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Cortney Copeland
Final Draft: 14th May 2012
Word Count: 3993
Education: The Center of a Monastic Buddhist Community in West Sacramento
O great in courage, great in power, great compassionate one!
I pray would now uncover and dispel my subt’lest doubts.
Thus cause me quickly to attain supreme enlightenment,
And sit within the bodhimandas of the tenfold realms
And even could the nature of Shunyata melt away
My vajra-like supreme resolve would still remain unmoved1.
This appeal to the Buddha is a part of how nearly every weekend begins at the City
of Dharma Realm. Every Saturday morning at precisely 8:30, a seemingly dead time in the
less-than-thriving West Capitol Avenue area of West Sacramento, shaven-headed Buddhist
nuns chant in flowing, melodic Sanskrit to the beat of a deep drum to introduce the fast,
rhythmic Shurangama Mantra that they will chant for the next hour and a half. In their redcarpeted Buddha Hall filled with golden Buddha statues, bright fresh flowers, and jeweled
lotus-shaped ornaments, they chant this mantra over and over several times a week, until
they know it by memory. According to Buddhist myth, if the mantra is forgotten demons
will wreak havoc on the Earth. But the people at the City of Dharma Realm, a nunnery as
well as a public worship center, Buddhist and interfaith education center, and private
school, are doing their part to make sure that never happens. Education is the center of
their work.
One of many branches of the Dharma Realm Buddhist Association founded by the
Chan Buddhist monk Venerable Master Hsuan Hua, West Sacramento’s City of Dharma
Realm is largely dedicated to education. Located on a 13-acre campus that still looks much
like the holiday resort it used to be- tennis courts, signs pointing toward the gym, palm
trees and all- it is a work in progress currently under renovation. Nuns live here full time,
English translation of lines 14-19 of the introduction to the Shurangama Mantra,
published by Malaysia Dharma Realm Buddhist Association: Prajna Guan Yin Sagely
Monastery.
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while services, meditation sessions, and classes on Buddhism and Chinese language are
open to the public2.
The founder Hsuan Hua is very much present at the Dharma Realm through his
legacy. His portrait hangs in a conference room and in the reception, while a large golden
statue of him in seated meditation rests in the center of the Buddha Hall. Hsuan Hua is
reported to have learned a lineage of teaching that can be traced directly to the semilegendary Bodhidharma, who brought Chan Buddhism to China centuries ago. In a
similarly ambassadorial fashion, Hsuan Hua worked to establish Buddhism in the West by
establishing monastic and teaching centers in the US starting in 1962. His goal was “to
extensively propagate the Dharma for the benefit of all living beings,”3 and this has
remained the goal of his organization. The Dharma Realm Buddhist Association now has 17
branches- many in California, several in other Western states, a choice few in the Eastern
US, and some in Southeast Asia. The hub of the organization is in Ukiah, California. The City
of Ten Thousand Buddhas in Ukiah provides much of the supplies and support needed at
the City of Dharma Realm, and it seems that the West Sacramento branch is moving to
emulate the CTTB’s role as a major educational center.
The school principal of the City of Dharma Realm, a nun who was given the name
Heng Shr by her teacher, seems always happy to give tours of what she hopes will be a
thriving school when it is finished. I received two such tours during my visits to the City of
Dharma Realm, which I visited for several weekend recitations of the Shurangama Mantra
in the spring of 2012 – one on a Sunday and two on Saturdays. I also visited a special
annual service, the 10,000 Buddhas Repentance. My visits lasted from 3 – 5 hours each, and
were always filled with the vast amounts of information the nuns wanted to share about
themselves, their beliefs, and their developing school. Heng Shr was my main informant,
along with another nun called Ke and one nun whose name I never learned.4 All of these
nuns are advanced Dharma Masters, with saffron-colored robes that distinguish them from
City of Dharma Realm website. Cityofdharmarealm.org.
“A Year by Year Record of the Life of Venerable Master Hua and the Dharma Realm
Buddhist Association.” www.cttb.org.
4 In my notes I call her “the short nun,” and regrettably I never encountered her during my
final visit nor could I describe her well enough to the others for them to tell me her name.
She will, therefore, remain “the short nun” until such occasion as I can return.
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the blacks and greys of the novices. They did not seem to mind my frantic scribbling in a
notebook as they spoke to me; they are used to student visitors. Ke told me she appreciated
my writing as a sign that I really cared about learning.
This emphasis on learning is what has driven me to write the present paper. All the
people I have met at the Dharma Realm, from the laypeople who come on Sundays to the
novices to the Dharma Masters, have expressed an interest in my progress and education.
After each visit I lug home more books and CDs that I have been instructed to read or listen
to. My big question is: why do they care so much about how well I learn their mantras?
Why are they so interested in teaching?
Before delving into this question, I would like to introduce the dimensions of
religion delineated by Ninian Smart. Smart coined the term “structured empathy” as a
means for studying religion, describing structured empathy simply and powerfully as
“feeling what a worldview is like.”5 Following this methodology, I have tried to take what
the nuns have told me on their own terms and to understand the “structures of belief” at
work.
Structures of belief can be classified into seven related dimensions: Doctrinal,
Mythic, Ethical, Practical, Experiential, Social, and Material.6 I have observed all of these
dimensions in my visits to the City of Dharma Realm – some more than others – but I seek
here to explore in each of them themes related to learning and educating. Ultimately, my
goal is one that Smart has listed as one of seven points that sum up “the modern study of
religion”: “it aims to show the power of religious ideas and practices and their interactions
with other aspects of human existence.”7
A Doctrinal Basis for Learning and Educating
A single belief seems to be one of the strongest forces driving the Sangha (monastic
community) at the City of Dharma Realm: the belief that all beings possess Buddha Nature,
Ninian Smart. Worldviews: Crosscultural Explorations of Human Beliefs. New York: Charles
Scribner’s Sons. 1983. p. 16.
6 ------------. p. 7-9. Smart does not explicitly include the material dimension in this
introductory list, but it emerges later in the course of the text.
7 Ninian Smart. p. 22.
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and all beings can be liberated by realizing this nature. There are many realms of existence
in the Buddhist universe.8 There are demons, ghosts, animals, people, and beings higher
than people. Reincarnation progresses or regresses through the hierarchy of realms, but
being a human is a particularly important opportunity to rapidly advance. Finally, there are
the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas who have escaped all this, but come back to help other
beings learn their true nature.
The short nun, a small spectacled woman who always sent me home with something
new to read, explained the doctrinal importance of learning to me as I wrote in my little
purple notebook:
It takes more than a lifetime to learn the meaning of everything.
“We come back,” she says, “learn more.” She explains that she will come
back for another life, and encourages me to start studying the mantras
now so I can begin to advance … The way she talks makes me feel as if she
earnestly wants me to join her on a journey – she is ahead of me on this
journey, but encourages me to begin. Her use of ‘we’ makes us sound like
equals in a sense.
She continues to explain that we come back again and again until
we escape the life cycle … I ask, “and that means we stop being reborn?”
She says yes.
I ask her, “So someday you will stop being reborn too?”
She responds, her eyes sparkling, “I hope so.” She is silent for a
brief moment, then quickly adds, “But then you become Buddha, you come
back.”
Once we are enlightened and we become a Buddha, she says, we feel
great compassion and we help all the other suffering beings.
The Buddhist doctrine of enlightenment – “learning the meaning of everything”makes learning a fundamental practice of the religion. The supreme goal is knowledge that
liberates one from suffering, and enables one to help liberate others. A belief in
reincarnation based upon one’s learning gives everybody a chance to strive for
enlightenment. Those who know little when they die will have another chance. Those who
cannot study, like animals, will eventually get theirs when they become humans. Thus, the
nuns reach out to everybody to offer the best learning opportunities possible. They help me
Note there are many forms of Buddhism that vary greatly on this point. The City of
Dharma Realm seems to contain elements of both Chan and Pure Land Buddhism, both
Mahayana traditions.
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find my place on the page while chanting the mantra, they open their services and classes
to the public, and they welcome all of the plants, animals, and insects that live on their
property.
Vegetarianism: Letting Other Beings Learn
Vegetarianism is variously doctrinal, ethical, and practical, revealing the
connectedness of the dimensions of religion. A practice that stems from ethics and is taught
as doctrine, it is undoubtedly an important aspect of life at the City of Dharma Realm.
All of the meals cooked and served at the City of Dharma Realm are vegetarian.
Among the mantras, biographies, and educational books that are offered to visitors there
are also illustrated books of vegetarian poetry that celebrate the beauty of a living fish and
mourn the waste of the life of a chicken on a dinner plate. I was tempted to take home a
vegetarian cookbook titled “Merciful Cooking: Joyful Tasting,” but despite the English title
the recipes were all written in Chinese.
Vegetarianism has its roots in the doctrines of Buddha Nature and reincarnation
described above. I asked Heng Shr about it while we were discussing another implication of
shared Buddha Nature, religious tolerance:
According to them, Buddhism does not exclude people of other
religions. Heng Shr expounds on this, saying that “we all have the same
nature.” Every being has Buddha Nature.
I as if this is a part of why they are vegetarian, and she says it is.
Animals have Buddha Nature and can someday be enlightened. When any
being dies, it doesn’t go away – it “changes address in the universe.” How
you are reborn depends on “how you master mind and outer conduct.” We
are supposed to be “bright and wholesome.” Being a human is an
important stage, from which we can either go down or up – devolve or
evolve. We have a lot of power over our conduct, and our advancement.
And we must be compassionate to other beings – for we are all of the same
nature, we all suffer, and we all have the same destination.
According to Buddhist teachings, life is a time of learning for all beings, and
therefore should not be cut short. If we eat another animal, we lessen its opportunity to

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learn and advance toward enlightenment. Heng Shr further explained that vegetarianism is
a part of mastering outer conduct and remaining bright and wholesome.
Many animals eat other animals, but it is because they are controlled by instinct. As
humans, Heng Shr points out, we have more power over our conduct and we can move
beyond that. Therefore, the human stage is the first one in which we can truly control our
advancement toward enlightenment – in which we can choose to study and learn— and it
is also the first stage in which we recognize our responsibility toward other beings as well.
Because animals can learn and can eventually come to realize their Buddha Nature,
it is the ethical responsibility of humans to not impede their journey toward enlightenment.
We were once animals and insects too, and given the opportunity we can all become
Buddhas. Thus, vegetarianism as a practice is one of the ways in which the nuns at the City
of Dharma Realm help others learn and progress toward their full potential.
The Mythical Importance of Learning
I have already mentioned a myth that gives great urgency to learning and education:
the myth of the Shurangama Mantra. The City of Dharma Realm offers a Thursday evening
sutra study, to discuss the Shurangama Sutra that explicates the Shurangama Mantra.
When I asked Ke what the sutra and mantra addressed, she responded simply: “How the
universe came about.” It is extremely important.
The Shurangama mantra is one of the longest mantras in
Buddhism. This mantra is meant to maintain the world and prevent its
destruction by demons. As the tall nun [Ke] told me, as long as at least one
person on earth knows the mantra by memory and can recite it, the
demons are kept at bay. However, if ever the day comes that nobody on
earth knows the Shurangama mantra, the demons will appear publicly to
destroy the world … I ask the tall nun if she has the mantra memorized.
She simply responds “yes” with a quiet smile. She is doing her part to
prevent the destruction of the world. I asked if it took her very long to
learn, and she said it took different times for different people. Some
people recite the mantra “21 times” and have it memorized, for others it
takes longer.
This mythical context explains the earnest concern all of the nuns (along with other
community members I met) expressed for my progress in learning the mantra. I was never

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short of encouragement or advice. On each of my visits to the City of Dharma Realm, I
joined in the chanting of this mantra, trying to follow along in a borrowed book as we
recited it over and over, sometimes standing, sometimes bowing, sometimes slowly
walking clockwise around the large Buddha Hall. Whenever I lost my place, a nun or a
novice or a layperson would help me find it again. Afterwards, several people would
inquire as to my progress with the mantra. How was I finding it? Could I keep up? The short
nun who gave me books also gave me advice: listen to the mantra on a CD in the car, and
then later follow along in the book. That would help me memorize it. I got to wondering:
Why does it matter so much that I learn this mantra?
Because the world depends on it.
Learning and teaching the Shurangama mantra is one of the central practices at the
City of Dharma Realm. It is recited Friday, Saturday, and Sunday mornings. Free books
containing the mantra are available for people to take, along with the CDs. The books must
be treated with great respect- not taken into the bathroom, always carried above waistheight, and always set in a high place. The short spectacled nun gave me a copy of the
mantra, and said that the respectful treatment of it was important because it would protect
me. If I listened to it on CD while driving, I would not have to worry about anything and I
would be safe.
The mythical power of the mantra ensures that it will not be forgotten. Indeed, at
the City of Dharma Realm it is taught with the enthusiasm born of utmost urgency and
importance, even to outsiders like myself.
Learning and Educating as Ethical Social Action
The seven dimensions of religion are so deeply intertwined that in some cases it is
impossible to discuss one without several others. The school being built at the City of
Dharma Realm encompasses ethical and social dimensions of Buddhism and enacts them as
practice. I will therefore discuss these dimensions and their relationships together.
At the City of Dharma Realm, the basic Buddhist belief in equality has become
focused and adapted to the interculturalism (and intercultural conflict) of today’s
sociopolitical world. The nuns teach to encourage peace among all people- an ethical duty

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in a world where warfare carries religious undertones and hate crimes are common. The
stakes are literally life and death. The presence of Buddha Nature in all beings translates
ethically into a tolerance of all religions, socially into interaction and peaceful coexistence
with people of other faiths, and practically into specific efforts to learn about and share
different religious traditions to promote peace and understanding. Heng Shr has expressed
to me that she worries about our country because of the cuts to education, and so the City
of Dharma Realm strives to educate people of different faiths about each other.
The City of Dharma Realm has twice hosted the Western Monastic Conference, a
gathering of many Buddhist congregations of all types – Theravada, Mahayana, Vajrayana,
Tibetan, and others the names of which I did not recognize. This is a major part of the City
of Dharma Realm’s role as a Buddhist Education Center. It is comparable to bringing all the
different kinds of Chrisianity, from evangelical to liberal, together under one roof to discuss
the day’s major issues with an attitude of respect and solidarity. This kind of interaction
and communication is a vital part of their educational mission, and it is not limited to
Buddhist communities.
The City of Dharma Realm does much to bring people of different faiths together to
learn about each other. Heng Shr beams when she talks about the students from Christian
Brothers High School who visit regularly. “They are always very interesting in Buddhism,”
she says (her English is clear but less-than-perfect.). “They could stay the whole day!” The
City of Dharma Realm has hosted field trips for the Catholic high school for 6 or 7 years
now, and student groups come every semester. On my third visit to the Dharma Realm I
asked how this tradition started, and Heng Shr told me it started with a lady named Holly
Peterson, who she describes as “a good lady” and “a firm strong Christian with a PhD.”
Holly had contacted the City of Dharma Realm to start the field trips and they have gone on
ever since. Heng Shr refers to Holly as a friend, and demonstrates the kind of respect for
Holly’s Christian faith that she describes as a necessary part of her Buddhist faith. They are
both partners in educating others for the sake of peace and understanding.
Heng Shr and Ke described this educational mission when they told me about the
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They mention Easter and Thanksgiving services. I ask what they do
during these – what is an Easter service like? The example they give … is
an Easter service in which a Lutheran pastor, a woman, came to the
Dharma Realm and performed some of her congregation’s rituals, and
people from other different religious groups came and did their rituals
too.
The tall nun emphasizes that they “embrace different faiths” and she
and Heng Shr both take turns discussing their desire to promote peace.
This is where they start talking the most, and the fastest (although they
never rush.) They have a lot to say on the topic …
As we begin to leave the room, I see a portrait of a man hanging up
high on the wall at the front … their founder, who came from Hong Kong in
1962. The tall nun tells me something he had said, that she thought very
wise: “Education is the best national defense.” She says that “the capacity
of his mind is vey big” and that he “includes everybody.” They strive to do
the same.
For the nuns at the City of Dharma Realm, education is an important way to try and
improve a troubled world. They teach regular subjects too, like math and physics and
reading. But alongside these subjects they teach things like virtue, respect, and tolerance.
We are all born with a “pure seed”, which must be cultivated with virtue, filial devotion,
fraternity, loyalty, righteousness, and other such qualities. Ethical behavior is a necessary
part of education – of learning to live a meaningful life. Heng Shr told me that this was their
mission.
“We are not looking for fame and profit. We are looking for the meaning of
being a person. The meaning of life – how to make use of life to serve.” I
ask what they mean by serve: to let other people know these things, to
share the knowledge, to educate. To teach people how to be “bright and
wholesome beings.” As they simply and eloquently sum up their
philosophy, “if we know, we should serve.”
Just as the enlightened Buddha returns to the earth to enlighten others, those with
knowledge have the duty of sharing it with others. This is the ethical calling of the nuns at
the City of Dharma Realm. They see learning as a duty to themselves, a part of their
religion, and also as a duty to others. They gain knowledge so that they may share it. Hence
the ethical duty is necessarily a social one, which brings about the practices of interfaith
education they consider so important to promoting peace in today’s world.
Material Comfort Helps One Learn

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Finally, it is important to note that this emphasis on dutiful learning does not
translate into a life of striving or material austerity. Rather, the nuns at the City of Dharma
Realm recognize that material comfort and pleasure are important factors in cultivating a
state of mind that is conducive to learning. Like the Buddha, they do not espouse
asceticism. Things like hunger, pain, sadness, and cold can distract a person’s mind. In
nearly everything they do, the nuns bear in mind the health and comfort of themselves and
their students.
During my two tours of the school, I gained a glimpse into the many details the nuns
take into consideration while building it. They encouraged me to test out some of the
government surplus chairs they had recently purchased. Ke told me that they try and test
out the chairs they are buying whenever possible. She, Heng Shr and I all sat down in some
of their 110 mismatched but quite comfortable chairs, and as we sat and enjoyed getting off
our feet for a few minutes she said, “I hope the student will sit here well and listen.” An
uncomfortable chair would be a distraction to learning, so it must be avoided. Similarly,
the nuns teach that during meditation it is important to use blankets and cushions so that
we do not get cold. The material dimension, then, is certainly important. Making the
material environment conducive to learning is another way to help ensure progress.
The nuns have made sure that every classroom has a window looking outside onto
the extensive gardens bursting with plants and flowers. Heng Shr frequently points out
benches where students can sit and read outside, or pathways where they can take a walk
in between classes. These are material reminders of their interconnectedness with the
environment and with all life. It is here that the experiential dimension also comes into
play, as the nuns say they can feel the energy of the plants around them. They sometimes
stop to stand and feel the energy of a young pine tree, or to touch and smell a rosemary
plant. These experiences of the material world reinforce the oneness of Buddha Nature that
is the driver of their educational mission.
Walking around the garden with the nuns is often how my visits ended, and so it
seems suitable to end my report the same way. The nuns are particularly proud of their
garden, because under their care and with their spare resources it is growing abundantly.
They hope the same will be the case for their school- that with kindness and care the school
will become a place conducive to the growth of its students, both in knowledge and in

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virtue. The nuns point out how peaceful the garden is, how healthy and happy it can be
when it is nurtured the right way and protected by the energy of the mantras. The world
can be like the garden: abundant, colorful, and full of living beings that coexist peacefully.
Learning to live in such peace and purity- to be and to be among bright and wholesome
beings- is the center of all facets of life at the City of Dharma Realm and the inspiration
behind their educational mission.
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Bibliography
1. Shurangama Mantra. (n.d., trans. not given). Malaysia Dharma Realm Buddhist
Association: Prajna Guan Yin Sagely Monastery.
2. “About us” and “Events.” City of Dharma Realm. Retrieved on 13th May 2012 from
http://cityofdharmarealm.org/.
3. “A Year by Year Record of the Life of Venerable Master Hua and the Dharma Realm
Buddhist Association.” (n.d., no author).The City of Ten Thousand Buddhas.
www.cttb.org. Retrieved on 13th May 2012 from
http://www.cttbusa.org/founder2/yearbyyear_record2.htm.
5 - 7. Smart, Ninian. Worldviews: Crosscultural Explorations of Human Beliefs. New York:
Charles Scribner’s Sons. 1983.