The Birth of Insight

The Birth of Insight Meditation, Modern Buddhism, and the Burmese Monk Ledi Sayadaw

by Erik Braun

University of Chicago Press, 2013
Cloth: 978-0-226-00080-0 | Paper: 978-0-226-41857-5 | Electronic: 978-0-226-00094-7
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226000947.001.0001

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ABOUT THIS BOOKAUTHOR BIOGRAPHYREVIEWSTABLE OF CONTENTS

ABOUT THIS BOOK

Insight meditation, which claims to offer practitioners a chance to escape all suffering by perceiving the true nature of reality, is one of the most popular forms of meditation today. The Theravada Buddhist cultures of South and Southeast Asia often see it as the Buddha’s most important gift to humanity. In the first book to examine how this practice came to play such a dominant—and relatively recent—role in Buddhism, Erik Braun takes readers to Burma, revealing that Burmese Buddhists in the colonial period were pioneers in making insight meditation indispensable to modern Buddhism.

Braun focuses on the Burmese monk Ledi Sayadaw, a pivotal architect of modern insight meditation, and explores Ledi’s popularization of the study of crucial Buddhist philosophical texts in the early twentieth century. By promoting the study of such abstruse texts, Braun shows, Ledi was able to standardize and simplify meditation methods and make them widely accessible—in part to protect Buddhism in Burma after the British takeover in 1885. Braun also addresses the question of what really constitutes the “modern” in colonial and postcolonial forms of Buddhism, arguing that the emergence of this type of meditation was caused by precolonial factors in Burmese culture as well as the disruptive forces of the colonial era. Offering a readable narrative of the life and legacy of one of modern Buddhism’s most important figures, The Birth of Insight provides an original account of the development of mass meditation.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

Erik Braun is associate professor in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Virginia.

REVIEWS

“The Birth of Insight represents an important addition to current scholarship on modern Burmese Buddhism, which has broader implications for our understanding of contemporary Buddhism in South and Southeast Asia and global Buddhism generally. Engaging and challenging, it restores the study of ‘texts’ to the repertoire of tools at our disposal for the critical examination of Burmese tradition.”

— Patrick Pranke, University of Louisville

“Insight meditation (vipassana) is increasingly central to the modern practice of Buddhism, worldwide; mindfulness practices (sati) are ever more widely used in contemporary western psychotherapies. Tracing the genealogy of these developments takes us to nineteenth- and twentieth-century Burma, and Erik Braun’s fascinating and lucid account of Ledi Sayadaw provides a detailed and illuminating historical context, notably in relation to colonialism, for the beginnings of the whole process. A final chapter describes Ledi’s influence on other teachers in Burma, and through them on the American disciples who brought the techniques to the West. A very fine book.”

— Steven Collins, University of Chicago

“Erik Braun’s superbly researched, elegantly crafted, and eminently accessible book is the most authoritative study to date of Ledi Sayadaw and the origins of the modern Buddhist meditation revival in Burma. But its significance goes well beyond the confines of twentieth-century Burmese history. Ledi Sayadaw and his followers laid the foundation for ‘Buddhist modernism,’ and by the last quarter of the twentieth century their innovative—if sometimes controversial—approach to Buddhist doctrine and practice had spread to the rest of Asia, as well as to Europe, America, and beyond. Braun’s account of their achievements should be required reading for anyone interested in the roots of modern ‘insight’ (or ‘mindfulness’) meditation practice.”

— Robert H. Sharf, University of California, Berkeley

“This is an exemplary work within the history of religions with its careful argumentation and substantial evidence for the foundation of vipassana meditation to be located within the ideas of an important nineteenth-century Burmese monk. This book will be important reading for students in the history of religions and Southeast Asian studies, and those interested in meditation and Buddhism.”

— H-Net

“Masterful. . . . This is an excellent study, one that will deservedly become a classic in the field and make possible many other studies of the history of Burmese Buddhism.”

— Journal of Southeast Asian Studies

“Provides a detailed and masterfully contextualized analysis of the innovative career of Ledi Sayadaw. . . . Because of Ledi’s multi-faceted influence, the book will be of interest to scholars working on both Southeast Asian and Western Buddhism, as well as researchers interested in religion and its relationship with colonialism, modernity, or communication developments.”

— Studies in Religion

“An erudite and thoughtful investigation of a remarkable man and his crucial role in the development of modern Burmese Buddhism. Moreover, from a methodological viewpoint, Braun’s study exhibits a formidable command of primary-source materials that are seamlessly woven into a direct narrative style in a manner that highlights the inseparability of individual historical agents, traditional religious beliefs, and modern political activity.”

— Religion

“Thought-provoking . . . . Braun’s discussion of Ledi Sayadaw as an ‘improviser,’ for whom the traditional Buddhist context mattered more than colonialism, is an important contribution to the understanding of national agency in colonial Asia. . . . [An] assiduous and judicious study of the relevant literature.”

— Religious Studies Review

Ledi Sayadaw and the Gifts of the Buddha - Erik Braun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226000947.003.0001
[modern Buddhism, lay Buddhism, pre-colonial Buddhism, pre-modern Buddhism, calming meditation, concentration meditation, insight, local Buddhism]
To lay the basis for the study of Ledi Sayadaw’s innovations in meditation practice, this chapter first describes meditation’s preeminent place in modern Buddhism and contrasts it to the pre-modern situation, which emphasized generosity and devotion, especially in lay Buddhism. A short exploration of scholarly approaches to meditation in Theravāda Buddhism— critically, the practices of calming (samatha) and concentration (samādhi) versus insight (vipassanā)— and to the history of meditation in Burma precedes an argument that Ledi’s life calls for the exploration of local context and continuities in learning and practice. An awareness of continuity complicates the sources for forms of modern Buddhism by identifying their presence in situations that straddle the pre-colonial/colonial and pre-modern/modern divides. After a consideration of the sources used in the book, in the final sections of the chapter the story of Ledi’s childhood frame an overview of subsequent chapters. (pages 1 - 14)
This chapter is available at:
https://academic.oup.com/chica...

The Best of Times and the Worst: Ledi Sayadaw’s Formative Period - Erik Braun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226000947.003.0002
[Konbaung Dynasty, Thudhamma sect, Fifth Buddhist Council, meditation, science, collective karma, forest monk, cosmology]
This chapter argues that Ledi’s schooling in Mandalay at the end of the Konbaung Dynasty, his teaching at a royal monastery of the main Thudhamma sect of monks, and his participation in events such as the Fifth Buddhist Council impressed upon him the importance of literary mastery. In particular, he was exposed to meditation as a scholastic topic used by King Mindon’s court to make sense of the modern world, including science from the West. The chapter also describes Ledi’s life after he left Mandalay. A letter he wrote shortly after Burma fell to the British demonstrates his understanding of the social force of collective karma that shaped his approach to meditation. The chapter then describes Ledi’s life as a forest monk, his founding of a monastery, his visit to India, and his own meditative practice that reveals his cosmological outlook that would shape his presentation of meditation. (pages 15 - 44)
This chapter is available at:
https://academic.oup.com/chica...

The Great War of the Commentaries: Ledi Sayadaw’s Abhidhamma Controversy - Erik Braun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226000947.003.0003
[Paramatthadīpanī controversy, Paramatthadīpanī, Abhidhamma, decline of Buddhism, British colonialism, print culture, laity]
The central question driving this chapter is why Ledi’s highly technical and complex Abhidhamma commentary, the Paramatthadīpanī, caused tremendous controversy starting from its publication in 1901. Examination of the Paramatthadīpanī and the works opposed to it, as well as the reactions to Ledi’s text in the social sphere, demonstrate that the controversy stemmed not from doctrinal disagreements, but from Ledi’s confrontational style. His numerous dismissals of authoritative interpretations of the revered and fragile Abhidhamma exacerbated Burmese people’s perception of the decline of Buddhism under British colonialism, particularly with the arrival of a print culture that spread the Paramatthadīpanī far beyond the scholarly elite. The chapter thus shows the importance of the Abhidhamma to Burmese Buddhism; it also shows a powerful way that Ledi made a national name for himself, even as he learned about the power of print capitalism and the readiness of the laity to learn doctrine. (pages 45 - 76)
This chapter is available at:
https://academic.oup.com/chica...

“In the Hands of All the People”: Ledi Empowers the Laity - Erik Braun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226000947.003.0004
[print culture, vernacular writing, social organization, preaching, scientific religion, world religion, Abhidhamma, laicization, monasticization, lay life]
This chapter explores Ledi Sayadaw’s efforts after 1900 to popularize study and practice among the laity. He exploited print culture, producing many vernacular writings, he went on wide-ranging preaching tours, and he founded numerous social organizations during his extensive travels— all to teach doctrine and moral behavior. Ledi’s program helped to empower lay people to collective action by arguing for Buddhism as the most scientific and superior of world religions. The chapter examines a speech by Ledi, in which he argues that lay people have the responsibility to protect and promote Buddhism. In this role, Ledi saw mastery of the Abhidhamma as the most powerful means that the laity could deploy, once again underlining the importance of philosophy and study to Burmese Buddhism. Rather than laicization or monasticization, Ledi’s multipronged effort supported a leveling between monk and layperson and an intensification of lay life that reconstructed Burmese Buddhism. (pages 77 - 101)
This chapter is available at:
https://academic.oup.com/chica...

“In This Very Life”: Lay Study of the Abhidhamma - Erik Braun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226000947.003.0005
[Abhidhamma study, lay study, poem, Paramattha sa? khip‘, Meditation, Pali, social organizations, social development]
This chapter examines Ledi Sayadaw’s Paramattha sa? khip‘, a Burmese-language poem published in 1904 that condenses the seven canonical books of the Abhidhamma into 690 easy-to-learn verses. Through this best-selling work, Ledi popularized lay study of the Abhidhamma, making it a resource for collective action. The poem brought lay people into the culturally prestigious world of Abhidhamma study and even Pali scholarship. It provided them, too, with the conceptual vocabulary and modes of analysis to engage in Abhidhammic forms of meditation. The chapter also examines the social organizations Ledi founded at this time to promote the study of the Paramattha sa? khip‘. The chapter shows that as he worked to encourage doctrinal study more broadly, Ledi positioned the study of the Paramattha sa? khip‘ in a group setting as a particularly powerful means to spiritual, and even social, development. (pages 102 - 121)
This chapter is available at:
https://academic.oup.com/chica...

The Birth of Insight - Erik Braun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226000947.003.0006
[popularization, meditation, Abhidhamma, Simplification, four elements, dry insight meditation, calming meditation, mass insight practice, Buddhist modernity]
This chapter examines works on meditation by Ledi Sayadaw to show his vision of meditative practice, grounded in features described in earlier chapters. Ledi popularizes practice for all people, whatever their station in life. He uses basic Abhidhamma study as the basis for meditation, stressing fundamental doctrinal categories, particularly the four elements of earth, fire, water, and wind. This approach simplifies practice, because such learning is sufficient for “dry insight meditation” (sukhavipassanā) that requires no prior “calming meditation” (samatha). Meditation becomes a practice that one can do in the midst of lay life. Abhidhamma emerges in the analysis as the factor that explains the birth of mass insight practice in Burma as nowhere else. In Ledi’s vision, the pursuit of awakening is part of modern lay life, and this fact reflects a Buddhist modernity that sees no conflict between religion and the modern world. (pages 122 - 149)
This chapter is available at:
https://academic.oup.com/chica...

The Death of Ledi and the Life of Insight - Erik Braun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226000947.003.0007
[modern Buddhism, path dependence, continuity, colonialism, improvisation, insight practice, United States]
This chapter considers the impact of Ledi Sayadaw’s vision of modern Buddhism. His life reveals continuities between the pre-colonial and colonial periods, in terms of the valuation of the Abhidhamma, doctrinal learning, and the protection of Buddhism. Modern Buddhism did not start from scratch during colonialism, yet it was not simply the result of the past; it developed in a path-dependent process from the pre-colonial period, which made possible Ledi’s improvisations in the colonial moment that formed modern insight practice. The chapter surveys meditation teachers after Ledi in order to demonstrate his influence. It ends with a consideration of Ledi’s impact beyond Burma in the United States. However much contemporary movements diverge from Ledi’s vision, the genealogy traced here shows that such modern forms of Buddhism and meditative practice still depend on the past, even as people’s improvisations create radically new forms. (pages 150 - 170)
This chapter is available at:
https://academic.oup.com/chica...