Douglas Penick utilizes historical research with a solid understanding of Chinese culture and Buddhism to make stories accessible, beautiful and enlightening. In his words, "I contribute to the mischief, longing, satisfaction, lust, sorrow and fascination which make our presence in this world a discovery of true love." The Website of Douglas. Other LEVEKUNST articles by the same author.
The stories and legends presented in the Shambhala tradition are not myths as such since we only refer to such material as myth when they no longer have any accepted credence. Rather, the stories of the four ancestral sovereigns are closer to the epic tradition.
We extend our sympathies far beyond the constraints of our time and place and individuality. Out of solitude and love, the deep bond of our sheer humanness brings us worlds.
The vision of Shambhala is not a vision of something seen, but rather a way of seeing and perceiving and acting in the context of the phenomenal world. The Kingdom of Shambhala is an innate and spontaneous longing to realize the freedom of the awakened state within the context of our existing social life.
This was fate, for several past lives ago, the Reverend Lo had, out of sheer curiosity, played hooky from his relentless line of virtuous incarnations and had ended up as the Little Ha-to be’s long ago German husband.
Douglas J. Penick’s mini-novel begins with: Little Ha was, of course, herself the incarnation of an innumerable succession of beings. She had lived as a number of low ranking deities, the most distinguished of which was a river goddess near Nanjing whose shrine was ground to powder by the Red guards.