Kyabje Kalu Rinpoche

Luminous Mind

Luminous Mind is a remarkable compilation of the oral and written teachings of the late Kalu Rinpoche – who was called “a beacon of inspiration” by the Dalai Lama. A master of meditation and leader of the Shangpu Kagyu school of Tibetan Buddhism, Kalu Rinpoche taught with an inviting, playful and lucid style that was just one natural manifestation of his own profound realization. The teachings presented in Luminous Mind are immediate and timeless.

As the Dalai Lama notes in his foreword, Luminous Mind covers “the full range of Buddhist practice from the basic analysis of the nature of the mind up to its ultimate refinement in the teachings of Mahamudra.” This anthology of Kalu Rinpoche’s writings and oral teachings resonates with his wisdom and compassion.

Comparing Kyabje Kalu Rinpoche with Milarepa, the greatest mediation master Tibet has ever known, His Holiness the Dalai Lama extols the author of Luminous Mind as a “beacon of inspiration” for spiritual practitioners of all traditions. Noting that “there have been few like him before or since,” His Holiness urges us to delve into this remarkable anthology of the late Kalu Rinpoche’s essential instructions so that we may encounter “the full range of Buddhist practice from the basic analysis of the nature of the mind up to its ultimate refinement in the teachings of Mahamudra.” Drawn from both his lucid writings and his eloquent oral presentations, this unprecedented book lays bare the full grandeur of Kalu Rinpoche’s legacy. At the same time, the gentle words and playful stories of this master of meditation are filled with a depth of clarity and warmth that could only arise from a profound realization of both wisdom and compassion.

• Buy

The Illusory Body & Mind

Note: this course was previously titled Luminous Mind.

• Enroll

Light of Samantabhadra

A gateway to Indian philosophy and its explication in Tibet.

Among the many works produced in the rich philosophical tradition of India’s classical age, few have had more impact than Dharmakīrti’s Commentary on Valid Cognition (Pramāṇavārttika). Composed in India in the seventh century, it became the cornerstone for the study of logic and epistemology in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition.

This work translated here is by one of the premier scholars of the Sakya school, Gorampa Sönam Sengé (1429–89). It illuminates the first two chapters of Dharmakīrti’s work, those on using inference to enlighten oneself (svārthānumāna) and on establishing valid cognition (pramāṇasiddhi) both to determine the authority of the Buddha as a valid teacher and to eliminate the cognitive obstacles to awakening. The root text is composed in compact verses, and these are translated here along with Gorampa’s word-by-word commentary that reveals their often veiled meanings. These chapters explore key issues in the philosophy of language and the nature of conventional designation, the way to employ sound reasoning, the proof of past and future lives, and the way to eliminate the view of self. In the skilled hands of translator Gavin Kilty, these insights are made accessible.

Light of Samantabhadra is the first volume in new academic series from Wisdom and the Khenpo Appey Foundation. The Khenpo Appey Collection of Sakya Classics aspires to fulfill Khenchen Appey Rinpoche’s vision of making important and authoritative Sakya works accessible to English-speaking audiences. This series, conceived by the Khenpo Appey Foundation and published by Wisdom Publications, will contain translations of texts central to Tibetan Buddhist study composed by influential Sakya masters to provide a holistic and comprehensive presentation of Buddhist thought and philosophy.

• Read Now
• Buy

Tibetan Calligraphy, Part 2

The Wisdom Academy is very pleased to announce that next year, we’ll be bringing out our next course with master calligrapher Tashi Mannox. Stay tuned for further announcements!

• View

Tibetan Calligraphy, Part 2

• View

Freedom through Correct Knowing

How do we perceive the world and how does our mind shape those perceptions into an understanding of what we perceive? In this course, Geshe Tenzin Namdak explains these essential aspects of our minds and helps us to eliminate distorted perceptions, realize ultimate reality, and attain the paths to liberation and enlightenment. Exploring these ideas helps us to see the infinite potential of consciousness, and generates a deep conviction in the possibility of radical positive transformation.

You’ll learn how a mind realizes its object, which types of consciousness realize their objects, and when a consciousness is considered to be valid in the sense of realizing its object. Having explained inference and yogic direct perceivers, which are essential to understanding the four noble truths, Geshe Namdak offers a lucid presentation of how to progress on the spiritual paths of liberation and enlightenment. With this, one can learn to develop an unmistaken realization of the fundamental reality, which eliminates the root cause of all samsaric suffering.

This course is based on Freedom through Correct Knowing: On Khedrup Je’s Interpretation of Dharmakirti’s Seven Treatises on Valid Cognition, translated and commentary by the Sera Jey Monastic University Translation Department, edited by Geshe Tenzin Namdak and Ven. Tenzin Legtsok.

Your course includes:

• Ten video lectures with Geshe Tenzin Namdak;
• Ten guided audio meditations;
• Readings from Geshe Namdak’s book Freedom through Correct Knowing
• A study guide created by Geshe Tenzin Namdak, to accompany the book Freedom through Correct Knowing;
• Short quizzes to test your knowledge;
• A forum to discuss with fellow students and two live Q&A sessions with Geshe Namdak.

• Enroll

Dzogchen: Ten Key Terms

Starts June 30, 2023, and runs for 10 weeks. This first live run will include three online Q&As with Malcolm. Dates of Q&As can be found on this page.

In this new course from the Wisdom Academy, you’ll be guided by a master translator through some of the most important and often-misunderstood terms in Dzogchen.

As a student in Dzogchen: Ten Key Terms, you’ll have the chance to delve deep into ten terms and hone a more advanced understanding that will illuminate your practice and inspire your path.

Ācārya Malcolm Smith explores the deep meaning in the dzogchen context of terms such as vidya, kadag, lhudrub, yeshe, and much more.

You’ll enjoy video lectures from Malcolm Smith, curated readings, short quizzes to test your understanding, and a forum for discussion with your fellow students. 

Key information

• The course is currently scheduled to start June 30, 2023 and run for 10 weeks.

• It will include live Zoom Q&As with Malcolm for enrolled students.

• Materials will remain available to enrolled students after the end date.

• Enroll

Dzogchen: Ten Key Terms

• Enroll

Freedom through Correct Knowing

• Enroll

Cortland Dahl: Meditation and Neuroscience (#157)

This episode of the Wisdom Podcast, recorded live as a Wisdom Dharma Chat, features Cortland Dahl speaking with host Daniel Aitken. Cortland is a scientist, translator, and meditation teacher who offers workshops and leads retreats around the world. He has practiced meditation for nearly three decades and has spent time on retreat in monasteries and retreat centers throughout Japan, Burma, and India, including eight years spent living in Tibetan refugee settlements in Kathmandu, Nepal. In addition to his work as an Instructor for the Tergar community and Executive Director of Tergar International, Cortland serves as Research Scientist and Chief Contemplative Officer at UW-Madison’s Center for Healthy Minds and the center’s affiliated non-profit, Healthy Minds Innovations. Cortland is actively involved in scientific research and has published articles on the impact of meditation practices on the body, mind, and brain. He has also published twelve books of translations of classical texts on Buddhist philosophy and meditation.

Cortland and Daniel discuss:

• Cort’s journey to the Dharma, struggling with childhood anxiety; 
• discovering relief through establishing a meditation practice;
• Cortland’s years in Asia, connecting with Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche and Chatral Sangye Dorje Rinpoche;
• returning to the West and academia via the emerging contemplative sciences field;
• using technology to support the unfolding of inner experience;
• and much more!

Remember to subscribe to the Wisdom Podcast for more great conversations on Buddhism, meditation, and mindfulness. And please give us a 5-star rating in Apple Podcasts if you enjoy our show—it’s a great support to us and it helps other people find the podcast. Thank you!

• Listen

Histories of Tibet

The thirty-four essays in this volume follow the particular interests of Leonard van der Kuijp, whose groundbreaking research in Tibetan intellectual and cultural history imbued his students with an abiding sense of curiosity and discovery.

As part of Leonard van der Kuijp’s research in Tibetan history, he patiently and expertly revealed treasures of the Tibetan intellectual tradition in fourteenth-century Tsang, seventeenth-century Lhasa, or eighteenth-century Amdo. The thirty-four essays in this volume follow the particular interests of the honoree and express the comprehensive research that his international cohort has engaged in alongside his generous tutelage over the course of forty years. His inquisitiveness can be experienced through every one of his writings and can be found as well in these new essays in intellectual, cultural, and institutional history by Christopher Beckwith, Yael Bentor, the late Hubert Decleer, Franz-Karl Ehrhard, Jörg Heimbel and David Jackson, Nathan Hill, Isabelle Henrion-Dourcy, Matthew Kapstein, Todd Lewis, Kurtis Schaeffer, Peter Schwieger, Gray Tuttle, Pieter Verhagen, Michael Witzel, and others.

• Buy

Living Treasure

Senior scholars and former students celebrate the life and work of Janet Gyatso, professor of Buddhist studies at Harvard Divinity School. Inspired by her contributions to life writing, Tibetan medicine, gender studies, and more, these offerings make a rich feast for readers interested in Tibetan and Buddhist studies.

Janet Gyatso has made substantial, influential, and incredibly valuable contributions to the fields of Buddhist and Tibetan studies. Her paradigm-shifting approach is to take a topic, an idea, a text, a term—often one that had long been taken for granted or overlooked—and turn it inside out, to radically reimagine the kinds of questions that might be asked and what the answers might reveal. The twenty-nine essays in this volume, authored by colleagues and former students—many of whom are now also colleagues—represent the breadth of her interests and influence, and the care that she has taken in training the current generation of scholars of Tibet and Buddhism. They are organized into five sections: Women, Gender, and Sexuality; Biography and Autobiography; the Nyingma Imaginaire; Literature, Art, and Poetry; and Early Modernity: Human and Nonhuman Worlds. Contributions include José Cabezón on the incorporation of a Buddhist rock carving in Central Asian culture; Matthew Kapstein on the memoirs of an ambivalent reincarnated lama; Willa Blythe Baker on Jikmé Lingpa’s theory of absence; Andrew Quintman on a found poem expressing worldly sadness on the forced closure of a monastery; and Padma ’tsho on Tibetan women’s advocacy for full female ordination. These and the many other chapters, each fascinating reads in their own right, together offer a glowing tribute to a scholar who indelibly changed the way we think about Buddhism, its history, and its literature.

• Read Now
• Buy

Sounds of Innate Freedom, Volume 3

This is the third volume in an historic six-volume series containing many of the first English translations of the classic mahāmudrā literature compiled by the Seventh Karmapa. Sounds of Innate Freedom: The Indian Texts of Mahāmudrā are historic volumes containing many of the first English translations of classic mahamudra literature. The texts and songs in these volumes constitute the large compendium called The Indian Texts of the Mahāmudrā of Definitive Meaning, compiled by the Seventh Karmapa, Chötra Gyatso (1456–1539). The collection offers a brilliant window into the richness of the vast ocean of Indian mahamudra texts cherished in all Tibetan lineages, particularly in the Kagyü tradition, giving us a clear view of the sources of one of the world’s great contemplative traditions.

This third volume contains twenty-four texts, the bulk of which are dohās by Saraha and commentaries on them, as well as works by other renowned Indian Buddhist mahāsiddhas such as Nāropa, Kṛṣṇa, and Śākyaśrībhadra. The extensive commentaries brilliantly unravel enigmas and bring clarity to the songs they comment on as well as to many other songs of realization in the series. These expressive songs of the inexpressible offer readers a feast of profound and powerful pith instructions uttered by numerous male and female mahāsiddhas, yogīs, and ḍākinīs, often in the context of ritual gaṇacakras and initially kept in their secret treasury. Displaying a vast range of themes, styles, and metaphors, they all point to the single true nature of the mind—mahāmudrā—in inspiring ways and from different angles, using a dazzling array of skillful means to penetrate the sole vital point of buddhahood being found nowhere but within our own mind. Reading and singing these songs of mystical wonder, bliss, and ecstatic freedom, and contemplating their meaning, will open doors to spiritual experience for us today just as it has for countless practitioners in the past.

• Buy

The Fourteenth Dalai Lama’s Stages of the Path, Volume 2

Coming soon! This book will be available in September 2023. Enter your name and email below to be notified when this book is available for purchase.

Central to Buddhism is knowing our own minds. Until we do, we are driven by unconscious, often destructive desire and aversion. We couldn’t have a better guide for inner transformation than the Dalai Lama.

The Fourteenth Dalai Lama’s Stages of the Path, Volume 2: An Annotated Commentary on the Fifth Dalai Lama’s Words of Mañjuśrī is the second volume of the Dalai Lama’s outline of Buddhist theory and practice. Having introduced Buddhist ideas in the context of modern society in volume 1, the Dalai Lama turns here to a traditional presentation of the complete path to enlightenment, from developing faith in the Dharma to attaining the highest wisdom. This book, compiled by the revered Tibetan lama Dagyab Rinpoché, comments on the Fifth Dalai Lama’s stages of the path titled Oral Transmission of Mañjuśrī. The volume will appeal to all readers interested in the Dalai Lama’s works, both those new to Buddhism and those looking to deepen their understanding of the Tibetan presentation of the Buddhist path.

• Buy

Realizing the Profound View

The eighth volume in the Dalai Lama’s definitive and bestselling Library of Wisdom and Compassion series, and the second of three focusing on emptiness.

In Realizing the Profound View the Dalai Lama presents the analysis and meditations necessary to realize the ultimate nature of reality. With attention to Nāgārjuna’s five-point analysis, Candrakīrti’s seven-point examination, and Pāli suttas, the His Holiness leads us to investigate who or what is the person. Are we our body? Our mind? If we are not inherently either of them, how do we exist, and what carries the karma from one life to the next? As we explore these and other fascinating questions, he skillfully guides us along the path avoiding the chasms of absolutism and nihilism and introduces us to dependent arising. We find that although all persons and phenomena lack an inherent essence, they do exist dependently. This nominally imputed mere I carries the karmic seeds. We discover that all phenomena exist by being merely designated by term and concept—they appear as like illusions, unfindable under ultimate analysis but functioning on the conventional level. Furthermore, we come to understand that emptiness dawns as the meaning of dependent arising, and dependent arising dawns as the meaning of emptiness. The ability to posit subtle dependent arisings in the face of realizing emptiness and to establish ultimate and conventional truths as noncontradictory brings us to the culmination of the correct view.

• Read Now
• Buy

Khandro Kunzang Dechen Chodron: Immersion in the Ngagpa Tradition (#154)

In this episode of the Wisdom Podcast, recorded live as a Wisdom Dharma Chat, host Daniel Aitken is joined by Khandro Kunzang Dechen Chodron, student of the great Nyingmapa Tsa-Lung and Dzogchen master, Kunzang Dorje Rinpoche. Khandro Kunzang left behind a promising career in the early 1990’s to pursue her practice of the Dharma and became a novice nun in the Drikung Kagyu lineage, studying under Khenchen Konchog Gyaltsen and H.E. Garchen Rinpoche. In 1998 she met Acharya Dawa Chhodak Rinpoche while attending a Dharma healing seminar. Between 1999 and 2009, Khandro Kunzang received the entire cycle of teachings and empowerments of the Rigdzin Sogdrub lineage from Kunzang Dorje Rinpoche, and completed many retreats under his direct supervision.

In 2011, Acharya Dawa Chhodak Rinpoche bestowed the Tri-Don (enthronement ceremony) conferring authority to guide and teach others, and giving her the title of Khandro. Since the passing of Lama Dawa Rinpoche in 2017, Khandro Kunzang divides her time between teaching and traveling tours throughout Europe and Mexico, serving as the Executive Director for Saraswati Bhawan, leading retreats and teachings at P’hurba Thinley Ling in Iowa; heading the P’hurba Peace Mandala Project International; and offering teachings, guidance, and support to students world-wide.

Khandro Kunzang and Daniel discuss

• Khandro Kunzang’s early Buddhist journey, beginning in Vermont with the book Sky Dancer about Yeshe Tsogyel;
• Dharma Protectors and drive on the spiritual quest;
• nature spirits, omens, and divination;
• the Ngagpa ordination tradition in Dolpo and throughout the Himalayan region;
• meeting Acharya Dawa Rinpoche in Oregon and her enthronement as a Khandro;
• her reckoning with Himalayan cultures and patriarchal traditions;
• and much more!

Remember to subscribe to the Wisdom Podcast for more great conversations on Buddhism, meditation, and mindfulness. And please give us a 5-star rating in Apple Podcasts if you enjoy our show—it’s a great support to us and it helps other people find the podcast. Thank you!

• Listen

Science and Philosophy in the Indian Buddhist Classics, Vol. 3

Deepen your understanding of meaning and truth with the third volume of the Dalai Lama’s esteemed series Science and Philosophy in the Indian Buddhist Classics.

In this third volume the focus turns to exploring the philosophical schools of India. The practice of presenting the views of various schools of philosophy dates back to the first millennium in India, when proponents of competing traditions would arrange the diverse sets of philosophical positions in a hierarchy culminating in their own school’s superior tenets. Centuries later, relying on the Indian Buddhist treatises, Tibet developed its own tradition of works on tenets (grub mtha’), often centered on the four schools of Buddhist philosophy, using them to demonstrate the philosophical evolution within their own tradition, and within individual practitioners, as they progressed through increasingly more subtle expressions of the true reality.  

The present work follows in this venerable tradition, but with a modern twist. Like its predecessors, it presents the views of seven non-Buddhist schools, those of the Samkhya, Vaisesika, Nyaya, Mimamsa, Vedanta, Jaina, and Lokayata, followed by the Buddhist Vaibhasika, Sautrantika, Cittamatra, and Madhyamaka schools, arranging them like steps on a ladder to the profound. But rather than following in the sharply polemical approach of its ancient predecessors, it strives to survey each tradition authentically, relying on and citing the texts sacred to each, allowing the different traditions to speak for themselves. What, it asks, are the basic components of the world we experience? What is the nature of their ultimate reality? And how can we come to experience that for ourselves? See how the rich spiritual traditions of India approached these key questions, where they agreed, and how they evolved through dialogue and debate. 

This presentation of philosophical schools is introduced by His Holiness and is accompanied by an extensive introduction and survey by Professor Donald Lopez Jr. of the University of Michigan, who is uniquely qualified to communicate the scope and significance of this literary and spiritual heritage to modern readers.

• Read Now
• Buy

Shila, Samadhi, and Prajna

• Enroll

Stages of the Path and the Oral Transmission

A major contribution to the literature on Buddhist practice according to the Geluk school of Tibetan Buddhism from its foremost interpreter.

Although it was the last major school to emerge in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, the Geluk school has left an indelible mark on Buddhist thought and practice. The intellectual and spiritual brilliance of its founder, the great Tsongkhapa (1357–1419), has inspired generations of scholars and tantric yogis to place him at the heart of their daily meditative practice. The Geluk tradition’s close ties to the Dalai Lamas have also afforded it an outsized influence in all aspects of Tibetan life for centuries. At its peak, its combined monasteries boasted a population in the tens of thousands, and its sway encompassed the religious landscape of Mongolia and much of Central Asia.

This widespread religious activity fostered a rich literary tradition, and fifteen seminal works are featured here representing four genres of that tradition. The first are works on the stages of the path, or lamrim, the genre for which the Geluk is most renowned. Second are works on guru yoga, centered around the core Geluk ritual Offering to the Guru (Lama Chöpa). Third are teachings from the unique oral transmission of Geluk mahāmudrā, meditation on the nature of mind. Fourth are the “guide to the view” (tatri) instructions. The volume features well-known authors like Tsongkhapa, the First Panchen Lama, and the Fifth Dalai Lama, but also important works from lesser-known figures like Gomchen Ngawang Drakpa’s stages of the path in verse and Gyalrong Tsultrim Nyima’s extensive commentary on the Lama Chöpa that interweaves precious explanations from the Ensa Oral Tradition he received from his own teacher. 

Your guide to these riches, Thupten Jinpa, maps out their historical context and spiritual significance in his extensive introduction.

• Read Now
• Buy