The Living Thoughts of Gotama the Buddha

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Summary: ONE OF BEST BOOKS OUT OF 2300+ BOOKS I OWN ON BUDDHISM
Review: Im a Pali scholar and write books on Buddhism. This book is (outside of the Suttas) is the single best introductory book to own on Buddhism... AK Coomaraswamy is seen by Indians and experts in Buddhism as a "GOD" of Indian Philosophy. He spent endless years translating Pali as well as Sanksrit. He is also very well trained in Platonism as well as Neo Platonism. ...

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Summary: Goes t o the Heart of Buddhism!
Review: This book is one of the best introductions to Buddhism. It goes past the layers of obfuscating polemics that were added to make the Buddha into a cult figure, which in his own life he wasn't.

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Summary: Accurate Book based in Scripture, not conjecture.
Review: This book, inexpensive and tiny though it be, is the single BEST introduction to buddhism available in print. A double introduction by Dr. AK Coomaraswamy and followed by a corpus of primary translations by IB Horner, herself a famous Pali translator.

What makes this book absolutely phenomenal and stands out from the massive amount of trashy books under the title of "Buddhism"? Simple, this book makes no claims without citation, no conclusions without references in Sutta (Buddhist nikaya doctrine). Other so-called books on Buddhism are 99% composed of the authors personal dogmas and conjectures without even a jot of reference, or citation.

In actuality, 80% of this book is composed of key translations by Mrs. IB Horner, only the very lengthy introduction is by Dr. Coomaraswamy. A.K. Coomaraswamy is author of over 60 books before he passed, was prolific in Pali, Sanskrit, greek, latin, and other languages and is often heralded as the "God of Indian Philosophy" by many. Myself having many thousands of books on Buddhism, this little simplistic book remains top 30 books out of over 4000 books on Buddhism I personally own. Outside of reading the Suttas themselves in the original Pali (something unheard of in practicality), this is the single book which upholds scriptural accuracy and is philosophically choate to the Sramanistic Monism that was original pre-secular Buddhism.