Path Press

NEW: ‘Nanavira Hamuduru’ – Short Documentary about his life and work

pathpress — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 07:49:21 +0000

British Buddhist monk, Ven. Ñanavira Thera ordained in Ceylon shortly after WWII and lived as a hermit on the outskirts of a remote village, Bundala, until his suicide in 1965. His complex and innovative writings remain largely unknown – in part because of his suicide, but also due to the challenging and unorthodox nature of his work. The film explores Ven. Ñanavira’s biography, writings, and the questions around monastic suicide.

Here is available only the low quality of the original. Also we cut out 30sec. long clip from Maugham’s radio play “The Question of Retreat” due to copyright restrictions.

Part One

Part Two

Reviews

Ven. Nanavira – the scholar monk, the suicide and the film
by Nan, The Island, July 23, 2011

Suicide by the terminally ill
by Nan, The Island, July 30, 2011

Ven. Ñāṇavīra: The Film
By Bhikkhu Yogananda, Nidahas, August 3, 2011

eBook: The Tragic, the Comic & the Personal (BPS)

pathpress — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 11:48:28 +0000

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EPUB MOBI

NEW: Path Press Archive

pathpress — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 12:21:50 +0000

We opened an archive space at Issuu for Path Press files which have been already published on our websites and those interesting materials which have been posted at Akalika Forum, and also to archive many other papers which have never been shared before. So, keep visiting us and we hope you will find those files interesting and beneficial in your practice. Click bellow and see for yourself:

issuu.com/pathpressarchive

Akalika Forum is still in process of converting relevant files into PDFs so that at the end of the year we can completely delete the forum. How in future to communicate with us and friends please read Networks.

Networks

pathpress — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 14:17:34 +0000

Dear friends,

The Akalika Forum is currently in process of archiving some relevant and interesting posts which have been published at Akalika Forum and we file them into Path Press archive. These materials and many other are going to be archived at http://issuu.com. When it is ready for the public we will inform you.

We also connect together our website pathpress.org with facebook (/path.press) and Twitter (@pathpress). This means that the same message is going to be displayed on these social networks and on the left sidebar of Path Press website at the same time. So, you have few options to choose how to be connected with Path Press.

For those who will miss the discussions of forums now they can choose any of many alternative ways how to connect with others. Discussions can be posted on the main Path Press website, facebook, twitter, google+, and also at forthcoming issuu archive space (where you can leave a comments on articles and books).

I hope that all these services will replace forum without great inconveniences. If you have any further feedback, please do let us know.

With best wishes,

Bhikkhu Nyanasuci

eBook: Collected Essays of Samanera Bodhesako

pathpress — Sat, 19 Nov 2011 12:00:25 +0000

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EPUB MOBI

Ven. Ñānavīra: The Film

pathpress — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 15:42:40 +0000

by Bhikkhu Yogananda

My friend Tom Rosenberg sent me a copy of his film Ñāṇavīra Hamuduru. It’s a labour of love and a fitting tribute to a monk who has influenced many of us in the way we approach the Buddha’s teaching. I’m glad that the film seems to have triggered an interest among Colombo Buddhists when it was screened on July 18, and I hope that it could eventually be made available for free online viewing.

The Island reviewer of the film, though clearly being sympathetic, seems to be fascinated with the suicide rather than Ven. Ñāṇavīra Thera’s writings. According to the article, “[m]uch more controversial to the interested and sympathetic person is Nanavira Thera’s suicide, more than his unique interpretation and exposition of the Dhamma”. The reviewer admits to being “sadly ignorant of his views on the Teachings having not read a single of his books but feeling real karuna at his suffering physically, emotionally and mentally”.

This line of thinking seems to have prevented many Buddhists from making use of Ven. Ñāṇavīra Thera’s writings meaningfully. To quote Dr. John Stella:

Critics have been appalled by the correspondence with his physician and his publisher wherein he contemplates putting an end to his life. They have used it as a weapon to attack him personally and to discredit his Notes on Dhamma. Supposedly, one who could commit such a desperate act was surely non compos mentis and could not possibly perceive the Dhamma correctly: those ‘morbid’ thoughts prove his ideas are flawed, or worse, deluded. But such specious reasoning should really be an object of satire. Had Shakespeare taken his life, would his plays be a whit less meaningful? Should we dismiss the dialogues of Socrates because he drank poison? And what about the arahants mentioned in the Suttas who ‘used the knife’? Did they not comprehend the Buddha’s Teaching?

Clearly, the real question is whether Ven. Ñāṇavīra’s ideas on Dhamma hold up to scrutiny. It is a pity to spend even a few words refuting ad hominem arguments, but as he would say, although the ‘seasoned thinker’ will be wise to them, they could deceive readers unacquainted with logical fallacies.

Apparently the notice sent out announcing the screenings said: “This film looks at the issue of monastic suicide within the context of Ñāṇavīra Thera’s commitment to practicing the Buddhist Dhamma.” I believe what one considers more important here — the suicide or the commitment to practice (and the resultant writings) — is an indication of how serious a person is about the Buddha’s teachings.

The film itself does not go into the details of Ven. Ñāṇavīra Thera’s interpretation. It is no doubt difficult for a 20-minute biographical documentary to adequately cover such a complex topic. Yet it did include a good overview featuring one of my favourite Ñāṇavīra quotes:

Only in a vertical view, straight down into the abyss of his own personal existence, is a man capable of apprehending the perilous insecurity of his situation; and only a man who does apprehend this is prepared to listen to the Buddha’s Teaching.

I was a little disappointed then that the experts interviewed for the film failed to discuss this most important point. Neither Prof. Asanga Tilakaratne nor Mr. Bogoda Premaratne found it worthwhile to say that Ven. Ñāṇavīra Thera’s biggest contribution was pointing out that the Buddha’s teaching needs to be applied subjectively; that it has litle to do with an objective world. In Dr. Stella’s words:

Heavily reliant on twentieth-century Western philosophy and literature, [Notes on Dhamma] boldly introduces existentialist ideas into the Canon, and the meaning to be deduced from it becomes readily apparent. Ven. Ñāṇavīra quickly cautions us that the Existentialists are in no wise a substitute for the Buddha, for whatever their merits, they found ‘No Exit’ to the dilemmas they posed and consequently remained puthujjanas. Nevertheless, he learned from them that one must take a ‘vertical view, straight down into the abyss of his own personal existence’ in order to progress in the Dhamma. He relentlessly asserts that meaning of the Canon relates to me, to my problems, my frustrations, my sorrows, and their resolution—and nothing else. He regarded the ‘horizontal’ or impartial view, so often taken by post-canonical texts, as a kaṇha dhamma: a ‘dark teaching’, not leading to awakening, or to borrow an existentialist idiom, yet another act of ‘bad faith’.

I find this to be the least understood aspect of Ven. Ñāṇavīra Thera’s writings, probably because it is incredibly difficult to change one’s perspective as required, especially if one is entrenched in the traditional interpretation. But without getting this right, I do not see how one can understand or appreciate Notes on Dhamma. Subjectivity is fundamental to the ‘Ñāṇavīrist’ interpretation. Incidentally, this is something ignored by Mr. Bogoda Premaratne in his Sinhala ‘translations’ of Ven. Ñāṇavīra Thera too, thus sadly misrepresenting him.

Though I no longer consider myself a ‘Ñāṇavīrist’, I would always be grateful to Ven. Ñāṇavīra Thera for pointing out this extremely important characteristic of the Buddha’s teachings. I deeply admire him for being such a committed practitioner for whom the Dhamma was the ‘only thing to be taken seriously’. Tom Rosenberg’s film is a beautiful introduction to the life and works of this often misunderstood monastic rebel who has inspired many of us to question the tradition and our own commitment to the Dhamma.

(Source: http://nidahas.com/2011/08/nanavira-film/)

Ven. Nanavira – the scholar monk, the suicide and the film

pathpress — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 06:46:34 +0000

Sunday Island – July 23, 2011, 4:49 pm
Sunday Island – July 30, 2011, 4:57 pm

‘Clearing the Path’ and ‘Seeking the Path’ are now available!

pathpress — Tue, 17 May 2011 07:09:20 +0000

Path Press Publications published two volumes of Collected Writings of Ñānavīra Thera: the first one is revised edition of one of the Buddhist classics, Clearing the Path, and in the second are early writings – which had never been published before – collected into a book Seeking the Path. Both books are quite voluminous, each containing over 600 pages and covered by hard black cover with nicely designed jacket. The books are prepared and printed professionally in Netherlands, and we can guarantee its perfection in texts and layout.

Ven. Ñānavīra Thera’s writings fall into two periods: from 1950 until 1960 (which are included in Seeking the Path), and from 1960 until 1965 (included in Clearing the Path). The early texts show a man who, in his own thinking and discussion with others, earnestly searches a way to approach the essence of the Buddha’s Teaching by repeated trial-and-error. This search has finally yielded its fruit when, though suffering from amoebiasis (or colitis, i.e. small perforations to the colon), Ñānavīra Thera apparently attained sotāpatti, or Stream-entry, on 26.vi.1959. The one who has ‘entered the stream’ has ipso facto abandoned personality-view (sakkaya-ditthi), which is the self-view implicit in the experience of an ordinary worldling not free from ignorance, and understood the essential meaning of the Buddha’s teaching on the Four Noble Truths. Ñānavīra Thera’s writings after 1960 (Clearing the Path) express this very kind of certainty: no more wandering in the dark, no more doubt or speculative guessing.

Clearing the Path
(1960-1965)

Clearing the Path contains the text of Ñānavīra’s revised Notes on Dhamma (1960-1965) together with 161 letters of varying lengths written by Ñānavīra to twelve correspondents, which serve (as the author himself stated) as a commentary on the Notes. The texts are scrupulously edited, extensively annotated and cross-referenced by means of a comprehensive index.

isbn: 987 94 6090 004 4
640 p.
€ 35,00

http://pathpresspublications.com/en/page/books/detail/2/Clearing_the_Path

More information

Notes on Dhamma has been variously described as ‘arrogant, scathing, and condescending’, as ‘a fantastic system’, and as ‘the best and most important book on Buddhism ever written by a Westerner’. Ñānavīra Thera himself remarked of the book that ‘it is vain to hope that it is going to win general approval … but I do allow myself to hope that a few individuals … will have private transformations of their way of thinking as a result of reading [the Notes]’.

And indeed, the influence of Notes on Dhamma on Buddhist thinkers continues to increase more than a quarter of a century after its publication. Inasmuch as the first edition, long out of print, consisted of only 250 copies, how is it that this book has aroused such extraordinary interest and controversy? The answer, it seems, is to be discovered not only in the specific content of the Notes but in their general attitude, their view and direction. In describing that attitude their author wrote of the Notes that they ‘attempt to provide an intellectual basis for the understanding of the Suttas (the Buddhist texts) without abandoning saddha (faith)’; that they ‘have been written with the purpose of clearing away a mass of dead matter which is choking the Suttas’; and that, above all, ‘the Notes are designed to be an invitation to the reader to come and share the author’s point of view’.

That point of view—achieved by Ñānavīra through dedicated self-investigation using the Buddha’s Teaching as a guide—is described unflinchingly in the Notes, which assume that ‘the reader’s sole interest in the Pali Suttas is a concern for his own welfare’. However, the Notes, with their admitted intellectual and conceptual difficulties, are not the only way to discuss right view or to offer right view guidance. The letters which are collected here are not only ‘something of a commentary on the Notes’; they are, independently, a lucid discussion of how an individual

concerned fundamentally with self-disclosure deals with the dilemma of finding himself in an intolerable situation, where the least undesirable alternative is suicide.

With openness, calmness, grace, and considerable wit, the Ven. Ñānavīra discusses with his correspondents the illnesses that plague him and what he can and cannot do about them, and about his own existence. His life as a Buddhist monk in a remote jungle abode in not incidental to the philosophy he expounds: the two are different aspects of the same thing, namely a vision that penetrates into the human situation both as universal and particular, and recognizes that it is this situation which is the business of each of us to resolve for ourselves. In presenting this view the Ven. Ñānavīra offers a contemporary exposition of the Teaching of the Buddha. In living this view he evokes a dramatic situation wherein an individual resolutely faces those questions which every lucid person must eventually face.

(You can order Notes on Dhamma also as an independent copy. More more information see here)

Seeking the Path Early Writings
(1954-1960) & Marginalia

Seeking the Path consists of Ñānavīra’s extensive correspondence with Ñaṇamoli Thera from 1954-1959. These letters shed considerable light on the relations between the two men and provide a wealth of material on the formation of Ñānavīra’s thought prior to his ‘stream entry’. The remainder of the volume includes two early essays (Nibbana and Anatta and Sketch for a Proof of Rebirth) as well as notes from a Commonplace Book and Marginalia from books owned by Ñānavīra.

isbn: 987 94 6090 003 7
688 p.
€ 35,00

http://pathpresspublications.com/en/page/books/detail/3/Seeking_the_Path

More information

Before use is made of Seeking the Path – Early Writings of Ñānavīra Thera (1954-1960), the reader should be familiar with Clearing the Path – Writings of Ñānavīra Thera (1960-1965), to which the present volume serves as a supplement.

The main portion of the Early Writings consists of letters written to the late Ñanamoli Thera, where the two English monks explored many modes of Western thought (including quantum mechanics). This correspondence lasted until 1960, the year of Ñanamoli Thera’s death. Gradually they discovered that the Western thinkers most relevant to their interests were those from the closely allied schools of phenomenology and existentialism, to whom they found themselves indebted for clearing away a lot of mistaken notions with which they had burdened themselves. These letters make clear the nature of that debt; they also make clear the limitations which Ñānavīra Thera recognized in those thinkers. He insists upon the fact that while for certain individuals their value may be great, eventually one must go beyond them if one is to arrive at the essence of the Buddha’s Teaching. Existentialism, then, is in his view an approach to the Buddha’s Teaching and not a substitute for it.

In the first part of the book (A), along with the letters, which were preserved by the recipient, were found draft copies of some of the replies which were sent to Ñānavīra Thera. A few letters written to Ñānavīra Thera’s chief supporters, Mr. and Mrs. Perera, and to his family are also included. In the second part of the book (B) are two published essays: ‘Nibbana and Anatta’ and ‘Sketch for a Proof of Rebirth’ in abbreviated form. In the end there are also the contents of the author’s Commonplace Book, Marginalia and a collection of various papers discovered after their author’s death (notes, translations, etc).

SUPPORT OUR PUBLICATIONS

Publications of Path Press has been made possible through the contributions of various individuals who, having themselves benefited from these writings, now have a personal desire to share them with a wider audience than has previously been possible. And just now we printed Seeking the Path (Early Writings of Ven. Ñāṇavīra Thera (1954 – 1960) and revised edition of Clearing the Path, Writings of Ven. Ñāṇavīra Thera (1960 – 1965), and it could not be done without your support.

These writings are probably not commercially viable; nor do they represent the views of any established sect, school or university which might sponsor their publication. The idea has been put forward that inasmuch as Path Press Publications has already published two books of this type (Notes on Dhamma and Letters of Sister Vajirā) it could use that experience as a basis for issuing those occasional writings which are of exceptional merit and yet do not attract established publishers.

If this is to be done, it will require financial support: publishing is expensive, and we intend to price our books low enough to be affordable to all who are genuinely interested. Therefore the facilities of Path Press Publications can be utilized to issue these additional writings only with the help of those who agree with us that this is a worthwhile endeavour, and who are willing to support it with their contributions. If you would like to contribute, or to learn more about Path Press Publications, or wish to be put on our mailing list for future announcements, please visit www.pathpresspublications.com

ERRATA to Notes on Dhamma (PPP, 2009)

pathpress — Thu, 12 May 2011 14:41:43 +0000

Anonymous Mahāthera bhikkhu who knew Ven. Ñāṇasumana personally pointed to Path Press editor that that the addition to SAKKĀYA (b) of Notes on Dhamma is Ven. Ñāṇasumana’s work and not Ven, Ñāṇavīra’s as had been assumed (cf. ‘Editor’s Foreword’, 2^nd para.). That the addition of a text was from a loose slip of paper which was inserted into the manuscript believed to have written by Ven. Ñāṇavīra, confirmed from his marginal notes to Kierkegaard’s Concluding Unscientific Postscript (See the note here). Now it is known to us that Ven. Ñāṇasumana intended to make ‘extra notes’ to complement Ven. Ñāṇavīra’s according to his understanding and practice (he was inclined to samatha bhāvanā). Also just by considering the change of style one can see it is not longer Ven. Ñāṇavīra. Besides, as the Venerable Mahāthera pointed to us, from a Dhamma point of view it is wrong: anulomikāya khantiyā samannāgato need not be dependent upon “initiation of samatha bhāvanā”.

Therefore, please, cross out from your copy of Note on Dhamma the passage on pp. 84-5, note (b) from “I.e., by falling away from this samatha bhāvanā practice…” to the end of the note.

Our sincere apology for the mistake and any inconvenience caused.

The Editor

Channa’s Suicide in the Samyukta-āgama

pathpress — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 09:48:27 +0000

by Bhikkhu Analayo

The present article offers a translation of the Saṃyukta-āgama parallel to the Channa-sutta of the Saṃyutta-nikāya, which describes the events surrounding the suicide of a monk who might have been an arahant. Ven. Analayo also offers some reflections on misunderstanding some Vinaya points regarding suicide. Full Text: PDF