2015

1) The first of the three remaining blog entries will be due on January 21, and you may focus on one of the following activities, as suits your interests and your character’s role in the village. Readings will provided to help you research each of these topics; you may also do additional research if you are interested in topics not otherwise addressed.

1. One of the texts discovered in the caves was a travelogue describing a sacred pilgrimage site — it is posted online. Read this text carefully. You may join a group of villagers on a pilgrimage to this place, or you may go on pilgrimage by yourself. Your written assignment would address aspects of pilgrimage as a religious practice and how your character engaged in this practice in some particular way. For example, if you are a doctor, you might wish to gather plants or minerals for the medicine factory while you are traveling. Alternatively, you may stay home and engage with that text as a scholar would, discussing some aspect of its structure or contents in a more academic way.

Since the completion of the library inside the nunnery, i have found myself in retreat from our community and alone in my cave studying the notes I acquired earlier these months from ancient texts and sutras we were able to include in the canon of our library. I am thrilled with the progress I have made. I find myself exploring ideas and philosophies I have addressed in previous years, but never in such depth. I also find myself fascinated with the words of vimalakirti. I have been particularly fascinated with the purification of the Buddha-field teachings.

More recently, I have turned my attention to a text discovered by one of the voyaging groups earlier this winter. Our community has been hard at work to understand the role of pilgrimage and to even pilgrimage to this place outlined in the text. I have decided to take this step alone. Many of the others have already left. I feel confident that I will survive the trip on my own. I have taken that extra time to ensure I know where I am going and what I may be confronted with. I have spent weeks gathering food from the surrounding bush area- I was pleased to find many berries growing under the snow.

The purpose of this voyage- for me- is understanding. I think this is an amazing opportunity to further understand not only the manner in which the Buddhist tradition spread from India to China but the different things these voyagers may have experienced on their journey. This joinery also allows us to further explore the purpose/concept of pilgrimage within the Buddhist tradition among other religious practices. The text we have found is incredible in that it is extremely detailed with the account of personal experiences along their journey. There is much to gain through the reading of this text- and its experience. As outlined: ‘They contain vital information about the social and political conditions in South Asia and king-dome situated on the routes between China and India. They offer remarkable insights into cross cultural perceptions and interactions. Additionally, these accounts throw light on the arduous nature of long-distance travel, commercial exchanges, and the relationship between Buddhist pilgrims and itinerant merchants.” (Sen p.24)

Personal accounts within this text are so significant that the works of Faxian Xuanzang offer the first eye witness account of Buddhist practices and pilgrimage in Central and South Asia to be written in Chinese. This can be recognized as a larger deal when we take into consideration the manner in which texts may have been translated at the time of early Buddhist scripture. We know that for the first 500 years after the Buddha’s life the tradition was passed along through oral translation. When texts are translated from language to language in such early times there was bound to be discrepancy. To have an account written directly in the Chinese language to offer an in-dept account of his experience is extraordinary for the time.

Faxian’s account also details and provides a narratives to the rituals he witnessed associated with various relics of the Buddha in Central and South Asia. Faxian’s account is so detailed he has eye-witnessed account of the rituals associated with specifically the worship of the Buddha’s alms bowl. This is extremely interesting to me as the article continues to mention the manner in which this account may be attributed to the replication of these rituals within China and Chinese Buddhist tradition and ritual. From this example we may see the manner in which these explorations may have served as a way to expand a communities knowledge surrounding the Buddhist tradition. I can not help but relate this to our own exploration through the words of these explorers. We are voyaging for much of the same purpose- as I said- for understanding. Additionally, if it were not for great voyagers before us, we may never have acquired such scripture or religious practices and rituals that the Buddhist tradition has spread worldwide today.

I am looking forward to our journey and what may come out of it. I look forward to the new people I may meet. I am hoping to join forces with others along the way. My late start is due to my own misunderstanding, and I am having a hard time thinking ahead to making this journey alone, but after reading such accounts in the text and knowing how many others may have been making this journey, I feel confident. I am anxious to offer my own unique perspective on what may happen. Also to update texts with new information similar to that of what was provided in what I read. Such matters of social interactions, cultural representation, political power forces, etc are sure to have changed at this point. I am extremely interested to see all of these changes for myself. I can not begin to imagine the differences in what I will experience and what they did.

I am finally hoping to utilize my journey to help my work within our community as a healer. I am a doctor and do my best to cure my patients naturally. There will be many opportunities to gather new herbs, minerals, salts, stones and sages to burn along the way. I must be careful not to collect too much as I am an older woman. I thrive on a plant based diet, so I am quite fit and will do okay but must pase myself. I have prepared a separate bag that I will bring that contains many different areas and pouches for specific items I will collect. This is something I am really looking forward to. I hope that others along the journey will collect things suited to their character and interests. If compiled together when we all arrive back to the community, we will be confronted with a spectacular variety of precious items. Among the things others will collect on their other voyages separate from our own purpose.

I notice as our community has developed we have begin to grow both together and each independently. I believe it has been extremely beneficial for us all to work together on the projects we did earlier this winter season. It seems like we are broadening our horizons now that we have reached a common understanding within our community about what exactly we are working towards and the knowledge we are gaining and understanding. I am thrilled for our community to gather this great karma as we plant the seeds to reap the benefits.