The Development of Insight – A Study of the U Ba Khin Vipassanā Meditation Tradition as Taught by S . N . Goenka in Comparison with Insight Teachings in the Early Discourses

Abstract

With the present paper I investigate how key aspects of insight delineated in the early discourses have been approached in modern day Theravāda meditation practice. In order to illustrate one of the ways in which such practice has been undertaken, I take as an example what at present appears to be the most widely practiced Theravāda vipassanā method. This is the vipassanā tradition of the Burmese lay meditation teacher U Ba Khin (1899–1971), in the form as it is taught by his Indian disciple S.N. Goenka (1924). My study proceeds through the following topics: