Middle Way Education: Advisory Committee
Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche | Spiritual Advisor
Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche, is the inspiration behind Middle Way Education and the Middle Way School. He is the founder of Khyentse Foundation, a not for profit organization that supports all traditions of Buddhist study and practice. KF is the lead sponsor of the school through a special grant. Born in 1961 in Bhutan, Rinpoche was recognized as a tulku of Jamyang Khyentse Chökyi Lödro by H.H. Sakya Trizin, and received empowerments and teachings from many of the greatest masters of Tibetan Buddhism, including H.H. the 16th Karmapa; H.H. Dudjom Rinpoche and Lama Sonam Zangpo (his paternal and maternal grandfathers); Chatral Rinpoche; Nyoshul Khen Rinpoche, Khenpo Appey, and many others. His root guru was Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche, who began training Rinpoche from the age of 7.
He also oversees two monasteries in Bhutan, one in India and one in Tibet, and has established dharma centers in Australia, Europe, North America, and Asia. He has written several books including What Makes You Not a Buddhist, Not For Happiness, and The Guru Drinks Bourbon?. On the side, he as directed award-winning feature films including The Cup. His work was selected for the 2019 Venice Biennale. Rinpoche continuously travels all over the world, practicing and teaching the dharma.
Jigme Khyentse Rinpoche
(Tib. འཇིགས་མེད་མཁྱེན་བརྩེ་རིན་པོ་ཆེ།) (b.1963) is the third son of Kangyur Rinpoche. He was recognized by Kyabje Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche, Kyabje Dudjom Rinpoche and H.H. the 16th Karmapa as the incarnation of Jamyang Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö. Jigme Khyentse Rinpoche spent his childhood in Darjeeling and later passed much of his time with Kyabje Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche in India, Nepal and Bhutan, receiving many precious teachings. Jigme Khyentse Rinpoche frequently gives teachings in France and in various other countries, in both French and English. He also oversees Padmakara’s projects of translating texts from Tibetan into Western languages. Rinpoche supports Middle Way Education’s dharma curriculum development as an advisor.
Drubgyud Tenzin Rinpoche
Drubgyud Tenzin Rinpoche is the abbot of Chökyi Gyatso Institute (CGI), in eastern Bhutan. Born in Nepal in 1991, he was recognized by Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche as the incarnation of Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche’s maternal grandfather, Lama Sonam Zangpo, who was a great yogi from Bhutan and the founder of CGI. Drubgyud Tenzin Rinpoche trained DKCLI and at some of the Himalayan region’s monastic colleges institutes. He studied Sanskrit in Varanasi, India, and completed a 3-year retreat in Paro Bhutan. He is an advisor to Middle Way Education. He is married and a father.
Shugen Roshi
Abbot of the Zen Mountain Monastery, kindly agreed to join the Middle Way advisory committee in April, 2018. His deep commitment to the dharma and his great love of education will help inform our path as we develop a new model of education. We are profoundly grateful. Shugen received dharma transmission from Daido Roshi in 1997. He is head of the Mountains and River Order and abbot of both Zen Center of New York City and Zen Mountain Monastery. He has been in full-time residential training since 1986, before which he studied music and mathematics. His teachings have appeared in various Buddhist journals and in The Best Buddhist Writing 2009.
Bhikkhu Bodhi
Ven. Bhikkhu Bodhi is an American Buddhist monk from New York City, born in 1944. He obtained a BA in philosophy from Brooklyn College and a PhD in philosophy from Claremont Graduate School. After completing his university studies he traveled to Sri Lanka, where he received novice ordination in 1972 and full ordination in 1973, both under the leading Sri Lankan scholar-monk, Ven. Balangoda Ananda Maitreya (1896-1998). From 1984 to 2002 he was the editor for the Buddhist Publication Society in Kandy, where he lived for ten years with the senior German monk, Ven. Nyanaponika Thera (1901-1994), at the Forest Hermitage. He returned to the U.S. in 2002. He currently lives and teaches at Chuang Yen Monastery in Carmel, New York. Ven. Bodhi has many important publications to his credit, either as author, translator, or editor. These include The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha (Majjhima Nikaya, 1995), The Connected Discourses of the Buddha (Samyutta Nikaya, 2000), and The Numerical Discourses of the Buddha (Anguttara Nikaya, 2012). In 2008, together with several of his students, Ven. Bodhi founded Buddhist Global Relief, a nonprofit supporting hunger relief, sustainable agriculture, and education in countries suffering from chronic poverty and malnutrition.