Heart Sutra

Although this is a contemporary book written in English, it has a much more traditional feel—text and commentary—than most shiny new psychology books that are Buddhist (or use Buddhism). I like this, as I feel that we don’t allow brown and yellow people to have much, even Buddhism, but (alas), reading this also makes me see that I’m not about to start over as a Buddhist. (I’m sorry Thay, but no soul makes no sense. Just be glad I learned how to say your first name and let’s go.)

But anyway. I guess that when we read history or about kings—say King David—we think that the king was really around when he was at that awesome plateau at the peak of his power, even though for most of his life he’s either gaining or losing power, and can’t avoid the bell curve of impermanence, if life is a graph. Life, we think, is later, when we finally finish what we start. Reading this I sorta realized that your life is the whole thing, every day, although nothing that broad is still new to me.

Also, and I don’t know what this is in relation to except personal history, job history, but the cross-cultural truth that suffering is chosen even when circumstances are not cannot safely be made too high-minded: I create my suffering by mishandling painful circumstances (and I still don’t think this is a reason to have to sweat sing and make six figures), yes, but very importantly my personal immediate circumstances—not just my place in world history, and the history of abstract cartoon kings.

And I still chase butterflies—don’t just read the reviews—although I have to learn to let them go too. Or maybe I don’t, because when I die they’ll burn my body along with my books, ensuring that I still have them in the ether library with Jesus and King Arthur….… (mehr)

Thich Nhat Hanh’s translation and commentary on the Prajnaparamita Heart Sutra, written and revised over the course of almost 30 years:

1. The Heart of Understanding: Commentaries on the Prajnaparamita Heart Sutra by Thích Nhất Hạnh. Audio recording of Dharma talk given at Green Gulch Zen Center, Muir Beach, Calif. on 4/19/1987. 120 min audio CD published by Parallax Press in 2002. Listen to Thich Nhat Hanh’s live teaching.

2. The Heart of Understanding: Commentaries on the Prajnaparamita Heart Sutra by Thich Nhat Hanh. Parallax Press (1988), Paperback, 56 pages
Based on Thich Nhat Hanh’s teachings at Green Gulch (and perhaps elsewhere). Thich Nhat Hanh’s translation and commentary.

3. The Other Shore: A New Translation of the Heart Sutra with Commentaries by Thich Nhat Hanh (Author) Palm Leaves Press (2017), Edition: Revised ed., 196 pages. Deeply moving revision of his translation and commentary.

From the author’s preface: “On the twenty-first of August in 2014, at around three in the morning, just after I finished the translation, a moon ray penetrated my room.”

[Thich Nhat Hanh sustained a “severe brain hemorrhage” less than three months later.]… (mehr)