E-MAHO
Dzogchen
Center Newsletter
Updated 09 Apr 2002
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E-MAHO Dzogchen
Center Newsletter Updated 09 Apr 2002 |
|
Welcome
to Emaho
Dedication
Dzogchen Center
Would you like to help? Please do!
From Lama Surya
Lama John's Investiture
Retreat Beat
Hey! It's Happening!
What in Creation
A Word on Submissions
Buddhism for the West
E-maho is Dzogchen Center’s online newsletter. And in traditional Dzogchen teachings, emaho! is the shortest teaching. It's an expression of astonished delight, an affirmation of the Great Perfection, a heart-felt prayer. The spontaneous vajra songs of the Tibetan masters of our lineage are punctuated with it. People whisper it or shout it sometimes during meditation, just from the sheer exhilaration of suddenly catching the view. Emaho means "wondrous" or "amazing". It's an effortless, surprising-even-to-ourselves response to the ease, clarity, and bliss of this type of meditation.
Tibetan Buddhism is a happy place to be, and Dzogchen is its core practice. Dzogchen is the very heart of it, fresh, immediate, and totally accessible. And though it is relatively new to us here in Europe and America, teachers such as Lama Surya Das are working to further establish it in this hemisphere, in this culture, now.
We invite you to be part of that, in whatever way you wish. This newsletter is really a dynamic process, so the features and information presented will continually change as you follow it. We can e-mail you updates as they come on-line, for as long as you want us to*. Or you can access it through the Dzogchen Center website, at www.dzogchen.org/emaho .Information about submitting material for E-maho is at the end of the newsletter.
*(To unsubscribe, send an empty message to
dzogchencenter-unsubscribe@mlm.aval.net)
by Lama Surya Das
Dzogchen Center is dedicated to the memory of our beloved lineage master, the late Nyoshul Khenpo Rinpoche, who passed away at Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche's Shechen Monastery and three-year retreat center in Dordogne, France.
His body remains interred in Bhutan awaiting cremation, while a Vajrasattva temple is being erected according to his wishes.
It was among Nyoshul Khenpo's last wishes to me to build a retreat center, temple, and stupa, and to train lineage successors, in this country.
Lama Surya Das founded the Dzogchen Foundation ten years ago, and with the generous help of many devoted and dedicated volunteers, it has served to realize its original mission statement—to bring Dzogchen teachings to the West. With the recent passing of Nyoshul Khenpo Rinpoche, and his dying wishes as expressed in the above dedication, Surya Das has encompassed a vision of a Center whose mission remains the same, but whose activities have expanded in scope. Of singular importance is the training of lineage successors and teachers in this country.
The development of an actual physical retreat and teaching Center will happen when the time is right and resources are available to do so. For now, the Center is working through retreats, workshops, the web site, and other efforts, to continue the mission of making the traditional Dzogchen teachings open and accessible to anyone who is interested.
Dzogchen Center is happy to announce that Lama
Surya Das and Lama John Makransky regularly guide practice and give
Dharma talks for the public on Monday evenings in Cambridge, MA.
In addition, Lama-led Vajrayana practices (including foundational
practices, ngondro) and Lama-led Bodhisattva practices (including
mind-heart training, lojong/tong-len) are offered regularly in weekend
practice sessions, day-long and weekend retreats. Please see the Teaching Schedule, Retreats
Page and the website cambridgedzogchen.org
for location, times, and contact information.
As many of our activities as possible have been and will continue to be provided free of charge, or on a dana (voluntary donation) basis only. But we need everyone who can, to whatever degree he or she can, to help us further this important and beneficial work. Primarily, the wider sangha needs the strength and consistency of our practice. But in the economically-based society we live in, we at the Dzogchen Center need funding to continue to do what we do, and to make the dharma available and accessible to all. Even the smallest contribution, offered with genuine caring, counts immeasurably. In the certain knowledge that all beings, even the smallest insects, wish greatly to be happy and long to be free of misery, we invite you to share in the delight of making the Dharma flourish in and for the whole universe.
Here are some ways you can.
1. Join our on-going effort by becoming a full-fledged member of Dzogchen Center. Your donation per year will be one of the best gifts you've ever received.
$1200 - Patron $600 - Sustaining $300 - Regular
$75 - Student and un-waged
Please make your membership subscription payable to the Dzogchen Foundation and mail to us at P.O. Box 400734, Cambridge, MA 02140, USA. Your donation is fully deductible for US taxpayers; please indicate whether you wish to receive a tax receipt.
2. Plan to make an end-of-year or annual donation to Dzogchen Center. For tax-deductible purposes, this too should be made payable to the Dzogchen Foundation.
3. Once you are thoroughly familiar with the Dzogchen Center, its retreats and other types of outreach, and have gained confidence in them, consider bequeathing property or assets to the Center in your will, for future generations.
4. Step up your social and spiritual activism, whenever and however possible, as part of your practice of generosity and compassion. This could mean anything from helping out at an animal shelter to supplying books to a prison sangha. Opportunities are as numerous and varied as beings in need.