The Classical Ideas Podcast

Latest Episodes:

EP 181: Carving the Divine and Busshi with Yujiro Seki Oct 30, 2020

Show notes

Yujiro Seki is the documentary filmmaker of the film "Carving the Divine." Carving the Divine offers a rare and intimate look into the life and artistic process of modern-day Busshi – practitioners of a 1400 year lineage of woodcarving at the beating heart of Japanese, Mahayana Buddhism.

For more information, visit: https://www.carvingthedivine.com/

EP 180: Firefighter Zen w/Hersch Wilson Oct 20, 2020

Show notes

Hersch Wilson is a thirty-year veteran volunteer Firefighter-EMT with the Hondo Fire Department in Santa Fe County, New Mexico. He is also a story-teller, committed to explaining how First Responding can change how we see and experience our own lives. In his "real job" he is a writer, speaker, and consultant. He is the author of "Firefighter Zen," out now from New World Library.

Buy "Firefighter Zen": https://www.amazon.com/Firefighter-Zen-Field-Guide-Thriving/dp/1608686884/ref=sr_1_1?crid=24PZQ4UR1SWNK&dchild=1&keywords=firefighter+zen&qid=1603160557&sprefix=firefighter+zen%2Caps%2C162&sr=8-1

EP 179: "Hidden Zen" w/Meido Moore Oct 10, 2020

Show notes

Meido Moore Roshi was a disciple of the lay Zen master Tenzan Toyoda Rokoji, under whom he endured a severe training in both Zen and traditional martial arts. He also trained under Dogen Hosokawa Roshi, and later under So'zan Miller Roshi. All three of these teachers are in the lineage of the famous Omori Sogen Roshi, perhaps the most famous Rinzai Zen master of the twentieth century. Meido serves as abbot of Korinji, a monastery near Madison, Wisconsin, and is a guiding teacher of the international Rinzai Zen Community, traveling widely to lead retreats.

Buy the book: https://www.shambhala.com/hidden-zen.html

EP 178: The Spirituality of Dag Hammarskjöld w/Dr. Roger Lipsey Sep 30, 2020

Show notes

Dag Hammarskjöld served as secretary-general of the United Nations from 1953 until his tragic death in a suspicious plane crash in 1961. During those years he saw the fledgling international organization through numerous crises with skill that made him a star on the international stage. As readers of his now-classic diary, Markings, are aware, Hammarskjöld understood political leadership as an honor calling for resourcefulness, humility, moral clarity, and spiritual reflection.

Buy Roger Lipsey's books here: https://www.shambhala.com/authors/g-n/roger-lipsey.html

EP 177: Dharma Relief and the Essence of Chan w/Guo Gu Sep 22, 2020

Show notes

Guo Gu (Dr. Jimmy Yu) is the founder of the Tallahassee Chan Center (www.tallahasseechan.com) and is also the guiding teacher for the Western Dharma Teachers Training course at the Chan Meditation Center in New York and the Dharma Drum Lineage. He is one of the late Master Sheng Yen's (1930–2009) senior and closest disciples, and assisted him in leading intensive retreats throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia. Guo Gu has edited and translated a number of Master Sheng Yen's books from Chinese to English. He is also a professor of Buddhism and East Asian religions at Florida State University, Tallahassee.

Visit Tallahassee Chan Center on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/Tallahasseechan

EP 176: Pentecostals in America w/Dr. Arlene Sánchez Walsh Sep 12, 2020

Show notes

Dr. Arlene Sánchez Walsh is a professor of religious studies and the author of the award-winning book Latino Pentecostal Identity, which was released by Columbia University Press in 2003, as well as the book Pentecostals in America from Columbia University Press in 2018. She has served as a media expert for outlets such as the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and On Being with Krista Tippett, and served as an expert on Latino/a religious history for the PBS series God in America.

EP 175 - Japanese Buddhist Art: KU Meets KU Sep 02, 2020

Show notes

Rachel Quist specializes in East Asian Buddhist imagery with focuses in pre-modern Japan and China. Her research centers on questions of interaction with imagery, materiality and object agency, and the accessibility of image-based practices. She has written on topics such as Buddhist reliquary design and expressivity, the didactic project underlying the hell tableau at Baodingshan, and the construction of a collective memory surrounding the Shingon monk Kōbō Daishi at the temple complex of Mount Kōya. Rachel is currently conducting research on early imperial patronage of Daigoji, a Shingon temple in Kyoto, for her dissertation.

Michael VanHartingsveldt received an undergraduate degree in English Language and Literature before teaching in South Korea in at an English immersion school. While there, he became enamored with the religious art of East Asia. He finished a Master's degree in East Asian art and its markets from Claremont Graduate University in 2017, after which he worked for two years as an Asian Art collections specialist at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Michael has collaborated with the Los Angeles office of The Japan Foundation in the curation of three exhibitions and two public lecture series. He now studies at the University of Kansas.

EP 174: Religion and Film with Dr. S. Brent Plate Aug 26, 2020

Show notes

S. Brent Rodriguez Plate is a writer, editor, public speaker, and college professor. He's interested in how sensuality affects spirituality. His writings all circle around questions of the ways sense perceptions influence ways of being religious, and how religious traditions change our ways of perceiving the world around us. In other words, religion and spirituality are rooted in the body. Along these lines, he has authored and edited fifteen books, while his essays have appeared in Salon.com, the Los Angeles Review of Books, America, Religion Dispatches, The Christian Century, The Islamic Monthly, Killing the Buddha, Chronicle of Higher Education, and other venues. Having taught at the University of Vermont and Texas Christian University, he is currently visiting associate professor at Hamilton College, NY.

Visit Dr. Brent Plate online at: https://www.sbrentplate.net

EP 173: "Lifeblood of the Parish" w/Dr. Alyssa Maldonado-Estrada Aug 17, 2020

Show notes

Dr. Maldonado-Estrada is Assistant Professor of Religion at Kalamazoo College where she teaches classes on religion and masculinity, Catholics in the Americas, urban religion, and religions of Latin America. She is an ethnographer and her research focuses on material culture, contemporary Catholicism, and gender and embodiment. She is the author of Lifeblood of the Parish: Men and Catholic Devotion in Williamsburg, Brooklyn (NYU Press, 2020).

Pre-order "Lifeblood of the Parish" and use the code "LIFEBLOOD30" at checkout to receive 30% off your order.

Preorder here: https://nyupress.org/9781479830497/lifeblood-of-the-parish/

EP 172: Teaching Classical Ideas w/Jonathan McFarland Aug 10, 2020

Show notes

Jonathan McFarland teaches Classical Ideas and World Religions at Hickman High School in Columbia, Missouri.