This book brings together the most important suttas from the Pali Canon and extracts from the commentaries dealing with anapanasati—the meditative practice of mindfulness of breathing.
Anapanasati or “mindfulness of breathing” was the method of meditation that the Buddha himself used to attain enlightenment, and during his long teaching career he often stressed its importance to his disciples. In the living Buddhist tradition mindfulness of breathing is regarded as the “root” meditation subject, the basis for all other approaches to meditation as well as a self-sufficient system that covers the entire range of practice for gaining calm and insight.
This is a useful anthology of important and pragmatic source material from the Pali Canon and Commentaries on the technique of Anapana, or breath-awareness meditation. It includes the Discourse on Respiration-Mindfulness from the Majjhima Nikaya, commentary from the Visuddhimagga (Path of Purification), and analyses of other passages and suttas. All this material has been rendered into lucid English by Bhikkhu Nyanamoli, one of the foremost translators of Pali Buddhist texts in our age.
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