Before the founding of the Institute of Buddhist Dialectics (IBD), children in Tibetan schools in exile mainly focused on modern education, while monks and nuns in exile engaged only in religious studies and activities. There was no Tibetan institute providing a combination of traditional and modern education aimed at addressing the new educational needs that arose for many young Tibetans in the upheaval of exile. Our innovative purpose has been to offer both traditional Tibetan disciplines and modern subjects, combining the inner and outer sciences.
What the Institute has sought to do is unprecedented in the history of Tibetan education and culture. It is crucial for ensuring that the people of Tibet are able to accommodate modernity without losing their rich spiritual heritage.
The Institute is a place where Tibetans are striving to maintain their country’s strong and age-old peaceful spiritual, philosophical and cultural traditions, and to fulfill the needs of the Tibetan community for trained personnel for schools, colleges, and other government and non-government institutions. This will empower the present and the coming generation of Tibetans in our temporary home in exile and ensure the ability to serve, govern and maintain important institutions when we return to our homeland. Equipping Tibetans for the modern world while being supported and inspired by our rich cultural traditions is one of our major goals.
Goals of the Institute
- To create a learning center where young Tibetans with a good modern educational background could pursue a broad curriculum which integrates Buddhist philosophical studies with modern educational pursuits.
- To produce teachers, scholars, writers, and researchers in the fields of Buddhism, Tibetan language and Tibetan culture.
- To produce advanced religious practitioners devoted to retreat and meditation.
- To produce Dharma translators.
- To promote studies comparing and relating Buddhism with modern science.
- To enable graduates to serve society in various administrative and official roles.