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David Bubna-Litic is an internationally recognized interdisciplinary scholar with interests in whole of systems thinking applied to individual, organizational, economic, and social change.

He researches the dialogue between mindful ways of being (presence), deep integrity, eastern philosophy, and established western disciplines to create a merged horizon for social and economic change.

He is Senior Lecturer at the University of Technology Sydney. (Adapted from Source June 16, 2023)

David E. Cooper is a British author and philosopher. He was brought up in Surrey and educated at Highgate School and then Oxford University, where he was given his first job in 1967, as a Lecturer in Philosophy. He went on to teach at the universities of Miami, London and Surrey before being appointed, in 1986, as Professor of Philosophy at Durham University – where he remained until retiring in 2008. During his academic career, David was a Visiting Professor at universities in the United States, Canada, Malta, Sri Lanka and South Africa. Cooper is the former Chair (or President) of the Aristotelian Society, the Mind Association, the Friedrich Nietzsche Society, and the Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britain. He is Secretary and a Trustee of the charity Project Sri Lanka, and he spends time each year visiting and supervising educational and humanitarian projects.

Cooper has published across a broad range of philosophical subjects, including philosophy of language, philosophy of education, ethics, aesthetics, environmental philosophy, animal ethics, philosophy of technology, philosophy of religion, history of both Western philosophy and Asian philosophy, and modern European philosophy, especially Heidegger, Nietzsche, and Wittgenstein. In recent years, Cooper has written widely on environmental and Buddhist aesthetics, music and nature, the relationship of beauty and virtue, cultures of food, the significance of gardens, Daoism, our relationship to animals, and the notion of mystery.

Cooper is the author of a number of books, including World Philosophies: An Historical Introduction; Meaning; Existentialism: A Reconstruction; The Measure of Things: Humanism, Humility and Mystery; A Philosophy of Gardens; Convergence with Nature: A Daoist Perspective; Senses of Mystery: Engaging with Nature and the Meaning of Life; and Animals and Misanthropy. He has also edited a number of collections, including Blackwell Companion to Aesthetics; Philosophy: The Classic Readings; Epistemology: The Classic Readings; Ethics: The Classic Readings; and Aesthetics: The Classic Readings – the latter four notable for their inclusion of material from the Indian and Chinese traditions. He is joint editor of Key Thinkers on the Environment. Cooper is a regular reviewer of books for magazines, including The Times Literary Supplement and The Los Angeles Review of Books. He is also the author of three novels, all set in Sri Lanka: Street Dog: A Sri Lankan Story, its sequel, Old Stripe, and A Shot on the Beach. (Source Accessed Mar 12, 2021)

David Gray received his B.A. in Religious Studies from Wesleyan University and his M.A. and Ph.D. in the History of Religion from Columbia University. His research explores the development of tantric Buddhist traditions in South Asia, and their dissemination in Tibet and East Asia, with a focus on the Yogin?tantras, a genre of Buddhist tantric literature that focused on female deities and yogic practices involving the subtle body. He focuses particularly on the Cakrasamvara Tantra, an esoteric Indian Buddhist scripture that serves as the basis for a number of important Nepali and Tibetan Buddhist practice traditions. (Source Accessed Dec 3, 2019)

Curriculum Vitae

David J. Kalupahana (1936–2014) was a Buddhist scholar from Sri Lanka. He was a student of the late K.N. Jayatilleke, who was a student of Wittgenstein. He wrote mainly about epistemology, theory of language, and compared later Buddhist philosophical texts against the earliest texts and tried to present interpretations that were both historically contextualized and also compatible with the earliest texts, and in doing so, he encouraged Theravadin Buddhists and scholars to reevaluate the legitimacy of later, Mahayana texts and consider them more sympathetically.

Born in Galle District, Southern Sri Lanka, Kalupahana attended Mahinda College, Galle for his school education. He obtained his BA (Sri Lanka, 1959), Ph.D (London), and D. Litt (Hon. Peradeniya, Sri Lanka). He was Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at the University of Hawaii. He was assistant lecturer in Pali and Buddhist Civilization at the University of Ceylon, and studied Chinese and Tibetan at the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London where he completed a Ph.D. dissertation on the problem of causality in the Pali Nikayas and Chinese Agamas in 1966.

He left the University of Ceylon (1972) to join the University of Hawaii, serving as the Chairman of the Department of Philosophy and Chairman of the Graduate Field in Philosophy (1974–80). He directed international intra-religious conferences on Buddhism, and on Buddhism and Peace.

Many of his books are published and widely available in India (by Motilal Banarsidass and others), and therefore presumably have a fairly significant influence on the fields of Buddhism and Buddhist Studies in India and other nearby South Asian countries, such as his native Sri Lanka. (Source Accessed Apr 21, 2021)

Adjunct Assistant Professor at Columbia University. (BU JD, CU PhD). Dr. Kittay specializes in teaching courses on Buddhism and on Eastern and Western philosophy, most recently, “Technology, Religion, Future,” “Interpreting Buddhist Yoga,” "Law and Religion," and "Reincarnation, Simulation, Resurrection." He is the translator of The Vajra Rosary Tantra (Wisdom Publications, forthcoming 2019), Alaṃkakalaśa’s word commentary on the Vajra Rosary Tantra, and, with Professor Lozang Jamspal, Pha Dampa Sangs rgyas's One Hundred Spiritual Instructions to the Dingri People (Ladakh Ratnashridipika Press, 2011), the Elucidation of the Intention Tantra, The Questions of the Four Goddesses Tantra and Tsong Khapa's commentary on it, The Vajra Intuition Compendium Tantra, with Tsong Khapa's commentary, and the Later Tantra (these being the first complete English translations of the Explanatory Tantras of the Guhyasamāja under the Noble Tradition, and (under a grant from 84000,Translating the Words of the Buddha) The Symphony of Dharma Sūtra, along with other publications about Buddhism, religion, and law. He regularly lectures at Tibet House US, where he serves on the Board, and at Do Ngak Kunphen Ling Tibetan Buddhist Center, at Columbia, and worldwide, and is the President of the Tibetan Classics Translators Guild of New York. He also writes and lectures on the subject of compassionate lawyering, and has served as a trial and civil rights lawyer, federal bankruptcy trustee and a receiver for the Securities Exchange Commission. He is currently Director and Professor of Philosophy at the Harlem Clemente Course for the Humanities, teaching humanities to economically disadvantaged people in Harlem.

Dr. Kittay's current primary research interests are Buddhist philosophy and tantra, hermeneutic yoga, and consciousness studies. (Source: Columbia University, Accessed July 27, 2024)

David Robert Loy is a professor, writer, and Zen teacher in the Sanbo Zen tradition of Japanese Zen Buddhism.

He is a prolific author, whose essays and books have been translated into many languages. His articles appear regularly in the pages of major journals such as Tikkun and Buddhist magazines including Tricycle, Lion's Roar, and Buddhadharma, as well as in a variety of scholarly journals. Many of his writings, as well as audio and video talks and interviews, are available on the web. He is on the advisory boards of Buddhist Global Relief, the Clear View Project, Zen Peacemakers, and the Ernest Becker Foundation.

David lectures nationally and internationally on various topics, focusing primarily on the encounter between Buddhism and modernity: what each can learn from the other. He is especially concerned about social and ecological issues. A popular recent lecture is "Healing Ecology: A Buddhist Perspective on the Eco-crisis", which argues that there is an important parallel between what Buddhism says about our personal predicament and our collective predicament today in relation to the rest of the biosphere. You can hear David's podcast interview with Wisdom Publications here. Presently he is offering workshops on "Transforming Self, Transforming Society" and on Ecodharma: Buddhist Teachings for the Precipice, which is also the title of a new book forthcoming in early 2019. He also leads meditation retreats.

Loy is a professor of Buddhist and comparative philosophy. His BA is from Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota, and he studied analytic philosophy at King’s College, University of London. His MA is from the University of Hawaii in Honolulu and his PhD is from the National University of Singapore. His dissertation was published by Yale University Press as Nonduality: A Study in Comparative Philosophy. He was senior tutor in the Philosophy Department of Singapore University (later the National University of Singapore) from 1978 to 1984. From 1990 until 2005, he was professor in the Faculty of International Studies, Bunkyo University, Chigasaki, Japan. In January 2006, he became the Besl Family Chair Professor of Ethics/Religion and Society with Xavier University in Cincinnati, Ohio, a visiting position that ended in September 2010. In April 2007, David Loy was visiting scholar at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. From January to August 2009 he was a research scholar with the Institute for Advanced Study, the Hebrew University, Jerusalem. From September through December 2010 he was in residence at Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado, with a Lenz Fellowship. In November 2014, David was a visiting professor at Radboud University in the Netherlands. In January through April 2016, David was visiting Numata professor of Buddhism at the University of Calgary. (Source Accessed Sep 17, 2021)

David Michie is the internationally best-selling author of The Dalai Lama's Cat series of novels, as well as non-fiction titles including Why Mindfulness is Better than Chocolate, Hurry Up and Meditate, Buddhism for Busy People and Buddhism for Pet Lovers. His books are available in 26 languages in over 40 different countries.

David is a keynote speaker, corporate trainer and coach on mindfulness and meditation. He has extensive experience presenting to a wide variety of different audiences around the world.

In 2015 he established Mindful Safaris, leading groups to Africa – where he was born and brought up – encouraging people to visit unexplored places, outer and inner, through a combination of daily game viewing trips and mindfulness sessions.

David’s blog on mindfulness and related subjects at www.davidmichie.com attracts a global audience of thousands of visitors each week. (Source Accessed Apr 6, 2021)

David Need is Lecturing Fellow of Religion at Duke University. He has taught at Duke since 1999, primarily in Religious Studies. He developed the ICS gateway class and taught it from 2005–2012. His academic expertise is in Asian Religions and in Literature and Religion, with a focus on poetics, ritual, and meditation systems.

In addition to scholarly articles, he has published three books — two are translations and essays on Rainer Maria Rilke, the third is a selection of his own poetry, including a long poem set alongside the Gospel of Mark.

Current Research Interests

• Poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke
• Non-dual awareness and poetics
• Influence of Buddhism on 20th Century American Poetry
• Women's Religious Experience & Poetics

David R. Brockman, Ph.D., is a nonresident scholar for the Baker Institute’s Religion and Public Policy Program. He is also an adjunct professor at both Texas Christian University and Southern Methodist University, where he teaches various courses in religion and religious studies.

From 2010 to 2012, Brockman served as the project director for the World Conference of Associations of Theological Institutions. He is the author several books, including “Dialectical Democracy through Christian Thought: Individualism, Relationalism, and American Politics” (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2013) and “No Longer the Same: Religious Others and the Liberation of Christian Theology” (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2011). His forthcoming publication, “Educating For Pluralism, or Against It? Lessons from Texas and Quebec on Teaching Religion in Public Schools,” will appear in Religion & Education.

Brockman holds a Ph.D. in religious studies from Southern Methodist University. He received a Master of Theological Studies degree from the Brite Divinity School at Texas Christian University and his bachelor’s degree in English and education from the University of Texas at Arlington. (Source Accessed Nov 25, 2019)

David Ross Komito is a professor of Asian Philosophy and author on the subjects of Mādhyamaka Buddhist philosophy, meditation and the psychology of religion.

Komito received his B.A. in psychology from the University of California, Los Angeles, his M.A. in Religious Studies, M.S. in Counseling and Ph.D. in Tibetan Studies from Indiana University, Bloomington. From 1986 through 1990 he was Dean of John F. Kennedy University's Graduate School for the Study of Human Consciousness. Since 1987 has lectured at San Francisco Zen Center, Finding the Path to Liberation Buddhist Center and other Buddhist centers in the Western USA. After teaching at John F. Kennedy University and the University of San Francisco, he created the Religious Studies Program at Eastern Oregon University. Since retiring from Eastern Oregon University he has been teaching part-time in the Philosophy Department of Portland State University, Oregon.

He is married to the thanka artist Kayla Komito and lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico. (Source Accessed Mar 7, 2025)

David Llewellyn Snellgrove (29 June 1920 – 25 March 2016) was a British Tibetologist noted for his pioneering work on Buddhism in Tibet as well as his many travelogues. Snellgrove was born in Portsmouth, Hampshire, and educated at Christ's Hospital near Horsham in West Sussex. He went on to study German and French at Southampton University. In 1941 he was called up to do his military service as a member of the Royal Engineers. He attended the Officers Cadet Training Unit in the Scottish seaside town of Dunbar, and was commissioned as an infantry officer. Thereafter he attended various intelligence courses and further training at the War Office in London, from where he requested a posting to India.

Snellgrove arrived in Bombay in June 1943, and travelled cross-country to Calcutta. He was stationed at Barrackpore, some way up the Hooghly River. A few months after beginning his posting he contracted malaria and was sent to the military hospital at Lebong, just north of Darjeeling. It was while he was at Lebong that he began his future life's calling by purchasing some books about Tibet by Charles Bell as well as a Tibetan Grammar and Reader.

Snellgrove returned to Darjeeling, from where he sometimes went on leave to Kalimpong. On one of these visits he took a young Tibetan into his personal employ in order to have someone with whom to practice speaking Tibetan. He also travelled in the small Himalayan state of Sikkim, and on one such visit he met Sir Basil Gould, who was then the British Representative for Tibet.[2] Inspired to work in Tibet, in 1946 after he left the Army he sat the entrance exams for the Indian Civil Service. This was the first time the exams had been held since the start of the war, and the last time they were ever held. Although he passed the exams, he was not able to take up an appointment in India. Having already begun to study Tibetan, he resolved to find a university where he could further his studies. However, as no university offered courses in Tibetan at that time he was convinced by Sir Harold Bailey that a sound knowledge of Sanskrit and Pali would be beneficial, so he gained entry to Queens' College, Cambridge in October 1946. While at Cambridge, he converted to Roman Catholicism, in part through the influence of his friend Bede Griffiths.

In 1950, after having completed his studies at Cambridge, he was invited to teach a course in elementary Tibetan at the School of Oriental and African Studies University of London.[3] He was Professor of Tibetan at SOAS until his retirement in 1982.

Snellgrove's research subsequent to his retirement was focused increasingly upon the art history of South East Asia. He died on 25 March 2016 in Pinerolo, Italy. (Source Accessed Feb 14, 2020)

David Tuffley is a Senior Lecturer in Applied Ethics & Socio-Technical Studies at Griffith University in Australia.

David writes on a broad range of interests; from Anthropology, Psychology, Ancient and Modern History, Linguistics, Rhetoric, Comparative Religions, Philosophy, Architectural History, Environments and Ecosystems.

Dr. Dennis Hirota is a professor in the Department of Shin Buddhism at Ryukoku University in Kyoto, Japan. He was born in Berkeley, California in 1946 and received his B.A. from University of California, Berkeley. In 2008, he was a visiting professor of Buddhism at Harvard Divinity School where his studies focused on the Buddhist monk Shinran.

He has worked extensively as a translator and editor of Buddhist works. He is particularly known for his translation work in The Collected Works of Shinran. He has also published numerous books and articles, in both English and Japanese, on Pure Land Buddhism and Buddhist aesthetics. (Source Accessed June 2, 2023)

Dharmacandra (法月, 653–743) is known to be from either eastern India or the kingdom of Magadha in central India. He traveled widely in central India and was accomplished in medical arts and the Tripiṭaka. Then he went to the kingdom of Kucha (龜茲, or 庫車, in present-day Aksu Prefecture, Xinjiang, China), where he taught his disciple Zhenyue (真月) and others.

At the written recommendation of Lu Xiulin (呂休林), the governor appointed to keep peace with the western region (安西節度使), in 732, the twentieth year of the Kaiyuan (開元) years of Emperor Xuanzong (唐玄宗) of the Tang Dynasty (618–907), Dharmacandra arrived in Chang-an (長安), China. As an offering to the Emperor, he presented Sanskrit texts on alchemy and herbal remedies, as well as the Sūtra of the Mighty Vidya King Ucchuṣma (T21n1227), translated by Ajitasena, who was from northern India. With the help of his disciple Liyan (利言), Dharmacandra translated into Chinese the Sanskrit text of herbal remedies as well as of the Sūtra of the All-Encompassing Knowledge Store, the Heart of Prajñā-Pāramitā (T08n0252).

During an uprising in China, Dharmacandra moved to the kingdom of Yütian (于闐), or Khotan (和闐), present-day Hetian (和田), in Xinjiang, China. He stayed at the Golden Wheel Temple (金輪寺), teaching people attracted to him, until his death in 743, at the age of ninety-one. (Source Accessed Aug 19, 2021)

Dhongthog Rinpoche Tenpé Gyaltsen (Wyl. gdong thog bstan pa’i rgyal mtshan) aka T.G. Dhongthog Rinpoche (1933-2015) was one of the foremost Tibetan Buddhist scholars of recent times, noted especially for his work as a historian, lexicographer and prolific author. From 1979 Rinpoche was based in Seattle, USA. He published a number of books in Tibetan and English, especially through the Sapan Institute, of which he was the founding-director.

After being recognized as the fifth reincarnation of Jampal Rigpai Raldri by the Sakya Dagchen Ngawang Kunga Rinchen, Rinpoche studied Tibetan literature and Buddhist philosophy at Dzongsar Shedra. Before leaving Tibet in 1957, Rinpoche was the head teacher of Dhongthog Rigdrol Phuntsog Ling Monastery, Kardze, Tibet. Rinpoche served the Tibetan Government-in-Exile for 13 years before moving to the United States in 1979. In those 13 years, Rinpoche worked at the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives in Dharamsala and at Tibet House in New Delhi.

He wrote several books, including The History of Sakyapa School of Tibetan Buddhism, The Cleansing Water-drops, The Earth Shaking Thunder of True Word, The History of Tibet, and New Light English-Tibetan Dictionary. In addition, he worked as a translator and editor on the Tibetan version of Sogyal Rinpoche's The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying and translated David Jackson's biography of Dezhung Rinpoche into Tibetan.

Ven. Dhongthog Rinpoche passed away on the morning of 13th January, 2015 in Seattle, Washington. (Source Accessed, April 10, 2015)

Diana Y. Paul was born in Akron, Ohio and is a graduate of Northwestern University with a degree in both psychology and philosophy and of the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a Ph.D in Buddhist Studies.

. . . Her short stories have appeared in a number of literary journals and she is currently working on a second novel, A Perfect Match. Currently, she lives in Carmel, CA with her husband and loves to create mixed media art, focusing on printmaking in her studio.

As a Stanford professor, she has authored three books on Buddhism, one of which has been translated into Japanese and German (Women in Buddhism, University of California Press). (Source Accessed Jan 14, 2020)

Her other Buddhist works include Philosophy of Mind in Sixth-Century China: Paramartha’s Evolution of Consciousness and The Buddhist Feminine Ideal: Queen Srimala and the Tathagatagarbha.

Schuh graduated in 1972 from Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms University in Bonn and submitted his habilitation in 1976. He has been a Professor of Tibetan Studies since 1978. He was given the title professor emeritus in 2007. In addition to his academic career Schuh is an entrepreneur. Since 1983, he and his son Temba have led a company as a property developer, property and asset managers, since the early 1990s established in Halle, Saxony-Anhalt. He also started the weekly magazine New Hallesches daily paper on 1 March 1996, which he disbanded after a few weeks. In 1994 he was an independent member of the Council of the Halle in Saxony-Anhalt.

For research purposes he stayed several times in Tibet and bordering areas. In addition he has published many academic papers and books on subjects related to Tibet. In various publications, he has worked with other Tibetologists including Luciano Petech, Christopher Beckwith, and Peter Schwieger. He also edited several books.

In 1983 he developed the book Tibet: Dream and Reality with a DVD documentary of the snow land of Tibet, the Tibet of his journey along with members of the German ZDF television channel. On his 65th Birthday, the anniversary publication Tibetstudien: Festschrift für Dieter Schuh zum 65. Geburtstag was edited by Petra Maurer and others, with contributions from various tibetologists. He lives in Switzerland. (Source Accessed Apr 23, 2021)

A Newar Pandit, Divyavajra was born in the family of a very well known Vajrāchārya family of Nila Vajra and Bal Kumari in Māhābaudha, Kathmandu, Nepal on Jestha 24th Astami, 1976 Vikram Sambat (1919AD).

He tied up his married life with Miss Keshari, the daughter of Meer Subba Heera Man Vajrachrāya at the age of nine. They had four sons and five daughters.

Pandit Divyavajra's life consists of two phases: the first half dedicated to the traditional, herbal and naturalopathic (Ayurvedic) medicine and the second half to the preservation of Nepalese Buddhist philosophy and literature. Towards the end of first half period of his life (around the year 2013 VS/ 1956AD) he suffered from diabetes and tuberculosis. That forced him to stay away from his traditional profession of naturopathic treatment which he had started by establishing the Piyusvarshi Aushadhālaya (Medical Center) in Māhābaudha Tole, Kathmandu, Nepal in the year 2001 VS(1944AD). This change in his life had inspired him to study the Buddha's philosophy and to take a teaching job. In addition, he also taught the Pāli language to several Newar Buddhist monks.

Until the year 2010 (1953), he was very active in teaching naturalopathy by visiting villages such as Thaiba, Baregāũ etc in the valley, and opened the health related Ayurvedic traditional schools. Besides this, in 2017 VS(1960), he also coordinated the opening of the first National Museum in Kathmandu and in the same year, organized a health and vocational exhibition.

From the very beginning of his adulthood, his eyesight was very weak, however he was bold and possessed a sharp memory. He never gave up studying Buddhist texts. By the year 2036 (1979) he had recited the whole text of Avidharma, and collected, translated and explained the Sanskrit Buddhist texts such as Bodhi Charyāvatār, Langkāvatār, and so on to the public. He became an advisory member to several Buddhist organizations and became the president of the Dharmodaya Sabha, the National Buddhist Association in Kathmandu, Nepal.(Source Accessed Mar 15, 2021)

Kyabjé Dodrupchen Rinpoche, the Fourth Dodrupchen Rinpoche, Tubten Trinlé Pal Zangpo (Tib. ཐུབ་བསྟན་ཕྲིན་ལས་དཔལ་བཟང་པོ་, Wyl. thub bstan phrin las dpal bzang po) aka Jikmé Trinlé Palbar (1927-2022), was one of the most important masters in the Nyingma and Dzogchen traditions. As the fourth incarnation of Dodrupchen Jikmé Trinlé Özer, the heart-son of Jikmé Lingpa who revealed the Longchen Nyingtik cycle, Dodrupchen Rinpoche was the principal holder of the Longchen Nyingtik teachings.

He was born in 1927 in the Golok province of Dokham in the eastern part of Tibet....At the age of four, he travelled to the Dodrupchen monastery, where he was enthroned....

At Dodrupchen monastery, he built a Scriptural College, and he provided the woodblocks for printing the Seven Treasures of Longchenpa. He gave many major teachings, especially in the eastern part of Tibet.

On account of the changing political situation, Dodrupchen Rinpoche left Tibet and arrived in Sikkim in October 1957; from then on, he made Gangtok his permanent residence. Once again he subsidized the printing of many books, including Longchenpa's Seven Treasures and Trilogy of Finding Comfort and Ease. He has given many empowerments, transmissions and teachings in Sikkim, where he has two monasteries, in Bhutan, where he also heads a monastery, and in India and Nepal. Dodrupchen Rinpoche recognized the Seventh Dzogchen Rinpoche, whose enthronement was held in the Royal Temple at Gangtok in 1972...

He made a number of visits to the West, his first being in 1973, when he established a centre called the Maha Siddha Nyingmapa Centre in Massachusetts. Dodrupchen Rinpoche also visited Britain, France and Switzerland, and in 1975, gave the empowerment of Rigdzin Düpa at Sogyal Rinpoche's request in London. (Rigpa Wiki, Source Accessed February 2, 2022)

Dominic D. Z. Sur is an Assistant Professor of Religious Studies, teaching courses in world religions and Buddhism. Dr. Sur's recent publications include Entering the Way of the Great Vehicle: Dzogchen as the Culmination of the Mahāyāna (2017). He is presently working on a study of the rise of scholasticism and sectarian identity in eleventh century Tibet. (Source Accessed Jan 27, 2020)

• Recent Publications:
  • Constituting Canon and Community in Eleventh Century Tibet: The Extant Writings of Rongzom and His Charter of Mantrins (sngags pa’i bca’ yig). Religions (2017) 8, 40. doi:10.3390/rel8030040

Professor in Korean History and Civilization

He received his Ph.D. in Korean history from the University of Washington and has taught at UBC since 1987. He teaches undergraduate and graduate courses on Korean history and thought (religion, philosophy, and pre-modern science). In addition, he teaches a graduate seminar on the reproduction of historical trauma in Asia, in which he leads graduate students in an examination of how traumatic events in Asia in the 20th century, such as the Korean and Vietnam Wars, the bombing of Hiroshima, partition of India, China’s Cultural Revolution, and the killing fields of Cambodia have been reproduced in eyewitness accounts, historiography, fiction, and film.

He was a co-editor of the Sourcebook of Korean Civilization and editor of Critical Readings on Korean Christianity. He is also the author of Chosŏn hugi yugyo wa ch’ǒnjugyo ŭi taerip (The Confucian confrontation with Catholicism in the latter half of the Joseon dynasty), published by Iljogak in 1997, Korean Spirituality (University of Hawaii Press, 2008), and Catholics and Anti-Catholicism in Chosŏn Korea (University of Hawaii Press, 2017). He will soon publish How to be Moral, an annotated translation of a commentary by Tasan Chŏng Yagyong on the Zhongyong. (Source Accessed Aug 2, 2023)

Dong Qichang (Chinese: 董其昌; pinyin: Dǒng Qíchāng; Wade–Giles: Tung Ch'i-ch'ang; courtesy name Xuanzai (玄宰); 1555–1636), was a Chinese painter, calligrapher, politician, and art theorist of the later period of the Ming dynasty.

Life as a scholar and calligrapher:
Dong Qichang was a native of Hua Ting (located in modern-day Shanghai), the son of a teacher and somewhat precocious as a child. At 12 he passed the prefectural Civil service entrance examination and won a coveted spot at the prefectural Government school. He first took the imperial civil service exam at seventeen, but placed second to a cousin because his calligraphy was clumsy. This led him to train until he became a noted calligrapher. Once this occurred he rose up the ranks of the imperial service passing the highest level at the age of 35. He rose to an official position with the Ministry of Rites.[1]

Landscape with Calligraphy, Tokyo National Museum:'
His positions in the bureaucracy were not without controversy. In 1605 he was giving the exam when the candidates demonstrated against him causing his temporary retirement. In other cases he insulted and beat women who came to his home with grievances. That led to his house being burned down by an angry mob. He also had the tense relations with the eunuchs common to the scholar bureaucracy. Dong's tomb in Songjiang District was vandalized during the Cultural Revolution, and his body dressed in official Ming court robes, was desecrated by Red Guards.

Painter:'
His work favored expression over formal likeness. He also avoided anything he deemed to be slick or sentimental. This led him to create landscapes with intentionally distorted spatial features. Still his work was in no way abstract as it took elements from earlier Yuan masters. His views on expression had importance to later "individualist" painters.

Art theory:'
In his art theoretical writings, Dong developed the theory that Chinese painting could be divided into two schools, the northern school characterized by fine lines and colors and the southern school noted for its quick calligraphic strokes. These names are misleading as they refer to Northern and Southern schools of Chan Buddhism thought rather than geographic areas. Hence a Northern painter could be geographically from the south and a Southern painter geographically from the north. In any event he strongly favored the Southern school and dismissed the Northern school as superficial or merely decorative.

His ideal of Southern school painting was one where the artist forms a new style of individualistic painting by building on and transforming the style of traditional masters. This was to correspond with sudden enlightenment, as favored by Southern Chan Buddhism. He was a great admirer of Mi Fu and Ni Zan. By relating to the ancient masters' style, artists are to create a place for themselves within the tradition, not by mere imitation, but by extending and even surpassing the art of the past. Dong's theories, combining veneration of past masters with a creative forward looking spark, would be very influential on Qing dynasty artists as well as collectors, "especially some of the newly rich collectors of Sungchiang, Huichou in Southern Anhui, Yangchou, and other places where wealth was concentrated in this period". Together with other early self-appointed arbiters of taste known as the Nine Friends, he helped determine which painters were to be considered collectible (or not). As Cahill points out, such men were the forerunners of today's art historians. His classifications were quite perceptive and he is credited with being "the first art historian to do more than list and grade artists." (Source Accessed July 14, 2023)

• since 2016 - Master’s degree programme in Tibetology and Buddhist Studies, University of Vienna
• 2013 - 2016 - Bachelor’s degree programme Languages and Cultures of South Asia and Tibet, University of Vienna
• 2005 - 2008 - Secondary School LEWIT, Merano, Italy

Gyurme Dorje (1950 – 5 February 2020) was a Scottish Tibetologist and writer. He was born in Edinburgh, where he studied classics (Latin and Greek) at George Watson's College and developed an early interest in Buddhist philosophy. He held a PhD in Tibetan Literature (SOAS) and an MA in Sanskrit with Oriental Studies (Edinburgh). In the 1970s he spent a decade living in Tibetan communities in India and Nepal where he received extensive teachings from Kangyur Rinpoche, Dudjom Rinpoche, Chatral Rinpoche, and Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche. In 1971 Dudjom Rinpoche encouraged him to begin translating his recently completed History of the Nyingma School (རྙིང་མའི་སྟན་པའི་ཆོས་འབྱུང་) and in 1980 his Fundamentals of the Nyingma School (བསྟན་པའི་རྣམ་གཞག) - together this was an undertaking that was to take twenty years, only reaching completion in 1991. In the 1980s Gyurme returned to the UK and in 1987 completed his 3 volume doctoral dissertation on the Guhyagarbhatantra and Longchenpa's commentary on this text at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) at the University of London.

From 1991 to 1996 Gyurme held research fellowships at London University, where he worked with Alak Zenkar Rinpoche on translating (with corrections) the content of the Great Sanskrit Tibetan Chinese Dictionary to create the three volume Encyclopaedic Tibetan-English Dictionary. From 2007 until his death he worked on many translation projects, primarily as a Tsadra Foundation grantee. He has written, edited, translated and contributed to numerous important books on Tibetan religion and culture including The Nyingma School of Tibetan Buddhism: Its Fundamentals and History (2 vols.) (Wisdom, 1991), Tibetan Medical Paintings ( 2 vols.) (Serindia, 1992), The Tibet Handbook (Footprint, 1996), the first complete translation of the Tibetan Book of the Dead, and A Handbook of Tibetan Culture (Shambhala, 1994). (Source Accessed Jul 14, 2020)

Melanie is a psychotherapist, lecturer and teacher of Tibetan Buddhism, and has been empowered by Lama Yeshe Rinpoche to teach. She has worked and taught in a variety of fields with individuals and groups for the past 40 years. These include meditation, dream work, death and dying, bereavement, inner child work, relationships, karma and reincarnation, inner peace, discovering your true potential and many others.

Melanie gives weekly Buddhist lectures on Monday mornings and Tuesday evenings on many different dharma topics from how to clear our psychological karmic imprints to the deeper Vajrayana Buddhist teachings. (Source Accessed August 22, 2025)

Khenpo Drayab Lodrö Gyaltsen (Tib. བྲག་གཡབ་བློ་གྲོས་རྒྱལ་མཚན་, Wyl. brag g.yab blo gros rgyal mtshan) (d. early 1960s?) - He came from Drayab Sakya Monastery. His main teachers were Öntö Khyenrab Chökyi Özer, Gapa Khenpo Jamgyal and Gatön Ngawang Lekpa and Jamyang Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö. He was the fifth khenpo at Dzongsar Shedra, from ca. 1939-1943.

He taught just like Öntö Khyenrab Chökyi Özer, who, it is said, taught exactly like Khenpo Shenga. He spent many years in prison, were he was tortured, but he taught his fellow inmates whenever he had an opportunity.

Writings

He composed a commentary on the ninth chapter of the Bodhicharyavatara. He also wrote a commentary to Sakya Pandita's Treasury of Valid Reasoning, which has not survived. (Source: Rigpa Wiki)

Rase Konchog Gyatso was born in 1968 in the village below the monastery of Drikung Thil in Tibet. Dagpo (or Gampo) Chenga is the 8th reincarnation of the heart son of Gampopa (1079-1153).

From his young age Dagpo Chenga revealed a virtuous personality as well as a sharp mind. He studied at Drikung Buddhist College and at the Tibetan College in Lhasa. Dagpo Chenga also attended the Medical and Astrological College. He studied the Ten Aspects of Knowledge, as well as natural sciences, social sciences, and history and became very erudite in many fields of knowledge. Already as a young student he began writing papers on many subjects of Tibetan history and Tibetan Buddhism under his name Rase Konchog Gyatso. Among his books is also a seven-volume publication entitled A Faithful Speech that shows how to develop, improve and spread the Dharma tradition of the Drikung Kagyu in the future. Dagpo Chenga is considered one of the most learned lamas of the Drikung tradition. (Source Accessed Oct 6, 2022)

His Eminence Dagpo Chenga Rinpoche was recognized as the 8th incarnation of Dagpo Chenga (the heart-disciple of Gampopa (1079 – 1153)) and carries the Tulku-name Konchok Tenzin Thrinle Lhündrup. Many of his books were published under the name Rase Konchok Gyatso.

His Eminence Dagpo Chenga Rinpoche was born in 1968 in the village below the monastery of Drikung Thel in Tibet. At young age, he revealed a virtuous personality as well as a sharp mind. In 1981, Drubwang Pachung Rinpoche (1901-1988) advised him to become a monk, gave him important teachings, and instructed him to study and practice The Four Dharmas of Gampopa and the Six Yogas of Naropa. Since then he studied under many great teachers.

His Eminence Dagpo Chenga Rinpoche studied at Drikung Buddhist College and at the Tibetan College in Lhasa. He also attended the Medical and Astrological College. He studied the Ten Aspects of Knowledge, as well as natural sciences, social sciences, and history. He became a scholar proficient in all fields and is recognized as one of the most erudite master in the Drikung Kagyü lineage.

Already as a young student, His Eminence Dagpo Chenga Rinpoche began writing papers on many subjects of Tibetan history and Tibetan Buddhism under the name Rase Konchok Gyatso. Among his books are The History of the Yangrigar Monastery, The Main Seat of Pagdru Kagyü, The Benefit of Being Vegetarian, and A Faithful Speech, which shows how to develop, improve and spread the Drikung Kagyü Dharma traditions in the future. He also wrote a book entitled The Mothers in the Land of Snows, about famous women in the history of Tibet.

In 2004 a great thangka painting master, Penpa Tsering’s famous disciple, Amdo Jampa, painted a series of sophisticated thangkas portraying the Drikung Kagyü lineage holders, as well as The Fivefold Path of Mahāmudrā thangka, The Twenty-Five Main Disciples of Milarepa, and The Eight Types of Incarnations of Kyobpa Jigten Sumgon. All the drawings were made in accordance with Dagpo Chenga's meticulous commentary on the iconography.

His most important publication is The History of Drikung ('bri gung chos' byung), which was published in 2004. In 2007, he published The Ornament of Gongchig, a praise of the famous Gongchig teachings of Kyobpa Jigten Sumgon (1143-1217) bestowed upon his disciple Chenga Sherab Jungne (1187-1241), as well as a refutation of criticisms brought forward against the Gongchig. In addition, he authored several short texts on Lord Jigten Sumgon, Achi Chokyi Dolma, Angon Rinpoche, the history of Drikung Thel Monastery, and an introduction to the Drikung sky burial ground (Durto Tenchag), and a booklet on the holy places in the Drikung area.

Rase Konchok Gyatso also published some texts on Buddhist studies, among them are the commentaries on the Fivefold Path of Mahāmudrā and the Essence of the Three Vows (sdom pa gsum). He compiled the daily rituals of Drikung in two volumes and authored many articles about special Drikung teachings, including a Phowa text of the Drikung tradition called The Color of the Rainbow.

To rescue the most important works on the Drikung Kagyü lineage, for nearly a decade, Rase Konchok Gyatso has collaborated with His Eminence Drikung Angon Rinpocche and some monks from the Drikung Thel Monastery, gathering, combining and editing. The Great Treasury of Drikung Kagyü has now reached 150 volumes. Under the organization of Balok Rinpoche, Drikung Kagyü Marpa Translation Center is currently translating these sacred articles into Chinese and English.

At the request of His Holiness Chungtsang Rinpoche, Rase Konchok Gyatso is currently composing A Comprehensive Explanation of the Thirteen Major Subjects (gzhung chen bcu gsum) covering the thirteen major root texts of the Buddhist philosophy such as Vinaya, the bodhisattva trainings, Maitreya's five treatises, Abhidharma, Madhyamaka, and so on.

His Eminence Dagpo Chenga’s writings are same as his oral teachings, namely, very precise, direct, and clear. They stand out with very profound view and excellent knowledge. He continues to exert tireless effort writing texts in order to benefit Buddhism in general and the Drikung Kagyü lineage in particular. (Source Accessed May 16, 2025)

Drupa Rinpoche Lobsang Yeshi, who is 7th in the lineage of Drupa Rinpoches, is the head of Drupa Monastery in Kham, Eastern Tibet. The present Drupa Rinpoche was born in India and recognized by His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama in the year of 1988 as the reincarnation of 6th Drupa Rinpoche Shedrup Tenpai Gyaltsen.

Drupa Rinpoche joined Drepung Loseling Monastery in 1988 and completed his monastic studies by receiving his Geshe degree in 2005. Rinpoche is trilingual (Tibetan, English and Hindi) which enabled him to successfully pursue a Bachelor in Psychology (Hons) degree from HELP University, Malaysia and thereafter, a Master of Science in Positive Psychology (MSPP) from Life University, GA, USA. Rinpoche presented his research paper titled “Are materialism and spirituality two sides of the happiness coin? A mixed-methods study” at the 31st International Congress of Psychology (ICP), Yokohama, Japan. Rinpoche has been inducted as a member of Psy Chi, the International Honor Society in Psychology. (Source Accessed Oct 28, 2021)

The 7th Dzogchen Ponlop (Karma Sungrap Ngedön Tenpa Gyaltsen, born 1965) is an abbot of Dzogchen Monastery, founder and spiritual director of Nalandabodhi, founder of Nītārtha Institute for Higher Buddhist Studies, a leading Tibetan Buddhist scholar, and a meditation master. He is one of the highest tülkus in the Nyingma lineage and an accomplished Karma Kagyu lineage holder.

Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche was born in 1965 at Rumtek Monastery (Dharma Chakra Center) in Sikkim, India. His birth was prophesied by the supreme head of the Kagyu lineage, Rangjung Rigpe Dorje, 16th Karmapa, to Ponlop Rinpoche's parents, Dhamchö Yongdu, the General Secretary of the Sixteenth Gyalwang Karmapa, and his wife, Lekshey Drolma. Upon his birth, he was recognized by the 16th Gyalwang Karmapa as the seventh in the line of Dzogchen Ponlop incarnations and was formally enthroned as the Seventh Dzogchen Ponlop at Rumtek Monastery in 1968.[1]

After receiving Buddhist refuge and bodhisattva vows from the 16th Gyalwang Karmapa, Dzogchen Ponlop was ordained as a novice monk in 1974. He subsequently received full ordination and became a bhikṣu, although he later returned his vows and is now a lay teacher.

Rinpoche received teachings and empowerments from the 16th Gyalwang Karmapa, Dilgo Khyentse, Kalu Rinpoche, Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche, Khenchen Thrangu Rinpoche (chief Abbot of the Kagyu lineage), Alak Zenkar Rinpoche, and Khenpo Tsultrim Gyamtso Rinpoche, his root guru.

Ponlop Rinpoche began studying Buddhist philosophy at the primary school in Rumtek at age 12. In 1979 (when Rinpoche was fourteen), the 16th Karmapa proclaimed Ponlop Rinpoche to be a heart son of the Gyalwang Karmapa and a holder of his Karma Kagyu lineage. In 1980 on his first trip to the West, he accompanied the Sixteenth Gyalwang Karmapa to Europe, United States, Canada, and Southeast Asia. While serving as the Karmapa's attendant, he also gave dharma teachings and assisted in ceremonial roles during these travels.[2]

In 1981, he entered the monastic college at Rumtek, Karma Shri Nalanda Institute for Higher Buddhist Studies where he studied the fields of Buddhist philosophy, psychology, logic, and debate. During his time at Rumtek, Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche worked for the Students' Welfare Union, served as head librarian, and was the chief-editor of the Nalandakirti Journal, an annual publication which brings together Eastern and Western views on Buddhism. Rinpoche graduated in 1990 as Ka-rabjampa from Karma Shri Nalanda Institute for Higher Buddhist Studies in Rumtek Monastery. (Ka-rabjampa means "one with unobstructed knowledge of scriptures", the Kagyu equivalent of the Sakya and Gelug's geshe degree.) He simultaneously earned the degree of Acharya, or Master of Buddhist Philosophy, from Sampurnanant Sanskrit University. Dzogchen Ponlop has also completed studies in English and comparative religion at Columbia University in New York City. (Source Accessed Nov 19, 2019)

For further information about Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche, visit his Official Website

Edward was ordained in 1971 by Shunryu Suzuki Roshi, who gave him the Dharma name Jusan Kainei, which means "Longevity Mountain, Peaceful Sea."

Edward has been practicing Zen since 1965 and also has done extensive vipassana practice, yoga, and chi gung. He leads regular sitting groups and meditation retreats in Northern California and offers workshops in the U.S. and internationally on a variety of subjects, including cooking, handwriting change, and Mindfulness Touch. Edward is an accomplished chef, who helped found Greens Restaurant in San Francisco and worked with Deborah Madison in writing The Greens Cookbook. Edward's other books include The Tassajara Bread Book, Tassajara Cooking, The Tassajara Recipe Book, and Tomato Blessings and Radish Teachings. He also edited Not Always So, a collection of Suzuki Roshi's lectures. In 2007, Edward was the subject of a critically acclaimed feature-length documentary film entitled How to Cook Your Life, directed by Doris Dörrie. (Source Accessed Nov 25, 2020)

Edward Hamilton Johnston was a British oriental scholar who was Boden Professor of Sanskrit at the University of Oxford from 1937 until his death. He was born on 26 March 1885; his father was Reginald Johnston, Governor of the Bank of England from 1909 to 1911. He was educated at Eton College before studying at New College, Oxford, switching to history after a year of mathematics and obtaining a first-class degree in 1907. He joined the Indian Civil Service, winning the Boden Sanskrit Scholarship during his probation, and worked in India from 1909 onwards in various capacities. He took the opportunity to retire in 1924 after working in India for 15 years, and returned to England. Thereafter he spent his time on the study of Sanskrit, later learning sufficient Tibetan and Chinese to make use of material available in those languages.

Although Johnston seems only to have published one article in India (on a group of medieval statues), his later works show that he had noted local Indian practices in agriculture and other areas, since he made reference to these in his analysis of Sanskrit texts. Between 1928 and 1936, he published an edition and translation of the Buddhacārita (Acts of the Buddha) by the 2nd-century author Aśvaghoṣa; this was described by the writer of his obituary in The Times as his "magnum opus."

In 1937, he was elected Boden Professor of Sanskrit and Keeper of the Indian Institute at the University of Oxford, also becoming a Professorial Fellow of Balliol College. He started cataloguing the Sanskrit manuscripts acquired for the Bodleian Library by an earlier Boden professor, A. A. Macdonell, helped improve the museum of the Indian Institute, and worked on the manuscripts held by the India Office Library. He published several articles on a variety of topics. (Source Accessed Jan 13, 2020)

The eighth member of the incarnation lineage of the Karmapas, Mikyö Dorje, was a prolific scholar and an acclaimed artist, often credited with the development of the Karma Gadri style of painting. Though he only lived into his mid-40's his contributions to the Karma Kagyu and Tibetan tradition, in general, were immense. His collected works are said to have originally filled thirty volumes and he is widely held to be one of the most significant of the Karmapa incarnations.

For a detailed discussion of The Eighth Karmapa's life, with interesting reference to source texts, see the 17th Karmapa's teachings from February 2021.

From the book, Karmapa: 900 Years (KTD Publications, 2016, revised 3rd edition):

Mikyö Dorje is among the greatest scholars Tibet has ever produced. He was an active participant in the rigorous intellectual debates of his day, making major contributions in virtually all areas of textual study. He was an accomplished Sanskritist, and wrote Sanskrit grammars alongside works ranging from poetry to art to tantra. The Eighth Karmapa’s voluminous writings include substantial commentaries on all the principal Sanskrit texts, clarifying points of confusion and deeply engaging with their inner meaning. The act of composing philosophical texts within the Karma Kagyu—a lineage so fully devoted to attaining realization through practice—is wholly unlike the act of producing philosophical texts in a modern academic or scholastic setting. Rather, the philosophical works of Mikyö Dorje point out the way to view reality in order to be liberated from the cycles of samsaric suffering. As such, his compositions are a supreme act of kindness. It is said that Mikyö Dorje’s deeds in recording his insight and understanding in his commentaries had the effect of doubling or tripling the lifespan of the Karma Kagyu lineage.(Source: Page 73, Karmapa: 900 Years (KTD Publications, 2016, revised 3rd edition). E-Book available online here: http://www.ktdpublications.com/karmapa-900-third-edition-e-book/ .

Mikyö Dorje left numerous Buddhist writings on all major and minor topics, including a biography of Bodong Chogle Namgyal (1376–1451), entitled Ocean of Miracles (ngo mtshar gyi rgya mtsho), a Gongchik commentary, and he introduced a special guru yoga in four sessions, which is the basis for contemporary Karma Kagyu practice. See a list of Tibetan works by the 8th Karmapa available as free ePubs on Tsadra Foundation's DharmaCloud website.

For more biographical information see the following sources:

• Rheingans, Jim. 2017. The Eighth Karmapa's Life and His Interpretation of the Great Seal: A Religious Life and Instructional Texts in Historical and Doctrinal Contexts. Bochum, Germany: Projekt Verlag.
• BDRC Person page for The 8th Karmapa, Mikyo Dorje
• WikiData entry for The 8th Karmapa, Mikyo Dorje
• Himalayan Art Resource page for The 8th Karmapa, Mikyo Dorje
• Tsadra Foundation person page for The 8th Karmapa, Mikyo Dorje
• Official Karmapa Office Page on the 8th Karmapa
• Tsurphu Monastery Page on the 8th Karmapa

Ekai Kawaguchi (河口慧海, Kawaguchi Ekai) (February 26, 1866 – February 24, 1945) was a Japanese Buddhist monk, famed for his four journeys to Nepal (in 1899, 1903, 1905 and 1913), and two to Tibet (July 4, 1900–June 15, 1902, 1913–1915), being the first recorded Japanese citizen to travel in either country.

From an early age Kawaguchi, whose birth name was Sadajiro, was passionate about becoming a monk. In fact, his passion was unusual in a country that was quickly modernizing; he gave serious attention to the monastic vows of vegetarianism, chastity, and temperance even as other monks were happily abandoning them. As a result, he became disgusted with the worldliness and political corruption of the Japanese Buddhist world. Until March, 1891, he worked as the Rector of the Zen Gohyaku rakan Monastery (五百羅漢寺, Gohyaku-rakan-ji) in Tokyo (a large temple which contains 500 rakan icons). He then spent about 3 years as a hermit in Kyoto studying Chinese Buddhist texts and learning Pali, to no use; he ran into political squabbles even as a hermit. Finding Japanese Buddhism too corrupt, he decided to go to Tibet instead, despite the fact that the region was officially off limits to all foreigners. In fact, unbeknownst to Kawaguchi, Japanese religious scholars had spent most of the 1890s trying to enter Tibet to find rare Buddhist sutras, with the backing of large institutions and scholarships, but had invariably failed.

He left Japan for India in June, 1897, without a guide or map, simply buying his way onto a cargo boat. He had a smattering of English but did not know a word of Hindi or Tibetan. Also, he had no money, having refused the donations of his friends; instead, he made several fishmonger and butcher friends pledge to give up their professions forever and become vegetarian, claiming that the good karma would ensure his success. Success appeared far from guaranteed, but arriving in India with very little money, he somehow entered the good graces of Sarat Chandra Das, an Indian British agent and Tibetan scholar, and was given passage to northern India. Kawaguchi would later be accused of spying for Das, but there is no evidence for this, and a close reading of his diary makes it seem quite unlikely. Kawaguchi stayed in Darjeeling for several months living with a Tibetan family by Das' arrangement. He became fluent in the Tibetan language, which was at that time neither systematically taught to foreigners nor compiled, by talking to children and women on the street.

Crossing over the Himalayas on an unpatrolled dirt road with an untrustworthy guide, Kawaguchi soon found himself alone and lost on the Tibetan plateau. He had the good fortune to befriend every wanderer he met in the countryside, including monks, shepherds, and even bandits, but he still took almost four years to reach Lhasa after stopovers at a number of monasteries and a pilgrimage round sacred Mount Kailash in western Tibet. He posed as a Chinese monk and gained a reputation as an excellent doctor which led to him having an audience with the 13th Dalai Lama, Thubten Gyatso (1876 to 1933). He spent some time living in Sera Monastery.

Kawaguchi devoted his entire time in Tibet to Buddhist pilgrimage and study. Although he mastered the difficult terminology of the classical Tibetan language and was able to pass for a Tibetan, he was surprisingly intolerant of Tibetans' minor violations of monastic laws, and of the eating of meat in a country with very little arable farmland. As a result, he did not fit in well in monastic circles, instead finding work as a doctor of Chinese and Western medicine. His services were soon in high demand.

Kawaguchi spent his time in Lhasa in disguise and, following a tip that his cover had been blown, had to flee the country hurriedly. He almost petitioned the government to let him stay as an honest and apolitical monk, but the intimations of high-ranking friends convinced him not to. Even so, several of the people who had sheltered him were horribly tortured and mutilated. Kawaguchi was deeply concerned for his friends, and despite his ill health and lack of funds, after leaving the country he used all his connections to petition the Nepalese Prime Minister Chandra Shumsher Rana for help. On the Prime Minister's recommendation, the Tibetan Government released Kawaguchi's loyal Tibetan friends from jail. (Source Accessed Mar 19, 2021)

Elio was born in Varese, Italy, on 5 August 1954 and grew up in Como. He studied art and received a Master of Arts before traveling to India to study Buddhism. On his return from India he moved to Switzerland, where for ten years he learned Tibetan language and Buddhist philosophy under one of the Dalai Lama’s philosophical advisors. Elio joined the Dzogchen community in 1986, when he received teachings from Chögyal Namkhai Norbu for the first time.

Invited by the late Kalu Rinpoche, Elio spent almost twenty years in India working on the large encyclopedia on Indo-Tibetan knowledge known as Shes bya kun khyab (Myriad Worlds,Buddhist Ethics, Systems of Buddhist Tantra, The Elements of Tantric Practice) authored by Kongtrul the Great, published in separate volumes by Snow Lion Publications. During this time Elio continued to actively collaborate with the Dzogchen Community and especially with the Shang Shung Institute in Italy, of which he is a founding member.

Elio has worked on various translations for the Shang Shung Institute in Italy, including several books by Chögyal Namkhai Norbu relating to Tibetan medicine. He has completed several levels of the Santi Maha Sangha training, and became an authorized teacher of the base, first, and second level. Since 2003, Elio has been one of the three principal translators for the Ka-ter project of the Shang Shung Institute of Austria. Aside from serving as instructor for the Training for Translators from Tibetan program, he also works for the Dzogchen Tantra Translation Project. (Source Accessed March 26, 2020)

Elizabeth has been engaged in contemplative training and Tibetan Buddhist studies for more than 35 years. A Tsadra Fellow since 2002, she has engaged in both written translation and oral interpretation including working closely with Khenpo Tsültrim Gyamtso, as well as completing two three-year retreats at Kagyu Thubten Chöling, New York. Elizabeth specializes in translating texts related to mahāmudrā and esoteric tantric commentaries. Her most recent publication is Dakpo Tashi Namgyal’s Moonbeams of Mahāmudrā (Phyag chen zla ba’i ‘od zer) and the Ninth Karmapa’s Dispelling the Darkness of Ignorance (Ma rig mun sel). Elizabeth is also the director of advanced study scholarships at Tsadra Foundation and is the executive director of Marpa Foundation.

Current Projects as a Tsadra Foundation Fellow:

• The Treasury of Precious Instructions: Essential Teachings of the Eight Practice Lineages of the Tibetan Buddhism, Vol. 7 & 8 – Marpa Kagyu Tradition, various authors collected by Jamgön Kongtrul.

Completed Projects as a Tsadra Foundation Fellow:

• The Treasury of Knowledge: Book VI, Part 3; Frameworks of Buddhist Philosophy, Jamgön Kongtrul
• The Profound Inner Principles, Karmapa Rangjung Dorje, with commentary by Jamgön Kongtrul
• Moonbeams of Mahāmudrā, Dakpo Tashi Namgyal, with Dispelling the Darkness of Ignorance by Wangchuk Dorje, the Ninth Karmapa

Previously Published Translations:

• Mahamudra: Ocean of Definitive Meaning, the Ninth Karmapa, Wangchuk Dorje Source: Tsadra.org

Obituary: Elliot Sperling (1951-2017) by Tenzin Dorjee. (HIMALAYA. Volume 37, Number 1, pp 149-150)

Professor Elliot Sperling’s death was a colossal tragedy by every measure. He was only 66 years old, and he exuded life, health, and purpose—the antithesis of death. After retiring from a long professorship at Indiana University in 2015, where he was director of the Tibetan Studies program at the department of Central Eurasian Studies, Sperling moved back to his native New York. He bought an apartment in Jackson Heights, where he converted every wall into meticulously arranged bookshelves—only the windows were spared. He was clearly looking forward to a busy retirement, living in what was basically a library pretending to be an apartment. Sperling was the world’s foremost authority on historical Sino-Tibetan relations. For his landmark work “on the political, religious, cultural, and economic relations between Tibet and China from the fourteenth through seventeenth centuries,” he was awarded a MacArthur genius grant at the age of 33.1

He accumulated a compact but enduring body of work that defined and shaped Tibetan studies over the last three decades. No less important, he was also a phenomenal teacher, storyteller, entertainer, whiskey connoisseur (he delighted in teaching us how to enjoy the peaty Scotch whiskies), and a passionate advocate for Tibetan and Uyghur causes. Through his seminal writings on Tibet’s relations with China during the Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties, he became arguably the first historian to use both Chinese language archives and Tibetan language sources extensively, bringing to light the separation and independence that characterized the relationship between the two nations. Until he came along, most Western academics viewed Tibet through Chinese eyes, largely because they could not access Tibetan sources. Sperling, fluent in Tibetan as well as Chinese, upended the old Sino-centric narrative and transformed the field. Roberto Vitali, who organized a festschrift for Sperling in 2014, writes that Sperling’s work “will stay as milestones” in Tibetan studies.2 His writings have become so central to the field that any scholar who writes a paper about historical Sino-Tibetan relations cannot do so without paying homage to Sperling’s work. He is, so to speak, the Hegel of Sino-Tibetan history.

One can imagine the joy many of us felt when Professor Sperling chose to make his home in Jackson Heights, the second (if unofficial) capital of the exile Tibetan world— after Dharamsala, India. We saw him at demonstrations at the Chinese consulate, art openings at Tibet House, poetry nights at Little Tibet restaurant, and sometimes at dinner parties in the neighborhood. At every gathering, he held court as the intellectual life of the party. His friends and students bombarded him with questions on topics ranging from art to politics to linguistics, for his erudition was not limited to history alone. Unfailingly generous and eloquent, he supplied the most intriguing, insightful and exhaustive answers to every question. Each conversation with him was a scholarly seminar. Among the circle of Tibetan activists and artists living in New York City, Sperling quickly fell into a sort of second professorship, an underground tenure without the trappings of university. We weren’t about to let him retire so easily. Some of Professor Sperling’s most influential early works include: The 5th Karma-pa and Some Aspects of the Relationship Between Tibet and the Early Ming (1980); The 1413 Ming Embassy to Tsong-ka-pa and the Arrival of Byams-chen chos-rje Shakya ye-shes at the Ming Court (1982); Did the Early Ming Emperors Attempt to Implement a ‘Divide and Rule’ Policy in Tibet? (1983); and The Ho Clan of Ho-chou: A Tibetan Family in Service to the Yuan and Ming Dynasties (1990) among others. One of my personal favorites in his corpus is The 5th Karmapa and Some Aspects of the Relationship Between Tibet and the Early Ming. In this text, Sperling argues that in the early years following the collapse of the Mongol Yuan dynasty in 1367, the Ming rulers of China adopted a non-expansionist foreign policy, displaying greater interest in drawing clear boundaries to keep the ‘barbarians’ out of China than in expanding its boundaries to encroach into non-Ming territories. Ming China was initially conceived more as an inward-looking state than an outward-looking empire, partly in critique of the ruthless expansionism of their predecessors, the Mongol Yuan rulers. In fact, Sperling quotes from the very proclamation carried by the first mission that Ming Taitsu, or the Hongwu Emperor, sent to Tibet:

Formerly, the hu people [i.e. the Mongols] usurped

authority in China. For over a hundred years caps

and sandals were in reversed positions. Of all

hearts, which did not give rise to anger? In recent

years, the hu rulers lost hold of the government….

Your Tibetan state is located in the western lands.

China is now united, but I am afraid that you have

still not heard about this. Therefore this proclamation [is sent].3

Sperling goes on to write that this “first mission is acknowledged by Chinese records to have met with no success,” and that necessitated the dispatching of a second mission.4

In Did the Early Ming Emperors Attempt to Implement a “Divide and Rule” Policy in Tibet?5 Sperling defies decades of conventional wisdom with a bold argument when he writes:

The Chinese court was never, in fact, able to mount

a military expedition beyond the Sino-Tibetan

frontier regions. This fact becomes strikingly

obvious as one glances through both Tibetan and

Chinese sources for the period in question…. Unable

to protect its embassies or even to retaliate against

attacks on them, China was hardly in a position to

manifest the kind of power needed to implement a

policy of “divide and rule” in Tibet.

For many Tibetans who care about seemingly inconsequential details of the murky Sino-Tibetan relations from the fourteenth to the seventeenth centuries, a historical period that has become a domain of highly charged information battles between Dharamsala and Beijing, Sperling’s writings are like a constellation of bright lamps illuminating the tangled web of Sino-Tibetan history. He excavated critical pieces of Tibet’s deep past from the forbidding archives of antiquity, arranged them in a coherent narrative, and virtually placed in our hands several centuries of our own history.

Elliot Sperling’s academic stature would have allowed him to be an ivory tower intellectual. Instead, he chose to be a true ally of the Tibetan people and an unwavering champion of Tibetan freedom. While he studied with Taktser Rinpoche, the Dalai Lama’s elder brother, he maintained lifelong friendships with the people he met in Dharamsala: Tashi Tsering (the preeminent Tibetan historian), Jamyang Norbu (the rebel intellectual and award-winning author), Peter Brown (the ‘American Khampa’ and a brother in the Tibetan struggle). Sperling joined many of us in the trenches of activism, always encouraging us to embark on bigger and bolder advocacy campaigns for Tibet. Speaking in his Bronx-accented Tibetan, he told us that if only Tibetans studied our history more seriously, we would be able to believe that Tibet will be free again.

A sharp and fearless critic of Beijing, Sperling neither minced his words nor censored his writings under fear of being banned from China. Even when he taught in Beijing for a semester, where he developed a close friendship with the Tibetan poet Woeser, he successfully avoided the trap of self-censorship that has neutered so many scholars in our time.6

While railing against Beijing’s atrocities in Tibet, he managed to be critical of Dharamsala’s excessively conciliatory stance toward Beijing.7

His provocative critiques of the Tibetan leadership sometimes made us uncomfortable, but that was exactly the impact he was seeking as a teacher who cared deeply about Tibet: to awaken and educate us by pushing us into our discomfort zone. “Having a teacher like Sperling was a bit like having access to a genius, a father, and some sort of bodhi all in one,” says Sara Conrad, a doctoral student at Indiana University who studied with Sperling for many years. “A walking encyclopedia, I felt I could learn a lot just being near him—and he took every opportunity to teach me. I benefited learning from him about Tibet and Tibetan of course, but also about parenthood and morality, music and comedy. In terms of academia he told me I must be able to live with myself after I write, and therefore it is always best to be honest.”

In recent years, Sperling took up the case of Ilham Tohti, the Uyghur intellectual sentenced to life imprisonment by Beijing. He played a key role in raising Tohti’s profile as a prisoner of conscience, nominating him for human rights awards. He took Tohti’s daughter, Jewher, under his wing and oversaw her wellbeing and education. In Jewher’s own words, Elliot Sperling became “like a second father” to her. His friendship with Ilahm Tohti and Jewher exemplified the compassion and generosity with which he treated everyone. Sure, he made his mark in this world as a scholar, but his monumental intellect was matched by his unbounded kindness, altruism, and humanity.

“Professor Sperling was the moral compass of Tibetan studies,” said fellow historian Carole McGranahan at Sperling’s March 11 memorial in New York. His untimely death has left an abyss in our hearts and a chasm in the world of Tibetology. Christophe Besuchet, a fellow activist, remarked that it is “as if a whole library had burned down.”

Even so, it is worth remembering that Sperling has already done far more than his fair share of good in the world, and he deserves a rest (or a break, if you consider it from a Buddhist perspective). In the course of 66 years, he lived multiple lifetimes—as a taxi driver, hippie, scholar, mentor, activist, father—each one more productive and meaningful than the last. He has engraved his spirit so deeply in the lives of so many of us that, in a way, he is still alive. And while one library has burned down, there are thousands of libraries where his words still live and breathe.

Endnotes
1. MacArthur Foundation, <https://www.macfound.org/ fellows/236/> (accessed 6 March 2017).

2. Roberto Vitali, “For Elliot from a Friend,” International Association for Tibetan Studies. Also see Trails of the Tibetan Tradition: Papers for Elliot Sperling, edited by Roberto Vitali (Amnye Machen Institute: 2014).

3. Elliot Sperling, “5th Karmapa and Some Aspects of the Relationship Between Tibet and the Early Ming,” in Michael Aris and Aung San Suu Kyi, eds., Tibetans Studies in Honour of Hugh Richardson, Warminster, 1980 (published in translation as Shiboling, “Wushi Gamaba yiji Xizang he Mingchu de guanxi yaolue,” in Guowai Zangxue yanjiu yiwenji, vol. 2, Lhasa, 1987), pp.279-289.

4. Ibid.

5. Elliot Sperling, “Divide and Rule Policy in Tibet,” in Ernst Steinkellner, ed., Contributions on Tibetan Language, History and Culture. Proceedings of the Csoma de Koros Symposium Held at Velm-Vienna, Austria, 13-19 September 1981, Vienna, 1983, pp.339-356.

6. See Tsering Woeser, “A Chronicle of Elliot Sperling,” in Trails of the Tibetan Tradition: Papers for Elliot Sperling, Roberto Vitali eds., (published by Amnye Machen Institute, 2014).

7. He has criticized the Dalai Lama’s ‘Middle Way Approach’ to dealing with China as too conciliatory. See his article Self-Delusion, <http://info-buddhism.com/SelfDelusion_Middle-Way-Approach_Dalai-Lama_Exile_CTA_ Sperling.html#f1>.

Tenzin Dorjee is a writer, activist, and a researcher at Tibet Action Institute. His monograph The Tibetan Nonviolent Struggle: A Strategic and Historical Analysis was published in 2015 by the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict. His writings have been published in various forums including Global Post, Courier International, Tibetan Review, Tibet Times, and the CNN blog. He is a regular commentator on Tibet-related issues for Radio Free Asia, Voice of America, and Voice of Tibet. He served as the Executive Director of Students for a Free Tibet from 2009 to 2013. An earlier version of this obituary was published in the Huffington Post <https://www.huffpost.com/entry/remembering-elliot-sperling-personal-reflections-on_b_5899c990e4b0985224db59cb>.

Venerable Elvin W. Jones is a prominent Buddhist translator and scholar affiliated with the Geluk school of Tibetan Buddhism. He worked closely with Geshe Lhundub Sopa, a pioneering figure in bringing Buddhist teachings to the Western world, serving as his assistant and collaborator in Madison, Wisconsin.

Jones is known for his significant contributions to Buddhist scholarship and translation. He co-authored the Primer of Literary Tibetan with Geshe Sopa, establishing himself as an important figure in Tibetan language education for Western students. His translation work includes major Buddhist philosophical texts, most notably the collaborative translation of Kamalasīla's Stages of Meditation, undertaken with Geshe Lhundub Sopa and John Newman.

In addition to his translation endeavors, Venerable Jones served as an author and editor of Mahayana Buddhist Meditation: Theory and Practice, compiled with Minoru Kiyota, a scholarly work that explores Buddhist meditation practices and theory for Western audiences.

Through his affiliation with Geshe Sopa and his work at Deer Park Buddhist Center in Oregon, Wisconsin, Venerable Elvin W. Jones has played an important role in making Tibetan Buddhist teachings, texts, and practices accessible to Western practitioners and scholars.

Eric came to Santa Clara University with over a decade of experience in higher education. Eric received his PhD in Buddhist Studies from the University of Michigan, where he taught Buddhist and Asian Studies courses, worked with faculty on integrating technology into their teaching, and facilitated interdisciplinary workshops. He also received his M.A. in Religious Studies at the University of Colorado, where he taught religion courses, and his B.A. in Religious Studies from Occidental College. At SCU, Eric coordinates instructional technology support and trainings, and works with faculty in digital media assignment collaborations, course design consultations, and in Technology and Teaching Workshops.

(Source Accessed April 24, 2023)

Lama Eric Triebelhorn first came to KCC (Kagyu Changchub Chuling, Portland, OR) not long after graduating from college and quickly immersed himself in the center’s activities. He served as Board president for four years and was the first caretaker of our retreat land, Ser Chö Ösel Ling. In 2002, he moved to India to study Tibetan language and practice with Kyabje Bokar Rinpoche. He requested and was finally granted permission to participate in a traditional Shangpa three-year retreat at Bokar Monastery, which he completed in 2008. Following retreat, Lama Eric translated for Khenpo Lodrö Donyö Rinpoche, Gyaltsab Rinpoche, and others and eventually served as an English teacher for the reincarnation of his teacher, Bokar Rinpoche. Lama Eric became KCC’s resident lama in January 2020.

(Source: Adapted from KCC Website)

Erich Frauwallner studied classical philology and Sanskrit philology in Vienna. He taught Indology from 1928-29 at the University of Vienna. His primary interest was Buddhist logic and epistemology, and later Indian Brahmanic philosophy, with close attention to primary source texts.

In 1938 Frauwallner joined the Department of Indian and Iranian philosophy at the Oriental Institute after its Jewish director, Bernhard Geiger, was forced out. Frauwallner became director in 1942. He was called up for military service in 1943 but did not serve, continuing to teach until 1945 when he lost his position due to his Nazi Party membership (dating to 1932). In 1951, after a review, he was reinstated. In 1955 the Institute for Indology founded, which he chaired, becoming a full professor in 1960.

Donald S. Lopez, Jr., professor of Buddhist and Tibetan Studies at the University of Michigan, called Frauwallner "one of the great Buddhist scholars of this [the twentieth] century." (Source Accessed Jun 11, 2019)

Erick Tsiknopoulos is a translator of Tibetan literature into English. Originally from the United States, he studied Tibetan language and Buddhism intensively in the Himalayan region of North India and Nepal, where he lived for 11 years (2008-2019).

He has practiced Buddhism since 1999, studied Tibetan language since 2004, and translated & interpreted Tibetan professionally since 2008.

He is the founder and director of the Trikāya Translation Committee, Trikāya Translation Services, and the Trikāya Tibetan Language Academy. (Adapted from Source Oct 17, 2025)

Erik Hoogcarspel (1946) studied contemporary continental philosophy in Groningen, founded a Buddhist meditation center and studied Asian philosophies and religions. He taught Hinduism at Radboud University in Nijmegen.

During his work as a teacher and teacher he wrote textbooks for his students and columns. Among other things, he translated Nāgārjuna's Principles of the Philosophy of the Middle from Sanskrit and edited the anthology The Great Way to Light, a selection from the literature of Mahayana Buddhism, and wrote The Buddha Phenomenon . . . . He practices meditation and Taijiquan. (Adapted from Source Mar 23, 2021)

Erik Zürcher was a Dutch Sinologist. From 1962 to 1993, Zürcher was a professor of history of East Asia at the Leiden University. He was also Director of the Sinological Institute, between 1975 and 1990. His Chinese name was Xǔ Lǐhe (许理和).

He studied Sinology, Buddhism, specializing in Chinese religions. In 1959, his PhD was over The Buddhist Conquest of China. In 1962 he became professor of history of East Asia, particularly the Chinese Buddhism, Chinese reactions to the Christianity and early relations between China and the outside world.

He was a member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences since 1975 and Associate of the Academie des Belles Lettres et des Incriptions of the Institut de France. He was also awarded the Medal of Honor for Art and Science in the Order of the House of Orange and made a Knight of the Order of the Netherlands Lion.

His son Erik-Jan Zürcher (born 1953) is a professor of Turkish languages and cultures at the University of Leiden and former director of the International Institute of Social History. (Source Accessed Jan 20, 2020)

DMITRY ERMAKOV was born in 1967 in Leningrad, Soviet Union, and trained as a classical musician from the age of six. He was raised in a highly cultural environment, attending after-school classes on ancient history, mythology and art history at the prestigious Hermitage Museum. During his summer holidays he often participated in archaeological digs led by his aunt, the former Head of Archaeology at Kiev University. In 1987 Dmitry joined the University of Leningrad's expedition to Khakassia near the Tuvan (Tyvan) border to excavate Scythian Kurgans. This was his first trip to Siberia.

His interest in Buddhism began in his childhood, with a book called Gods of the Lotus by Parfionov. The book details the author's trip to the Himalayas and it opened up a whole new world of deities and religions. Later, this interest was combined with martial arts based on Taoism and Zen philosophy, and Qi Gong, disciplines which were strictly forbidden in the Soviet Union. It was only with the coming of Perestroika in 1989 that Dmitry was able to meet Buddhist masters: receiving a blessing for the Lotus Sutra from a Japanese Zen master; and then teachings and initiations from a Tibetan Buddhist lamas: Bakula Rinpoche (1989), Khenchen Palden Sherab and Khenpo Tsewang Dongyal Rinpoches (1991), Namkhai Norbu Rinpoche (1992).

In 1993 Dmitry moved to the UK and in 1995 he met the great Bönpo master Yongdzin Lopon Tenzin Namdak Rinpoche. He has been practising Yungdrung Bon and attending Yongdzin Rinpoche's teachings ever since.

Dmitry first visited Buryatia in 1990 where he struck up a deep friendship with the Buddhist thangka-painter Batodalai Doogarov as well as with a several of the local bo and utgan shamans.

Welcomed into their circle, Dmitry was able to gain unique insight into the Buryatian spiritual tradition of Bo Murgel, insight which developed into a detailed study of the similarities and differences between this ancient tradition and Yungdrung Bon. With the patient help of Yongdzin Rinpoche, Dmitry spent years researching a large anthology, Bo and Bon: Ancient Shamanic Traditions of Siberia and Tibet in their Relation to the Teachings of a Central Asian Buddha, (2008), which sheds new light on both traditions.

Dmitry went on to study Tibetan at Oxford University with Prof. Charles Ramble (2009-2010) and, as well as having articles published in both English and Russian, has been invited to lecture in Oxford, London, St. Petersburg, Vilnius, Cagliari, Budapest etc. His knowledge of Tibetan brings a new level of scholarship to the books and transcripts he and his wife Carol produce for the international Bonpo sangha.

Dmitry currently lives in the North Pennines, UK, where he works as a freelance translator. Alongside his work for the Bon tradition, he is currently composing pieces for a new fusion album.

Ester Bianchi holds a Ph.D. in ‘Indian and East-Asian Civilization’ from the University of Venice (co-tutorial Ph.D. received from the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Section des Sciences Religieuses of Paris). She is currently associate professor of Chinese Literature, Chinese Religions and Philosophy, and Society and Culture of China at the University of Perugia (Italy); in the past, she has also been in charge of classes of Chinese Language (modern and classical) and Sinology. She is external associated researcher of the Groupe Sociétés, Religions, Laïcités CNRS-EPHE (2012-) and, together with Daniela Campo, directs the research project “當代中國、臺灣的戒律復興 – Vinaya Revival in 20th Century China and Taiwan” (funded by the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange, August 2015-July 2018).

Her studies focus on the religions of China, and particularly on Buddhism, both in imperial and in modern and contemporary time; her research is centered on Sino-Tibetan Buddhism, Chinese Buddhist monasticism and, more recently, the revival of Buddhist monastic discipline in China.

Ester Bianchi is the author of The Iron Statue Monastery, Tiexiangsi: A Buddhist Nunnery of Tibetan Tradition in Contemporary China (Firenze 2001), of a general book on the history, practices and cultural traditions of Daoism (Milano 2009), and of the first Italian translation of the Gaoseng Faxian zhuan (Faxian: un pellegrino cinese nell’India del V secolo, Perugia, 2012-13).

Her main publications include the following articles: “Subtle erudition and compassionate devotion: Longlian (1909-2006), the most outstanding bhiksuni in modern China” (in D. Ownby, V. Goossaert, Ji Zhe, eds., Making Saints in Modern China, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016- 2017, pp. 272-311), “Chinese Chantings of the Names of Mañjuśrī: The Zhenshi ming jing 真實名經 in Late Imperial and Modern China” (in V. Durand-Dastès ed., Empreintes du Tantrisme en Chine et en Asie Orientale. Imaginaires, rituals, influences, Leuven-Paris-Bristol: Peeters 2015, pp. 117-138), “A Religion-Oriented ‘Tibet Fever’. Tibetan Buddhist Practices Among the Han Chinese in Contemporary PRC” (in Dramdul and F. Sferra eds., From Mediterranean to Himalaya. A Festschrift to Commemorate the 120th Birthday of the Italian Tibetologist Giuseppe Tucci – 从地中海到喜马拉雅: 意大利著名藏学家朱塞佩·图齐 诞辰120周年纪念文集, Beijing: China Tibetology Publishing House 2014, pp. 347-374), “Yamāntaka-Vajrabhairava in Modern China. Analysis of 20th Century Translations from Tibetan” (in G. Orofino, S. Vita eds., Buddhist Asia 2, Kyoto: Italian School of East Asian Studies 2010, pp. 99-140), “The ‘Chinese lama' Nenghai (1886-1967). Doctrinal tradition and teaching strategies of a Gelukpa master in Republican China” (in M. Kapstein ed., Buddhism Between Tibet and China, Boston: Wisdom Publications 2009, pp. 295-346), “Protecting Beijing: The Tibetan Image of Yamāntaka-Vajrabhairava in Late Imperial and Republican China” (in M. Esposito ed., Images of Tibet in the 19th and 20th Centuries, Paris: l’École Française de l’Extrême Orient 2008, pp. 329-356), and “The Tantric Rebirth Movement in Modern China. Esoteric Buddhism re-vivified by the Japanese and Tibetan Traditions” (Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungarica 57, 1, 2004, pp. 31-54). (Source Accessed Feb 27, 2023)

Eva Natanya is a Teacher, Translator, Scholar, Philosopher, and Theologian.

I have studied the classical Tibetan language for over twenty years, and have translated hundreds of pages from the works of Je Tsongkhapa (1357-1419), as well as from such Gelukpa masters as Gyaltsab Je, Khedrub Je, the First Panchen Lama Lobsang Chukyi Gyaltsen, and Choney Lama Drakpa Shedrup. I also have significant experience reading and translating texts from the Great Perfection (Dzokchen) tradition of the Nyingma lineage. I care deeply about the nonsectarian (Rimé) movement in nineteenth century Tibetan history, and am committed to contemporary efforts that seek mutual understanding between the great lineages of Tibetan Buddhism. (Source Accessed April 23, 2024)

Eve Arnold was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to Russian immigrant parents. She began photographing in 1946, while working at a photo-finishing plant in New York City, and then studied photography in 1948 with Alexei Brodovitch at the New School for Social Research in New York.

Arnold first became associated with Magnum Photos in 1951 and became a full member in 1957. She was based in the US during the 1950s but went to England in 1962 to put her son through school; except for a six-year interval when she worked in the US and China, she lived in the UK for the rest of her life.

Her time in China led to her first major solo exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum in 1980, where she showed the resulting images. In the same year, she received the National Book Award for In China and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Society of Magazine Photographers.

In later years, she received many other honours and awards. In 1995, she was made fellow of the Royal Photographic Society and elected Master Photographer – the world’s most prestigious photographic honour – by New York’s International Center of Photography. In 1996, she received the Kraszna-Krausz Book Award for In Retrospect. The following year she was granted honorary degrees by the University of St Andrews, Staffordshire University, and the American International University in London; she was also appointed to the advisory committee of the National Museum of Photography, Film & Television in Bradford, UK. She has had twelve books published.

Eve passed away in January of 2012. (Source Accessed Feb 14, 2023)

Lama Tsering Everest was one of the main students of Chagdud Tulku Rinpoche, who recognized her as an emanation of Tara and a holder of the Red Tara lineage.

Born in the U.S.A., Lama Tsering has served Chagdud Tulku Rinpoche as his translator for more than 11 years. After completing a three year retreat in 1995, she was ordained as a lama and recognized by Chagdud Tulku Rinpoche as a holder of the Red Tara lineage, authorized to give teachings and empowerments. In the same year she was invited to teach in Brazil where she moved to shortly after.

She teaches and conducts retreats in many cities across Brazil, Chile, New Zealand and Australia as well as returning each year to fulfill the requests of her students in North America.

Lama Tsering is the resident lama and director of Chagdud Gonpa Odsal Ling in São Paulo and is currently coordinating the construction of Odsal Ling's temple in Cotia, Brasil, along with her husband Lama Padma Norbu. (Source: Rigpa Wiki)

Fabio Rambelli is an Italian academic, author, and editor. He is a professor in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB).

Fabio Rambelli was born in Ravenna, Italy. He earned a BA in Japanese language and culture from the University of Venice. In 1992, he was awarded his PhD in East Asian Studies from University of Venice and the Italian Ministry of Scientific Research. He also studied at the Oriental Institute in Naples and at the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies.

In 2001, Rambelli was a professor of religious studies, cultural studies, and Japanese religions at Sapporo University in Japan. At present, Rambelli holds the International Shinto Foundation Chair in Shinto Studies at UCSB. (Source Accessed April 6, 2020)

Carmen Dragonetti (born in Argentina, 1937) and Fernando Tola (born in Peru, 1915) are the most prestigious Indologists in the Spanish-speaking world, both being researchers from the National Council for Scientific and Technical Research, Argentina. They were President and Vice-President, respectively, of the Institute of Buddhist Studies Foundation (FIEB).

Both were professors at universities in Peru and Argentina. Dedicated to Indology and the study of Buddhism, they published a large number of books and articles in Spanish and English, containing highly reliable translations of Sanskrit, Pali, Chinese and/or Tibetan texts, such as the unsurpassed Tola versions of the Gita Govinda and the Bhagavad Gita, and Dragonetti's Dhammapada, which are remarkable for their beauty and clarity, one of the most relevant qualities of these authors as writers.

Other translations by the same authors include Five Mahayana Sutras, also published by Primorda Media, the Udana and The Sutra of Infinite Meanings, Wu liang i ching. (Adapted from Source Oct 4, 2022)

Fida Muhammad Hassnain (Urdu فدا حسنین; Srinagar, 1924 – 2016) was a Kashmiri writer, lecturer and Sufi mystic.

He was born in 1924 in Srinagar, Kashmir, as the child of school teachers. His father fought with the British Indian forces in the Boer War in South Africa in 1902. Fida Hassnain graduated from the University of Punjab and the Aligarh Muslim University, and became a barrister, but the events surrounding the partition of colonial British India made him lose faith in the law, and after a short period of social work he became a lecturer in 1947 at the Sri Patrap (SP) College in Srinagar. In 1954, he became Director of the Kashmir State Archives, retiring in 1983. Fida Hassnain died on 9 July 2016 in Srinagar, Kashmir.

His study tours resulted in the salvaging of several hundred manuscripts in Arabic, Sanskrit and Persian, which were housed in the Archives and Oriental Research Libraries. As an archaeologist, he conducted several excavations.

He has written several books on the subject of Lost years of Jesus and Kashmir,[7] which have been translated into Spanish, Italian, Polish, and Japanese. He has made frequent guest appearances in documentaries about the tomb of Roza Bal, supporting the teaching of the founder of Ahmadiyya Islam, Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (1899), that Jesus of Nazareth died in India. Christian theologians have been highly critical of Hassnain's works - Christian academics dismissing these claims include Günter Grönbold, Wilhelm Schneemelcher, Norbert Klatt, Per Beskow, and Gerald O'Collins.

In January 2009 the Jammu Kashmir Government recognized Hassnain for his lifetime contributions. (Source Accessed Dec 12, 2024)

• 1961 born in Staveren on March 28
• 1981-1986 sailor at shipping companies, Rotterdam
• 1986-1993 studied Indology at Leiden University
• 1991 studied at Hamburg University
• 1991-1996 studied philosophy at Leiden University
• 1997-2002 research fellow at the CNWS, Leiden University
• 2000-2002 substitute lecturer Buddhology and Indian philosophy, Leiden University
• 2004 PhD under the supervision of T.E. Vetter and Th.C.W. Oudemans, Leiden University
• 2002-present teacher at Stanislas College, Pijnacker

Francesca Tarocco is Visiting Associate Professor of Buddhist Cultures at NYU Shanghai. Prior to joining NYU Shanghai she was Lecturer in Buddhist Studies and Leverhulme Trust Research Fellow in Chinese History at the University of Manchester, UK.

Tarocco’s research interests are in the cultural history of China, Chinese Buddhism, visual culture and urban Asia. Her books include The Cultural Practices of Modern Chinese Buddhism: Attuning the Dharma (Routledge, 2007 and 2011) and The Re-enchantment of Modernity: Buddhism, Photography and Chinese History (2018). Her scholarly articles include “The City and the Pagoda: Buddhist Spatial Tactics in Shanghai” (2015), “Terminology and Religious Identity: The Genealogy of the Term Zongjiao,” (2012) and “On the Market: Consumption and Material Culture in Modern Chinese Buddhism” (Religion, 2011).

Tarocco is the co-founder and director of the international research initiative Shanghai Studies Society and a fellow of the Critical Collaborations network at the Institute for Advanced Study (NYU). She is the recipient of awards from the Leverhulme Trust, the Sutasoma Foundation and the Chinese Ministry of Education, among many others. Tarocco is a regular contributor of the contemporary visual culture journals Parkett, Flash Art International and Frieze.

Research Interests

History of Religion in China
Shanghai Buddhism
Buddhist Visual Culture
Chinese Photography
Chinese Diasporic Art
Global Visual Culture

Education

PhD, Chinese History, University of London
MA, Chinese Studies, University of London
MA, Chinese and Buddhist Studies, Venice University
(Source Accessed Jan 10, 2020)

Francis Woodman Cleaves (born in Boston in 1911 and died in New Hampshire on December 31, 1995) was a Sinologist, linguist, and historian who taught at Harvard University, and was the founder of Sino-Mongolian studies in America. He is well known for his translation of The Secret History of the Mongols.

Cleaves received his undergraduate degree in Classics from Dartmouth College, and then enrolled in the graduate program in Comparative Philology at Harvard, but transferred to the study of Far Eastern Languages under Serge Elisséeff in the mid-1930s, prior to the formal establishment of the department.

In 1935, on a fellowship from the Harvard-Yenching Institute, Cleaves went first to Paris, where he studied Mongolian and other Central Asian languages with the Sinologist Paul Pelliot for three years, then to Beijing where he studied with the Mongolist Antoine Mostaert S.J. Always an avid book collector, he also roamed the stalls and shops in Liulichang, the street for books and antiques. There he accumulated an extensive collection not only in Chinese and Mongolian, his own interests, but also in Manchu, which he did not plan to use himself. The books in Manchu were particularly rare and form the core of Harvard's Manchu collection.

Cleaves returned to Harvard in 1941 and taught Chinese in the Department of Far Eastern Languages as well as worked on the Harvard-Yenching Institute Chinese-English dictionary project. In the following year he received his Ph.D. with a dissertation entitled “A Sino-Mongolian Inscription on 1362,” and offered Harvard’s first course on the Mongolian language. Cleaves enlisted in the United States Navy and served in the Pacific. After the war ended, he helped to relocate Japanese citizens who had lived in China back to Japan and sorted through the books they left behind to find those suitable for shipping to the Harvard-Yenching Library.

In 1946, Cleaves returned to Harvard and proceeded to teach Chinese and Mongolian, without interruption, for the next thirty-five years. He is unique for being the only professor in the history of the department never to take a sabbatical. He trained his students in the traditional European sinology of his mentors. Among his best-known disciples were Joseph Fletcher, the distinguished Mongolist and historian, and Elizabeth Endicott-West, author of basic studies on the Yuan dynasty and History of Mongolia.

Cleaves had an especially close relation with William Hung, a preeminent scholar who had become his friend and mentor when they met in China in the 1930s. A mutual friend recalled that Cleaves was "an old-fashioned gentleman perhaps more at home with his cows, horses, and fellow farmers in New Hampshire than with the academic intrigues of Cambridge," while Hung was a "pragmatic Confucianist." The two would meet every weekday at three to sip tea and perhaps read from the Chinese classics or dynastic histories. Cleaves introduced Hung to the Mongol histories, and Hung published several articles in this field. Hung's article on the Secret History of the Mongols, however, drew conclusions which Cleaves did not feel were correct. Out of respect for his friend, Cleaves did not publish his own translation until 1985, after Hung's death.

Cleaves was renowned for his meticulously annotated translations of Chinese and Old Mongolian texts, and consistently emphasized literal philological accuracy over aesthetic beauty. He published over seventy books and articles, many of which were on bilingual Sino-Mongolian stele inscriptions from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. His largest project was a complete annotated translation of the Secret History of the Mongols, of which only the first volume was ever published. In order to give readers the flavor of the original, Cleaves restricted the vocabulary to words used in Elizabethan English, a decision which made the text hard for some readers to comprehend. In 1984, Paul Kahn published a translation based on Cleaves but using contemporary English.

A deeply committed teacher, Cleaves reluctantly retired in 1980, and continued his scholarship on Mongolian history. Much of his work, including notes on the remaining sections of the Secret History and manuscripts for dozens of additional articles, remained unpublished at the time of his death in 1995. (Source Accessed Mar 12, 2021)

François Chenique is a French essayist and author of studies on esotericism. He was a professor of computer science at Sciences-Po Paris and participated in the creation of one of the first computer management services within the Society of Pont-à-Mousson. He is a specialist in classical and modern logic and has written several books on this subject.

Chenique also held a doctorate in Religious Sciences from the University of Strasbourg. He devoted himself mainly to the study of Christian esotericism in the traditionalist tradition initiated by René Guénon. (Source Accessed Oct 18, 2019)

Françoise Pommaret (born 1954) is a French ethno-historian and Tibetologist.

Pommaret grew up in the Congo. She received her Master of Arts in the history of art and archeology from the Sorbonne University and completed her studies in Tibetan at the Institut national des langues et civilisations orientalest (INALCO). Her doctoral thesis on "People who come back from the netherland in the Tibetan cultural areas" received the prix Delalande-Guérineau from the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres.

She holds the position of Director of Research Emeritus at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) in Paris. Her work focuses on cultural anthropology in Bhutan and she has published extensively on different aspects of Bhutanese culture.[2][3]

She has worked in Bhutan since 1981 and with the Bhutan Tourism Corporation between 1981 and 1986, after which she participated in educational and cultural projects in Bhutan. She has been a consultant for UNESCO as well as guest-curator for exhibitions. She lectures around the world on aspects of Bhutanese history and culture.

Pommaret works as Associate Professor and adviser to the College of Language and Culture Studies (CLCS), Royal University of Bhutan and worked as scientific advisor to the Bhutan Cultural Atlas.

Pommaret is also honorary consul of France in Bhutan and the president of the association of Amis du Bhoutan (friends of Bhutan, founded 1987). (Source Accessed Nov 14, 2023)

Friedrich Weller (born July 22, 1889 in Markneukirchen, † November 19, 1980 in Leipzig) was a German philologist and Indologist. After graduating from high school, Friedrich Weller devoted himself to studying philology at the University of Leipzig before starting his work on Zum Lalita in 1915. . . .

After completing his habilitation in Indology at the University of Leipzig in 1922, he was appointed private lecturer in Chinese and East Asian religious history at the Philological and Historical Department of the Faculty of Philosophy, which he completed until 1928. Immediately thereafter, Weller received the unscheduled professorship for Sanskrit , Chinese and East Asian religious history, before he took over the chair for Indian philology in 1938, which he held until his retirement in 1958. In 1933 he signed the professors' declaration of Adolf Hitler at German universities and colleges.

Weller was a full member of the Saxon Academy of Sciences from 1943 to 1980. In 1955 he was awarded the GDR's second class national prize for science and technology. In recognition of his services in the field of Indology, the Friedrich Weller Prize, endowed with 2500 euros, was launched in 1985. (Source Accessed Mar 10, 2021)

Ani Migme as she was known to anyone who met her during her long tenure at Gampo Abbey for many she embodied what it was to be a western Buddhist monastic. Her commitment to monasticism was unwavering and her influence on life at Gampo Abbey was all pervasive. In 2008 a short biography and interview with Ani Migme The Fortunate Life of Ani Migme was included in the Abbey’s newsletter The Lionsroar. https://gampoabbey.org/files/2016/10/Ani-Migme-a-Fortunate-Life.pdf.

In addition to her unwavering commitment to the monastic tradition Migme Chödrön worked tirelessly to make the dharma available to others through her work as a transcriber, editor and translator of Buddhist teachings. Gampo Abbey has had the privilege to host many prominent Buddhist teachers over the years most of whom would give teachings to the community. Ani Migme transcribed and edited all of these teachings which amounted to dozens of talks, most in the early years were done with a manual typewriter. Many of these talks became the basis for some of the earliest published teachings of their kind available to western students including Acharya Pema Chödrön’s first book. In later years working in conjunction with Lodro Sangpo under the mandate of the Chökyi Gyatso Translation Committee, Ani Migme translated many scholarly Buddhist texts from French into English. For more details on her translation work visit the Karma Changchub Ling website.

Gelongma Migme Chödrön has produced translations of the following texts:

Mahāprajñāpāramitāśāstra. Translated by Étienne Lamotte.
Vijñaptimātratāsiddhi. Translated by Louis de La Vallée Poussin.
Mahāyānasaṃgraha. Translated by Étienne Lamotte.
Les Sectes Bouddhiques du Petit Véhicule. By André Bareau.
La Saveur de l’Immortel (Amṛtarasa). Translated by Van den Broeck.
Vie et chants de ‘Brug-pa Kun-legs le yogin (The Life and Songs of Drugpa Kunlegs). Translated by R.A. Stein. (Note that Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche was said to be an incarnation of Drugpa Kunlegs, who was known as the Madman of Bhutan.)

Founder of TBRC, now BDRC

• Obituary on 84000
• Obituary in Washington Post
• Documentary film about his life and work: Digital Dharma

Biography from BDRC:

E. Gene Smith (BDRC Founder and Senior Research Scholar) was born in Ogden, Utah in 1936. He studied at a variety of institutions of higher education in the United States: Adelphi College, Hobart College, University of Utah, and the University of Washington in Seattle.

In 1959, the Rockefeller Foundation, seeing the opportunity to promote Tibetan studies, funded the establishment of nine centers of excellence worldwide, one of which was at the University of Washington.

Under the auspices of the Rockefeller grant to the Far Eastern and Russian Institute, nine Tibetans were brought to Seattle for teaching and research, including the Ven. Deshung Rinpoche Kunga Tenpai Nyima, the tutor to the Sakya Phuntsho Phodrang. Smith had the good fortune to study Tibetan culture as well as Buddhism with Deshung Rinpoche and the rest of the Tibetan teachers in Seattle from 1960 to 1964. He lived with the Sakya family for five years. He spent the summer of 1962 travelling to the other Rockefeller centers in Europe to meet with the Tibetan savants there.

In 1964 he completed his Ph.D. qualifying exams and travelled to Leiden for advanced studies in Sanskrit and Pali. In 1965 he went to India under a Foreign Area Fellowship Program (Ford Foundation) grant to study with living exponents of all of the Tibetan Buddhist and Bonpo traditions.

He began his studies with Geshe Lobsang Lungtok (Ganden Changtse), Drukpa Thoosay Rinpoche and Khenpo Noryang, and H.H. Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche. He decided to remain in India to continue serious study of Tibetan Buddhism and culture. He travelled extensively in the borderlands of India and Nepal. In 1968 he joined the Library of Congress New Delhi Field Office. He then began a project which was to last over the next two and a half decades: the reprinting of the Tibetan books which had been brought by the exile community or were with members of the Tibetan-speaking communities in Sikkim, Bhutan, India, and Nepal.

He became field director of the Library of Congress Field Office in India in 1980 and served there until 1985 when he was transferred to Indonesia. He stayed in Jakarta running the Southeast Asian programs until 1994 when he was assigned to the LC Middle Eastern Office in Cairo.

In February 1997 he took early retirement from the U.S. Library of Congress to become a consultant to the Trace Foundation for the establishment of the Himalayan and Inner Asian Resources (HIAR) library.

In December 1999 he and a group of friends established the Tibetan Buddhist Resource Center in Cambridge.

He passed away on December 16, 2010. (Source Accessed on June 30, 2020)

Geoffrey Samuel’s research extends over a number of interrelated areas within religious studies, social anthropology, comparative sociology, and cognate disciplines. Theoretically, his interests centre around an understanding of cultural processes and their effects on human behaviour, in terms which recognise the embodied character of human existence and which give proper weight to both human consciousness and biology. He is particularly interested in religion (including ‘shamanism’) in relation to healing, gender and ecology, including the ways in which these issues manifest in contemporary societies.

His main ethnographic focus has been on religion in Tibetan societies. His work on Tibetan religion has also extended into the social history of Indic religions more generally. Other research topics include Tibetan medicine and health practices, the anthropology of music, research on Buddhism and other new religious movements (paganism, shamanism, esotericism) in the UK and Australia, and research into Islam in the UK and Bangladesh. He has carried out extensive field research over many years in India, Nepal, Tibet, and other Asian and Western societies.

His recent research, organised through the Research Group on the Body, Health and Religion (BAHAR), focusses on the understanding of healing processes in a variety of contexts: folk healing practices in Asian societies, ‘traditional’ Asian medical and yogic practices aimed at healing, and Western adaptations and developments of such practices within the field of complementary and alternative medicine. This research has included two major externally-funded projects under his direction, an AHRC-funded project on Tibetan longevity practices (with Cathy Cantwell and Rob Mayer) and a Leverhulme Trust-funded project on Tibetan medicine in the Bon tradition (with Colin Millard). Currently he is involved in a Templeton Foundation-funded project on meditation-derived compassion training for nurses and other health staff in Sydney, NSW.

In 2008-11, he also took part in an ESRC-funded project on young Bangladeshis, marriage and the family in Bangladesh and the UK directed by Dr Santi Rozario.
(Source Accessed Aug 7, 2020)

Ven. George Churinoff (Gelong Thubten Tsultrim) has taught and studied in FPMT centers around the world. Since attending his first November Course in Kopan in 1974 and ordaining in 1975, he has studied extensively. A physics graduate from MIT, Venerable George earned a Masters degree in Buddhist studies from Delhi University, India. He took ordination in 1975 and studied the Geshe Studies Program at Manjushri Institute, England, where he also served as Spiritual Program Coordinator.

Venerable George was instrumental in founding the Masters Program at Istituto Lama Tzong Khapa in Italy, where he also served as Program Coordinator. After studying and teaching there for eight years he spent several years at Tushita Centre in Delhi, followed by three years as Lama Osel Rinpoche's English curriculum tutor at Sera Je Monastery in South India. Venerable George has done many retreats in the sutra and tantra traditions and taught extensively in FPMT centers all over the world. He taught the Basic Program as resident teacher at Dorje Chang Institute, New Zealand and at Land of Medicine Buddha, USA. Venerable George now resides in Asheville, NC. (Source Accessed Aug 19, 2021)

For 35 years, Tanabe has been a key figure in Hawaiʻi in the field of religion, mainly in the area of Japanese Buddhism, focusing his efforts on educating students and doing research. He visited Japanese universities and fostered networks with the research faculty and coordinated academic symposiums such as the International Conference on the Lotus Sutra and Japanese Culture.

In 1974, Tanabe received a masters of arts in Japanese from the Department of East Asian Languages at Columbia University. He then spent two years researching Buddhist philosophy and history at the University of Tokyo as a foreign research student.

In 1977, he joined the faculty of the Department of Religion at UH Mānoa, where he taught religion and Buddhist philosophy for 28 years. Tanabe also served as the chair of the religion department from 1991 to 2001.

In 2006, Tanabe became an emeritus professor at the university and continued his writing and lectures. That year, he also became an advisor of the Numata Center at the Bukkyō Dendō Kyōkai. In 2001, following the Ehime Maru incident, Tanabe assisted and advised the American side on issues of varying sensitivities involving Japan culture and religion.

Among his published titles are Japanese Buddhist Temples in Hawaiʻi: An Illustrated Guide, which he wrote and researched with his wife Willa Tanabe, and Practically Religious: Worldly Benefits and the Common Religion of Japan, co-authored with Ian Reader. He is also general editor for the Topics in Contemporary Buddhism series. (Source Accessed June 2, 2023)

Georges B. J. Dreyfus (born 1950 in Switzerland) is an academic in the fields of Tibetology and Buddhology, with a particular interest in Indian Buddhist philosophy. In 1985 he was the first Westerner to receive the Geshe Lharampa degree, the highest available within the Tibetan scholastic tradition.

He currently is Jackson Professor of Religion at Williams College, Massachusetts. (Source Accessed March 13, 2024)

Gerhard Oberhammer (born 1929) studied theology and philosophy in Innsbruck before he turned his attention to Indology. In 1964 he succeeded Erich Frauwallner (1898–1974) as head of the Institute for Indology at the University of Vienna. He held this professorship until his retirement in 1997. His first co-operation with the ÖAW took place in 1970, when Oberhammer, with the support of Cardinal Franz König and the Academy, founded the De Nobili Research Library, which is now located at the ISTB of the University of Vienna on permanent loan from the ÖAW. From 1983 Oberhammer oversaw the "Commission for Languages and Cultures of South and East Asia," founded by Frauwallner, as well as the "Research Unit for Cultural and Intellectual History of Asia" that had been formed in 1986. The two units merged into an institute (the IKGA) in 1991, with Oberhammer serving as its director until his retirement in 1997.

The most important projects conducted or initiated at the Institute under Oberhammer's directorship include:

• Dictionary of Indian Epistemology and Logic (1983–2006), with the co-operation of Ernst Prets and Joachim Prandstätter.

• The Tāntrikābhidhānakośa Project: A Hindu Tantric Dictionary (since 1993), with the co-operation of Marion Rastelli.

• History of the Rāmānuja School (1994–2010), with the co-operation of Marcus Schmücker and Marion Rastelli. This project led to the work on the Viṣṇu philosopher Veṅkaṭanātha (traditionally dated 1270-1369), which remains a key topic at the IKGA.

• Hermeneutics of religion, an interdisciplinary research topic that highlights in particular the encounter of and the dialogue between western and eastern religions. (Source Accesed Jan 30, 2024)

Venerable Geshe Dorji Damdul is presently Director - Tibet House, New Delhi. He has undertaken several projects for His Holiness the Dalai Lama, serving as the primary translator for many of his works. Born in 1968, Geshe Dorji Damdul earned his Geshe Lharampa Degree in 2002 from Drepung Loseling Monastic University.

He has a most fantastic analytical mind, and his skillful technique ensures that most practitioners understand the wisdom rooted behind their practice. Geshe La regularly gives teachings at Tibet House and Deer Park Institute. (Source Accessed Oct 27, 2021)

Venerable Geshe Lhakdor is the Director of the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives in Dharamsala. Geshe La was born in western Tibet and came to India, completing advanced degrees at the University of Delhi and Punjab and continuing on to complete a full Geshe degree at Drepung Loseling Monastic University in south India. He has held many posts in support of the Dharma, as well as translating many texts, some from Tibetan to English, and some from English to Tibetan including:

• Shantideva's Compendium of Precepts (Shikshasamucchaya)
• The Three Essential Meanings (Nyingpo Donsum)
• Tsongkhapa's Three Principal Aspects of Path
• Words of Manjushri by the Fifth Dalai lama (into English)
• Versified Lamrim by Dvagpo Ngawang Drakpa (Into English)
• Universe in a Single Atom (into Tibetan)
  • Co-translator, co-editor, co-producer (partial list)
    • The Way to Freedom, by HH Dalai Lama, HarperCollins (USA)
    • The Joy of Living and Dying in Peace by HH Dalai Lama, HarperCollins
    • Awakening the Mind and Lightening the Heart by HH Dalai Lama, HarperCollins
    • Stages of Meditation by HH Dalai Lama, Snow Lion Publications, Ithaca NY, USA
    • His Holiness's Commentary of Nagarjuna's Fundamental Wisdom (into Tibetan)
    • Kindness, Clarity and Insight by HH Dalai Lama (into Tibetan)
    • His Holiness's Commentary on Nagarjuna's Letter to the Friend (into Tibetan)
    • His Holiness's Extensive Commentary on Thogme Zangpo's 37 Bodhisattava Practices.

The late Geshe Lobsang Dargyay was trained at Drepung Monastery in Tibet. He got his doctorate in Buddhist and Tibetan Studies from the Ludwig Maximilians Universität and held teaching and research positions in Vienna, Hamburg, and Calgary. Geshe-la was the first Tibetan to receive a doctorate from a Western university. He passed away in 1994. (Source Accessed Sept 23, 2020)

For a more complete biography, see "In Memoriam: Geshe Lobsang Dargyay (1935–94)" by Eva Neumaier, in Freedom from Extremes: Gorampa's "Distinguishing the Views" and the Polemics of Emptiness (Wisdom Publications, 2007), xi–xiv.

Geshe Tengye was born in Lhatse, Tibet, in 1927. He went to the local monastery at the age of six. He followed a traditional path of in-depth monastic Buddhist study until the 1959 Chinese takeover of Tibet. He went into exile in India and continued his geshe studies at Buxa Chogar, the camp for refugee monks in Buxa Duar, West Bengal, India. Despite illness and hardship, Geshe Tengye received the lharampa geshe degree in 1969.

In 1980, at the request of FPMT co-founder Lama Thubten Yeshe, Geshe Tengye became the resident teacher at Institut Vajra Yogini (IVY), the newly established FPMT center located in the south of France near Toulouse. Due to Geshe Tengye’s infinite patience, wisdom, and compassion, IVY has grown into a large and flourishing Dharma center. (Source Accessed Apr 6, 2021)

Geshe Nawang L. Nornang (Nor nang Ngag dbang blo mthun) was born on 9 December, 1924, the wood-rat year, to Rdo rje rgyal po and Dbyangs can of the aristocratic Nor nang family, the sixth of their nine children, at a time when his father was commissioner of Sku rnam Rdzong in Dwags po.

In 1933, Geshela entered the G.yul sgang private school in Lhasa where he studied reading and writing until 1937. Thereafter he spent a year under the tutelage of his maternal uncle, Thub bstan kun mkhyen, one of the chief secretaries (drung yig che mo) of the Ecclesiastic Office (Yig tshang).

In 1938, he took his novice vows in the presence of the Stag brag Regent, and he was enrolled in Dwags po Bshad sgrub rnam rgyal ba’i gling, a monastery noted for its strict devotion to scholarship and discipline. There he was tutored by Dge bshes Blo bzang dbyigs bsnyen in logic, philosophy and ritual, following a standard Dge-lugs-pa curriculum which included the Abhisamayālaṃkāra and other Prajñāpāramitā works, the Abhidharmakośa and its commentaries, the Madhyamakāvatāra and the major works of Tsong kha pa on Madhyamaka, works by the 19thgdan rab of Dwags po, Rje byams pa chos mchog and on logic by Phur bu lcog yongs ‘dzin. As a chos mdzad, a monk whose family makes a substantial contribution to the monastery and is thereby excused from the obligatory labor of a young monk, he was also allowed to visit his family in Lhasa for three months a year.

In 1946, Geshela took his vows as fully ordained monk and served as a tutor at Bshad sgrub gling. In 1948, he served for two years as monastic treasurer (phyag mdzod). In 1950, monastic stores were almost depleted due to the over-enrolment of monks, and the monastery petitioned the government for a permit to solicit funds and supplies. Geshela was in charge of this mission and travelled extensively throughout Central Tibet in order to do so. He also visited India twice on wool-trading trips in 1953 and 1956, when he also completed the pilgrimage at Bodh Gaya during the 2500th anniversary of the parinirvāṇa of the Buddha. He also continued his studies toward the geshe degree which he completed just before the 1959 revolt in Tibet. Unfortunately the political turmoil of that year prevented the formal conferral of the degree.

From 1954 on, as the representative for his monastery, he also went annually to Lhasa for the “Great Prayer Festival” (Smon lam chen mo), when the government would honor a request to supply monasteries with fiscal help.

At the time of the revolt in 1959, he was in Lhasa for the Great Prayer Festival. After the Dalai Lama fled, he returned to his monastery, but Chinese military movements in the area forced him to flee south through E, Gnyal, Bya yul, Klo yul and the Northeast Frontier Area of India. After two months at Misamari refugee camp he took up residence in Kalimpong with relatives and lived there until 1960, when he and his niece, Lhadon Karsip (Rnam rgyal lha sgron Skyar srib), were brought to the University of Washington by Professor Turrell V. Wylie as Tibetan language instructors in the University’s newly-established Tibet Studies Program, the first of its kind in the United States.

At this time, the Far Eastern Languages Department at the University of Washington had also contracted with the US Office of Education under the National Defense Education Act to produce the first systematic study and teaching materials of the Lhasa dialect of Tibetan. His work with the linguists Chang Kun and Betty Shefts Chang over the next three years resulted in their Manual of Spoken Tibetan (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1964), as well as material that Chang & Shefts published later (Spoken Tibetan Texts, Taipei:Institute of History and Philology, Academia Sinica, 1978-1980). After the NDEA contract expired in 1963, Geshela was hired by the Department of Asian Languages and Literature as Tibetan language instructor, where he remained until his retirement in 1985.

During this time he also coauthored with Melvyn C. Goldstein Modern Spoken Tibetan: Lhasa Dialect (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1970). It would be no exaggeration to say that, through these works, particularly the latter, Geshela became the primary teacher of Lhasa Tibetan to a generation of scholars. In addition to his language teaching duties, Geshela worked tirelessly for his students and colleagues at the University of Washington, giving generously of his time and knowledge to help students and scholars with their projects, whether they involved translations from Tibetan, questions in Buddhist philosophy or other social and cultural subjects. His influence and assistance, acknowledged or otherwise, is found in many works of students who passed through the Tibetan program at the University of Washington and elsewhere for more than a quarter of a century and even well beyond the time he retired. He was always available to help many new Tibetans settle in when they came to live in the Seattle area, and he volunteered to teach Tibetan to Tibetan children for more than twelve years. (Source Accessed Oct 31, 2023)

Geshe Ngawang Sonam received his novice monk’s vows in 1996 from the late Kyabje Dhakpa Rinpoche and his full ordination as a Bikshu from His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama in 1997. In 2008, after placing first in his examinations in his last year of Madhyamika Philosophy, he was selected to become one of the English translators for His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Since 2008, he has travelled extensively with His Holiness to nine countries around the world. In 2009, Sera Mey Monastery conferred upon him the Rigchung Degree.

In 2011, he travelled to several Tibetan camps in South India and gave extensive talks on Buddhism. He joined the Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama in 2016 and simultaneously completed his two final years of Gelugpa University Examinations. He became a Geshe Lharampa, [equivalent of Doctor of Divinity] in January 2019. Geshe Ngawang Sonam has been a speaker at conferences with scientists on many occasions, including two panels on Quantum Physics and Buddhism last fall. He has taught in India at various Buddhist communities and given lectures at Tibetan schools and college hostels. (Source Accessed Apr 7, 2025)

Geshe Pema Dorjee is an internationally recognized authority, scholar, and teacher of Tibetan Buddhism. His fluent English, keen intellect, clear and practical explanations, warm-hearted nature, and infectious sense of humor enrich his talks and discussions with meaning and inspiration.

He was born into a nomadic family in Tibet in 1951. They escaped from the invading Chinese, and he settled in Dharamsala, India, the seat of the Tibetan government-in-exile and the home of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.

From 1973 to 1981 at the Institute of Buddhist Dialectics founded by H.H. the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala, he completed an undergraduate degree and two Masters degrees in Buddhist Philosophy, one in Prajnaparamita (the Perfection of Wisdom) and one in Madhyamika (the Middle Way).

For the next 16 years, he dedicated himself to the Tibetan Children’s Village School located in Dharamsala. For nine of those years, he taught Tibetan Buddhism, language, and culture. In 1990, he was appointed Principal of the school, and from 1993 to 1997 he was its Director.

In 1995, he earned his Geshe degree at the Drepung Loseling Monastery.

Geshe Pema Dorjee served for two years as the Principal of the Tibetan Teachers Training Center. He was then named the first Principal of the College for Higher Tibetan Studies, and he remained in charge of that College from 1997 to 2002.

The Tibetan government-in-exile asked him to undertake various tasks. The Cabinet, for example, appointed him to the Higher Level Textbook Review Committee. His Holiness appointed him as a member of the Public Service Commission. The Department of Health appointed him as spiritual counselor to former political prisoners who had been tortured.

In 2001, H. H. the Dalai Lama asked Geshe Pema Dorjee to revive an important part of Tibetan Buddhism that had fallen into desuetude, the Bodong tradition. Fulfilling this task required him to establish both a scholarly project and a very practical one. To find the lost writings of that ancient tradition, to study them, translate them, and publish them, he founded in 2003 and continues to direct the Bodong Research and Publication Center in Dharamsala. To educate new monks in the Bodong tradition, he founded and continues to direct the Bodong monastery and school known as Porong Pelmo Choeding in Kathmandu, Nepal.

Although he insists that he is only a simple monk, Geshe Pema Dorjee lives the compassionate life about which he preaches. He travels to the most remote and impoverished regions of Himalayan India and Nepal. After a thorough analysis of what is most needed, he creates, organizes, directs, and raises funds for numerous humanitarian projects.

These projects include establishing schools, arranging medical care for the sick and injured, providing care for the elderly, creating an orphanage, supporting a drug rehabilitation center, educating villagers to protect them from human trafficking, creating a safe house for street girls, helping young people in Tibetan refugee camps, introducing new agricultural techniques, and providing safe water, toilets, and smokeless cookstoves.

Since 1997, he has donated much of his time to teaching and lecturing about Buddhist philosophy in countries around the world, including Sweden, England, Switzerland, Belgium, Germany, Finland, Norway, France, Estonia, India, Nepal, and Israel.

Since 2009, Geshe Pema Dorjee has lectured and taught in cities across the United States, including New York, Chicago, Minneapolis, Portland, Miami, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., Boston and Cambridge. (Source: Tibet House US)

Geshe Sonam Ngodrup, was born in 1968 in the Ganze region of Kham, Tibet and left at the age of 13 to study Buddhism in India. He was ordained as a novice monk at Sera Jey Monastery that year, and at the age of 21 received full ordination from His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Over the years he regularly attended many of His Holiness’ teachings in India. At Sera Jey, he studied the philosophical texts primarily with Khensur Rinpoche Dorje Tashi, Khensur Rinpoche Lobsang Delek, and Geshe Karma Sonam.

Geshe la graduated as a Geshe Lharampa from Sera Jey Monastery in first position in 2003, and in 2004 completed a year of tantric studies at Gyumed Monastery in Hunsur. He was one of the most popular petri geygan (official scripture teachers) at Sera Jey with several hundred students, teaching complex topics of the monastic curriculum. He also served in various capacities at the monastery including as khangtsen gen at Tehor Khangtsen. In addition, Geshe la taught sutra studies at Dzongkhar Choede and Gyumed monasteries where his classes were in high demand. In 2011, Geshe la came to the West, teaching the topics of the Basic Program first at Nalanda Monastery in France and then at Maitreya Institute in the Netherlands, in addition to courses on introductory Buddhism throughout Europe. While in Europe he received teachings and empowerments from His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche in particular.

In 2019, Geshe la settled in Canada. He is a well-loved teacher whose vast scriptural knowledge is tempered by a naturally humble nature and profound non-sectarian approach to the study of the teachings. (Source Accessed Nov 24, 2025)

Venerable Geshe Tenzin Chodrak (Dadul Namgyal) is a prominent scholar in Tibetan Buddhism. He has a doctorate (Geshe Lharampa) in Buddhism and Philosophy from the Drepung Monastic University earned in 1992. He also holds a Master’s degree in English Literature from Panjab University in Chandigarh, India.

Author of several articles on Buddhism, Geshe-la was also a professor of Philosophy at Central Institute of Higher Tibetan Studies at Sarnath, Varanasi, India for seven years. In addition, he has been the Spiritual Director of LSLK Tibetan Buddhist Center, Knoxville, USA.

Due to his facility in both Tibetan and English, he has served as interpreter and speaker for numerous conferences exploring the interface of Buddhism with modern science, Western philosophy and psychology, and other religious traditions on both a national and international level. His language ability has also enabled him to serve as an English language translator for His Holiness the Dalai Lama throughout the world.

As a published author and translator, Geshe-la’s credits include a Tibetan translation of His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s Power of Compassion, a language manual, Learn English through Tibetan, and a critical work on Tsongkhapa’s Speech of Gold. He also serves as a Board Member for Tibet House, New York.

From 2010 until recently, he had served as Senior Resident Teacher at Drepung Loseling Monastery in Atlanta. Around the same time, he began full-time position as Senior Translator/Interpreter with the Center for Contemplative Science and Compassion-based Ethics at Emory University, Atlanta. There he was working in producing a six-year bilingual (English and Tibetan) science curriculum and preparing additional research & pedagogy materials in Modern Science for use in Tibetan monasteries and nunneries.

Geshe-la visited several times, inspiring us with his passion for Madhyamaka philosophy and his sheer joy in sharing Buddha’s teachings. See photos of Geshe-la teaching at Sravasti Abbey in 2016.

The Sravasti Abbey community is delighted that Geshe-la is now a resident teacher at the Abbey. He brings his abundant knowledge, compassion, and humility and acts as an excellent role model for new monastics at the Abbey. Since joining our community, he has decided to go by his ordination name, Venerable Tenzin Chodrak. (Source: sravastiabbey.org)

Geshe Thubten Soepa was born in Zanskar, India in 1955. At the age of fourteen he entered the monastery of Dromo Geshe Rinpoche in Kalimpong and at 19, he was sent to Sera Je Monastery in South India.

Geshe Soepa took his novice vows before Serkong Tsenshab Rinpoche and his full vows before Kyabje Ling Dorjechang, the 97th head of the Gelug tradition (Tib: Ganden Tri Rinpoche). He also received many teachings and initiations from them, as well as from Ganden Zong Rinpoche. He attained the lharumpa geshe degree at Sera Je in 1997.

After three years as resident teacher at Dzongkha Chode monastery, Lama Zopa Rinpoche invited Geshe Soepa to be the resident geshe of Aryatara Institut in Munich, Germany, where he taught for ten years.

Geshe Soepa has travelled extensively in Europe and the United States, and teaches at many FPMT centers around the world. He is respected for his teachings on cherishing animals and is well known for his advocacy of animal rights and his stance on leading a vegetarian life.

Protecting the Lives of Helpless Beings, a book by Geshe Soepa, presents a detailed discussion in support of vegetarianism and animal welfare.

He passed away in Mysore, India, on November 2, 2022. (Source Accessed Oct 29, 2021)

Ngawang Wangyal (Tibetan: ངག་དབང་དབང་རྒྱལ་, Wylie: Ngag-dbang Dbang-rgyal), aka Sogpo (Mongolian) Wangyal, popularly known as "Geshe Wangyal" and "America's first lama," was a Buddhist lama and scholar of Kalmyk origin who was born in the Astrakhan province in southeast Russia sometime in 1901. He developed the code for the CIA that aided the Dalai Lam's escape from Tibet, spearheaded a two decade long undertaking to lift political proscriptions on US visits by the Dalai Lama, opened the first Tibetan Buddhist dharma center in the West, and trained the first generation of Tibetan Buddhist scholars in America. He is considered a "founding figure" of Buddhism in the West.

(Read more here)

The first of the Katok Getse (kaH thog dge rtse) incarnations, Gyurme Tsewang Chokdrup, Katok Getse Mahapandita (1761-1829) was an important Nyingma scholar from Katok Monastery who famously wrote a catalogue to the Nyingma Gyübum.

He was born in the Iron Snake year of the thirteenth calendrical cycle (1761) and recognized as an incarnation of Tsewang Trinlé, the nephew of Longsal Nyingpo (1625-1692). His teachers included Dodrupchen Kunzang Shenpen, Ngor Khenchen Palden Chökyong, Changkya Rolpé Dorje and Dzogchenpa Ati Tenpé Gyaltsen. Through his connection with the Derge royal family, he arranged for the printing of the Collection of Nyingma Tantras (Nyingma Gyübum) and the writings of Longchenpa and Jikmé Lingpa, and took responsibility for proofreading. Among his students were the Third Dzogchen Rinpoche and the Third Shechen Rabjam, Rigdzin Paljor Gyatso (1770-1809). (Source Accessed Feb 18, 2022)

See also:

• Deity, Mantra and Wisdom: Development Stage Meditation in Tibetan Buddhist Tantra, translated by the Dharmachakra Translation Committee, Snow Lion, 2007.
  • Ronis, Jann M. “Celibacy, Revelations, and Reincarnated Lamas: Contestation and Synthesis in the Growth of Monasticism at Katok Monastery from the 17th through 19th Centuries”. Available from the University of Virginia, here.
• Tomoko Makidono, "Kah thog Dge rtse Mahāpaṇḍita’s Doxographical Position: The Great Madhyamaka of Other-Emptiness (gzhan stong dbu ma chen po)" in Indian International Journal of Buddhist Studies (IIJBS) vol. 12 (2011), pp. 77-119
• Tomoko Makidono, "The Turning of the Wheel of Mantrayāna Teachings in the Rnying ma rgyud ’bum dkar chag lha’i rnga bo che by Kaḥ thog Dge rtse Mahāpaṇḍita ’Gyur med tshe dbang mchog grub (149-186)" in IIJBS vol. 13 (2012), pp. 149-186

Gharungwa Lhai Gyeltsen (g+ha rung ba lha'i rgyal mtshan) was born at Nyetang (snye thang) in 1319.

At five years of age he received ordination as a novice monk at Kumbumtang (sku 'bum thang) and began studies of the monastic code. For two years he also studied Prajñāpāramitā, epistemology, and Abhidharma. Then he traveled to many different monasteries in U for further studies in the same subjects and others such as the Bodhisattvacaryāvatāra and the Five Treatises of Maitreya. While at the great Karma Kaygu monastery of Tsurpu (mtshur phu), he received the transmission of several tantras from the clairvoyant yogin Tokden Drakseng (rtogs ldan grags seng), who also recognized him as an incarnation of the Indian master Aryadeva.

When he was twenty years old Gharungwa traveled to the Tsang region, where he reached a high level of expertise in the treatises of the vehicle of the perfections, epistemology, Abhidharma, and the monastic code under the teacher Konchok Sangpo (slob dpon dkon bzang, d.u.) at Drakram Monastery (brag ram). He also studied and taught at many other places before arriving at the great monastery of Sakya (sa skya), where he studied the same subjects under the master Jamyang Chokyi Gyeltsen ('jam dbyangs chos kyi rgyal mtshan, d.u.), but also received the Tantra Trilogy of Hevajra and the Bodhisattva Trilogy.

He then studied at Pelteng Monastery (dpal steng dgon) under the master Rinchen Zangpo (rin chen bzang po, d.u.), and next traveled to the Kagyu monastery of Ralung (ra lung dgon), where he received many tantric transmissions such as the initiations of Hevjara in both the Sakya and the Kagyu traditions and the Doha Trilogy of the great Indian adept Saraha. While at Ralung, he heard about Dolpopa Sherab Gyeltsen (dol po pa shes rab rgyal mtshan) and was filled with faith.

When Gharungwa was thirty-two years old he arrived at Jonang Monastery (jo nang dgon) and met Dolpopa. He offered the great master a white conch shell and other gifts and received many initiations such as Kālacakra and Guhyasamāja, and all the guiding instructions such as the six-branch yoga. He gained exceptional experience in meditation, actually beheld Avalokiteśvara and his pure land, and experienced pure visions such as the transformation of himself into a buddha and the light rays of his own body illuminating the entire three worlds. For many years Gharungwa received from Dolpopa a number of profound teachings such as the Bodhisattva Trilogy and the ten sutras of definitive meaning.

Gharungwa also received special transmissions from some of Dolpopa's other major disciples: from Kunpang Chodrak Pelzang (kun spangs chos grags dpal bzang, 1283-1363) he received the Vimalaprabhā commentary on the Kālacakra Tantra seven times, the instructions of the six-branch yoga, Nāropa's commentary on the Sekoddesha, and so forth; from Jonang Lotsāwa Lodro Pel (jo nang lo tsA wa blo gros dpal, 1299-c.1353) he received the Vimalaprabhā and other tantric teachings; from Mati Paṇchen (ma ti paN chen blo gros rgyal mtshan, 1294-1376) he received many teachings such as the Five Treatises of Maitreya and the Lamdre (lam 'bras); from Chokle Namgyel (phyogs las rnam rgyal, 1306-1386) and Nyawon Kunga Pel (nya dbon nun dga' dpal, 1285-1379) he received many transmissions such as the Lamdre in both the Sakya tradition and the Shang tradition, and the Bodhisattva Trilogy.

Gharungwa then ascended to the monastic seat of Gharung Monastery (g+ha rung), where he taught for many years. He was eventually offered the hermitage of Namkha Dzod (nam mkha' mdzod) and took up residence there, teaching the Vimalaprabhā and various other topics.

He passed away in 1401.

Gherardo Gnoli (6 December 1937 in Rome – 7 March 2012 in Cagli) was a historian of Italian religions and Iran expert.

Gherardo Gnoli has been since 1996 the president of the Italian Institute for Africa and the East (IsIAO). He was also the head of the Public Counsel Institute and later the Italian Institute for the Middle and the Far East (ISMEO), which had been founded in 1933 by Giovanni Gentile and Giuseppe Tucci. He headed the Italy-Africa Institute (IIA), which had been founded in 1906 under the name of "Italian Colonial Institute" by Italian explorers, academics and diplomats.

He was a professor of Iranian philosophy at the University of Naples "L'Orientale" (from 1965 to 1993, where he became the chancellor from 1971 to 1978 and the head of religious history of Iran and Central Asia at La Sapienza University of Rome (from 1993 to 2008). In addition he was the president of the same academy from 1979 to 1995. From 1995 until his death, Gherardo Gnoli was also the president of the Italian Society for the History of Religions. (Source Accessed Aug 4, 2023)

Dr. Gian Giuseppe Filippi is Professor of lndology and History of Art of lndia, University “Ca’ Foscari”, Venice. Involved, since 1971, in extensive field studies in India, directed specially towards the traditional relations between the shrines and rituals, he is not just one of the discoverers of Drupad Kila (in mid- Ganga plains), but led the multidisciplinary research team, credited with this discovery.

Extensively published, Professor Filippi is President of the Venetian Academy of Indian Studies (VAIS), heads Human Sciences research in the “Kampilya Project”; and is Member of Is.I.A.O., Royal Society of Asian Affairs, Indian Archaeological Society, and Pafichal Research Institute, among several other institutions in Europe and India. (Source Accessed Nov 20, 2023)

Glenn H. Mullin (born June 22, 1949 in Quebec, Canada) is a Tibetologist, Buddhist writer, translator of classical Tibetan literature and teacher of Tantric Buddhist meditation.

Mullin has written over twenty-five books on Tibetan Buddhism. Many of these focus on the lives and works of the early Dalai Lamas. Some of his other titles include Tsongkhapa's Six Yogas of Naropa and The Practice of Kalachakra (Snow Lion); Death and Dying: The Tibetan Tradition (Arkana/Viking Penguin); Mystical Verses of a Mad Dalai Lama (Quest Books); The Mystical Arts of Tibet (Longstreet Press); and The Fourteen Dalai Lamas, as well as The Female Buddhas (Clear Light Books). He has also worked as a field specialist on three Tibet-related films and five television documentaries, and has co-produced five audio recordings of Tibetan sacred music. (Source Accessed Dec 6, 2023)

Greg Seton is a scholar of both ancient and modern Buddhist texts in Tibetan and Sanskrit, specializing in Buddhist philosophy and the theoretical frameworks for the meditational practices inspired by the Buddhist “Scripture on the Perfection of Wisdom.” Initially earning a BA in Film Studies from Wesleyan University in 1990, graduating from the American Film Institute, and working in the film industry as an award-winning writer and director for nine years, he returned to academia in 2001 to do his first masters degree in Indo-Tibetan Buddhist Studies. After receiving his DPhil in Buddhist Studies from the University of Oxford, he took a position as professor of Tibetan and Indian Buddhist Studies at Mahidol University in Thailand. Through his DAAD fellowship at the University of Hamburg in Germany, he studied and critically edited the historically important Indian commentary on the Perfection of Wisdom based on 11th and 13th century palm leaf Sanskrit manuscripts and 15th century Tibetan block prints. His study and translation of the commentary and scripture, along with his Tibetan and Sanskrit critical editions of them, is set to be published as a four volume set. (Source: Dartmouth College)

Learn more about professor Seton on his personal website: https://www.gregseton.com/about

Gungru Gyaltsen Zangpo (Tib. གུང་རུ་རྒྱལ་མཚན་བཟང་པོ་, Wyl. gung ru rgyal mtshan bzang po) (1383–1450) - the third throneholder of Sera Monastery. He was a disciple of Tsongkhapa, Gyaltsab Je, and Khedrup Je. He was a teacher of Ga Rabjampa Kunga Yeshe. His extant writings were recently published in three volumes.

Volume 1
byams pa'i dgongs rgyan - a commentary on Prajnaparamita philosophy.

Volume 2
dbu ma rtsa ba shes rab kyi don bsdus - Short explanation of the meaning of Nagarjuna's Mulamadhyamakakarika.
dbu ma 'jug pa'i 'grel pa - Commentary on the Madhyamakavatara of Chandrakirti.
legs bshad bla ma'i man ngag bdud rtsi'i chu rgyun - General treatise on Madhyamika philosophy.

Volume 3
dbu ma bzhi brgya pa'i 'grel pa - Commentary on Aryadeva's Four Hundred Verses
dbu ma'i stong thun - Survey of Madhyamika thought in the context of the various philosophical positions.
mngon rtogs rgyan gyi de kho na nyid gsal bar byed pa mkhas pa'i yid 'phrog - A commentary on the Abhisamayalankara. (Source Accessed Jan 27, 2023)

Guntram Hazod is an anthropologist focusing on the early history of Tibet. His methodological approach combines text and historical ethnography. He has been the co-author of several major monographs on Central Tibet’s medieval political and religious history, as well as author of numerous contributions that deal with identifying historical Tibetan toponyms, especially related to the period of the Tibetan empire. Linked to this is his interest in archaeology and landscape archaeology, with particular focus on early Tibetan burial practices, including the Tibetan tumulus tradition (4th–10th cent. CE).

Hazod received his PhD and habilitation at the University of Vienna. He has been working at the Austrian Academy of Sciences since 1992, from 2006 as a Senior Researcher at the Institute for Social Anthropology (ISA), and from July 2016 as a co-funded researcher at both the ISA and IKGA. Since January 2019 he has been working as a Senior Researcher exclusively at the IKGA. (Source Accessed Feb 24, 2023)

Gustav Roth (born January 22, 1916 in Breslau; † June 6, 2008 in Lenglern) was a German Indologist.

Roth passed his Abitur in 1935 at the König-Wilhelm-Gymnasium in Breslau. He then studied from 1935 (immediately in 1935 and all year round in 1936 due to work in the labor service, so that he could not begin attending lectures until 1937), first at the University of Breslau and then from 1939 in Leipzig and in 1941 in Halle (Saale). During his time in Breslau he became a member of the Corps Silesia there. During the Second World War he worked as a teacher for Persian at an interpreting school of the Wehrmacht in Meissen and then moved to Bordeaux. From January 1944 until the end of the war he was an interpreter for Hindustani and Punjabi for the Indian Freedom Corps Azad Hind Fauj, which he had already looked after during his time in Königsbrück. In 1949 he enrolled at the University of Munich. He graduated in 1952 with a doctorate of philology. From 1953 to 1960 he stayed for scientific studies in India and Nepal. After his return he was an academic advisor at the Indological seminar at the University of Göttingen where he stayed until his retirement in 1981. From 1982 to 1985 Roth lived as director of the Shri Nava Nalanda Mahavihara Institute in Bihar, India, before finally returning to Germany. Roth's scientific life achievement was recognized by several commemorative publications in his honor. (Adapted from Source July 22, 2021)