Through Which Reality Shines: A Commentary on D. T. Suzuki's 'Outlines of Mahayana Buddhism'

Outlines of Mahayana Buddhism by D. T. Suzuki (1870-1966) was one of the first comprehensive accounts of Mahayana Buddhism in English. For Sangharakshita, a seminar on this pioneering but flawed work provided an occasion to demonstrate his own critical methodology. In doing so, he could also elaborate his synthesis of the key features of Mahayana Buddhism. 'The arising of the Mahayana was not the arbitrary founding of a sect,' he explains, 'but the whole process of Buddhism becoming richer over the course of centuries.' Tracing the contours of Suzuki's work, Sangharakshita offers distinctive interpretations of a wide range of topics that include karma, anatman, and the mysterious dharmakaya. Sparkling in its originality, scope, and fluency, this commentary amounts to a kind of imaginative journey into Sangharakshita's fertile and meticulous sensibility.