THDL Shechen Text Input Project Summary

The Shechen Input Project

Shechen Monastery (zhe chen) was founded in 1735 in the province of Kham, or Eastern Tibet. It became one of the six principal monasteries of the Nyingma tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. Following the devestation of the Cultural Revolution, in exile Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche (1910-1991) constructed a new branch of Shechen monastery in the Kathmandu valley of Nepal.

Since 1989 a team of Tibetan, Nepali and Bhutanese monks at Shechen Monastery in Nepal, working under the inspiration of Khyentse Rinpoche's grandson and present abbot, Shechen Rabjam Rinpoche, and with the guidance of Matthieu Ricard, have been inputting into computer the major texts of the Nyingma tradition. The goal is to input rare manuscripts or xylographics prints, and major texts that are essential for the preservation of the scriptural tradition. The texts are entered using the Tibet Doc software and Tibet Machine Font, so that they can be printed out in the form of traditional folios.

So far, fifty one of these volumes have been input within the following four broad categories:

H.H. Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche's lifetime of teachings and writings has been published. These Collected Writings comprise twenty-five volumes of biographies, poems, meditation instructions, and commentaries.
The main commentaries for the philosophical studies and contemplative practice of the Nyingma tradition. We plan to offer camera-ready copies of these texts to publishers in Tibet who are struggling to help monasteries and learning centers reconstruct their libraries.
A collection of rare manuscripts preserved in Khyentse Rinpoche's library.
The specific texts required for the curriculum of the colleges (Shedras) for advanced Buddhist studies of the Nyingma school of Tibetan Buddhism. This collection, pertaining to both the sutra and the tantra traditions, will start with twenty-five volumes.

Please visit their manuscript input website at http://www.shechen.org/sub_publications.html#manuscript or contact us at shechen@sprynet.com for further details.