Dashboard Buddha: Doctor Who Edition

"Mankind doesn't need warfare and bloodshed to prove itself. Everyday life can provide honour and valour. Let's hope that from now on this country can find its heroes in smaller places. In the most ordinary of deeds."
--The Doctor

Fig. 1 The Doctor is most definitely IN

In the series three finale of the new Doctor Who, the “Master”—a powerful Time Lord gone completely mad—seizes control of the planet Earth and rules with no mercy for an entire year. During that time, the Doctor is imprisoned, but he tells his trustworthy companion, Martha, to roam the world in order to develop a weapon against the Master: a special injection gun that will kill him instantly. The Master finds her and destroys the gun, but Martha is amused that the Master would think the gun was their entire plan.

“As if I would ask her to kill?” the Doctor says from his cage, displaying his usual reluctance to take life, even in such an extreme situation. Killing was the Master’s way of doing things, but that’s not the Doctor’s style.

Turns out the real plan was to the spread the word of the Doctor’s powers in order to get everyone on Earth to call out his name at a certain moment—a prayer of hope, if you will—which magically breaks the Doctor’s bonds and renders the Master powerless. Up until that moment, for the entire year, the Doctor had said time and time again that he had one thing to say to the Master. The Master knows what it is, and he takes it as a threat.

“I forgive you,” the Doctor says, embracing the fearful Master as a friend.

Despite all the Master had done to hurt and kill humans, the Doctor had no intention of harming him. The Master, after all, was the only other Time Lord in the entire universe, and the lonely Doctor didn’t wish to lower himself to a level of hatred and malice that would cut his population in half.

After the Doctor reverses time and the world goes back to what it was before the year of tyranny, Martha, upon looking out at all the people in London, says, “A time was, every single one of these people knew your name, now they’ve all forgotten you.”

“Good,” the Doctor says without hesitation, as he is happy to be perpetually uncredited for his part in saving lives.

Fig. 2 Make nice with your enemies

That Doctor Who episode reminded me of the tale of Ungali Maal and the Buddha. Ungali Maal was a fearsome man who wanted to sacrifice a thousand people to a goddess. He got his name, which in Sanskrit means “finger necklace” because he would take his victims’ fingers and string them together and wear them around his neck. After killing hundreds of people, Ungali Maal encountered the Buddha in a jungle and wanted to kill him as well.

The Buddha was fearless and said, “Take a leaf from that tree there, buddy.” Ungali Maal humored him and plucked a leaf from the tree. The Buddha then said, “Now put it back on the tree.”

Ungali Maal said, “Pfft, that’s impossible. You can’t put a leaf back once you’ve taken it.”

The Buddha said, “Then if you can’t put it back on, you shouldn’t pluck it off in the first place, my friend.”

Ungali Maal realized the real meaning of the Buddha’s lesson and immediately bowed down to him, the Buddha forgave him, and Ungali Maal the murderer went on to become a saint, one of the Buddha’s most devoted followers. The Buddha would never take credit for Ungali Maal’s transformation because he didn’t force him to be good, Ungali Maal himself made the decision to be good.


Practicing forgiveness and modesty is a very Buddha thing to do. It’s a very Muhammad thing to do. It’s a very Jesus thing to do. What if we treated all people like they’re the last of our kind?

Fig. 3 A little sonic screwdriver for the soul

Orthodox Jew Reggae stars and Islamic Rap artists and everything in between

"My heart, which is so full to overflowing, has often been solaced and refreshed by music when sick and weary."
--Martin Luther

Fig. 1 I Always thought clothes were overkill

I loved Ridley Scott’s Kingdom of Heaven from my first viewing at the theatre, and it wasn’t because Orlando Bloom gets shirtless in it (that’s just one reason). With institutions like Liam Neeson and Jeremy Irons involved, as well as an uncredited Edward Norton performance and Ridley’s signature mise-en-scene, it’s a masterfully illustrated story about the folly of pride and the human necessity to embrace all nations as one human family.

Perfectly underpinning this multicultural theme is Harry Gregson-Williams’ rich tapestry of a musical score. It seamlessly weaves Celtic, Mediterranean, and Persian influences into a set piece that is earthly for its mix of instruments, yet otherworldly because it makes the many cultures responsible for the different styles feel as if they were never separated by land or sea. A favorite thread in this score is the angelic echoing vocals of ancient choral hymns. I noticed the simplicity set me at ease whenever I was studying or reading, and I wanted more.

A search for Gregorian chants on iTunes yielded my now favorite group Sequentia, an ensemble dedicated to resurrecting the canticles of medieval Europe. Both male and female voices in predominantly acapella performances transport me to a musical plateau of serenity. Whenever I listen, I can practically smell the incense and feel the warmth of the sun filtering through the stained glass in colored shafts of light. As a bonus treat, Sequentia likes to toss in a few instrumental pieces that showcase the sounds of traditional strings and woodwinds.

There’s something universal and profound surrounding them. Perhaps it’s the sheer grace of God, or just the incomprehensible Latin, but I prefer to think it’s the purity of devotion that imbues them with comprehensive appeal. They were performed to praise a higher existence, not to deride or condemn, but inform listeners of the deeds and love of God.

In Mary Doria Russell’s exquisite novel The Sparrow, a young man working in Arecibo for the SETI program discovers a signal sent through space and time from a star system a few short light years away. He realizes that it’s a song, which indicates intelligent life. Scientists, humanists, and a Jesuit priest are all brought together by that ethereal music, and all of them travel to this new world on the Jesuit organization’s dime. For the Jesuits, as an influential and financially capable organization in the story, the mission is about finding rare resources that can be brought back to fund their missions on earth. For each of the characters, the journey becomes a spiritual test as they attempt to discover the source of the songs on a strange new planet.

Reading the book, I was surprised how moved I was by the description of the SETI discovery and it had me thinking for days about how I’d react to such a significant event. Hearing a song from an alien world filtering down through the stars and vast chasm of space would be a singular spiritual moment for all humankind.

Earth itself has a diversity of music that might overwhelm an off-worlder first hearing it. Even if they only listened to the religious tracks, they’d be surprised at the variety. I certainly was.

Podcasts, movies and documentaries may not be alien sources, but they provided plenty of absorbing listening from perspectives I never knew existed. Here’s a spiritual playlist of some of my favorites:



“There Is A Tree” by Carrie Newcomer
I heard an interview with this Quaker folk singer/songwriter on Interfaith Voices a while back, and was particularly impressed by the mystic quality of this song and her rich, earthy voice. It invokes a sense of the profound in everyday life, as does Carrie’s entire album “Geography of Light.” My other favorite song of hers, “Where You Been,” makes direct reference to many faiths, revealing the universality and playfulness of spirit.


“O Quam Mirabilis Est (Antiphona)” by Sequentia
The simplest, most angelic of Sequentia’s tracks. I have no clue what she’s saying, but it doesn’t beg translation. I feel the love, the dedication, the devotion, the joy. It’s beautiful in its musicality, heartbreaking in its purity.


“Hannukah on Hannukah” by Erran Baron Cohen
I read an article on Tabletmag.org (formerly Nextbook.org) on a newly released album in December 2008 that was created to “change Hanukkah’s reputation.” It’s called “Songs in the Key of Hannukah” and upon hearing it once through, I decided I could listen to it all year long. It’s composed by internationally acclaimed DJ Erran Baron Cohen, who cranks up the irony of his brother’s anti-Semitic characters by injecting a proud and somewhat fundamentalist Jewish flavor to this holiday album. Lighting the shamash and eating sufganiyot has never been so hip.


“Mul Mantra” by Snatam Kaur
Whenever I hear this song, I’m reminded of the long trip between New Orleans and Killeen, Texas with my sister and her husband. I stared out at the endless Texan grazing land and listened to the Sikhwithin podcast, where I first heard Snatam Kaur’s soothing voice. Turns out she’s something of a rockstar in Sikh circles, a California-born woman who performs kirtan devotional music on peace-promoting world tours. The Mul Mantra is the essence of the Guru Granth Sahib, the official Sikh text, and within its few words, contains dense layers of spiritual concepts. Snatam is such a gifted singer that simply hearing her version of the chant without any previous knowledge of Sikh theology, one can sense the depth and emotion and history suffusing it.


“Welcome Home” by Hamza Peréz
Featured in the excellent PBS POV documentary New Muslim Cool, this inspirational rap serves as a primer for leading a righteous life after leaving jail. Informed by Hamza’s own story as a Puerto Rican ex-drug-dealer in the streets of Pittsburg who converted to Islam, this song cuts through to the core of spiritual conversion: to change your life for the better, forever. The film demonstrates the injustices visited upon Hamza’s mosque community as well as the strength of brotherhood and sisterhood they have to endure life’s hardships, and how Islam always guides them toward kindness and standing up for themselves.


“I Will Be Light” by Matisyahu
Matthew Paul Miller, known by his Hebrew name Matisyahu, was influenced through a youth equally defined by Bob Marley and yeshiva, and his music seamlessly sews together reggae-flavored instrumentals and vocals with Hasidic Jewish theological themes. Another Interfaith Voices discovery, this song, with its “dreadlocks to sidelocks” backstory, struck me as a powerful testament to the dynamism of religion and how beautifully it can evolve and inspire each new generation.


“Jesus Is Just Alright With Me” by The Doobie Brothers
I just really love this song. It’s very catchy. Its spiritual message doesn’t detract from its pop cred at all. Anyone can listen to it, whether you’re Christian or not, because it’s stripped of dogma. It’s a simple story of finding Jesus as a friend, and no matter that I’m a Buddhist, I can still agree that Jesus is just alright.


“Pal Pal Hai Bhaarii” by A.R. Rahman
This one is on the soundtack of the excellent hindi film Swades, and it’s from the scene featuring the Ramlila, the traditional play about Lord Ram’s life and adventures. The lyrics are based on the classical storytelling style and as usual, A.R. Rahman’s underlying score defines itself as anything but simple accompaniment. Find the translation of the story on Bollywhat.com and you’ll enjoy the full impact of the lyrics, both dramatic and mystical.


“Sacred Stones” by Sheila Chandra
Oddly enough, I first heard this song on an episode of Queer As Folk, and it was played during a slow-motion sequence meant to give some pause to the usual fast-paced beats that pump through the heart of Babylon, the characters’ nightclub of choice. I noted its singularity among other songs featured in the show and discovered the meditative quality it had. It’s just the kind of song you’d hear playing in the background at a yoga class, but it constitutes more than your standard ambient vaguely South Asian-flavoured white noise. It combines a handful of religious chants in one song to exemplify the tonal, and, incidentally, the spiritual similarities among them. Listen closely.


“Muestro Senyor Elohenu” by Yasmin Levy
Listening to Vox Tablet one day at work, I heard the story of a woman whose father painstakingly preserved thousands of traditional Sephardic songs sung in Ladino—a Hebrew-Spanish language, an Iberian version of Yiddish. Having a Puerto Rican background myself, and a pretty sharp ear for music, I was struck by the instant visceral reaction I had to her voice. In her interview, she described how her feet stood in three worlds—Israel, Arabia, & Spain—and her multicultural influence was so evident in her songs, the unification of which brought me to tears. It still does, every time. Her music, especially this song, is a manifesto for the brotherhood of human life.


“Twilight and Shadow” by Howard Shore
The Lord of the Rings trilogy is no doubt three of the most spiritual and soul-searching films of any generation, and the music reflects themes as diverse as the races of Middle Earth. I find this track one of the most essential because it distills the complex bittersweet tone of the entire story into a sad but hopeful hymn that you could drop into a list of songs by Sequentia and not know the difference.

The Hanukkah bush is still burning

“Does Hanukkah commemorate events profound and holy?
A king who came to save the world?”

“No. Oil that burned quite slowly.”

--Stephen Colbert & Jon Stewart singing “Can I interest you in Hanukkah?”


Fig. 1 My sister, hungry for Hanukkah

You gotta hand it to Christians. They really have a lot of pizazz in their holiday celebrations. Whatever it means to you, you can’t deny the jocularity of the Christmas season. Pageantry, singing, sparkling lights, tinsel, brightly colored presents and party costumes and dresses--it’s no wonder the English language has developed the expression “Gay as Christmas.”

The Jews, on the other hand, are comparatively “meh” about the old “sensible alternative to Christmas,” Hanukkah. That’s not to say they haven’t tried. I mean, eight days of presents certainly trumps one day, but it’s often described as an exercise in delayed satisfaction instead of a week of gift-giving bonanzas. The food is great, though! What’s more deliciously American than oil-soaked potatoes and jelly donuts? I’m surprised they don’t use that in their marketing campaign more often.

Fig. 2 Jon tries to convince Stephen that Hanukkah is cool

For me, celebrating Hanukkah has meant profoundly understanding every nuance in a finely-crafted jokes Jewish comedians make about it. The subtle but illustrative dropping of Yiddish terminology and references to the Maccabean battles of old have proven extremely hilarious in the right context. And I get stares from people who are obviously not Jewish “it-getters.”

Two years ago, I went menorah shopping in preparation of my upcoming Hanukkah festivities. Did you know that you could spend as much on a menorah as you do on a Christmas tree? They last longer though, and many become heirlooms, which certainly sticks with the Hanukkah theme of conservation. Can you imagine having the same artificial Christmas tree in your family for generations? Didn’t think so.

Menorahs are nowhere near as messy, though instead of kvetching about pine needles and preventing the dog from drinking the tree water, I had a festive time scraping melted candle wax off my mantel. A handy tip: to get the wax off the menorah itself, put it in the freezer for an hour, then chip off the frozen wax. Much easier on the lower back than hauling the tree into the attic.

Fig. 3 The Jewish equivalent of an artificial Christmas tree

The first time I insisted on giving Hanukkah a try, my family already had years of trained experience making latkes. My mom, the multi-talented cook who always loves trying new recipes from all walks of life, taught us the joys of shredding potatoes and squeezing out their copious amounts of water to make the pancakes stay in one piece in the pan. They are, by far, one of the greatest contributions to culinary art ever. Smothered with sour cream and chives (or applesauce, if you’re traditionally-minded) with a side of Hebrew Nationals and some carrot coins… oh baby. It gives you the energy for days worth of dreidel spinning.

We also challenged ourselves to giving eight gifts to each other every evening after lighting the candles. We were already bogged down with buying Christmas gifts, so they usually amounted to very small tokens involving inside jokes and edible treats. My dad, the creative one, came up with an unexpectedly complex plot to crush us with his gift-giving and storytelling prowess. At the time, I’m not sure he fully appreciated what he had gotten himself into, but I’m glad he did it.

Each night, sitting on the sofa in the living room, he revealed a small chapter of a Hanukkah story he had conjured, and each night he gave us something related to the story, much like how Kindergarten teachers use props to read children’s books to their students. It was a story about a young man with a magical “Gelt Horse” and a magical basket that filled up with coins every night so he could save enough money to marry a young lady. Dad gave us each a small plastic toy pony with a Star of David Sharpied onto its rump, then a small basket, then an increasing amount of golden Sacagawea dollars appeared in the baskets. They doubled every night. You can imagine that we ended up with a handsome sum when we ran out of candles.

Fig. 4 The purebred Gelt Horse

Best lesson in saving money EVER.

Thank you, Dad, for making your little girl’s first Hanukkah a memorable one.

As for the real reason people celebrate Hanukkah, its details are thought provoking in their outward mediocrity. Judah Maccabee led the Jewish revolt against the tyrannical Antiochus in Judea around 164 BCE. When the Maccabees took back control of the temple, they found only one day’s worth of the consecrated oil needed for daily ceremonies, but during the eight days it took to make more oil, the oil they had never burned out. The story was considered too recent and inconsequential at the time of compiling the Jewish testament, so it didn’t make the final edit. Hanukkah as a commemoration ranks as a minor holiday compared to Pesach (Passover) or Yom Kippur.

So why has it risen to the rank of the most popularly known of Jewish holidays (in America, at least)? The tradition of gift-giving and the focus on childhood activities may have been installed to give the holiday more chutzpah and a means of Jewish immigrants to assimilate into American culture during the country’s nation-building era. But as Jon Stewart tends to say regarding his own interfaith family’s holiday observations, “Christmas blows the doors off of Hanukkah.”

Fig. 5 Even our dog Harmon got into the spirit

Most fascinating to me, though, is how each traditional image we associate with Hanukkah still steadfastly embodies reference to the Maccabbean story. The dreidel, something so innocuous and seemingly random, has the Hebrew letters Nun, Hay, Gimel, Shin, which stands for the Hebrew phrase: “Nes Gadol Haya Sham” (A Great Miracle Happened There”), referring to the miracle of the eight-day oil. The nine-armed menorah (as opposed to the ancient traditional seven-armed menorah) is actually called a Hanukkiah (related to the Hebrew word for “to dedicate”), denoting its use as a lamp for “dedicating” the new temple that Judah had captured from Antiochus.

Hanukkah, as a minor holiday, is simply not built to be the kind of all-encompassing epic celebration of anything as world changing as a messiah coming to Earth, which is part of the reason why it’s got flyweight muscle in the pop culture match between it and that heavyweight champion, Christmas. Hanukkah basically had the unfortunate luck of occurring adjacent to Christmastime and is compared to Jesus’ birthday by virtue of proximity, which is totally fakakta.

Fig. 6 If Martha Stewart were Jewish...

Hanukkah was designed for something else entirely. It’s a small holiday that has, in the grand history of things, made the others still possible. Hanukkah commemorates the little miracles that make all the difference. Little miracles like oil-fried latkes with sour cream. Mmmm.

Sunrise, Sunset

“I marvel at the resilience of the Jewish people. Their best characteristic is their desire to remember. No other people has such an obsession with memory.”
--Elie Wiesel


Fig. 1 My Nature Coast sunset

On Wednesday, 12 September 2007, I went to the beach with my sister. It was a typical sun-kissed September day, and some fluffy clouds rolled in the late afternoon, just in time for a photoshoot during the “Magic Hour.” Before hopping into the car, my sister grabbed her camera, and I grabbed handfuls of sand from my Zen garden and I put some in my pockets.

We drove out to Pine Island, which is just about the smallest beach in existence. It’s a spit of land on the margin of a saltwater marsh connected to Nature Coast scrub prairie by a long but modest two-lane limestone dirt causeway. The road winds out to where a handful of stilt houses have taken up residence, along with a small park skirted by white quarried sand trucked out there for the enjoyment of sunbathers and castle builders.

Pine Island is almost never what you’d normally define as “populated.” By Santa Monica standards, PI is as deserted as a beach on Pluto, hosting more seagulls and almond-sized crabs than humans. It’s one of the Gulf Coast’s many little secrets that require no more than direct knowledge and $2 for parking (and even that is waived after a certain hour). When the neon-cheddar-orange disc of the sun dipped into the Gulf of Mexico, we emptied our pockets into the water, symbolically casting off our sins and problems from the past year and letting the tiny waves carry them away.


Fig 2. Suck it, sin!

My sister, the natural photographer, got some great shots of this event. A Pine Island sunset is remarkable enough without ushering in a religious holiday, but hey, the more spiritual significance, the merrier. Ushering out the old year with water, sand and warm autumnal sunsets appeals more than a cold January garish ball drop several latitudes away.

That was our first Rosh Hashanah.

When I first decided to study everything, I began with investigating holidays. Everyone loves an excuse for getting out of work and spending a day full of music, food, and fireworks with the occasional James Bond movie marathon.

Fig. 3 Daniel Craig: Good for the Jews
(see Munich & Defiance... seriously, go see them)

Jews have accumulated an impressive number of holidays not because it’s so ancient (Hinduism beats it by a thousand years or so) or because they’re particularly self-congratulatory (all the Woody Allen self-deprecation says otherwise), but because the Torah focuses so much on remembrance and preserving memory of the Tribe’s incredible history. For eighteen minutes of that incredible history, try downloading The Tribe short film from iTunes. Best two sheckels ever spent. See also: West Bank Story. I think it won "Best Use of Hummus in a Short Subject Film" at the Oscars.

There are a lot of fasts and feasts throughout the year, but there are fourteen that will show up in the most religiously aware of wall calendars, and they’re all fun to pronounce: Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Sukkot, Shemini Atzeret, Simchat Torah, Chanukah, Tu B’shvat, Purim, Pesach, Yom HaSho’ah, Yom Ha’Atzmaut, Lag B’Omer, Shavuot, and Tisha B’av. They last from one to ten days (depending on who you ask), and they’re brimming with all the mentally enticing symbols and customs my culturally titillated heart adores.

For me, 5768 (according to the Hebrew calendar) was a do-it-yourself year of becoming less of a blatant shiksa, and I still enjoy my new traditions of celebrating the big ones in my own freestyle way.

Fig. 4 Not kosher

Next weekend, I’ll post my reflections on Chanukah (Hanukkah, whatever, as long as it has 8 letters, it's spelled right), which begins this year at sunset on December 11. It’s one of the few Jewish holidays that manifest with a small, dedicated section of the seasonal greeting cards aisle in Target, along with an endcap shelf containing menorahs, candles, and decorative gel window clings. So break out your dreidels and latke recipes and your Yiddish dictionary and join me for some oil-soaked fun!

Head to the ground

"The earth has been made for me [and for my Ummah] as a masjid [place for worship] and a pureness ; therefore, anyone of my Ummah can pray whenever the time of Prayer is due."
--Prophet Muhammad

Fig. 1 A two-year-old can understand this. Someone fetch me a two-year-old!

Listening to a Speaking of Faith podcast from a few years ago, I was struck today by Ingrid Mattson’s description of her first prostration experience. This particular episode is an interview with Ingrid regarding her conversion to Islam and subsequent appointment as the first woman president of ISNA, the Islamic Society of North America.

Ingrid tells the story of being in France during her first exposure to Senegalese Muslim devotees who became her friends. One day, they invited her to pray with them and she said she didn’t know how. They said that she could just follow along with what they were doing, so she obliged. Islamic prayer, the du'a, involves many steps, including several body positions and prescribed chants and Ingrid felt extremely awkward trying to keep up.

Fig. 2 I'm pretty sure it's not quite this complicated

But once she had her forehead to the ground, taking pause in that position, she felt closer to the earth, closer to God, and in the intimacy of the moment in which she could not be distracted simply because her eyes are staring at the floor, she felt prayer as a full body experience for the first time. When I heard her say that, I remembered that I had the exact same feelings doing my first Buddhist prostration.

I don’t know about y’all, but the last time I had my forehead to the ground was last night, after dinner. My pre-yoga ritual consists of what may be called a standard Buddhist chant:

I take refuge in the Buddha.

I take refuge in the Dharma.

I take refuge in the Sangha.

I follow this up with candle-lighting and some prostrations of my own, borrowed from the Tibetans. I hold my palms together in a specific mudra (hand formation) and touch the top of my head, my forehead, my heart, and then bend down for a full-body prostration on the ground, touching my forehead to the carpet. I do this three times, each time reciting the above mantra.

Fig. 3 Olympic Cross-country prostration

When I did this for the first time, I was in the privacy of my bedroom, with nothing to distract me and no one to see me make this new step toward adopting a cultural tchotchke my new faith. It felt incredibly strange and awkward. As a not-so-churchy person to start with, when I saw movies and documentaries showing Buddhists doing this pretty obvious, involved, anti-subtle prayer ritual, I was confused. I had to keep in mind that it was a Tibetan-style prostration, one full of meaning and metaphor and even superstitious history, but it was beautiful and I wanted in.

I wanted to “create sacred space” and learn to respect it by bookending my meditations and yoga practices with a small ritual.

But the prostrations were awkward for more than one reason, i.e. I had no clue what I was doing because I had never done them before. It was strange because bowing and touching the floor, in Western society, is associated with subservience and is way too self-deprecating an act for a middle-class protestant nation that worked very hard to escape class-obsessed systems and aristocratic societal structure.

For Eastern societies, these acts are a sign of profound respect toward someone or something and in no way demeans the person doing them. It is humbling, but it’s a willful humility I adopt whenever expressing my respect for my teacher, The Buddha. I bow to him, not as a worshipper, but as a student, and in the process, I also bow to nature and the Universe, connecting myself to a stable ground beneath me through a gentle touch that always touches me back.

I definitely fulfill my quota of hours with my head in the clouds (and especially in outer space due to my love of astronomy), so it's common sense to balance it out by literally touching it down to the ground everyday.