Search results for ""Author Elizabeth J Harris""

In Buddhism in Five Minutes, academic specialists offer answers to 75 questions about Buddhism that people curious about Buddhism might ask. The questions cover the Buddha, what the Buddha taught, Buddhist monasticism and the role of lay people, the historical development of Buddhism, Buddhist art, Buddhist ethics, Buddhist responses to other religions, and Buddhist thought on contemporary issues. They include: Who is the fat Buddha figure? Can we know what the historical Buddha taught? What is Nirvāṇa? Why do Buddhists meditate? Does Buddhism support gender equality? What is Zen Buddhism? Are Buddhists pacifist? What do Buddhists think about those who are LGBTQI? Are alcohol and drugs ever acceptable to Buddhists? How do Buddhists view Artificial Intelligence? Taken together the questions cover most aspects of Buddhist belief and practice in the contemporary world. The collection is sponsored by the UK Association for Buddhist Studies but contributors are drawn from Asia, North America and Latin America, as well as Europe. The questions are answered in accessible, non-specialist language without too many footnotes. Each should take not much more than five minutes to read.

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This volume discusses contemporary Buddhist responses to religious diversity from Theravadin and Tibetan Buddhist perspectives. Buddhist attitudes toward other religious traditions (and its own) are unquestionably diverse, and have undergone changes throughout historical eras and geographic spaces, as Buddhists, and traditions Buddhists have encountered, continue to change (after all, all conditioned things are impermanent). The present time is a particularly dynamic moment to take stock of Buddhist attitudes toward religious others, as Buddhist identities are being renegotiated in unprecedented ways in our increasingly globalized age. Is it true that Buddhists are tolerant of other religions? To what extent are Buddhists tolerant? Is nirvana held to be attainable through Buddhism alone? If so, through which Buddhist tradition? This volume approaches these questions and others from perspectives representing Theravadin and Tibetan traditions of Buddhism. The chapters herein bring together a spectrum of views that are not often found side-by-side in a single volume or in a meaningful dialogue with each other, needless to mention with other religions. This volume seeks to remedy this situation, and break new ground to enable further dialogue, understanding, and constructive encounters across Buddhist traditions and between other religious traditions and Buddhists.

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