Buddhism starts from an observation: life involves suffering, and much of it comes from attachment, from wanting things to be permanent when everything changes. Not even the self would be a fixed thing. The central question is how to be freed from this cycle. The answer is the Noble Eightfold Path, which joins ethical conduct, meditation and wisdom, leading to nirvana, the extinction of the craving that produces suffering.
It arose in northern India around the fifth century BC with the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha. It spread across Asia and developed many schools. In thirteenth-century Japan, Dogen founded the Soto school of Zen, centered on seated meditation. In the twentieth century Alan Watts introduced Zen to Western audiences, and in Brazil Monja Coen, of the Soto lineage, teaches the practice. Today mindfulness techniques inspired by Buddhism are used even in health care.
Core ideas
Suffering arises from attachment and craving
Everything is impermanent, including the self
Ethics, meditation and wisdom lead to liberation
Where to start reading
Each thinker's starter book, picked for beginners.
