Wisdom of the Kadam Masters

Book excerpt: For many Tibetans, the phrase "the Kadam masters” evokes a spiritual golden age in Tibet--an image of a community of simple monks devoted to humble rectitude in the service of others. These Tibetan masters are particularly famed for their pithy spiritual sayings, poignant utterances that capture essential teachings in digestible bites. The sayings reveal an absence of confusion about what makes for a truly happy life, one grounded in ethics, love, and insight borne of meditation. The teachings of the Kadam masters have spiritually nourished the Tibetan people for nearly a millennium. The Kadampa tradition began in the eleventh century with the arrival in Tibet of the Indian Bengali teacher Atisa, who heralded a large-scale revival of Buddhism there with a return to the basics. Although these Tibetan teachings emerged nearly a thousand years ago, within a specific historical cultural context, like many of the world’s great spiritual teachings, the teachings of the Kadam masters embody wisdom that resonates beyond the boundaries of time, culture, and language. To modern-day Tibetan Buddhists, this volume will offer in an accessible format some of the most loved teachings of the Tibetan tradition. For practitioners of other religious traditions, the texts collected in this special