The excitement at the moment is the beginning of the Buddhist Psychology Diploma Programme and the course on the History of Buddhism in China. Students are registering and starting the process of getting to know one another and learning familiarity with the necessary web sites and communication media for the courses.



You can access recent past issues of the newsletter at
https://eleusis.ning.com/global-sangha-newsletters



If you are registered for the Diploma Programme in Buddhist Psychology (BP), there are initial meetings this Saturday at 11:00 and at 18:00 (Rome). Please get to both if you can. Time zones mean that not everybody will be able to do so, of course.

The first meeting for the Dharma Ocean (DO) course on Transmission of the Dharma in medieval China will be at 11:00 on Saturday 12th February.

Forward programme:
5th Feb: 11:00 & 18:00 BP: Introductory Meetings of Psychology Students
12th Feb*: 11:00 DO: Unit Five Seminar: Buddhism Arrives in China
26th Feb: 19:00 BP: Unit One Seminar: Buddhist Psychology as Learning Theory
19th Mar*: 10:00 BP: Unit One Seminar: Inter-personal Modelling & Influence
19th Mar*: 12:00 DO: Unit Five Seminar: Early Chinese Masters
2nd April: 19:00 BP: Unit Two Seminar: Psychotherapy without Self
9th April: 19:00 DO: Unit Six Seminar: Great Chinese
16th April*: 11:00 BP: Unit Two Seminar: Conditioned Mind

Items marked * coincide with Upasattha Sangha Days so may be attended by sangha members who are not (yet) enrolled on the programmes.


We have our regular meetings:

Saturday 14:00 Refuge Group
Codes separately circulated

Sunday 10:30 Interest Group
An informal meeting for all.
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88974912642?pwd=N2VyQnc0MUM4WUU0YTFTdCt0QWVmQT09
Meeting ID: 889 7491 2642  -:-  Passcode: 537296

Sunday 20:00,  GS Friendship Group
An informal meeting for all
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87394084532?pwd=eEY3eUhHcjN0b0xLanZXcTNqVmVzdz09
Meeting ID: 873 9408 4532  -:-  Passcode: 519784



Starting on Tuesday 8th February and continuing every other week 17:00-18:00, Angela Romani is resuming giving Italian lessons.
https://bit.ly/3yxLd3Z  -:-  Meeting ID: 889 9850 0278  -:-  Passcode: 515887

You can see all about the Project at https://www.justice-defenders.org

I recently watched "The Priest" a Russian film with English sub-titles that is deeply affecting. It gives insight into a period of history but also is a very human document. Don't watch it if you are of a fragile disposition.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zghBLMX972U&t=5291s

Aniruddha is one of the ten great disciples of Shakyamuni. His name means "one without craving" - and, therefore, contented. He is the son of the Buddha's uncle, Sukkodana. He has a full brother,Mahanama, and a sister, Rohini. His half-brother (by a different mother) is Ananda. It seems that he grows up in an extreme of luxury. There is a story of him playing marbles with other boys, wagering rice cakes on the result. Aniruddha keeps losing and sends to his mother each time for more cakes. Finally she sends a message that there a no more cakes. Aniruddha has never heard of there being no more of anything so assumes that 'no-more" is a kind of cake. He sends the servant to get the "no-more" cakes. The servant returns with an empty box, but Aniruddha's past karma is so good that on the way the gods fill the box with celestial cakes. Aniruddha never lacked for anything.

When Buddha visits Kapilavastu, many people are inspired by his teachings and some become bhikshus. Aniruddha and his brother Mahanana discuss whether somebody from their family should go and join the sangha. Mahanama says that either he himself or his brother should go. At first Aniruddha is frightened of the challenge of living without the luxury that he has been used to. However, he knows that when he becomes fully an adult he will have to work as a farmer and they talk about how the work of a farmer is unending and goes on throughout this life and then for life after life. This gives Aniruddha a profound sense of the futility of the conventional life and he decides that he will join the sangha. He goes to tell his mother and she refuses to let him go. They have an intense discussion and she finally says that he can only go if Prince Bhaddiya would go with him. She is probably convinced that Bhaddiya would never renounce his prospect of becoming a Shaklyan chieftain. Aniruddha goes to Bhaddiya and another intense discussion ensues. Bhaddiya is very reluctant, but eventually agrees. With this example before them, four other young Sakyan nobles also join and the six princes go to the Buddha, taking Upali with them to cut their hair. They give their finery to Upali, but he puts it in a bundle and leaves it hanging on a tree and follows them. The Buddha ordains Upali immediately and the princes seven days later.

Aniruddha becomes enlightened within a year of being ordained. There are many stories about his special powers. It is said that he sees beings in all the six realms and for this he is called foremost in vision. However, his very ability to see the inner light and supra-mundane forms became an obstacle for him, becoming a cause of conceit and worry and he then receives further teachings, both from Shakyamuni and from Shariputra, that bring him to arhatship. The divine eye is the capacity to see the passage of beings from life to life and is a function of mastery of the dhyanas and the four satipatthanas, in which Aniruddha is expert. He teaches that through satipatthana one acquires equanimity, having the power to see the repulsive as non-repulsive and the non-repulsive as repulsive. When he was ill the other monks were surprised by his equanimity in bearing pain and he attributed this to satipatthana.

Aniruddha prefers solitude to company and is not centrally involved in the life of the sangha, but he is not a complete recluse and has some disciples. From time to time he has discussions with other disciples and with devout laypeople and some of these are recorded in the sutras. Often he spends periods in retirement in the forest with his companions Nandiya and Kimbila.

When Buddha dies Aniruddha ascends to heaven to tell Mahamaya, the Buddha's mother. Then, when the Mallas try to light the funeral pyre and find that it will not light, Aniruddha says that the gods have told him that Buddha is waiting for the arrival of Kashyapa. Aniruddha outlives the Buddha by many years and plays a part in the spread of the Dharma after the death of the great sage.