Re-enchantment

The colourful tale of the successful flowering of an obscure, ancient Eastern sect in the modern world. mountain people, associated with bizarre, almost medieval, superstitions, to perhaps the most rapidly growing and celebrity-studded religion in the West. numbers of Americans have found their way to the wisdom of Tibetan lamas in exile. Earthy, humorous, commonsensical, and eccentric, these flamboyant teachers; larger-than-life characters like Lama Yeshe and Chogyma Trungpa; proved to be charismatic and gifted ambassadors for their ancient religion. So did two Western women, born in Brooklyn and London's East End, whose home-grown religious intuitions turned out to be identical with the most sophisticated Tibetan teachings, revealing them to be reincarnated lamas. in page-turning, richly informative fashion how Tibetan Buddhism, rarified and sensual, mystical and commonsensical, became the ideal religion for a post-religious age.