In this week's FBA Podcast "The Tale of Maha-Kassapa" Amoghavajra asks us, what is it that gladdens your heart?

Taking us back 2,500 years to the Kingdom of Magadha in Northern India to the birth of a boy called Kassapa, Amoghavajra tells the story of how he grows up happily and as he gets older he becomes less and less worldly. Kassapa marries Bhadda who has equally renunciant tendancies. They both go forth together.

Kassapa meets the Buddha, becomes his disciple and gains Enlightenment. He is known as a superb meditator and was foremost among the bhikkus for practising austerities. According to Amoghavajra's story, one of the teachings that the Buddha gave to Kassapa was to attend to whatever gladdens the heart.

Be prepared for the odd surprise in our FBA Podcast today where Dhivan asks: "What Do We Really Know About the Buddha?"

A lovely talk here from the excellent Dhivan. As he sifts the information that's come down to us, we meet several different versions of a human being as he blurs with the archetypal presence he has also come to represent. Yet whichever manifestation we prefer, more than anything this talk brings us face to face with the rich and moving legacy of a brilliant and truly compassionate individual, changing the world he took part in, stepping out of history "with the walk of a lion, the walk of a swan."

Talk given at the Cambridge Buddhist Centre, 2008

Our FBA Podcast today is a wonderfully entertaining talk on Perfect Vision titled: "Welsh Bats, A Vajrasattva Drugs Mule and Spanish Insight." Here Vajrin tells a story of a wide ranging journey, including his early days at the Bristol Buddhist Centre in Long Ashton; his time as a junior doctor working in Africa; travels through India and Tibet; a visit to an Everest base camp and finally to ordination at a retreat centre high in the Spanish sierras. Along the way he manages to acquire a splendid Vajrasattva rupa and overcoming considerable obstacles, brings it home, thereby establishing a life-long association with this powerful bodhisattva of purification.