Dorje Chang Buddha III Comes to Wisconsin
September 1, 2008-Oregon, Wisconsin: The Dharma Propagation Team visited the Deer Park Buddhist Center and monastery. Lamas Puti Duxi and Hongxi Fazang are seen here with a resident monk. Only two weeks earlier the Dalai Lama had visited the area and performed the blessing ceremonies to consecrate the center, which was founded in 1975. Deer Park is under the spiritual direction of Ven. Geshe Lhundub Sopa, the first Tibetan to be tenured in an American university. He taught at the University of Wisconsin at Madison for thirty years and was the teacher of many of the most respected Buddhist scholars and translators in the West.
September 2-3, 2008--Madison, Wisconsin: Team members presented the book H.H. Dorje Chang Buddha III to Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle and the Madison Public Library. The lamas are shown here with Barbara Nelson who accepted the book for Governor Doyle.
Zhaxi Zhuoma Rinpoche lectured to a primarily non-Buddhist group at the Madison Public Library on the origins and significance of Dorje Chang Buddha and the various methods of practice, especially the quick path of the vajrayana tradition. The rinpoche explained how and why the various traditions evolved and how they were all legitimate paths within Buddhism and that Shakyamuni Buddha taught 84,000 different methods to help those with different karmic conditions. The audience had very many questions, many relating to comparisons between Buddhism and Christianity and how one can know what is the truth and find the correct path. The rinpoche explained that it is because individuals have differing karmic affinities for different dharma (teachings) that one path may be correct for one person and not another. Also you may find you need different dharmas at different times in your evolution. It is just like finding the correct medicine to cure a particular disease. You may start with one medicine and end up with something quite different as the disease progresses. The rinpoche also told how Shakyamuni Buddha told His followers to not believe Him just because He said it. "Just as you would not take gold from a stranger without first testing it, you should not believe anything, just because someone said it--including me." Zhaxi Zhuoma told the group that you need to test the various teachings to see if they work. Do they enable you to have good fortune? Do they make you happy? Do you continue to suffer? Do people who follow these teachings become liberated and are they able to escape the suffering of earthly existence? Rinpoche spoke of how over 100,000 practitioners from just one temple in Tibet were able to attain the rainbow body and ascend like Jesus. Even today people are achieving that level of realization in their current lifetimes. The book H.H. Dorje Chang Buddha III includes testimonials of those who have already achieved the rainbow state of awareness. Multi-colored dharma wheel mandalas, like the one on the back of the chair in the middle photo, appeared on nine photographs taken at this presentation, just as they had at many of the previous places where the book H.H. Dorje Chang Buddha III was or had been present.
September 4, 2008--Milwaukee, Wisconsin: The team also presented the book to the Milwaukee Public Library as shown on the far right.
Click photos for enlargements.
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