![]() ![]() And I fear that while, Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche might act very hip, he is clearly coming from an ancient, misogynistic view point and students need to not lose sight of that. I cannot help but wonder if this isn’t an intentional strategy-why else did he request that students read the entire article? Why did he refuse to have it edited? I cannot help but wonder if this is not the first step towards business as usual at Rigpa centers.Īnd in the context of the clear, economical statements made by HH Dalai Lama and Mingyur Rinpoche, this rambling, disconnected rant seems very troublesome. Their clear ideas of right and wrong are diminished. They forget that this is about fellow students being harmed-and about students who would defend them being silenced. Students slogging through all 10,000 words of this article become side-tracked and lose their shock. This is about sentient beings who are suffering, really suffering, and needing clear guidance at this time.Īnd once people start losing their outrage and being distracted in this way, then momentum is lost. ![]() Students then find some distractions or antidotes that they like, such as the point that we have to communicate better or that lamas have to warn students about Vajrayana-or the quips about the New York Times-and then they forget the main point. All of them are mere shiny objects that distract from that point. None of them show any compassion or concern that suffering might be occurring. I mean, I really don’t think that the press treat Buddhists badly or are to be blamed for this situation! Nonetheless, none of the points he makes speak directly to the fact that students are being harmed. I am not saying that Rinpoche doesn’t make some good points in the article, though he makes some points that I question and some points that seem a little trivial to my mind. By the time he finished, the main point-that a Tibetan, Vajrayana lama, who had been given asylum in a law-abiding, Western country, could break the laws of that country, could rape and beat women, and if his students spoke out, they would go to hell-was lost. What did I find? After dropping what I considered to be an ethical bombshell, he simply continued blithely onto other subjects. So I thought maybe he had something to say that would ameliorate his horrible claim. Then I regained my perspective and remembered that Rinpoche had advised readers to finish reading all 10,000 words of his article before judging. Though the view should be as vast as the sky, keep your conduct as fine as barley flour. There was a moment, after reading this, when I had the feeling that I could no longer continue as a Buddhist. I stopped reading after he said that students who spoke out against Sogyal Rinpoche’s behaviours had broken samaya-and that Vajrayana masters might even break Western laws if they needed to and there was nothing students could do. As a woman living in a Western country with laws, as a liberal with a subscription to The New York Times, and as a follower of HH Dalai Lama, I found the recent statement from Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche regarding the troubles at Rigpa to be deeply disturbing. ![]()
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