Tibetan Graduate Studies Seminar

The Preliminary Practices not only initiate practitioners into a specific tradition, but also more fundamentally, into Vajrayana Buddhism as it is practiced in contemporary Tibet. In this paper, I explore the Preliminary Practices of a specific group of Tibetan Buddhist women in Bongma Mayma a rural area of Yushu Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Qinghai Province. I focus specifically on the nuns a...

Christopher Bell's talk about oracles, protector deities, and other mysteries The Dalai Lama has sought and trusted the advice of the Nechung Oracle for centuries. In that time, this powerful office has involved the Tibetan Buddhist protector deity Pehar, or his emanations, to possess a human medium and offer prophetic counsel periodically. But the mechanisms through which the institution of Nechu...

In the late 12th century Yungdrung Bön text Grags pa gling grags a deity that has a special relationship to the Tibetan ruler plays a prominent part in the narrative of the Tibetan kings. However, it is not called sku bla but gur lha a term that would seem to be unknown in the imperial period Its characteristics and functions partly overlap with those of the sku bla but to a significant extent als...