The greatest athletes in the world today are not the Olympic
champions or the stars of professional sports, but the "marathon
monks" of Japan's sacred Mount Hiei. Over a seven-year training
period, these "running buddhas" figuratively circle the globe on
foot. During one incredible 100-day stretch, they cover 52.5 miles
daily-twice the length of an Olympic marathon. And the prize they
seek to capture is the greatest thing a human being can achieve:
enlightenment in the here and now.
This book is about these amazing men, the magic mountain on
which they train, and the philosophy of Tendai Buddhism, which
inspires them in their quest for the supreme. The reader will learn
about the monks' death-defying fasts, their vegetarian training
diet, their handmade straw running shoes, and feats of endurance
such as their ceremonial leap into a waterfall. Illustrated with
superb photographs, the book also contains the first full-length
study in English of Mount Hiei and Tendai Buddhism.
John Stevens lived in Japan for thirty-five years, where he was
a professor of Buddhist studies at Tohoku Fukushi University in
Sendai. Stevens is a widely respected translator, an ordained
Buddhist priest, a curator of several major exhibitions of Zen art,
and an aikido instructor. He has authored more than thirty books
and is one of the foremost Western experts on aikido, holding a
ranking of 7th dan Aikikai. Stevens has also studied calligraphy
for decades, authoring the classic "Sacred Calligraphy of the
East." Other John Stevens titles that are likely to be of interest
include "Extraordinary Zen Masters" and "The Philosophy of
Aikido."
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