Georges Dreyfus | |
---|---|
Personal | |
Born | 1950 (age 70–71) |
Religion | Buddhism |
Occupation | Professor of Religion |
Senior posting | |
Based in | Williams College |
Georges B.J. Dreyfus (born 1950 in Switzerland) is an academic in the fields of Tibetology and Buddhology, with a particular interest in Indian Buddhist philosophy. [1] In 1985 he was the first Westerner to receive the Geshe Lharampa degree, the highest available within the Tibetan scholastic tradition.
He currently is Jackson Professor of Religion at Williams College, Massachusetts.
The Gelug is the newest and currently most dominant school of Tibetan Buddhism. It was founded by Je Tsongkhapa (1357–1419), a philosopher and Tibetan religious leader. It is known as the Yellow Hat school. The first monastery he established was named Ganden. The Ganden Tripa is the nominal head of the school, though its most influential figure is the Dalai Lama. Allying themselves with the Mongols as a powerful patron, the Gelugpa have emerged as the pre-eminent Buddhist school in Tibet and Mongolia since the end of the 16th century.
Reginald Ray is an American Buddhist academic and teacher.
Charles Margrave Taylor is a Canadian philosopher from Montreal, Quebec, and professor emeritus at McGill University best known for his contributions to political philosophy, the philosophy of social science, the history of philosophy, and intellectual history. His work has earned him the Kyoto Prize, the Templeton Prize, the Berggruen Prize for Philosophy, and the John W. Kluge Prize.
Indian philosophy refers to philosophical traditions which developed in the Indian subcontinent. Modern scholars generally divide the field between "Hindu Philosophy" and non-Hindu traditions such as Buddhist Philosophy and Jain Philosophy. This division is generally derived from traditional Indian classifications.
Robert Alexander Farrar Thurman is an American Buddhist author and academic who has written, edited, and translated several books on Tibetan Buddhism. He was the Je Tsongkhapa Professor of Indo-Tibetan Buddhist Studies at Columbia University, before retiring in June 2019. "Robert Thurman held the first endowed chair in Buddhist Studies in the West." He also is the co-founder and president of the Tibet House US New York. He translated the Vimalakirti Sutra from the Tibetan Kanjur into English. He is the father of actress Uma Thurman.
Huston Cummings Smith 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 sold over three million copies as of 2017 and remains a popular introduction to comparative religion.
Dorje Shugden, also known as Dolgyal and as Gyalchen Shugden, is an entity associated with the Gelug school, the newest of the schools of Tibetan Buddhism. Dorje Shugden is variously looked upon as a destroyed gyalpo, a minor mundane protector, a major mundane protector, an enlightened major protector whose outward appearance is that of a gyalpo, or as an enlightened major protector whose outward appearance is enlightened.
Buddhism is the world's fourth-largest religion with over 520 million followers, or over 7% of the global population, known as Buddhists. Buddhism encompasses a variety of traditions, beliefs and spiritual practices largely based on original teachings attributed to the Buddha and resulting interpreted philosophies. It originated in ancient India as a Sramana tradition sometime between the 6th and 4th centuries BCE, spreading through much of Asia. Two major extant branches of Buddhism are generally recognized by scholars: Theravāda and Mahāyāna.
Bhāviveka, also called Bhavya or Bhāvaviveka was a sixth-century Madhyamaka Buddhist. In Tibetan Buddhism Bhāviveka is regarded as the founder of the Svātantrika tradition of the Mādhyamaka school of Buddhism, which is seen as antagonistic to Prāsaṅgika Madhyamaka.
Theosophical teachings have borrowed some concepts and terms from Buddhism. Some theosophists like Helena Blavatsky, Helena Roerich and Henry Steel Olcott also became Buddhists. Henry Steel Olcott helped shape the design of the Buddhist flag. Tibetan Buddhism was popularised in the West at first mainly by Theosophists including Evans-Wentz and Alexandra David-Neel.
Dr. Donald Sewell Lopez Jr. is the Arthur E. Link Distinguished University Professor of Buddhist and Tibetan Studies at the University of Michigan, in the Department of Asian Languages and Cultures.
Buddhism is an ancient Indian religion, which arose in and around the ancient Kingdom of Magadha, and is based on the teachings of the Gautama Buddha who was deemed a "Buddha". Buddhism spread outside of Magadha starting in the Buddha's lifetime.
Paul Williams is Emeritus Professor of Indian and Tibetan Philosophy at the University of Bristol, England. Until his retirement in 2011 he was also director for the University's Centre for Buddhist Studies, and is a former President of the UK Association for Buddhist Studies.
Buddhist logico-epistemology is a term used in Western scholarship for pramāṇa-vāda and Hetu-vidya. Pramāṇa-vāda is an epistemological study of the nature of knowledge; Hetu-vidya is a system of logic. These models developed in India during the 5th through 7th centuries.
Shedra is a Tibetan word meaning "place of teaching" but specifically refers to the educational program in Tibetan Buddhist monasteries and nunneries. It is usually attended by monks and nuns between their early teen years and early twenties. Not all young monastics enter a shedra; some study ritual practices instead. Shedra is variously described as a university, monastic college, or philosophy school. The age range of students typically corresponds to both secondary school and college. After completing a shedra, some monks continue with further scholastic training toward a Khenpo or Geshe degree, and other monks pursue training in ritual practices.
Christian Konrad Wedemeyer is an American scholar and political and social activist.
Evan Thompson is a professor of philosophy at the University of British Columbia. He writes about cognitive science, phenomenology, the philosophy of mind, and cross-cultural philosophy, especially Buddhist philosophy in dialogue with Western philosophy of mind and cognitive science.
John D. Dunne is the Distinguished Chair in Contemplative Humanities through the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He also holds a co-appointment in the Department of East Asian Languages and Literature. Until January 2016, he was Associate Professor in the Department of Religion and the Graduate Division of Religion at Emory University.
Kurtis R. Schaeffer is Professor of Tibetan and Buddhist Studies at the University of Virginia and Chair of the Religious Studies department. His primary topics of research are the history of the regions of Nepal, India, Tibet, and China, with a focus on the forms of Buddhism present in these areas, most especially Tibetan Buddhism. Some specific issues he has been concentrated on include Indo-Tibetan poetry, the development of classical learning and printed literature in Tibetan cultural regions, and the history of women, saints, and Dalai Lamas in Tibet. For his work, Schaeffer has received Fulbright, Ryskamp, and Whiting fellowships.
Janet Gyatso is a Religious Studies scholar currently employed as the Hershey Professor of Buddhist Studies and the Associate Dean for Faculty and Academic Affairs at Harvard Divinity School. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Gyatso's research interests are in Buddhism and its relationship to Tibetan and South Asian civilizations.