In this episode, we speak with Dr. Ralph H. Craig III about his beginnings as a scholar of Buddhism, background in yoga practice, his work on Mahāyāna Buddhism, reading the Lotus Sūtra, Buddhist preachers (dharmabānaka), and more. We also preview his upcoming online course, BS 113 | Mahāyāna Buddhism, which will explore these issues in more depth.

Speaker Bio

Ralph H. Craig III is an interdisciplinary scholar of religion, whose research focuses on South Asian Buddhism and American Buddhism. He received his B.A. in Theological Studies at Loyola Marymount University and his Ph.D. in Religious Studies at Stanford University. His research interests include memoir, popular culture, yoga/meditation theory, religious experience and authority. He works with textual materials in Sanskrit, Pāli, Buddhist Chinese and Classical Tibetan. His work has appeared in the journals American Religion, Buddhist-Christian Studies, and the Japanese Journal of Religious Studies; in Lion’s Roar and Tricycle magazines; on the American Academy of Religion’s Reading Religion website; and the 84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha. His first book was Dancing in My Dreams: A Spiritual Biography of Tina Turner (Eerdmans Publishing, 2023) which explores the place of religion in the life and career of Tina Turner and examines her development as a Black Buddhist teacher. Among other forthcoming projects, his next book project is a monograph on preachers in Mahāyāna Buddhist sūtras.

Episode Links

• BS 113 | Mahāyāna Buddhism
• https://rhcraig.com
• Dancing in My Dreams: A Spiritual Biography of Tina Turner (2023)

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Pierce Salguero about his beginnings as a scholar of Buddhism and medicine, his time studying traditional Thai medicine, what counts as Buddhist medicine, and why Buddhism and medicine have always been intertwined. He  shares recent work with students documenting the thriving and diverse Buddhist medicine cultures that can be found around Philadelphia.

We also discuss his online course, BS 111 | Buddhism and Medicine, which will explore these issues in more depth!

Speaker Bio

Dr. Pierce Salguero is a transdisciplinary scholar of health humanities who is fascinated by historical and contemporary intersections between Buddhism, medicine, and cross-cultural exchange. He has a Ph.D. in History of Medicine from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine (2010), and teaches Asian history, medicine, and religion at Penn State University’s Abington College, located near Philadelphia.

The major theme in his scholarship is discovering the role of Buddhism in the global transmission and local reception of knowledge about health, disease, and the body. He approaches this topic using methodologies from history, religious studies, translation studies, and literary studies. More recently, he has gotten into ethnography and documentary filmmaking as well.

Links discussed in episode

•  BS 111| Buddhism and Medicine
• The Jivaka Project
• Buddhish: A Guide to the 20 Most Important Buddhist Ideas for the Curious and Skeptical by Pierce Salguero
• Buddhism and Medicine: An Anthology of Premodern Sources, edited by Pierce Salguero
• Buddhism and Medicine: An Anthology of Modern and Contemporary Sources, edited by Pierce Salguero 
• A Global History of Buddhism and Medicine by Pierce Salguero

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Rebecca Bloom about her beginnings as a scholar and curator of Himalayan Buddhist art history, the meaning of "art" in a Buddhist context, and why she thinks studying art history is valuable for people interested in Buddhism. She also gives a behind-the-scenes look at how museum curators organize exhibitions, and talks about why she loves this kind of work.

We also preview her upcoming online course, BS 109 | Introduction to Buddhist Art, which will explore these issues in more depth!

Speaker Bio

Dr. Rebecca Bloom is Diane P. Stewart Assistant Director, Curatorial Affairs at the Southern Utah Museum of Art. She is a scholar and curator who specializes in Tibetan Buddhism, Buddhist material culture, and issues surrounding the intersection of religion and museums. She holds a BA in Art History and Religion from Middlebury College, an MA in Asian Religions from Yale Divinity School, and she recently received her PhD from the Department of Asian Languages and Cultures at the University of Michigan, where she also earned a Graduate Certificate in Museum Studies.

Dr. Bloom began her career at the Rubin Museum of Art, where she curated and co-curated more than a dozen exhibitions of Tibetan and Himalayan art, as well as contemporary and historical photography. At the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art, she co-curated a multi-year exhibition of Buddhist art entitled Encountering the Buddha: Art and Practice across Asia, for which she designed the Tibetan Buddhist Shrine Room and created the related app, Sacred Spaces. Assembly of the Exalted: The Tibetan Buddhist Shrine Room, coauthored with Donald S. Lopez, Jr., focuses on the shrine’s history and its objects. Dr. Bloom also contributed to a multi-disciplinary project dedicated to the pilgrimage of the eighth-century, Korean monk, Hyecho. The project produced two apps, a website, and a book that each explore the world of Buddhism Hyecho encountered on his journey, with special attention paid to Buddhist material culture.

Links discussed in episode

•  BS 109 | Introduction to Buddhist Art
• The Rubin Museum
• Himalayan Art
•  Assembly of the Exalted: The Tibetan Buddhist Shrine Room
• Encountering the Buddha: Art and Practice across Asia
• Tibetan Buddhist Shrine Room

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Stephen Jenkins about his beginnings as a scholar of Buddhism, his research on the place of compassion in Buddhism, and how he thinks this fundamental idea has been overlooked in many contemporary discussions of Buddhism. Plus, we discuss the relation between compassion and wisdom, the role of imagination in Buddhist practice, and the reasons Buddhist traditions argue that compassion benefits the practitioner!

We also preview Dr. Jenkins' upcoming online course,  BSO 108 | Buddhism and Compassion, which will history and development of this key idea in Buddhist thought and practice.

Speaker Bio

Dr. Stephen Jenkins is Professor of Religious Studies at Humboldt State University. He received his doctorate from Harvard University in 1999. Much of his career has been spent in Asia serving study abroad programs in India, Tibet, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Japan. His research has been primarily focused on Indian Buddhist concepts of compassion, their philosophical grounding, and their ethical implications. 

Links

• BSO 108 | Buddhism and Compassion

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Daniel Cozort about his path to Buddhist Studies, research on Buddhist philosophy, and adventures in Buddhist ethics. We discuss the question of whether and how Buddhists might address contemporary issues like climate change. Are these topics that Buddhists should be concerned about? How have Buddhists in the past approached issues of environmentalism? Does the Buddha himself say anything about the environment? What resources in the Buddhist tradition can help address these problems, and what work remains to be done? We also preview his upcoming online course, BSO 107 | Buddhism and Climate Change, which addresses all of these issues at greater length.

Speaker Bio

Daniel Cozort is Professor Emeritus of Religion at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. He retired from Dickinson College in June 2021, having taught for 37 years in many areas, but specializing in Tibetan Buddhism.

A native of North Dakota, Dr. Cozort graduated from Brown University, where he focused on Christian theology and ethics but encountered Buddhism through the Providence Zen Center. At the University of Virginia, as a student of Dr. Jeffrey Hopkins, he began his study with Tibetan lamas. He did a year of fieldwork in India, traveling broadly and staying in Tibetan monasteries.

In his teaching career, he created over forty courses, but he also curated art exhibits, directed study abroad programs in South India and in England, and made a film about sand mandalas. He is the author of six books, including Highest Yoga Tantra, Buddhist Philosophy, and Unique Tenets of the Middle Way Consequence School, as well as book chapters and articles. For thirteen years, he was the Editor of the Journal of Buddhist Ethics. His most recent book is the Oxford Handbook of Buddhist Ethics (2018), and he recently published an article in Lion’s Roar titled “​​Ten Years After My Accident”. He is currently compiling a new sourcebook for courses on Buddhism and climate change.

Links

• BSO 107 | Buddhism and Climate Change
• Faculty Page 
• Highest Yoga Tantra, by Daniel Cozort
• Buddhist Philosophy by Daniel Cozort
• Unique Tenets of The Middle Way Consequence School by Daniel Cozort
• Journal of Buddhist Ethics (open access academic journal) 
• Green Buddhism by Stephanie Kaza
• Dharma Rain by Stephanie Kaza
• Interview with Frans de Waal
• "Principles and Poetry, Places and Stories: The Resources of Buddhist Ecology" by Don Swearer

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Aleix Ruiz-Falqués about his beginnings as a scholar of Pali, his research into Pali grammar, and how reading Buddhist texts in original languages can help us appreciate them in a new way. We discuss common questions about Pali, such as: what are the differences between Pali and Sanskrit? Did the Buddha speak Pali? Why study Pali?  We also preview his upcoming online course, PALI 101 | Elementary Pali, which will explore these issues in more depth!

Speaker Bio

Dr. Aleix Ruiz-Falqués is Head of the Department of Pali and Languages at the Shan State Buddhist University, Khyentse Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Buddhist Studies, and Lecturer of Pali at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

He teaches graduate courses in Pali language and literature in Taunggyi, Myanmar. Aleix completed his PhD at the University of Cambridge in 2016, under the supervision of Prof. Eivind Kahrs. His research focuses on traditional grammar and scholasticism in Pali, particularly in Myanmar. More broadly, he is interested in ancient Indian literature (kāvya) and philosophy or knowledge systems (śāstra).

After completing his PhD, Aleix worked for two years on Pali manuscripts in Thailand, and he spent one year doing independent research in India. In 2018, he moved to the Shan State in Myanmar, where his long-term project is to teach and learn the Pali and Burmese languages and literature in a traditional monastic setting. One of his long-term goals is to reveal and demystify the treasures of the Pali medieval tradition that explain how we still possess the ancient words of the Buddha today.

Website: www.kabbasetu.com
 
Links discussed in episode

• PALI 101 | Elementary Pali
• Access to Insight

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Geoff Barstow about his beginnings as a scholar of Tibetan Buddhism, the complicated status of animals in Buddhism, his research into the history of vegetarianism in Tibet, and how thinking with animals can help us see the world in a new way. We discuss common questions about Buddhism and animals, such as: what did the Buddha teach about animals? Are most Buddhists vegetarians? What are some of the different ways Buddhist communities have interacted with animals?  We also preview his upcoming online course, BSO 106 | Buddhism and Animals, which will explore these issues in more depth!

Speaker Bio

Dr. Geoffrey Barstow is Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Oregon State University.
He first encountered Tibetan Buddhism in 1999, and since that time the study of Tibetan religion, history, and culture has been the focus of his professional life. For the last decade and a half, his research has focussed on the history and practice of vegetarianism on the Tibetan plateau, asking questions about how animals were viewed, how they were treated (i.e., eaten), what that can tell us about Tibetan Buddhism, and how Buddhist ideas about animal ethics might impact broader philosophical discussions. His published work includes Food of Sinful Demons: A History of Vegetarianism in Tibet (Columbia University Press) and The Faults of Meat: Tibetan Writings on Vegetarianism (Wisdom Publications).

Links discussed in episode

• BSO 106 | Buddhism and Animals
• Food of Sinful Demons: A History of Vegetarianism in Tibet
• The Faults of Meat: Tibetan Writings on Vegetarianism 
• Unfortunate Destiny: Animals in the Indian Buddhist Imagination by  Reiko Ohnuma
• The Rule of Threefold Purity in MN 55.5
• Janet Gyatso on animal ethics on the Wisdom Podcast
• Kinship and Killing: The Animal in World Religions by Katherine Perlo

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Jue Liang about her beginnings as a scholar of Tibetan Buddhism, the life of the Tibetan saint Yeshe Tsogyal, and the broader topic of women in Buddhism. How should we think about the place of women in Buddhist philosophy, narrative, and practice? How do scholars attempt to recover the lives of women who are often forgotten in Buddhist history? And how does thinking with and about gender help us—whatever our gender—understand Buddhism? We also preview her upcoming online course, BSO 105 | Women and Buddhism, which will explore these issues in more depth!

Speaker Bio

Dr. Jue Liang is a scholar of Tibetan Buddhist literature, history, and culture, and is Postdoctoral Teaching Fellow at Denison University  and incoming Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Wittenberg University in Fall 2022.

She received her Ph.D. in Religious Studies from the University of Virginia. Her dissertation, Conceiving the Mother of Tibet: The Life, Lives, and Afterlife of the Buddhist Saint Yeshe Tsogyel, examines the literary tradition surrounding the matron saint of Tibet, Yeshe Tsogyel, in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. It also presents the blossoming of this literary tradition in tandem with the efforts to trace their religious pedigree and define what counts as authentic Buddhism by Nyingma Tibetan Buddhists.

She is currently working on a second book project titled Who Is a Buddhist Feminist: Theorizing Gender and Religion in Contemporary Tibet. It is a study on the history, discourse, and social effects of the khenmo program, a gender-equality initiative that has been taking place at Tibetan Buddhist institutions in China for the past three decades. Jue is also an active participant in discussions on Buddhism in both academic and public forums.

Links

• BSO 105 | Women and Buddhism

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Constance Kassor about her beginnings as a scholar of Tibetan Buddhism, different Tibetan interpretations of emptiness, and how studying history sheds light on philosophy and practice. Plus, we chat about some of our favorite books, articles, and other resources for learning more about Tibetan Buddhism!

We also preview Dr. Kassor's upcoming online course, 104 | Tibetan Buddhism, which will cover the history, schools, philosophy, and practices of Tibetan Buddhism. The course is meant to give an overview of various important aspects of Tibetan history and culture that give students frameworks of understanding that can support future study and practice.


Speaker Bio

Dr. Constance Kassor is an Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Lawrence University in Wisconsin, where she teaches courses on Buddhist thought and Asian religious traditions. Prior to joining the Lawrence faculty in 2016, she taught Buddhist Studies at Smith College, Hampshire College, Amherst College, and the Rangjung Yeshe Institute in Nepal.

Connie’s research primarily focuses on Tibetan Buddhist philosophy, and she is interested in different ways that Tibetan Buddhist scholars understand the cultivation of knowledge. Her forthcoming book, Accounting for Awakened Awareness, examines the nature of knowledge through the lens of the 15th century philosopher Gorampa Sonam Senge. With support from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Connie is also currently translating Gorampa’s extensive Madhyamaka treatise, Synopsis of Madhyamaka (dbu ma’i spyi don) into English, in collaboration with Khenpo Dr. Ngawang Jorden, principal and abbot of the International Buddhist Academy in Nepal.

Connie has spent several years living, working, and teaching in Buddhist communities in India and Nepal. In addition to her scholarly publications, she has written for Lion’s Roar and Tricycle, and has recently published an audio course for The Great Courses and Audible

Links

• 104 | Tibetan Buddhism

Referenced in the Episode

• The Parable of the Raft (in the Alagaddupama Sutta, MN 22)
• The Sound of Two Hands Clapping by Georges Dreyfus
• "The Heart Sutra: the Fullness of Emptiness" by Thich Nhat Hanh 
• Accounting for Awakened Awareness by  Constance Kassor (no link yet, but click here for other publications by Connie!)
• High Peaks Pure Earth Tibet Reading List

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Maria Heim about her beginnings as a scholar of classical South Asia, the role of commentaries in Buddhism, and the importance of emotions to the Buddhist path. We also preview her upcoming online course, BSO 202 | Visuddhimagga: The Path of Purification, which will focus on this important Theravada text written by Buddhaghosa in the 5th century and cherished by Buddhists ever since. We discuss Buddhaghosa's theory of the Buddha's speech as endlessly meaningful, and what that means for how we might read Buddhist texts ourselves.

Speaker Bio

Dr. Maria Heim is George Lyman Crosby 1896 & Stanley Warfield Crosby Professor in Religion at Amherst College.  She received her PhD from Harvard University in 1999, and was honored with a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2005. She currently chairs the Department of Religion at Amherst.

Heim works on Sanskrit and Pali textual traditions. She has written three books on Buddhaghosa (The Forerunner of All Things: Buddhaghosa on Mind, Intention, and Agency, Oxford, 2014; Voice of the Buddha: Buddhaghosa on the Immeasurable Words, Oxford 2018; and Buddhist Ethics, Cambridge, 2020). She is currently working on emotions in ancient and classical India, and her most recent book, A Treasury of Emotions from Classical India, is forthcoming from Princeton University Press. She is also translating the Milindapañha for the Murty Classical Library of India.

Links

• BSO 202 | Visuddhimagga: The Path of Purification

Referenced in the Episode

• The Jewel Discourse Sutta (Ratana Sutta)
• Thomas Dixon, From Passions to Emotions: The Creation of a Secular Psychological Category
• Lisa Feldman Barrett, How Emotions are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain