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Kawagoe Eishin is a 助手 (assistant) in the 文学部 (Faculty of Letters) at 東北大学 (Tohoku University). +
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. ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ekai_Kawaguchi Source Accessed Mar 19, 2021])
Elena Louisa Lange, Ph.D. (2011), University of Zurich, is Senior Researcher and Lecturer in Japanology at the University of Zurich. Her current research is on the reception of Marx's Critique of Political Economy. Her publishing focuses mostly on value theory. ([https://brill.com/edcollbook/title/32218?contents=editorial-content Source Accessed July 6, 2023]) +
Eli Franco (born June 19, 1953 in Tel Aviv ) is an Israeli Indologist. He received his BA in Philosophy and Jewish Philosophy from the University of Tel Aviv in 1976, the Diplôme de l' Ecole des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in 1978, Paris, and the Doctorat 3e cycle from the Université de Paris X and L'Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes in 1980. Since 2004 he has held the chair for Indology at the Institute for Indology and Central Asian Studies at the University of Leipzig, Germany. Among his writings include: ''Perception, Knowledge and Disbelief: A Study of Jayarāśi's Skepticism'' (Franz Steiner Verlag Wiesbaden, 1987), ''Dharmakīrti on Compassion and Rebirth'' (Arbeitskreis für Tibetische und Buddhistische Studien, Universität Wien, 1997), ''The Spitzer Manuscript: The Oldest Philosophical Manuscript in Sanskrit'' (Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2004), and (with Miyako Notake) ''Dharmakīrti on the Duality of the Object: Pramāṇavārttika III, 1 - 63'' (Lit Verlag, 2014). ([https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eli_Franco Adapted from Source July 20, 2019]) +
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. ([http://skyjewel.org/ Source Accessed March 26, 2020]) +
Elisabeth Lindmayer comes from a Viennese entrepreneurial family. She is a practicing Buddhist and, together with Sunim Tenzin Tharchin, was largely responsible for the construction of the well-known Peace Stupa in Grafenwörth, Austria. She has translated, along with Sunim Tenzin Tharchin, a German translation of the ''Ākāśagarbhasūtra'', ''Das Akashagarbha Sutra: Allumfassende Liebe und Weisheit; Heilend und Wunscherfüllend''. ([https://diamant-verlag.info/autoren/elisabeth-lindmayer/ Source Accessed Nov 30, 2021]) +
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 [http://www.ktgrinpoche.org/marpa-network/marpa-foundation 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:'''<br>
*''Mahamudra: Ocean of Definitive Meaning'', the Ninth Karmapa, Wangchuk Dorje [http://www.tsadra.org/translators/elizabeth-callahan/ Source: Tsadra.org] +
Elizabeth Clare Prophet (née: Wulf, a.k.a. Guru Ma) (April 8, 1939 – October 15, 2009) was an American spiritual leader, author, orator, and writer. In 1963 she married Mark L. Prophet (after ending her first marriage), who had founded The Summit Lighthouse in 1958. Mark and Elizabeth had four children. Elizabeth, after her second husband's death on February 26, 1973, assumed control of The Summit Lighthouse.
In 1975 Prophet founded Church Universal and Triumphant, which became the umbrella organization for the movement, and which she expanded worldwide. She also founded Summit University and Summit University Press. In the late 1980s Prophet controversially called on her members to prepare for the possibility of nuclear war at the turn of the decade, encouraging them to construct fallout shelters. In 1996, Prophet handed day-to-day operational control of her organization to a president and board of directors. She maintained her role as spiritual leader until her retirement due to health reasons in 1999.
During the 1980s and 1990s Prophet appeared on Larry King Live, Donahue and Nightline, among other television programs. Earlier media appearances included a feature in 1977 in "The Man Who Would Not Die," an episode of NBC's In Search Of... series. She was also featured in 1994 on NBC's Ancient Prophecies. ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Clare_Prophet Source accessed March 11, 2020]) +
Elizabeth Cook is a faculty member at Dharma College in Berkeley, CA and an editor for Dharma Publishing. +
Elizabeth J. Harris is an Honorary Lecturer at Birmingham University and Secretary for Inter Faith Relations for the Methodist Church in Britain. A former Research Fellow at Westminster College, Oxford, she is the author of many books and articles on Theravada Buddhism and Buddhist–Christian encounter. +
Elizabeth Napper received her PhD in Buddhist Studies from the University of Virginia in 1985. The editor of such books as ''Kindness, Clarity, and Insight'' by the Dalai Lama and ''Mind in Tibetan Buddhism'', she is currently codirector of the Tibetan Nuns Project in Dharamsala, India. ([https://wisdomexperience.org/content-author/elizabeth-napper/ Source Accessed Dec 19, 2024]) +
David Ellerton grew up in Denver, Colorado, and took his first Shambhala Training level in 1995 after reading several of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche’s books. A few years later he met Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche in Boulder and in 1999 participated in Seminary and Warriors Assembly. The following year he attended Kalapa Assembly. After a year on staff at Shambhala Mountain Center, he travelled with the Sakyong as a Continuity Kusung and Secretary (2001-2002). In 2004 he moved to Japan, where he taught English and continued his study of Japanese and Aikido, which he began practicing as an undergraduate student in Boulder.
Upon returning to the United States he enrolled in [[Naropa University]]’s M.A. program in Indo-Tibetan Buddhism (Shedra Track), and began his study of Tibetan. During this time he received the Vajrayogini Abhisheka from the Sakyong. After graduating, he spent much of 2008 in both India and Nepal studying Tibetan and receiving commentary on the Uttaratantra Shastra at Pullahari Monastery. In 2008 he began a Ph.D. program in Religious Studies at [[University of California, Santa Barbara]]. He is currently a Ph.D. Candidate at UCSB and is conducting his dissertation research on Tibetan prophecy (lung bstan) at the [[Central University of Tibetan Studies]] in India.
([http://nalandatranslation.org/who-we-are/members/david-ellerton/ Source Accessed May 26, 2015]) +
'''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''<br>
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>.
Vincent Eltschinger is Professor for Indian Buddhism at the École Pratique des Hautes Études, PSL Research University, Paris. His research work focuses on the religious background, the apologetic dimensions and the intellectual genealogy of late Indian Buddhist philosophy. His publications include numerous books and articles dedicated to various aspects of the Indian Buddhists’ polemical interaction with orthodox Brahmanism from Aśvaghoṣa to late Indian Buddhist epistemologists. Mention can be made of Penser l’autorité des Écritures (2007), Caste and Buddhist Philosophy (2012), Buddhist Epistemology as Apologetics (2014), Self, No-Self and Salvation (2013, together with Isabelle Ratié). Vincent Eltschinger has been teaching at various universities including Budapest, Lausanne, Leiden, Leipzig, Tokyo, Venice, Vienna, and Zurich. ([https://ephe.academia.edu/VincentEltschinger Source Accessed March 18, 2019]) +
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. +
From 1993 to 2003 Elías-Manuel Capriles-Arias filled the Chair of Eastern Studies at the Faculty of Humanities and Education, University of The Andes, Mérida, Venezuela (originally ascribed to the Dean’s Office and then to the Department of Philosophy). Thereafter he has been ascribed to the Center of Studies on Africa and Asia, School of History, same Faculty and University, where he teaches Philosophy and elective subjects on the problems of globalization, Buddhism, Asian Religions and Eastern Arts.
Besides teaching at the University, Capriles is an instructor of Buddhism and Dzogchen certified by the Tibetan Master of these disciplines, Chögyal Namkhai Norbu; in this field, he has taught in Venezuela, Peru, Spain, Costa Rica and Chile. ([https://eliascapriles.com/ Source Accessed Apr 17, 2023]) +
Emer O’Hagan is Associate Professor at the University of Saskatchewan. Her primary interests include the role of self-knowledge in moral agency and moral development, constitutivism in metaethics, and Kantian ethics. Some of her recent
publications include "Self-Knowledge and the Development of Virtue," in N. Birondo and S. Braun (eds.), ''Virtue's Reasons: New Essays on Virtue, Character, and Reasons'' (Routledge, 2017); "Shmagents, Realism and Constitutivism About
Rational Norms," in ''The Journal of Value Inquiry'' 2014; "Self-Knowledge and Moral Stupidity," in ''Ratio'' 2012; and "Animals, Agency, and Obligation in Kantian Ethics," in ''Social Theory and Practice'' 2009. (Source: [https://research.tsadra.org/index.php/Ethics_without_Self,_Dharma_without_Atman Ethics without Self, Dharma without Atman]) +
Acharya Emily Bower started meditating and studying with the Shambhala community in 1987 in Berkeley, California. She went on to live on staff at Karme Chöling for three years, and then moved to Boston, Massachusetts to work as a book editor specializing in Buddhism, yoga, and other spiritual traditions.
She worked for Shambhala Publications for a total of ten years. She is fortunate to have been able to work on books with many spiritual teachers, including Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche.
She lives and works now in Los Angeles as a book editor and publishing consultant, and is a co-founder of Dharma Spring, a curated online Buddhist bookshop, launching in 2017. She is an editor for 84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha, an international non-profit initiative to translate all of the Buddha’s words into modern languages and to make them available to everyone, free of charge.
In her service as a senior teacher in the Shambhala community, she leads both extended retreats and weekend programs. She especially enjoys presenting on themes that bring practical application to our wisdom traditions. ([https://shambhalaonline.org/acharya-emily-bower/ Source Accessed Mar 18, 2022]) +
Emily McRae is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of New Mexico. She specializes in Tibetan Buddhist philosophy, ethics, moral psychology, and feminism. She has published articles on issues in comparative moral psychology
in both Western and Asian philosophical journals and volumes, including ''American Philosophy Quarterly'', ''History of Philosophy Quarterly'', ''Journal of Religious Ethics'', ''Philosophy East and West'', and ''The Oxford Handbook of Buddhist Ethics''. Her translation, with Jay Garfield, of the nineteenth-century Tibetan master Patrul Rinpoche's ''Essential Jewel of Holy Practice'' has been published by Wisdom Publications (2017). She has also coedited, with Dr. George Yancy, a volume entitled ''Buddhism and Whiteness: Critical Reflections'' (Lexington Books, 2019). (Adapted from Source: [https://research.tsadra.org/index.php/Ethics_without_Self,_Dharma_without_Atman Ethics without Self, Dharma without Atman]) +
Emma Martin is Lecturer in Museology at the University of Manchester and Head of Ethnology at the National Museums in Liverpool, UK. She received her doctorate from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London in 2014 for her thesis, “Charles Bell’s collection of ‘curios:’ Negotiating Tibetan material culture on the Anglo-Tibetan borderlands, 1900–1945.” ([https://heiup.uni-heidelberg.de/journals/index.php/transcultural/article/view/23538 Source Accessed Mar 8, 2023]) +
