1 Losar Greetings 2021 H.E. Jetsun Kushok Chimey Luding Greetings to our dharma brothers and sisters. Thank you for your ongoing support for the work of Her Eminence! Spiritual Director Her Eminence is in residence The Tibetan New Year (Losar) —Feb. 12, 2021 is the at STTL. Please see the Year of the Iron Ox, 2148 in the Tibetan calendar. newsletter for their current The iron ox denotes the hard work, positivity and offerings. honesty that will be manifested in all of us in the coming 12 months. https://www.universalcompassion.org/event/ year-of-the-iron-ox/ Notes on our SDL Study Group Over the past four years, on the fourth Saturday at 10AM, using a ZOOM platform, our Practice Director, Jay Goldberg, has provided Celebrating Losar Chotrul Month (Miracle Month) guidance on studying The Way of His Holiness the Sakya Trichin will be giving a special public the Bodhisattva, by Shantideva, We blessing and transmission of the Samantabhadra prayer. completed that study this past year Feb. 27 and are now studying The Diamond February 12 marks the beginning of Losar, the Tibetan New Year. For That Cuts Through Illusion by fifteen days we commemorate the special moment when Shakyamuni Thich Nhat Hanh. Buddha, to inspire faith among his followers, displayed miraculous powers. Participants come from all over the This event culminated on the full moon, the fifteenth day of the lunar globe—Brazil, Hawaii, Russia and month. It is thus called Chotrul Duchen, or Day of Miracles, and the entire many parts of the U.S. It’s been a month is known as Miracle Month. The merits of virtuous actions wonderful experience to be part of performed during this period are multiplied by millions. s u c h a d e d i c a t e d g r o u p o f practitioners. Over the years, we have found Lama Jay to be exquisite in his attention to our questions and he theme for this year’s newsletter is Dharma in the time of comments. We take our time, go Covid-19. We rely on the the words of His Holiness the slowly, and practice patience. In this T Sakya Trichin from the Melody of Dharma: way we learn deeply. We have seen how people across the globe have found ways to Please Join Us communicate in novel ways, mainly through social media. People in SDL Study every society have developed ingenious stratagems to show Group. solidarity with each other, through sharing provisions, music, words of encouragement, and so much more. Every one of these acts of Please contact generosity has had an effect on making the world a better place in the midst of its ordeal… [email protected] regarding joining. For many, this predicament has triggered a search for a deeper meaning to life and a nascent or renewed inclination to spiritual practice. We are in the infinitely fortunate position to be already Sakya Dechen Ling 801 Pierce St #4, engaged in the Dharma path, protected by peerless enlightened Albany CA, 94706 spiritual masters, ceaselessly wrapped in their blessings and unfailingly guided by their words of wisdom. Since the start of the crisis, our masters have graced us with words of advice, teachings, prayers, initiations and blessings. Sakya Dechen Ling , 2021 2 The Sakya Jetsunmas: The Hidden World of Tibetan Female Lamas e are happy to introduce Elisabeth Benard’s new book,The Sakya Jetsunmas: The Hidden World of Tibetan Female Lamas, published by the Sapan Fund. Based on extensive scholarly research and hundreds W of hours of interviews with lineage holders of the Khon family and their attendants, this book details the lives of five great women masters, focusing on His Holiness the 41st Sakya Trichen’s elder sister, Her Eminence Jetsun Kushog, and his maternal aunt, Dagmo Trinlei Paljor, who raised them both. We are very fortunate to have this book in these challenging times. rom HH Sakya Trichen This invaluable work on the Sakya Jetsunmas offers an intimate look into the lives of exceptional yoginis F 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 the 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. rom the author, Elisabeth Benard This project began with two women in the Sakya tradition. The first one was Jetsunma Chime Tenpai Nyima F (1756-ca. 1855)--a nun who is the only female guru in the Vajrayogini guru lineage. Many years ago I asked HH Sakya Trichen about her and he told me that he would have to do some research. A few years later, HH did offer some information, but also told me that there wasn’t much information about her life. I was determined to find out as much as possible. It required reading numerous biographies of male lamas, uncles and cousins to glean a few facts. In the end I was able to write a chapter devoted to her in the book. The second woman was Dagmo Trinlei Paljor Zangmo (1906-1975), HE and HH’s maternal aunt who basically raised them as her own precious children after the early deaths of their mother and father. Both HE and HH shared many personal stories about this remarkable woman who was a great practitioner. Many people credit her foresight and determination to find the best teachers for HE and HH in Tibet in the 1950’s, before the great exodus to India, as having saved the Sakya tradition. Over the years these two women inspired me to complete a book about the Sakya Jetsunmas and some Dagmos (the title of a wife married to a Sakya Khon son). rom the publisher, the Sapan Fund by Victoria Scott The Sakya Jetsunmas and New Digitization Project from The Sapan Fund (www.sapanfund.org) is delighted to F publish Elisabeth Benard’s ground-breaking The Sakya Jetsunmas: The Hidden World of Tibetan Female Lamas, now available for free distribution through our website. After years of research on the project while a professor at the University of Puget Sound, Elisabeth retired and had time to finish this long-awaited work. It was a great pleasure to work with Elisabeth while editing her manuscript. We became fast friends while shepherding her book to publication, complete with its elegant cover design by April Dolkar, genealogical charts by Cate Hunter, and historic photos. The Sapan Fund has also begun digitizing cassette tapes of teachings given by Sakya lamas in the US in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. We have now digitized about 100 tapes, split into separate English and Tibetan files to allow listeners to access the teachings in their own language. The next phase is to make the digitized teachings available online. We hope to make the Tibetan-language files available to Tibetan speakers worldwide. As always, our purpose is to help deepen the understanding of kindness and honesty, for the sake of all sentient beings without exception. Sakya Dechen Ling , 2021 3 rom Sakya Thubten Tsechen Ling, Vancouver, Canada F https://www.sakyatsechenthubtenling.org/activities-events/ Jetsun Kushog is the spiritual director of STTL. Lama Ngawang Tenzin has been the resident special teacher for several series of special teachings held online during the pandemic, illustrating the flexibility of the dharma in times of crisis. All of the following offering are on Zoom: Lama Ngawang is offering a series of classes on Vajrayogini Self Empowerment, including setting up the shrine and the conduct of the empowerment, including mudras. Students need to attend all six sessions. Pre-requisite: Students must have received the Vajrayogini Blessing in the Sakya tradition. Starting Feb 20th, each Saturday, to March 27th., 2:00PM PST, 5:00PM EST Lama Ngawang is also leading online Vajrayogini Tsoks 2pm PST, held twice monthly, See the website https://www.sakyatsechenthubtenling.org/2021/01/08/vajrayogini-tsok/ for dates Prerequisite: Must have had Vajrayogini empowerment from a qualified Sakyapa Lama. Participants must prepare their own tsok and have their own text. Lama Ngawang is also leading weekly practice Time: 2pm PST 1st Sunday of the month White Tara practice 2nd Sunday of the month Vajrayogini practice 3rd Sunday of the month Chime Phagma Nyingtik practice 4th Sunday of the month Vajrapani practice For all text inquiries please contact Jennifer Harrington at [email protected] Prerequisite: Participants must have had the relevant empowerment and have the text. rom Sakya Kachod Choling, San Juan Island, Washington F by Pepper Koscis sakyakachodcholing.org. At Sakya Kachod Choling (SKC) we started 2020 with big plans, including building a stupa, running a three-month Vajrayogini retreat, growing enough food in our organic garden to feed all the retreatants and residents, hosting weekly meditation for our island community and more. Like so many others we had to cancel or postpone most of our plans. But we have adapted. Khenpo Pema Wangdak has generously been leading online programs from New York, hosted by Sakya Kachod Choling. Khenpo Pema is on our Board of Directors and usually comes to the island in the fall. Our first online program began in April 2020, after Thrinley DiMarco passed away. Thrinley had been retired a few years after serving as retreat manager for two decades.