Dear Nina,

thank you for your generous works. This occasionally opens up and leads to discussions which may further enhance our appreciation of Buddhism. Given our international membership with a large variety of backgrounds, through sharing and discussion, we should allow a deeper exploration of the facts related to the teachings, only to be constrained by time, space and our limited knowledge.

If you do not object, allow me to add a new dimension to sutta study.

Today, historians relate Isipatana to the modern day Sarnath, a small village in the northeastern state of Uttar Pradesh in India. According to history, King Asoka built a massive stupa to mark the spot where the Buddha preached this sutta. The Dhamekha Stupa, as it is known, had been vandalised and repaired over time, but it still retains many artistic carvings of Gupta origin, as well as inscriptions in Brahmi script. It is the only standing structure among the ruins of the plundered site. The name dhamekha seems to be a distorted form of dhammacakka, meaning the wheel of Dhamma.


metta,
Yong Peng.