Our first new addition this week is a commentary by Zen master Shodo Harada on the ancient series of Ten Oxherding Pictures tracing the path to enlightenment and beyond.

If we are burning completely, nothing we do or see catches us. We have gathered it all into one, seeing with no sense of having seen, eating with no sense of having eaten, and walking with no sense of having walked. We have to pass through this great darkness once, gathering everything into this darkness, compressing everything into it, until there is no place for even a single thought to enter. If we realize this place we become totally transparent.

• An article by Jean-Luc Marion on “The Universality of the University”, reflecting on the consequences of the professionalization and specialization of academia:

An animal knows within the limits of its desire and desires within the limits of what it knows, whereas man knows according to the measure of his limitless desire, and therefore desires what he does not know. To man belongs the privilege of asking questions without immediate answers.

• “Everlasting Joy”, a brief homily by Fr Pavel Florensky on a cryptic excerpt of the Orthodox liturgy:

…with a treasure in our bosom everyone of us wanders with a longing over the face of the earth, and often we do not even believe that it is possible to find such a pearl—even far, far away. Blessed is he who has discovered his own treasure.

• Forthcoming events: Less than a month now before our lecture and seminars with Harry Oldmeadow. Click here for details, including “Some Puzzles and Conundrums in the Teaching of Religion”, an evening conversation in Cambridge with RE teachers.