[Buddha-l] Jayarava's Rave Jan 30th--Rethinking Indian History

[jkirk]

Gombrich has written a number of articles on Vedic themes in Pāli
texts. 

Watch out for his new book later in the new year: "What the
Buddha Thought". It's on amazon as a pre-pub already. Since he
covered a lot of this in the lectures which form the basis of the
book, I think it will give a good overview of his thinking. The
lectures themselves were fantastic and I count myself very lucky
to attended them.

Jayarava
==================
amazon.com's description of Gombrich's book, to appear in Sept
09:

Product Description
This book argues that the Buddha was one of the most brilliant
and original thinkers of all time. While the book is intended to
serve as an introduction to the Buddha's thought, and hence even
to Buddhism itself, it also has larger aims: it argues that we
can know far more about the Buddha than it is fashionable among
scholars to admit, and that his thought has a greater coherence
than is usually recognised. It contains much new material.
Interpreters both ancient and modern have taken little account of
the historical context of the Buddha's teachings; but relating
them to early brahminical texts, and also to ancient Jainism,
gives a much richer picture of his meaning, especially when his
satire and irony are appreciated.Incidentally, since many of the
Buddha's allusions can only be traced in the Pali versions of
surviving texts, the book establishes the importance of the Pali
Canon as evidence. Though the Buddha used metaphor extensively,
he did not found his arguments upon it like earlier thinkers: his
capacity for abstraction was a breakthrough. His ethicising older
ideas of rebirth and human action (karma) was also a breakthrough
for civilisation. His theory of karma is logically central to his
thought. Karma is a process, not a thing; moreover, it is neither
random nor wholly determined. These ideas about karma he
generalised to every component of conscious experience - except
nirvana, the liberation from that chain of experience. Morally,
karma both provided a principle of individuation and asserted the
individual's responsibility for his own destiny.