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Books by Anne Carolyn Klein
Women and Interreligious Dialogue Series 3 , 2013
When we inquire into gender and our lived experience as men and women, we generally use terms lik... more When we inquire into gender and our lived experience as men and women, we generally use terms like "women" and "feminine" in juxtaposition to "men" and "masculine." These categories are part of a living dialogue, of conversations emerging through shifting sets of culturally determined dichotomies and polarities. To the extent that this is so, the poles of female and male get lined up with other polarities fundamental to cultural constructions of personhood-mind and body, self and other, intellect and emotion, abstract and particular, strong and weak. This has long been recognized in feminist discourse, and I have long been interested in how this plays out in spiritual perspectives.
Wisdom, 2023
An edited excerpt pulling together segments of my new book, "Being Human and a Buddha Too." It's... more An edited excerpt pulling together segments of my new book, "Being Human and a Buddha Too." It's about finding wholeness in life, and a prelude to the sevenfold mind training of Longchenpa, whih itelf is the story of a dance with one's own true and intimate nature. A kind of ultimate love story. Enjoy!
Path to the Middle: Oral Madhyamaka in Tibet, 1994
Introduction discusses the genre and importance of scholarly oral commentary in Tibet. Detailed s... more Introduction discusses the genre and importance of scholarly oral commentary in Tibet. Detailed scholarly oral commentary on the opening verses of Chapter VI,
on emptiness, of Tsongkhapa's Illumination of the thought (dbU ma dgongs pa rab gsal), his commentary on Candrakirti's Entrance to the Middle Way (dbU ma 'jug pa).
FICTION! SHORT STORIES by Anne Carolyn Klein
Articles by Anne Carolyn Klein
Traditional ritual can seem out of sync with modern day practitioners. A closer look at our resis... more Traditional ritual can seem out of sync with modern day practitioners. A closer look at our resistance to ritual can itself open a portal to greater freedom. The starting point here is ritual in the context of Tibetan Buddhist practice. What modern lines does it invite us to cross? What idioms does it scramble? What What kind of dialogue does it inspire ? Such questions themselves suggest a contemporary style of engagement with tradition.
Description of the cultural, ritual, and social understandings associated with the practice of a... more Description of the cultural, ritual, and social understandings associated with the practice of a Hail Master, charged with the important task of protecting crops . Based on extensive discussion with the renowned Khetsun Sangpo Rinpoche, who was a successful Hail Master in Tibet until the early 1960's. The main texts for his practice are Ser bsrung gnams ljags gur kha (Tent House Guarding Agagainst Hail ) and rTa mkhrin gsnang sgrub gyi sgo nas ser ba bsrung ba'i gdams pa ma rlung 'khrugs pa'i gter (Intstructions for holding off ferocious fire and water), both by Rig 'dzin 'god gyi ldem phru can (1333-1409)
Image by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center | https://tricy.cl/2x9KRnS The headlines roar. The feel... more Image by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center | https://tricy.cl/2x9KRnS The headlines roar. The feelings, however, are more nuanced. A disaster this big throws both shade and light, just like meditation itself can do. Our own and others' afflictions are exacerbated, and our goodness shines brighter. That's what we've seen here in Houston. I'm riveted by the overwhelming elemental power of the storm, the angry people waiting in long lines at gas stations, and the heartwarming human grace the situation inspires in people of so many races, religions, and nationalities in what has become the most diverse city in the United States. By late Friday afternoon we had shopped for food, despite empty shelves not seen here since Hurricane Rita, the last big hurricane that hit in 2005. The rain cut loose completely after that. Not silently, but with loud bouts of thunder following big bolts of lightning. Even though I think I know what a hurricane can do, I'm stunned at what the freshly unleashed forces of nature feel like. Below the skies dripping with menace and amid the streams and bayous bursting their basins were people from all walks of life helping their neighbors. Among them, a Jesse Gonzalez and his son rescued people in southeast Houston by boat. On Monday I first learned of the Louisiana Cajun Navy, born in the chaos of Hurricane Katrina, who brought their vessels to Houston to help.
Papers by Anne Carolyn Klein
Contemporary Buddhism
Abstract In fourteenth-century Tibet, Longchen Rabjam drew from classic Indian Buddhist writing a... more Abstract In fourteenth-century Tibet, Longchen Rabjam drew from classic Indian Buddhist writing and early Dzogchen tantric poetry to articulate unique features of the Great Completeness (Dzogchen] tradition. I trace here the pivotal shifts he describes: he upturns classic Buddhist views of self and senses. For the senses are not problems, they are portals to reality. The state of awakening, enlightened mind, bodhicitta, is not a goal to achieve, but the way things are. The path does not go anywhere, it simply opens. Wisdom, the ultimate truth, suffuses mind, body and world. Recognising this wisdom evokes in practitioners feelings of wonder, amusement and spacious delight. Longchenpa’s narrative is rooted in confidence that these qualities are so natural that they are bound to be elicited through practice. Therefore, in closing, I connect some of his key points with a more contemporary manner of eliciting feeling and knowing that otherwise remains occult to us.
TANTRA in Practice , 2000
A short text by Dodrupchen III( rdo grub chen 03 'jigs med bstan pa'i nyi ma, b 1865), with oral ... more A short text by Dodrupchen III( rdo grub chen 03 'jigs med bstan pa'i nyi ma, b 1865), with oral commentary by Khetsun Sangpo Rinpoche, expounding on the Dzgchen meaning of Manjushri's name. Describes the meaning of smoothe, (manju), splendid (shri) and fresh (ghosha) in the context of the base, path, and fruit that are a core stucture of Dzogchen practice and philosophical discourse.
The Encyclopedia of Philosophy of Religion
Emmanuel/A Companion to Buddhist Philosophy, 2013
From the earliest days of Buddhist teachings, it was made clear that neither the teaching itself,... more From the earliest days of Buddhist teachings, it was made clear that neither the teaching itself, nor the realization of it, was a matter simply of speaking words or of understanding them. Refuge, for example, is something Buddhists recite every day. Yet refuge is not just words. It is an experience born of learning, refl ection, and the wisdom of meditation that these make possible. This wisdom, though widely described as inconceivable and inexpressible, is capable of becoming fully evident. The practices that make it evident go beyond texts to include posture, chanting, movement, imagination, the performing and visual arts, ethical orientation, and more. These are related not only with words or ideas but also with the felt sense of the body, touching on the shifts in energy that accompany even the most elementary practices. The wisdom of meditation requires the movement of energy. This energy is the mount or steed of consciousness and experientially all but indistinguishable from knowing itself. These energies must be part of what we consider when we look into the living practices of Buddhist communities. Body as Dynamic Mystery Meditation practices are the revered heart of Buddhist culture, even if relatively few persons seriously engage them. Meditation is the culmination of the three wisdoms of listening, refl ection, and meditation. 1 Our way of inquiring into meditation and meditators will focus not only on their texts and instructions or even on the practices themselves. We take interest in the multiple dimensions of learning that these practices are meant to foster:
Pure Lands in Asian Texts and Contexts, 2019
Women and Interreligious Dialogue Series 3 , 2013
When we inquire into gender and our lived experience as men and women, we generally use terms lik... more When we inquire into gender and our lived experience as men and women, we generally use terms like "women" and "feminine" in juxtaposition to "men" and "masculine." These categories are part of a living dialogue, of conversations emerging through shifting sets of culturally determined dichotomies and polarities. To the extent that this is so, the poles of female and male get lined up with other polarities fundamental to cultural constructions of personhood-mind and body, self and other, intellect and emotion, abstract and particular, strong and weak. This has long been recognized in feminist discourse, and I have long been interested in how this plays out in spiritual perspectives.
Wisdom, 2023
An edited excerpt pulling together segments of my new book, "Being Human and a Buddha Too." It's... more An edited excerpt pulling together segments of my new book, "Being Human and a Buddha Too." It's about finding wholeness in life, and a prelude to the sevenfold mind training of Longchenpa, whih itelf is the story of a dance with one's own true and intimate nature. A kind of ultimate love story. Enjoy!
Path to the Middle: Oral Madhyamaka in Tibet, 1994
Introduction discusses the genre and importance of scholarly oral commentary in Tibet. Detailed s... more Introduction discusses the genre and importance of scholarly oral commentary in Tibet. Detailed scholarly oral commentary on the opening verses of Chapter VI,
on emptiness, of Tsongkhapa's Illumination of the thought (dbU ma dgongs pa rab gsal), his commentary on Candrakirti's Entrance to the Middle Way (dbU ma 'jug pa).
Traditional ritual can seem out of sync with modern day practitioners. A closer look at our resis... more Traditional ritual can seem out of sync with modern day practitioners. A closer look at our resistance to ritual can itself open a portal to greater freedom. The starting point here is ritual in the context of Tibetan Buddhist practice. What modern lines does it invite us to cross? What idioms does it scramble? What What kind of dialogue does it inspire ? Such questions themselves suggest a contemporary style of engagement with tradition.
Description of the cultural, ritual, and social understandings associated with the practice of a... more Description of the cultural, ritual, and social understandings associated with the practice of a Hail Master, charged with the important task of protecting crops . Based on extensive discussion with the renowned Khetsun Sangpo Rinpoche, who was a successful Hail Master in Tibet until the early 1960's. The main texts for his practice are Ser bsrung gnams ljags gur kha (Tent House Guarding Agagainst Hail ) and rTa mkhrin gsnang sgrub gyi sgo nas ser ba bsrung ba'i gdams pa ma rlung 'khrugs pa'i gter (Intstructions for holding off ferocious fire and water), both by Rig 'dzin 'god gyi ldem phru can (1333-1409)
Image by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center | https://tricy.cl/2x9KRnS The headlines roar. The feel... more Image by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center | https://tricy.cl/2x9KRnS The headlines roar. The feelings, however, are more nuanced. A disaster this big throws both shade and light, just like meditation itself can do. Our own and others' afflictions are exacerbated, and our goodness shines brighter. That's what we've seen here in Houston. I'm riveted by the overwhelming elemental power of the storm, the angry people waiting in long lines at gas stations, and the heartwarming human grace the situation inspires in people of so many races, religions, and nationalities in what has become the most diverse city in the United States. By late Friday afternoon we had shopped for food, despite empty shelves not seen here since Hurricane Rita, the last big hurricane that hit in 2005. The rain cut loose completely after that. Not silently, but with loud bouts of thunder following big bolts of lightning. Even though I think I know what a hurricane can do, I'm stunned at what the freshly unleashed forces of nature feel like. Below the skies dripping with menace and amid the streams and bayous bursting their basins were people from all walks of life helping their neighbors. Among them, a Jesse Gonzalez and his son rescued people in southeast Houston by boat. On Monday I first learned of the Louisiana Cajun Navy, born in the chaos of Hurricane Katrina, who brought their vessels to Houston to help.
Contemporary Buddhism
Abstract In fourteenth-century Tibet, Longchen Rabjam drew from classic Indian Buddhist writing a... more Abstract In fourteenth-century Tibet, Longchen Rabjam drew from classic Indian Buddhist writing and early Dzogchen tantric poetry to articulate unique features of the Great Completeness (Dzogchen] tradition. I trace here the pivotal shifts he describes: he upturns classic Buddhist views of self and senses. For the senses are not problems, they are portals to reality. The state of awakening, enlightened mind, bodhicitta, is not a goal to achieve, but the way things are. The path does not go anywhere, it simply opens. Wisdom, the ultimate truth, suffuses mind, body and world. Recognising this wisdom evokes in practitioners feelings of wonder, amusement and spacious delight. Longchenpa’s narrative is rooted in confidence that these qualities are so natural that they are bound to be elicited through practice. Therefore, in closing, I connect some of his key points with a more contemporary manner of eliciting feeling and knowing that otherwise remains occult to us.
TANTRA in Practice , 2000
A short text by Dodrupchen III( rdo grub chen 03 'jigs med bstan pa'i nyi ma, b 1865), with oral ... more A short text by Dodrupchen III( rdo grub chen 03 'jigs med bstan pa'i nyi ma, b 1865), with oral commentary by Khetsun Sangpo Rinpoche, expounding on the Dzgchen meaning of Manjushri's name. Describes the meaning of smoothe, (manju), splendid (shri) and fresh (ghosha) in the context of the base, path, and fruit that are a core stucture of Dzogchen practice and philosophical discourse.
The Encyclopedia of Philosophy of Religion
Emmanuel/A Companion to Buddhist Philosophy, 2013
From the earliest days of Buddhist teachings, it was made clear that neither the teaching itself,... more From the earliest days of Buddhist teachings, it was made clear that neither the teaching itself, nor the realization of it, was a matter simply of speaking words or of understanding them. Refuge, for example, is something Buddhists recite every day. Yet refuge is not just words. It is an experience born of learning, refl ection, and the wisdom of meditation that these make possible. This wisdom, though widely described as inconceivable and inexpressible, is capable of becoming fully evident. The practices that make it evident go beyond texts to include posture, chanting, movement, imagination, the performing and visual arts, ethical orientation, and more. These are related not only with words or ideas but also with the felt sense of the body, touching on the shifts in energy that accompany even the most elementary practices. The wisdom of meditation requires the movement of energy. This energy is the mount or steed of consciousness and experientially all but indistinguishable from knowing itself. These energies must be part of what we consider when we look into the living practices of Buddhist communities. Body as Dynamic Mystery Meditation practices are the revered heart of Buddhist culture, even if relatively few persons seriously engage them. Meditation is the culmination of the three wisdoms of listening, refl ection, and meditation. 1 Our way of inquiring into meditation and meditators will focus not only on their texts and instructions or even on the practices themselves. We take interest in the multiple dimensions of learning that these practices are meant to foster:
Pure Lands in Asian Texts and Contexts, 2019
Unbounded Wholeness, 2006
Tibetan Buddhist writings have long been intimately associated with various forms of orality. An ... more Tibetan Buddhist writings have long been intimately associated with various forms of orality. An understanding of how Buddhist texts are read or encountered in Tibetan traditions requires that we consider the forms of orality in which such textual encounters are embedded. I see Tibetan oral genres as falling into two broad categories. The first is explanatory, such as the oral philosophy referred to here, and its primary purpose is to amplify the meaning of a text. The second is more ritualistic, for it includes oral forms in which sound rather than meaning is paramount, such as the recitation of mantra or various forms of rhythmic chanting. Tibetan oral performances vary considerably in terms of how they balance explanatory and ritual power, some utilizing one genre almost to the exclusion of the other, some having both but emphasizing one or the other. In practice, therefore, these two genres are often intertwined. The variety of Tibetan oral genres, their relationship with written
... to receive his teaching on Long-chen-rap-jam's presentation of the nine vehicles in his ... more ... to receive his teaching on Long-chen-rap-jam's presentation of the nine vehicles in his Treasury of the Supreme Vehicle (Theg mchog mdzod),1 the same author's presentation of the sutra system in his Treasury of Tenets (Grub mtha' mdzod), and Ba-drul Jik-may-cho-gi-wang ...
Journal of Religion, 1991
Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies, Jun 30, 1985
Unbounded Wholeness, 2006
Oxford Handbooks Online, 2011
The Women's Review of Books, 1995
Hypatia, 2002
Noting that academic writing typically falls in the category of work, this piece considers the re... more Noting that academic writing typically falls in the category of work, this piece considers the relationship such writing might have with love. Animated by its observation that love's affinity with wholeness distinguishes it from work's tendency to divide a subject from herself, the essay playfully develops this contrast by telling a story of writing and wholeness. This story attempts to embody the contrasts of which it speaks, and in the process, to discover a counterpoint to the work of writing. Any work that cuts you in two, leaves part of you out, cannot be something you love. Love of all kinds, romantic, spiritual, and everything in between, yearns for and yields union. Work without love thrives on distance. Work involving language is doubly cursed, for in the very arc of their effectiveness, words divide. They disrupt silence and unconsciousness, partly because they carry enough conceptual burrs on them to hollow out a place of their own. This keeps them distinct from other words, images, and associations, working through entwined yet isolated jots of meaning. The words of work are too deeply associated with doing, with the labor of self-configuration, to welcome oceans of sheer being. Words are born of difference and contradiction; and work, even when not explicitly involved in producing or responding to language, thrives on difference as well. We work on things, meaning we are separate from them, we work for someone, meaning we do not fully own our purpose or activity, we work under someone, meaning we surrender authority, we work to get something or somewhere, meaning neither our work nor our being is satisfactory in and of itself. Why then would we love it? Or the self who dismisses part of her being to accomplish it? Is it possible to work, to think, to write, to perform, and still love? After all, we do not love on, for, under or to get. (Or do we do all these things and wonder
Unbounded Wholeness, 2006
Meeting the Great Bliss Queen: Persons (Chapter 2) and the Great Bliss Queen (Chptr 6) , 1996
The sixth through eighth (concluding) chapters from Meeting the Great Bliss Queen. This book is ... more The sixth through eighth (concluding) chapters from Meeting the Great Bliss Queen. This book is a conversation between (mainly traditional Tibetan) Buddhism and feminist reflection on essentialist and constructivist positions .Chapter VI brings the discussion to synthesis through the practice of the enlightened figure of the Great Bliss Queen. Chapter VII discusses the types of non-dualistic perspectives involved, and Chapter VIII reflects on the book's perspective as a whole.
Unbounded Wholeness, 2006
History of Religions, 1996
Discussion of Transmission of Tibetan Buddhism. Interview of Anne Klein by Donna Brown for FPMT.... more Discussion of Transmission of Tibetan Buddhism. Interview of Anne Klein by Donna Brown for FPMT. Republished by Tricycle and available (same text, less pictures) at
http://www.tricycle.com/blog/across-expanse