Kate Crosby Livres

Exploring the nearly lost tradition of boråan kamahåana, this book delves into the esoteric aspects of Theravada meditation, revealing its historical significance and cultural roots. Scholar Kate Crosby presents a comprehensive analysis of how this meditation practice has been overshadowed by modern, text-based approaches like Vipassana and mindfulness. Drawing on extensive research, she contextualizes the evolution of Theravada Buddhism, challenging contemporary perceptions and highlighting the depth of its traditional practices.

This comprehensive introductory overview explores all aspects of the origins, evolution, and current practice of Theravada, the oldest surviving Buddhist school of thought. Theravada Buddhism offers an enriching and enlightening introduction to the history, teachings, and practice of Theravada for students of Buddhism.

A groundbreaking exploration of a practice tradition that was nearly lost to history. Theravada Buddhism, often understood as the school that most carefully preserved the practices taught by the Buddha, has undergone tremendous change over time. Prior to Western colonialism in Asia—which brought Western and modernist intellectual concerns, such as the separation of science and religion, to bear on Buddhism—there existed a tradition of embodied, esoteric, and culturally regional Theravada meditation practices. This once-dominant traditional meditation system, known as borān kammatthāna, is related to—yet remarkably distinct from—Vipassana and other Buddhist and secular mindfulness practices that would become the hallmark of Theravada Buddhism in the twentieth century. Drawing on a quarter century of research, scholar Kate Crosby offers the first holistic discussion of borān kammatthāna, illuminating the historical events and cultural processes by which the practice has been marginalized in the modern era.