This book represents a comparison of the critique of Buddhism as set forth in the interpretations of Sankara, Madhva, and Ramanuja to the sutras of the second section (adhyaya) of the Brahma-sutras concerned with the refutation of Buddhism, with the positions actually elaborated by the Buddhists in their own texts. An attempt is also made to compare the conflicting interpretations of the three commentators to these particular sutras, in accordance with the philosophical approach unique to each commentator. The book is divided into two parts. The first part consists of an Introductory Background. It includes a brief description of the Brahma-sutras as a text and summarizes the philosophical positions of the three commentators. The second part proceeds sutra by sutra to study the three commentators' interpretations of the particular sutras directed against the Buddhists.

Responding to our modern disillusionment with any claims to absolute truth regarding morality or reality, this book offers a conceptual approach for discussing absolutes without denying either the relevance of divergent religious and philosophical teachings or the evidence supporting postmodern and poststructuralist critiques. Case studies of mysticism within Advaita-Vedānta Hinduism, Mādhyamika Buddhism, and Nicene Christianity demonstrate the value of this approach and offer many fresh insights into the metaphysical presuppositions of these religions as well as into the nature and value of mystical experience. Like Douglas Hofstadter's Gōdel, Escher, Bach, this book finds ultimate reality to be rationally graspable only as an eternal fugue of pattern and paradox. Yet it does not so much counter other philosophical views as provide a conceptual tool for understanding and classifying incommensurable views.

This is the first scholarly treatment of the emergence of American Buddhist Studies as a significant research field. Until now, few investigators have turned their attention to the interpretive challenge posed by the presence of all the traditional lineages of Asian Buddhism in a consciously multicultural society. Nor have scholars considered the place of their own contributions as writers, teachers, and practising Buddhists in this unfolding saga. In thirteen chapters and a critical introduction to the field, the book treats issues such as Asian American Buddhist identity, the new Buddhism, Buddhism and American culture, and the scholar's place in American Buddhist Studies. The volume offers complete lists of dissertations and theses on American Buddhism and North American dissertations and theses on topics related to Buddhism since 1892.

This book provides an in-depth analysis of the doctrines of early Advaita and Buddhism that has important implications for the question of the relationship between Hindu and Buddhist thought. The author examines the central doctrines of the Gaudapadiya-karikain a series of chapters that discuss early Advaita in relation to the Abhidharma, Madhyamaka, and Yogacara schools of Buddhism. The question of the doctrinal diversity of Indian Buddhism is also discussed through an analysis of the concept of 'Buddha-Nature' and its relationship with Vedantic thought.

Buddhism is a religion of universal peace and concord. The present book fulfils its aim by placin emphasis on the facts in relation to this aspect of the creed.The book is divided into five sections. Section I is Introductory. It recounts in particular the sacred books of the Buddhists, literature subsidiary to the canon the period of Origin of buddhism and Indian thoughts and ideals contemporaneous with it. Section II deals with the life of Buddha from conception birth the childhood to Parinirvana cremation and partition of the relics.

This book centers on the analysis of pure consciousness as found in Advaita Vedanta, one of the main schools of Indian philosophy. Written lucidly and clearly, this book reveals the depth and implications of Indian metaphysics and argument. It will be of interest to scholars of Indian philosophy and Religious Studies.