Questions from the City, Answers from the Forest

Why are we here? What is goodness? Is there any value in goodness that an ordinary person – the sort who can be lured into foolish behavior – can make use of in this world? Is there a God, and if so, can we depend upon Him or Her? These are the questions that plague the wakeful moments of a common man. A penetrating mind won’t find satisfaction in looking at these questions conventionally. These questions have to be seen from the bottom up, so to speak. In Questions from the City, Answers from the Forest, Buddhist monk and author Ajahn Sumano Bhikkhu explores the human mind and the causes behind humankind’s suffering. Written on a well-traveled, battery-powered laptop in a meditation cave in Thailand, this distillation of Buddhist wisdom answers the questions of “city” people who sought out the Buddhist in his forest retreat to obtain his answers to life’s most basic questions.