Study
Buddhist Glossary
Clear explanations of terms from Tibetan Buddhism as we study and practise them: from the foundations of the Buddhist path to the Ngöndro, the Nyingma tradition and Dzogchen. The glossary grows step by step alongside our teachings.
Foundations
The Three Jewels
könchok sum
The Three Jewels are the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha: the three in which a Buddhist takes refuge, and the ground on which all further practice rests.
Dharma
chö
Dharma is the Buddha's teaching and the practice of it: the path that leads out of suffering, and the reality that path points towards.
Karma
lé
Karma means action: the understanding that what we do, say and think leaves a trace, and that the trace comes back to us.
Taking refuge
kyabdro
Taking refuge means turning to the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha as what you genuinely rely on: the step by which someone enters the Buddhist path.
Vajrayana
Chö
chö
Chö means "cutting" and is the practice in which the practitioner gives away their own body in visualisation in order to sever clinging to a self.
Dakini
khandro
A dakini is the wisdom principle in female form, in Tibetan khandro, "she who moves through space".
Tsok
tsok
Tsok is a communal Vajrayana offering practice in which food and drink are offered, blessed, and then shared out among everyone present.
Nyingma & Lineage
Dudjom Tersar
düdjom tersar
The Dudjom Tersar, "the new treasures of Dudjom", is the cycle of terma teachings revealed by Dudjom Lingpa and H.H. Dudjom Rinpoche, and the main lineage of our centre.
Nyingma school
nyingma
Nyingma is the oldest school of Tibetan Buddhism, named after the first translations of Buddhist texts brought from India to Tibet in the eighth and ninth centuries.
Dzogchen
Dzogchen
dzogchen
Dzogchen, the Great Perfection, is the highest teaching of the Nyingma school and points directly to the nature of mind, which according to this teaching is already complete and lacks nothing.
Trekchö
trekchö
Trekchö means "cutting through" and is the first of the two main Dzogchen practices, in which the primordial purity of mind is recognised and held without effort.