Property:Bio
From Bodhicitta
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K
Ria was born in a R.C. family in Utrecht briefly before the end of World War II. She entered Utrecht University in 1964 to read Law for two years, and Indian Languages and Cultures with the famous Prof. Jan Gonda for six years, to which she added courses in Religious Studies and Cultural Anthropology in Leiden University. In later life, she fondly remembered seminars in Leiden by Prof. Fokke Sierksma, the rebellious disciple of Van der Leeuw and first post-Christian scholar of religions in Dutch Faculties of Theology, on themes such as hair as symbol of sex and gender, and on messianic and apocalyptic movements. She earned her MA-degree in Indian Languages and Cultures in 1970 with a major in Buddhism, Sanskrit and Pali, and
minors in Comparative Religion, Ancient Javanese and Tibetan, and an MA-thesis on Suicide in Buddhism, in which she investigated the recent public self-immolations of Buddhist monks in Vietnam in protest against the war.
She was appointed a junior lecturer in Buddhism in the Faculty of Theology of Utrecht University in 1970. Under Gonda’s guidance, she continued to work on ‘the concept of the ''Paccekabuddha'' in Pali canonical and commentarial literature’, on which she earned her PhD-degree in 1974. It dealt with the Buddhist ascetic who is ‘an enlightened one by himself’: he dies without having taught ''dhamma'' to others. It was her second publication, for in 1973 she had published already a critical edition of ''Catuşparişatsūtra'', the ''Sūtra on the Foundation of the Buddhist Order.'' She loved this kind of philological work but was quite fastidious in it by demanding from herself and her students that translations not only reflect accurately the contents of a text but also its literary qualities. In this vein she published a translation into Dutch of Sāntideva’s ''Bodhicaryāvatāra'' (‘The Path of the Bodhisattva’) from the Sanskrit in 1980, and, with her students, the ''Bhagavadgita'' in 1997, also from the Sanskrit, and ''Theratherigatha'', ‘The Verses of the ''Theri'' ’, (enlightened males and females), from the Pali in 1998 and 2000. Two more unfinished translation projects will be completed by one of her former students.
Ria became a Senior Lecturer in the Utrecht Faculty of Theology in 1975, but also taught part time at Tilburg University from 1978 to 1981, and from 1981 to 1984 at the University of Groningen. She became a full professor in Living Religions and the Comparative Study of Religions in 1988 in the Utrecht Faculty, the first woman ever to hold a full professorship in a Dutch faculty of theology. In her inaugural address she discussed the Buddha as ‘the teacher of the world and the trainer of humans’. She herself was also an excellent teacher. She knew how to join the Buddhist past and its historical diversity with modern developments in Asia and Europe, e.g. by inviting a Buddhist monk or nun, or a Dutch lay Buddhist, into her classes as examples how Buddhism might permeate a person’s life also in modern Western societies. Though many of the Utrecht students were hardly receptive to critical scholarship on religions because of the orthodox Christian theology they espoused, a few were much inspired by it. For them, Ria was much more than merely an inspiring teacher. She invited some into her home for all night discussions, music and dance, and a breakfast in her garden in the early morning. For others she conducted, at their request, travel tours to Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand where she was conducting research. Ria supervised ten PhDs, four of which were awarded a ''cum laude''. ([https://jangplatvoet.nl/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/Ria-Kloppenborg.In-Memoriam.pdf Source Accessed Mar 19, 2021])
David Ross Komito is a professor of Asian Philosophy and author on the subjects of Mādhyamaka Buddhist philosophy, meditation and the psychology of religion.
Komito received his B.A. in psychology from the University of California, Los Angeles, his M.A. in Religious Studies, M.S. in Counseling and Ph.D. in Tibetan Studies from Indiana University, Bloomington. From 1986 through 1990 he was Dean of John F. Kennedy University's Graduate School for the Study of Human Consciousness. Since 1987 has lectured at San Francisco Zen Center, Finding the Path to Liberation Buddhist Center and other Buddhist centers in the Western USA. After teaching at John F. Kennedy University and the University of San Francisco, he created the Religious Studies Program at Eastern Oregon University. Since retiring from Eastern Oregon University he has been teaching part-time in the Philosophy Department of Portland State University, Oregon.
He is married to the thanka artist Kayla Komito and lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico. ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Komito Source Accessed Mar 7, 2025]) +
Khenchen Konchog Gyaltsen Rinpoche, born in Tsari, Tibet in the spring of 1946, came to the West in the early 1980’s to found the Tibetan Meditation Center in Washington, D.C. An important Khenchen in the Drikung lineage, Rinpoche completed a nine-year course of study at the Central Institute of Higher Tibetan Studies in Varanasi, India beginning in 1967. In more recent years, Khenchen Rinpoche has spent a great deal of his time traveling in order to give teachings and lead retreats. He has established centers throughout the US and in Chile, and he frequently visits Europe, especially Germany and Austria, as well as Southeast Asia. In 2001 he received the high honor of being enthroned as Khenchen (great abbot). He lives in Frederick, Maryland. ([https://drikungtucson.org/our-teachers/khenchen-konchog-gyaltsen-rinpoche/ Source Accessed May 1, 2026])
:Publications:
*[[The Jewel Ornament of Liberation]], ''The Jewel Ornament of Liberation: The Wish-fulfilling Gem of the Noble Teachings''. By Gampopa (sgam po pa). Edited by Ani K. Chodron. Ithaca, NY: Snow Lion Publications, 1998.
*[[Wheel of Wisdom]]. Translated by Terence Barrett. Gainsville, FL: Vajra Publications, 2012.
*[[Opening the Treasure of the Profound]], ''Opening the Treasure of the Profound: Teachings on the Songs of Jigten Sumgön and Milarepa''. Edited by Khenmo Trinlay Chödron. Boston: Snow Lion/Shambhala Publications, 2013.
*See more at Vajra Publications (Florida): https://www.vajrapub.com/ +
Sten Konow (17 April 1867 – 29 June 1948) was a Norwegian Indologist. He was professor of Indic philology at the Christiania University, Oslo, from 1910, moving to Hamburg University in 1914, where he was professor for Indian history and culture. He returned to Oslo as professor for Indian languages and history in 1919.
He translated Rajasekhara's ''Karpuramanjari'', which was published as volume 4 of the Harvard Oriental Series in 1901. ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sten_Konow Source Accessed Aug 17, 2021]) +
Vladimir Korobov, Ph.D. is a lecturer of Tibetan and Buddhist studies at the Centre of Oriental Studies, Vilnius University. He currently works at the Department of Logic and History of Philosophy, Vilnius University. Vladimir does research in Logic, Epistemology and Pragmatics. ([https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Vladimir-Korobov Source Accessed Jan 16, 2025]) +
Jobst Koss is a psychotherapist and has been studying Tibetan Buddhism and the Tibetan language for over 25 years. He is the editor of several books on Buddhism. ([https://www.amazon.de/Die-Lebensf%C3%BChrung-Geiste-Erleuchtung-Bodhisattvacharyavatara/dp/3896202251/ref=pd_rhf_dp_p_img_1?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=3SSQKX67FGDJ1K93WVWH Source Accessed Jan 8, 2021]) +
Arnie Kotler, M.A. UC Berkeley, has been a developmental editor of nonfiction books since 1979, when he helped translator/scholar/artist Kazuaki Tanahashi with Moon in a Dewdrop: Writings of Zen Master Dōgen. In 1985, Arnie started Parallax Press and helped craft the lectures and writings of Thich Nhat Hanh and other spiritual peace activists into landmark books. He also compiled and edited books by Thich Nhat Hanh for New York publishers, including Peace Is Every Step (Bantam Books, 1 million sold), Living Buddha Living Christ (Riverhead), and The Heart of the Buddha’s Teaching (Broadway Books). Jodie Evans, cofounder of CODEPINK: Women for Peace, told Publishers Weekly, “Arnie has an unerring instinct for agents of change, and he has been able to deliver their messages.” In 1996, Clayton Carlson, founder of HarperSan Francisco, described Parallax Press as “one of the most impressive publishing achievements of the past decade.” The One Spirit Book Club, a division of the Book of the Month Club, described Parallax Press’s books as “simply the best works from the finest contemporary teachers on the topic of practical spirituality.”
In 2005, Arnie founded Koa Books in Hawai‘i to publish works on personal transformation, social justice, and indigenous cultures. Koa Books’ titles have won a host of awards and include Veterans of War, Veterans of Peace, edited by Maxine Hong Kingston; The Wisdom of Sustainability, by Sulak Sivaraksa; Inner Gold, by bestselling Jungian psychologist Robert A. Johnson; and Georgia O’Keeffe’s Hawai‘i, by Patricia Jennings and Maria Ausherman.
Since 2015, Arnie has focused on freelance editing, publishing consulting, and helping authors find publishers. ([https://arniekotlereditingservices.com/accomplishments/ Source Accessed May 15, 2026]) +
Kawase Kōzyun was a Japanese Buddhist scholar active in the mid-twentieth century, best known for his contribution to ''Das Sutra Vimalakirti'' (''Das Sutra über die Erlösung''), a German-language edition of the ''Vimalakīrti Sūtra''—one of the most celebrated texts in the Mahāyāna Buddhist tradition.
Published in Tokyo by Hokuseido in 1944, the work was a collaborative effort: Kawase served as the primary scholarly authority on the source text, while Jakob Fischer and Yokota Takezo rendered it into German. The publication reflects the broader interest among Japanese Buddhist institutions in the early twentieth century in making canonical sutras accessible to Western audiences. A later edition appeared in 1969, extending the work's reach into the postwar period. +
Dr. Hab. Ulrich Timme Kragh is a scholar of Asian languages and cultures. He holds two separate MA degrees in Tibetan studies and Indology (University of Copenhagen, 1998 and 2016), the PhD degree with a thesis on early Buddhist theories of karma and causality (University of Copenhagen, 2004), and a Habilitation degree with a study on a medieval Tibetan anchorite community (Adam Mickiewicz University, 2018). He has conducted research projects in classical and medieval Asian studies at Harvard University (2004-2007), Geumgang University (2008-2010), Leiden University (2011-2013), the Australian National University (2014-2015), the University of Copenhagen (2014-2016), and Adam Mickiewicz University (2016-2021). He has taught at Florida State University (2007-2008) and the University of Sydney (2014). His research employs methods of philology, theory of history, literary theory, and gender studies, and is mostly concerned with various topics in the Buddhist and Jain traditions in India, Tibet, and China. He is engaged in a metahistorical analysis of classical and medieval Indian, Persian, Tibetan, and Chinese theories of historical narrative in comparison to Western ideas of narrative and story, and the humanist application of these theories to the study of pre-modern and modern Asian history writing. He is currently a visiting scholar at the Apabhramsha Sahitya Academy in Jaipur, India. ([https://independent.academia.edu/UlrichTimmeKragh Source Accessed Aug 13, 2025]) +
Georgi Krastev M.A. is currently a University of Vienna, Department of South Asian, Tibetan, and Buddhist Studies graduate student. He is a freelance translator at the Khyentse Foundation. ([https://www.linkedin.com/in/georgi-krastev-m-a-583456142/?originalSubdomain=at Source Accessed Sep 7, 2021]) +
Sue Kraus is a professor in the Department of Psychology at Fort Lewis College. She joined the college in 1994. Dr. Kraus is a social psychologist with expertise in statistical analyses and research methods. She is involved in research on teaching pedagogy for higher education, compassion in diverse communities, the effect of meditation on compassion and the effect of culture on perceptions of health and body image. Dr. Kraus has collaborated with another psychology faculty member on a replication project funded by the Association for Psychological Science. Along with FLC students, the group is replicating a 2002 study on commitment and forgiveness in relationships. Dr. Kraus serves on the Higher Learning Commission accreditation team and the Institutional Review Board at Fort Lewis. She is a reviewer for various professional journals for the psychology discipline. Dr. Kraus has been active in the Durango community, and is past board president and past advisory board member for the Durango Public Library. Currently, she is the county appointee to the La Plata County Child Welfare Grievance Board.
Dr. Kraus is the 2013 recipient of the FLC Alice Admire Excellence in Teaching Award. She was nominated as Colorado Professor of the Year in 2010 and received the C. Oswald George prize for her 2010 article in Teaching Statistics. Dr. Kraus is a member of the Society for Teaching of Psychology and the Rocky Mountain Psychological Association. ([https://www.fortlewis.edu/academics/faculty-directory/faculty-details/kraus Source Accessed Dec 31, 2025]) +
Senior translator and student of Khenpo Chöga (b.1965) – a teacher at Shri Singha Shedra. Known online for translation of Khenpo Kunpal’s Commentary on Shantideva’s ''Bodhicaryavatara'', part of which can be found [https://www.yumpu.com/en/kunpal.com here]. +
Robert Kritzer is professor emeritus, Kyoto Notre Dame University. he received his Ph.D. in Buddhist Studies from the University of California, Berkeley. His research interests, mainly in Indian Buddhism, include Abhidharma, early Yogācāra, and Buddhist theories of rebirth. His most recent book is ''Garbhāvakrāntisūtra: The Sūtra on Entry into the Womb'' (The International Institute for Buddhist Studies, 2014). ([https://notredame.academia.edu/RobertKritzer Adapted from Source Apr 29, 2022]) +
Adam’s dissertation, "The Seven Siddhi Texts: The Oḍiyāna Mahāmudrā Lineage in its Indic and Tibetan Contexts," focuses on an early corpus of Vajrayāna Buddhist texts that came to be known in Nepal and Tibet as part of a larger canon of Indian works on ‘the great seal’ or ''mahāmudrā''. In addition to providing text-critical historical analyses of these works, his dissertation focuses on larger issues such as a revaluation of demonology as an analytic paradigm for critical historical research in South Asian religions, inter-sectarian dynamics in the formulation of the Vajrayāna, and practical canonicity and curriculum in tantric Buddhist textual communities. His recently published work is titled "Pakpa’s Verses on Governance in ''Advice to Prince Jibik Temür: A Jewel Rosary''," published in a special issue of ''Cahiers d’Extrême-Asie'' on Kingship, Ritual, and Narrative in Tibet and the Surrounding Cultural Area by The French Institute of Asian Studies (École française d’Extrême-Orient). He has received two U.S. State Department research grants through the Fulbright-Nehru Student Research Fellowship program and the Council of American Overseas Research Centers, and is currently a lecturer in Religious Studies at the University of Colorado, Boulder. ([https://www.religion.ucsb.edu/people/student/adam-krug/ Source Accessed June 18, 2021]) +
The Venerable Cheng Kuan is the founder, president, and abbot of Americana Buddhist Temple (Michigan) and Mahavairocana Temple (Taiwan), as well as the founder and president of the Neo-carefree Garden Buddhist Canon Translation Institute (Taiwan).
He became an ordained Buddhist monk in 1988 under Master Hsien-Ming (the 45th-generation patriarchate holder of the Tien-Tai sect).
Born in 1947 in Taipei, Taiwan, he graduated from the English department of Taiwan Normal University (1977–1978) and attended graduate school at Texas Christian University (1979–1982).
His publications include many translations of Buddhist sutras: ''The Sutra of 42 Chapters'' (2005), ''The Diamond Sutra'' (2005), ''The Altar Sutra'' (2005), ''The Sutra of Consumate Enlightenment'' (2009), ''The Sutra of Terra-Treasure'' (2009), ''The Heart Sutra'' (2012), and ''The Lotus Sutra of Wondrous Dharma'' (2014).
His other writings in English include: ''The Sweet Dews of Ch'an'' (1995), ''Three Contemplations toward Buddha Nature'' (2002), and ''Tapping the Inconceivable'' (2002). (Source: Adapted from author's biography in ''Three Contemplations Toward Buddha Nature'', 2018) +
Tsugunari Kubo is associated with the Reiyūkai movement, a Japanese Buddhist new religious movement. He is the son of Kakutarō Kubo, the founder of Reiyūkai, and succeeded Kimi Kotani as the president of Reiyūkai in 1971 after her death.
Kubo is best known for his translation work, particularly his collaboration with Akira Yuyama on the English translation of the ''Lotus Sutra''. This translation, published by the Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research in 2007, is highly regarded for its scholarly accuracy and use of common English Buddhist terms. The translation is part of the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series project, which aims to translate the entire Chinese and Japanese Buddhist canon into English.
As the president of Reiyūkai, Kubo played a significant role in the international expansion of the organization. Under his leadership, Reiyūkai established centers in various countries around the world, including the United States, Brazil, Canada, and several others. He also oversaw the organization's Inner Self Development campaign and participated in various international events promoting Buddhism and interfaith dialogue. +
Noriyuki Kudo is a faculty member at Soka University, Japan. +
Leonard van der Kuijp is professor of Tibetan and Himalayan Studies and chairs the Committee on Inner Asian and Altaic Studies. Best known for his studies of Buddhist epistemology, he is the author of numerous works on Tibet and Tibetan Buddhism. Recent publications include An Early Tibetan Survey of Buddhist Literature (Vol. 64, Harvard Oriental Series, 2008), coauthored with Kurtis R. Schaeffer, and In Search of Dharma: Indian and Ceylonese Travelers in Fifteenth Century Tibet (Wisdom, 2009). Van der Kuijp’s research focuses primarily on the Indo-Tibetan Buddhist thought, Tibetan Buddhist intellectual history, Tibetan Buddhism, and premodern Sino-Tibetan and Tibeto-Mongol political and religious relations. He teaches three new courses this term, covering histories, the era of the 5th Dalai Lama, and the historical geography of the Tibetan cultural area. Van der Kuijp received his Master's degree at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, Canada, and his doctorate at the University of Hamburg in Germany. He joined the faculty at Harvard in 1995. He is the former chair of the Department of Sanskrit and Indian Studies (now the Department of South Asian Studies). In 1993 van der Kuijp received the MacArthur Fellowship for "pioneering contributions to the study of Tibetan epistemology, biography and poetry." Van der Kuijp worked with the Nepal Research Center of the Humboldt University of Berlin and the University of Washington in Seattle. In 1999, he founded the Tibetan Buddhist Resource Center (TBRC), together with E. Gene Smith. ([https://ealc.fas.harvard.edu/people/leonard-van-der-kuijp Source Accessed Jan 14, 2019]) +
Kumudākaramati (Tib. པཎྜི་ཏ་ཆེན་པོ་ཀུ་མུ་ཏ་འབྱུང་བའི་བློ་གྲོས་ཞབས, paṇḍita chen po ku mu ta 'byung ba'i blo gros zhabs) was an Indian tantric author credited with two short ritual works preserved in the Tengyur: ''The Compendium of Sādhanas'' (Skt. ''Sādhanasamuccaya''; Tib. སྒྲུབ་ཐབས་ཀུན་ལས་བཏུས་པ), Toh 3400, translated by Yarlung Lotsāwa Drakpa Gyaltsen (1242–1346) as part of the larger "Ocean of Sādhanas" (Skt. ''Sādhanasāgara'') collection — 245 short ''sādhana''s translated as a set at Sakya in 1286, received via "the great paṇḍita Gautama" through "the great paṇḍita Kīrticandra," and closely related to the Sanskrit Sādhanamāla collection (ed. Bhattacharyya, Baroda, 1925) — and ''A Sādhana of the King of the Three Commitments'' (Skt. ''Trisamayarājasya sādhana''; Tib. དམ་ཚིག་གསུམ་གྱི་རྒྱལ་པོའི་སྒྲུབ་པའི་ཐབས), Toh 3144, translated by the monk Tsultrim Gyaltsen (a disciple of Pa tshab) and by Abhayākaragupta; no biographical details — dates, place of activity, teachers or lineage — currently survive in the available catalog record, though his two attributed works share substantial ritual boilerplate (offering formulas, purification recitations built around the hundred-syllable mantra), suggesting a consistent liturgical idiom across his corpus, material later drawn on, at least in citation, by Śāntideva's ''Śikṣāsamuccaya'' under the general title "the holy Trisamayarāja." +
Khenchen Kunzang Pelden was a Nyingma scholar and teacher associated with Katok Monastery. A student of a number of distinguished Nyingma teachers including Dza Patrul and Ju Mipam, he was an important Longchen Nyingtik lineage holder. He composed a famous commentary to the ''Bodhisattvacaryāvatāra'' ([[The Nectar of Manjushri's Speech]]), and served Katok Monastery as the first abbot of its study center, Shedrub Norbu Lhunpo, for three years. Following retirement he returned to his hometown and taught until his death in 1944. (Source: [http://treasuryoflives.org/biographies/view/Kunzang-Pelden/9593 Treasury of Lives])<br>[https://dharmacloud.tsadra.org/book-author/kunzang-palden/ Free digital Tibetan texts by Kunzang Palden here on DharmaCloud]. +
