ မိဖုရားေခါင္ၾကီး နတ္ရြာစံသြားေသာေၾကာင့္ ျဖစ္သည္။ မည္သုိ႔ေသာ အေၾကာင္းေၾကာင့္ မင္းၾကီး စိတ္ေသာက ေရာက္ေနသည္ မည္သူမွ မသိေသာ္လည္း မင္းၾကီး၏ ပူေဆြးေနေသာ ႏွလုံးအိမ္ႏွင့္ လစ္ဟာေနေသာ မိဖုရားၾကီး၏ ေနရာကုိ ၾကည့္လွ်င္ သိႏုိင္ပါသည္။

ေလာကတြင္ မည္သုိ႔ေသာ ေယာက်ၤားသည္ အိမ္ေထာင္သည္ ဘ၀သုိ႔ ေရာက္ရွိသြားေသာ အခါ ထုိအိမ္ေထာင္သည္ ဘ၀ကုိ ျမတ္ႏုိးျခင္း တက္မက္ျခင္း ကာမရာဂျဖင့္ တည္ေဆာက္ထားျခင္း ေၾကာင့္ မိမိ၏ ကုိယ္ပုိင္ပုံရိပ္ အိမ္ရိပ္တြင္ ခြန္အားျဖစ္ေစေသာ ဇနီးသည္ မရွိလွ်င္ မ်က္လုံးတဖက္ မရွိေသာ လူတေယာက္ အသြင္သုိ႔ ေရာက္သြားသကဲ့သုိ႔ ျဖစ္သည္။

မင္းၾကီးလည္း ထုိနည္းအတူ မိမိ၏ ၾကင္ယာေတာ္ ခ်စ္ဇနီး သူဘ၀ထဲက ထြက္ခြာကာ နတ္ ရြာ စံခဲ့သည့္အတြက္ေၾကာင့္ စိတ္ေသာက ဗ်ာပါေ၀လ်က္ ရွိေနေသာ္လည္း သူ၏ လယ္ယာေျမ ေကာင္း သဖြယ္ျဖစ္ေသာ ဥယ်ာဥ္ထဲတြင္ သိဒၶတၳကုမာရ မင္းသားကို အစားထုိး ခ်စ္မဆုံးေသာ အၾကင္နာ တရားေတြနဲ႔ ယုယေထြးပုိက္ကာ တသသ ရင္မွာလွဳိက္ေသာ ပီတိ အျပဳံးေတြျဖင့္ ေပ်ာ္မဆုံး ျဖစ္ခဲ့ရသည္။ တေန႔ေသာအခါ မင္းဆရာျဖစ္ေသာ ရေသ့ၾကီးတပါး နန္ေတာ္အတြင္းသုိ႔ ၾကြလာခဲ့သည္။ ရေသ့သည္ သင့္သင့္ေလွ်ာက္ပတ္ေသာ ေနရာ၌ ေနထုိင္သီတင္းသုံးေနစဥ္တြင္ လူမမယ္ ကေလးေလး ျဖစ္ေသာ မင္းသားေလး သိဒၶတၳသည္ ရေသ့ၾကီး၏ ဦးေခါင္းထိပ္သုိ႔ တက္ ေရာက္ေနသည္။

ထုိအခါ၌ ရေသ့ၾကီးသည္ အံၾသဘနန္းျဖစ္၍ ေဖာ္မျပႏုိင္ေသာ ေသာကေတြ ရင္လွဳိက္သည္း လွဳိက္ ခံစားရင္း စကၡဴႏွစ္ကြင္း အလင္းေရာင္၏ အေရွ႕တြင္ မ်က္ရည္စီးေၾကာင္းေလးမ်ား တသြင္ သြင္ စီးေနမိသလုိ သူေတာ္စဥ္ ပုလဲမ်က္ရည္ေလးမ်ား ေျမပါးျပင္ေပၚသုိ႔ ခစားလာရသည္။ ထုိ အခ်ိန္မွာ ဘုရင္ၾကီးလည္း အေၾကာင္းစုံ သိခ်င္ေသာေၾကာင့္ ဆရာရေသ့ၾကီးကုိ ေမးေလွ်ာက္ ၾကားလုိက္ပါသည္။ ရေသ့ၾကီးက “အခုလုိ အရွင္မင္းၾကီး၏ လယ္ယာေျမေကာင္းေသာ ေျမကြက္ ေပၚမွာ ဥယ်ာဥ္လည္းေကာင္း ဥယ်ာဥ္မွဴးလည္းေကာင္းသျဖင့္ အရွင္မင္းၾကီး၏ ရင္ေသြးျဖစ္ေသာ သိဒၶတၳကုမာရ မင္းသားေလးတည္းဟူေသာ ကမၻာ့ပန္းေကာင္းေလး တပြင့္ ပြင့္ထြက္လာျခင္းက အလြန္ကံေကာင္းေလစြ တကား၊

ထုိအျပင္ ေနာင္လာမည့္ အနာဂါတ္မွာလည္း မင္းစၾကာ သုိ႔မဟုတ္ ေလာကသုံးတုိ႔ အတုလ ပုိင္ရွင္လည္းျဖစ္ လူသားတုိ႔၏ အေလ့ဂရုျပဳအပ္ေသာ ေလာကသား အားလုံးတုိ႔၏ ဖခင္တဆူ ျဖစ္ လိမ့္မည္ ထုိအေၾကာင္းသည္ စင္စစ္ဧကန္ပင္ျဖစ္သည္”။ ရေသ့ၾကီးသည္ မင္းၾကီးအား မ်က္၀န္း အိမ္က မေျခာက္ေသးေသာ မ်က္ရည္နဲ႔ၾကည့္ရင္း တုန္ခါေနေသာ ႏႈတ္ခမ္းပါးအစုံက ေျပာျပေန သည္။ မင္းၾကီးလည္း ထုိအေၾကာင္းကုိ သိရွိ၍ သားေတာ္ သိဒၶတၳကုမာရကုိ ၾကည့္ရင္း လြန္စြာ ၀မ္း ေျမာက္ခဲ့သည္။

ထုိအခ်ိန္မွာ သက္တမ္းအားျဖင့္ ၾကီးရင့္လာသျဖင့္ ေနာင္ဆယ္ႏွစ္ေက်ာ္ ႏွစ္ဆယ္ေလာက္ ကာလသာ ေနရမည့္ ရေသ့ၾကီးသည္ “ငါသည္ ေလာကထြက္ထား သုံးေလာကသနင္း တရားမင္း ျဖစ္ေသာ ဘုရားရွင္ကုိ ဖူးျမင္ရေတာ့မည္ မဟုတ္ပါ” ဟု အေတြးအိမ္မွာ ေတြးေတာရင္း မ်က္ရည္ ေျဖမဆည္သာ၍ တဖန္ ႏွလုံးအိမ္မွာ မုိးထစ္ခ်ဳန္း ရြာခ်လာသျဖင့္ စကၡဴအိမ္ ေရလမ္းေၾကာင္းမွ တသြင္သြင္ စီးက်လာခဲ့သည္။

သုိ႔ေသာ္ ရေသ့ၾကီးသည္ ၾကဳိတင္ကာ အေလာင္းေတာ္ သိဒၶတၳကုမာရ မင္းသားေလးကုိ လက္ဆယ္ျဖာ ထိပ္မွာမုိး၍ ရွိခုိးျခင္းျဖင့္ ပီတိေသာမနႆ ထုံလႊမ္းကာ ၀မ္းေျမာက္ျခင္း သီတာမ်က္ ရည္တုိ႔ တဖန္စီးဆင္းေနခဲ့သည္။ ထုိေနာက္ ႏွစ္ပရိေစၧဒ အနည္းငယ္ၾကာလြန္ေသာအခါ မင္းၾကီး သည္ တုိင္းျပည္ရွိ တုိင္းသူတုိင္းသားမ်ားျဖစ္ေသာ ပညာရွိ ပုေရာဟိတ္တုိ႔ကုိ ေၾကညာေမာင္းတီး၍ ဆင့္ေခၚ ကာ သားေတာ္ သိဒၶတၳမင္းသားေလး၏ လကၡဏာၾကီးငယ္တုိ႔ကုိ ၾကည့္ရႈဖတ္ခုိင္းခဲ့သည္။

ထုိအခ်ိန္တြင္ မဇၥိ်မတုိင္းႏုိင္ငံရွိ နာမည္ေက်ာ္ ပုေရာဟိတ္ ငါးဦးတုိ႔သည္ မင္းသားေလး၏ လကၡဏာၾကီးငယ္ကုိ ဖတ္ၾကျပီး ေလးေယာက္ေသာ ပုဏၰားတုိ႔သည္ စၾကာမင္း သုိ႔မဟုတ္ ေလာက ထြက္ထား ဘုရားရွင္အျဖစ္ ကမၻာသူ ကမၻာသားတုိ႔၏ ဖခင္ ျဖစ္လိမ့္မည္ဟု ေဟာၾကားခဲ့ၾကသည္။ သုိ႔ေသာ္ ေကာ႑ည ပုဏၰားေလးသည္ ေလာကသုံးပါး တုိ႔၏ အေလ့ဂရုျပဳအပ္ေသာ ဘုရား စင္စစ္ ဧကန္ ျဖစ္လိမ့္မည္ဟု တခုတည္းေသာ အေျဖျဖင့္ ေျပာၾကားခဲ့သည္။

မင္းၾကီးသည္ ထုိအေၾကာင္းအရာအားလုံးကုိ သိေတာ္မူေသာအခါ မိမိ၏ သားေတာ္ကုိ လုိေလေသးမရွိေအာင္ ဖခင္တုိ႔ ခ်စ္ျခင္းေမတၱာျဖင့္ လုိအပ္တာမွန္သမွ်ႏွင့္ အရြယ္ေရာက္ေသာ အခါမွာလည္း ဘဒၵကဥၨန ဟုေခၚေသာ ယေသာ္ဓရာ မင္းသၼီးနဲ႔ မိဘတုိ႔ ၀တၱရားအတုိင္း ထိမ္းျမား ေပးခဲ့သည္။ ထုိ႔အျပင္ မင္းၾကီးသည္ သားေတာ္ကုိ ခ်စ္ျမတ္သျဖင့္ ေရႊနန္းၾကီး သုံးေဆာင္ျဖင့္ ထားခဲ့သည္။ ထိမ္းျမားျပီး ႏွစ္အနည္းငယ္ၾကာေသာအခါ မင္းသိဒၶတ္ႏွင့္ ဘဒၵကဥၨနမင္းသၼီးတုိ႔၏ သားဦးရတနာေလး ရာဟုလာကုိ ေမြးဖြားေပးခဲ့သည္။ အသက္အားျဖင့္ ႏွစ္ဆဲ့ကုိးႏွစ္သုိ႔ ေရာက္ ေသာအခါ နိမိတ္ၾကီးေလးပါးကုိ ေတြ႔ျမင္ခဲ့သလုိ ေလာကဦးရည္ျဖစ္ေသာ ကာမဂုဏ္၏ သကာ ရည္ကုိ ရြံ႕ရွာသျဖင့္ ေတာထြက္ခဲ့သည္။

သူ၏ ခ်စ္ခင္လွစြာေသာ ဇနီးႏွင့္သားကုိ စြန္႔လြတ္သြားျခင္းသည္ ေလာကလူသားတုိ႔ သဘာ၀ အေလွ်ာက္ မေကာင္းေသာ္လည္း အနာဂါတ္ ေလွ်ာက္လွမ္းမည့္ မိမိရင္၌ မလြယ္ရ ေသာ္လည္း ဓမၼရင္၌ လြယ္၍ ေမြးေပးရေသာ သားသၼီးအတြက္ ေကာင္းေစဖုိ႔ လုပ္ေဆာင္ခဲ့ျခင္း ျဖစ္သည္။ ထုိေၾကာင့္ မင္းသိဒၶတ္သည္ အေနာ္မာေသာင္ကမ္းမွ ဥရုေ၀လေတာသုိ႔ ထြက္လာခဲ့ျခင္း ျဖစ္သည္။ အျခားတဖက္၌လည္း အုိမင္းတရား၏ ထံသုိ႔ျခင္းကပ္ေနေသာ မင္းတရား သုေဒၶါဒနသည္ သားေတာ္ကုိ မည္သုိ႔ေသာ အေၾကာင္းရာမ်ားျဖင့္ တားစီးခဲ့ေသာ္လည္း တားစီးခြင့္ မရွိေသာေၾကာင့္ သားေတာ္ ေပ်ာက္ျခင္းမလွ ေပ်ာက္သြားေသာေၾကာင့္ ပူေဆြးျခင္း ေသာကေတြ ရင္မွာပုိက္လုိ႔ သား ေတာ္ကုိ ရွာပုံေတာ္ ဖြင့္ခဲ့ရသည္။

သုိ႔ေသာ္ ႏွစ္ေတြအလီလီၾကာ  ေညာင္းေသာ္လည္း သားေတာ္၏ ေျခရာေတာင္ မေတြ႕ခဲ့ရ သျဖင့္ ေ၀ဒနာနဲ႔ ရင္ထုကာ ပူေဆြးျခင္း ၀မ္းနည္းျခင္း ေသာကေတြနဲ႔ စားမ၀င္ အိပ္မေပ်ာ္ခဲ့ေသာ ညတုိင္းလုိ မ်က္ရည္ျဖင့္ ေရႊကုတင္ေပၚမွာ ေမ်ာခဲ့ရသည္။ ႏွစ္ေဟာင္းေတြေျပာင္း ႏွစ္သစ္မွာ ရြက္ သစ္ေ၀ေသာ တစ္ႏွစ္ခရီးသည္ ကုန္ဆုံးခဲ့ရသည္။ ထုိအခ်ိန္မွာ သားေတာ္ မင္းသိဒၶတ္သည္ ဥရု ေ၀လေတာတြင္ ရေသ့ရဟန္းျပဳျပီး၍ ဒုကၠရစရိယ အက်င့္တရားကုိ အားထုတ္ေနျခင္း ျဖစ္သည္။

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The life of Buddha

Before descending to Earth in 563 B.C., Buddha Shakyamuni was born in the Tushita Heaven as Devaputra with great clear mind and profound recollection. Seated on the lion throne, he gave teachings to all the gods. At this time, he heard the celestial sound of the cymbals and the songs of the Buddhas of the three times perfectly invoked, addressing him thus: "In samsara, burning with the fire of emotions, you, great warrior, pervade the clouds. The falling rain of your ambrosia pacifies the afflicting emotions of those who are not gods." Hearing these words, he looked for the five sights - the continent called Jambudvipa; the six cities such as Champaka; the Shakya clan which for seven generations, has not declined through intermarriage; a mother named Mahamaya, who was free from the 32 negative qualities; and a time of the five increasing degenerations in which people suffer greatly and become objects of compassion, for they are difficult to tame, hold wrong views, have a declining life span, are defiled by the five mental poisons, and gain wealth through impure means. Seeing these things, he said to the gods: "I will blow the conch shell of impermanence, beat the gong of emptiness, and roar with the sound of selflessness." He then empowered Maitreya to take his place on the throne, and declared three times to the six realms of the gods that he was descending to this world.



Then he manifested as the precious elephant having an immense, though glorious and gentle, body with six trunks. He was adorned with the golden nets and a beauteous red hat, and gave forth a pleasant odor because of the medical herbs he ate. In the middle of the fifteenth day of the second month at the time of the full moon, when Mahamaya was in retreat, the Lord Buddha entered her womb through the right side. Mahamaya then dreamed that a mountain had become her pillow, that the sun was rising within her body, and that she was giving teachings to many sentient beings. She felt light and at ease. In the months to come, she had many other auspicious dreams, and experienced bliss and freedom from afflicting emotions





After ten months, the moment for giving birth. Mahamaya was passing by the Lumbini Garden when, quick as a flesh of lightening, she grasped a branch of the laksha tree with her right hand. The child emerged from her right side, and Brahma and Indra descended to Earth to make offerings, wrapping him in a pure silk cloth. After the gods and nagas bathed him, the child took seven steps in each of the four directions. He became known as Siddhartha (the fulfiller of wishes) because he revealed many tresures at that time and fulfilled the wishes of his father.

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INDIAN BACKGROUND (2)

Intellectual life centred chiefly in monasteries. But learning and culture seem to have spread even among the masses. The fact that Asoka's Edicts were written not in Sanskrit but in vernacular dialects, on the assumption that the masses would read and understand them, indicates a high standard of literacy among the ordinary people. 

Vincent A. Smith says: "I think it likely that the percentage of literacy among the Buddhist population in Asoka's time was higher than it is now in many provinces in British India."

In Asoka's time there were many large cities in India, each as Pataliputra and Vedisa. Mehasthenes, the Greek ambassador of Seleucus to the Court of Chandragupta, describes Pataliputra as having a wall defended by 570 towers and pierced by a number of gates. 

Around the city was a ditch 600 feet broad and 30 cubits deep. The building of Srinagar in Kashmir and city in Nepal are attributed to Asoka himself. The country was full of great monasteries such as the Asokarama in Pataliputra and stupas such those of Sanchi and Bharhut. 

"The truth is that, so far as Buddhism is concerned, the cult of the relic-stupa was virtually initiated by Asoka." Asoka was not a Buddhist by birth. Although we are not quite certain about the religion of his father and grandfather, we can be sure that they were non-Buddhists. 

A Jain tradition, which is neither corroborated nor contradicted elsewhere, says that his grandfather Chandragupta was or became a Jain, and towards the end of his life abdicated to spend his last days as an ascetic. The Divyavadana records that an Ajivaka saint named Pingalavatsa was invited by King Bundusara in connection with the question of Asoka's succession to the throne.

The Mahavamsa Tika, borrowing from the old Sinhalise commentary on named Janasana was the family-priest of the royal house of Bindusara, and that Janasana was a naked ascetic. We may infer from this that he was a Jain belonging to the Digambara sect.The Mahavamsa- Tika has another reference to this same  Janasana which says that he was the friend and counsellor of Bindusara's queen. 

Both the Samantapasadika and the Mahavamsa agree that Bindusara was of brahmanic faith (Brahman-bhatto), that he entertained brahmins and brahman ascetics of various orders and that Asoka followed his father's practice for three years but that in the fourth year, after his coronation, he became a Buddhist.

The grant by Asoka of certain caves to Ajivikas also indicated that he honoured his ancestral religoin which he himself had followed for a time. Asoka became an upasaka, that is, a lay Buddhist, a few years after his coronation. But for about two or three years he was indifferent to his new faith. 

It was only after he came into close contact with the Sangha, the Order of Buddhist monks, that he became really devoted to Buddhism, and gave himself up to the exercise of piety. The Mahavamsa says that Asoka in early days was known as Candasoka (Asoka the Cruel) because of his atrocities, but that later when he became a pious man he was known as Dhammasoka (Asoka the Pious).

After witnessing that terrible destruction of human life and the enormous suffering involved in the Kalinga war, in the eighth year of his coronation and through the good influence of the Sangha, Asoka became a changed man. This was the turning love of Dhamma, and his preaching of Dharma became intense."

He sheathed his sword never to draw it again for any more conquests, and thence forward he concentrated on moral and spiritual conquest called "Dharmavijaya, which is considered by His Sacred Majesty to be the chief conquest."

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INDIAN BACKGROUND (1)

In order to understand and appreciate the history of early Buddhism in Ceylon we should have, as a background, some general idea of the third century B.C. from where Buddhism came to Ceylon, and also of the pre-Buddhist Ceylon to which it was introduced. 

When the Indian missionaries brought Buddhism to this Island, they carried here with them not only the teaching of the Buddha but also the culture and civilization of Buddhist India. 

Almost all the Buddhist rites, ceremonies, festival and observances of Ceylon were, with slight local changes and modifications, the continuation of Indian practices which the early Buddhist missionaries introduced into this  country. It is necessary therefore at the very beginning to have an idea of the conditions prevalent in India at the time of the advent of Buddhism to Ceylon.

Buddhism began as an intellectual and ethical movement in the sixth century B.C., with the first sermon preached by the  Buddha to the five ascetics at Isipatana near Beneras. 

It spread gradually during the life-time of the Buddha along with the Gangetic valley and found its way into several kingdoms in North India ministers, bankers and wealthy merchents, brahmins and peasants became the followers of this new teaching which was a revolt against some of the accepted theories and practices of the day.

At the tome of the Buddha's death, about 483 B.C almost all the important states in North India seemed to have been deeply influenced by the new teaching. 

According to the Mahaparinibbana-sutta, eight countries claimed, on various grounds, a portion of the ashes of the Buddha- which shows that he had already gained many ardent devotees in these states. 

Yet, there is no evidence to show that the teaching of the Buddha had been adopted as the state religion of any of these kingdoms till long after his death.

Immediately after the Buddha's death, a Council was held at Rajagaha during the rainy season under the patronage of Ajatasattu, king of Magadha, with Maha-Kassapa as its president, the most senior of the disciples of the Buddha then alive. 

Its purpose was to decide and settle the authentic teaching of the Master. The Buddha's immediate disciples, like Ananda and Upali, were the principal protagonists in this great event.

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STEAVEN SEAGAL WHO IS A BUDDHIST AND WHAT IS STEAVEN SEAGAL CALLED A BUDDHIST

LIFE ISN'T THE BEST OR THE WORST!

In an interview with screenwriter Stanley Weiser, the martial arts expert and action film star Seagal speaks about his many years of Buddhist practice and his Buddhist teachers:

Were you introduced to Buddhism as an off-shoot of your martial arts discipline?

Well, to be honest with you I am not sure, I was born with a serious spiritual consciousness and for many years studied different paths. I went to Japan in the late sixties and began Zen sitting. I visited monasteries, studying Buddhism and receiving spiritual instruction. This was the beginning for me, the way I believed it should be --- the development of a physical man through martial arts and polishing the spiritual side simultaneously.

You also studied acupuncture?

Right. That was the way I was originally introduced to Tibetan Buddhism. There was a handful of lamas who had come over from Tibet. They were sick and had been tortured. Because I was studying acupuncture, I was asked to try to look after a couple of them, even though I didn't speak Tibetan. We were able to eventually communicate. I learned a little Tibetan and I became very close with them.

Who was your root guru?

Basically, for me His Holiness Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche was the greatest, and now I have a very strong devotion to Minling Trichen and His Holiness Penor Rinpoche.

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WHEN PSYCHOTHERAPY MEETS BUDDHISM

Psychologist and management guru Dr. Daniel Goleman, Ph.D., is probably American Buddhism's finest journalist, and was nominated twice for the Pilitzer Price. His book Emotional Intelligence in 1995 introduced millions of people the very Buddhist concept that self-awareness and empathy or EQ are essential to success in life. In his latest book, Destructive Emotions: A Scientific Dialogue With The Dalai Lama (Bantam books, 2004), Goleman chronicles a five-day meeting of the minds among Buddhist scholars, cognitive scientists and the Dalai Lama in March 2000 in Dharamsala, India. The following is an extract of an interview Daniel gave to the Scientific Research Society in the US.

How did you become interested in the relation between Buddhist 

and Western approaches to understanding the mind?

Back in the early 1970s, when I was completing my doctorate in psychology at Harvard University, I had a pre-doctoral traveling fellowship (from the Ford Foundation) and then a post-doctoral which gave me the opportunity to spend a total of two years in Asia, particularly India, Sri Lanka and Dharasala (a "little Tibet" in the Himaliyan foothills). While there I began to study the Asian religions as theories of mind. I was surprised to find fully articulated systems of psychology----generally little known-- at the heart of these religions; the most fully articulated was "Abhidhamma:, a Buddhist system of thought.

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RECHARD GERE WHO IS A BUDDHIST

HAPPINESS TO ALL BEINGS

Rechard Gere, an Oscar-winning star, and best known for his performance in Pretty Woman, Runaway bride, and an Officer and a Gentleman, is today considered a serious Buddhist practitioner.

Together with many other well-known Hollywood celebrities such as Harrison Ford, Goldie Hawn, and Kennu Reeves, Gere has been in the forefront to promote Tibetan Buddhism and culture to the West. The following is a short extract of an interview he gave to Rajiv Mehrotra for Indian national television channel Doordarshan:

YOU COME TO INDIA QUITE OFTEN. WHAT BRINGS YOU HERE?

Well, his holiness the Dalai Lama, obviously. I have been his student since 1982-83. Sometimes I come to Dharasala (headquarters of the Tebetan government-in-exile in northern India) twice or thrice a year.

IN WHAT WAY HAS HIS HOLINESS TRANSFORMED YOU?

Most of my teachers are from the Gelupa school of Tibetan Buddhism. There is a lot of work on the mind and intellecture play and exploration of reality itself, using language and pure logic, along with various techniques of meditation. It's a gradual process as the mind is familiarized with another way of seeing things and hopefully, the correct way. So it is a process that takes several lifetimes, but if within a lifetime one can see gradual change.........

You mentioned the Dalai Lama is a remarkable human being. You've spent a lot of time with him as a student. What is the role, the contribution, you believe the Dalai Lama is making?

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JENNIFER LOPEZ WHO IS A BUDDHIST AND DICAPRIO SEEKS SOLACE IN BUDDHISM TOO

London, Oct 9, 2004--- Celebrities seem to have a strange fascination for Buddhism, and this time it is Latino diva jennifer Lopez who is taking up Buddhism.
The 'Wedding Planner' actress was reportedly so impressed by her co-star Richard Gere's dedication to Buddhism that she was inspired to embrace the religion after she had a number of spiritual talks with him, reports the Sun.
Lopez, who is acting with Gere in the movies 'Shall we Dance' says that she is now aware of higher energy, and the fact that it is very important to be a good human being.
"Now I know there's a force in the world. There's an energy that if you put out good and you put out love it comes back to you. That's a basic thing that works for me," the report quoted her as saying.

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