Why Do We Count the Breaths in Meditation? Early Buddhist Origins

For many of us, meditation involves a practice of counting the breaths. But it wasn't originally practiced that way. We'll look at the development of the practice of counting the breaths through some of its earliest written descriptions. Then we'll consider why the practice may have originated.

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✅ Video mentioned:
The Five Hindrances to Meditation: "Armies of Māra" --    • The Five Hindrances to Meditation: "Armies...  

✅ Books mentioned:
Anālayo, Mindfulness of Breathing (Windhorse, 2019), pp. 231-233. -- https://amzn.to/3xff00P

The Path of Freedom (Vimuttimagga) http://www.ahandfulofleaves.org/docum... pp. 159-160.

P.V. Bapat, Vimuttimagga and Visuddhimagga, A Comparative Study https://archive.org/details/Vimuttima...

Ñāṇamoli (trans.) The Path of Purification (Visuddhimagga) pp. 271ff -- https://amzn.to/3wojbHC

Leo Pruden (trans. of De La Vallée Poussin) Abhidharmakośabhāṣyam -- https://amzn.to/3v5knOQ

✅ Other literature mentioned:
Anālayo, “How the Steps of Mindfulness of Breathing Decreased from Sixteen to Two,” in Illuminating the Dharma: Buddhist Studies in Honour of Venerable Professor KL Dhammajoti, Toshiichi Endo (ed.) (Centre of Buddhist Studies, U. Hong Kong, 2021).

Anālayo, “The Treatise on the Path to Liberation (解脫道論) and the Visuddhimagga” https://www.buddhismuskunde.uni-hambu...

Florin Deleanu, “Mindfulness of Breathing in the Dhyāna Sūtras” https://ahandfulofleaves.files.wordpr...

00:00 Intro
02:17 When Counting Began
03:01 The Vimuttimagga
06:35 The Visuddhimagga
13:13 Abhidharmakośabhāsyam
14:56 Why counting may have developed
18:46 Problems with counting

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