The Sakya Jetsunmas
-
Amazon eBook Download
Before you go, sign up to receive news & promotions from Shambhala.com
Apple eBook Download
Before you go, sign up to receive news & promotions from Shambhala.com
Google eBook Download
Before you go, sign up to receive news & promotions from Shambhala.com
Kobo eBook Download
Before you go, sign up to receive news & promotions from Shambhala.com
Nook eBook Download
Before you go, sign up to receive news & promotions from Shambhala.com
Snow Lion03/01/2022Pages: 320Size: 6 x 9ISBN: 9781645470915DetailsAn exploration of an extraordinary group of female meditation masters from the Sakya Buddhist tradition in Tibet whose determination and accomplishments can serve as a great example for meditators the world over.
In The Sakya Jetsunmas, Elisabeth Benard presents the first in-depth study of the great female practitioners born into the Sakya Khon family, one of the most prestigious families of wisdom-holders in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. These jetsunmas (“venerable women”) received the same training as their brothers, taught some of the most famous male lamas of their times, and transmitted wisdom from one female adept to another. Benard did extensive research in Tibet, India, and Nepal, collecting texts, diaries, and many interviews. In this groundbreaking book, the hidden world of the Sakya Jetsunmas is finally revealed.RelatedCheck items to add to the cart orAuthor BioELISABETH BENARD (Ph.D. Columbia University) is a professor emerita of religion at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, Washington. She is the author of Chinnamastā: The Aweful Buddhist and Hindu Tantric Goddess (Motilal Banarsidass, 1994) and numerous scholarly articles. She is a longtime student of H.H. the Forty-First Sakya Trizin (now Trichen) and H.E. Jetsun Kushok.Praise"This invaluable work on the Sakya Jetsunmas offers an intimate look into the lives of four exceptional yoginīs who were outstanding by virtue of both their birth and their spiritual accomplishments. Biographies of realized female spiritual adepts are few and far between, and until now this has also been true of the Jetsunmas of the Khon family. And so, it is a huge boon that the pages of this wonderful book are so abundantly filled with rich details of the Jetsunmas’ extraordinary lives. The book is filled with wonder and is bound to inspire and instruct not only female practitioners but anyone who is walking the spiritual path in earnest. I pray that it may lead uncountable beings to enlightenment." —His Holiness the Forty-First Sakya Trichen
"With impeccable research, Elisabeth Benard has opened the hidden treasury of the lives of Sakya women of the Khon clan, trained from childhood for awakening. Chapter after chapter we meet yoginīs whose wisdom, radiance, and resourcefulness in the face of obstacles glow from every page. This invaluable book brings these remarkable women out of obscurity into the living history of Tibetan Buddhism." —Acharya Judith Simmer-Brown, Naropa University, author of Dakini’s Warm Breath: The Feminine Principle in Tibetan Buddhism
"Elisabeth A. Benard has compiled a scholarly and riveting history of the Sakya jetsunmas, female Tibetan lamas, that is a most welcome new addition to the sparse canon of research into the vital topic of female Buddhist teachers. . . . The book is highly readable and even gripping at times. Scholarly, yet never dry, it is alive with the warmth of the stories of family and lineage, as well as the transmission and uniquely non-dualistic style of the contemporary Jetsun Kushok-la herself. The book flows seamlessly between the spiritual and the secular teachings that Tibetan lamas, especially female lamas, so aptly embody and impart." —Sarah C. Beasley, Buddhistdoor Global
"Specialists and scholars will appreciate this contribution to the scant literature on female figures in Buddhist history." —Publishers Weekly
"Readers of The Sakya Jetsunmas: The Hidden World of Tibetan Female Lamas will enjoy learning about the lives and accomplishments of Jetsunma Chime Tenpai Nyima, Jetsunma Tamdrin Wangmo, Kyabgon Pema Trinlei, Dagmo Trinlei Paljor, and Jetsun Kushok, as well as discovering more about the history of a powerful aristocratic family of Tibet and all that entails. Replete with fascinating aspects of Tibetan life including, but not limited to: insights into polyandrous marriage; descriptions of material culture, such as statues and flying masks; the procuring of goods from the Khampa traders, the Pandatsang family; and the history of the Sakya witches, Benard’s well-researched The Sakya Jetsunmas provides a gateway into the splendid world of Tibetan culture." —Yeshe: A Journal of Tibetan Literature, Arts and Humanities
Selected Reader Reviews