English Dharma Class
03.07.2020
The first Saturday Weekly Dharma class took off on 7th March, from 3.00pm to 5.00pm. Guided by Venerable Zhi Shuan, a total of 15 students attended the class. Sister Lillian informed the class that the structure of the Weekly Dharma Study will be Sutra Studies based on the book "The Great Perfection of Wisdom Treatise" and once a month, there will be a Reading Club to discuss on articles written by Venerable Master Hsing Yun based on the book "Buddha-Dharma: Pure and Simple".
After recitation of the Heart Sutra, and as a prelude to the main topic, the class did an ice breaking session to engage participants' interaction. Each participant was given a piece of paper to draw a picture to describe their life's journey. Everyone shared a good description of their life's path and this session also allowed us to understand each other on a deeper level.
Venerable Zhi Shuan introduced the preface of the book "The Great Perfection of Wisdom Treatise", in sanskrit is known as "Mahaprajnaparamita" or 大智度論. Venerable's lecture centered around the legendary author, Nagarjuna, and the famous translator, Kumarajiwa. Nagarjuna was a very intelligent Indian scholar and he was introduced to Mahayana sutras by an Indian monk during his stay at the Himalaya mountains and he was the founder of Madhymaka (middle way) School of Mahayana Buddhism. Kumarajiwa was one of the four famous translators and his first translation work was the Amitabha Sutra, followed by The Great Perfection of Wisdom Treatise and subsequently other sutras. According to Venerable, The Great Perfection of Wisdom Treatise was translated from 402-406 CE and was known as a Buddhist encyclopedia. It was certainly a very awakening and interesting lesson and the class look forward to the next chapter with great enthusiasm.