BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY CLASS – I: TCCC Sunday Buddhist Philosophy Class
The Tibetan Canadian Cultural Centre has been organizing Buddhist Philosophy class in Tibetan Language since 2008. Since January 2010 Gomde Lharampa Geshe Thubten Samdup has been most kind and generous to teach the Buddhist philosophy class at Gangjong Choedenling. The class has been held on weekends and the language of instruction is Tibetan.
Geshe la has designed a 5 year Buddhist Philosophy that constitutes both the Teachings of Sutra and Tantra. Click here for the curriculum (in Tibetan). Below find the broad focus of each year.
YEAR 4: 2013-14
Time: 11:00 am –12:00 Noon
1. Day & Date: Every Sunday, August 4, 2013 to August 25, 2013
Topic: Teaching of “21 Tara”
2. Day and Date: Every Sunday, September 1, 2013 onwards
Topic: Teaching of Guhyasamaja Completion Stage
Time: 12:00 Noon –1:00 pm
Topic: Buddhism Level 1: The Stages of Path – Practitioners of small scope
Day and Date: Every Sunday, August 4, 2013 onwards
Teacher: Gomde Lharampa Geshe Thubten Samdup
Language of Instruction: Tibetan
Venue: Tibetan Canadian Cultural Centre, 40 Titan Road, Etobicoke, ON
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YEAR 1: 2010-2011
ལོ་རིམ་དང་པོའི་ཁྲིད་ཚན། – སྐྱེས་བུ་ཆུང་ངུའི་ལམ་གྱི་རིམ་པ།
Topic: Stages of Path of a person of Small Scope (or initial Motivation)
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YEAR 2: 2011-2012
Topic: Stages of Path of a person of Middling Scope (or initial Motivation)
ལོ་རིམ་གཉིས་པའི་ཁྲིད་ཚན། – སྐྱེས་བུ་འབྲིང་གི་ལམ་གྱི་རིམ་པ།
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YEAR 3: 2012-2013
From September 2012, the class has been held every Sunday and please note the topic and schedule below.
ལོ་རིམ་གསུམ་པའི་ཁྲིད་ཚན། – སྐྱེས་བུ་ཆེན་པོའི་ལམ་གྱི་རིམ་པ།
TOPIC: Path of a person of great scope
Day & Date: Every Sunday from September 9, 2012
Time: 11:00 am – 01:00 pm
Venue: Tibetan Canadian Cultural Centre, 40 Titan Road, Etobicoke, ON M8Z 2J8
Teacher: Gomde Lharampa Geshe Thubten Samdup
Language of Instruction: Tibetan
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BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY CLASS -II: TCCC Saturday Buddhist Philosophy Class
During His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s Lamrim Teaching in Mundgod in South India last year, TCCC Buddhist Philosophy teacher Geshe Lharampa Thuben Samdup la submitted a report to His Holiness the Dalai Lama about TCCC Buddhist Philosophy class. His Holiness the Dalai Lama blessed and showered happiness about the update, and advised to continue with more effort and to teach three subject/texts.
TCCC is happy to announce that Geshe Thubten Samdup la will be teaching one of the texts from Saturday, April 6. 2013. Please find below the details.
༼ ད་རེས་ཀྱི་ཁྲིད་གཞུང་དང་གནས་ཡུ
ཁྲིད་གཞུང་། ཀློང་ཆེན་རབ་འབྱམས་པའི་གྲུབ་
སློབ་སྟོན་པ། སྒོམ་སྡེ་ལྷ་རམས་པ་དགེ་བཤེས་ཐུ
ཚོགས་ཡུལ། གངས་ལྗོངས་ཆོས་ལྡན་གླིང་།
དུས་ཚོད། ༢༠༡༣ ཟླ་ ༤ ཚེ་ ༦ རེས་གཟའ་སྤེན་པ་ཆར་ཅན། ཞོགས་པ་ཆུ་ཚོད་ ༡༡ ནས། ༡༢:༣༠
Click here for detail Teaching Announcement (in Tibetan)
Text: Drub Tha Zod by Kun Khyen Longchen Rabjampa
Teacher: Geshe Lharampa Thubten Samdup
Day & Date: Every Saturday from April 6, 2013 unless otherwise noticed.
Time: 11:00 am – 12:30 pm
Venue: Tibetan Canadian Cultural Centre, 40 Titan Road, ON M8Z 2J8
Language of Instruction: Tibetan
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A brief biography of Gomde Lharampa Geshe Thubten Samdup:
A piece of stone buried in the mud of Samsara;
You cleansed and polished it with your compassionate hands.
And turned it into a precious jewel.
I pay homage to my root Guru, Tenzin Gyatso (His Holiness the Dalai Lama).
Gomde Lharampa Geshe Thubten Samdup is a former monk of Sera Je Monastic University, one of the largest monastic universities of Tibet. He joined Sera-je monastery in South India, in 1972. After studying intensively and diligently for twenty one years, in 1993, he achieved the highest degree given by the Gelugpa Tradition, the degree of Geshe Lharampa (an equivalent of PhD in Buddhism). This was followed by Tantric studies at the Gyuto Tantric College in Bomdila, East India. In 1994, he was officially elected as one of the two teachers for Sera Je debate classes.
In 1992, the first most demanding Geshe Lharampa examination took place in Mundgod, South India for twelve days. That was the most challenging Geshe examination ever held in exile. Eight monks among the twenty, who took part in the exam had failed and could not become Geshe Lharamapa. But Geshe-la and his friend from Sera je (Geshe Lobsang Choedhar) both successfully passed the exam. This exam was advised and endorsed by the Dalai Lama because of many complaints he received over the years from the West expressing their dissatisfaction and disappointment towards the Tibetan Lamas, Geshes, and teachers in the West who are not qualified and was requested to have stricter rules to acquire these titles.
Although he is one of the top scholars among his generation, yet he is very modest and humble. His unique teaching style with great clarity and simplicity makes students feel hopeful; even with the most complex subject it would seem easy and comprehensible. He has been teaching Dharma for twenty nine years, and has many students at Sera monastery and in the West. Many of his students at Sera have become Geshes Lharampas.
He has taught all the five great texts at the monastery:
1. Pramanavartikarika, the logic;
2. Prajnaparamita, the perfection of wisdom;
3. Madyamaka, the middle way;
4. Abhidharmakosha, the treasury of knowledge;
5. Vinaya, the monk’s discipline.
He has also taught “The Generation and Completion Stage of Guhyasamaja Tantra” The Highest Yoga Tantra to advanced students in the West. Geshe-la is a very well known scholar and has written many books, but because of his modesty and humbleness students did not know he could teach Tantra, but later when he was repeatedly requested to teach Tantra, then he taught with such a profoundity and clarity the students were amazed. Although, he attracts large numbers of students when he teaches Tantra, he never prematurely teaches Tantra to the students who have no understanding of Lamrim and Sutrayana teachings.
He has written many books, short writings, and numerous articles for the Tibetan News Papers and Magazines, but his greatest work is his Dharma encyclopedic dictionary called Gomde Tsikzo Chenmo, the Great Gomde Dictionary, which is rather an encyclopedia than a dictionary, which has more than one thousand and five hundred pages. This encyclopedia is the third largest dictionary in Tibetan and probably the largest dedicated Buddhist dictionary in the world. The copy of the first edition was offered to His Holiness the Dalai Lama in 2004. It was published in Dharamsala, India in 2005. The publication was sponsored by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Despite many obstacles and hardships he has never wavered, and after twelve long years he successfully finished his second edition and offered the first copy to His Holiness the Dalai Lama during his recent visit to Toronto, Canada, in October 22, 2010. He will be adding more entries to this book until his last breath. This is the third largest dictionary in Tibetan history and the first largest Buddhist dictionary.
He has received the Shelung lineage of Lama Tzongkhapa’s Lamrim Chenmo, The Great Treatise on the Stages of The Path To Enlightenment, four times from His Holiness and once from Ling Rinpoche, the senior tutor and the medium Lamrim from Trijang Rinpoche, the junior tutor to His Holiness the Dalai Lama; he also received the small Lamrim from His Holiness on several occasions. That makes him fully qualified to teach Lamrim Chenmo. If a student wishes to study Buddha Dharma in depth and want to learn Dharma word by word then Geshe-la is the answer.
The Dalai Lama is very fond of Geshe-la because of his tireless contribution in preserving Tibetan culture, devotion to his teachers, great humility, and his knowledge and expertise in Dharma. In fact, His Holiness has invited Geshe-la four times: in 1988, 2004, 2009, and 2010, without even him having to request. In fact, there are a very few people who have had such privilege.
Geshe-la is well-known for his debate skills, and he is considered as one of the top debaters. In 1988, when Geshe-la happened be in Dharamsala, India during the Tibetan New Year; he and another monk from Sera Je, (Lobsang Dorje) were asked by His Holiness to perform the New Year’s debate ceremony, called Karto Tsoklang (dKar sPro Tshogs Lang) in the presence of the Dalai Lama, Tibetan government officers, Namgyal monks, and other dignitaries. That debate was very successful and from then on Geshes from the three great universities were asked to perform the same ceremony during the Tibetan New Year in Dharamsala, India. He had good fortune to perform the same debate ceremony again in 1993, when he was becoming Geshe Lharampa.
In October 29, 2009 during the Dalai Lama’s visit to Vancouver, His Holiness appointed Geshe-la as a spiritual teacher to the Tibetan community. Presently, he is the spiritual teacher of TCCC (Tibetan Canadian Cultural Center), Gangjong Choedenling in Toronto, Canada. He also established a Dharma study group called “Je Tsongkhap Study Group” in Toronto where he teaches Western and Chinese students in English.
His writings include:
- An encyclopaedic Dharma dictionary called The Great Gomde Dictionary (1560 pages)
- A dictionary for young people (dag yig gzhon nu’i dga’ ston)
- A commentary on the Mandala offering (in Tibetan)
- A commentary on the Guhyasamaja completion stage, (in Tibetan)
- A Guhyasamaja ritual text (in Tibetan)
- A commentary on the Heart Sutra (in Tibetan)
- A commentary on ”bSang Po sPyod pa’i sMon Gyi rGyal Po”, The King of Prayer (in Tibetan)
- A commentary on Tara
- A commentary on Tibetan national anthem (in Tibetan) and numerous articles and other short writings as well as poems.
