Property:Bio
From Tsadra Commons
This is a property of type Text.
H
Hongzhi Zhengjue (Chinese: 宏智正覺; pinyin: ''Hóngzhì Zhēngjué''; Wade–Giles: ''Hung-chih Cheng-chueh'', Japanese: ''Wanshi Shōgaku''), also sometimes called Tiantong Zhengjue (Chinese: 天童正覺; pinyin: ''Tiāntóng Zhēngjué''; Japanese: ''Tendō Shōgaku'') (1091–1157), was an influential Chinese Chan Buddhist monk who authored or compiled several influential texts. Hongzhi's conception of silent illumination is of particular importance to the Chinese Caodong Chan and Japanese Sōtō Zen schools. Hongzhi was also the author of the Book of Equanimity, an important collection of kōans.
Life:<br>
According to the account given in Taigen Dan Leighton's ''Cultivating the Empty Field'', Hongzhi was born to a family named Li in Xizhou, present-day Shanxi province. He left home at the age of eleven to become a monk, studying under Caodong master Kumu Facheng (枯木法成), among others, including Yuanwu Keqin, author of the famous kōan collection, the ''Blue Cliff Record''.
In 1129, Hongzhi began teaching at the Jingde monastery on Mount Tiantong, where he remained for nearly thirty years, until shortly before his death in 1157, when he ventured down the mountain to bid farewell to his supporters.
Texts:<br>
The main text associated with Hongzhi is a collection of one hundred of his kōans called the ''Book of Equanimity'' (Chinese: 從容録; pinyin: ''Cóngróng Lù''; Japanese: 従容録; rōmaji: ''Shōyōroku''). This book was compiled after his death by Wansong Xingxiu (1166–1246) at the urging of the Khitan statesman Yelü Chucai (1190–1244), and first published in 1224, with commentaries by Wansong. This book is regarded as one of the key texts of the Caodong school of Zen Buddhism. A collection of Hongzhi's philosophical texts has also been translated by Leighton.
Hongzhi is often referred to as an exponent of Silent Illumination Chan (''Mokushō Zen'' (黙照禅) in Japanese).
Aside from his own teacher, Eihei Dōgen—the founder of the Sōtō school of Zen in Japan—quotes Hongzhi in his work more than any other Zen figure. ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hongzhi_Zhengjue Source Accessed June 13, 2023])
Jeffrey Hopkins (1940-2024) was Professor Emeritus of Tibetan Buddhist Studies at the University of Virginia where he taught Tibetan Buddhist Studies and Tibetan language for thirty-two years from 1973, retiring in 2005. He received a B.A. magna cum laude from Harvard University in 1963, trained for five years at the Lamaist Buddhist Monastery of America in Freewood Acres, New Jersey, USA (now the Tibetan Buddhist Learning Center in Washington, New Jersey), and received a Ph.D. in Buddhist Studies from the University of Wisconsin in 1973.<br> For ten years, from 1979 to 1989, Hopkins served as His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s chief interpreter into English on lecture tours. At the University of Virginia, he founded the largest academic program in Tibetan and Buddhist studies in the West, and served as Director of the Center for South Asian Studies for twelve years. He has published forty-eight books, some of which have been translated into a total of twenty-two languages. He published the first translation of the foundational text of the Jo-nang school of Tibetan Buddhism in ''Mountain Doctrine: Tibet’s Fundamental Treatise on Other-Emptiness and the Buddha-Matrix''. He has translated and edited sixteen books from oral teachings by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the last four being ''How to See Yourself as You Really Are''; ''Becoming Enlightened''; ''How to Be Compassionate''; and ''The Heart of Meditation: Discovering Innermost Awareness''.<br> He is the President and Founder of the UMA Institute for Tibetan Studies. ([https://uma-tibet.org/author-hopkins.html Source: Updated on July 2, 2024, original content from UMA accessed July 22, 2020])
His own reflections on his life and career can be found here: https://networks.h-net.org/node/6060/pages/3914200/hopkins-jeffrey
Curriculum Vitae available for download [https://uma-tibet.org/bod/cv/hopkins_cv.pdf here] +
Horst Lasic is a Senior Scholar at the Institute for the Cultural and Intellectual History of Asia at the Austrian Academy of Sciences. Horst Lasic studied Tibetan and Buddhist Studies at the University of Vienna and received his PhD in 1999. He has been a research fellow at the Institute for the Cultural and Intellectual History of Asia at the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna since 1995. His main areas of research are religion and philosophy in South Asia and Tibet, with a special focus on the Buddhist philosophers Dignāga, Dharmakīrti, Jinendrabuddhi, Jñānaśrīmitra, and Ratnakīrti. He has been teaching at the University of Vienna since 1999. ([https://verlag.oeaw.ac.at/en/person/lasic-horst/502 Source Accessed Oct 9, 2025]) +
Hortön Namkha Pel (1373-1447) - a disciple of Tsongkhapa and the author of ''Mind Training Like the Rays of the Sun''.
Nam kha Pel was a direct disciple of Lama Tsongkhapa, who lived in Tibet around the 15th century. Little is known about him except that he appears to have been the scribe for many of Tsongkhapa's literary works and was praised by Je Rinpoche for his intelligence and faith. ([https://thubtenchodron.org/commentaries/nam-kha-pels-mind-training-like-rays-of-the-sun/ Source Accessed Mar 27, 2025]) +
Hsing Yun (Chinese: 星雲; pinyin: Xīng Yún) (born August 19, 1927) is a Chinese Buddhist monk. He is the founder of the Fo Guang Shan Buddhist order as well as the affiliated Buddha's Light International Association in Taiwan. Hsing Yun is considered to be one of the most prominent proponents of Humanistic Buddhism and is considered to be one of the most influential teachers of modern Taiwanese Buddhism. In Taiwan, he is popularly referred to as one of the "Four Heavenly Kings" of Taiwanese Buddhism, along with his contemporaries: Master Sheng-yen of Dharma Drum Mountain, Master Cheng Yen of Tzu Chi and Master Wei Chueh of Chung Tai Shan. ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hsing_Yun Source Accessed Aug 10, 2021]) +
Professor Hsiung Ping-chen received her Ph.D. in History from Brown University and her S.M. in Population Studies and International Health from Harvard University. She is Professor of History and Director of the Taiwan Research Centre at The Chinese University of Hong Kong. Her main research interest lies in the area of women’s and children’s health. Her works included ''A Tender Voyage: Children and Childhood in Late Imperial China'', ''Childhood in the Past: A History of Chinese Children'' and ''Ill or Well: Diseases and Health of Young Children in Late Imperial China''.
She is a visiting fellow at the Global and Transregional Studies Platform at the University of Göttingen. ([https://www.cemeas.de/meet-our-researchers-prof-hsiung-ping-chen/ Source Accessed June 19, 2023]) +
Huaiyu Chen is an associate professor of religious studies at the School of Historical, Philosophical, and Religious Studies, with a joint appointment at the School of International Letters and Cultures. He has also held several visiting positions in North America, Europe, and Asia, such as a membership of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton in 2011-2012, a Spalding Visiting Fellowship at Clare Hall of Cambridge University in 2014-2015, a visiting professorship at Beijing Normal University in June-July 2015, a visiting scholarship at Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (MPIWG) in Berlin in June-July, 2018, and a visiting scholarship at Institute for Religions and Ethics of Tsinghua University in August, 2018. ([https://isearch.asu.edu/profile/1268668 Source Accessed Mar 21, 2022]) +
Jamie Hubbard graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a doctorate in Buddhist studies and has been teaching at Smith College since 1985.
Hubbard is the author of books, articles and films on Buddhism in East Asia, including ''Pruning the Bodhi Tree'' (with Paul Swanson), "Absolute Delusion, Perfect Buddhahood," and the film ''The Yamaguchi Story: Buddhism and the Family in Japan''. He also has extensive interests in the use of technology in Buddhist studies and has worked on numerous projects in the area of archiving Buddhist texts and digital publication, and more recently in the field of neuroscience and emerging technologies of awareness: Cyborg Buddha! ([https://www.smith.edu/academics/faculty/jamie-hubbard Source Accessed June 13, 2019]) +
'''In Memoriam: Hubert Decleer (1940–2021)'''
:by Andrew Quintman
With great sadness, we share news that our incomparable teacher, mentor, colleague, and friend Hubert Decleer passed away peacefully on Wednesday, August 25. He was at his home with his wife, the poet Nazneen Zafar, in Kathmandu, Nepal, near the Swayambhū Mahācaitya that had been his constant inspiration for nearly five decades. His health declined rapidly following a diagnosis of advanced-stage lung cancer in May, but he remained lucid and in high spirits and over the past weeks he was surrounded by family members and close friends. Through his final hours, he maintained his love of Himalayan scholarship and black coffee, and his deep and quiet commitment to Buddhist practice.
Hubert’s contributions to the study of Tibetan and Himalayan traditions are expansive, covering the religious, literary, and cultural histories of Tibet, Nepal, Bhutan, and India. For nearly thirty-five years he directed and advised the School for International Training’s program for Tibetan Studies, an undergraduate study-abroad program that has served as a starting point for scholars currently working in fields as diverse as Anthropology, Art History, Education, Conservation, History, Religious Studies, Philosophy, and Public Policy. The countless scholars he inspired are connected by the undercurrent of Hubert's indelible "light touch" and all the subtle and formative lessons he imparted as a mentor and friend.
Hubert embodied a seemingly inexhaustible curiosity that spanned kaleidoscopic interests ranging from Chinese landscapes to Netherlandish still lifes, medieval Tibetan pilgrimage literature to French cinema, 1940s bebop to classical Hindustani vocal performance. With legendary hospitality, his home, informally dubbed “The Institute,” was an oasis for scholars, former students, artists, and musicians, who came to share a simple dinner of daal bhaat or a coffee on the terrace overlooking Swayambhū. The conversations that took place on that terrace often unearthed a text or image or reference that turned out to be the missing link in the visitor's current research project. When not discussing scholarship, Hubert inspired his friends to appreciate the intelligence and charm of animals—monkeys and crows especially—or to enjoy the marvels of a blossoming potted plum tree. His attentiveness to the world around him generated intense sensitivity and compassion. He was an accomplished painter and a captivating storyteller, ever ready with accounts of the artists’ scene in Europe or his numerous overland journeys to Asia. The stories from long ago flowed freely and very often revealed some important insight about the present moment, however discrete.
Hubert François Kamiel Decleer was born on August 22, 1940, in Ostend, Belgium. In 1946, he spent three months in Switzerland with a group of sixty children whose parents served in the Résistance. He completed his Latin-Greek Humaniora at the Royal Atheneum in Ostend in 1958, when he was awarded the Jacques Kets National Prize for biology by the Royal Zoo Society of Antwerp. He developed a keen interest in the arts, and during this period he also held his first exhibition of oil paintings and gouaches. In 1959 he finished his B.A. in History and Dutch Literature at the Regent School in Ghent. Between 1960 and 1963 he taught Dutch and History at the Hotel and Technical School in Ostend, punctuated by a period of military service near Köln, Germany in 1961–62. The highlight of his military career was the founding of a musical group (for which he played drums) that entertained officers’ balls with covers of Ray Charles and other hits of the day.
In 1963 Hubert made the first of his many trips to Asia, hitchhiking for thirteen months from Europe to India and through to Ceylon. Returning to Belgium in 1964, he then worked at the artists’ café La Chèvre Folle in Ostend, where he organized fortnightly exhibitions and occasional cultural events. For the following few years he worked fall and winter for a Belgian travel agency in Manchester and Liverpool, England, while spending summers as a tour guide in Italy, Central Europe, and Turkey. In 1967 he began working as a guide, lecturer, and interpreter for Penn Overland Tours, based in Hereford, England. In these roles he accompanied groups of British, American, Australian, and New Zealand tourists on luxury overland trips from London to Bombay, and later London to Calcutta—excursions that took two and a half months to complete. He made twenty-six overland journeys in the course of fourteen years, during which time he also organized and introduced local musical concerts in Turkey, Pakistan, India, and later Nepal. He likewise accompanied two month-long trips through Iran with specialized international groups as well as a number of overland trips through the USSR and Central Europe. In between his travels, Hubert wrote and presented radio scenarios for Belgian Radio and Television (including work on a prize-winning documentary on Nepal) and for the cultural program Woord. The experiences of hospitality and cultural translation that Hubert accumulated on his many journeys supported his work as a teacher and guide; he was always ready with a hint of how one might better navigate the awkward state of being a stranger in a new place.
With the birth of his daughter Cascia in 1972, Hubert’s travels paused for several years as he took a position tutoring at the Royal Atheneum in Ostend. He also worked as an art critic with a coastal weekly and lectured with concert tours of Nepalese classical musicians, cārya dancers, and the musicologist and performer Michel Dumont.
In 1975, during extended layovers between India journeys, Hubert began a two-year period of training in Buddhist Chinese at the University of Louvain with pioneering Indologist and scholar of Buddhist Studies Étienne Lamotte. He recalled being particularly moved by the Buddhist teachings on impermanence he encountered in his initial studies. He also worked as a bronze-caster apprentice and assistant to sculptor—and student of Lamotte—Roland Monteyne. He then resumed his overland journeying full time, leading trips from London to Kathmandu. These included annual three-month layovers in Nepal, where he began studying Tibetan and Sanskrit with local tutors. He was a participant in the first conference of the Seminar of Young Tibetologists held in Zürich in 1977. In 1980 he settled permanently in Kathmandu, where he continued his private studies for seven years. During this period he also taught French at the Alliance Française and briefly served as secretary to the Consul at the French Embassy in Kathmandu.
It was during the mid 1980s that Hubert began teaching American college students as a lecturer and fieldwork consultant for the Nepal Studies program of the School for International Training (then known as the Experiment in International Living) based in Kathmandu. In 1987 he was tasked with organizing SIT’s inaugural Tibetan Studies program, which ran in the fall of that year. Hubert served as the program’s academic director, a position he would hold for more than a decade. Under his direction, the Tibetan Studies program famously became SIT’s most nomadic college semester abroad, regularly traveling through India, Nepal, Bhutan, as well as western, central, and eastern Tibet. It was also during this period that Hubert produced some of his most memorable writings in the form of academic primers, assignments, and examinations. In 1999 Hubert stepped down as academic director to become the program’s senior faculty advisor, a position he held until his death.
Hubert taught and lectured across Europe and the United States in positions that included visiting lecturer at Middlebury College and Numata visiting faculty member at the University of Vienna.
Hubert’s writing covers broad swaths of geographical and historical territory, although he paid particular attention to the Buddhist traditions of Tibet and Nepal. His research focused on the transmission history of the Vajrabhairava tantras, traditional narrative accounts of the Swayambhū Purāṇa, the sacred geography of the Kathmandu Valley (his 2017 lecture on this topic, “Ambrosia for the Ears of Snowlanders,” is recorded here), and the biographies of the eleventh-century Bengali monk Atiśa. His style of presenting lectures was rooted in his work as a musician and lover of music—he prepared meticulously to be sure his talks were rhythmic, precise, and yet had an element of the spontaneous. One of his preferred mediums was the long-form book review, which incorporated new scholarship and original translations with erudite critiques of subjects ranging from Buddhist philosophy to art history and Tibetan music. His final publication, a forthcoming essay on an episode contained in the correspondence of the seventeenth-century Jesuit António de Andrade (translated by Michael Sweet and Leonard Zwilling in 2017), uses close readings of Tibetan historical sources and paintings to complicate and contextualize Andrade’s account of his mission to Tibet. This exemplifies the spirit and method of his review essays, which demonstrate his deep admiration of published scholarship through a meticulous consideration of the work and its sources, often leading to new discoveries.
In addition to Hubert’s published work, some of his most endearing and enduring writing has appeared informally, in the guise of photocopied packets intended for his students. Each new semester of the SIT Tibetan Studies program would traditionally begin with what is technically called “The Academic Director’s Introduction and Welcome Letter.” These documents would be mailed out to students several weeks prior to the program, and for most other programs they were intended to inform incoming participants of the basic travel itinerary, required readings, and how many pairs of socks to pack. The Tibetan Studies welcome letter began as a humble, one-page handwritten note, impeccably penned in Hubert’s unmistakable hand.
Hubert’s welcome letters evolved over the years, and they eventually morphed into collections of three or four original essays covering all manner of subjects related to Tibetan Studies, initial hints at how to approach cultural field studies, new research, and experiential education, as well as anecdotes from the previous semester illustrating major triumphs and minor disasters. The welcome letters became increasingly elaborate and in later years regularly reached fifty pages or more in length. The welcome letter for fall 1991, for example, included chapters titled “Scholarly Fever” and “The Field and the Armchair, and not ‘Stage-Struck’ in either.” By spring 1997, the welcome letter included original pieces of scholarship and translation, with a chapter on “The Case of the Royal Testaments” that presented innovative readings of the Maṇi bka’ ’bum. Only one element was missing from the welcome letter, a lacuna corrected in that same text of spring 1997, as noted by its title: Tibetan Studies Tales: An Academic Directors’ Welcome Letter—With Many Footnotes.
Hubert was adamant that even college students on a study-abroad program could undertake original and creative research, either for assignments in Dharamsala, in Kathmandu or the hilly regions of Nepal, or during independent-study projects themselves, which became the capstone of the semester. Expectations were high, sometimes seemingly impossibly high, but with just the right amount of background information and encouragement, the results were often triumphs.
Hubert regularly spent the months between semesters, or during the summer, producing another kind of SIT literature: the “assignment text.” These nearly always included extensive original translations of Tibetan materials and often extended background essays as well. They would usually end with a series of questions that would serve as the basis for a team research project. For fall 1994 there was “Cultural Neo-Colonialism in the Himalayas: The Politics of Enforced Religious Conversion”; later there was the assignment on the famous translator Rwa Lotsāwa called “The Melodious Drumsound All-Pervading: The Life and Complete Liberation of Majestic Lord Rwa Lotsāwa, the Yogin-Translator of Rwa, Mighty Lord in Magic Intervention.” There were extended translations of traditional pilgrimage guides for the Kathmandu Valley, including texts by the Fourth Khamtrul and the Sixth Zhamar hierarchs, for assignments where teams of students would race around the valley rim looking for an elusive footprint in stone or a guesthouse long in ruins that marked the turnoff of an old pilgrim’s trail. For many students these assignments were the first foray into field work methods, and Hubert's careful guidance helped them approach collaborations with local experts ethically and with deep respect for diverse forms of knowledge.
One semester there was a project titled “The Mystery of the IV Brother Images, ’Phags pa mched bzhi” focused on the famous set of statues in Tibet and Nepal and based on new Tibetan materials that had only just come to light. Another examined the “The Tibetan World ‘Translated’ in Western Comics.” Finally, there was a classic of the genre that examined the creative nonconformity of the Bhutanese mad yogin Drugpa Kunleg in light of the American iconoclast composer and musician Frank Zappa: “A Dose of Drugpa Kunleg for the post–1984 Era: Prolegomena to a Review Article of the Real Frank Zappa Book.”
Frank Zappa was, indeed, another of Hubert’s inspirations and his aforementioned review included the following passage: “If there’s one thing I do admire in FZ, it is precisely these ‘highest standards’ and utmost professional thoroughness that does not allow for any sloppiness (in the name of artistic freedom or spontaneous freedom)…. At the same time, each concert is really different, [and]…appears as a completely spontaneous event.” Hubert’s life as a scholar, teacher, and mentor was a consummate illustration of this highest ideal.
Hubert is survived by his wife Nazneen Zafar; his daughter Cascia Decleer, son-in-law Diarmuid Conaty, and grandsons Keanu and Kiran Conaty; his sister Annie Decleer and brother-in-law Patrick van Calenbergh; his brother Misjel Decleer and sister-in-law Martine Thomaere; his stepmother Agnès Decleer, and half-brother Luc Decleer. A traditional cremation ceremony at the Bijeśvarī Vajrayoginī temple near Swayambhū is planned for Friday.
Benjamin Bogin, Andrew Quintman, and Dominique Townsend
Portions of this biographical sketch draw on the introduction to [[Himalayan Passages]]: Newar and Tibetan Studies in Honor of Hubert Decleer (Wisdom Publications, 2014)
Reverend Master Hubert was a senior disciple of Rev. Master Jiyu-Kennett. He was ordained a monk in 1988 and was transmitted by Rev. Master Jiyu in 1992. He translated the ''Shobogenzo'', as well as numerous scriptures and religious texts. He was a resident of [Shasta] Abbey from the time of his ordination. ([https://www.facebook.com/olympiazencenter/posts/remembering-rev-hubert-nearmanrev-hubert-nearman-obc-died-at-shasta-abbey-on-the/10153432879308214/ Source Accessed June 28, 2021]) +
Hugh Edward Richardson CIE OBE FBA (22 December 1905 – 3 December 2000) was an Indian Civil Service officer, British diplomat and Tibetologist. His academic work focused on the history of the Tibetan empire, and in particular on epigraphy. He was among the last Europeans to have known Tibet and its society before the Chinese invasions which began in 1950. ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugh_Edward_Richardson Source Accessed Feb, 2024]) +
Dajian Huineng (traditional Chinese: 大鑒惠能; pinyin: Dàjiàn Huìnéng; Wade–Giles: Ta-chien; Japanese: Daikan Enō; Korean: Hyeneung); (February 27, 638 – August 28, 713), also commonly known as the Sixth Patriarch or Sixth Ancestor of Chan (traditional Chinese: 禪宗六祖), is a semi-legendary but central figure in the early history of Chinese Chan Buddhism. According to tradition he was an uneducated layman who suddenly attained awakening upon hearing the ''Diamond Sutra''. Despite his lack of formal training, he demonstrated his understanding to the fifth patriarch, Daman Hongren, who then supposedly chose Huineng as his true successor instead of his publicly known selection of Yuquan Shenxiu.
Twentieth century scholarship revealed that the story of Huineng's Buddhist career was likely invented by the monk Heze Shenhui, who claimed to be one of Huineng's disciples and was highly critical of Shenxiu's teaching.
Huineng is regarded as the founder of the "Sudden Enlightenment" Southern Chan school of Buddhism, which focuses on an immediate and direct attainment of Buddhist enlightenment. ''The Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch'' (六祖壇經), which is said to be a record of his teachings, is a highly influential text in the East Asian Buddhist tradition. ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huineng Source Accessed July 14, 2021]) +
Huston Cummings Smith (May 31, 1919 – December 30, 2016) was a leading scholar of religious studies in the United States. He was widely regarded as one of the world's most influential figures in religious studies. He authored at least thirteen books on world's religions and philosophy, and his book ''The World's Religions'' (originally titled ''The Religions of Man'') sold over three million copies as of 2017 and remains a popular introduction to comparative religion.
Born and raised in Suzhou, China in a Methodist missionary family, Huston Smith moved back to the United States at the age of 17 and graduated from the University of Chicago in 1945 with a PhD in philosophy. He spent the majority of his academic career as a professor at Washington University in St. Louis (1947-1958), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1958-1973) and Syracuse University (1973-1983). In 1983, he retired from Syracuse and moved to Berkeley, California, where he was a visiting professor of Religious Studies at the University of California, Berkeley until his death. ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huston_Smith Source Accessed Nov 23, 2020]) +
Hélios Hildt (Drupchen Dorje) studied in Shechen Monastery and currently lives in France, where he occasionally translates for visiting Tibetan teachers. ([https://www.lotsawahouse.org/translators/drupchen-dorje/ Source Accessed Oct 9, 2024]) +
I
Dr. Gloria (I-Ling) Chien is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Gonzaga University.
Before coming to Gonzaga in 2017, she taught courses in Buddhism, Eastern Religions, and Religion and Film at Virginia Commonwealth University.
She conducts bibliographic analysis of the Tibetan Buddhist master Tokmé Zangpo's (1295–1369) biographies and Collected Works in order to shed light on the cultural legacy of Tibetan Buddhist ''Lojong'' (mind training) meditation tradition. Her research has taken her to Nepal, India, China, and Tibet. Inspired by her research, she became a certified instructor in the Cognitively-Based Compassion Training® contemplation program developed at Emory University. In the spring of 2018, she taught a CBCT® course entitled “Compassion Meditation and Happiness” to promote emotional well-being in Gonzaga’s students and to enlarge their ethical considerations of others. This course was funded by the Office of the Dean at the College of Arts and Sciences. Her publication based on this course is featured in this GU news article. Dr. Chien’s peer-reviewed articles concern topics such as Tokmé Zangpo’s life and Collected Works, Ignatian pedagogy, teaching Buddhism in higher education, and Chinese religions in film.
To promote scholarly discussion on teaching Buddhism, she established and co-chairs the Buddhist Pedagogy Seminar at the American Academy of Religion (2019–2023). She is the recipient of 2019–20 Faculty Award for Teaching Excellence for Tenure-Track Faculty at GU. Upon request, she became the advisor of the student meditation club in 2021. Information on the club can be found in the Gonzaga Bulletin. To bring her scholarship and specialties to the general public, Dr. Chien has led several contemplation sessions for various groups, such as for the ZoNE Essential Skills Series and the Spokane Public Library. ([https://www.gonzaga.edu/academics/faculty-listing/detail/gloria-i-ling-chien-phd-bed21c41 Source Accessed Feb 25, 2025]) +
Iain Sinclair (PhD, Monash University, 2016) is a lecturer at Nan Tien Institute, Australia, and an Honorary Research Fellow at The University of Queensland School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry. He studies the Hindu-Buddhist culture of South Asia, the Himalayas and the Malay Archipelago. In 2018 and 2019 he was a Visiting Fellow at the Nalanda-Sriwijaya Centre (now THRC) of the ISEAS –
Yusof Ishak Institute. His published research focuses on Buddhist tantra, medieval Asian history, Sanskrit manuscripts, classical art and contemporary religion. Email: i_sinclair @outlook.com. +
Dr. Ian Baker holds a PhD in History and a MPhil in Medical Anthropology from University College London, following earlier graduate work in Buddhist Studies at Columbia University and English Literature at the University of Oxford. He is the author of seven critically acclaimed books on Himalayan and Tibetan cultural history, environment, art, and medicine including, ''Tibetan Yoga: Principles and Practices'', ''The Dalai Lama’s Secret Temple'', ''The Heart of the World'', ''The Tibetan Art of Healing'', and ''Buddhas of the Celestial Gallery'', with introductions by the H.H. the Dalai Lama and Deepak Chopra. He was lead curator for an exhibition at London’s Wellcome Collection entitled "Tibet’s Secret Temple: Body, Mind, and Meditation in Tantric Buddhism". He is well known for his extensive field research in Tibet’s ‘hidden-lands’ (beyul), resulting in National Geographic Society designating him as an ‘Explorer for the Millennium’. He has led international groups in Tibet, Nepal, and Bhutan for Smithsonian Institution and National Geographic Expeditions and is a board member of the International Society for Bhutan Studies. ([https://events.thus.org/teacher/ian-baker/ Source Accessed July 24, 2023]) +
Ian Charles Harris (born June 17, 1952, died December 23, 2014 ) was an English Orientalist, Sanskrit scholar, and Buddhist. Harris studied at Lancaster University from 1977 to 1982. He earned a master's degree in religious studies at Lancaster University, and then earned a doctorate at Lancaster, with the book ''The Continuity of Madhyamaka and Yogācāra in Indian Mahāyāna Buddhism'' (1991). He then graduated from the University of Cambridge, and then became a teacher of religious studies and then head of department for schools in Bradford and Keighley. In 1987, his time began as a lecturer in religious studies at St. Martin's College Lancaster (later part of the University of Cumbria). ([https://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ian_Charles_Harris Source Accessed Dec 4, 2019])
An online obituary can be found [https://buddhism.arts.ubc.ca/2015/01/06/obituary-professor-ian-charles-harris-june-17th-1952-to-december-23rd-2014/ here.] +
Ian Ives grew up in the US and has been a student of Sogyal Rinpoche since he was a teenager. He studied at the Rigpa Shedra East in Pharping, Nepal under the guidance of Khenchen Namdrol from 2007 to 2012, and before that at Rigpa Shedra West, from 2003 to 2006.
He attended the seven-month teaching periods of Rigpa’s 2006–2009 Three Year Retreat, and served as a teaching assistant to Rinpoche from 2007 to 2017; travelling with him extensively from 2012 onward. Since this time, and with the encouragement of Rinpoche, he has been guiding study sessions and teaching on topics connected to the foundational and Mahayana levels.
Ian helps design and guide Rigpa’s international study programme and the programme for Lerab Ling, Rigpa’s retreat centre in southern France. He has a family with two young children and lives near Lerab Ling. ([https://www.rigpa.org/rigpa-teachers Source Accessed June 28, 2023]) +
Ian James Coghlan (Jampa Ignyen) trained as a monk at Jé College, Sera Monastic University, completing his studies in 1995, and holds a Ph.D. in Asian Studies from La Trobe University. He has translated and edited a number of works from Tibetan including ''Principles of Buddhist Tantra'' (with Kirti Tsenshap Rinpoché and Voula Zarpani); ''Hundreds of Deities of Tusita, An Offering Cloud of Nectar'', and ''Stairway to the State of Union'' (with Choden Rinpoché and Voula Zarpani). Currently he is a translator for the Institute of Tibetan Classics and an adjunct research fellow at SOPHIS, Monash University. (Source: [https://wisdomexperience.org/product/ornament-abhidharma/ Wisdom Publications]) +
