Eva Natanya
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Je Tsongkhapa's Guhyasamaja Sadhana
at Shantarakshita Library
Central University of Tibetan Studies,
​Sarnath, Varanasi, India
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There are thousands of Buddhist scriptures, commentaries, philosophical treatises, ritual texts, instruction manuals for meditation, inner and outer yoga, and devotional practices that remain untranslated. I am committed to the life-long work of understanding, translating, and making such texts available to English speakers in forms that can be readily understood and put into practice.

Eva Natanya, PhD 
Indian and Tibetan Buddhism
University of Virginia, Dept. of Religious Studies

Translator, Scholar, Philosopher, Theologian

I have studied the classical Tibetan language for over twenty years, and have translated hundreds of pages from the works of Je Tsongkhapa (1357-1419), as well as from such Gelukpa masters as Gyaltsab Je, Khedrub Je, the First Panchen Lama Lobsang Chukyi Gyaltsen, and Choney Lama Drakpa Shedrup. I also have significant experience reading and translating texts from the Great Perfection (Dzokchen) tradition of the Nyingma lineage. I care deeply about the nonsectarian (Rimé) movement in nineteenth century Tibetan history, and am committed to contemporary efforts that seek mutual understanding between the great lineages of Tibetan Buddhism.

Thanks to the Ludo and Rosane Rocher Research Fellowship in Sanskrit Studies, which I received from the American Institute of Indian Studies (AIIS), I spent more than nine months in full-time study at Tibetan monasteries and nunneries in India, attending classes in philosophy and tantra along with monks and nuns.

​My doctoral dissertation, 
Sacred Illusion: On Purity and Creation in Je Tsongkhapa's Philosophy of Tantra, examines Je Tsongkhapa’s Vajrayana philosophy, focusing on the exemplary system of Guhyasamaja. By studying several of Tsongkhapa's tantric commentaries alongside his most important works on the Mind-Only and Middle Way schools of Indian Buddhist philosophy, I seek to discover how different portions of his thought might be understood to form a systematic whole. I believe we can grasp the practical, transformative applications of Tsongkhapa’s Middle Way view much more clearly when reading these specialized texts in the light of his broader vision of Buddhist cosmology, ethics, human nature, and perceptual theory. I also consider that we gain insight into lesser known implications of Tsongkhapa’s Madhyamaka when turning to passages where he explained that view specifically for the purpose of Vajrayana meditation.
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I have collaborated with Dr. B. Alan Wallace on the following volumes:
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Śamatha and Vipaśyanā: An Anthology of Pith Instructions
The Vital Essence of Dzogchen: 
A Commentary on Dudjom Rinpoche’s Advice for a Mountain Retreat​
Fathoming the Mind: Inquiry and Insight in Dudjom Lingpa's Vajra Essence
Open Mind: View and Meditation in the Lineage of Lerab Lingpa
Copyright © 2017-2025  All photographs and text property of Eva Natanya. All rights reserved.
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