Writing and teaching in the same tradition as Robert Aitken (Taking the Path of Zen) and John Tarrant (Bring Me the Rhinoceros), Susan Murphy shares their warm and lyrical approach to Zen Buddhism.

Upside-Down Zen is Murphy’s unique invitation to explore the vivid spirit of Zen. Concentrating her gaze on the particular-the lived moment-she delivers Zen’s timeless wisdom in a voice that stimulates and sustains the interest of the contemporary reader. She illuminates Zen koans, the often misunderstood teaching stories of the tradition, by drawing on diverse sources such as literature, folk-tales, modern cinema, and Australian aboriginal spirituality.

Upside-Down Zen is an excellent, enjoyable read for anyone with an interest in meditation, self-knowledge, and the opening of insight and compassion in ordinary life.

By engaging deeply with the wisdom and practices of the Buddhist path, we are brought face to face with the true nature of our mind and reality. We are taken beyond our stories and opinions, our hopes and our fears, to the place of clarity and peace inherent within us all. The nature of mind is limitless, infinite like the sky, and when we recognize it, we awaken to profound compassion and insight.

This collection of thirty-one teachings, drawn primarily from the Nyingma school of Tibetan Buddhism, provides a gateway into practice for those new to Buddhism and fresh access to timeless truths for longtime practitioners. Readers will appreciate the distinct voices and approaches of both renowned contemporary teachers and great masters of the recent past.

Includes contributions by:

• Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche
• Phillipe Cornu
• His Holiness the Dalai Lama
• Dilgo Kyentse Rinpoche
• Dudjom Rinpoche
• Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche
• Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche
• Dzogchen Rinpoche
• Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche
• Francesca Fremantle
• Patrick Gaffney
• Gyalwang Drukpa Rinpoche
• Jamyang Kyentse Chokyi Lodro
• Kalu Rinpoche
• Khetsun Sangpo Rinpoche
• Christine Longaker
• Nyoshul Khen Rinpoche
• Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche
• Frank Ostaseski
• Ringu Tulku Rinpoche
• Sakya Jetsun Chimey

The Dalai Lamas of Tibet are unique. A succession of fourteen have been guiding the spiritual life of the Tibetan people for nearly six centuries, and for three hundred years have held secular power as well. Revered as the human embodiment of Chenrezig, the Buddha of Compassion, they choose, out of their great desire to benefit others, to reincarnate life after life as the Dalai Lama.

Thubten Gyatso, the Thirteenth Dalai Lama, was born to a peasant family in 1876. He was discovered, brought to Lhasa, and enthroned at the age of three. Educated as a monk, he took over full power when he was eighteen and ruled until his death thirty-seven years later. His rule would prove to be more stronger, more radical, and more complete than that of any Dalai Lama since the Great Fifth.

“His courage ad energy were inexhaustible. He recoiled from nothing,” writes Charles Bell, who, as Political Officer in the Himalayas, first met the Thirteenth Dalai Lama in 1910. They developed a firm and affectionate friendship, politically and personally, that would last twenty-five years.

Portrait is packed full of history, stories, facts and figures, anecdotes, and conversation, and is a compelling read. Bell describes all aspects of Tibetan life, religion, and politics—the very heart of which is the Dalai Lama. He paints a vivid and masterly picture of this powerful yet humble man, who worked tirelessly and unceasingly for the good of Tibet; who struggled continually against both political and military onslaughts from China and fought for support from the outside world; who made radical changes at every level of life in his medieval nation, uniting and strengthening it as never before.

Learn more about the thirteenth Dalai Lama at the Treasury of Lives.

The Zen tradition has just two main meditative practices: shikantaza, or “just sitting”; and introspection guided by the powerful Zen teaching stories called koans. Following in the tradition of The Art of Just Sitting (endorsed as a “A book we have needed for a long, long time”), this new anthology from John Daido Loori illuminates the subtle practice of koan study from many different points of view.

Includes writings by:

• Robert Aitken
• William Bodiford
• Robert Buswell
• Roko Sherry Chayat
• Francis Dojun Cook
• Eihei Dogen
• Heinrich Dumoulin
• Hakuin Ekaku
• Victor Sogen Hori
• Keizan Jokin
• Philip Kapleau
• Chung-fen Ming-Pen
• Taizan Maezumi
• Dennis Genpo Merzel
• Soen Nakagawa
• Ruth Fuller Sasaki
• Sokei-an Sasaki
• Nyogen Senzaki
• Zenkei Shibayama
• Eido Shimano
• Philip Yampolsky
• Hakuun Yasutani
• Wayne Yokoyama
• Katsushiro Yoshizawa

The first in-depth English commentary on the Five Ranks—a core text of the Zen tradition that teaches what can’t be taught—which contains new translations of all of the key texts of the Five Ranks cycle.

We imagine ourselves and the universe to be distinct, but within us glimmers the suspicion that we are in fact intimately connected and inseparable from all that there is. The dawning and expansion of such awareness is called enlightenment. In his masterwork—a suite of dialectical works known collectively as the Five Ranks—Dongshan, a Zen master of Old China, approaches enlightenment from five angles, using paradox and poetry to lay out a multifaceted path whereby we might discover enlightenment within this very moment.

Ross Bolleter Roshi assembles and provides commentary on all of the core texts of the Five Ranks, including the precursors that inspired it and works inspired by it. Approaching the Five Ranks from a rich and sophisticated koan perspective, Bolleter Roshi augments his explanations of the works with liberal doses of humor and storytelling, bringing this esteemed classic to life. Each part of the Five Ranks focuses differently on the relationship between the timeless realm of our essential natures and the contingent realm of life and death. They encourage us to transcend naive individualism and to bring our best qualities of compassion and wisdom intimately into our daily lives. In this regard, Dongshan’s Five Ranks lays out the path that every student of the Way must traverse on the journey to becoming a teacher.

Discover the ten perfections—qualities of the heart and mind that cultivate happiness, wisdom, and compassion—and learn how to bring them into your life with this in-depth practice manual. Life Is Spiritual Practice carefully lays out the perfections, or paramis: the Buddha’s foundational teaching for true happiness.

• Generosity
• Ethical Integrity
• Renunciation
• Wisdom
• Wise Effort
• Patience
• Truthfulness
• Resolve
• Loving-Kindness
• Equanimity

Drawing on her more than twenty years of teaching experience, Jean Smith teases out the subtleties of the perfections and offers helpful exercises, real-life examples, and instructions for an independent self-retreat for their practical application. With this book in hand, embody the ten perfections and achieve lasting happiness, regardless of your spiritual tradition.

As a special thank-you to our readers, we’re including a free gift with your purchase of Life Is Spiritual Practice (paperback only).

Open up Daily Wisdom and find page after page of illuminating words. You’ll encounter ancient Buddhist sages and contemporary meditation masters offering encouragement and quiet counsel—some in spacious poetry, others in lucid prose—on love and living wisely, on meditation and mindfulness, on the pitfalls of anger and necessity of compassion. Whether you’re seeking morning inspiration or a few uplifting words to help keep a difficult day in perspective, Daily Wisdom is a valuable companion. Includes words of wisdom from:

• The Dalai Lama
• Lama Yeshe
• Ayya Khema
• Bhante G.
• Thich Nhat Hanh
• B. Allan Wallace
• Lorne Ladner
• Sandy Boucher
• Lama Zopa Rinpoche
• Master Hsing Yun
• Sakya Pandita
• Milarepa
• Kalu Rinpoche
• and many more!

Muso Soseki, the renowned fourteenth-century Zen master, is today most known for developing the art of traditional Japanese Zen gardening. Even more impressive is his creation of the institutional structure for all Japanese Buddhist temples, which is still in use today.

Dialogues in a Dream is one of the many projects Soseki took on in this final period of his life. Written in the guise of a conversation between Soseki and the shogun, the work covers the breadth of Buddhist philosophy and practice and includes insightful discussions of prayer, mediation, and the place of study in religious life. His penetrating analysis deepens our appreciation of even the simplest Buddhist practices. Acclaimed scholar Thomas Yuho Kirchner painstakingly translates this classic text into English.

Exquisite line drawings of the most important figures in the Tibetan Buddhist pantheon: Shakyamuni Buddha, Chenrezig, Tara, Manjushri, and more. The artists provide detailed explanations of the figures as well as traditional coloring instructions. A great gift for meditators, fans of Himalayan art, or anyone who appreciates beauty. For all ages.

Pico Iyer, Victor Pelevin, Doris Dorrie and other renowned contributors join young award-winners in what National Book Award-winner Charles Johnson calls “an embarrassment of literary riches,” sure to please fiction lovers of every stripe. From the O. Henry Award-winning title story, to visionary short-shorts and barely fictionalized personal memoirs, Nixon Under the Bodhi Tree is inventive, exciting, and unlike any collection before it.

In this brilliant new translation and commentary on The Diamond Sutra—one of the sublime wisdom teachings of Mahayana Buddhism—Mu Soeng integrates this ancient wisdom teaching with current scientific and psychological thought. His clear and readable commentary traces the connections between these teachings and contemporary theories of quantum reality, explores the sutra within the framework of Buddhist meditation practices, and provides a comprehensive historical survey of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition. Mu Soeng’s goal throughout is to reveal the inspiration and wisdom of The Diamond Sutra to today’s reader in an accessible, engaging, and modern manner.

The Lamrim Chenmo, or Great Treatise on the Steps of the Path, by Je Tsongkhapa is a comprehensive overview of the process of individual enlightenment. Meditation on these steps has been a core practice of Tibetan Buddhists for centuries. The Lamrim Chenmo presents the Buddha’s teachings along a continuum of three spiritual attitudes: the person who worries about rebirth, the person who wants to escape rebirth, and finally the person who strives for buddhahood in order to relieve the suffering of all beings—this is the supreme aspiration of the bodhisattva. Given over two months to a group of Western Students in Dharamsala, India, Yangsi Rinpoche’s commentary revitalizes our understanding of Tsongkhapa’s work, giving readers renewed inspiration. 

Read Tsongkhapa’s biography at the Treasury of Lives.

Many books are called groundbreaking, but this one is truly unique and sure to appeal to anyone with an interest in fantasy literature. It employs a Buddhist perspective to appreciate some of the major works of modern fantasy—and uses modern fantasy fiction to elucidate Buddhist teachings. In the tradition of David Loy’s cutting-edge presentation of a Buddhist social theory in The Great Awakening, this pioneering work of Buddhist literary analysis, renown scholar David Loy and Linda Goodhew offer ways of reading modern fantasy-genre fiction that illuminate both the stories themselves, and the universal qualities of Buddhist teachings. Authors examined include J.R.R. Tolkien, Philip Pullman (of The Amber Spyglass trilogy, from whose works the word “daemon” is borrowed in the title), Ursula K. LeGuin, and the anime movie Princess Mononoke.

The massive outpouring of consumer products available today might alone lead one to ask “How much is enough?” But at the same time, if we allow ourselves to see the social, political, economic and environmental consequences of the system that produces such a mass of “goods,” then the question is not simply a matter of one’s own personal choice, but points to the profound interconnectedness of our day to day decisions about “How much is enough?” The ease with which we can acquire massive quantities of food, clothing, kitchenware, and various electronic goods directly connects each of us with not only environmental degradation caused by strip mining in West Virginia, and with sweat shops and child labor in India or Africa, but also with the ongoing financial volatility of Western capitalist economies, and the increasing discrepancies of wealth in all countries.

This interconnectedness is the human environment, a phrase intended to point toward the deep interconnection between the immediacy of our own lives, including the question of “How much is enough?,” and both the social and natural worlds around us. This collection brings together essays from an international conference jointly sponsored by Ryukoku University, Kyoto, and the Institute of Buddhist Studies, Berkeley. The effects of our own decisions and actions on the human environment is examined from several different perspectives, all informed by Buddhist thought. The contributors are all simultaneously Buddhist scholars, practitioners, and activists—thus the collection is not simply a conversation between these differing perspectives, but rather demonstrates the integral unity of theory and practice for Buddhism.

“The Great Way is not difficult / for those who have no preferences. / When love and hate are both absent / everything becomes clear and undisguised. / Make the smallest distinction, however / and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart.”

So begins “Trust in Mind,” the beloved poem that has again and again welcomed generations to their practice of Zen Buddhism. Traditionally attributed to the third Chinese ancestor of Zen (Sengcan, d. 606), it is often considered the first historical “Zen” document and remains an anchor of Zen Buddhist practice to this day.

Here, scholar and commentator Mu Soeng explores the poem’s importance and impact in three sections: The Dharma of Trust in Mind, The Tao of Trust in Mind, and The Chan of Trust in Mind. Finally, a brilliant line-by-line commentary brings the elements of this ancient work completely to life for the modern reader.

Trust in Mind is the first book of its kind, looking at this very important Zen text from historical and cultural contexts, as well as from the practitioner’s point of view. It is sure to interest readers of Mu Soeng and his fellow Buddhist contemporaries, as well as those with an interest in meditation and Eastern religions—most especially Zen practitioners, academics, philosophers, and scholars of Mind.

In all religions, sacred texts and objects have appeared miraculously. Among the most remarkable of these revelatory traditions is the terma tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. Termas herald a fresh opportunity for the renewal of spiritual practice. Here Tulku Thondup tells the story of the terma treasure tradition initiated by Padmasambhava, the ninth-century saint who established Buddhism in Tibet.

Dependent-arising and emptiness are two essential Buddhist concepts. Elizabeth Napper helps us understand the integral relationship of these ideas and the ways that they have been interpreted by Tibetan and Western scholars. An essential reference work for students and practitioners of Buddhism.

Along with a translation of the insight (vipashyana) section of Tsongkhapa’s Great Exposition on the Stages of the Path (Lam rim chen mo), Napper provides an extensive introduction that contrasts the Geluk view of emptiness to that of Western scholars, and a translation of four interwoven commentaries on the text.

Read Tsongkhapa’s biography at the Treasury of Lives.

The key to happiness is not the eradication of all problems but rather the development of a mind capable of transforming any problem into a cause of happiness. Essential Mind Training is full of guidance for cultivating new mental habits for mastering our thoughts and emotions.

This volume contains eighteen individual works selected from Mind Training: The Great Collection, the earliest compilation of mind-training (lojong) literature. The first volume of the historic Tibetan Classics series, Essential Mind Training includes both lesser-known and renowned classics such as Eight Verses on Mind Training and The Seven-Point Mind Training. These texts offer methods for practicing the golden rule of learning to love your neighbor as yourself and are full of practical and down-to-earth advice.

The techniques explained here, by enhancing our capacity for compassion, love, and perseverance, can give us the freedom to embrace the world.

Read the biographies of Chekawa Yeshe Dorje and Atisha at the Treasury of Lives.

The User’s Guide to Spiritual Teachers is a necessary book for anyone who has, or wants to have, a spiritual teacher—regardless of faith or tradition. This book addresses concerns that many of us have on the spiritual path, including how to find a spiritual teacher, how to manage expectations about what they can do, and what to do when you realize you’re in a dangerous relationship with one. Spiritual teachers of all traditions will themselves find this book incredibly useful as they reflect on how they benefit their students or may be overstepping their boundaries and actually creating harm. This is your place to look for information, inspiration, sanity, and words of caution.

Zen Bridge collects Dharma talks given by the Zen master Keido Fukushima Roshi. Fukushima Roshi’s anecdotes on his own training are humble, hilarious, and full of wisdom. His reflections on classical teachings intermingle with personal stories, allowing them to be accessible to all readers while at the same time transcendent. The power and authenticity of this true Zen master shines through in his words.

This book includes black and white illustrations of basic sitting and hand posture for meditation as well as selections of Fukushima Roshi’s calligraphy.