Join renowned translator, professor and scholar, Vesna A. Wallace, for an enlightening discussion exploring the connection between perception, imagination, and spiritual practices in Tantric Buddhism.
About This Course
This three-part course focuses on two important modes of practice in tantric Buddhism, drawing examples from different Indian and Mongolian Kālacakra tantric sources:
The first session relates to the role of imagination. We explore how the ritual performances of imagination are forms of mental exercise that serve several important functions, including methodological, epistemic, and ultimately soteriological.
The second session then relates to how the epistemology of perception becomes closely related to the bodily chakras and their constitutive channels, responsible for our modes of perceiving and experiencing the world.
The third session features a Q&A session.
The Teacher
Vesna A. Wallace teaches South Asian and Inner Asian religions and advanced Sanskrit courses in the Department of Religious Studies at UC Santa Barbara. Her areas of specialization are Indian Buddhism, particularly Mahayana and Vajrayana traditions and Mongolian Buddhism.
She is widely considered one of the world’s leading experts on the Kalachakra Tantra. She has authored and translated four books related to Indian Buddhism, three of which pertain to the Kalachakra tantric tradition in India, and has published numerous articles on Indian and Mongolian Buddhism.
