Brunnholzl is a brilliant teacher whose devotion and energy have resulted in this rich, wide-ranging study of the Heart Sutra, the page-and-a-half-long text that contains the entire essence of Mahayana Buddhist philosophy. In 160 pages of fast-moving explication, he quotes sources as varied as Janis Joplin and Ludwig Wittgenstein, probes the text, explains its terminology, and answers students questions.

Karl Brunnholzl was trained as a physician and presently works as a Tibetan translator and Buddhist teacher. He studied Tibetology, Buddhology, and Sanskrit at Hamburg University and Tibetan language and Buddhist philosophy and practice at the Marpa Institute for Translators in Kathmandu. Currently he works as a translator and interpreter for the Tsadra Foundation, Nalandabodhi, and the Nitartha Institute. In 2009 he was appointed as the first Western khenpo (abbot, in the Kagyu and Nyingma lineages) by Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche. He is the author and translator of The Center of the Sunlit Sky (2004), the first in-depth study of the Kagyu interpretation of Madhyamaka in a Western language; Straight from the Heart (2007), an anthology of Buddhist pith instructions; Nagarjuna's In Praise of Dharmadhatu (2007) with commentary by the Third Karmapa; Luminous Heart (2009), the Third Karmapa on buddha nature, consciousness, and wisdom; and Gone Beyond, vols. 1 and 2 (2010-2011).

	Contents: The Heart Attack Sutra
	Introduction	7
	The Craziness of the Heart Sutra	7
	Emptiness Means Letting Go	12
	Grounded in Groundlessness	12
	Emptiness, Dependent Origination, and Quantum Physics	15
	The Buddha's Three Styles of Teaching	16
	Expressing the Inexpressible	16
	The Teachings as Scriptures and Realization	20
	Prajnaparamita - Perfect Wisdom Gone Beyond	22
	The Flaming of Prajna - Sharp, Illuminating, and Compassionate Inquisitiveness	25
	Lady Prajnaparamita- Intuition Embracing Intellect	30
	Prajnaparamita as Ground, Path and Fruition	35
	The Prajnaparamita Sutras	36
	Complicated Simplicity	39
	Prajnaparamita as a Buddhist Heresy	42
	Groundless Paths	44
	Dirt, Soap, and Water	48
	The Undoing of Doing	51
	The Commentary on the Heart Sutra	57
	The Stage and the Main Actors	57
	The Title	60
	Transcendent Wisdom Lady Full of Qualities	60
	The Heart of the Mother of all Buddhas	65
	The Prologue	66
	The Excellent Time	67
	The Excellent Teacher	68
	The Excellent Place	71
	The Excellent Retinue	72
	The Excellent Teaching	74
	Avalokitesvara - Emptiness with a Heart of Compassion	77
	Compassion in Action	81
	Not Seeing the World as We Know It	83
	The Main Part of the Sutra	87
	Sariputra's Innocent Question	87
	Avakijutesvara's Not so Innocent Short Answer	90
	The Fourfold Profound Emptiness	100
	Are Form and Emptiness Two Things?	102
	The Middle Way Without a Middle	106
	All Elements of Our Body and Mind Are Like Space	117
	The Eightfold Profundity	118
	The Three Doors to Liberation	131
	More Ways of Slicing the Cake of Illusory Phenomena	132
	Even Dependent Origination is Emptiness	139
	The Demise of the Four Noble Truths	141
	No Hope in Prajnaparamita Either	144
	The Transparent Vajra of Fearlessness	148
	Arriving at Dwelling Nowhere	154
	The Mantra - the Final Leap off the Cliff	158
	The Buddha's Applause	165
	The Epilogue	168
	A Meditation on Prajnaparamita and the Heart Sutra	169
	The Sutra of the Heart of the Glorious Lady Prajnaparamita	173
	Selected Bibliography	175