This playlist includes the last two of the films, and include reflections on the meaning of the dhutanga practices in this age, and how it goes against the stream. In the final video there is also a summary of Ven Miao Xiang’s retreats and dhutanga practices from 1995-2012.
In the Mahāyāna tradition in China, there are still many monks very strictly abiding to the Vinaya tradition, who engage in all the ascetic practices (dhutanga), and live a very austere life.
This playlist is the last in a series of films about the Vinaya-trained monks from the Miao Xiang Sangha, based in Liaoning in north-eastern China (bordering North Korea), who are living such a life, and records their various practices.
These rules differ somewhat from those in the better-known Theravāda traditions, but the monks abiding to these rules are equally bound to living a strict and austere life and are equally sincere in their practices.
It is also to be noted that along with reflections on the meaning of the dhutanga practices themselves, there are also reflections on Dharma and why we practice and what goals we are trying to achieve.
We also find out in the last of these videos that they were recorded over a period of ten years, in which the Miao Xiang Sangha went on walkabout (cārika) all over northern China bearing witness to the living tradition, and inspiring people wherever they went.
The video editing took five years: it is surely a major achievement recording the dhutanga tradition. At the end we see the Saṅgha return to their home monastery and the welcome they receive.
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to see an album of screenshots click here