Brooke Schedneck, Assistant Professor of Religious Studies, Rhodes College
Fri, January 21, 2022
Zen Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh praying during a three-day requiem for the souls of Vietnam War victims in 2007. Hoang Dinh Nam/AFP via Getty Images
Thich Nhat Hanh, the monk who popularized mindfulness in the West, died in the Tu Hieu Temple in Hue, Vietnam, on Jan. 21, 2022. He was 95.
In 2014, Thich Nhat Hanh suffered a stroke. Since then he was unable to speak or continue his teaching. In October 2018 he expressed his wish, using gestures, to return to the temple in Vietnam where he had been ordained as a young monk. Devotees from many parts of the world had continued to visit him at the temple.
Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh on a wheelchair wearing a purple robe and surrounded by monks in similar robes.
As a scholar of the contemporary practices of Buddhist meditation, I have studied his simple yet profound teachings, which combine mindfulness along with social change, and which I believe will continue to have an impact around the world.
Peace activist
In the 1960s, Thich Nhat Hanh played an active role promoting peace during the years of war in Vietnam. He was in his mid-20s when he became active in efforts to revitalize Vietnamese Buddhism for peace efforts.
Over the next few years, Thich Nhat Hanh set up a number of organizations based on Buddhist principles of nonviolence and compassion. His School of Youth and Social Service, a grassroots relief organization, consisted of 10,000 volunteers and social workers offering aid to war-torn villages, rebuilding schools and establishing medical centers.
He also established the Order of Interbeing, a community of monastics and lay Buddhists who made a commitment to compassionate action and supported war victims. In addition, he founded a Buddhist university, a publishing house and a peace activist magazine as ways to spread the message of compassion.
In 1966, Thich Nhat Hanh traveled to the United States and Europe to appeal for peace in Vietnam.
In lectures delivered across many cities, he compellingly described the war’s devastation, spoke of the Vietnamese people’s wish for peace and appealed to the U.S. to cease its air offensive against Vietnam.
During his years in the U.S. he met Martin Luther King Jr., who nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1967.
However, because of his peace work and refusal to choose sides in his country’s civil war, both the communist and noncommunist governments banned him, forcing Thich Nhat Hanh to live in exile for over 40 years.
During these years, the emphasis of his message shifted from the immediacy of the Vietnam War to being present in the moment – an idea that has come to be called “mindfulness.”
Being aware of the present moment
Thich Nhat Hanh first started teaching mindfulness in the mid-1970s. The main vehicle for his early teachings was his books. In “The Miracle of Mindfulness,” for example, Thich Nhat Hanh gave simple instructions on how to apply mindfulness to daily life.
In his book “You Are Here,” he urged people to pay attention to what they were experiencing in their body and mind at any given moment, and not dwell in the past or think of the future. His emphasis was on the awareness of the breath. He taught his readers to say internally, “I’m breathing in; this is an in-breath. I’m breathing out; this is an out-breath.”
Thich Nhat Hanh emphasized that mindfulness could be practiced anywhere. Antonio Guillem/Shutterstock.com
People interested in practicing meditation didn’t need to spend days at a meditation retreat or find a teacher. His teachings emphasized that mindfulness could be practiced anytime, even when doing routine chores.
Even doing the dishes, people could simply focus on the activity and be fully present. Peace, happiness, joy and true love, he said, could be found only in the present moment.
Mindfulness in America
Hanh’s mindfulness practices don’t advocate disengagement with the world. Rather, in his view, the practice of mindfulness could lead one toward “compassionate action,” like practicing openness to others’ viewpoints and sharing material resources with those in need.
Jeff Wilson, a scholar of American Buddhism, argues in his book “Mindful America” that it was Hanh’s combination of daily mindfulness practices with action in the world that contributed to the earliest strands of the mindfulness movement. This movement eventually became what Time magazine in 2014 called the “mindful revolution.” The article argues that the power of mindfulness lies in its universality, as the practice has entered into corporate headquarters, political offices, parenting guides and diet plans.
For Thich Nhat Hanh, however, mindfulness was not a means to a more productive day but a way of understanding “interbeing,” the connection and codependence of everyone and everything. In a documentary “Walk With Me,” he illustrated interbeing in the following way:
A young girl asks him how to deal with the grief of her recently deceased dog. He instructs her to look into the sky and watch a cloud disappear. The cloud has not died but has become the rain and the tea in the teacup. Just as the cloud is alive in a new form, so is the dog. Being aware and mindful of the tea offers a reflection on the nature of reality. He believed this understanding could lead to more peace in the world.
Hanh’s mindfulness practices don’t advocate disengagement with the world. Rather, in his view, the practice of mindfulness could lead one toward “compassionate action,” like practicing openness to others’ viewpoints and sharing material resources with those in need.
Jeff Wilson, a scholar of American Buddhism, argues in his book “Mindful America” that it was Hanh’s combination of daily mindfulness practices with action in the world that contributed to the earliest strands of the mindfulness movement. This movement eventually became what Time magazine in 2014 called the “mindful revolution.” The article argues that the power of mindfulness lies in its universality, as the practice has entered into corporate headquarters, political offices, parenting guides and diet plans.
For Thich Nhat Hanh, however, mindfulness was not a means to a more productive day but a way of understanding “interbeing,” the connection and codependence of everyone and everything. In a documentary “Walk With Me,” he illustrated interbeing in the following way:
A young girl asks him how to deal with the grief of her recently deceased dog. He instructs her to look into the sky and watch a cloud disappear. The cloud has not died but has become the rain and the tea in the teacup. Just as the cloud is alive in a new form, so is the dog. Being aware and mindful of the tea offers a reflection on the nature of reality. He believed this understanding could lead to more peace in the world.
Thich Nhat Hanh’s lasting impact
Thich Nhat Hanh will have a lasting impact through the legacy of his teachings in over 100 books, 11 global practice centers, over 1,000 global lay communities and dozens of online community groups. The disciples closest to him – the 600 monks and nuns ordained in his Plum Village tradition, along with lay teachers – have been planning to continue their teacher’s legacy for some time.
They have been writing books, offering teachings and leading retreats for several decades now. In March 2020, the Thich Nhat Hanh Foundation, along with Lion’s Roar, hosted an online summit called “In the Footsteps of Thich Nhat Hanh” to make people aware of his teachings through the disciples he trained.
Although Thich Naht Hanh’s death will change the community, his practices for being aware in the present moment and creating peace will live on.
This is an updated version of a piece first published on March 18, 2019.
This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Brooke Schedneck, Rhodes College.
Read more:
Rhino horn consumers reveal why a legal trade alone won’t save rhinos
Thich Nhat Hanh, the Buddhist monk who introduced mindfulness to the West, prepares to die
Brooke Schedneck does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Thich Nhat Hanh, influential Zen Buddhist monk, dies at 95
Vietnamese Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh, center, arrives for a great chanting ceremony at Vinh Nghiem Pagoda in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam on March 16, 2007. Zen Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh, who helped pioneer the concept of mindfulness in the West and socially engaged Buddhism in the East, has died at age 95 on Saturday, Jan. 22, 2022, according to an announcement on his verified Twitter page. (AP Photo, File)More
HAU DINH, ELAINE KURTENBACH and HRVOJE HRANJSKI
Fri, January 21, 2022
HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — Thich Nhat Hanh, the revered Zen Buddhist monk who helped spread the practice of mindfulness in the West and socially engaged Buddhism in the East, has died. He was 95.
The death was confirmed by a monk at Tu Hieu Pagoda in Hue, Vietnam who said that Nhat Hanh, known as Thay to his followers, died at midnight on Saturday. The monk declined to be named because he is not authorized to speak to media.
A post on Nhat Hanh's verified Twitter page attributed to The International Plum Village Community of Engaged Buddhism also confirmed the news, saying, “We invite our beloved global spiritual family to take a few moments to be still, to come back to our mindful breathing, as we together hold Thay in our hearts."
Born as Nguyen Xuan Bao in 1926 in Hue and ordained at age 16, Nhat Hanh distilled Buddhist teachings on compassion and suffering into easily grasped guidance over a lifetime dedicated to working for peace. In 1961 he went to the United States to study, teaching comparative religion for a time at Princeton and Columbia universities.
For most of the remainder of his life, he lived in exile at Plum Village, a retreat center he founded in southern France.
There and in talks and retreats around the world, he introduced Zen Buddhism, at its essence, as peace through compassionate listening. Still and steadfast in his brown robes, he exuded an air of watchful, amused calm, sometimes sharing a stage with the somewhat livelier Tibetan Buddhist leader Dalai Lama.
“The peace we seek cannot be our personal possession. We need to find an inner peace which makes it possible for us to become one with those who suffer, and to do something to help our brothers and sisters, which is to say, ourselves,” Nhat Hanh wrote in one of his dozens of books, “The Sun My Heart.”
The Dalai Lama said he was saddened by the death of “his friend and spiritual brother.”
“In his peaceful opposition to the Vietnam War, his support for Martin Luther King and most of all his dedication to sharing with others not only how mindfulness and compassion contribute to inner peace, but also how individuals cultivating peace of mind contribute to genuine world peace, the Venerable lived a truly meaningful life,” he said.
Surviving a stroke in 2014 that left him unable to speak, Nhat Hanh returned from France to Vietnam in October 2018, spending his final years at the Tu Hieu Pagoda, the monastery where he was ordained nearly 80 years earlier.
Nhat Hanh plunged into anti-war activism after his return to his homeland in 1964 as the Vietnam War was escalating. There, he founded the Order of Inter-being, which espouses “engaged Buddhism” dedicated to nonviolence, mindfulness and social service.
In 1966, he met the U.S. civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. in what was a remarkable encounter for both. Nhat Hanh told King he was a “Bodhisattva,” or enlightened being, for his efforts to promote social justice.
The monk’s efforts to promote reconciliation between the U.S.-backed South and communist North Vietnam so impressed King that a year later he nominated Nhat Hanh for the Nobel Peace Prize.
In his exchanges with King, Nhat Hanh explained one of the rare controversies in his long life of advocating for peace — over the immolations of some Vietnamese monks and nuns to protest the war.
“I said this was not suicide, because in a difficult situation like Vietnam, to make your voice heard is difficult. So sometimes we have to burn ourselves alive in order for our voice to be heard so that is an act of compassion that you do that, the act of love and not of despair,” he said in an interview with U.S. talk show host Oprah Winfrey. “Jesus Christ died in the same spirit.”
Sulak Sivaraksa, a Thai academic who embraced Nhat Hanh’s idea of socially engaged Buddhism, said the Zen master had “suffered more than most monks and had been involved more for social justice.”
“In Vietnam in the 1950s and 1960s, he was very exposed to young people, and his society was in turmoil, in crisis. He was really in a difficult position, between the devil and the deep blue sea — the Communists on the one hand, the CIA on the other hand. In such a situation, he has been very honest — as an activist, as a contemplative monk, as a poet, and as a clear writer,” Sivaraksa was quoted as saying.
According to Nhat Hanh, “Buddhism means to be awake — mindful of what is happening in one’s body, feelings, mind and in the world. If you are awake, you cannot do otherwise than act compassionately to help relieve suffering you see around you. So Buddhism must be engaged in the world. If it is not engaged, it is not Buddhism.”
Both North and South Vietnam barred Nhat Hanh from returning home after he went abroad in 1966 to campaign against the war, leaving him, he said, “like a bee without a beehive.”
He was only allowed back into the country in 2005, when the communist-ruled government welcomed him back in the first of several visits. Nhat Hanh remained based in southern France.
The dramatic homecoming seemed to signal an easing of controls on religion. Nhat Hanh’s followers were invited by the abbot of Bat Nha to settle at his mountain monastery, where they remained for several years until relations with the authorities began to sour over Nhat Hanh’s calls for an end to government control over religion.
By late 2009 to early 2010, Nhat Hanh’s followers were evicted from the monastery and from another temple where they had taken refuge.
Over nearly eight decades, Nhat Hanh’s teachings were refined into concepts accessible to all.
To weather the storms of life and realize happiness, he counseled always a mindful “return to the breath,” even while doing routine chores like sweeping and washing dishes.
“I try to live every moment like that, relaxed, dwelling peacefully in the present moment and respond to events with compassion,” he told Winfrey.
Nhat Hanh moved to Thailand in late 2016 and then returned to Vietnam in late 2018, where he was receiving traditional medicine treatments for the after-effects of his stroke and enjoyed “strolls” around the temple grounds in his wheelchair, according to the Buddhist online newsletter LionsRoar.com.
It was a quiet, simple end to an extraordinary life, one entirely in keeping with his love for taking joy from the humblest aspects of life. “No mud, no lotus,” says one of his many brief sayings.
___
Kurtenbach and Hranjski reported from Bangkok.
Vietnamese Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh, center, arrives for a great chanting ceremony at Vinh Nghiem Pagoda in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam on March 16, 2007. Zen Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh, who helped pioneer the concept of mindfulness in the West and socially engaged Buddhism in the East, has died at age 95 on Saturday, Jan. 22, 2022, according to an announcement on his verified Twitter page. (AP Photo, File)More
HAU DINH, ELAINE KURTENBACH and HRVOJE HRANJSKI
Fri, January 21, 2022
HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — Thich Nhat Hanh, the revered Zen Buddhist monk who helped spread the practice of mindfulness in the West and socially engaged Buddhism in the East, has died. He was 95.
The death was confirmed by a monk at Tu Hieu Pagoda in Hue, Vietnam who said that Nhat Hanh, known as Thay to his followers, died at midnight on Saturday. The monk declined to be named because he is not authorized to speak to media.
A post on Nhat Hanh's verified Twitter page attributed to The International Plum Village Community of Engaged Buddhism also confirmed the news, saying, “We invite our beloved global spiritual family to take a few moments to be still, to come back to our mindful breathing, as we together hold Thay in our hearts."
Born as Nguyen Xuan Bao in 1926 in Hue and ordained at age 16, Nhat Hanh distilled Buddhist teachings on compassion and suffering into easily grasped guidance over a lifetime dedicated to working for peace. In 1961 he went to the United States to study, teaching comparative religion for a time at Princeton and Columbia universities.
For most of the remainder of his life, he lived in exile at Plum Village, a retreat center he founded in southern France.
There and in talks and retreats around the world, he introduced Zen Buddhism, at its essence, as peace through compassionate listening. Still and steadfast in his brown robes, he exuded an air of watchful, amused calm, sometimes sharing a stage with the somewhat livelier Tibetan Buddhist leader Dalai Lama.
“The peace we seek cannot be our personal possession. We need to find an inner peace which makes it possible for us to become one with those who suffer, and to do something to help our brothers and sisters, which is to say, ourselves,” Nhat Hanh wrote in one of his dozens of books, “The Sun My Heart.”
The Dalai Lama said he was saddened by the death of “his friend and spiritual brother.”
“In his peaceful opposition to the Vietnam War, his support for Martin Luther King and most of all his dedication to sharing with others not only how mindfulness and compassion contribute to inner peace, but also how individuals cultivating peace of mind contribute to genuine world peace, the Venerable lived a truly meaningful life,” he said.
Surviving a stroke in 2014 that left him unable to speak, Nhat Hanh returned from France to Vietnam in October 2018, spending his final years at the Tu Hieu Pagoda, the monastery where he was ordained nearly 80 years earlier.
Nhat Hanh plunged into anti-war activism after his return to his homeland in 1964 as the Vietnam War was escalating. There, he founded the Order of Inter-being, which espouses “engaged Buddhism” dedicated to nonviolence, mindfulness and social service.
In 1966, he met the U.S. civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. in what was a remarkable encounter for both. Nhat Hanh told King he was a “Bodhisattva,” or enlightened being, for his efforts to promote social justice.
The monk’s efforts to promote reconciliation between the U.S.-backed South and communist North Vietnam so impressed King that a year later he nominated Nhat Hanh for the Nobel Peace Prize.
In his exchanges with King, Nhat Hanh explained one of the rare controversies in his long life of advocating for peace — over the immolations of some Vietnamese monks and nuns to protest the war.
“I said this was not suicide, because in a difficult situation like Vietnam, to make your voice heard is difficult. So sometimes we have to burn ourselves alive in order for our voice to be heard so that is an act of compassion that you do that, the act of love and not of despair,” he said in an interview with U.S. talk show host Oprah Winfrey. “Jesus Christ died in the same spirit.”
Sulak Sivaraksa, a Thai academic who embraced Nhat Hanh’s idea of socially engaged Buddhism, said the Zen master had “suffered more than most monks and had been involved more for social justice.”
“In Vietnam in the 1950s and 1960s, he was very exposed to young people, and his society was in turmoil, in crisis. He was really in a difficult position, between the devil and the deep blue sea — the Communists on the one hand, the CIA on the other hand. In such a situation, he has been very honest — as an activist, as a contemplative monk, as a poet, and as a clear writer,” Sivaraksa was quoted as saying.
According to Nhat Hanh, “Buddhism means to be awake — mindful of what is happening in one’s body, feelings, mind and in the world. If you are awake, you cannot do otherwise than act compassionately to help relieve suffering you see around you. So Buddhism must be engaged in the world. If it is not engaged, it is not Buddhism.”
Both North and South Vietnam barred Nhat Hanh from returning home after he went abroad in 1966 to campaign against the war, leaving him, he said, “like a bee without a beehive.”
He was only allowed back into the country in 2005, when the communist-ruled government welcomed him back in the first of several visits. Nhat Hanh remained based in southern France.
The dramatic homecoming seemed to signal an easing of controls on religion. Nhat Hanh’s followers were invited by the abbot of Bat Nha to settle at his mountain monastery, where they remained for several years until relations with the authorities began to sour over Nhat Hanh’s calls for an end to government control over religion.
By late 2009 to early 2010, Nhat Hanh’s followers were evicted from the monastery and from another temple where they had taken refuge.
Over nearly eight decades, Nhat Hanh’s teachings were refined into concepts accessible to all.
To weather the storms of life and realize happiness, he counseled always a mindful “return to the breath,” even while doing routine chores like sweeping and washing dishes.
“I try to live every moment like that, relaxed, dwelling peacefully in the present moment and respond to events with compassion,” he told Winfrey.
Nhat Hanh moved to Thailand in late 2016 and then returned to Vietnam in late 2018, where he was receiving traditional medicine treatments for the after-effects of his stroke and enjoyed “strolls” around the temple grounds in his wheelchair, according to the Buddhist online newsletter LionsRoar.com.
It was a quiet, simple end to an extraordinary life, one entirely in keeping with his love for taking joy from the humblest aspects of life. “No mud, no lotus,” says one of his many brief sayings.
___
Kurtenbach and Hranjski reported from Bangkok.
Thousands mourn Buddhist monk who brought mindfulness to the West
Tran Thi Minh Ha
Sat, January 22, 2022
Thousands of mourners packed a pagoda in Vietnam's Buddhist heartland on Sunday to pay tribute to the late Vietnamese monk and peace activist Thich Nhat Hanh, credited with bringing mindfulness to the West.
The Zen master, whose reach within Buddhism was seen as second only to the Dalai Lama, died aged 95 on Saturday at the Tu Hieu Pagoda in the city of Hue.
Widely known as the father of mindfulness, Thich Nhat Hanh spent nearly four decades in exile after he was banished from his homeland for calling for an end to the Vietnam War.
He wrote more than 100 books on mindfulness and meditation and hosted retreats worldwide.
Early on Sunday morning, chanting monks carried his body covered by a yellow sheet along with decorative umbrellas through the throng of mourners.
The smell of incense wafted in the air as they put his body in a wooden coffin and placed it in the meditation hall decorated with yellow daisies.
Buddhist monks in yellow and brown robes recited prayers and followers wearing grey stood in silent contemplation of a remarkable life.
- 'Great teacher' -
Among the mourners was Tran Dinh Huong, 46, who hastily travelled from Hanoi to pay her respects.
"I read many of his books and his words helped me a lot when I was down or going through difficulties," she told AFP.
"I think it will be a very long time until Vietnam and the world has such a great teacher again."
Nguyen Nhat from Ho Chi Minh City said it was deeply moving to see the body.
"I admire him for his simple and modest life," he told AFP.
Thich Nhat Hanh spent 39 years in France and advocated for religious freedom around the world.
Vietnamese authorities permitted him to return to the country in 2018 but plainclothes police kept a vigil outside the pagoda compound closely monitoring his activities.
His messages have not always been welcomed as authorities in one-party Vietnam are wary of organised religion: in 2009 his followers were driven from their temple in southern Lam Dong province by hired mobs.
But Cong An Nhan Dan newspaper -- considered the official mouthpiece of the public security ministry -- published on Sunday a glowing tribute to the writer, poet, scholar, historian and peace activist.
"Monk Thich Nhat Hanh from the Plum Village was a spiritual teacher who had a deep and widespread influence across the world," the obituary said.
Thich Nhat Hanh's coffin is expected to remain in the meditation hall for a week -- as mourners file past to pray -- before a cremation ceremony next Saturday.
Memorial ceremonies will also take place at monasteries in the United States and France and will be broadcast online.
- Legacy lives on -
Tributes flowed to the late monk from all over the world.
The Dalai Lama said his friend and spiritual brother had lived a "truly meaningful life".
"I have no doubt the best way we can pay tribute to him is to continue his work to promote peace in the world," he wrote in a message to the monk's Zen teaching organisation -- the Plum Village Community of Engaged Buddhism.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in said the monk visited his country three times and praised him as a "living Buddha".
"(He)showed his love for mankind through his actions," he said on Twitter.
Marie C. Damour, charge d'affaires at the US Embassy in Hanoi, said he would be "remembered as arguably one of the most influential and prominent religious leaders in the world".
"His teachings, in particular on bringing mindfulness into daily life, have enriched the lives of innumerable Americans."
US comedian and director Judd Apatow urged people to read the monk's work, characterising it as "life changing" in a Twitter post.
Supporters said Thich Nhat Hanh's legacy will continue.
"I see the master in every single grass, flower, tree branch. He did not pass away, he remains there in another form and status," Le Khanh Linh told AFP at the pagoda.
tmh-lpm/mtp/qan
Tran Thi Minh Ha
Sat, January 22, 2022
Thousands of mourners packed a pagoda in Vietnam's Buddhist heartland on Sunday to pay tribute to the late Vietnamese monk and peace activist Thich Nhat Hanh, credited with bringing mindfulness to the West.
The Zen master, whose reach within Buddhism was seen as second only to the Dalai Lama, died aged 95 on Saturday at the Tu Hieu Pagoda in the city of Hue.
Widely known as the father of mindfulness, Thich Nhat Hanh spent nearly four decades in exile after he was banished from his homeland for calling for an end to the Vietnam War.
He wrote more than 100 books on mindfulness and meditation and hosted retreats worldwide.
Early on Sunday morning, chanting monks carried his body covered by a yellow sheet along with decorative umbrellas through the throng of mourners.
The smell of incense wafted in the air as they put his body in a wooden coffin and placed it in the meditation hall decorated with yellow daisies.
Buddhist monks in yellow and brown robes recited prayers and followers wearing grey stood in silent contemplation of a remarkable life.
- 'Great teacher' -
Among the mourners was Tran Dinh Huong, 46, who hastily travelled from Hanoi to pay her respects.
"I read many of his books and his words helped me a lot when I was down or going through difficulties," she told AFP.
"I think it will be a very long time until Vietnam and the world has such a great teacher again."
Nguyen Nhat from Ho Chi Minh City said it was deeply moving to see the body.
"I admire him for his simple and modest life," he told AFP.
Thich Nhat Hanh spent 39 years in France and advocated for religious freedom around the world.
Vietnamese authorities permitted him to return to the country in 2018 but plainclothes police kept a vigil outside the pagoda compound closely monitoring his activities.
His messages have not always been welcomed as authorities in one-party Vietnam are wary of organised religion: in 2009 his followers were driven from their temple in southern Lam Dong province by hired mobs.
But Cong An Nhan Dan newspaper -- considered the official mouthpiece of the public security ministry -- published on Sunday a glowing tribute to the writer, poet, scholar, historian and peace activist.
"Monk Thich Nhat Hanh from the Plum Village was a spiritual teacher who had a deep and widespread influence across the world," the obituary said.
Thich Nhat Hanh's coffin is expected to remain in the meditation hall for a week -- as mourners file past to pray -- before a cremation ceremony next Saturday.
Memorial ceremonies will also take place at monasteries in the United States and France and will be broadcast online.
- Legacy lives on -
Tributes flowed to the late monk from all over the world.
The Dalai Lama said his friend and spiritual brother had lived a "truly meaningful life".
"I have no doubt the best way we can pay tribute to him is to continue his work to promote peace in the world," he wrote in a message to the monk's Zen teaching organisation -- the Plum Village Community of Engaged Buddhism.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in said the monk visited his country three times and praised him as a "living Buddha".
"(He)showed his love for mankind through his actions," he said on Twitter.
Marie C. Damour, charge d'affaires at the US Embassy in Hanoi, said he would be "remembered as arguably one of the most influential and prominent religious leaders in the world".
"His teachings, in particular on bringing mindfulness into daily life, have enriched the lives of innumerable Americans."
US comedian and director Judd Apatow urged people to read the monk's work, characterising it as "life changing" in a Twitter post.
Supporters said Thich Nhat Hanh's legacy will continue.
"I see the master in every single grass, flower, tree branch. He did not pass away, he remains there in another form and status," Le Khanh Linh told AFP at the pagoda.
tmh-lpm/mtp/qan
