Resource Areas Index

During my on-line travels I have come across all kinds of expression of Buddha Dhamma. I have collated some of these in this directory. As with any subject on the 'net, the number of resources has been growing at an exponential rate and this little page can only give a taste of what's available. Please write to me if you see a link that no longer works and/or wish to recommend a special site of interest. Please note that there are some additional sites on a separate UK index.

1: Major Buddhist Indices/Gateways

2: Practice: Ethics and Meditation

3: Academic Resources

4: Buddhism in Society

5: Sangha - Organisations and Centres

6: Personal Pages

7: Publications - On-line Periodicals etc

8: Buddhism and the Arts

9: Newsgroups, Mailing Lists and Forums

10: Cultural Restoration/ History

11: Crafts for the Home

12: Miscellaneous Resources

Major Buddhist Indices/Gateways

Dharmanet: DEFA Home Page.
This is a large and pretty comprehensive source of information for Buddhism of all schools, particularly for the United States. It was one of the first resources I discovered (using gopher!).

Access to Insight
This provides very useful Gateways to Theravada Buddhist practice. I particularly like the presentation of the Four Noble Truths, especially the Eightfold Noble Path .

Sadhu! The Theravada Buddhism Web Directory and Portal
This very useful service is similar in style to Yahoo. It offers an efficient way of accessing many relevant sites.

E-Sangha Buddhism Portal
Another wide-ranging service that contains free e-books, discussion forum, free e-cards etc that serves followers of many different traditions. I found a very interesting discussion on sitting postures for meditation and as part of my Master's studies, I got a good response on the forum to a survey on the Fifth Precept. Alas the forum got hacked and it doesn't look like resurfacing. :-(

International Research Institute for Zen Buddhism
This site contains many academic resources including concordances and the Electronic Bodhidharma, named after the monk who, according to tradition, brought Buddhism to the Far East. Its a good source for Zen.

For Tibetan Buddhism, there are many colourful sites. A couple are:

Quiet Mountain Tibetan Resource Guide, which aims to contribute to the awareness of Tibetan Buddhism, it's culture and clear path of compassion to the world.

Osel Shen Phen Ling, Missoula, Montana, US, part of the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition. This site was one of the first one where I was able to see a picture of His Holiness the Dalai Lama (must have been long ago!) and where you can learn about the significance of prayer wheels [many more prayer wheels linked at Dharma-Haven.org]

Tibet Online Resource Gathering
This link is slightly different from the others, being a general index to Tibet, not just Tibetan Buddhism: perhaps a useful reminder of the sacrifice that has been made in spreading these Buddhist teachings to the West.


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Practice: Ethics and Meditation

Meditating Buddhists Ring provides a useful launchpad to a wide selection of practices.

Meditation
Adapted from "Good Question Good Answer" by Venerable Shravasti Dhammika, this provides useful motivation for making the effort to meditate!

Dhammakaya Meditation zone - a good introduction for beginners. It's the kind of technique you can learn to practice continually (See also my mini index to Dhammakaya)

Meditation and Mental Culture
From the Ottawa Special Interest Group on Buddhism, this page gives a variety of teachings from some famous Theravada monks, including Ven. Ajahn Chah, Mahasi Sayadaw, and also Jack Kornfield

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Academic Resources

Journal of Buddhist Ethics
This is one of the most highly respected journals that bases its studies firmly on ethics.

UK Association for Buddhist Studies
Another well respected resource, where recently there was created for the first time in the UK a Professorship in Buddhist Studies (held by Peter Harvey).

Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies
Under the academic direction of Richard Gombrich, this Centre will draw on many of the rich resources that Oxford has to offer in the study of Buddhist texts. Beyond this hub, there is a much wider remit manifest as the Society for the Wider Understanding of the Buddhist tradition. Being based in Oxford, I'm very pleased to support such efforts.

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Buddhism in Society

Sarvodaya Shramadana Under the guidance of Dr A T Ariyaratne, this organisation has developed and matured a sustainable ways of living that works successively greater levels, starting with the cultivation of peace inside, through meditation, and radiating out, so now it has schemes in thousands of villages. I once attended a presentation by Dr Ariyaratne and was very impressed.

Presentation of the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize to His Holiness the Dalai Lama and His Holiness' acceptance speech.

Ven. Thich Nhat Hanh's nomination by Martin Luther King Jnr.

Angulimala
Named after a rogue who reformed on meeting the Buddha, this is a UK Buddhist Chaplaincy devoted to helping the practice of Buddhism by prisoners. The spiritual director is Phra Ajahn Khemadhammo of the Forest Hermitage

The way of the spiritual pragmatist is about a Thai monk, Ven. Prayudh A. Payutto, who has received acclaim for peace in education - his exposition is very clear and realistic.

Thamkrabok Foundation exists to cure people of drug addiction. It has a monastery in Thailand that has been offering Detoxification and Rehabilitation to those addicted to harmful substances for over fifty years.

The Amida Trust is a bold attempt to integrate the spheres of Buddhism, Psychotherapy and the Arts, supporting a wide range of projects. It is much inspired by Zen, but welcomes practitioners from all backgrounds.

The Karuna Trust is an organisation dedicated to the promotion of human rights and other conditions that improve life, particularly for the 'Untouchables' of India.

Amitabha Hospice offers invaluable support for the dying, based on Buddhist principles. (I was very impressed by St. Mary's hospice in Birmingham, UK, where the staff looked after my mother really well during her final week).

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Sangha, Centres, Temples and Viharas

Nalanda Buddhist Community of Brazil is a study and practice centre, whose inspiration comes from the forest tradition of the Theravaada School, though also maintaining a firm belief in the fundamental unity of the three ways: the Path of the Elders, the Great Vehicle and the Diamond Vehicle.

Heartland Sangha - a non-sectarian American Buddhist sangha whose members are from several traditions, with special interest in the teachings developed by the Ven. Rev. Gyomay Kubose.

Jamyang Buddhist Centre, London
This is a very active centre in the Tibetan Gelugpa tradition, which has received strong support from His Holiness the Dalai Lama.

Kagyu Samye Dzong, London
This London centre, in the Tibetan Kagyu tradition, is a branch of Kagyu Samye Ling Monastery in Scotland. Kagyu Samye Dzong London is under the direct guidance of Dr. Akong Tulku Rinpoche and Ven.Lama Yeshe Losal.

Tengye Ling Tibetan Buddhist Temple, Ottawa
This is another temple in the Gelugpa tradition, again very devoted to His Holiness the Dalai Lama. "A place of refuge for developing a kind heart, compassion for all beings, and wisdom."

Bodhinyanarama Net is a monastic residence of the Theravada tradition set in a Native Reserve of regenerating bush in New Zealand. It has its origins in the Thai Forest Tradition, particularly the respected meditation master Ajahn Chah.

Order of Interbeing, established by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanha, is a community of monastics and lay people who have committed to living their lives in accord with the Fourteen Mindfulness Trainings, a distillation of the Bodhisattva (Enlightened Being) teachings of Mahayana Buddhism. Their main monastery is Plum Village, in France.

Zen Buddhist Order of Hsu Yun is a Zen study centre and Buddhist temple of the Southern School. It has a wide selection of teachings and other materials to help Chan practice, some translated into Spanish plus Pinyin and Chinese characters.

Zen in Daily Life, located in Israel, is for Zen teaching of disciples of Prof. Masunaga Reiho, of SOTO Zen lineage which traces its roots to the way of Dogen, in 13th Century Japan. The site is maintained by Ofer Cohen.

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Personal Pages

Index to Personal Pages held at Dharmanet provides a listing of Buddhist sites maintained by individuals.

Forest Dhamma Notes are reflections on Dhamma in the Forest Kamatana tradition as practised by Bhikkhus especially in NE Thailand. The reflections are in diary form, i.e. in a blog.

Lama Lhakpa Yeshe, currently based in London, teaches Tibetan Buddhism of the Kagyu-Nyingmapa lineage. He trained for 20 years in the Zigar monastery, Dege, in Tibet, where his spiritual teachers were Ven. Sangye Trinly Rinpoche and Ven. Tchipla Rinpoche who were the head Lamas of the monastery. Then he moved on to India to receive further teachings, before travelling to the West.

The Buddhism Guide from About.com is currently Barbara O'Brien (previously well established by Anthony Flanagan and Dick Dillon) is a large site with broad coverage that is frequently and regularly updated. About.com is a commercial operation, but although there are adverts, the guides are allowed to build up the site quite freely within certain structures [I was the first guide, for a very brief period].

Buddhism - The Buddha`s Message to Mankind according to Michael Holmboe Meyer
An unusual page that presents the main teachings with contemporary commentary, and goes on to express interesting views on Jesus. When it was first put online, I was struck by its visual impact.

Brian Ruhe Director of the Theravada Buddhist Community of Vancouver, Ruhe is a teacher in of Vipassana meditation and mainstream Buddhism and has wide experience. On his web site his essays go into areas that are more far out or not normally associated with Buddhism.

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Publications - On-line Periodicals etc

Tricycle Buddhist Review is a lively magazine of contemporary Buddhism with varied content.

Buddhist Door HomePage by Tung Lin Kok Yuen, Canada Society, is a colourful Zen Buddhist WWW Magazine, though images can take some while to download.

Zolag - Books and Articles on Theravada Buddhism Formerly the Triple Gem Press, this site has grown quite considerably from being just a small Theravadin organisation producing Dhamma texts. It now contains lots of teachings, Q&A, including some for schoolchildren, photos from holy sites etc.

Wisdom Books Home Page.
Wisdom Books is a well respected distributor of 1000's of Buddhist books and has grown into a large online operation. It was responsible for publishing "What the Buddha Taught", by Walpola Rahula.

Other articles and books

A number of very good Dharma teachings from distinguished practitioners is still(!) available by ftp from the Coombs Buddhist archive.

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Buddhism and the Arts

Thai Jataka Paintings These are exquisite depictions of the stories of the Buddha Gotama's previous lives.

Buddha - Radiant Awakening was "a major exhibition of more than 120 works of art depicting Buddha, dating from the first through to the twenty first century... The exhibition presents images of the myriad individual Buddhas and Buddha Lands conveying the incomprehensible immensity of Buddhahood. " A book is now available.

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Newsgroups, Mailing Lists and Forums

The links in this section are noticeably old! I'd recommend checking out other lists, e.g. Buddhist Studies - Electronic Resources maintained by T. Matthew Ciolek.

Joining an Internet-based group or community can be an excellent way to learn and share. The facilities available have been evolving a lot and my list has not kept pace very well: developments in Web2.0 and social networking mean a plethora of choices, but that is not necessarily making it easier to find really good communities.

The first set of links are to USENET newsgroups, kept mainly for archival purposes. They required only a simple terminal interface and were most popular in the early and mid 90s before the Web became prominent. As the Web grew, the whole archive was subsequently acquired by Google which has provided a convenient Web interface to delve back to previous messages (as far as 20 years ago in some cases). You can also contribute to new discussions (using a Google account), but from a cursory glance the quality has deteriorated, in some cases completely swamped by spam, so I'd suggest investigating other sources before spending much time with these.

• talk.religion.buddhism has been the main international forum for topical discussion- traditional USENET | Google group .
• alt.buddha.short.fat.guy used to be full of humo[u]r :) and Dharma, but deteriorated a lot with the odd exception
• alt.religion.buddhism.tibetan caters for Tibetan Buddhism - traditional USENET | Google group
• alt.zen Zen (or Ch'an) Buddhism - traditional USENET | Google group
• uk.religion.buddhist is where folks in the UK (like myself) can discuss the Dharma - traditional USENET | Google group.

A useful way to stimulate ideas is to join a mailing list. A selection of academic lists is offered by the UK Association of Buddhist Studies. Another academic list, one based in the US, is H-Net. I've had very little involvement with these, so can't comment.

Below are one or two others.

• Buddhism Mailing List in Indonesian

  A moderated list in Indonesian language (some English) to share ideas, knowledge and experience on the Teachings of the Buddha and their practice in daily life. To enquire/subscribe, simply write to Milis_Buddha@poboxes.com.

A light-hearted forum, that has a very cheerful presentation is:

• Dharma the Cat
  "The Thinking Person's Cartoon Strip".

Now there are many Web-based fora that cover general and specific interests - you can simply type 'Buddhism forum' into a search engine and then investigate! See how it is structured, what the guidelines are, how busy is it, what is the general tone of the converation etc.

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Cultural Restoration and Historical Aspects

Cultural Restoration Tourism Project (CRTP) is undertaking a very interesting and valuable programme to support the restoration of Mongolian culture and history, particularly Mongolian Buddhism, art and architecture.

The Revival of Buddhism in Mongolia (archive only) contains an exhibition by Barbara Hind of wonderful photographs, text and video, from various nunneries and monasteries in and around Ulaanbaataar. Web design is by Paul T!

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Crafts for the Home

Shalincraft: Tangkas and Buddha [rupas] These works produced in India look elegant and very colourful, the result of meticulous effort. The site has very many products spanning many religions.

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Miscellaneous Resources

Stupas This is an interesting index to the wide range of stupas of old, more recent, and those currently under construction. It has pointers to all kinds of relevant resources.

ATI: Glossary of Pali & Buddhist Terms from Access to Insight, provides translations and explanations of many of the words used in scripture.
Another glossary is available here with some additional terms specific to Thai.

Electronic Buddhist Text Institute attempts to store and disseminate Buddhist resources electronically, much of it to appear on the internet or CD-ROM.

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- (Paul Trafford)

Last modified: 28 October 2010