Throughout
history, there have been numerous traditions of meditation and
all of them are, in one-way or another, attractive to people of
differing dispositions. Yoga, Kundalini, Transcendental Meditation,
Sufi, Zen, Samatha, Vipassana, and Satipatthana are some examples.
These traditions have continued generation after generation without
ever going out of fashion because they all bring about benefits
to people. While all might go under the common name of 'meditation',
the benefits they produce might be different and hence attract
different interest groups. Of these meditations, Yoga, Kundalini,
and Transcendental Meditation have come from Hinduism. Sufi is
from Islam, and the rest of them have been introduced by Buddhism.
Forms of
meditation are also present in Judaism, Christianity and Jainism
too, yet they are not so widely practiced as in the traditions
mentioned above. All these examples show that the practice of
meditation is not limited to one or two religions. Rather, it
is a common aspect of many religious traditions. Even some philosophies
like the Vedanta system emphasise meditation in their systems.
The scope of this meditation homepage, however, is limited to
the Buddhist meditation found in Thailand.
The history
of meditation reaches beyond the known history of mankind. According
to archaeologists, a figure of a yogi found in the Indus Valley
Civilisation indicates that yoga practice could have existed in
the first Indian civilisation itself. Ever since yoga and other
forms of meditation have been essential practices in Hinduism.
The Buddha's life story gives detailed accounts on the advanced
yogis from whom Prince Siddhartha Gotama learned yoga practices.
Some of these pre-Buddhistic teachers had achieved eight jhaanas
as well as the magical skills based on their trance states. Under
these teachers, Siddhartha mastered the teachings of meditation
within a short period of time. He was even offered teaching positions
by these masters, but Siddhartha refused their offers and continued
searching for more by experimenting further with the techniques
of meditation. Siddhartha's achievement which eventually brought
him to enlightenment as the Buddha was the result of these experiments.
Somewhat like the Buddhists, who have the Buddha to lead them
in practice, the Sufis of Islam claim that their meditation started
right from the beginning of their religion as the Prophet Mohammed
himself practised it.
Obviously,
the history of each religion is a long one, as well as the history
of meditation within each religion. The Buddha taught 
his disciples and these disciples taught theirs.
From master to master there have been individual approaches and
interpretations to the original practices. When Buddhism was received
by Chinese, Japanese, Tibetans, and Southeast Asians, they added
their own methods and interpretations. Japanese Zen and Tibetan
Tantra are good examples of such expanded versions of Buddhist
meditation. Again the scope of this homepage does not allow us
to discuss the long history of Buddhist meditation. Here we will
be limited to a few experiments and comments which can be more
useful to our lives today than its historical events and developments.
We have already
noted that before achieving the Buddhahood Siddhartha Gotama developed
jhaanas as well as the supranormal skills based on them.
This type of meditation is known as samatha because by
calming down one's thoughts and by cultivating the power of concentration
one's mind reaches the state of jhaana. Thus, samatha
meditation came from the pre-Buddhistic practices. What actually
led Siddhartha to the Buddhahood was his own experimentation in
meditation. This new meditation is known as vipassanaa
which means insight or penetration into reality. 'Vipassanaa'
is Pali term meaning the ability to 'see' the nature of
life and the world through one's meditation. It is through vipassanaa
that one can attain Nirvana, the Absolute or the Goal of Buddhism.
Even the one who has mastered samatha does not attain Nirvana;
he has to develop vipassanaa in order to see Nirvana. An
essential step of vipassanaa is satipa.t.thaana
(i.e. the foundations of mindfulness). Through satipa.t.thaana
the meditator becomes is able to see the body in the body (inner
bodies), the feelings within the feelings (the feelings of happiness,
suffering or indifference within each inner body), the mind in
the mind (the mind of each inner body) and the mental phenomena
within the mental phenomena (the contents of the mind of each
inner body). Thus, although there are many different kinds of
meditation, ultimately, they all lead to vipassanaa according
to the Four Foundations of Mindfulness.
