|
| |
Plum Village |
Biography
Additional Biography of Ven. Thich Nhat Hanh
One of the best known and most respected Zen masters in the world today,
poet, peace and human rights activist, Thich Nhat Hanh has led an
extraordinary life. Born in central Vietnam in 1926, Nhat Hanh was ordained
a Buddhist monk in 1942, at the age of sixteen. Just eight years later, he
co-founded what was to become the foremost center of Buddhist studies in
South Vietnam, the An Quang Buddhist Institute.
In 1961, Nhat Hanh came to the United States to study and teach comparative
religion at Columbia and Princeton Universities. But in 1963, his
monk-colleagues in Vietnam invited him to come home to join them in their
work to stop the US-Vietnam war. After returning to Vietnam, he helped lead
one of the great nonviolent resistance movements of the century, based
entirely on Gandhian principles.
In 1964, along with a group of university professors and students in
Vietnam, Thich Nhat Hanh founded the School of Youth for Social Service,
called by the American press the “little Peace Corps,” in which teams of
young people went into the countryside to establish schools and health
clinics, and later to rebuild villages that had been bombed. By the time of
the fall of Saigon, there were more than 10,000 monks, nuns, and young
social workers involved in the work. In the same year, he helped set up what
was to become one of the most prestigious publishing houses in Vietnam, La
Boi Press. In his books and as editor-in-chief of the official publication
of the Unified Buddhist Church, he called for reconciliation between the
warring parties in Vietnam, and because of that his writings were censored
by both opposing governments.
In 1966, at the urging of his fellow monks, he accepted an invitation from
the Fellowship of Reconciliation and Cornell University to come to the U.S.
“to describe to [us] the aspirations and the agony of the voiceless masses
of the Vietnamese people” (New Yorker, June 25, 1966). He had a densely
packed schedule of speaking engagements and private meetings, and spoke
convincingly in favor of a ceasefire and a negotiated settlement. Martin
Luther King, Jr. was so moved by Nhat Hanh and his proposals for peace that
he nominated him for the 1967 Nobel Peace Prize, saying, “I know of no one
more worthy of the Nobel Peace Prize than this gentle monk from Vietnam.”
Largely due to Thich Nhat Hanh’s influence, King came out publicly against
the war at a press conference, with Nhat Hanh, in Chicago.
When Thomas Merton, the well-known Catholic monk and mystic, met Thich Nhat
Hanh at his monastery, Gethsemani, near Louisville, Kentucky, he told his
students, “Just the way he opens the door and enters a room demonstrates his
understanding. He is a true monk.” Merton went on to write an essay, “Nhat
Hanh Is My Brother,” an impassioned plea to listen to Nhat Hanh’s proposals
for peace and lend full support for Nhat Hanh’s advocacy of peace. After
important meetings with Senators Fullbright and Kennedy, Secretary of
Defense McNamara, and others in Washington, Thich Nhat Hanh went to Europe,
where he met with a number of heads of state and officials of the Catholic
church, including two audiences with Pope Paul VI, urging cooperation
between Catholics and Buddhists to help bring peace to Vietnam. In 1969,
at the request of the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam, Thich
Nhat Hanh set up the Buddhist Peace Delegation to the Paris Peace Talks.
After the Peace Accords were signed in 1973, he was refused permission to
return to Vietnam, and he established a small community a hundred miles
southwest of Paris, called “Sweet Potato.” In 1976-77, Nhat Hanh conducted
an operation to rescue boat people in the Gulf of Siam, but hostility from
the governments of Thailand and Singapore made it impossible to continue. So
for the following five years, he stayed at Sweet Potato in retreat –
meditating, reading, writing, binding books, gardening, and occasionally
receiving visitors.
In 1982, Thich Nhat Hanh established Plum Village, a larger, thriving
retreat center near Bordeaux, France, where he has been living in exile from
his native Vietnam. Since 1983 he has traveled to North America to lead
retreats and give lectures on mindful living and social responsibility,
“making peace right in the moment we are alive.” He has offered retreats for
Vietnam veterans, mental health and social workers, prison inmates,
ecologists, businessmen, police officers and members of Congress. In 1997,
Nhat Hanh founded the Green Mountain Dharma Center and Maple Forest
Monastery in Vermont. In 2000, he founded Deer Park Monastery in Escondido,
California. He has ordained over two hundred monks and nuns from different
parts of the world. In addition, 230 lay practice communities practicing in
the tradition of Thich Nhat Hanh meet regularly throughout the United States
and around the world.
Since his days in Vietnam, Thich Nhat Hanh has been a leading proponent of
“engaged Buddhism,” a way of life and a spiritual practice that works
actively in the world to relieve suffering. Nhat Hanh continues his work to
alleviate the suffering of refugees, boat people, political prisoners and
hungry families in Vietnam and other Third World countries. He has been
instrumental in initiating the declaration, by the General Assembly of the
United Nations, dedicating 2001-2010 as the “International Decade for a
Culture of Peace and Non-Violence for the Children of the World” (Resolution
A/RES/53/2519/111998). He collaborated with the Nobel Peace Laureates in
drafting the “Manifesto 2000,” with six points on the Practice of Peace and
Non-violence distributed by UNESCO. In December 2000, Thich Nhat Hanh was
invited to give a lecture at the White House World Summit Conference on HIV
and AIDS. He has also been invited to speak at The Gorbachev World Forum and
the World Economic Summit in Davos, Switzerland.
Thich Nhat Hanh has received recognition for his prolific writings on
meditation, mindfulness, and peace. He has published over 85 titles of
accessible poems, prose, and prayers, with more than 40 of those works in
English. His best-known books include Peace is Every Step, Being Peace,
Touching Peace, Call Me by My True Names, Living Buddha, Living Christ,
Teachings on Love, and Anger.
Now seventy-seven years old, Thich Nhat Hanh is emerging as one of the great
teachers of our time. In the midst of our society’s emphasis on speed,
efficiency, and material success, Thich Nhat Hanh’s ability to walk calmly
with peace and awareness and to teach us to do the same has led to his
enthusiastic reception in the West. Although his mode of expression is
simple, his message reveals the quintessence of the deep understanding of
reality that comes from his meditations, his Buddhist training, and his work
in the world.
|
