A Honed and Heavey Axe – Samatha and Vipassana in Harmony by Ajahn Chandako. Imagine you need to chop down a dead tree with an axe. To be successful the axe will have to be both sharp and reasonable heavy. But where does sharpness end and weight begin? It is clear that even with great effort neither using a razorblade nor a baseball bat is going to do the trick. In the context of Buddhist meditation practice the weight of the axe may be compared to serenity (samatha) and its sharpness to insight (vipassana). These two aspects of meditation play the crucial roles in awakening beings to the nature of reality and releasing them from suffering