2016/04/24

尋常ならざる我が国の言論状況――【シリーズ植村隆の闘い 第1回】 | ハーバービジネスオンライン

尋常ならざる我が国の言論状況――【シリーズ植村隆の闘い 第1回】 | ハーバービジネスオンライン

심상치 않은 우리나라의 언론 상황 - [시리즈 우에 무라 다카시의 투쟁 제 1 회】 2016 년 04 월 24 일

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 '표현, 출판, 편집, 그러한 자유는 매우 확보되어있다 "- 21 일 기자 회견 에서 '국경없는 기자회'가 발표 한 '언론 자유 순위'에서 일본의 순위가 전년의 61 위에서 더욱 후퇴하고 180 개국 중 72 위로 크게 떨어졌다 지적 된 칸 관방 장관은 다소 낙담하면서 이렇게 대답했다. (참조 "언론의 자유"지극히 확보 "칸씨 순위 하락에 반박"2016 년 4 월 22 일 「아사히 신문」) 칸이 낙담하는 것은 무리도지도 모른다. 어떻게 유명하지만 '국경없는 기자회'는 단순한 NGO. 그들은내는 권고 나 랭킹에 아무런 법적 또는 조약에 근거한 구속력은 없다. 단순한 한 NGO가내는 「랭킹」따위에 일희 일비하고 국정 등 운영 할 수없는 것이다. 칸은 "바보 같은 묻지마 '라고 말하고 싶었던 것이 틀림 없다. 하지만 유엔에서 "한국의 표현의 자유 괜찮을까요?"라고 의문을 呈さ 된다면 어떨까? 19 일 약 일주일 조사를 마치고 출국하는​​ 유엔 '표현의 자유'특별 보고관의 데이비드 케인 씨는 보도 자료를 발표했다. ( "Preliminary observations by the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the right to freedom of opinion and expression, Mr. David K​​aye at the end of his visit to Japan (12-19 April 2016)"유엔 인권 고등 판무관실 사이트에 掲出) 일주일 내내 청취 조사 결과 '(일본의 언론의 자유를 둘러싼 우려는) 더 깊어졌다 "고하는 케인 씨가이 보도 자료에서 다룬 문제는 방송법 제 4 조 및 특정 비밀 보호법 개정 기자 클럽 폐지, 자민당 개헌 초안의 우려 점 등 상당히 광범위하고 구체적인 것으로되어있다. 씨의 제언 내용에 대한 자세한 내용은 다른 미디어의 기사 (예를 들어, "유엔"표현의 자유 "특별 보고관"우려가 깊어졌다 "기자 클럽 폐지 등 제언 【발언 상세한보고]"2016 년 04 월 20 일 " 허 핑턴 포스트 '등)을 참조하기로 본고에서는 씨의 보도 자료에서 개인 이름을 거론 한 유일한 저널리스트, 우에 무라 다카시 씨에 대해 주목하고 싶다.

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유엔까지도 주목 한 우에 무라 씨에게 괴롭힘 케인 씨는이 보도 자료에서 우에 무라 씨 사건을 "우에 무라 씨에 대한 성희롱 사건"이라고 단언한다. 물론 이것은 케인 씨의 말대로 다. 지난 몇 년 우에 무라 씨와 씨의 가족의 수난 괴롭힘 이외의 무엇도 아니다. 게다가 케인 씨는이 사건을 언급하는데 거의 한 장 분량을 보낸다. "The university to which he moved faced pressures to remove him, and outside individuals threatened him and even his daughter with violence, including sexual violence and death."이 문장에서 나오는 "The university"는 물론, 우에 무라 씨가 교단에 서 있었다 北星 대학의 것.北星 대학 협박 사건은 이렇게하여 유엔 인권 고등 판무관 사무소가 주목하는 대사건이되었다. 우에 무라 씨는 물론, 케인 씨가 '성희롱'이라고 표현하는 수많은 수난에 대해 침묵하는 것은 아니다. 단단히 법적 대응을 취하고있다. 그 중 하나 인 사쿠라이 요시코 씨에 대한 명예 훼손 소송의 제 1 회 구두 변론이 4 월 22 일 삿포로 지방 법원에서 열렸다.

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우에 무라 씨에 대한 증오를 선동 한 한 칼럼 법정에서 우에 무라 씨가 낭독 한 의견 진술서의 내용은 너무 처참하고 씨와 씨의 가족이 얼마나 포악한 눈에 맞게 만들어져 왔는지를 말해 준다. 그 중에서 조금 인용하자 (전문은 여기 http://sasaerukai.blogspot.jp/2016/04/blog-post_60.html) "협박장은 이런 내보내기이었습니다."귀하들은 우리의 거듭되는 경고 에도 불구하고 国賊 인 우에 무라 다카시의 고용 지속을 결정했다.이 결정은 国賊 인 우에 무라 다카시 의한 악랄한 날조 행위를 긍정뿐만 아니라 남한을 비롯한 반일 세력의 앞잡이로 전락 것을 의미하는 것이다 "5 장에 이르는 협박장은 다음의 말로 끝납니다. ""国賊 "우에 무라 다카시의 딸인 ○○○을 반드시 죽인다. 기한은 설치하지 않는다. 몇 년 걸려도 죽인다. 어디로 도망쳐도 죽인다. 땅 끝까지 추적 해 죽이는 절대 죽일" "" 딸에 대한 공격은 위협뿐만 아닙니다. 2014 년 8 월에는 인터넷에 얼굴 사진과 이름이 노출되었습니다. 그리고 "녀석의 아버지 때문에 얼마나 많은 일본인이 고생 한 적이 있습니까? 자살까지 몰고가는 수밖에 없다"고 적혀있었습니다. 이러한 기록을 삭제하기 위해 삿포로 변호사들이 딸의 이야기를 들어주었습니다. 나에게 푸념을 흘리지 않고 밝게 행동하고 있던 딸이 변호사 앞에서 뚝뚝 눈물을 흘리는 것을보고 나는 가슴이 찢어지는 생각이었습니다. "의견 진술의 시간은 한정되어있다. 여기서 우에 무라 씨가 올린 협박장의 사례는 빙산의 일각에 불과하다.이 외에도 협박장은 다수 보내 왔으며, 北星 대학에 입전 한 협박 전화에 이르러서는 그 몇 배에 달하는 것이다. 더 이상 심상치 짓이 아니다.이 차별적 의도를 포함한 증오를 부추 긴 것은 사쿠라이 요시코 씨에 다름 없다. 우에 무라 씨의 의견 진술서는 이렇게 있다. "나는 고베 松蔭女子学院大学에 교수로 일단 채택되었습니다. 그 대학 전교에서 내 앞으로 편지가 왔습니다. '산케이 뉴스'인터넷 판에 게재 된 사쿠라이 씨의 그 칼럼이 프린트 된 후, 손으로 이렇게 써있었습니다. "양심에 따라 설명하십시오. 일본인을 폄하 한 죄를 용서할 수 없습니다."편지는 익명 이었기 때문에 누가 보내 왔는지 모릅니다. 그러나 내용에서 보면, 사쿠라이 씨의 칼럼에 선동 된 것이라고 생각됩니다. '핵 (와) 같은 협박장에서 교수 채용 인사 사안을 좌우 고베 松蔭女子学院大学 주견이 없음은 별도 비난하자. 그러나 우선 "이런 전근대적이라고 할 심상치 않은 사태 수 し있는 것이 현재의 일본인 '이라는 사실을 직시하고 싶다. 그리고 그 사실 이야말로 케인 씨하고 "일본의 언론의 자유를 둘러싼 우려는 더 깊어졌다"고 말하게하는 것이며, '국경없는 기자회'을 '언론의 자유 랭킹」에서 일본의 지위를 낮추시키는 것에 다름 없다. 다음은 같은 법정에서 사쿠라이 요시코 씨가 낭독 한 의견 진술서의 내용에 띈다. 저절로 "우리나라 언론의 왜곡"이 부각되는 것이다. <글 / 칸노 완료 (Twitter ID : @noiehoie)> ※ 칸노 강씨의 연재 "풀뿌리 보수의 준동"이 대망의 서적 화. 연재시 원고에 가필 '일본 회의 연구 "로 후소샤 신서 발매됩니다!

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2016/04/23

Amazon.com: The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement - 30th Anniversary Edition (Audible Audio Edition): Eliyahu M. Goldratt, Jeff Cox, uncredited, a division of Recorded Books HighBridge: Books

Amazon.com: The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement - 30th Anniversary Edition (Audible Audio Edition): Eliyahu M. Goldratt, Jeff Cox, uncredited, a division of Recorded Books HighBridge: Books

The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement - 30th Anniversary Edition Audible – Unabridged

Eliyahu M. Goldratt (Author), Jeff Cox (Author), & 2 more

4.5 out of 5 stars    672 customer reviews

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Top Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 starsConcepts from The Goal

By Ted Kantrow on February 21, 2005

Format: Paperback

The author of this business novel thinks he's the Messiah. The gist of the 384-page book could have been expressed in a page, and some of it is obvious. But it may be useful anyway, and it's an entertaining read.



His schtick is that one can achieve great gains by identifying the bottlenecks ('constraints') that are blocking improved performance toward your goal, and then doing anything necessary to unblock those constraints - even if this means inefficiently using other non-bottleneck resources.



He says that one should think of the cost of each resource as including its effect on the whole system. So if a machine costs $1K/month to operate, but its rate of production is preventing the business from accepting or fulfilling extra orders that would represent $10K/month in profits, then the true cost of the machine is $11K.



It follows that anything one can do to remove that bottleneck would be worthwhile, provided it adds less than the amount saved to the cost and doesn't introduce a new bottleneck. It's fine if you have to overpay for other resources or use them inefficiently as long as you accomplish this.



It then becomes a matter of analyzing and brainstorming all the ways that bottleneck can be reduced. For instance:



- Can extra capacity be added, even if it is less efficient or uses antiquated equipment or is outsourced to a vendor?



- Can you prioritize the use of the bottlenecked resource so that high-profit and time-sensitive work comes first?



- Can you divert work that doesn't need to go through the bottleneck, even if it would then go through another more cumbersome process?



- Can you prevent work from reaching the bottleneck if Quality Control will eventually reject it?



- Can you increase the rate of output of the bottleneck resource by doubling up batches?



This logic applies regardless of the nature of the bottleneck - whether it relates to a machine (production capacity), marketing effort (how much business is coming in), or any other element of one's environment.



To help identify the bottlenecks and judge tradeoffs, one should identify one's goal as a measure (in a business context this is generally profits or ROI), then identify the factors that influence that measurement and create an equation. For instance,



Profits = Sales - Cost of Inputs - Cost of Transforming Inputs



or,



Return On Investment = (Sales - Cost of Inputs - Cost of Transforming Inputs) / Money Trapped In Unfinished Goods And Inventory



Essentially, his thesis is that by focusing on these bottlenecks, and analyzing and brainstorming their solutions, one takes advantage of the 80/20 rule by prioritizing those few factors that most greatly impact one's performance.



The most rewarding part of the book are the examples in the Testimonials section at the end. The testimonials describe creative solutions to tough bottleneck situations. The book doesn't help the reader come up with this type of creative solution - it only mentions where to look for the problem. Here are the memorable examples he cites:



1. A large office supply company (similar to Staples) was losing business to companies that were charging very low prices. Investigating this marketing bottleneck, they determined that from the customers' perspective, the larger problem was the overall cost of stocking and procuring and purchasing and tracking the office supplies.



Rather than competing on price, its owner fixed the Sales bottleneck with an innovative concept, where they arranged to place fully stocked cabinets filled with office supplies throughout their client companies, just like a hotel minibar. They'd visit each week, restock any items that were used, and charge the company for the items that were removed, thereby saving the company the aggravation and cost of even having to purchase or account for office supplies. They also supplied each customer with detailed information regarding what was used, when. In exchange for this unique convenience, they charged higher prices and achieved large profit margins.



2. A printing company, constrained by the number of presses available to print jobs, made more efficient use of its presses by routing jobs to different types of presses in a way that would maximize the total output of the presses.



3. A manufacturing company's output was limited by a saw that cut pipes. They dug up an old, inefficient saw, put it to work to remove that bottleneck, and increased output and profits significantly.



4. In the book itself, the protagonist's factory increased its Return On Investment (profit/money tied up) by shortening the time it took for a product to be manufactured (as doing that reduced the money tied up, hence increased ROI). This was accomplished by removing delays that were keeping costly unfinished products sitting around the plant. For instance, by reducing the 'batch size', a product would wait less time for its batch to be complete, allowing it to move to the -----

3.0 out of 5 stars

Good for Beginners, Outdated

By Coghan on April 8, 2011

Format: Paperback

If you were stuck in a production environment gone horribly wrong, and you had no clue at all how to begin fixing it, this might give you some ideas to think about. But if you are that lost, why would you be managing a huge production operation to begin with. It isn't that the ideas are bad ones, but they do have limited application. Also, I would definitely say some of these theories have been improved on greatly in the 20 some years since the book was written.



The sub-story of the author's marriage gone horribly wrong is just sad. He apparently knew as little about marriage as he did about managing a production operation. The wife's confession that she just wanted to go shopping and have a nice house and nice things and nice kiddies with a doting husband... well... gag.



With that said, it must be extremely hard to write a business book that comes off like a novel (albeit a cheesy one). It wasn't as much of a snoozer as most of these mandatory reading assigments we get from management. And there is nothing inherently wrong with the info. It's just a bit simplistic. There are much better resources for teaching constraints, socratic method, and six sigma. But if you need the basics and you need them fast, this is a reasonable book to get.

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3.0 out of 5 stars

Strong Foundation, Weak Structure

By J. Edgar Mihelic on March 22, 2015

Format: Paperback Verified Purchase

I haven't read that many business books. The ones I have are usually more poorly written than the economics books I read. I know that there is often a dedicated course in business writing in the academy, but in my experience, it isn't a focus of the program.



So when I was assigned a long business book as additional reading for my operations management class, I wasn't too jazzed. I was pleasantly surprised though, the Goal isn't that bad.



To talk about the Goal, I have to talk about the structure. It is a 330-page business novel. I had no sense on going in what a business novel would be like, and it is basically that, a novel with plot and characters.



The problem is that it is a didactic novel. That means it is teaching you something. And in that role, it is often very heavy handed. The plot is that Alex, the main character who we get to enjoy present tense first person narration though, has been promoted to be the plant manager of his hometown plant. It is not producing the profits that corporate would like to see. On top of that, the orders are late and they're always in a rush. So corporate comes down and gives Alex an ultimatum that you have three months to turn around the plant or we will look into closing it.



So what does Alex do? Thankfully, Alex meets an old physics teacher friend of his named Jonah, who happens to be an internationally famous business consultant. The problem here is that Jonah is always busy, so he can't handhold Alex to improve the plant. This device is here so that you as the reader and the character of Alex isn't told straight up what changes to make. You/Alex need to find from the stated principles to improve the plant. The whole thing is based on the idea of the Socratic dialogue where the teacher doesn't tell you anything but the educate is a coming to knowledge of the student. It's really heavy-handed, since the author mentions it in the introduction and also has a subplot where Alex's wife starts reading philosophy and they have a couple dialogue exposition-dump conversations.



Ultimately, Alex does come up with a process of improvement where he takes some of the old rules off the board and looks at defining the ultimate goal of the plant vis a vis the company and what he can do to help the plant meet those goals. He and his team identify bottlenecks in the plant, reimagine them, and the plant is a success. He is promoted to district manager at the end, and he and his team start to see how they could apply the more general principles they had determined to processes that are harder to define than movement of material in a plant. For me, the end was the weakest part because I work in service and I kept trying to figure out how this could apply to me in my job. I still haven't and I hope there was a sequel or something that applies the goal to a larger organization.



The general processes that Alex worked out by way of Jonah (who is a total stand-in for the author) are:

1) Identify the system's constraints

2) Decide how to exploit the system's constraints.

3) Subordinate everything else to the above decisions

4) Elevate the system's constraints

5) If in the previous steps, a constraint has been broken, go back to step 1, but do not allow inertia to cause a system constraint.



They sound like good general principles, and they work in the book. I do have some issues with the book and the idea though. First of all, the structure of the book feels entirely unnecessary. We as the reader have very little context for what the company Alex works for even makes. It is just some generalized manufacturing plant in a nameless town. That means the process described in the book cannot be fully trusted to have worked. I would like to see evidence-based material to prove that the process works. As it, it might as well be like the mystery writer who cannot really solve mysteries but just knows what he wants at the end so he can work backwards.

Second, the novel approach is just weird. It makes the book longer by three times than it could be to convey the same information. For example, there is a part in the book where the main character takes his son on a walk in the woods with the rest of the Boy Scout troop. The whole thing is just in there to illustrate that any process is only as strong as its weakest link or as fast as its slowest part. And it takes a long time to do so. The characters never really develop a secondary consideration. There's a whole subplot where Alex and his wife are fighting and she ends up moving out for a while and it is just ridiculous. As a reader of fiction, it is horrible. You don't know why these characters are in love in the first place and their reconciliation is unbelievable. It is also completely unnecessary for what Goldratt is trying to teach in his book. It just adds pages and I still never really cared about the characters.



Smaller things nagged as well. For example, what is it about the impetus to restructure the company? Do you need to be close to failure to rethink your processes? Alex only went ahead with it because he had nothing to lose. That gave him reason to change. If things are working well enough at work, why change, even if efficiencies can be found? Another is that this book has been around a while now. Are efficiencies still possible? Or does every generation of managers have to relearn the same general principle here? Further with the decline of manufacturing in the states to more labor-intensive countries, did the companies that embraced the goal succeed? There's no indication in the book of the real world, so that bugged me.



One last thing. Alex always refers to the cars he and his wife owns by their make. He has a Mazda, and she has an Accord. If he works in domestic manufacturing, why the heck does his family have two foreign cars?

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3.0 out of 5 starsDecent Business Book, Horrible Novel

By An Amazon Customer on February 12, 2015

Format: Audible Audio Edition

From the perspective of reviewing a novel:

Not good. Two stars tops.



The main character is incredibly unlikeable, alienating his wife and children, blowing off meetings, and leaving work with no explanation for hours at a time. He supposedly is capable enough that he was promoted to plant manager, but he has no idea what's going on from day to day at his home or plant. He gets drunk after work with a female coworker, has her drive him home, "accidentally" falls and drags her on top of him, and then when his wife (who has been waiting for him for hours with no news of a his whereabouts) sees them and gets angry, he feels wronged. When he takes his son for a Scouting hike, he spends the whole time thinking about the plant and not interacting with the kids, except as relates to his job. He named all his plant bottlenecks Herbie after the slower, pudgy Scout on the hike. I could go on. And on.



In a painfully obvious case of Marty Stumanship, Goldratt writes himself into the book as Jonah, a jet-setting Israeli genius who gets paid phenomenal rates to bless manufacturers with his gems of wisdom. Most of the characters are two-dimensional talking heads with acute tendencies toward info dumping. No kidding, one of the character's names is Bob. I lost count of the number of times I saw the phrase "As you know, Bob...." The storyline is patchy and inconsistent, the characters' motivations are hard to understand, and the story's conclusion is abrupt and doesn't wrap up most of the plot threads.



From the perspective of reviewing a business book:

Four stars. I liked Goldratt's ideas. The common sense approach to processes was refreshing . In spite of how bad it made the main character look, my favorite part of the book was the Scout hike. It extracted the process concepts from complex environment of a manufacturing plant and put them into simple terms that made sense to me.



I think he chose to write the book as a novel because he could pad the content. It probably should have been a pamphlet. If you'd like to get the gist of the useful content, I suggest reading his article "Standing on the Shoulders of Giants." It's available free online and contains all the useful bits from the book, plus external sources and a case study.

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Amazon.com: Beyond the Goal: Theory of Constraints (Audible Audio Edition): Eliyahu M. Goldratt, LLC Gildan Media: Books

Amazon.com: Beyond the Goal: Theory of Constraints (Audible Audio Edition): Eliyahu M. Goldratt, LLC Gildan Media: Books

Since it was first introduced in the multi-million-copy best seller The Goal, Dr. Eliyahu Goldratt's Theory of Constraints (TOC) has emerged as one of the most flexible and effective approaches to management and problem solving in the corporate world. Now taught in business schools everywhere and successfully used in companies of all sizes around the world, TOC has changed the way a generation of professionals maximize profits and resources by focusing on and clearing the constraints that get in their way.
In Beyond The Goal, Dr. Goldratt elaborates on his profoundly influential theories in a straightforward, practical, and pragmatic presentation designed to help you put these powerful ideas to valuable use. Speaking with the brilliance and insight that has made him a sought-after teacher and top consultant, Dr. Goldratt addresses some of the most asked-about elements of understanding and applying TOC, including:
  • The basic assumptions of TOC
  • Why management assumptions must be changed to obtain lasting, bottom-line results
  • What is necessary and sufficient to establish a foundation for future success
  • The rules of operations, project management, and distribution
  • How to implement TOC as a holistic approach to continuous improvement
Whether you're new to Dr. Goldratt's philosophy, or a TOC veteran looking for fresh strategies for turning turn concepts into consequences, Beyond The Goal makes it abundantly clear why joining the Theory of Constraints revolution has never been easier, or more important for your company and your career.
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In a Sunburned Country: Bill Bryson: 9780767903868: Amazon.com: Books

In a Sunburned Country: Bill Bryson: 9780767903868: Amazon.com: Books

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Bill Bryson follows his Appalachian amble, A Walk in the Woods, with the story of his exploits in Australia, where A-bombs go off unnoticed, prime ministers disappear into the surf, and cheery citizens coexist with the world's deadliest creatures: toxic caterpillars, aggressive seashells, crocodiles, sharks, snakes, and the deadliest of them all, the dreaded box jellyfish. And that's just the beginning, as Bryson treks through sunbaked deserts and up endless coastlines, crisscrossing the "under-discovered" Down Under in search of all things interesting.Bryson, who could make a pile of dirt compelling--and yes, Australia is mostly dirt--finds no shortage of curiosities. When he isn't dodging Portuguese man-of-wars or considering the virtues of the remarkable platypus, he visits southwest Gippsland, home of the world's largest earthworms (up to 12 feet in length). He discovers that Australia, which began nationhood as a prison, contains the longest straight stretch of railroad track in the world (297 miles), as well as the world's largest monolith (the majestic Uluru) and largest living thing (the Great Barrier Reef). He finds ridiculous place names: "Mullumbimby Ewylamartup, Jiggalong, and the supremely satisfying Tittybong," and manages to catch a cricket game on the radio, which is like

listening to two men sitting in a rowboat on a large, placid lake on a day when the fish aren't biting; it's like having a nap without losing consciousness. It actually helps not to know quite what's going on. In such a rarefied world of contentment and inactivity, comprehension would become a distraction.
"You see," Bryson observes, "Australia is an interesting place. It truly is. And that really is all I'm saying." Of course, Bryson--who is as much a travel writer here as a humorist, naturalist, and historian--says much more, and does so with generous amounts of wit and hilarity. Australia may be "mostly empty and a long way away," but it's a little closer now. --Rob McDonald --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly

With the Olympics approaching, books on Australia abound. Still, Bryson's lively take is a welcome recess from packaged, staid guides. The author of A Walk in the Woods draws readers in campfire-style, relating wacky anecdotes and random facts gathered on multiple trips down under, all the while lightening the statistics with infusions of whimsical humor. Arranged loosely by region, the book bounces between Canberra and Melbourne, the Outback and the Gold Coast, showing Bryson alone and with partners in tow. His unrelenting insistence that Australia is the most dangerous place on earth ("If you are not stung or pronged to death in some unexpected manner, you may be fatally chomped by sharks or crocodiles, or carried helplessly out to sea by irresistible currents, or left to stagger to an unhappy death in the baking outback") spins off dozens of tales involving jellyfish, spiders and the world's 10 most poisonous snakes. Pitfalls aside, Bryson revels in the beauty of this country, home to ravishing beaches and countless unique species ("80% of all that lives in Australia, plant and animal, lives nowhere else"). He glorifies the country, alternating between awe, reverence and fear, and he expresses these sentiments with frankness and candor, via truly funny prose and a conversational pace that is at once unhurried and captivating. Peppered with seemingly irrelevant (albeit amusing) yarns, this work is a delight to read, whether or not a trip to the continent is planned. First serial to Outside magazine; BOMC selection. (June)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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The Diamond That Cuts Through Illusion

The Diamond That Cuts Through Illusion
2010 | 160 pages | 0.2 MB / 0.2 MB

The Diamond Sutra has fascinated Buddhists for centuries because of its insights into dualism and illusion. It illuminates how our minds construct limited categories of thought. It offers us alternative ways to look at the world in its wholeness so we can encounter a deeper reality; develop reverence for the environment and more harmonious communities, families, and relationships; and act in the world skillfully and effectively. In his trademark style of making even the most esoteric teachings accessible and meaningful for our every day life, Thich Nhat Hanh writes with great humor, even about the more mundane applications of the sutra, such as the insights one may gain while peeing into the woods: “After I studied the Diamond Sutra . . . I realized that peeing is also a marvelous and wondrous reality, our gift to the universe. We only have to pee mindfully, with great respect for ourselves and whatever surroundings we are in."
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2016/04/22

Geshe Michael Roach – The Sad Case of a Gifted Man – Tibetan Buddhism :: Struggling With Diffi·Cult Issues

Geshe Michael Roach – The Sad Case of a Gifted Man – Tibetan Buddhism :: Struggling With Diffi·Cult Issues

Geshe Michael Roach – The Sad Case of a Gifted Man

SEPTEMBER 20, 2013 BY  17 COMMENTS
Sorry, but I don’t want to add more on this topic. There has been said enough already. I just want to make you aware of two recent articles about Michael Roach, one in Rolling Stone and one by Scott Carney (in Playboy). You find more material and links at the end of the article by Scott Carney.
When I read the Interview with Geshe Michael Roach & Christie McNally (PDF) in 2003 and especially the passage where Roach tries to defend himself, skillfully avoiding to answer the question what his teacher, Khen Rinpoche Geshe Lobsang Tharchin, says about his (strange) behavior, I realized that Michael Roach has created an own inner world where voices can only reach him if they suit his own views. Since there are still some people who think it might be worth to follow Mr. Roach or that he might be a genuine Buddhist teacher, I added the article by Scott Carney to my website. Food for Thought! I am grateful that Alexander Berzin warned me personally to be careful with Roach – though at that time, I was not pleased to hear it because I placed my spiritual hopes already in Michael Roach …
During a tantric teaching the teacher of Roach, Khen Rinpoche, was asked about Roach, and he clearly distanced himself from Roach. Sadly, so far I was not able to get the recording but it exists. That this explicitly alienation by Roach’s teacher exists was told to me by a person I trust who listened to these teachings by Khen Rinpoche.
Last and least, Robert Thurman about Roach in the RollingStone interview:
Robert Thurman, a Columbia University religion professor and a leading expert on Eastern religions, calls Roach’s version of Tibetan Buddhism “an American pop-religion knockoff.”  …
The office of the Dalai Lama issued a rebuke, and Roach’s associates urged him to remove his robes to indicate that he was not celibate. When he refused, Robert Thurman, a former ordained monk, tried to reason with him. “I asked him to meet,” says Thurman, who is married and long ago resigned his robes. “He finally came with his consort to Columbia. I told him to go back to being a lay minister, to take off the robes. Bottom line is, he said he wouldn’t give up the robes. He said, ‘I have never consorted with a human female,’ and I said to Christie, ‘Are you human?’ And she didn’t say yes or no. She said, ‘He said it, I didn’t.'”
Thurman felt McNally was young and naive and being manipulated by Roach, but McNally felt empowered. According to her, the retreat had altered their dynamic. She had gone into it as Roach’s lesser, emerging as his equal. “The roles in the play now had changed from teacher and student to ‘partners,'” she says, and goes on to say that since Roach was interested in embracing his feminine side, “normal sexual relations between two married partners were absent from this relationship.”
Instead of waiting for new acolytes to come to them, Roach and McNally began holding classes at popular New York yoga studios like Jivamukti, whose clientele included Wall Street bankers, fashionistas like Donna Karan and celebrities such as Sting, Russell Simmons and Madonna. He had translated the Yoga Sutra from Sanskrit and spoke of how yoga could lead to enlightenment. “His teaching was the missing link in the writings on the Yoga Sutra,” says Morris. “Nobody had accomplished what was described in there, and here was somebody who had. I was moved. He was a good, holy, honest man then.”

Update

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Diamond Sutra - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Diamond Sutra - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Diamond Sutra

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Frontispiece of the Chinese Diamond Sūtra, the oldest known dated printedbook in the world
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The Diamond Sūtra(Sanskrit:Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra) is aMahāyāna (Buddhist) sūtrafrom the Prajñāpāramitā, or "Perfection of Wisdom" genre, and emphasizes the practice ofnon-abiding and non-attachment. The Diamond sutra is one of the most influential Mahayana sutras inEast Asia, and is a key object of devotion and study in Zen Buddhism.
A copy of the Chinese version of Diamond Sūtra, found among the Dunhuang manuscripts in the early 20th century by Aurel Stein, was dated back to May 11, 868.[1]It is, in the words of the British Library, "the earliest complete survival of a datedprinted book."[2]

Title[edit]

The Sanskrit title for the sūtra is the Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra, which may be translated roughly as the "Vajra Cutter Perfection of Wisdom Sūtra." In English, shortened forms such as Diamond Sūtraand Vajra Sūtra are common. The title relies on the power of the vajra(diamond or thunderbolt) to cut things as a metaphor for type of wisdom that cuts and shatters illusions to get to ultimate reality. The sutra is also called by the name Triśatikā Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra (300 lines Perfection of Insight sutra).
The Diamond Sūtra has also been highly regarded in a number of Asian countries where Mahāyāna Buddhism has been traditionally practiced. Translations of this title into the languages of some of these countries include:
  • Sanskrit: वज्रच्छेदिकाप्रज्ञापारमितासूत्र, Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra
  • Chinese: 《金剛般若波羅蜜多經》, Jingang Banzuopoluomiduo Jing(Chin-kang Pan-Jo-p'o-lo-mi-to Ching); shortened to 《金剛經》,Jingang Jing (Chin-kang Ching)
  • Japanese: 金剛般若波羅蜜多経, Kongō hannya haramita kyō, shortened to 金剛経, Kongō-kyō
  • Korean: 금강반야바라밀경, geumgang banyabaramil gyeong, shortened to 금강경, geumgang gyeong
  • Mongolian: Yeke kölgen sudur[3]
  • Vietnamese Kim cương bát-nhã-ba-la-mật-đa kinh, shortened to Kim cương kinh
  • Tibetan འཕགས་པ་ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ་རྡོ་རྗེ་གཅོད་པ་ཞེས་བྱ་བ་ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོའི་མདོ།, Wylie: ’phags pa shes rab kyi pha rol tu phyin pa rdo rje gcod pa zhes bya ba theg pa chen po’i mdo

History[edit]

Statue of Kumārajīva in front of the Kizil Caves in Kuqa,Xinjiang province, China
The full history of the text remains unknown, but Japanese scholars generally consider the Diamond Sūtra to be from a very early date in the development of Prajñāpāramitā literature.[4] Some western scholars such as Gregory Schopen also believe that the Aṣṭasāhasrikā Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra was adapted from the earlier Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra.[4] Early western scholarship on the Diamond Sūtra is summarized by Müller.[5]
The Vajracchedika sutra was an influential work in the North Indian Mahayana Buddhist tradition. Buddhist philosophers such as Asangaand Vasubandhu wrote commentaries on the sutra.
The first translation of the Diamond Sūtra into Chinese is thought to have been made in 401 CE by the venerated and prolific translatorKumārajīva.[6] Kumārajīva's translation style is distinctive, possessing a flowing smoothness that reflects his prioritization on conveying the meaning as opposed to precise literal rendering.[7] The Kumārajīva translation has been particularly highly regarded over the centuries, and it is this version that appears on the 868 CE Dunhuang scroll. It is the most widely used and chanted Chinese version.[8]
In addition to the Kumārajīva translation, a number of later translations exist. The Diamond Sūtra was again translated from Sanskrit into Chinese by Bodhiruci in 509 CE, Paramārtha in 558 CE, Dharmagupta (twice, in 590 and in 605~616), Xuanzang (twice, in 648 CE and in 660~663), and Yijing in 703 CE.[9][10][11][12]
The Chinese Buddhist monk Xuanzang visited a Mahāsāṃghika-Lokottaravāda monastery at Bamiyan, Afghanistan, in the 7th century CE. Using Xuanzang's travel accounts, modern archaeologists have identified the site of this monastery.[13] Birchbark manuscript fragments of several Mahāyāna sūtras have been discovered at the site, including the Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra (MS 2385), and these are now part of the Schøyen Collection.[13] This manuscript was written in the Sanskrit language, and written in an ornate form of the Gupta script.[13] This same Sanskrit manuscript also contains the Medicine Buddha Sūtra (Bhaiṣajyaguruvaiḍūryaprabhārāja Sūtra).[13]
The Diamond Sūtra gave rise to a culture of artwork, sūtra veneration, and commentaries in East Asian Buddhism. By the end of the Tang Dynasty (907) in China there were over 800 commentaries written on it (only 32 survive), such as those by prominent Chinese Buddhists likeSengzhao, Xie Lingyun, Zhiyi, Jizang, Kuiji and Zongmi.[14] One of the best known commentaries is the Exegesis on the Diamond Sutra byHuineng, the Sixth Patriarch of the Chan School.[15]

Contents[edit]

A traditional pocket-sized folding edition of the Diamond Sūtra in Chinese
The Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā Sutra contains the discourse of the Buddha to a senior monk, Subhuti.[16] It's major themes are 
  • anatman (not-self), 
  • the emptiness of all phenomena (though the term 'Shunyata' itself does not appear in the text),[17] 
  • the liberation of all beings without attachment and 
  • the importance of spreading and teaching the Diamond sutra itself. 


In his commentary on the Diamond Sūtra, Hsing Yun describes the four main points from the sūtra as 
  • giving without attachment to self, 
  • liberating beings without notions of self and other, 
  • living without attachment, and 
  • cultivating without attainment.[18] 


According to Shigenori Nagamoto the major goal of the Diamond sutra is: "an existential project aiming at achieving and embodying a non-discriminatory basis for knowledge" or "the emancipation from the fundamental ignorance of not knowing how to experience reality as it is."[19]
In the sūtra, the Buddha has finished his daily walk to Sravasti with the monks to gather offerings of food, and he sits down to rest. ElderSubhūti comes forth and asks the Buddha a question: "How, Lord, should one who has set out on the bodhisattva path take his stand, how should he proceed, how should he control the mind?"[20] What follows a dialogue regarding the nature of the 'perfection of insight' (Prajñāpāramitā) and the nature of ultimate reality (which is illusory and empty). The Buddha begins by answering Subhuti by stating that he will bring all living beings to final nirvana - but that after this "no living being whatsoever has been brought to extinction".[20] 
This is because a bodhisattva does not see beings through reified concepts such as 'person', 'soul' or 'self', but sees them through the lens of perfect understanding, as empty of inherent, unchanging self.
A Nepalese sculpture of aVajra.
The Buddha continues his exposition with similar statements which use negation to point out the emptiness of phenomena, merit, the Dharma(Buddha's teaching), the stages of enlightenment and the Buddha himself. Japanese Buddhologist, Hajime Nakamura, calls this negation the 'logic of not' (Sanskrit:na prthak).[19] Further examples of the Diamond sutra's via negativainclude statements such as:[20]
  • As far as ‘all dharmas’ are concerned, Subhuti, all of them are dharma-less. That is why they are called ‘all dharmas.’
  • Those so-called ‘streams of thought,’ Subhuti, have been preached by the Tathagata as streamless. That is why they are called ‘streams of thought.’
  • ‘All beings,’ Subhuti, have been preached by the Tathagata as beingless. That is why they are called ‘all beings.’
  • “And whenever the Tathagata preaches about a ‘trigalactic megagalactic world-system,’ that has been preached by the Tathagata as systemless. That is why it is called ‘a trigalactic megagalactic world-system.’
The Buddha is generally thought to be trying to help Subhūti unlearn his preconceived, limited notions of the nature of reality. Emphasizing that all phenomena are ultimately illusory, he teaches that true enlightenment cannot be grasped until one has set aside attachment to them in any form.
Another reason why the Buddha makes use of negation is because language reifies concepts and this can lead to attachment to those concepts, but true wisdom is seeing that nothing is fixed or stable, hence according to the Diamond sutra thoughts such as "I have obtained the state of an Arhat" or "I will bring living beings to nirvana" does not even occur in an enlightened one's mind because this would be "seizing upon a self...seizing upon a living being, seizing upon a soul, seizing upon a person."[20] Indeed, the sutra goes on to state that anyone who says such things should not be called a bodhisattva. According to David Kalupahana the goal of the Diamond sutra is "one colossal attempt to avoid the extremist use of language, that is, to eliminate any ontological commitment to concepts while at the same time retaining their pragmatic value, so as not to render them totally empty of meaning."[17] 
Kalupahana explains the negation of the Diamond sutra by seeing an initial statement as an erroneous affirmation of substance or selfhood, which is then critiqued ("'all dharmas' are dharmaless"), and then finally reconstructed ("that is why they are called 'all dharmas'") as being conventional and dependently originated. Kalupahana explains this final reconstruction as meaning: "that each concept, instead of either representing a unique entity or being an empty term, is a substitute for a human experience which is conditioned by a variety of factors. As such, it has pragmatic meaning and communicative power without being absolute in any way."[17]
According to Paul Harrison the Diamond sutra's central argument here is that "all dharmas lack a self or essence, or to put it in other words, they have no core ontologically, they only appear to exist separately and independently by the power of conventional language, even though they are in fact dependently originated."[21]
The mind of someone who practices the Prajñāpāramitā or 'perfection of insight' is then a mind free from fixed substantialist or 'self' concepts:
"However, Lord, the idea of a self will not occur to them, nor will the idea of a living being, the idea of a soul, or the idea of a person occur. Why is that? Any such idea of a self is indeed idealess, any idea of a living being, idea of a soul, or idea of a person is indeed idealess. Why is that? Because the Buddhas and Lords are free of all ideas."[20]
Throughout the teaching, the Buddha repeats that successful memorization and elucidation of even a four-line extract of it is of incalculable merit, better than giving an entire world system filled with gifts and can bring about enlightenment. Section 26 also ends with a four-line gatha:
All conditioned phenomena
Are like a dream, an illusion, a bubble, a shadow,
Like dew or a flash of lightning;
Thus we shall perceive them.”[22]
Paul Harrison's translation states:[20]
"A shooting star, a clouding of the sight, a lamp, 
An illusion, a drop of dew, a bubble, 
A dream, a lightning’s flash, a thunder cloud
— This is the way one should see the conditioned."

Dunhuang block print[edit]

Elder Subhūtiaddresses the Buddha. Detail from theDunhuang block print
There is a wood block printed copy in theBritish Library which, although not the earliest example of block printing, is the earliest example which bears an actual date. The book displays a great maturity of design and layout and speaks of a considerable ancestry for woodblock printing.
The extant copy has the form of a scroll, about 5 meters (16 ft) long. Thearchaeologist Sir Marc Aurel Steinpurchased it in 1907 in the walled-upMogao Caves near Dunhuang in northwestChina from a monk guarding the caves - known as the "Caves of the Thousand Buddhas".
The colophon, at the inner end, reads:
Reverently made for universal free distribution by Wang Jie on behalf of his two parents on the 13th of the 4th moon of the 9th year of Xiantong [11 May 868].
This is approximately 587 years before the Gutenberg Bible was first printed.
In 2010 UK writer and historian Frances Wood, head of the Chinese section at the British Library, was involved in the restoration of its copy of the book.[23][24] The British Library website allows readers to view the Diamond Sutra in its entirety.[25]

Selected English translations[edit]

AuthorTitlePublisherNotesYearISBN
Max MüllerThe Vagrakkhedika or diamond-cutter, inBuddhist Mahayana Texts (Sacred Books of the East), F. Max Muller et al.Oxford University PressTranslation of the Vajracchedikā prajñāpāramitā from Sanskrit. Based on Muller's edition, the first Sanskrit edition published in the West, based on four Sanskrit manuscripts, one from Tibet, one from China, and two from Japan.1894
Daisetz Teitaro SuzukiThe Diamond SutraVariousTranslation of the Diamond Sutra1934
Schopen, GregoryThe Manuscript of the Vajracchedikā Found at Gilgit,in Studies in the Literature of the Great Vehicle: Three Mahāyāna Buddhist Texts, ed. by L. O. Gómez and J. A. SilkCenters for South and Southeast AsiaTranslation of the Diamond Sutra from the SanskritGilgit manuscript1989ISBN 978-0891480549
Thich Nhat HanhThe Diamond that Cuts Through IllusionParallax PressThe Diamond Sutra with a Vietnamese Thiền commentary1992ISBN 0-938077-51-1
Mu SoengThe Diamond Sutra: Transforming the Way We Perceive the WorldWisdom PublicationsTranslation of the Diamond Sutra with commentary2000ISBN 978-0861711604
Edward ConzeBuddhist Wisdom: The Diamond Sutra and The Heart SutraRandom HouseThe Diamond Sutra and The Heart Sutra, along with commentaries on the texts and practices of Buddhism2001ISBN 978-0375726002
Michael RoachThe Diamond Cutter, An Exalted Sutra of the Greater Way on the Perfection of WisdomTibetan-English edition, translated from the Tibetan translation of Shilendra Bodhi.2001
Red PineThe Diamond Sutra: The Perfection of Wisdom; Text and Commentaries Translated from Sanskrit and ChineseCounterpointThe Diamond Sutra, translated from the Sanskrit (mostly from the editions by Max Muller and Edward Conze) with selections of Indian andChán commentary from figures such as Asanga,Vasubandhu, Huineng,Linji[disambiguation needed]and Chiang Wei-nung (1871-1938).2001ISBN 1-58243-256-2
Hsuan HuaA General Explanation: The Vajra Prajna Paramita SutraBuddhist Text Translation Society2002ISBN 0881394300
Nan Huai-ChinThe Diamond Sutra ExplainedPrimodia Media2004ISBN 0-9716561-2-6
A.F. Price and Wong Mou-LamDiamond Sutra and the Sutra of Hui-nengShambhala ClassicsTranslation of the Diamond Sutra and Platform Sutra2005ISBN 978-1590301371
Paul HarrisonVajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā: A New English Translation of the Sanskrit Text Based on Two Manuscripts from Greater GandhāraHermes PublishingTranslation of the Diamond Sutra from the Sanskrit(compiled from Gilgit and the Schøyen collection manuscripts)2006

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. Jump up^ Soeng, Mu (2000-06-15). Diamond Sutra: Transforming the Way We Perceive the World. Wisdom Publications. p. 58.ISBN 9780861711604. Retrieved 11 May 2012.
  2. Jump up^ "Online Gallery - Sacred Texts: Diamond Sutra". Bl.uk British Library. 2003-11-30. Archived from the original on November 10, 2013. Retrieved 2010-04-01.
  3. Jump up^ "Manuscript of a Mongolian Sūtra". World Digital Library. Retrieved2014-06-22.
  4. ^ Jump up to:a b Williams, Paul. Mahāyāna Buddhism: the Doctrinal Foundations. London, UK: Routledge. p. 42. ISBN 0-415-02537-0.
  5. Jump up^ Müller, Friedrich Max (1894). The Sacred Books of the East, Volume XLIX: Buddhist Mahāyāna Texts, Part II. Oxford: Clarendon Press. pp. xii–xix.
  6. Jump up^ "The Korean Buddhist Canon: A Descriptive Catalog (T 235)". A. Charles Muller. Retrieved April 16, 2015.
  7. Jump up^ Nattier, Jan (1992). "The Heart Sūtra: A Chinese Apocryphal Text?".Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 15 (2): 153–223.
  8. Jump up^ Yongyou Shi (2010). The Diamond Sūtra in Chinese Culture. Los Angeles: Buddha's Light Publishing. p. 11. ISBN 978-1-932293-37-1.
  9. Jump up^ "The Korean Buddhist Canon: A Descriptive Catalog (T 236)". A. Charles Muller. Retrieved April 16, 2015.
  10. Jump up^ "The Korean Buddhist Canon: A Descriptive Catalog (T 237)". A. Charles Muller. Retrieved April 16, 2015.
  11. Jump up^ "The Korean Buddhist Canon: A Descriptive Catalog (T 220,9)". A. Charles Muller. Retrieved April 16, 2015.
  12. Jump up^ "The Korean Buddhist Canon: A Descriptive Catalog (T 239)". A. Charles Muller. Retrieved April 16, 2015.
  13. ^ Jump up to:a b c d "Schøyen Collection: Buddhism". Retrieved 23 June 2012.
  14. Jump up^ Yongyou Shi (2010). The Diamond Sūtra in Chinese Culture. Los Angeles: Buddha's Light Publishing. p. 14. ISBN 978-1-932293-37-1.
  15. Jump up^ Hui Neng; Cleary, Thomas (1998). The Sutra of Hui-neng, Grand Master of Zen: With Hui-neng's Commentary on the Diamond Sutra.Shambhala Publications. ISBN 9781570623486.
  16. Jump up^ Buswell, Robert Jr; Lopez, Donald S. Jr., eds. (2013). "Subhuti", in Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. p. 862. ISBN 9780691157863.
  17. ^ Jump up to:a b c Kalupahana, David J. A History of Buddhist Philosophy, page 156.
  18. Jump up^ Hsing Yun (2012). Four Insights for Finding Fulfillment: A Practical Guide to the Buddha's Diamond Sūtra. Buddha's Light Publishing. p. 87.ISBN 978-1-932293-54-8.
  19. ^ Jump up to:a b Nagatomo, Shigenori (2000). The Logic of the Diamond Sutra: A is not A, therefore it is A; Asian Philosophy 10 (3), 217-244
  20. ^ Jump up to:a b c d e f Harrison, Paul. Vajracchedika Prajñaparamita Diamond Cutting Transcendent Wisdom
  21. Jump up^ Harrison, Paul. (2006) 'Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā: A New English Translation of the Sanskrit Text Based on Two Manuscripts from Greater Gandhāra', in Buddhist Manuscripts in the Schøyen Collection (Vol. III). Hermes Publishing, Oslo, p.139.
  22. Jump up^ "The Diamond of Perfect Wisdom Sutra". Chung Tai Translation Committee. Retrieved April 16, 2015.
  23. Jump up^ "Restoring the world's oldest book, the Diamond Sutra". BBC. December 5, 2010. Retrieved April 16, 2015.
  24. Jump up^ Wood, Francis; Barnard, Mark. "Restoration of the Diamond Sutra".IDP News (38): 4–5. Archived from the original on April 5, 2013. Retrieved April 16, 2015.
  25. Jump up^ "Copy of Diamond Sutra". bl.uk. Archived from the original on June 3, 2004.

Further reading[edit]

  • Cole, Alan (2005). For a close reading of the text's rhetoric, see chapter 4 of Text as Father: Paternal Seductions in Early Mahayana Buddhist Literature (Berkeley: U Cal Press, 2005), pp. 160–196, entitled "Be All You Can't Be, and Other Gainful Losses in theDiamond Sutra."
  • William Gemmell (transl.): The Diamond Sutra, Trübner, London 1912.
  • Joyce Morgan and Conrad Walters: Journeys on the Silk Road: a desert explorer, Buddha’s secret library, and the unearthing of the world’s oldest printed book, Picador Australia, 2011, ISBN 978-1-4050-4041-9.

External links[edit]

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