THE HISTORICAL BUDDHA AND HIS TEACHING

Description

The Historical Buddha and His Teaching is a clear, demythologized portrait of Siddhattha Gotama and the original Dhamma-written with scholarly care and everyday clarity. Drawing on archaeological, textual, and epigraphical evidence, Bhikkhu Nyānadassana traces the Buddha’s life and sets his message in its historical context, avoiding exaggeration while keeping the prose approachable for both newcomers and specialists. Readers meet the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path as a practical training, explore dependent origination and the three marks of existence, and see how ethical action (kamma) shapes our future. The meditation chapters make serenity and insight concrete-including step‑by‑step guidance on jhāna-while the closing study of Greco‑Buddhism illuminates the exchange between Hellenism and early Buddhism. The result is a single volume that unites history, doctrine, and practice without myth-just the Buddha’s path, explained and made useful today.

About the author: Venerable Nyānadassana (Ioannis Tselios) is a Greek Theravāda monk and scholar with decades of practice and study in monasteries in Sri Lanka and Myanmar. He works directly with the Pāli Canon and has authored or translated numerous Buddhist books in German, English, Sinhalese, Pāli, and Greek.

Short blurb: A rigorous yet readable guide to the Buddha’s life and the original Dhamma-history, practice, and insight in one volume.