Anālayo | |
|---|---|
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| Personal life | |
| Born | 1962 (age 62–63) |
| Nationality | German |
| Religious life | |
| Religion | Buddhism |
| School | Theravada |
| Sect | Amarapura–Rāmañña Nikāya |
| Ordination | 1995 |
| Senior posting | |
| Teacher | Pemasiri Thera |
| Based in | Sri Lanka |
Bhikkhu Anālayo is abhikkhu (Buddhist monk), scholar, and meditation teacher. He was born in Germany in 1962, andwent forth in 1995 in theTheravādin monastic tradition ofSri Lanka. He is best known for his comparative studies ofEarly Buddhist Texts as preserved by the various early Buddhist traditions.[1]
Bhikkhu Anālayo temporarily ordained in 1990 inThailand, after a meditation retreat at Wat Suan Mokkh, the monastery established by the influential 20th-century Thai monk AjahnBuddhadasa.[2] In 1994 he went to Sri Lanka, looking to meetNyanaponika Thera after having read his bookThe Heart of Buddhist Meditation.[2] Nyanaponika Thera died just days before Analayo's arrival but he stayed on and studied withBhikkhu Bodhi.[2] In 1995 he tookpabbajja again underBalangoda Ananda Maitreya Thero.[3] He received hisupasampada in 2007 in the Sri LankanShwegyin Nikaya (belonging to the mainAmarapura Nikaya), with Pemasiri Thera of Sumathipala Aranya as his ordinationacariya.[4]Bhikkhu Bodhi has been Bhikkhu Anālayo's main mentor in the study of the Pāli discourses.[5] The late Bhikkhu Kaṭukurunde Ñāṇananda has also been an important influence in his understanding of the Dhamma,[6] whereasGodwin Samararatne has been the most influential meditation teacher in his early practice life.[7]
Bhikkhu Anālayo completed a PhD thesis on theSatipaṭṭhāna Sutta at theUniversity of Peradeniya in 2000, which was later published asSatipaṭṭhāna, the Direct Path to Realization.[8] During the course of that study, he had come to notice the interesting differences between thePāli andChinese Buddhist canon versions of this early Buddhist discourse. This led to his undertaking ahabilitation research at theUniversity of Marburg, completed in 2007, in which he compared theMajjhima Nikāya discourses with their Chinese,Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit andTibetan Buddhist canon counterparts.[9] In 2013 Anālayo then publishedPerspectives on Satipaṭṭhāna,[10] where he builds on his earlier work by comparing the parallel versions of the Satipaṭṭhāna-sutta and exploring the meditative perspective that emerges when emphasis is given to those instructions that are common ground among the extant canonical versions and thus can reasonably well be expected to be early.
Bhikkhu Anālayo has published extensively on early Buddhism.[11] The textual study of early Buddhist discourses in comparative perspective is the basis of his ongoing interests and academic research.[12] At present he is the chief editor and one of the translators of the first English translation of the ChineseMadhyama-āgama (Taishō 26),[13] and has undertaken an integral English translation of the ChineseSaṃyukta-āgama (Taishō 99), parallel to the PaliSaṃyutta Nikāya collection.[14]
Central to Anālayo's academic activity remain theoretical and practical aspects of meditation. He has published several articles on insight and absorption meditation and related contemporary meditation traditions to their textual sources.[15]
His comparative studies of early Buddhist texts have also led Anālayo to focus on historical developments of Buddhist thought, and to research the early roots and genesis of thebodhisattva ideal[16] and the beginning ofAbhidharma thought.[17]
Bhikkhu Anālayo was a presenter at theInternational Congress on Buddhist Women's Role in the Sangha.[18] Exploring attitudes towardsbhikkhunis (female monastics) in early Buddhist texts and the story of the foundation of the bhikkhuni order[19] has allowed him to be a supporter of bhikkhuni ordination, which is a matter of controversy in the Theravada and Tibetan traditions.[20]
Bhikkhu Anālayo has retired from being a professor of the Numata Centre for Buddhist Studies at theUniversity of Hamburg. He is the co-founder of theĀgama Research Group, a resident scholar at theBarre Center for Buddhist Studies[21] and a member of the Numata Centre for Buddhist Studies at theUniversity of Hamburg.
{{cite journal}}:Cite journal requires|journal= (help) (reprinted as a booklet together with translations into Sinhala, Thai and Burmese: West Malaysia: Selangor Buddhist Vipassanā Meditation Society, 2013; and New York: Buddhist Association of the United States, 2014).PDF{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link){{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)| International | |
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