Sangharakshita
Encyclopedia
Sangharakshita is a Buddhist teacher and writer, and founder of the Triratna Buddhist Community, which was known until 2010 as the Friends of the Western Buddhist Order, or FWBO.
He was one of a handful of westerners to be ordained as Theravadin Bhikkhus in the period following World War II, and spent over 20 years in Asia, where he had a number of Tibetan Buddhist teachers. In India, he was active in the conversion movement of Dalits — so-called "Untouchables" — initiated in 1956 by B. R. Ambedkar
. He has authored more than 60 books, including compilations of his talks, and has been described as "one of the most prolific and influential Buddhists of our era," "a skilled innovator in his efforts to translate Buddhism to the West," and as "the founding father of Western Buddhism" for his role in setting up what is now the Triratna Buddhist Community.
Sangharakshita formally retired in 1995 and in 2000 stepped down from the movement's leadership, but he remains its dominant figure, and lives close to its headquarters in Birmingham, England. Sangharakshita has often been regarded as a controversial teacher, and has been criticized for having had sexual relations with Order members.
, London
, in 1925. After being diagnosed with a heart condition he spent much of his childhood confined to bed, and used the opportunity to read widely. His first encounter with non-Christian thought was with Madame Helena Blavatsky's Isis Unveiled
, upon reading which, he later said, he realized that he had never been a Christian. The following year he came across two Buddhist texts — the Diamond Sutra
and the Platform Sutra
— and concluded that he had always been a Buddhist.
As Dennis Lingwood, he joined the Buddhist Society at the age of 18, and formally became a Buddhist in May 1944 by taking the Three Refuges and Five Precepts from the Burmese monk, U Thittila.
He was conscripted into the army in 1943, and served in India
, Sri Lanka
(then known as Ceylon), and Singapore
as a radio engineer in the Royal Signal Corps.
It was in Sri Lanka, while in contact with the swamis in the (Hindu) Ramakrishna Mission, that he developed the desire to become a monk. In 1946, after the cessation of hostilities, he was transferred to Singapore, where he made contact with Buddhists and learned to meditate.
. They spent fifteen months in 1947-48, in the Ramakrishna Mission
centre at Muvattupuzha
with the consent of Swami Tapasyananda and Swami Agamananda. In May 1949 he became a novice monk, or sramanera, in a ceremony conducted by the Burmese monk, U Chandramani, who was then the most senior monk in India. It was then that he was given the name Sangharakshita (Pali
: Sangharakkhita), which means "protected by the spiritual community." Sangharakshita took full bhikkhu
ordination the following year, with another Burmese bhikkhu, U Kawinda, as his preceptor (upādhyāya), and with the Ven. Jagdish Kashyap
as his teacher (ācārya). He studied Pali, Abhidhamma, and Logic with Jagdish Kashyap at Benares (Varanasi) University. In 1950, at Kashyap's suggestion, Sangharakshita moved to the hill town of Kalimpong close to the borders of India
, Bhutan
, Nepal
. and Sikkhim, and only a few miles from Tibet
. Kalimpong was his base for 14 years until his return to England in 1966.
During his time in Kalimpong, Sangharakshita formed a young men's Buddhist association and established an ecumenical center for the practice of Buddhism (the Triyana Vardhana Vihara). He also edited the Maha Bodhi Journal
and established a magazine, Stepping Stones. In 1951, Sangharakshita met the German-born Lama Govinda, who was the first Buddhist Sangharakshita had known "to declare openly the compatibility of art with the spiritual life," and who gave Sangharakshita a greater appreciation for Tibetan Buddhism. Govinda had begun his explorations of Buddhism in the Theravada tradition, studying briefly under the German-born bhikkhu, Nyanatiloka Mahathera
(who gave him the name Govinda), but after meeting the Gelug Lama, Tomo Geshe Rinpoche, in 1931, he turned towards Tibetan Buddhism. Sangharakshita's spiritual explorations were to follow a similar trajectory.
Sangharakshita was ordained in the Theravada
school, but said he became disillusioned by what he felt was the dogmatism, formalism, and nationalism of many of the Theravadin bhikkhus he met and became increasingly influenced by Tibetan Buddhist
teachers who had fled Tibet
after the Chinese invasion in the 1950s. Two years after his meeting with Lama Govinda he began studying with the Gelug Lama, Dhardo Rinpoche. Sangharakshita also received initiations and teachings from teachers who included Jamyang Khyentse, Dudjom Rinpoche
, as well as Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche. It was Dhardo Rinpoche who was to give Sangharakshita Mayahana ordination. Later, Sangharakshita also studied with a Ch'an teacher, Yogi Chen
(Chen Chien-Ming), along with another English monk, Bhikkhu Khantipalo. Together, the three men turned their ongoing seminar on Buddhist theory and practice into a book, Buddhist Meditation, Systematic and Practical.
In 1952, Sangharakshita met Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar (1891–1956), the chief architect of the Indian constitution and India's first law minister. Ambedkar, who had been a so-called Untouchable, converted to Buddhism, along with 380,000 other Untouchables (now known as "dalits") on 14 October 1956. Ambedkar and Sangharakshita had been in correspondence since 1950, and the Indian politician had encouraged the young monk to expand his Buddhist activities. Ambedkar appreciated Sangharakshita's "commitment to a more critically engaged Buddhism that did not at the same time dilute the cardinal precepts of Buddhist thought. Ambedkar initially invited Sangharakshita to perform his conversion ceremony, but the latter refused, arguing that U Chandramani should preside. Ambedkar died six weeks later, leaving his conversion movement leaderless, and Sangharakshita, who had just arrived in Nagpur to visit dalit Buddhists, continued what he felt was Ambedkar's work by lecturing to former Untouchables, and presiding over a ceremony in which a further 200,000 Untouchables converted. For the next decade, Sangharakshita spent much of his time visiting dalit Buddhist communities in western India.
Sangharakshita returned to England and in April 1967 founded the Friends of the Western Buddhist Order
. The Western Buddhist Order was founded a year later, when he ordained the first dozen men and women. The first ordinations were attended by a Zen monk, a Shin priest, and two Theravadin monks.
Satisfied neither with the lay-Buddhist approach of the Buddhist Society, nor the monastic approach of the Hampstead vihara — the two dominant Buddhist organizations in Britain at that time —he created what he said was a new form of Buddhism. The order would be neither lay nor monastic, and members take a set of ten precepts that are a traditional part of Mahayana Buddhism.
Initially, Sangharakshita led all classes and conducted all ordinations. He gave lectures drawing on what he felt were the essential teachings of all the major Buddhist schools. He led major retreats twice a year and frequent day and weekend events. As the order grew, and centers became established across Britain and in other countries, order members took more responsibility until, in August 2000, he devolved his responsibilities as the head of the Western Buddhist Order to eight men and women who formed what was called the "College of Public Preceptors."
newspaper published complaints over some of his sexual relationships with FWBO members during the 1970s and 1980s. For a decade following these public revelations, he declined to give any response to concerns from within the movement that he had misused his position as a Buddhist teacher to sexually exploit young men. He later addressed the controversy, stressing that his sexual partners were, or appeared to be, willing, and expressed regret for any mistakes.
For Sangharakshita, as with other Buddhists, the factor that unites all Buddhist schools is not any particular teaching, but the act of "going for refuge" (sarana-gamana), which he regards "not simply as a formula but as a life-changing event" and as an ongoing "reorientation of one's life away from mundane concerns to the values embodied in the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha." Any decisive act upon the spiritual path—renunciation, ordination, initiation, the attainment of Stream Entry, and the arising of the bodhicitta—are manifestations or examples of Going for Refuge.
Among his distinctive views is his use of the scientific theory of evolution as a metaphor for spiritual development, referring to biological evolution as the "lower evolution" and spiritual development as being a form of self-directed "higher evolution." He has drawn parallels between Buddhism and the spirit of the Romantics, who believed that what art reveals has great moral and spiritual significance, and has written of "the religion of art."
Including compilations of his talks, Sangharakshita has authored more than 60 books. Meanwhile, the Triratna Buddhist Community, which he founded as the FWBO, has been described as "perhaps the most successful attempt to create an ecumenical international Buddhist organization." The community is one of the three largest Buddhist movements in Britain, and has a presence in Europe, the Americas, Asia, and Africa. More than a fifth of all Western Buddhist Order members, as of 2006, were in India, where Dr. Ambedkar's mission to convert dalits to Buddhism continues. Martin Baumann, a scholar of Buddhism, has estimated that there are 100,000 people worldwide who are affiliated with the Triratna Buddhist Community.
For Buddhologist Francis Brassard, Sangharakshita's major contribution is "without doubt his attempt to translate the ideas and practices of [Buddhism] into Western languages." The non-denominational nature of the Triratna Buddhist Community, its equal ordination for both men and women, and its evolution of new forms of shared practice, such as what it calls team-based right livelihood projects, have been cited as examples of such "translation," and also as the creation of a "Buddhist society in miniature within the Western, industrialized world." For Martin Baumann, the Triratna Buddhist Community serves as proof that "Western concepts, such as a capitalistic work ethos, ecological considerations, and a social-reformist perspective, can be integrated into the Buddhist tradition."
He was one of a handful of westerners to be ordained as Theravadin Bhikkhus in the period following World War II, and spent over 20 years in Asia, where he had a number of Tibetan Buddhist teachers. In India, he was active in the conversion movement of Dalits — so-called "Untouchables" — initiated in 1956 by B. R. Ambedkar
B. R. Ambedkar
Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar , popularly also known as Babasaheb, was an Indian jurist, political leader, philosopher, thinker, anthropologist, historian, orator, prolific writer, economist, scholar, editor, a revolutionary and one of the founding fathers of independent India. He was also the Chairman...
. He has authored more than 60 books, including compilations of his talks, and has been described as "one of the most prolific and influential Buddhists of our era," "a skilled innovator in his efforts to translate Buddhism to the West," and as "the founding father of Western Buddhism" for his role in setting up what is now the Triratna Buddhist Community.
Sangharakshita formally retired in 1995 and in 2000 stepped down from the movement's leadership, but he remains its dominant figure, and lives close to its headquarters in Birmingham, England. Sangharakshita has often been regarded as a controversial teacher, and has been criticized for having had sexual relations with Order members.
Early life
Sangharakshita was born Dennis Philip Edward Lingwood in StockwellStockwell
Stockwell is a district in inner south west London, England, located in the London Borough of Lambeth.It is situated south south-east of Charing Cross. Brixton, Clapham, Vauxhall and Kennington all border Stockwell...
, London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, in 1925. After being diagnosed with a heart condition he spent much of his childhood confined to bed, and used the opportunity to read widely. His first encounter with non-Christian thought was with Madame Helena Blavatsky's Isis Unveiled
Isis Unveiled
Isis Unveiled, published in 1877, is a book of esoteric philosophy, and was Helena Petrovna Blavatsky's first major work.The book discusses or quotes, among others, Plato, Plotinus, the Chaldean Oracles, the Egyptian Book of the Dead, the Bible, Pythagoras, Ammonius Saccas, Porphyry, Iamblichus,...
, upon reading which, he later said, he realized that he had never been a Christian. The following year he came across two Buddhist texts — the Diamond Sutra
Diamond Sutra
The Diamond Sūtra , is a short and well-known Mahāyāna sūtra from the Prajñāpāramitā, or "Perfection of Wisdom" genre, and emphasizes the practice of non-abiding and non-attachment...
and the Platform Sutra
Platform Sutra
The Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch , is a Buddhist scripture that was composed in China. It is one of the seminal texts in the Chan/Zen schools. It is centered on discourses given at Shao Zhou temple attributed to the sixth Chan patriarch, Huineng...
— and concluded that he had always been a Buddhist.
As Dennis Lingwood, he joined the Buddhist Society at the age of 18, and formally became a Buddhist in May 1944 by taking the Three Refuges and Five Precepts from the Burmese monk, U Thittila.
He was conscripted into the army in 1943, and served in India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...
(then known as Ceylon), and Singapore
Singapore
Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...
as a radio engineer in the Royal Signal Corps.
It was in Sri Lanka, while in contact with the swamis in the (Hindu) Ramakrishna Mission, that he developed the desire to become a monk. In 1946, after the cessation of hostilities, he was transferred to Singapore, where he made contact with Buddhists and learned to meditate.
India
Having been conscripted into the Army and posted to India, at the end of the war Sangharakshita handed in his rifle, left the camp where he was stationed and deserted. He moved about in India for a few years,with a Bengali novice Buddhist, the future Buddharakshita, as his companion, meditating and experiencing for himself the company eminent spiritual personalities of the times, like Mata Anandamayi, Ramana Maharishi and Swamis of Ramakrishna MissionRamakrishna Mission
Ramakrishna Math and Ramakrishna Mission are twin organizations which form the core of a worldwide spiritual movement known as Ramakrishna Movement or Vedanta Movement. The Ramakrishna Mission is a philanthropic, volunteer organization founded by Ramakrishna's chief disciple Swami Vivekananda on...
. They spent fifteen months in 1947-48, in the Ramakrishna Mission
Ramakrishna Mission
Ramakrishna Math and Ramakrishna Mission are twin organizations which form the core of a worldwide spiritual movement known as Ramakrishna Movement or Vedanta Movement. The Ramakrishna Mission is a philanthropic, volunteer organization founded by Ramakrishna's chief disciple Swami Vivekananda on...
centre at Muvattupuzha
Muvattupuzha
Muvattupuzha is a municipality in Ernakulam district in the Indian state of Kerala. It is a junction of three districts namely Ernakulam, Kottayam and Idukki. The town is bordered by Kottayam district on southern side and Idukki district on eastern side approximately 20 km from the town...
with the consent of Swami Tapasyananda and Swami Agamananda. In May 1949 he became a novice monk, or sramanera, in a ceremony conducted by the Burmese monk, U Chandramani, who was then the most senior monk in India. It was then that he was given the name Sangharakshita (Pali
Páli
- External links :* *...
: Sangharakkhita), which means "protected by the spiritual community." Sangharakshita took full bhikkhu
Bhikkhu
A Bhikkhu or Bhikṣu is an ordained male Buddhist monastic. A female monastic is called a Bhikkhuni Nepali: ). The life of Bhikkhus and Bhikkhunis is governed by a set of rules called the patimokkha within the vinaya's framework of monastic discipline...
ordination the following year, with another Burmese bhikkhu, U Kawinda, as his preceptor (upādhyāya), and with the Ven. Jagdish Kashyap
Jagdish Kashyap
Bhikkhu Jagdish Kashyap was born in 1908 in Ranchi, Bihar, India; he died 28 January 1976. His birth name was Jagdish Narain, and the name Kashyap was given to him at his bhikkhu ordination in 1933.-Education:* BA Patna College, 1929...
as his teacher (ācārya). He studied Pali, Abhidhamma, and Logic with Jagdish Kashyap at Benares (Varanasi) University. In 1950, at Kashyap's suggestion, Sangharakshita moved to the hill town of Kalimpong close to the borders of India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, Bhutan
Bhutan
Bhutan , officially the Kingdom of Bhutan, is a landlocked state in South Asia, located at the eastern end of the Himalayas and bordered to the south, east and west by the Republic of India and to the north by the People's Republic of China...
, Nepal
Nepal
Nepal , officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, is a landlocked sovereign state located in South Asia. It is located in the Himalayas and bordered to the north by the People's Republic of China, and to the south, east, and west by the Republic of India...
. and Sikkhim, and only a few miles from Tibet
Tibet
Tibet is a plateau region in Asia, north-east of the Himalayas. It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people as well as some other ethnic groups such as Monpas, Qiang, and Lhobas, and is now also inhabited by considerable numbers of Han and Hui people...
. Kalimpong was his base for 14 years until his return to England in 1966.
During his time in Kalimpong, Sangharakshita formed a young men's Buddhist association and established an ecumenical center for the practice of Buddhism (the Triyana Vardhana Vihara). He also edited the Maha Bodhi Journal
Maha Bodhi Society
The Maha Bodhi Society is a South Asian Buddhist society founded by the Sri Lankan Buddhist leader Anagarika Dharmapala. The organization's self-stated initial efforts were for the resuscitation of Buddhism in India, and restoring the ancient Buddhist shrines at Bodh Gaya, Sarnath and...
and established a magazine, Stepping Stones. In 1951, Sangharakshita met the German-born Lama Govinda, who was the first Buddhist Sangharakshita had known "to declare openly the compatibility of art with the spiritual life," and who gave Sangharakshita a greater appreciation for Tibetan Buddhism. Govinda had begun his explorations of Buddhism in the Theravada tradition, studying briefly under the German-born bhikkhu, Nyanatiloka Mahathera
Nyanatiloka
Nyanatiloka Mahathera , born as Anton Gueth, was one of the earliest westerners in modern times to become a Bhikkhu, a fully ordained Buddhist monk.-Early life and education:...
(who gave him the name Govinda), but after meeting the Gelug Lama, Tomo Geshe Rinpoche, in 1931, he turned towards Tibetan Buddhism. Sangharakshita's spiritual explorations were to follow a similar trajectory.
Sangharakshita was ordained in the Theravada
Theravada
Theravada ; literally, "the Teaching of the Elders" or "the Ancient Teaching", is the oldest surviving Buddhist school. It was founded in India...
school, but said he became disillusioned by what he felt was the dogmatism, formalism, and nationalism of many of the Theravadin bhikkhus he met and became increasingly influenced by Tibetan Buddhist
Tibetan Buddhism
Tibetan Buddhism is the body of Buddhist religious doctrine and institutions characteristic of Tibet and certain regions of the Himalayas, including northern Nepal, Bhutan, and India . It is the state religion of Bhutan...
teachers who had fled Tibet
Tibet
Tibet is a plateau region in Asia, north-east of the Himalayas. It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people as well as some other ethnic groups such as Monpas, Qiang, and Lhobas, and is now also inhabited by considerable numbers of Han and Hui people...
after the Chinese invasion in the 1950s. Two years after his meeting with Lama Govinda he began studying with the Gelug Lama, Dhardo Rinpoche. Sangharakshita also received initiations and teachings from teachers who included Jamyang Khyentse, Dudjom Rinpoche
Dudjom Rinpoche
Dudjom Rinpoche is the title of a prominent line of tulkus of the Nyingmapa order of Tibetan Buddhism. Dudjom Rinpoche was born in 1904 on the tenth day of the sixth month in the year of the wood dragon in Southern Tibet in a region called the "hidden land" of Pema Ko. He died on January 17, 1987...
, as well as Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche. It was Dhardo Rinpoche who was to give Sangharakshita Mayahana ordination. Later, Sangharakshita also studied with a Ch'an teacher, Yogi Chen
Yogi Chen
Yogi Chen was a Chinese hermit who lived in Kalimpong, India, from 1947 until 1972, when he moved to the United States, where he lived for the remainder of his life. According to Lama Ole Nydahl, Chen had, in his youth in China, been terrified of death and had at first practiced Taoist...
(Chen Chien-Ming), along with another English monk, Bhikkhu Khantipalo. Together, the three men turned their ongoing seminar on Buddhist theory and practice into a book, Buddhist Meditation, Systematic and Practical.
In 1952, Sangharakshita met Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar (1891–1956), the chief architect of the Indian constitution and India's first law minister. Ambedkar, who had been a so-called Untouchable, converted to Buddhism, along with 380,000 other Untouchables (now known as "dalits") on 14 October 1956. Ambedkar and Sangharakshita had been in correspondence since 1950, and the Indian politician had encouraged the young monk to expand his Buddhist activities. Ambedkar appreciated Sangharakshita's "commitment to a more critically engaged Buddhism that did not at the same time dilute the cardinal precepts of Buddhist thought. Ambedkar initially invited Sangharakshita to perform his conversion ceremony, but the latter refused, arguing that U Chandramani should preside. Ambedkar died six weeks later, leaving his conversion movement leaderless, and Sangharakshita, who had just arrived in Nagpur to visit dalit Buddhists, continued what he felt was Ambedkar's work by lecturing to former Untouchables, and presiding over a ceremony in which a further 200,000 Untouchables converted. For the next decade, Sangharakshita spent much of his time visiting dalit Buddhist communities in western India.
Return to the West
In 1964, Sangharakshita was invited to help with a dispute at the Hampstead Buddhist Vihara in north London., where he proved to be a popular teacher. His ecumenical approach and failure to conform to some of the trustees' expectations was said to contrast with the strict Theravadin-style Buddhism at the vihara. Although originally planning to stay only six months, he decided to settle in England, but after he returned to India for a farewell tour, the Vihara's trustees voted to expel him.Sangharakshita returned to England and in April 1967 founded the Friends of the Western Buddhist Order
Friends of the Western Buddhist Order
The Triratna Buddhist Community is an international fellowship of Buddhists, and others who aspire to its path of mindfulness, under the leadership of the Triratna Buddhist Order...
. The Western Buddhist Order was founded a year later, when he ordained the first dozen men and women. The first ordinations were attended by a Zen monk, a Shin priest, and two Theravadin monks.
Satisfied neither with the lay-Buddhist approach of the Buddhist Society, nor the monastic approach of the Hampstead vihara — the two dominant Buddhist organizations in Britain at that time —he created what he said was a new form of Buddhism. The order would be neither lay nor monastic, and members take a set of ten precepts that are a traditional part of Mahayana Buddhism.
Initially, Sangharakshita led all classes and conducted all ordinations. He gave lectures drawing on what he felt were the essential teachings of all the major Buddhist schools. He led major retreats twice a year and frequent day and weekend events. As the order grew, and centers became established across Britain and in other countries, order members took more responsibility until, in August 2000, he devolved his responsibilities as the head of the Western Buddhist Order to eight men and women who formed what was called the "College of Public Preceptors."
Alleged sexual misconduct
In 1997, Sangharakshita became the focus for controversy when The GuardianThe Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
newspaper published complaints over some of his sexual relationships with FWBO members during the 1970s and 1980s. For a decade following these public revelations, he declined to give any response to concerns from within the movement that he had misused his position as a Buddhist teacher to sexually exploit young men. He later addressed the controversy, stressing that his sexual partners were, or appeared to be, willing, and expressed regret for any mistakes.
Contributions and legacy
Sangharakshita has been described as "among the first Westerners who devoted their life to the practice as well as the spreading of Buddhism," and as a "prolific writer, translator, and practitioner of Buddhism." As a Westerner seeking to use Western concepts to communicate Buddhism, he has been compared to Teilhard de Chardin, termed "the founding father of Western Buddhism," and noted as "a skilled innovator in his efforts to translate Buddhism to the West."For Sangharakshita, as with other Buddhists, the factor that unites all Buddhist schools is not any particular teaching, but the act of "going for refuge" (sarana-gamana), which he regards "not simply as a formula but as a life-changing event" and as an ongoing "reorientation of one's life away from mundane concerns to the values embodied in the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha." Any decisive act upon the spiritual path—renunciation, ordination, initiation, the attainment of Stream Entry, and the arising of the bodhicitta—are manifestations or examples of Going for Refuge.
Among his distinctive views is his use of the scientific theory of evolution as a metaphor for spiritual development, referring to biological evolution as the "lower evolution" and spiritual development as being a form of self-directed "higher evolution." He has drawn parallels between Buddhism and the spirit of the Romantics, who believed that what art reveals has great moral and spiritual significance, and has written of "the religion of art."
Including compilations of his talks, Sangharakshita has authored more than 60 books. Meanwhile, the Triratna Buddhist Community, which he founded as the FWBO, has been described as "perhaps the most successful attempt to create an ecumenical international Buddhist organization." The community is one of the three largest Buddhist movements in Britain, and has a presence in Europe, the Americas, Asia, and Africa. More than a fifth of all Western Buddhist Order members, as of 2006, were in India, where Dr. Ambedkar's mission to convert dalits to Buddhism continues. Martin Baumann, a scholar of Buddhism, has estimated that there are 100,000 people worldwide who are affiliated with the Triratna Buddhist Community.
For Buddhologist Francis Brassard, Sangharakshita's major contribution is "without doubt his attempt to translate the ideas and practices of [Buddhism] into Western languages." The non-denominational nature of the Triratna Buddhist Community, its equal ordination for both men and women, and its evolution of new forms of shared practice, such as what it calls team-based right livelihood projects, have been cited as examples of such "translation," and also as the creation of a "Buddhist society in miniature within the Western, industrialized world." For Martin Baumann, the Triratna Buddhist Community serves as proof that "Western concepts, such as a capitalistic work ethos, ecological considerations, and a social-reformist perspective, can be integrated into the Buddhist tradition."
Biography
- Anagarika Dharmapala: A Biographical Sketch
- Great Buddhists of the Twentieth Century
Books on Buddhism
- The Eternal Legacy: An Introduction to the Canonical Literature of Buddhism
- A Survey of Buddhism: Its Doctrines and Methods Through the Ages
- The Ten Pillars of Buddhism
- The Three Jewels: The Central Ideals of Buddhism
Edited Seminars and Lectures on Buddhism
- The Bodhisattva Ideal
- Buddha Mind
- The Buddha's Victory
- Buddhism for Today – and Tomorrow
- Creative Symbols of Tantric Buddhism
- The Drama of Cosmic Enlightenment
- The Essence of Zen
- A Guide to the Buddhist Path
- Human Enlightenment
- The Inconceivable Emancipation
- Know Your Mind
- Living with Awareness
- Living with Kindness
- The Meaning of Conversion in Buddhism
- New Currents in Western Buddhism
- Ritual and Devotion in Buddhism
- The Taste of Freedom
- The Yogi's Joy: Songs of Milarepa
- Tibetan Buddhism: An Introduction
- Transforming Self and World
- Vision and Transformation
- Who Is the Buddha?
- What Is the Dharma?
- What Is the Sangha?
- Wisdom Beyond Words
Essays and Papers
- Alternative Traditions
- Crossing the Stream
- Going For Refuge
- The Priceless Jewel
- Aspects of Buddhist Morality
- Dialogue between Buddhism and Christianity
- The Journey to Il Covento
- St Jerome Revisited
- Buddhism and Blasphemy
- Buddhism, World Peace, and Nuclear War
- The Bodhisattva Principle
- The Glory of the Literary World
- A Note on The Burial of Count Orgaz
- Criticism East and West
- Dharmapala: The Spiritual Dimension
- With Allen Ginsburg In Kalimpong (1962)
- Indian Buddhists
- Ambedkar and Buddhism
Memoirs, Autobiography and letters
- Facing Mount Kanchenjunga: An English Buddhist in the Eastern Himalayas
- From Genesis to the Diamond Sutra: A Western Buddhist's Encounters with Christianity
- In the Sign of the Golden Wheel: Indian Memoirs of an English Buddhist
- Moving Against the Stream: The Birth of a New Buddhist Movement
- The Rainbow Road: From Tooting Broadway to Kalimpong
- The History of My Going for Refuge
- Precious Teachers
- Travel Letters
- Through Buddhist Eyes
Poetry and Art
- The Call of the Forest and Other Poems
- Complete Poems 1941–1994
- Conquering New Worlds: Selected Poems
- Hercules and the Birds
- In the Realm of the Lotus
- The Religion of Art
Polemic
- Forty Three Years Ago: Reflections on My Bhikkhu Ordination
- The FWBO and 'Protestant Buddhism': An Affirmation and a Protest
- The Meaning of Orthodoxy in Buddhism
- Was the Buddha a Bhikkhu? A Rejoinder to a Reply to 'Forty Three Years Ago'.
Sangharakshita
– Sangharakshita's home page: writings and poetry- Books by Sangharakshita
- Recorded lectures by Sangharakshita
- Transcriptions of talks by Sangharakshita
- Videos featuring Sangharakshita
- FWBO official website.
- A brief third-party introduction to Sangharakshita.
See also
- Bringing Buddhism to the West – a biography by Dharmachari SubhutiDharmachari SubhutiDharmachari Subhuti, originally Alex Kennedy, is a senior associate of Sangharakshita, founder of the Triratna Buddhist Community...
- Sangharakshita – a new voice in the Buddhist tradition by Dharmachari SubhutiDharmachari SubhutiDharmachari Subhuti, originally Alex Kennedy, is a senior associate of Sangharakshita, founder of the Triratna Buddhist Community...
: offers a concise introduction to Sangharakshita's thought.