Buddhist Digital Resource Center

🚀 BDRC Launches Major Initiative to Build Open Buddhist Datasets for AI

Artificial intelligence is rapidly shaping how people access knowledge — including knowledge about Buddhism. We believe that if AI is going to speak about the Dharma, it should be trained on authentic Buddhist sources.

With generous support from Khyentse Foundation, BDRC has launched a major new project to create a foundational open-access corpus of Tibetan Buddhist texts, fully prepared for integration into modern AI systems.

This initiative will produce the largest and most reliable open-access digital corpus of Tibetan Buddhist literature ever assembled — representing standardized, cross-validated editions of tens of thousands of texts. These materials will be made available on the platforms where major AI systems derive their training data, helping ensure that future conversations about Buddhism are informed by authentic primary sources.

This initiative is developed in partnership with Dharmaduta Services (“Dharma Emissary”), a Tibetan-founded technology organization working at the forefront of Tibetan-language OCR and AI, and in close coordination with Khyentse Foundation’s Wisdom and AI Committee.

Importantly, the datasets and OCR models will also be released into the public domain, supporting independent, community-led Buddhist and Tibetan AI initiatives around the world.

We are deeply grateful to Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche and Khyentse Foundation for empowering BDRC to contribute meaningfully to this transformative moment in technology.

📅 The grant runs through 2027 — and we look forward to sharing many milestones along the way.

📜✨Resilience in Print: A Testament to the Revival of Tibetan Buddhism

Our previous post about the Tibetan woodblock printeries in India featured a copy of Tsongkhapa’s Golden Garland of Eloquence ལེགས་བཤད་གསེར་ཕྲེང. Remarkably the first volume of this text bears a colophon written by the highly revered Kyabje Ling Rinpoche, who served as the Ganden Tripa from 1965–1983. We offer a transcription of the text and a translation below to inspire you. Read them and tell us which lines inspire you most!
🖋️
Homage and faith I offer to Mañjughoṣa, the Moon among preachers,
Whose wondrous virtue and excellence arise from the mountain peaks in the East,
Who perfectly possesses the full measure of the Ten Powers of wondrous intelligence,
And who is renowned for marvelous erudition, discipline, and outstanding goodness.

Born from the deep oceanic mind of the Victor Maitreya,
the wish-fulfilling Jewel of this śāstra is replete with the two qualities of curing and protecting,
It is beautified by the many precious ornaments of the Abhisamayālaṅkāra,
Which reveals the hidden meaning of the Mother Sūtras, the essence of the Buddha's excellent teachings.

The Golden Garland of Eloquence brilliantly expounds the meanings
Of the Twenty-One Treatises of the Paṇḍitas and Accomplished Masters of the Noble Land.
Serving as a necklace for myriads of eminent masters,
Their music of manifest praise rings out everywhere.

Just as a hundred thousand reflections of Śakra, Lord of Gods,
Appear upon a spotless Vaidūrya surface,
By the great merit embraced by the smiling, pure flower of selfless aspiration,
So too do many copies arise from a single printing matrix.

May the great ocean of the excellent tradition of Mañjughoṣa remain majestic
Through the splendor of the courageous ones who vibrate their larynxes of erudition—
That flock of swans whose forms are beautified by flawless conduct,
And who transform at will the waves of activity generated by their wings of explanation and practice.

May the King of Wish-Fulfilling Jewels, fulfilling the Two Aims and granting all wishes,
Which is the flourishing spring churned from the milk-ocean of the compassion of all Victors, remain steadfast and majestic,
Bringing universal joy to the expanse of the Three Realms with the radiant light of enlightened activity.

May all connected sentient beings, headed by the patrons and sponsors,
Be enriched by the many kinds of supreme conduct
Of the Great Noble Ones, who establish countless beings
In the city of the ultimate, peaceful omniscience.

This poem was composed with devotion as a dedication of merit and aspiration at the time of publishing this great explanation called The Golden Garland of Eloquence, which is the extensive commentary on the Ornament for Clear Realization and its accompanying commentaries, spoken by the King of Dharma, Mañjughoṣa Tsongkhapa the Great.

It was composed with deep reverence by the one bearing the title of the ninety-seventh Ganden Tripa, Yongzin Ling Tulku, when monk Khyenrab Phagpa, a renunciant from Sera Je College, who is highly endowed with supreme selfless aspiration and profound faith, provided the material resources and sponsored its publication, for the benefit of all intelligent individuals seeking its meaning.
May virtue and excellence increase! Maṅgalam! May there be virtue! May there be virtue! May there be virtue!

༎ཨོཾ་སྲ་སྟི།ངོ་མཚོར་དགེ་ལེགས་ཤར་རིའི་སྤོ་ལས་འོངས༎རོ་མཚུར་བློ་གྲོས་སྟོབས་བཅུའི་གང་བ་རྫོགས༎ངོ་མཚར་མཁས་བཙུན་བཟང་པོའི་གྲགས་པ་ཅན༎འཇམ་མགོན་སྨྲ་བའི་ཟླ་བར་དད་ཕྱག་བརྩེགས༎
ལེགས་གསུང་རྒྱལ་བའི་དགོངས་བཅུད་ཡུམ་གྱི་མདོའི༎སྦས་དོན་མངོན་རྟོགས་རིན་ཆེན་རྒྱན་མང་གིས༎ཡོངས་མཛེས་འཆོས་སྐྱོབ་གཉིས་ལྡན་ནོར་གྱི་བུ༎མ་ཕམ་རྒྱལ་བའི་ཐུགས་མཚོའི་འཇིང་ལས་འཁྲུངས༎
གཅིག་ལྷག་བཅུ་ཟུང་འཕགས་ཡུལ་པཎ་གྲུབ་ཀྱི༎གཞུང་དོན་ལེགས་པར་བཤད་པའི་གསེར་གྱི་ཕྲེང་༎དྲན་དབང་བྱེ་བའི་མགུལ་པའི་རྒྱན་ཉིད་དུ༎མངོན་པར་བསྔགས་པའི་རོལ་མོ་ཅི་ཡང་འཁྲོལ༎
ཇི་ལྟར་དྲི་བྲལ་བཻ་ཌཱུར་ས་གཞིའི་ངོས༎ལྷ་དབང་གཟུགས་བརྙན་འབུམ་དུ་འཚར་བ་ལྟར༎གཅིག་ལས་དུ་མར་འཆར་བའི་པར་གྱི་དངོས༎ལྷག་བསམ་ཀུན་དའི་འཛུམ་གྱིས་བསུས་པའི་དགེས༎
མ་སྨད་སྤྱོད་པས་ལུས་མཛེས་བཤད་སྒྲུབ་ཀྱི༎གཤོག་རླབས་འདོད་དགུར་བསྒྱུར་བའི་ལུས་དཀར་ཁྱུ༎མཁས་ཚུལ་མགྲིན་རྔ་འཁྲོལ་ལ་དཔའ་པའི་གཟིས༎འཇམ་མགོན་ལུགས་བཟང་ཆུ་གཏེར་བརྗིད་གྱུར་ཅིག།
རྒྱལ་ཀུན་ཐུགས་རྗེའི་འོ་མཚོ་བསྲུབས་པའི་དཔྱིད༎དོན་གཉིས་འདོད་འཇོ་བསམ་འཕེལ་དབང་གི་རྒྱལ༎འཕྲིན་ལས་འོད་སྣང་གྲོལ་བས་ས་གསུམ་ཁྱོན༎ཀུན་དགར་བྱེད་པས་སྙེམས་བཞིན་བརྟན་གྱུར་ཅིག།
རྒྱུ་སྦྱོར་གྱིས་གཙོས་འབྲེལ་ཐོགས་ཡིད་ཅན་ཀུན༎ཀུན་མཁྱེན་མཆོག་རབ་ཞི་བའི་གྲོང་ཁྱེར་དུ༎དུ་མའི་འགྲོ་རྣམས་འགོད་པའི་འཕགས་ཆེན་སྤྱོད༎སྤྱོད་མཆོག་རྣམ་པ་དུ་མས་ཕྱུག་གྱུར་ཅིག།
ཅེས་པ་འདི་ཡང་འཇམ་མགོན་ཆོས་ཀྱི་རྒྱལ་པོ་ཙོང་ཁ་པ་ཆེན་པོའི་གསུང་བསྟན་བཅོས་མངོན་པར་རྟོགས་པའི་རྒྱན་འགྲེལ་པ་དང་བཅས་པའི་རྒྱ་ཆེར་བཤད་པའི་ལེགས་བཤད་གསེར་གྱི་ཕྲེང་བ་ཞེས་བྱ་བ་འདི་ཉིད་བློ་གསལ་དོན་གཉེར་བ་ཅན་རྣམས་ལ་སྨན་སླད་དད་གཏོད་ལྷག་བསམ་མཆོག་གིས་མངོན་པར་ཕྱུག་པ་སེར་བྱེས་བྱ་བྲལ་དགེ་སློང་མཁྱེན་རབ་འཕགས་པ་ནས་རྒྱུ་སྦྱར་ཏེ་པར་དུ་བསྐྲུན་སྐབས་དགེ་བསྔོའི་སྨོན་ཚིག་ཏུ་དགའ་ལྡན་ཁྲི་ཐོག་གོ་བདུན་པ་ཡོངས་འཛིན་གླིང་སྐྱེ་མིང་པས་དང་བས་སྦྱར་བ་དགེ་ལེགས་འཕེལ༎མངྒ་ལཾ།དགེའོ།དགེའོ༎དགེའོ༎

📢 A Scholar's Legacy Unlocked: New Archive of Rare Tibetan Texts on BDRC!

The heart of the BDRC archive is the personal collection of our legendary founder, Gene E. Smith, a scholar whose Mañjuśrī-like research shaped the field of Tibetan Studies.

This month, we are overjoyed to publish a massive trove of texts from his library, including over 150 rare manuscripts and woodblock prints, plus dozens of Gene's previously unavailable research papers and notes.

Preserving the Past, Inspiring the Future

Gene passed away 15 years ago, and we feel that this new release, comprising 45,754 pages of material, is a powerful way to honor his legacy. It will connect those who knew him with the new generation of scholars who started their work after his passing. This publication is especially significant as we celebrate BDRC’s 25th Anniversary! 🎂

What's Inside?

In addition to the rare manuscripts and woodblock prints, we've digitized a pile of Gene's early notebooks, typescript notes, and even his original seminar papers from his time studying under Dezhung Rinpoche at the University of Washington. These offer a unique window into the mind of a pioneering scholar.

Thank You, Donors! 🙏

We couldn't have done this without you. Our fundraising campaign earlier this year saw an overwhelming, heartwarming response! Your generosity allowed us to digitally preserve and share even more texts than we initially planned.

Dive in and explore this incredible new collection:

➡️ Links to the new publication are in the comments!

Buddhism

A fun interview with veteran scholar Robert Sharf about his career and the historically vibrant (and trailblazing) Buddhist culture in Northern California.
"To better understand what it means to be a scholar in Buddhist Studies at UC Berkeley and understand Buddhism in the Bay Area, I spoke with Robert Sharf, the person who restarted [Berkeley's Buddhist Studies] program and built it into what it is today."

Entering the ‘library cave’ of Buddhist studies at UC Berkeley Buddhist Studies at UC Berkeley works with thousands-of-years-old texts in order to unearth the ancient histories of Buddhist religion and culture.

Preserving Wisdom, Empowering Teachers 🌏📚

Earlier this month, BDRC had the joy of supporting the Bhutan Innovation in Pedagogy and Leadership Workshop — a gathering of monastic and lay teachers exploring creative new ways to teach and learn with digital tools, all grounded in the rich wisdom of Buddhist tradition.

In this photo, Bhutan’s Home Minister presents a diploma to a khenmo participant. Her smile says it all.

Each of the more than two dozen monastic teachers received a BDRC hard drive containing over 8,000 volumes of Vajrayana Buddhist classics — an offline, shareable library that connects ancient texts with modern learning, even in remote areas with limited internet.

This is why we do what we do at the Buddhist Digital Resource Center. Digital preservation isn't just about saving texts—it's about making sure these profound teachings reach the people who can share them with the next generation.

Huge gratitude to our partners at the Khedrup Foundation of Bhutan and the Generative Contemplation Initiative at the University of Virginia for making this possible.

✨ Preserving the past. Empowering the present.

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