RYI STUDENT BLOG

Studying Buddhism in Rangjung Yeshe Institute is a great opportunity  for us to cleanse our adventitious defilement, which we have accumulated  since beginningless time via our three doors (speech, mind and body). These Dharma teachings turn any of our mistaken directions towards the  virtuous path and pacify all our unwholesome or impure activities within  our daily life. Every single morning before we start our classes our  teachers  (Khenpos or Lopons) remind us to maintain our pure motivations and  conduct while we listen to the Dharma teaching. We are doing virtuous activities while learning these Dharma texts. For that reason we should  consider that we are practicing the most precious Buddhadharma to  benefit all sentiment beings from all over the world with our pure  motivation. We are not studying only for our individual benefit or just for  fun. Therefore we have been doing virtuous actions and thinking virtuous  thought every single day in order to accumulate our

Congratulations to Gwenaelle Witt-Doerring , who successfully defended her MA Thesis! " Slob dpon bson nam rste mo and his saintly death: Illuminating the 2nd Founding Father's Position within the Sakya Tradtion." The thesis supervisor was Dr. Karin L. Meyers and the External Reader was  Khenpo Ngawang Jorden, Ph.D. Director of IBA in Kathmandu .  Gwen started her Buddhist Studies career in her home town, at the  University of  Vienna where she studied  Tibetology.  In 2007 she transferred to  the Bachelor's program at the Centre for Buddhist Studies at Rangjung Yeshe Institute.  Taking a break from the BA program studies, Gwen entered the one year Translator  Training program in 2009 and after successfully completing this intensive program, continued her BA studies and graduated in 2010.  In the same year she enrolled in the Master of Arts program in Buddhist Studies.  Gwen secured a scholarship from Tsadra Foundation for her MA studies at CBS. A

In 2008 I arrived in Boudhanath to take a break from my job and to study a little bit of Buddhist philosophy. Now, I am still here and am privileged to study - kindly supported by the Tsadra foundation – in the monks’ shedra.  At the moment we are studying Chandrakirti’s   Madhyamakavatara bhashya.        From all the good things I have experienced at RYI in Boudhanath the monk shedra is certainly the climax. Khenpo Urgyen Tenphel unpacks Chandrakirti’s complicated text in a highly lucid way with clear Tibetan sentences … well, it’s still sometimes too fast for my limited capacity but there is also a review class and I also meet regularly with Paul, my intelligent Western colleague in this class, to go again through difficult passages.              But best of all is certainly the presence of the monks with whom we study. They are the most friendly, relaxed, humble, and faithful people I have ever met in this life. It makes me want to be one of them in my next life…