A Modern Buddhist Bible: Essential Readings from East and West
Prolific Tibetan Buddhist scholar Lopez wonderfully advances his argument for framing a contemporary understanding of Buddhism that is rooted in history and pays attention to texts as well as practice. This "Bible" is a selection of 20th-century texts that have shaped modern Western-American Buddhism, which Lopez considers a sect in the same way that Thai or Tibetan Buddhism is a sect. The author of Prisoners of Shangri-La: Tibetan Buddhism and the West assembles a canon for modern Buddhism, noting the interconnection of influential figures who form a kind of Buddhist lineage. The cast of characters includes some surprises, such as Theosophist Helena Blavatsky, as well as such usual suspects as Paul Carus, Alan Watts and W.Y. Evans-Wentz, who made The Tibetan Book of the Dead an accessible text. The selections are themselves diverse. The earlier 20th century writers provide fascinating views of the beginnings of the modern Asian-Western encounter of belief systems in the context of evolving postcolonial political awareness. An astute essay by Watts from 1959 on "Beat Zen, Square Zen and Zen" might be worth the price of the book. Poems written by Allen Ginsberg about the death of maverick Tibetan Buddhist guru Trungpa Rinpoche simply resonate. The book is a great contribution to bridging the gap between the text-and-language camp of academic Buddhists and the practice, practice, practice camp of modern Buddhist adepts.Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.