My OperaThe power of the Modern West !
Friday, April 25, 2008 2:20:54 PM
In most Buddhist cultures throughout history, women have been seen as lesser beings. The dominant view has been that they’re not capable of achieving enlightenment, and that their births are lower ones. There are nunneries in Tibet and in exile in India, but the religious education offered to the nuns has generally been poor. With the help of the Dalai Lama and others, this is changing now. Still, with the exception of Jetsun Khusola, who lives in Vancouver and doesn’t teach much anymore, Khandro Rinpoche is the only female Tibetan teacher to have come to the West. It’s not that there aren’t any excellent female practitioners and teachers in Tibet and India—there are—but they have chosen, for a variety of reasons, to remain under the radar, to have few students, or no students at all. They don’t want to teach publicly to large groups, they don’t want a name. Khandro Rinpoche, on the other hand, understands her responsibility: it is, in part, to encourage and inspire women, particularly Tibetan women, to take their seats as teachers of the dharma. This trailblazing is bold, for obvious reasons, and it’s brave.
“Women in patriarchal systems are haunted by lack of confidence and fear of being leaders,” says Judith Simmer-Brown, author of Dakini’s Warm Breath: The Feminine Principle in Tibetan Buddhism. “But Khandro Rinpoche has unfailingly challenged women to take a risk in their practice and their lives, even while she has cautioned them about excessive emotionality or a merely political response. She is deeply committed to practice and realization as the key to empowerment for women.”
This is what Khandro Rinpoche is working on in her own life: the simplicity of resting. That’s what she says to you, though it’s almost eleven o’clock at night, four years after the children’s blessing, and she’s at it again—seeing people, one by one, in a back office at that same New York City dharma center after a long evening teaching on the preciousness of our human birth. She is only here in New York for one night this time, before moving on to another teaching in another state. Tonight she is sitting up straight in the corner of a large couch that is draped in thick brocades. She is a very short woman in maroon and saffron robes. Her head is shaved, she has dark, round eyes like a bird’s, and a small, slightly pursed mouth. The whole time you are with her she keeps her attention on you. Her gaze is not unfriendly—sometimes it is neutral, most times pleasant, waiting.
“The simplicity of resting. . .” she says. She speaks fast, and her delivery has an offhand quality, as if she has thought so much about what she’s saying that it’s now part of her, cruising through her veins with her blood, gliding out on the breath. She looks at you and tilts her head. “The simplicity of resting—there is so much profoundness in that.” Then she says, “It is, I think, what really needs to be worked with at all times.”
“Women in patriarchal systems are haunted by lack of confidence and fear of being leaders,” says Judith Simmer-Brown, author of Dakini’s Warm Breath: The Feminine Principle in Tibetan Buddhism. “But Khandro Rinpoche has unfailingly challenged women to take a risk in their practice and their lives, even while she has cautioned them about excessive emotionality or a merely political response. She is deeply committed to practice and realization as the key to empowerment for women.”
This is what Khandro Rinpoche is working on in her own life: the simplicity of resting. That’s what she says to you, though it’s almost eleven o’clock at night, four years after the children’s blessing, and she’s at it again—seeing people, one by one, in a back office at that same New York City dharma center after a long evening teaching on the preciousness of our human birth. She is only here in New York for one night this time, before moving on to another teaching in another state. Tonight she is sitting up straight in the corner of a large couch that is draped in thick brocades. She is a very short woman in maroon and saffron robes. Her head is shaved, she has dark, round eyes like a bird’s, and a small, slightly pursed mouth. The whole time you are with her she keeps her attention on you. Her gaze is not unfriendly—sometimes it is neutral, most times pleasant, waiting.
“The simplicity of resting. . .” she says. She speaks fast, and her delivery has an offhand quality, as if she has thought so much about what she’s saying that it’s now part of her, cruising through her veins with her blood, gliding out on the breath. She looks at you and tilts her head. “The simplicity of resting—there is so much profoundness in that.” Then she says, “It is, I think, what really needs to be worked with at all times.”
