I feel that with this one contribution we've
started the equivalent of 100 monasteries.
--Dzongsar Khyentse
Rinpoche, August 2006, on the establishment of
the KF Distinguished Professorship in Tibetan Buddhism at UC Berkeley
Story below
Siddhartha's Intent
Community: A Vihara without
Walls
Have you discovered the Siddhartha's Intent Community
site? It's a vihara without walls--a treasure trove of teachings from
Rinpoche
and other
teachers; a manual of step-by-step guidelines for Rinpoche's students;
a library of publications; vibrant discussion groups; access to
instructors
appointed by Rinpoche; and much more.
From the SI Community welcome page: "A vihara traditionally meant a
dwelling place used by wandering monks during the rainy season. It can
also mean
a monastery, temple, or Buddhist university--a place for communal
practice and study.
"The Vihara here has many aspects to it, different students find themselves drawn to different areas. In order
to help everybody find their way around, it is divided into several buildings--much like a physical Vihara would be.
"The Library houses the teachings. The School focuses on study and
practice. The Garden emphasises the community aspect, and The Office is
where
administration happens.
"The golden thread that runs through everything of course is the presence of the Three Jewels."
Read more about the
Double Every Dollar That You Contribute
A group of Khyentse Foundation Matching Fund sponsors has made the
extremely generous commitment to match all scheduled, recurring
donations,
dollar for dollar, for as long as the donations continue. For every
dollar that you donate, we put $2 to work. For example, a pledge of
$100 per
month
generates $2,400 a year for the Foundation. In about two years, you can
fund a special grant to support Buddhist study and practice, like the
one to support Buddhist revival in Mongolia. Please commit to make a
monthly contribution under the Matching Funds Program. No amount is too
small;
even a commitment of $10 per month makes a difference.
Sather Gate,
University of California at Berkeley
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WORDS FROM RINPOCHE
Count on Merit, Not on Luck
by Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche
On August 25, 2008,
Rinpoche spoke at the Mahabodhi Society of the USA, in Cupertino,
California.
His talk
was
translated into Chinese for the largely Chinese-speaking Mahabodhi
sangha. Here are a few notes from that talk, "How to Accumulate Merit."
In this age, people don't like
to talk about merit--they talk about luck. From the Buddhist
perspective, merit
and luck are very different. Luck is accidental-- you can't really make
luck happen. There are no books on how to create luck. Luck just
happens.
Merit is very different from luck.
What do we mean by merit in
Buddhadharma? The Buddhist interpretation of merit is always in
reference to what
is closer to the truth or farther away from the truth. Anything that
brings us closer to the truth is merit. Anything that takes us farther
from the
truth is lack of merit. It's because of our collective merit that we
still have the teachings of the Buddha today.
Here are some methods of accumulating merit:
Do prostrations to crush pride.
Make offerings to go against stinginess.
Practice compassion to dismantle ego.
Rejoice in other's successes to combat jealousy.
Turn the wheel of dharma by asking masters to teach.
Pray or ask for the long life of masters.
Dedicate the merit.
Offering alms provides a great opportunity for ordinary people to
create a karmic link, to practice generosity, to practice detachment,
and to accumulate merit.
--Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche
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FOCUS ON MONGOLIA
KF Special Grant Supports
Buddhist Revival in Mongolia
Every year, thanks to the generosity of donors around the world, Khyentse Foundation awards special grants to
individuals and organizations for
projects that support the practice of Buddhadharma. Here is a report on one such project that received a KF grant in July 2008.
Words of My Perfect Teacher Translated into
Mongolian
In July, Khyentse Foundation awarded a special grant to the Mongolian Buddhist Revival Project of Kunzang
Palyul Choling to print
1,000 copies of
their translation into Mongolian of Patrul Rinpoche's classic text, The Words of My Perfect Teacher. More...
TBRC Goes to Mongolia
In 2007, Gene Smith and David Lunsford traveled to Mongolia, where they met with representatives of
monasteries, universities, and other
organizations to help set up libraries with TBRC's collection of scanned texts.
To read about Gene Smith and the Tibetan Buddhist Resource Center, click Communiqués and
then click November 2007.
View a colorful and inspiring slideshow of their
trip.
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UPDATE:
Identifying Centers of Excellence in
Buddhist Studies
The search is on...again!
A Khyentse Foundation team of data collectors, experts in Buddhist higher education, and their advisors is
hard at work to identify centers of
excellence in Buddhist education all over the world, with a three-fold goal:
- To assess the status of Buddhist studies in universities around the world today
- To identify areas where the support of Khyentse Foundation, as well as other charitable organizations, can be most useful
- To publish the findings and make them available to organizations and individuals interested in promoting the academic
study of Buddhism
Read more about this
project...
PROGRESS:
A Four-Year
Collaboration
Comes to
Fruition
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The Berkeley-KF team celebrates the successful collaboration: (front) Prof. Jakob Dalton. (back) Sydney Jay, Cangioli Che, Prof. Patricia Berger, Prof. Robert
Sharf, and Prof. Steven Goodman.
Inaugural KF Lecture at Berkeley
On October 21, an enthusiastic audience of about 70 Buddhist scholars
and practitioners welcomed Jacob Dalton to his new appointment as
assistant
professor in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures and
the Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies. This position was
made
possible through the establishment of the Khyentse Chair in Tibetan
Buddhism at the University of California at Berkeley.
More...
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