Sopa, Lhundub

Sopa, Lhundub on the DRL

Authors of English Works • Geshes • Ordained (Monks and Nuns) • Professors • Tibetan Buddhist Teachers

English Phonetics	Geshe Lhundub Sopa

Dates

Birth:	1923
Death:	2014
Place of birth:	Shang region of Tsang province, Tibet

Tibetan calendar dates

Dates of birth

Day
Month
Gender
Element
Animal
Rab Jyung

Dates of passing

Day
Month
Gender
Element
Animal
Rab Jyung

Contact information

Website:	http://www.deerparkcenter.org/NewFiles/sopa.html

About

Religious Affiliation

Tibetan Buddhism; Geluk

Biographical Information

Born in the Tsang region of Tibet in 1923, Geshe Lhundub Sopa was both a spiritual master and a respected academic. He rose from a humble background to complete his geshe studies at Sera Je Monastic University in Lhasa with highest honors and was privileged to serve as a debate opponent for the Dalai Lama’s own geshe examination in 1959. He moved to New Jersey in the United States in 1963 and in 1967 began teaching in the Buddhist Studies Program at University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he professor emeritus. In 1975, he founded the Deer Park Buddhist Center in Oregon, Wisconsin, site of the Dalai Lama’s first Kalachakra initiation granted in the West. He is the author of several books in English, including the five-volume comprehensive teaching, Steps on the Path to Enlightenment. (Source accessed April 10, 2020)

Publications

• Cutting through appearances: Practice and Theory of Tibetan Buddhism, co-authored with Jeffrey Hopkins
• Wheel of Time: the Kalachakra in Context, co-authored with Roger Jackson and John Newman
• Peacock in the Poison Grove: Two Buddhists Texts for Training the Mind
• Steps on the Path to Enlightenment: A Commentary on the Lamrim Chenmo;

Volume 1: The Foundation Practices; Volume II Karma; Volume III Way of the Bodhisattva; Volume IV Śamatha; Volume V Insight;

• Teachings from Tibet: Guidance from Great Lamas, co-authored
• Like a Waking Dream: the Autobiography of Geshe Lhundrub Sopa
• The Crystal Mirror of Philosophical Systems: A Tibetan Study of Asian Religious Thought

Links

Wiki Pages

• Sopa, Lhundub on the DRL
• Sopa, Lhundub on the LIB
• Sopa, Lhundub on the BNW

Buddha Nature Project

Person description or short bio

Expand to see this person's philosophical positions on Buddha-nature.

Is Buddha-nature considered definitive or provisional?
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All beings have Buddha-nature
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If "Qualified", explain:
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Which Wheel Turning
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Yogācāra vs Madhyamaka
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Zhentong vs Rangtong
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Promotes how many vehicles?
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Analytic vs Meditative Tradition
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What is Buddha-nature?
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Svātantrika (རང་རྒྱུད་) vs Prāsaṅgika (ཐལ་འགྱུར་པ་)
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Causal nature of the vajrapāda
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Names

Tibetan: ལྷུན་གྲུབ་བཟོད་པ།
Wylie:

• lhun grub bzod pa
  
• lHun grub bzod pa
  

Other Transliterations in use:

• Lhundub Sopa
  
• Lhundup Sopa
  
• Lhundrup Sopa
  
• Geshe Lhundub Sopa
  

Dates

Born 1923, Tsang, Tibet

Affiliation

Deer Park Center

Other Biographical Information

• Wikipedia Entry

• Biography in the dedication section of Tibetan Literature: Studies in Genre

Can refer to either the Kālacakra Tantra and its derivative texts or to the systematic tantric tradition based on these texts, as well as the deity Kālacakra upon which the associated practices are centered.

Can refer to either the Kālacakra Tantra and its derivative texts or to the systematic tantric tradition based on these texts, as well as the deity Kālacakra upon which the associated practices are centered.

A person who seeks enlightenment for the sake of others. In Mahāyāna Buddhism, a Bodhisattva is a compassionate being who is training on the path to Buddhahood and aspires to eliminate the suffering of all beings and take all sentient beings to the state of enlightenment. The Mahāyāna sūtras including those on buddha-nature generally have Bodhisattvas as the main audience or interlocutors for the Buddha's discourses.

Refers to something that is taught for a specific reason, rather than because it is entirely true.

Along with Madhyamaka, it was one of the two major philosophical schools of Mahāyāna Buddhism. Founded by Asaṅga and Vasubandhu around the fourth century CE, many of its central tenets have roots in the Saṃdhinirmocanasūtra and the so-called third turning of the dharma wheel (see tridharmacakrapravartana).

Along with Yogācāra, it is one of the two major philosophical schools of Mahāyāna Buddhism. Founded by Nāgārjuna around the second century CE, it is rooted in the Prajñāpāramitā Sūtras, though its initial exposition was presented in Nāgārjuna's Mūlamadhyamakakārikā.

The state of being devoid of that which is wholly different rather than being void of its own nature. The term is generally used to refer to the ultimate, or buddha-nature, being empty of other phenomena such as adventitious defiling emotions but not empty of its true nature.

The state of being empty of self, which references the lack of inherent existence in relative phenomena.

Tsen Khawoche's "meditative tradition" of exegesis of the Uttaratantra; it is one of two major Tibetan traditions of exegesis, both stemming from students of Sajjana.