Text of the Month: Verses on Mahāmudrā with Elizabeth Callahan and Marcus Perman

For our June Text of the Month, we welcomed translator and Tsadra Foundation Fellow Elizabeth M. Callahan and Executive Director Marcus Perman for a special collaborative event celebrating Tsadra’s many contributions to Buddhist translation and transmission, as well as our partnership with them.

During this session, we explored Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo’s Commentary on the Summary Verses on Mahāmudrā — the first text published by KVP from the Treasury of Precious Instructions (Damngak Dzö), arranged by Jamgön Kongtrul. KVP’s Editorial Director Casey Forgues hosted the session, and the discussion included the significance of the Kagyu Mahāmudrā tradition and its connection to the Khyentse lineage.

Elizabeth Callahan began her contemplative training in the Kagyu tradition in 1977 and has dedicated decades to translating its key texts, including Mahamudra: Ocean of Definitive Meaning, Moonbeams of Mahāmudrā, and The Treasury of Precious Instructions: Marpa Kagyu. She has been a Tsadra Foundation Fellow since 2002 and is a director of Marpa Foundation.

Marcus Perman has served as Executive Director of Tsadra Foundation for 16 years, during which he developed the Translation & Transmission Conference series and the Lotsawa Workshops, and has devoted his career to building online educational resources and digital tools for translators and scholars of Tibetan Buddhism.