Lhundub Sopa

Who is Lhundub Sopa?

Lhundub Sopa is a Tibetan monk.

Sopa became a novice monk and entered Gaden Chokor Monastery in 1932. In 1941, he joined Sera Monastery in Lhasa. He was considered a remarkable scholar from a young age, and even before completing his own geshe degree examinations, he was chosen as one of the Dalai Lama's debate examiners during the annual Prayer Festival in 1959.

Geshe Sopa sought political asylum in India in 1959. In 1962, he was awarded the degree of Lharampa Geshe. At the request of Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama, he moved to the USA with three other monks that same year to learn English and to study American culture.

In 1967, Sopa was invited by Richard Robinson to join the faculty of the pioneer Buddhist Studies Program at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. In 1985, he became Emeritus Professor in the Department of South Asian Studies. Sopa was the first Tibetan to be tenured at an American university. He taught Modern and Literary Tibetan as well as courses in Tibetan Literature, the History of Buddhist Thought, Buddhist Epistemology, Buddhist Logic, and Buddhist doctrinal systems. During that time, Sopa trained many of the first generation of respected Buddhist scholars and translators in the USA, including Jeffrey Hopkins, José Cabezón, John Makransky and Zorba Paster. Sopa has retired since from his professorship.