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One difference between EBT and Mahayana: Ability to attract financial support and interest

 

I got an newsletter recently from Vipassana Research recently (known for Goenka 10 day courses internationally), they had a drive to raise money to fund operations, and they were happy to announce they met their goal of something like 120k$ USA dollars for the year.


When beginners to Buddhism ask me for recommendations, I usually send them over to Dhammatalks.org to read B. Thanissaro's works. I have a hard time getting them to spend 5-10 minutes to read even a short essay.


Meanwhile, here is Japanese Buddhist Priest Kossan doing a cover of a rock song, with 14000 followers on youtube, almost 200,000 views.



Metallica / Enter Sandman (Buddhist monk cover) / Kossan

192,819 views•Dec 4, 2020


Buddhist Priest / Rev. KOSSAN

13.9K subscribers


Some interesting comments from the youtube page:


* Never thought I'd see metallica open for Nirvana...

(For those who don't get the joke, 'nirvana' is a famous rock band, 'metallica' is the band that composed the song being performed, and the two bands were different genres of rock that would stylistically not collaborate or endorse each other)


* When you decide to become a monk and shave your head but later in life figure out that your inner self has long hair and loves metal more than Buddha.


* FYI, instead of the children's bedtime prayer (now I lay me down to sleep...), he's chanting the sutras called "Shigu Seigan Mon: The Four Bodhisattva Vows, that made me sit back and laugh:-) Great Buddhist preacher!


* I love it that the performance ends with a 5 min meditation


This r/Buddhism reddit discussion thread has link to the video:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Buddhism/comments/ldz7i3/metallica_enter_sandman_buddhist_monk_cover/





Comments

  1. BSRK AdityaMarch 1, 2021 at 1:07 AM

    Are these people (who have a hard time reading B.Thanissaro's works) native English speakers? This matters.

    If you detect that they are those who have a hard time reading essays, recommend (well-selected) Jataka's instead. The ideal Jataka should cover the key terms, and put them in a narrative.

    Also, chanting. They might like that too.

    ReplyDelete

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