Way of the Bodhisattva

Way of the Bodhisattva

Way of the Bodhisattva is a text by the monk Shantideva.
We can all find some inspiration in this teaching and in his story.

Shantideva was not a popular guy. He lived at a monastic college with 500 other men and had no friends. Everyone thought he was a lazy jerk and they looked for creative ways to bully him. They were wrong about him. They thought they could make him so embarrassed that he would leave forever. Instead they got one of the greatest spiritual teachings of all time, The Way of the Bodhisattva.

Bodhisattva is a sanskrit word that means “Enlightenment Being.” It has multiple definitions:

Bodhisattva:

1. an enlightened person

2. one who is on the path to enlightenment

3. one who enlightens others.

Mahayana Buddhism rests entirely on the Bodhisattva ideal. We have innate wakefulness—we are enlightened already—but we are also on the path to realizing the fact that we are awakened and our true nature is not separate from bringing others to awakening along with us. Helping others is helping ourselves and helping ourselves is realizing what has always been true.

You get there by realizing you’ve been there the whole time.

The nature of Mahayana practice is learning how to walk the Bodhisattva path. When we accept the task placed before us, to awaken for the sake of ourselves and all beings, then we are Bodhisattvas. As a sangha we strive together to make the world a better and more awakened place. I humbly suggest that this is what the Buddha intended when he started the first sangha.

Entering the Path

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What you will learn

• A study of the Mahayana Buddhist classic text "Way of the Bodhisattva" by Shantideva

Rating: 5

Level: Beginner Level

Duration: 3.5 hours

Instructor: Daniel Scharpenburg