Does Theravada have a practice similar to Tonglen in Mhayana?

[SarathW]

Does Theravada have a practice similar to Tonglen in Mhayana?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonglen

Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo recommends this to alleviate extream pain.

[dharmacorps]

I don't believe so. I've done tonglen years ago, looking back on it, its a nice visualization, but probably has no basis in the pali canon. I could actually think of many ways in which it would probably be seen as a misguided practice.

[SarathW]

I could actually think of many ways in which it would probably be seen as a misguided practice.

I felt the same way.
Can you elaborate your concerns?

[Spiny Norman]

Does Theravada have a practice similar to Tonglen in Mahayana?

I don't think so, though obviously there are some similarities with metta bhavana.

[dharmacorps]

Tonglen from my understanding involves the idea of "taking on others suffering", which is fairly explicitly described as being impossible by the Buddha in the Pali Canon. I would think if one wanted to have the effect of supporting someone and wishing them well in hard times, it would, as has been said be metta/goodwill.

[SarathW]

Interestingly HHDL said that he has no healing powers and he is skeptical about it.
It appears he does not believe in Tonglen.

[Javi]

Loving kindness meditation is similar, in that there is the same radiation of goodness out to all beings. However, there is no instruction to take in the bad.

[mikenz66]

Loving kindness meditation is similar, in that there is the same radiation of goodness out to all beings. However, there is no instruction to take in the bad.

I don't know much about Tonglen, but it seems that the instructions are designed to develop compassion and loving kindness.

So in the in-breath you breathe in with the wish to take away the suffering, and breathe out with the wish to send comfort and happiness to the same people, animals, nations, or whatever it is you decide.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonglen

“And what is a path to companionship with Brahmā? Firstly, a monk meditates spreading a heart full of love/compassion/rejoicing/equanimity to one direction, and to the second, and to the third, and to the fourth. In the same way above, below, across, everywhere, all around, they spread a heart full of love/compassion/rejoicing/equanimity to the whole world—abundant, expansive, limitless, free of enmity and ill will. ...
https://suttacentral.net/mn99/en/sujato#sc40

Mike

[Dorje Shedrub]

Interestingly HHDL said that he has no healing powers and he is skeptical about it.
It appears he does not believe in Tonglen.

HHDL did not say anything about tonglen in the video, just that He has no healing powers. Tonglen is actually a meditation practice that helps develop compassion.

Loving kindness meditation would probably be the most similar Theravada practice.

[Grigoris]

...has no basis in the pali canon.

Metta meditation from the Brahmaviharas.

Interestingly HHDL said that he has no healing powers and he is skeptical about it.
It appears he does not believe in Tonglen.

Tonglen is part of a cycle of practices known as Lojong (Mind Training), it's goal is to develop unbiased/universal compassion. There are some reports of very advanced practitioners using it to heal others, but the evidence is anecdotal. His Holiness has written a number of books on the subject/practice so it would take a wild flight of fantasy to conclude that he believes it is BS.

[SarathW]

His Holiness has written a number of books on the subject/practice so it would take a wild flight of fantasy to conclude that he believes it is BS.

Perhaps he is a changed man.

[Grigoris]

His Holiness has written a number of books on the subject/practice so it would take a wild flight of fantasy to conclude that he believes it is BS.

Perhaps he is a changed man.

Perhaps you are jumping to erroneous conclusions?

[SarathW]

Perhaps you are jumping to erroneous conclusions?

The benefit of the doubt to the victims.

[Dhammanando]

Does Theravada have a practice similar to Tonglen in Mhayana?

I haven't practised tonglen, but I understand that one component of it is reflection on the sameness/equality of one's own desire for happiness and freedom from suffering and that of other beings. This seems to have a counterpart in two aspects of mettabhāvanā as it is expounded in the Visuddhimagga.

The first is what Buddhaghosa calls sakkhibhāva, a term that literally means "generation/production of a witness", but which is translated by Ñāṇamoli (following Dhammapāla's ṭīkā) as "making oneself an example":

But this initial development [of mettā] refers to making oneself an example. For even if he developed loving-kindness for a hundred or a thousand years in this way, “I am happy” and so on, absorption would never arise. But if he develops it in this way: “I am happy. Just as I want to be happy and dread pain, as I want to live and not to die, so do other beings, too,” making himself the example, then desire for other beings’ welfare and happiness arises in him. And this method is indicated by the Blessed One’s saying:

I visited all quarters with my mind
Nor found I any dearer than myself;
Self is likewise to every other dear;
Who loves himself will never harm another.
(S. I 75; Ud. 47).

The second is in a more advanced stage of mettā development called "conjoining/annexation of territories" (sīmāsambheda - mistranslated by Ñāṇamoli as "breaking down the barriers").

When he discriminates between The four,
that is himself, the dear,
The neutral, and the hostile one,
Then “skilled” is not the name he gets,
Nor “having amity at will,”
But only “kindly towards beings.”

But when for a bhikkhu the four territories
Have all become conjoined,
He treats with equal amity
The whole world with its deities;
Far more distinguished than the first
Is he who knows no territorial distinctions.

[SarathW]

What I really like to know is the difference between Brahama Vihara in Theravada and the Tonglen practice.
What really worry me is the practice recommended in the video in OP that a practitioner is trying to take the suffering of others to themselves.