A Clear Guide Through the Buddhist Yanas
A Clear Guide Through the Buddhist Yanas
The practice and its foundations through a Vajrayana lens
The Vajrayana is a fruitional approach, and so its view is very different [from the view of Hinayana and Mahayana Buddhism]. The fruition of the path is not a distant goal that we might achieve at some undefined point in the future. Awakening is who we are right now. So in this approach, the “path,” if you can even call it one, is simply the process of learning to recognize our true nature here in the present moment. The path does not lead to a future fruition. The fruitional state of awakening is the path.
I chose that quote to set the stage for a review of Cortland Dahl’s new book because it illustrates two strengths: It’s written in clear language and explains a complex thought novelly and eloquently. In this case, Vajrayana teachers often express the complex idea in the phrase “swooping from above while climbing from below.” It means you’ve been taught about your Buddha Nature, which is already fully awakened, but you are practicing to more fully realize and rest in it experientially.
The book—A Meditator’s Guide to Buddhism: The Path of Awareness, Compassion, and Wisdom—will be released by Shambhala Publications on September 3. It is available for preorder from Shambhala here and from Amazon here. [Full disclosure: I am a student of Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche. Dahl is a student of Mingyur, a senior instructor, and a co-founder of Tergar International. I have attended some Tergar sessions on Zoom led by Dahl but have never met him in person.]
I asked Shambhala for a review copy of Dahl’s new book because the audience I aim for in From the Pure Land is people with one toe in the water of Buddhism, who I thought might benefit from A Meditator’s Guide. Reading it confirmed that, with a few caveats I’ll add later. Some of its significant strengths:
Refreshingly clear language that avoids some of Buddhism’s jargon.
Direct paths through concepts that seem confusing to some.
Honest personal anecdotes from the heart about Dahl’s struggles along the (pathless) path.
Suggestions of brief meditations for the reader to try that are woven into the text to support the concepts discussed.
Regarding the last bullet point, I’ll confess that I rarely do meditations when I read books with a section of them at the end of each chapter or in an appendix. They seem too much like school assignments. The way Dahl weaved them into the text and kept them brief, I did them. Emaho! (That’s a Tibetan exclamation of joy and amazement.)
As for Dahl’s personal reflections, I’ll choose this one because my experience was similar to his.
When I first encountered Vajrayana Buddhism, I had a very strong negative reaction to all the ritual and exotic imagery, and especially to the idea of having a guru. I was allergic to any whiff of organized religion, especially traditions that seemed to have a strong hierarchy and a lot of what seemed to me to be hollow rituals.
After six or seven years, he realized:
I had erroneously assumed that the relationship between the guru and student was one in which the student gives away all their power. What I completely missed is that the whole point of the teacher/student relationship is to help the student discover their own wisdom and compassion and gain the confidence to fully manifest these qualities in all aspects of their lives.
Is A Meditator’s Guide the perfect book for beginners to dip more fully into the water of Buddhism? If the student wants a broad introduction with explorations of Zen, Pure Land, and other forms of Buddhism available to Westerners, this is not it. Dahl swoops from the above of Vajrayana (Tibetan) Buddhism while climbing through the below of other traditions. I don’t mean that he disrespects them, but rather that he explains them from the mountaintop of Vajrayana.
The Sanskrit term yana is often used in Buddhism to refer to one of the primary vehicles for teaching and practicing Buddhism. Especially among Vajrayana teachers (and this is how Dahl structures his book), the yanas are Hinayana (the foundational vehicle), Mahayana (the greater vehicle), and Vajrayana (the vehicle that emphasizes the buddha nature within all experience).
Dahl calls Hinayana the foundational vehicle, which is fair from a Vajrayana standpoint. The first wave of Buddhism serves as the foundation for what followed. But those teachings are still practiced primarily in Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia, with followers worldwide. The polite name for their practice has become Theravada (school of the elders) because Hinayana literally means a “lesser” vehicle as opposed to the “greater” vehicle of Mahayana.
Even as a Vajrayana practitioner, I’m sometimes uncomfortable using “Hinayana” if it’s unclear that I’m speaking of historic roots rather than current practices. Maybe that’s because, in my early years of practicing Buddhism, I attended a retreat in a Theravada monastery and meditated in several Theravada temples in the United States. Dahl briefly states that “Theravada” is used for modern followers of that path but doesn’t elaborate.
A Meditator’s Guide is an excellent overview of Buddhism for those wanting a Vajrayana perspective, especially those who appreciate clear, modern, and personal writing. For those seeking a much longer and more academic read, there’s the two-book set Indestructible Truth and Secret of the Vaja World by Reginald A Ray. I’d recommend those only after exposure to the basics of Vajrayana Buddhism.
Another excellent introductory book by a Vajrayana teacher is Awakening the Buddha Within by Lama Surya Das (another teacher of mine). It is also written from a personal perspective and includes more about other Buddhist schools than Dahl’s book does. It was published in 1997, which may not make it outdated considering the long history of Buddhism, but it may matter to some.
If you’re ready for a college-level course or two on Vajrayana, Ray’s books would be my strong recommendation. I’d recommend Dahl’s book for those wanting to understand the essence of Vajrayana and its development. I’d recommend Surya’s for those wanting a broader view of Buddhism.
Now, a quibble for writing nerds.
Dahl’s description of Siddhartha Gautama’s early life was strikingly different from how he portrayed the Buddha’s life later. In the first part, Dahl used a style I’ve disliked intensely since the newspaper column I read on the day after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. That column (paraphrasing from memory) included phrases like:
King walked to the bathroom sink in his room in the Lorraine Motel to shave. The water he splashed on his face felt cool in the Memphis heat.
You get the idea. This is from Dahl’s book:
Siddhartha desperately wanted that sense of being at home in his life and in the world, but everywhere he looked, all he saw was suffering.
Later, with the Buddha sitting under the Bodhi tree, Dahl switches to:
We will never know for sure what he really experienced that night.
In this section, Dahl uses phrases like “According to legend…” Maybe this is more than a wording quibble because almost all we understand about the Buddha’s life is in stories and legends. I amplified on that here.
I’ll close with a single sentence about Dahl, which may be the only personal background needed for this review. After spending almost a decade in Asia, becoming fluent in Tibetan, and earning a master’s degree in Buddhist studies, he returned to the United States, where he received a Ph.D. in mind, brain, and contemplative science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Emaho!
From the Pure Land is read by subscribers in 22 US states and eight countries.
If you have found this blog post helpful, whatever your religious path, please share it with your friends.
All subscribers, free or paid, get the same From the Pure Land content. Paying for your subscription is a way of supporting my work. From now until the U.S. Labor Day on September 2, paid subscriptions are discounted by 40% for the first year. So they’re $3 a month or $30 a year. Click here or on the button below to make sure you get the reduced rate. After a year, if you don’t end your subscription, it will renew at the $5 or $50 rate. But you get the reduced rate for your first year only if you subscribe by September 2.
Whatever you decide, you’re supporting my work simply by reading it.