Introduction
Dza Patrul Rinpoche, Orgyen Chökyi Wangpo
In his account of the famous debate between Ju Mipham Namgyal Gyatso (’ju mi pham rnam rgyal rgya mtsho, 1846-1912) and Alak Dongak Gyatso (a lags mdo sngags rgya mtsho, 1824–1902),[1] Khetsun Sangpo Rinpoche tells us that Alak Dongak was so upset at losing the contest and seeing his treatise on Dzogchen burned in front of his teacher, Patrul Rinpoche (rdza dpal sprul o rgyan chos kyi dbang po, 1808-1887), that he broke down and wept.[2]
When I recently asked Tulku Thondup Rinpoche about this, he mentioned another possible explanation for Alak Dongak’s distress:
Khenpo Chemchok, my own teacher, used to say that on one occasion Könme Khenpo, my predecessor, asked Alak Dongak if it was true that he had cried after the debate with Mipham. Yes, he replied, he had wept, but it was not because he had lost the argument. In fact, he said, he had cried because Patrul Rinpoche had chastised him. Whenever he was winning, he said, Patrul would say to him, “I told you to meditate on love and compassion, but instead you’ve filled your head with all this scholarly stuff!” Yet whenever Mipham was winning, Patrul Rinpoche said nothing. Alak Dongak told Patrul, “I didn’t neglect your instructions. I have meditated on bodhicitta.” But it was the accusation of failing to apply his teacher’s instructions, he said, and not the humiliation of losing, that made him weep.
Introduction
As you may be aware, today is the 450th anniversary of William Shakespeare’s birth. In order to mark the occasion, let us share some more of the Bard’s most famous lines translated into Tibetan. This time, the translation comes directly from the forthcoming Tibetan version of Sogyal Rinpoche’s Tibetan Book of Living and Dying. 
Only a short distance from the glorious Dhamek stupa, marking the scene of Buddha’s first ever teaching, Sarnath’s Central University of Tibetan Studies provided an auspicious backdrop for the latest major conference on Tibetan Buddhist translation. The four-day event, organized jointly by the Central University and Columbia University’s American Institute of Buddhist Studies, focused on the Tengyur, the collection of ‘translated treatises’ (or shastras in Sanskrit) composed by the learned and accomplished masters of India and compiled in Tibet as the counterpart to the Kangyur, the ‘translated Word of the Buddha’. With the participation of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Professor Samdhong Rinpoche, the Ganden Tripa and many other Tibetan lamas, as well as leading scholars and translators from around the world, this gathering marked another important milestone on the road towards the eventual goal of translating the entire Tibetan Buddhist canon into English and other languages.
Adam S. Pearcey 
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