Syllabus
THE SYLLABUS OF THE COURSE 1. 3.10. The Buddha in Theravada teachings 2. 10.10. The Buddha in Theravada teachings 3. 17.10. Sangha - the Theravada monastic community 4. 7.11. Questions and answers session by Bhikkhuni Visuddhi (a Theravada Buddhist nun) 5. - 6. 10.11. - 12.11. Weekend excursion to a Theravada Buddhist monastery in Prostějov 7. 14.11. Theravada literature and languages 8. 21.11. Dhamma in literature and daily practice 9. 28.11. Lecture on Buddhism in India by Heinz Werner Wessler (a German indologist from Uppsala) 10. 5.12. Theravada meditation in the oldest texts and in present 11. 12.12. Modern developments in Theravada Buddhism; Modern Theravada teachers 12. 19.12. The genesis of the concept of religion, Buddhism and Theravada Buddhism
Selected literature:
Tipitaka and Visuddhimagga
Bodhi, Bhikkhu (ed.). Abhidhammattha Sangaha: a comprehensive manual of Abhidhamma. Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society, 2010, 1st edition 1993.
Bodhi, Bhikkhu. Introduction in Numerical Discourses of the Buddha: an anthology of the suttas from the Aṅguttara-Nikāya, transl. Nyanaponika and Bhikkhu Bodhi. Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society, 1999.
Bodhi, Bhikkhu. The Connected Discourses of the Buddha. A New Translation of the Samyutta Nikāya. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2000. 2074 p. ISBN 0-86171- 168-8.
Bodhi, Bhikkhu. The Numerical Discourses of the Buddha. A Complete Translation of the Aṅguttara Nikāya. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2012. ISBN 978-1- 61429-040- 7.
Buddgosa. Visuddhimagga. The Path of Purification. 4th edition, 2010. Transl. Bhikkhu Ñānamoli. Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society, c1975, 1st edition 1956 by Ananda Semage, Colombo. 794 p. ISBN 978-955- 24-0023- 6.
Ñānamoli, Bhikkhu, Bhikkhu Bodhi. The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha. A Translation of the Majjhima Nikāya. 4th edition, 2009. Boston: Wisdom Publications, c1995. 1420 p. ISBN 0-86171- 072-X.
Rhys Davids, T. W., William Stede (eds.). The Pali Text Society´s Pali-English Dictionary. Oxford: The Pali Text Society, 2004. 738 p. ISBN 0-86013- 059-2.
Walshe, Maurice. The Long Discourses of the Buddha. A Translation of the Dīgha Nikāya. Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society, 1996, c1995 by Wisdom Publications. 648 p. ISBN 955-24- 0154-2.
Online available at www.accesstoinsight.org
Secondary literature
(books of particular importance for this course are marked in bold; please borrow Kate Crosby (2014) from the library or find it elsewhere)
Almond, Philip C. The British Discovery of Buddhism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006, 1st edition 1988. 186 p. ISBN 978-0- 521-3385- 5.
Asad, Talal. Genealogies of Religion. Discipline and Reasons of Power in Christianity and
Bechert, Heinz. Buddhism, Staat und Gesellschaft in den Ländern des Theravada Buddhismus. Schriften des Instituts für Asienkunde in Hamburg, Vol. 1, 1966.
Carrithers, Michael. The Forest Monks of Sri Lanka: An Anthropological and Historical Study. Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1983. 306 p. ISBN 978-0- 19-561389- 6.
Conze, Edward. Buddhist Meditation. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1956. 183 p.
Crosby, Kate. Theravada Buddhism: Continuity, Diversity, and Identity, Wiley-Blackwell, 2014.
Fitzgerald, Timothy. Discourse on Civility and Barbarity. A Critical History of Religion and Related Categories. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. 354 p. ISNB 978-0- 19-975460- 1.
Fitzgerald, Timothy. The Ideology of Religious Studies. New York, Oxford: Oxford.
Gethin, Rupert. On the Practice of Buddhist Meditation According to the Pali Nikāyas and Exegetical Sources. Buddhismus in Geschichte und Gegenwart, Vol. 10, 2004. Pp. 17-37.
Gethin, Rupert. The Buddhist Path to Awakening. Oxford: R. M. L. Gethin, 2007. Previously published by E. J. Brill. 382 p. ISNB 1-85168- 285-6.
Gombrich, Richard F. How Buddhism Began. The Conditioned Genesis of the Early Teachings. London: Athlone, 1996. 180 p. ISBN 0-415- 37123-6.
Gombrich, Richard F. Precept and Practice: Traditional Buddhism in the Rural Highlands of Ceylon. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1971. 427 p. ISBN 978-0- 19-826525- 2.
Gombrich, Richard F. Buddhism in the modern world: secularization or protestantization? In Barker, E., J. A. Beckford and K. Dobbelaere (eds.). Secularization, rationalism and sectarianism. Essays in honour of Bryan R. Wilson. Oxford, 1993, pp. 59-79.
Gombrich, Richard F. and Gananath Obeyesekere. Buddhism Transformed: Religious Change in Sri Lanka. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988. 484 p. ISBN 81-208- 0287-x.
Gombrich, Richard F. From Monastery to Meditation Centre: Lay Meditation in Modern Sri Lanka. In Buddhist Studies: Ancient and Modern (Collected Papers on South Asia, No. 4), ed. Philip Denwood and Alexander Piatigorsky, 1983, pp. 20-34.
Gombrich, Richard F. Theravāda Buddhism. A Social History from Ancient Benares to Modern Colombo, London and New York: Routledge, 1996.
Gunaratana, Henepola, The Path of Serenity and Insight, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers Private Limited, 1994.
Griffiths, Paul. Concentration or Insight: The Problematic of Theravāda Buddhist Meditation-Theory. Journal of the American Academy of Religion, Vol. 49, No. 4, 1981, pp. 605-624.
Halbfass, Wilhelm. India and Europe. An Essay in Understanding. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1988. 449 p. ISBN 0-88706- 794-8.
King, Richard. Orientalism and Religion. Postcolonial Theory, India and “The Mystic East”. London and New York: Routledge, 1999. 283 p. ISBN 978-0- 415-20258- 9.
Kornfield, Jack. Modern Buddhist Masters. Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society, 2007, c1977 by Unity Press. 325 p. ISBN 978-955- 24-0042- 1.
Lopez, Donald S. Curators of the Buddha. The Study of Buddhism under Colonialism. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1995. 298 p. ISBN: 0-226- 49309-1.
Masuzawa, Tomoko. The Invention of World Religions. Or, How European Universalism Was Preserved in the Language of Pluralism. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2005. 359 p. ISBN 0-226- 50989-3.
Matsudo, Yukio. Protestant Character of Modern Buddhist Movements. Buddhist-Christian Studies, Vol. 20, 2000, pp. 59-69.
McMahan, David L. The Making of Buddhist Modernism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. 299 p. ISBN 978-0-19-518327- 6.
Neubert, Frank. Ritualdiskurs, Ritualkritik and Meditationspraxis: Das Beispiel von Vipassanā nach S. N. Goenka im “Westen”. Numen, Vol. 55, 2008, pp. 411-439.
Nyanaponika Thera. The Heart of Buddhist Meditation. A Handbook of Mental Training based on the Buddha´s way of mindfulness. Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society, 1998, 1st edition 1962. 250 p. ISBN 955-24- 0100-3.
Oosterwijk, R. C. van. Doctrinal Backgrounds of Vipassanā-meditation. Insight in current methods and according to canonical sources. Groningen: Barkhuis, 2012. 161 p. ISBN 978-9491431098.
Paravahera Vajirañāna Mahāthera. Buddhist Meditation in Theory and Practice. Kuala Lumpur: Buddhist Missionary Society, 1987, 1st edition 1962. 496 p. ISBN 967-9920- 41-0.
Pranke, Patrick. On saints and wizards. Ideals of human perfection and power in contemporary
Annotation
The aim of the course is to give introduction to Theravada Buddhist histories, literatures, teachings, ritual and soteriological practices and social organizations. The students will get acquainted with the most important concepts of Theravada Buddhism and learn about the lived practices of the different „Theravada“ cultures.
The course starts with the discussion of the concepts of Buddhism and Theravada and continues with the introduction of the Three Jewels in the texts and practices of Sri Lanka and mainland Southeast Asia. Special attention will be given to meditation and lived religion.
The lectures will be accompanied by audiovisual material. Two guest lecturers, a Buddhist nun and a specialist on Buddhism in India, will visit the course.