Teaching Your Children Buddhist Values

September 18, 2008

Author: Mary Talbot

Source: Tricycle: The Buddhist Review

http://www.tricycle.com/special-section/introduction-teaching-your-children-buddhist-values

Of all the thousands of the Buddha's teachings, he directed a very few - three or four, depending on what you count - specifically to children. Considering the multitude and breadth of his suttas, it's hard to imagine why more weren't geared to kids: was it because following his path requires a mature mind and mature commitment? Or was it because Indian society twenty-six hundred years ago had the instruction of children firmly in household hand - if adult family members were following the Buddha, children would naturally absorb the lessons and culture of the dharma, too. Or perhaps - and this is a personal guess - it was because the Buddha's principal teaching to a child so perfectly encapsulated the dharma that little else needed to be said. Was he doing what the most effective parents and teachers do - paring down a complicated set of ideas to its most profound, most pressing - and illustrating the lesson in such a way that a child can connect it to his or her own life?

See also: Buddhism, Youth