बुद्ध जन्मस्थल लुम्बिनी: महान बुद्धको गरिमालाई हलुका नपारौ

केदार शाक्य*

बुद्ध लुम्बिनीमा जन्मिएका हुन् भन्ने ऐतिहासिक कुरामा भारतीयहरुले बखेडा मच्याएको हुदै होइन । दिग्भ्रम कहाँ छ त ? लुम्बिनी उत्तर भारतमा छ । यो दिग्भ्रम उनीहरुले फैलाएका हुन् ।

योगगुरु रामदेव नेपाल आउँदा खुल्लामंचमा “बुद्धका जन्म नेपाल मे हुवा था” भन्छन र तालि खान्छन, तर हरिद्धार फर्केपछि “हमारा भारत महान  हैं जहाँ भगवान बुद्धका जन्म हुवा था” भनि पुस्तक लेख्छन ।.. फलानोले आफ्नो बाबुलाई देखाएर तिमी उसैका छोरा हौ भनि दिनु पर्ने कत्रो बिडम्बना ? फलानोले भनेको म त उसैको छोरा रहेछु भनेर गौरब गर्ने ?

पहिले लुम्बिनी विकास कोषको ऐन बनाउदा “लुम्बिनीको पबित्र माटोको रक्षा गर्न बान्छनीय भएकोले यो ऐनको ब्यबस्था गरिएको छ” भनि २०४७ सालमा ऐन बनाउन संसदमा पेस गरिएको थियो, पास भएको थिएन । ऐनको अन्तिम रुप तयार भइसकेको थियो । संसदमा पेस भएपछी एकजना सांसदले प्रश्न उठाएका  थिए, “यो ऐन अधुरो छ, लुम्बिनीको माटोलाई किन केका लागि सुरक्षा गर्ने ? ऐनमा प्रष्ट छैन । लुम्बिनी किन पबित्र छ ?” सांसद महोदयले यसरि प्रश्न उठाएपछि मात्र “भगवान बुद्धको पबित्र जन्मस्थल” भन्ने वाक्यांश थपिएको थियो ।

 

नेपाल रास्ट्र बैंकले निकालेको एक सय रुपियाको नोटमा “लुम्बिनी बुद्धको पबित्र जन्मस्थल” उल्लेख गरेर अशोक स्तम्भको चित्र नोटमा देखाएको छ । लुम्बिनी र बुद्धको स्पस्ट उल्लेख गरेको छ । यो नोट देखनेहरु निकै दंगदास छन् । तथापी यसमा पनि कहीं कतै कमि देखिएको छ । लुम्बिनी कहाँ छ ? उल्लेख छैन । तर्क आउन सक्छ नेपालको नोटमा लेखिएपछि लुम्बिनी पनि नेपालमा त हो नि ? यस्तो कुरा लेखेर अन्य कुनै मुलुकले पनि नोट प्रकाशन गर्न सक्छ । “लुम्बिनी भगवान बुद्धको पबित्र जन्मस्थल” यसमा “लुम्बिनी नेपाल” लेखिएको देखिदैन । नेपाल शब्द राख्न कन्जुसी किन ?

TIME’s Beautiful, White, Blonde ‘Mindfulness Revolution’

By Joanna Piacenza, Web Manager, Tricycle: The Buddhist Review

Few things in this world could pull me out of a six-month post-graduate-degree writing silence. Last week’s TIME cover managed to do so with vigor. Its presence and imagery choice stirred up issues about gender, beauty, race, religious marketing, and how the “face” of mindfulness and Buddhism in America hasn’t changed in over a decade.

My initial reaction to TIME’s “The Mindful Revolution” cover was pretty surface. I huffed and puffed about the fact that a prominent Western-based magazine was portraying Buddhism in such a Cover Girl way. Flawless make up, perfect bone structure, skin as supple as Snow White; this girl was getting a lot from the “Mindful Revolution.” What’s her secret?! Even the positioning of her head, tilting up as some sort of divine call-to-action, soaking up erethral rays, screamed Western Christianity. And yet, there, splashed above her bosom, was the Buddhist-themed headline.

I shared the photo — and some sort of sarcastic remark — with my social media network and called it a day. But then the wonderful Cathy Lynn Grossman, Religious New Service correspondent and all-around fantastic #religion tweeter, posted this side-by-side image…

Gautam Buddha was Born in Nepal: More evidence found in Nepal’s Tilaurakot: Gautama Buddha’s town

Matthieu Ricard: The habits of happiness

What is happiness, and how can we all get some? Biochemist turned Buddhist monk Matthieu Ricard says we can train our minds in habits of well-being, to generate a true sense of serenity and fulfillment.

After training in biochemistry at the Institute Pasteur, Matthieu Ricard left science behind to move to the Himalayas and become a Buddhist monk — and to pursue happiness, both at a basic human level and as a subject of inquiry. Achieving happiness, he has come to believe, requires the same kind of effort and mind training that any other serious pursuit involves.

His deep and scientifically tinged reflections on happiness and Buddhism have turned into several books, including The Quantum and the Lotus: A Journey to the Frontiers Where Science and Buddhism Meet. At the same time, he also makes sensitive and jaw-droppingly gorgeous photographs of his beloved Tibet and the spiritual hermitage where he lives and works on humanitarian projects.

His latest book on happiness is Happiness: A Guide to Developing Life’s Most Important Skill; his latest book of photographs is Tibet: An Inner Journey.

“Matthieu Ricard, French translator and right-hand man for the Dalai Lama, has been the subject of intensive clinical tests at the University of Wisconsin, as a result of which he is frequently described as the happiest man in the world.”

Robert Chalmers, The Independent 

Happiest man on earth is a Buddhist monk

• Brain scans reveal Buddhist monk Matthieu Ricard has largest capacity for happiness ever recorded
• Meditation ‘completely changes your brain and therefore changes what you are’, says 66-year-old
• He says you can do it too by learning how to let your thoughts drift

By CLAIRE BATES

Ricard: ‘Meditation is not just blissing out under a mango tree but it completely changes your brain’

A French genetic scientist may seem like an unusual person to hold the title – but Matthieu Ricard is the world’s happiest man, according to researchers.

The 66-year-old turned his back on Parisian intellectual life 40 years ago and moved to India to study Buddhism. He is now a close confidante of the Dalai Lama and respected western scholar of religion.

Now it seems daily meditation has had other benefits – enhancing Mr Ricard’s capacity for joy.

Neuroscientist Richard Davidson wired up the monk’s skull with 256 sensors at the University of Wisconsin as part of research on hundreds of advanced practitioners of meditation.

The scans showed that when meditating on compassion, Ricard’s brain produces a level of gamma waves – those linked to consciousness, attention, learning and memory – ‘never reported before in the neuroscience literature’, Davidson said.

The scans also showed excessive activity in his brain’s left prefrontal cortex compared to its right counterpart, giving him an abnormally large capacity for happiness and a reduced propensity towards negativity, researchers believe.

Research into the phenomenon, known as “neuroplasticity”, is in its infancy and Ricard has been at the forefront of ground-breaking experiments along with other leading scientists across the world.

‘We have been looking for 12 years at the effect of short and long-term mind-training through meditation on attention, on compassion, on emotional balance,’ he said.

‘We’ve found remarkable results with long-term practitioners who did 50,000 rounds of meditation, but also with three weeks of 20 minutes a day, which of course is more applicable to our modern times.’

बुद्ध जन्मस्थल चिनाउने अभियानका अभियन्ता

[लुम्बिनी-कपिलवस्तु दिवस अभियान के कस्तो परिबेशमा किन शुरु गर्नु पर्‍यो लगायत अन्य बिभिन्न केही महत्वपूर्ण जानकारी सहित अस्ट्रेलियाबाट प्रकाशित नेपालीन्यूजको २०१४ सालको जनवरी अंकको पेज २०-२३ मा ब्यक्ति-ब्यक्तित्व अन्तर्गत epaper  www.nepalinews.com.au मा प्रकाशित सामग्री epaper मा पढन त्यत्ति नरुचाउने केहीले पढनका लागि अन्य बिकल्पका बारेमा सोध्नु भएकोले अनलाइनमा पढने सुबिधा उपलब्ध गराउनका लागि यहाँ प्रकाशित गरिएको छ । प्रकाशित अंक अस्ट्रेलियामा मात्रै उपलब्ध गराइने ब्यबस्था छ । ]

व्यक्ति व्यक्तित्व

By कृष्ण तिवारी, Editor Nepal News Australia

वेलायत रहँदादेखि नै श्रेष्ठले  बुद्धका वारेमा आएका भ्रामक तथ्यलाई खरो रुपमा प्रतिवाद गरे । सन् २००९ मा भारतले बुद्धको जन्मस्थल लुम्बिनीलाई आफ्नै देशमा जन्मेको भनेर नक्कली लुम्बिनी निर्माण गरेको समाचारले श्रेष्ठको मन निकै छोयो । यसको न त सरकारले खण्डन गर्यो न त कुनै ठुला मिडिया नै यसको विरुद्धमा लागे । यस्लाई श्रेष्ठ सर्बपक्षीय मौनता भन्ने गर्छन । उनले भारतको रवैयाको विरुद्ध फेसबुक र इमेल मार्फत  अभियानको सूत्रपात नै गरे जस्ले यो छोटो समयमा विश्वब्यापी रूप लियो ।

रामकुमार श्रेष्ठ – साधरण पहिरन, सरल स्वभाव, पेशाले सिभिल इन्जिनियर । बसाइ अस्ट्रेलिया मेलवर्न नजिकको शहर जिलोङ । कर्मभूमि अस्ट्रेलियालाई बनाए पनि आफ्नो सबै तनमन र समय भने मातृभूमिका निम्ति खर्चेका छन् । बिगत २००९ को डिसेम्बरदेखि उनी बुद्ध नेपालमा जन्मेका हुन् भन्ने विश्वब्यापी अभियानमा अहोरात्र खटिएर सबैको प्रसंशा बटुलिरहेका छन् । लुम्बिनी कपिलवस्तु दिवस अभियानका विश्व संयोजक समेत रहेका रामकुमार श्रेष्ठले एउटा सामान्य नागरिकका हैसियतले विश्वसामु चलाएको बुद्धसम्बन्धी अभियान अत्यन्तै प्रशंसनीय र अनुकरणीय छ ।

श्रेष्ठको जन्म विस. २०१९ सालमा गोरखा जिल्लाको धारापानी बजारमा भएको थियो । अध्ययनमा निकै मिहिनेती तथा मेधावी छात्रको रुपमा चिनिएका श्रेष्ठले विस. २०३६ सालमा गोरखाकै शक्ति माविबाट प्रथम श्रेणीमा प्रवेशिका उत्र्तिण गरे । पढाइ अबधिभर प्रथम श्रेणीले उनलाई संधै पच्छ्याइरह्यो ।

किसान परिवारमा जन्मेर हुर्केका श्रेष्ठको परिवारको आर्थिक स्थिति भने नाजुक नै थियो । अध्ययनमा मेधावी श्रेष्ठलाई प्रवेशिकापछि पढाउन गाउँका शिक्षकहरुले निकै जोड गरेपछि अशिक्षित  आमाबुवाले उनलाई पढन काठमाण्डौ पठाएका थिए ।

प्रवेशिकापछि इन्जिनियरङ अध्ययनका लागि उनी काठमाडौ पुल्चोक क्याम्पसमा भर्ना भए । छात्रवृतिमा अध्ययन गरेका श्रेष्ठले पुल्चोक क्याम्पसमा राम्रो अंक ल्याएर उच्च शिक्षाको लागि रसिया सरकारको छात्रवृतिमा सिभिल इन्जिनियरिङमा मास्टर्स अध्ययनका लागि सन् १९८६ मा रसिया उडे ।

Correct misleading message on Lumbini

Kathmandu, Dec. 28: Stakeholders stressed on need of a concerted effort from all including the government as well as the

Nepalese residing abroad to correct the misleading messages in textbooks of various countries regarding the birthplace of Lord Buddha.

 The participants of the interaction programme said as the curriculum of various nations are found disseminating wrong message that Lord Buddha was born in the northern part of India, there is a need to dispel such baseless fact from all the textbooks and other reading materials from across the globe.

The speakers, organised by Lumbini, Kapilvastu Day Movement, mainly focused on finding the ways and measures to effectively run the campaign so that wrong publicity about the birthplace of Siddharth Gautam could be corrected.

Speaking at the interaction, Minister for Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation Ram Kumar Shrestha said it was very sad to know that the Lumbini related stakeholders have to struggle hard to establish the truth about the birthplace of Lord Buddha. Minister Shrestha added that the development of Lumbini was very necessary to dispel such misleading publicity. He said many Indian officials had stated that Lord Buddha was born in Nepal but the wrong publicity had resurfaced owing to some vested interests of some sections in India, the Minister clarified. He said that since the present government was an election government, it could not allocate essential amount of budget in time for Lumbini development.