Product Description

Dzongsar Khyentse is one of the most creative and innovative young Tibetan Buddhist lamas teaching today. The director of two feature films with Buddhist themes (the international sensation The Cup and Travelers and Magicians), this provocative teacher, artist, and poet is widely known and admired by Western Buddhists. Moving away from conventional presentations of Buddhist teachings, Khyentse challenges readers to make sure they know what they’re talking about before they claim to be Buddhist. With wit and irony, Khyentse urges readers to move beyond the superficial trappings of Buddhism—beyond a romance with beads, incense, and exotic people in robes—straight to the heart of what the Buddha taught. In essence, this book explains what a Buddhist really is, namely, someone who deeply understands the truth of impermanence and how our emotions can trap us in cycles of suffering. Khyentse presents the fundamental tenets of Buddhism in simple language, using examples we can all relate to.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #80833 in Books
• Published on: 2006-12-05
• Released on: 2006-12-05
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 128 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Here at last is a crisp new voice in Tibetan Buddhism. Khyentse, a lama from an influential family and Buddhist lineage in Bhutan, is also a filmmaker, responsible for the sleeper hit The Cup, about a group of Tibetan monks obsessed with soccer. The monk brings the same multicultural fluency to his first book. He can make references to Viagra and Camilla Parker-Bowles as easily as he can tell stories of the Buddha's life. With confidence tempered by wit, he cuts to the core of Buddhism: four "seals"—truths—that make up a Buddhist "right view" of the world and existence. This book is not, repeat not, about meditation. Instead, it looks at everyday life through a Buddhist lens, understanding happiness and suffering from that perspective. Enlightenment ends suffering but also trumps happiness. Khyentse writes persuasively about the importance of understanding emptiness: disappointment lessens, expectations soften, and change is not a shock. There is much food for thought in this short book for Buddhist students and for anyone interested in the ongoing adaptation of traditional Eastern wisdom into postmodern Western settings. "You can change the cup," Khyentse writes, "but the tea remains pure." (Jan. 9)
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Review
"Here at last is a crisp new voice in Tibetan Buddhism. . . . There is much food for thought in this short book for Buddhist students and for anyone interested in the ongoing adaptation of traditional Eastern wisdom into postmodern Western settings."—Publishers Weekly

"A pleasant refresher or an excellent introduction to Buddhism, even for those who choose not to be Buddhists."—New Age Retailer

About the Author
Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse (Khyentse Norbu) is a Tibetan Buddhist lama who travels and teaches internationally and is also an award-winning filmmaker. He is the abbot of several monasteries in Asia and the spiritual director of meditation centers in Vancouver, San Francisco, Sydney, Hong Kong, and Taipei. He is also head of a Buddhist organization called Siddhartha’s Intent.

Customer Reviews

Pessimism or Buddhism ?
I seriously could not finish this book. I gave 2 stars because there is some Buddhist content in this book.

I have been studying Buddhism for over 5 years and I have never read something so judgmental and cynical in my life. The interpretation of Buddhism by Dzongsar is as pestering as an unhappy wife.

I am sure that some readers would love to read on "how tragic life is" and "how the world is doomed". But if you want to do that, just turn the TV in CNN and you might get information without personal opinions.
This book is purely opinion based, rarely his statements are supported by facts or Buddhism history.

He nags about American culture, Confucius and even Theodore Roosevelt. But he does tell the story of our prince Siddhartha.

Here are some of his "delightful words"

"This planet earth that you are sitting on right now as you read this book will eventually become as lifeless as mars- if it`s not shattered by a meteor first."
( uau, I hope I can live until tomorrow)

"Your sweet little -behaved kids can grow up into cocaine-snorting thugs who bring home all kinds of lovers. The straightest parents in the world produce some of the most flamboyant homosexuals, just as some of the most laid-back hippies end up with neoconservative children."
( humnn...so let us all give up in trying to educate our children and just hand them some white powder . "flamboyant homosexuals"? A little Prejudice there Dzongsar?)
Buddhism is about contentment, acceptance, awareness and compassion.


If you want to read about that try Thich Nhat Hanh and our Holiness Dalai Lama books. These are truly Faithfull to Buddhism concepts and easy language.
If you are a mother try Sarah Napthali, she is amazing and enthusiastic. Good peaceful literature for mothers.

Wonderful introduction to Buddhism
"Consider generosity. When we begin to realize the first truth" (impermanence), "we see everything as transitory and without value, as if it belonged in a Salvation Army bag. We don't have to necessarily give it all away, but we have no clinging to it. When we see that our possessions are all impermament compounded phenomena, that we can't cling to them forever, generosity is already practically accomplished."
Thus we begin a journey into the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama, who was born in the city of Lumbini and was raised in Kapilavastu.

Born a prince, his father, King Suddhodana, was said to have been visited by a wise man shortly after Siddhartha was born. The wise man said that Siddhartha would either become a great king (chakravartin) or a holy man (Sadhu). Determined to make Siddhartha a king, the father tried to shield his son from the unpleasant realities of daily life. Despite his father's efforts, at the age of 29, he discovered the suffering of his people, first through an encounter with an elderly man. On subsequent trips outside the palace, he encountered various sufferings such as a diseased man, a decaying corpse, and a monk or an ascetic. These are often termed 'The Four Sights.'

Gautama was deeply depressed by these four sights and sought to overcome old age, illness, and death by living the life of an ascetic. Gautama escaped his palace, leaving behind this royal life to become a mendicant. For a time on his spiritual quest, Buddha "experimented with extreme asceticism, which at that time was seen as a powerful spiritual practice...such as fasting, holding the breath, and exposure of the body to pain...he found, however, that these ascetic practices brought no genuine spiritual benefits and in fact, being based on self-hatred, that they were counterproductive."

After abandoning asceticism and concentrating instead upon meditation and, according to some sources, Anapanasati (awareness of breathing in and out), Gautama is said to have discovered what Buddhists call the Middle Way--a path of moderation that lies mid-way between the extremes of self-indulgence and self-mortification. He accepted a little milk and rice pudding from a village girl and then, sitting under a pipal tree or Sacred fig (Ficus religiosa), also known as the Bodhi tree, in Bodh Gaya, he vowed never to arise until he had found the Truth. His five companions, believing that he had abandoned his search and become undisciplined, left. After 49 days meditating, at the age of 35, he attained bodhi, also known as "Awakening" or "Enlightenment." After his attainment of bodhi he was known as Buddha or Gautama Buddha and spent the rest of his life teaching his insights (Dharma). According to scholars, he lived around the fifth century BCE, but his more exact birthdate is open to debate. He died at the age of 80 in Kushinagara (Pali Kusinara) (India)

From these facts, a little book by master Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse is born out of his frustration that Siddhartha's teachings have not caught on enough to his liking.

He goes through the basic concepts of Buddhism in a relevant way, easy to read, and entertaining tale. This book is a jewel for anyone who is interested in Buddhism.

the Camille Paglia of Buddhism...
Khyentse obviously wrote this book to provoke and challenge, first and foremost. It is not meant to be some kind of systematic treatise or scholarly work, though he is a fully qualified and widely respected scholar of Buddhism. There is a deliberate attempt to be almost confrontational and certainly controversial, which the reader should bear in mind so as not to take the entire book at face value.

One of the things that quickly jumps out at you is how Khyentse employs tons of contemporary cultural and political references...some of which work while others fall flat into the realm of flakiness and rambling and name-dropping.

Overall I found this to be a fairly useful and entertaining book, though it would probably be most suitable for someone who's just starting down the path, a neophyte who wants to get a basic grounding. Or, someone who's been on the path for quite a while but perhaps could use a little shaking up if they've gotten too caught up in the traps of Buddhist institutionalism, traditionalism and formalism---someone who's lost sight of the forest for the trees.