We are delighted to share that Mu Soeng, former Director of Studies at the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies, has published a new book: Buddha’s Triads: Triadic Memes Across Buddhist Cultures. Mu Soeng was ordained in the Korean Zen tradition and served as a monk for 11 years. His previous works, including Revoicing the Buddha and The Heart of the Universe, have deeply influenced many on the path of Buddhist study and practice.
In Buddha’s Triads, Mu Soeng explores a largely overlooked aspect of Buddhist thought and practice: the triadic patterns found throughout the Pāli discourses of the Buddha and in later Mahāyāna and Zen teachings. These include the three jewels and three refuges, the three trainings, the three characteristics of phenomena, Vasubandhu’s “three natures,” the three pillars of Zen, and more.
Mu Soeng’s Reflections
In the reflections below, Mu Soeng shares what first drew him to these patterns, why Buddhist study has remained central to his vision for BCBS, and what he hopes readers will discover through their own creative and imaginative engagement with the teachings.
1. What first drew you to the triadic patterns in Buddhist teachings, and what did you begin to see differently once you started following them across traditions?
It has always seemed to me that the Buddha’s crafting of the Middle Way was a kind of triangulation, an interesting word I see as a way of crafting human existence between what is and what is not; between what human beings want and what they cannot have. We triangulate our lives between the fact that we suffer, yet we cannot give up the craving and clinging that make us suffer.
The Buddha lived in an oral culture and could not use the graphic triangular presentations we can use today for his teachings, such as Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha; Sīla, Samādhi, and Paññā; Dukkha, Anicca, and Anattā; and so on. But the threefold structures in the Pāli teachings, as a graphic presentation, were my original inspiration for situating them as a primary pattern. Also, when I was teaching courses on Vasubandhu’s Yogācāra and the Zen tradition, the threefold presentations in those traditions naturally segued into the earlier presentations in the Nikāya tradition. So, the idea of bringing all these triangular presentations together has been on my mind for a long time.
2. You have been an important teacher and guide for many in the BCBS community. What feels meaningful to you about sharing this new book with them now?
My vision for programming at BCBS since its beginning has been for people to become Buddhistically educated. The idea is to become well-informed in and about a tradition that has become meaningful in their lives and that they care about. In Zen terms, it is becoming familiar with your ancestors.
My own inclination has been to learn the history of whatever holds my attention, where it comes from, what its inspirations are, and so on. So, when I traveled to Mexico many years ago, I read a lot about Mexican history beforehand so I could connect with the feeling-tone of its culture and people, rather than simply being a tourist and drinking margaritas.
When I practiced in the Korean Zen tradition, there was no available history of the tradition, and my teacher and fellow practitioners were not particularly interested in its historical background. It was quite frustrating for me, and I ended up researching and writing the first book-length primer on the history of Korean Zen for the average practitioner.
In the same way, I think it is important for a Buddhist practitioner not only to practice but also to have a working knowledge of what the Buddha taught and a reliable understanding of those teachings. Many of the people who have been coming to BCBS for a long time now are teachers in their own right. For them, especially, it is important to know the roots of the tradition they teach. This book on Buddha’s triads is an attempt to inspire them to know the roots of the tradition.
3. This book invites readers to approach Buddhist teachings with both creativity and imagination. What would you most like readers to discover for themselves in Buddha’s Triads?
I think of the Buddha as a rational mystic, and his teachings as eminently relatable to our modern minds, given our access to findings in neuroscience, medical sciences, and postmodern philosophy. This is the first generation of highly educated Buddhist practitioners, and we should be able to engage creatively and imaginatively with patterns, such as triads, and themes in the Buddha’s teachings. If we recalibrate ourselves to engage with them as a rational mystic, they become a great resource for informing and transforming our lives.
In other words, these teachings are not merely interesting topics to discuss while sitting in a coffeehouse. They are to be integrated into one’s practice and reflection at a deep level. They are profound insights into our human existence, and an engagement with them is meant to be transformational, rather than transactional. We are fortunate to live in a time when plenty of resources are available to us for understanding the conditioning within our own minds and how to negotiate our way through its complexity.
I believe each one of us can take a deep interest in investigating the conditioning in our minds and look for patterns and themes there. The Buddha’s heritage is that each person can become their own teacher in the investigation of their mind. We can look for binary, triangular, quadrangular, and similar patterns in these teachings with creativity and imagination. These serve as frames for integrating the teachings into personal practice. It can be creative and transformational at the same time. Each person ought to give themselves permission to be informed and transformed in their practice through these traditional framings.
Purchase a Copy
To purchase a copy of the book, please visit the BCBS Campus Bookstore or order a copy on Amazon: https://a.co/d/06BqRMJB.
