Lord's Prayer in Aramaic, the language many scholars believe Jesus spoke The Aramaic Cycle, created by Saadi (Neil Douglas-Klotz, PhD), consists of eight dances that take us through the entire Lord's Prayer in Aramaic, the language many scholars believe Jesus spoke. Translations directly from the Aramaic convey depths of meaning often lost in the King James version, which was translated from Greek -- a language very different from Aramaic. Here's the prayer in Aramaic: Abwoon d'bashmaya Nethqadash shmakh [...]

Reading list for "What is a Man? zen retreat at Upaya http://www.upaya.org/programs/event.php?id=372 What is a man? zen retreat MY READING LIST FOR MEN’S RETREAT May 14 – 16, 2010 Compiled by Ray Olson as Suggestions for Background Information for Teachers and Participants Loy, David, Money, Sex, War, and Karma: Notes for a Buddhist Revolution, Wisdom Publications, 2008. Loy supports strongly socially engaged Buddhism, which opens our awareness of social suffering, promoted by group-selves as well as by ego-selves. [...]

A Declaration of Interdependence: A Declaration of Interdependence: A Call to Transform the Three Poisons for the Sake of All Sentient Beings January 2006 As concerned global citizens and as members of a diverse Buddhist community, we want to contemplate and question the role of government in creating a civil and compassionate society. From the standpoint of interconnectedness, those of us living in the United States have a special responsibility to the whole world to explore this question. [...]

Rumi ~ Where everything is music Don't worry about saving these songs! And if one of our instruments breaks, it doesn't matter. We have fallen into the place where everything is music. The strumming and the flute notes rise into the atmosphere, and even if the whole world's harp should burn up, there will still be hidden instruments playing. So the candle flickers and goes out. We have a piece of flint, and a spark. This singing art [...]

change of scene What I appreciated as I went through the material remains of Sheik Ken's life was that he kept relationships maintained. On the end of the desk was a box of blank cards. He'd kept one our friend Benny had made; I'd copied and distributed it a few holiday seasons ago, "Blessed, happy &(heart icon) holy be your days!" He'd bequeathed everything else, after his murids and son Jared got want they wanted, to those beloved [...]

Give yourself a kiss. Give yourself a kiss. If you live in China, don’t look somewhere else, in Tibet, or Mongolia.   If you want to hold the beautiful one, hold yourself to yourself.   When you kiss the Beloved, touch your own lips with your own fingers.   The beauty of every woman and every man is your own beauty.   The confusion of your hair obscures that sometimes.   An artist comes to paint you and [...]

The Hermit Crab Mary Oliver Once I looked inside … the darkness ……of a shell folded like a pastry ………and there was a fancy face—   or almost a face— …it turned away ……and frisked up its brawny forearms ………so quickly   against the light …and my looking in ……I scarcely had time to see it, ………gleaming   under the pure white roof …of old calcium ……When I set it down, it hurried ………along the tideline   of [...]

The Ponds ~ Mary Oliver Every year the lilies are so perfect I can hardly believe   their lapped light crowding the black, mid-summer ponds. Nobody could count all of them—   the muskrats swimming among the pads and the grasses can reach out their muscular arms and touch   only so many, they are that rife and wild. But what in this world is perfect?   I bend closer and see how this one is clearly lopsided— [...]

A dharma gem response copied from Mushim Ikeda-Nash I certainly hear you. My test for someone who felt they had had "profound awakening experiences" would be to have them take care of a teething baby for 2 months, followed by being in charge of a rambunctious group of 2 - 4 ...year olds who were busy showing age appropriate behavior such as trying to strangle one another, spitting, hitting, potty training, and among whom there was a hard [...]

Questions about Devastation....Rumi (IV,2341-2358,2366-2383) A man was breaking up the soil when another man came by, "Why are you ruining this land"?   "Don't be a fool! Nothing can grow until the ground is turned over and crumbled.   There can be no roses and no orchard without first this that looks devastating.   You must lance an ulcer to heal it. You must tear down parts of an old building to restore it, and so it is [...]