Buddha: elämä ja teot

by John S. Strong, Virpi Hämeen-Anttila (Translator)

This new, religious biography charts not only the life of the Buddha as it happened, but also considers what the life of Siddhartha Gautama still means to Buddhists today.

Genres: Buddhism, Biography, Nonfiction, Spirituality

271 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 2001

Reviews

[Nik Robbins]

Anyone who thinks Buddhism is a purely rational "philosophy not a religion" is unfamiliar with the many miracles and other supernatural occurrences, including the appearance of numerous deities, in the traditional Buddhist texts. This interesting biography of the Buddha Siddhartha Gautama is a summary of his life as presented in those texts.

[Brad McKenna]

Since I came to Buddhism from the west, I'm skeptical of a lot of the stories I hear about the Buddha. His taking steps in each direction and speaking immediately after birth and his supposed ability to fly. I am drawn towards his message of The Four Noble Truths and The Eightfold path. This book examines the literature surrounding Buddhism and explains what the authors were thinking. Like Christians and commandeering the pagan Yule holiday for their own Christmas celebration, cultures in the orient seem to have adopted Buddhism and raised it to fit in their belief structure.

This was a quick read and was very interesting to see how the stories came to be. It was actually fairly light on the tenants of Buddhism and was more of a history recounting how the religion changed over the years. Interesting take on things.

[Karen]

sums up many historical myths and stories surrounding the Buddhas enlightenment. Really good read