Why is ethics important? Why isn't meditation alone enough? In this unit, we'll look at the big picture and see that Buddhism is, at its heart, about finding ethical ways of being in the world.

Unit 1: Introduction

Why Ethics?

Why do we practice Buddhism? Why do we meditate? Our suggestion is that the awareness we're developing through these practices is in service of how we live. It's about ethics.

In this course we will show the overwhelming importance in Buddhist practice of holding ethics in mind continuously. It's a reversal from the usual ways that we understand this path. We usually understand the way the path unfolds from ethics as a ground to the higher reaches of understanding or wisdom. One of the ways we'll rethink this is that ethics is a foundation but also becomes the end goal. And we might suggest that the ethical political is at the culmination of this process.

We'll begin by making the case for the importance of ethics and its centrality in our lives. For example, two questions we might ask ourselves as we embark on this path are, "How do I live?" and "What do I do?"

Study your way

• All of the written content of this unit is contained in a workbook, which you can download here for reference and reflection.
• A single audio file containing all of the talks from this unit is also available below.
• You can download individual audio files, such as the meditation, on the Downloads page.