Prince Siddhartha

Scene from The Illustrated Sutra of Past and Present Karma. Kamakura period, Japan. © Metropolitan Museum of Art

Purpose and the Search for Happiness, by John Aske

By on • ( 4 )

The parallels with the story of the young Prince Siddhartha 2500 years earlier are clear. As childhood with its certainties (if we are lucky) and its securities, moves into adolescence and then maturity, we are all confronted with the opportunity of opening up to the world (and ourselves) and exploring it, or turning away from it and trying to restore the gilded cage we once lived in…

Sekizanzen-in's (赤山禅院) Juroku-rakan (十六羅漢 the '16 Arhats'). @KyotoDailyPhoto

And what, Monks, is Ageing? By Sylvia Swain

By on • ( 8 )

People who have a religion which provides for after-death welfare, such as in Tibetan Buddhism, are less troubled. But those without such beliefs, can trust to nature’s spiritual intentions for them, as they, like plants, struggle instinctively and unerringly towards the light…