Teaching Tibetan Buddhism through the Confucian Analects: Khenpo Sodargye on the ‘ordinary wisdom’ of Sakya Pandita, Mipham Rinpoche, and Confucius

Teaching Tibetan Buddhism through the Confucian Analects: Khenpo Sodargye on the ‘ordinary wisdom’ of Sakya Pandita, Mipham Rinpoche, and Confucius  

Khenpo Sodargye is one of the key second-generation Tibetan Buddhist leaders at Larung Gar Buddhist Academy, who has been highly influential in transmitting the teachings of the Nyingma lineage to Chinese lay and monastic practitioners. Fundamental to this transmission is his ‘translation’ – in both linguistic and cultural terms – of the Tibetan tradition through the medium of both traditional and modern Chinese culture. Khenpo teaches Tibetan Buddhism to Chinese followers often using Chinese cultural terms and historiography, yet draws these into the Tibetan Buddhist, and specifically Nyingma lineage, normalising them with parallels already found in the Tibetan tradition. This cumulative ‘Eastern’ religiosity he sets up in oppositional terms to ‘Western’ modern influences which have led to a decline in values in modern China. One such example of using Chinese culture in this manner is his teaching on the Analects (Lunyu), which this paper seeks to explore.