Property:Bio
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Meir Shahar received his undergraduate degree from the Hebrew University, Jerusalem. After studying Chinese in Taipei, he went on to pursue graduate studies in the United States, receiving his PhD in East Asian Languages and Civilizations from Harvard University in 1992. Meir Shahar is currently Professor of Chinese Studies at the Department of East Asian Studies, Tel Aviv University.<br><br>
Meir Shahar’s research interests include the interplay of Chinese religion and Chinese literature, Chinese martial-arts history, Chinese esoteric Buddhism, and the impact of Indian mythology on the Chinese pantheon of divinity.<br><br>
Meir Shahar is the author of ''Crazy Ji: Chinese Religion and Popular Literature'' (Harvard University Asia Center, 1998); ''Oedipal God: the Chinese Nezha and his Indian Origins'' (University of Hawaii Press, 2015); and the ''Shaolin Monastery: History, Religion, and the Chinese Martial Arts'' (University of Hawaii Press, 2008), which has been translated into several languages including Chinese, Italian, Portuguese, and Polish. He is the co-editor (with Robert Weller) of ''Unruly Gods: Divinity and Society in China'' (University of Hawaii Press, 1996); the co-editor (with John Kieschnick) of ''India in the Chinese Imagination: Myth, Religion, and Thought'' (The University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013); and the co-editor (with Yael Bentor) of ''Chinese and Tibetan Esoteric Buddhism'' (Brill, 2017). He is currently researching the Horse King (also known as the Horse God), who has been the tutelary deity of Chinese horses, donkeys, and mules.<br><br>
Meir Shahar’s Hebrew-Language publications include ''The Chinese Religion'' (הדת הסינית) (1998) and a translation of Wu Cheng’en’s ''Monkey and the Magic Gourd'' (קוף ודלעת הקסמים), with drawings by Noga Zhang Shahar (נגה ג'אנג שחר). ([https://english.tau.ac.il/profile/mshahar Source Accessed June 18, 2020]) +
Mel A. V. Voulgaris (they/them) has a decade of experience working with students. They began their career in 2013 as a high school teacher, before becoming a counsellor in 2022. As a counsellor, Mel has worked at Simon Fraser University between 2022-2023, and currently works with the Richmond School District (SD38) and in private practice. +
I am Assistant Professor at the Chinese Department of ELTE University, in Budapest. My research focuses on Chinese Tiantai philosophy, I wrote my doctoral thesis about Zhanran and his buddha-nature theory, and obtained a PhD in 2011. I'm interested in various forms of Chinese Buddhist philosophy, the ways of interpreting and re-interpeting the inherited ideas. +
Melissa Myozen Blacker, Roshi, is a Zen teacher with Boundless Way Zen, a school of Zen Buddhism with practice centers throughout New England and beyond. She is one of the resident teachers at Boundless Way Temple (Mugendo-ji) in Worcester, MA.
Background: Melissa was born in 1954 in Boston, Massachusetts. Her parents were secular Jews, who taught her from an early age to have a deep appreciation of art, theater, music (especially jazz) and leftist politics. In order to understand a spontaneous spiritual experience she had when she was nine years old, Melissa began a life-long exploration of religion and psychology.
Education, Work and Family: Melissa is a 1976 graduate of Wesleyan University, with a BA magna cum laude in Anthropology and Music. She went on to earn an MA in Counseling Psychology from Vermont College of Norwich University in 1991, specializing in grief counseling. In 1993, after careers as a vocalist, pianist, music teacher and psychotherapist, she joined the staff of the Center for Mindfulness, founded by Jon Kabat-Zinn at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester. Until 2012 she was a member of the teaching staff, the Associate Director of the Stress Reduction Clinic, and a Director of professional training programs at the Center. She met her husband David Dae An Rynick, Roshi in 1977, and they married in 1982. Their daughter, Rachel Blacker Rynick, was born in 1986.
Zen training and teaching: In 1981 she and David began studying Zen with the independent teacher Richard Clarke, a former student of Philip Kapleau, Roshi. After twenty years of study with Dr. Clarke she became the student of James Myoun Ford, Roshi, a dharma heir of Jiyu Kennett, Roshi and John Tarrant, Roshi. She was ordained a Soto Zen priest (unsui) in 2004 and completed shuso training in 2005. Advancing through the Harada-Yasutani koan curriculum she received Dharma transmission from James Ford in April of 2006, and was elected a guiding teacher of Boundless Way Zen. After hosting a Zen meditation group in their home for 20 years, Melissa and David founded Boundless Way Temple in 2009. Melissa received inka shomei from James Ford in July, 2010.
Melissa is co-editor of ''The Book of Mu'', published by Wisdom Publications in April of 2011, and her writing appears in ''Best Buddhist Writing'', 2012, published by Shambhala Publications and ''The Hidden Lamp'', published by Wisdom in 2013 . . . She is a member of the American Zen Teachers Association and the Soto Zen Buddhist Association.
([http://www.melissablacker.com/biography/ Source Accessed Jul 20, 2020])
Melvin McLeod is the editor-in-chief of two of America's leading Buddhist magazines, [https://buddhanature.tsadra.org/index.php/Category:Buddhadharma:_The_Practitioner%27s_Quarterly Buddhadharma: The Practitioner's Quarterly] and [https://buddhanature.tsadra.org/index.php/Category:Lion%27s_Roar Lion's Roar magazine] (formerly Shambhala Sun), and is the editorial director of [https://www.mindful.org/magazine/ Mindful magazine]. McLeod has edited three books of teachings by Thich Nhat Hanh, ''Mindful Politics: A Buddhist Guide to Making the World a Better Place'', and is the series editor for The Best Buddhist Writing series. He lives in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. ([https://www.alibris.com/search/books/author/Melvin-McLeod Adapted from Source Aug 4, 2020]) +
John Reynolds Harkness Professor of Anthropology, [[Case Western Reserve University]]
Co-Director, [[Center for Research on Tibet]]
Dr. Goldstein is a socio-cultural anthropologist specializing in Tibetan society. HIs topical interest include family and marriage (polyandry), cross-cultural and global aging, population studies, cultural ecology and economic development/change. He has conducted research in Tibet (Tibet Autonomous Region of China) on a range of topics including nomadic pastoralism, the impact of economic reforms on rural Tibet, family planning and fertility, the revival of Buddhism, modern Tibetan history, and socio-economic change. His has also conducted research in India (with Tibetan refugees), in northwest Nepal (with a Tibetan border community in Limi), in western Mongolia (with a nomadic pastoral community in Hovd province), in Kathmandu on family planning and intergenerational relations, and in eastern China on modernization and the elderly). Dr. Goldstein's current projects include: an oral history of Tibet, a multi-volume history of modern Tibet, a longitudinal study of the impact of China's reform policies on Tibetan nomads and a study investigating modernization and changing patterns of intergenerational relations in rural farming Tibet. [http://www.case.edu/artsci/anth/goldstein.html Source: Professor's Page at Case Western (Accessed March 17, 2012)]
*Goldstein's research and articles:
:: http://www.case.edu/affil/tibet/CollectedArticles.htm
:: http://www.case.edu/affil/tibet/index.htm
:: [[File:Interview with Melvyn Goldstein.pdf]] +
Mervyn Sprung, Professor Emeritus at Brock University and a former Hooker Visiting Professor at McMaster University, is the author of four previous books on eastern and comparative philosophy, including ''Lucid Exposition of the Middle Way: A Translation of the Prasannapada'' (Routledge & Kegan Paul). ([https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-magic-of-unknowing-an-east-west-soliloquy-mervyn-sprung/9552511 Source Accessed Nov 20, 2023]) +
See the short biography here: https://rywiki.tsadra.org/index.php/rme_ba_mkhan_po_thub_bstan +
Michael Vaillancourt Aris (27 March 1946 – 27 March 1999) was a Cuban-born English historian who wrote and lectured on Bhutanese, Tibetan and Himalayan culture and history. He was the husband of Aung San Suu Kyi, who would later become State Counsellor of Myanmar. ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Aris Source Accessed Feb 13, 2013])
== Other Information ==
*[http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/obituary-michael-aris-1083767.html Michael Aris' Obituary at Independent.co.uk]
*[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Aris Wikipedia Article on Michael Aris] +
Michael is currently teaching at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) and is also the Cataloguing and Bibliographic Assistant at UVA’s Contemplative Sciences Center. Michael’s area of research pertains to textual communities in Tibet during the 11th to 14th centuries, specifically the figures, doctrine(s), and historical issues surrounding the formation of the Kadam (Bka’ gdams) sect. ([https://www.uvatibetcenter.org/about/students/michael-schuman/ Source Accessed Jan 6, 2016]) +
Michael Barnhart is a professor in the History-Philosophy and Political Science Department at Kingsborough Community College in New York. +
Michael Griffin is Associate Professor of Classics and Philosophy at the University of British Columbia. His research focuses on Ancient Greek philosophy in late antiquity, particularly philosophical education. He is coeditor, with Richard Sorabji, of the Ancient Commentators on Aristotle project. He is author of ''Aristotle's Categories in the Early Roman Empire'' (OUP, 2015) and a two-volume translation of the Neoplatonist Olympiodorus’ introduction to Platonic philosophy, ''Olympiodorus: On Plato’s Alcibiades'' (Bloomsbury, 2014 and 2016). (Source: [[Ethics without Self, Dharma without Atman]]) +
Michael Hahn was a professor of Indology and Tibetology at Philipps-University in Marburg (Germany), his research interests focused on classical Sanskrit and Buddhist literature, in particular narrative works and didactic and epistolary texts. He was the author of numerous articles and books, among them a primer of the Tibetan language. ([https://buddhiststudies.berkeley.edu/2004-2005-events Adapted from Source Feb 17, 2021]) +
We are deeply saddened to announce that our colleague and friend, Michael Hee Ium, passed away at Vienna’s General Hospital on April 9, 2025, after a sudden onset of severe illness. Michael joined the Austrian Academy of Sciences in January 2025. He worked at the Institute for the Cultural and Intellectual History of Asia (IKGA) as a Postdoctoral Fellow within the project “TibSchol: The dawn of Tibetan Buddhist scholasticism (11th–13th c.).” We felt very fortunate to have him as a member of our Institute, even if his stay with us was cut short, and far too brief.
Born and raised in Toronto as the son of South Korean immigrants, Michael completed degrees at the University of Toronto (BSc Psychology), Maitripa College (MA Buddhist Studies), and the University of California, Santa Barbara, in the Department of Religious Studies (MA, PhD 2023, Religious Studies), where he also began to gain teaching experience. After having earned his PhD, he was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Toronto’s Department for the Study of Religion and the Robert H.N. Ho Family Foundation Centre for Buddhist Studies. He subsequently taught at the University of Toronto, Mississauga’s Department of Historical Studies.
A textualist and historian of religion, his research focused on the religions of Tibet and South Asia, and in particular, on the early history of Ganden Monastery and the construction of the Geluk tradition in Tibet, which was the subject of his dissertation. Although the Geluk tradition is largely regarded as a monastic and scholastic tradition, Michael’s research emphasized the importance of understudied aspects of the tradition, such as mahāsiddhas, oracular prophecy, and pilgrimage, for its growth and development. His 2022 article “Tsongkhapa as a mahāsiddha: A Reevaluation of the Patronage of the Gelukpa in Tibet” (Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 45, 73-117) provides a glimpse of his intellectual brilliance and his nuanced approach to Tibetan religious history. Michael also served as co-editor for the Canadian Journal of Buddhist Studies (CJBS, https://thecjbs.org/).
During his short period at the IKGA and as a member of the TibSchol project, we swiftly came to appreciate Michael not only for his insightful scholarship, deep intellectual curiosity and enthusiasm, but also for his warm and gentle nature, his humility and compassion. In only a few months time, Michael became a close colleague and friend to many at our Institute, as well as to colleagues and students at the University of Vienna. He was excited to embark on a new phase in his life, and the community in Vienna warmly embraced him. We all were looking forward to working with him, learning from him, and enjoying his amicable and uplifting company. His untimely passing was a shock that reverberated far beyond Vienna, however, and our thoughts are with everyone who had the pleasure of knowing him. Michael spent his final days with his beloved mother. Close colleagues and friends were by his side.
Obituary published here: https://www.oeaw.ac.at/ikga/obituary-michael-ium-1984-2025 (Source Accessed April 11, 2025)
Michael Lees received his PhD in Global and Comparative Education, MA in Contemplative Religions with a focus on Buddhist Studies, and a BA in Environmental/Ecological Studies and Indigenous Wisdom Traditions. His research interests include examining the intersections of eastern and western spiritual, contemplative, and ecoliterate pedagogical approaches to learning for emerging adults in the higher education classroom. He currently teaches courses including but not limited to: Buddhism, Taoism, Asian Religions, Religion and Culture: An Ecological Perspective, Native American Religions, Death, Dying, and the Afterlife, Creative Thinking, Introduction to Eastern Philosophy, Western Philosophy, and Religions of the World. ([https://montclair.academia.edu/MikeLees Adapted from Source Jan 20, 2021]) +
Michael Pye was born in 1939 in England, and studied Modern Languages and Theology at Cambridge, England (1958-61) as an Open Scholar of Clare College. He then spent five years in Japan before holding lecturing posts in Religious Studies at Lancaster and Leeds (where he was also awarded a Ph.D). Since 1982 he has been Professor of Religious Studies at Marburg University, Germany, interleaved with a three year period as Professor of Religious Studies at Lancaster University, England. Shortly after retirement in Marburg (2004) he took up a three year visiting professorship at Ōtani University, Kyōto, followed by one extra year for research only. From 1995 to 2000 he was President of the International Association for the History of Religions. He received an honorary doctorate from the Faculty of Theology of Helsinki University and is a foreign member of the Societas Scientiarum Fennica. Apart from a specialised interest in East Asian Buddhism and contemporary Japanese religions he has travelled widely and has interests in broad issues of religion and society in the modern world. ([https://www.religiousstudiesproject.com/persons/michael-pye/ Source Accessed June 7, 2021]) +
Michael Richards is an Australian scholar who lived in the Tibetan exile community of Dharamsala for many years. (Source: [https://wisdomexperience.org/content-author/michael-richards/ Wisdom Publications]) +
Michael Sweet received a PhD in Buddhist Studies in 1977 from the University of Wisconsin–Madison under the direction of Geshe Lhundub Sopa. From 1977–78 he taught and did research at the American Institute of Buddhist Studies. After later graduate studies, he was a psychotherapist in public and private practice (1980–2004) and a sometime lecturer at UW Madison, where he has been an assistant clinical professor in the Department of Psychiatry. He has written extensively on the history of sexuality in South Asia and on Buddhist Studies. Since 2001 his research has focused on Ippolito Desideri and the Catholic missions in Tibet. Current research focuses on the first mission to Tibet, led by the Portuguese Jesuit Antonio de Andrade. ([https://wisdomexperience.org/content-author/michael-j-sweet/ Source Accessed May 12, 2020]) +
Michael is a well-known editor of Tibetan Buddhist texts, particularly on Dzogchen and Mahamudra. Titles he has worked on include Blazing Splendor by Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche, Brilliant Moon by Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche, The Great Image: The Biography of Vairotsana, Clear Mirror by Dudjom Lingpa, The Royal Seal of Mahamudra by Khamtrul Rinpoche III, Freedom in Bondage by Adeu Rinpoche, Clarifying the Natural State by Dakpo Tashi Namgyal, Crystal Clear by Thrangu Rinpoche, Lotus Ocean by Tsikey Chokling Rinpoche, The Great Medicine by Shechen Rabjam Rinpoche, Heart Teachings by Penor Rinpoche (forthcoming), Wellsprings of the Great Perfection by Erik Pema Kunsang, and many others. ([http://www.zangthal.com/about Source Accessed May 7, 2020]) +
Professor Michael Zimmermann studied Classical Indology, Tibetology and Japanology at the University of Hamburg and earned his doctorate with a thesis on the origin of the teaching of buddha-nature in India. He spent several years at universities in Kyoto and Tokyo and later worked for the German Research Foundation in Hamburg and Kathmandu. After four years in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Stanford, in 2007 he became professor for Indian Buddhism at the Asien-Afrika-Institut of the University of Hamburg, one of Europe’s largest research institutions dealing with Asian languages and cultures.
His research focus is Indian Mahayana Buddhism in all its forms of expression, but in particular its textual history based on the canonical traditions in India, Tibet and China. Another of his interests are the developments regarding contemporary Buddhism in East and West. Zimmermann co-directs the Numata Center for Buddhist Studies at Hamburg University, an institutional hub promoting teaching, research, dialogue, academic exchange and public outreach. ([https://slc-events.sydney.edu.au/calendar/ubef-lecture-finding-happiness-in-samsara/ Source Accessed March 5, 2020]) +
