What the Buddha Taught with Texts from Suttas & Dhammapada by Walpola Rahula
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This book is a solid and straightforward overview of the basic philosophic tenets of Buddhism. The text itself is relatively short (less than 100 pages), but it is not simplistic. Rahula explains the main points and directs the reader to the sources for these ideas. For the most part, it doesn’t get into more esoteric details or points of dispute between different branches of Buddhism. He does indicate a few points of disagreement over interpretations, but leaves that more for the reader to go and explore on his own. Rahula explains the ways that Buddhist ideas have been misinterpreted or misunderstand by Western thinkers and he tries to correct these errors. The latter half of the book contains translations of original sources for those interested. This is definitely a good starting place for people interested in Buddhist ideas.
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