Buddhism: Thought and Practice
I) Basics
This take home exam is worth 20% of your final grade. It is due in the dropbox labeled “take home exam” before class on Monday, October 12, 2020.
There are ten questions each worth 10 points. Your answer to each question should be between 200 and 250 words. You should double space and use a mindful font.
Please follow the instructions below carefully because you will also lose 1 point (note: this is less than indicated in the Writing Instructions) from each of your answers for the following errors. Please note that if, for instance, you misspell “Buddha” as “Budda” in two different answers, you’ll lose 1 point in both answers.
II) Grading
a) You’ll lose 1 point for going over or under the 200-250 word range for each answer. Your name and such are not part of the word count, nor is the number of each question. You should do a word count for each answer and include it at the end of your answer in parentheses: thus, “…Rogers argues in The Mindful Twenty-something.” (223 words). The word count in parentheses does not count as part of the 200-250 words.
b) You should double space and will lose 1 point if an answer is single spaced.
c) You should also make sure to spell names, terms, and such correctly. This will take some effort. If you misspell key terms—for instance, Buddha as Budda, or Dalai Lama as Dali Lama—you’ll lose 1 point from that answer for each word that is misspelled. Thus, if you had “Budda” and “Dali Lama” in a single answer, you would lose 2 points. So please make sure to reread your work carefully to check for common errors—it’s easy to mistake mediation for meditation, for instance.
d) I will also take 1 point off if you make the following basic errors (Please note I’ll deduct the point only once for an error that is repeated in a single answer). So please make sure to reread your work before submitting it to the dropbox. This is a form of mindfulness practice.
-Correct usage of to, too, and two
-Correct usage of possessives:
a) a man’s coat, women’s rights
b-1) its (possessive): “My watch is not working. Its battery may have died.”
b-2) it’s (contraction of “it is” or “it has”): “It’s 4:00 a.m. and I can’t sleep because I’m so excited about going to Buddhism class this morning!”
c-1) whose (possessive): “Whose car is that?”
c-2) who’s (contraction of “who is” or “who has”): “Who’s got the time to help me with this?”
-Correct usage of their, there, and they’re
III) Formatting
Name: Scott Earl
Date: May 22, 2020
Take home exam
Question #1:
In Chapter 2 of Donald Lopez Jr.’s book, The Story of Buddhism, we learn about the historical Buddha… .
Question #2:
The Four Noble Truths represent a basic statement about the nature of reality according to Buddhist teachings… .
Note: You do not need a sources cited page. Rather, if you choose to quote material, please include a simple but clear reference in parentheses with, if possible, a page number. For instance, you could refer to page 5 of Donald Lopez Jr.’s The Story of Buddhism as follows “…. (Lopez Jr., 5).”
IV) Questions
Please answer each of the following questions.
1) Drawing on the material we have studied—for instance, The Story of Buddhism, “PBS: The Buddha: A History of Buddhism,” Siddhartha, and other materials—describe the historical Buddha, focusing on the significance of his personal story.
2) Drawing on the material we have studied, explain Buddhism’s Four Noble Truths.
3) In class, I’ve explained several times that the fourth Noble Truth is the so-called eightfold path. The eight parts of that path are generally divided into three broad categories: wisdom, ethics, and mental cultivation. Wisdom refers to “seeing the world as it truly is,” while the five precepts—the exercises you completed—is the most basic formulation of Buddhist ethics.
The third category, mental cultivation, includes mindfulness and meditation, which we have been practicing. Drawing on the material we have studied, explain why Buddhists believe mental cultivation through meditation and mindfulness is an important practice to attaining enlightenment.
4) Please explain the distinctions Holly Rogers makes in The Mindful Twenty-something between:
i) responding and reacting;
ii) and the thinking and the observing mind.
5) Please summarize one of the two following podcasts:
i) “Matthieu Ricard: Happiness as Human Flourishing”
ii) “Brother Thay: A Radio Pilgrimage with Thich Nhat Hanh”
6) Shunryu Suzuki’s book Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind is, naturally, about the “beginner’s mind.” Please describe the beginner’s mind.
7) In class, we discussed the following passage from Janwillem van de Wetering’s The Empty Mirror. In the passage, the master of the Zen monastery is speaking with van de Wetering just before the latter leaves Japan:
You don’t know it, or you think you don’t know it, but you have been forged in this monastery. The forging of swords isn’t limited to monasteries. This whole planet is a forge. By leaving here nothing is broken. Your training continues. The world is a school where the sleeping are woken up. You are now a little awake, so awake that you can never fall asleep again (p. 146).
What do you think the master means by this?
8) In Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha, a creative retelling of the Buddha’s story, each of the main characters, except for Vasudeva, represents some form of attachment or craving. We have learned that according to Buddhist thought such craving causes us to experience duhkha, or “suffering.” Please write one or two sentences about the craving each of the following characters represents: Siddhartha, Govinda, Kamala, Kamaswami.
9) In Living Buddha, Living Christ, Thich Nhat Hanh reinterprets the five basic precepts of Buddhism, which we engaged in an earlier exercise this semester. Please summarize that reinterpretation and offer your own thoughts on how it accords with your own experience practicing these precepts (See p. 89, “The Jewels of our Own Tradition”-p. 110).
10) In the film “Doing Time, Doing Vipassana” we learn about the implementation of the Buddhist meditation practice called vipassana in the notorious Tihar Jail in New Delhi, India. The film depicts Superintendent Kiran Bedi’s desire to help reform the prisoners in Tihar through this practice. The film follows four prisoners who have committed serious crimes and describes their transformation through this meditation practice.
Describe that transformation in general terms. You don’t know need to refer to individual prisoners by name although you’re welcome to do so. You might write something like, “One prisoner observes how, after doing several 10-day vipassana retreats, his anger started to subside….”
You can find the film on YouTube at the following url listed:
You might also revisit, “Vipassana Meditation and Body Sensation,” Eilona Ariel at TEDxJaffa 2013, available at: https://youtu.be/ixu4Kd5R1DI
