Indigenous Dharma: Native, Buddhist Voices

Susan Murphy (Inquiring Mind); Xochitl, Dhr. Seven, Crystal Q. (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

American Indian youth yearn for meaning in tradition and modernity. Does Buddhism work?

When Siddhartha sat under the awakening tree, he called on the Earth to witness.

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We have been the caretakers of Mother Earth.

INDIGENOUS DHARMA: Native American and Buddhist Voices by John Travis, Eduardo Duran, Fred Wahpepah, Lorain Fox Davis, Tsultrim Allione, Susan Murphy.

Susan Murphy is an Australian Zen teacher in the lineages of Robert Aitken and John Tarrant. She teaches at Zen Open Circle in Sydney, the Melbourne Zen Group, and at her rural retreat center, Cloud Mountain.

The Dalai Lama meets and greets familiar Native elders in the United States.

Elder Buddhist nun in Zanskar teaches a younger nun the mudras (Olivier Adam).

The roots of Native tradition are relationships with fellow living being and the Earth itse4lf.

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Inquiring Mind asked her to write the introduction to a series of essays and interviews on "Indigenous Dharma."

"When you know the place where you are, practice begins.”

- Zen Master Dogen

The Buddha's Earth-witnessing gesture or mudra called upon Mother Earth, who responded

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One could say that every stage of Buddhist practice, including realization [enlightenment] itself, forms and deepens a covenant with the Earth.

We bear witness to the Earth by learning to really be here, and when reality breaks through and shakes us to the core, it is the Earth reciprocating that intimate gesture of custodianship.

It is one elemental act of kindness being met by another. The testimonies that follow from Native American and Buddhist teachers bring to light some of the affinities of Buddhist practice with the old, native Earth-based traditions and their protocols for creating and tending good relations with the Earth, the source of life [on this planet].

Stalking Nirvana: The Native American (Red Path) Zen Way

Buddhist mudras or yogic "hand gestures"

In my [Susan Murphy] own practice as a Zen teacher in Australia, it has felt increasingly important to me to begin consciously to walk the song lines of the Way, to seek out Aboriginal Law holders.

I actively explore the affinities and resonance between Aboriginal and Zen spiritualities as they meet in the place where I am.

Can Westerners adopt Eastern traditions? (Bree Van Z)

It will not be the first time that Buddhism has been received, enlarged, and refined by the more ancient Earth-based spirituality that awaits it in a particular place.

The Dharma is wanting to learn to stand up here in olive-gray saltbush and red earth, gray kangaroos, and satin bowerbirds. It is never complete, and it is the Earth that constantly completes it.

Tsultrim Allione (pinterest.fr)

Our human conversation with the Earth has a chance to resume when we grow quiet and still and do some listening, some asking and a bit of thanking.

Meditation itself is a ritual action of respect, literally, “looking again,” with patience and forbearance.

Respect structures the spiritual authority through which both Native American and Buddhist teachings are offered and transmitted, and respect — a kind of nameless gratitude — marks every mindful gesture and breath, gradually maturing into a conscious minding of the universe. More

• What parallels are there between Native American and Buddhist teachings? (r/Buddhism/reddit.com)