Sunday, February 05, 2006

Same questions, different answers.

Same questions, different answers.

Back in the '70's, a group of Western teachers, mostly from IMS, compiled a list of ten questions that they intended to put to several pre-selected Oriental teachers of note. They fully expected to get different answers to each question, and at the end of their tour collated the data and published the results. The title of the book was something like "Living Mediation Masters" and the editor may have been Jack Kornfeld. As soon as I get the details right, I'll confirm or amend this accordingly.

The point of this piece being, that each practitioner finds his own path, and consequently comes to teach a different - his own - view of the 'Dhamma'.

It is quite traditional for individual students to then search for the teacher who's Dhamma is most in accord with their own Kammic predisposition, having first served an initial training - apprenticeship - period of five years with their local teacher.

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