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The Vision of Nitartha Institute

as discussed by The Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche
Nitartha Institute
July, 2003

It is wonderful to have this opportunity to explore the Western Buddhist community and to bring to Nitartha Institute the complete tradition of study and practice in the Tibetan Buddhist intellectual tradition. This is a very special journey for us. Sometimes I call it “Buddhist Intellectual Boot Camp.” Don’t worry; it’s not that bad. However, because we are teaching a lot of things in a short time, it is not as familiar to us as the atmosphere of a general Buddhist course. Many Western Buddhist practitioners are lay sangha, especially in North America, leading ordinary family lives with limited time for study and practice. Therefore, we have to bring in a great amount of teaching in a short time, which means that our program has a strong impact.

Our main hope at Nitartha Institute is to bring to the West the pure and genuine tradition of studying the dharma. Not only to bring that tradition and lineage here, but also to turn it into a Western Buddhist structure. Our main effort is not just to export acharyas or Tibetan books from Asia and import them to the Institute. We are trying to thoroughly process Western Buddhist students and provide a deeper way of training for them.

For the last number of years we have been working on that particular goal, and I would say we have been pretty successful in general. I’m very happy with the outcome. We have developed the curriculum of studies and materials, and we have translated, transcribed, and edited them. They have been taught several times, not only by the Tibetan teachers but also by our Western teachers. The combination of the two has become very important for the Institute and its development. In addition, debate in the English language has improved every year, especially since Acharya Lama Tenpa took charge of developing the debate classes. We also have wonderful debate teachers amongst our Western teachers.

Whenever you try to bring in something new, it becomes a great struggle. If you read Tibetan history, you will see that it was not easy to bring Buddhism into Tibet. Until Padmasambhava came, it was very difficult. In the same way, bringing the complete dharma to the West will take some time, and it will be a little bit of an effort for us. But we have to start somewhere. If we don’t start, we will never achieve anything. If we don’t have a dream, we will not achieve our dream. This is our dream, and we are on the way to achieving the dream of making Western Buddhism as full and complete as possible.

The reason we are emphasizing the intellectual tradition of Buddhism so much is that the other side, the meditation side, has already been taken care of quite well. All the traditions of Buddhism, Theravada, Mahayana Zen, Tibetan Mahayana/Vajrayana, and all the previous masters have done a wonderful job of introducing meditation here. Students in the West have been very diligent and have done a wonderful job of practicing using their cushions. We still need to do more work in that area as well. We need more realized yogis and yoginis. However, when we look at the intellectual, or study, aspect of Buddhism, we see that there is more work to be done and there is a need to put more emphasis on making our Western tradition of Buddhism a full tradition.

One important aspect of this challenge is to benefit other beings. To benefit oneself, we may not need so much deep training. But to benefit others, we need deeper training. Therefore, study is not only for self-benefit; it is also for the benefit of others. When we start Nitartha each day, it is important for us to give rise to bodhichitta, compassion, and loving kindness for other beings, and to say, “May our studies here bring benefit and joy in other sentient beings’ hearts.” That is an important part of our journey here.

I am extremely happy to be here with all of you and to have the opportunity to work on this dream together. It is not possible for the teacher alone or the student alone to achieve it. It is a mutual effort, a mutual work. When a teacher and student meet, there is no doubt that it will bear fruit. Therefore, I would like to thank you all for joining this study course. I hope you have an enchanting experience of intellectual, traditional dharma.