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Thich Nhat Hanh in 2010: Books on Charity, Mindfulness and Conscious Living
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CHAIWAT SUBPRASOM / REUTERS
Famed Zen master and author Thich Nhat Hanh is dead. The world-renowned author, whom Martin Luther King Jr. nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1967, died peacefully at his home in Tu Hieu Temple in Hue at the age of 95, as reported the Plum Village meditation center he founded announced on Twitter.
The Vietnamese's numerous books, in which he advocated charity and a life of mindfulness and awareness of the present, have been translated into almost two dozen languages. Thich Nhat Hanh was also active in Germany: in 2008 he founded the European Institute for Applied Buddhism (EIAB) in Waldbröl near Cologne. Around 30 of the monk’s works were published in German, including “The fearless Buddha: What carries us through fear”, “Understanding with the heart” and “Reconciliation with the inner child: On the healing power of mindfulness”.
In 1966, Thich Nhat Hanh was exiled from his homeland as part of his efforts to bring about peace during the Vietnam War. He then lived in exile in France for a long time. In 1982 he founded the famous »Plum Village«, a Buddhist meditation center, in the Dordogne department in the southwest of the country. Since then, thousands of people from all over the world have taken part in the retreats in the center every year.
After suffering a stroke in 2014, he returned to Vietnam in late 2018.
Thich Nhat Hanh told his students that he wanted to spend the rest of his life at Tu Hieu Monastery in the central Vietnamese city of Hue, where he was ordained as a monk at the age of 16.
One of the well-known quotes of the monk, who was called »Thay« (teacher) by his students, is: »The wave does not have to die to become water.
She is already water.'
mkl/dpa