Roshi Joan Halifax

Roshi Joan Halifax, PhD, is a Buddhist teacher, anthropologist, author, and social activist. She has worked with dying people since 1970. She is Abbot and Head Teacher of Upaya Zen Center and Institute in Santa Fe, New Mexico. She founded the Ojai Foundation, The Project on Being with Dying, the Upaya Prison Project, the National Network of Contemplative Prison Programs, and is co-founder of the Zen Peacemaker Order. She is currently the Distinguished Visiting Scholar and Kluge Fellow at the Library of Congress. Her various academic honors have included a National Science Foundation Fellowship in Visual Anthropology, appointment as an Honorary Research Fellow at Harvard University's Peabody Museum, Rockefeller Chair at California Institute of Integral Studies, and the Harold C. Wit Chair at Harvard Divinity School. Her books include: The Human Encounter with Death (with Stanislav Grof); Shamanic Voices; Shaman: The Wounded Healer; The Fruitful Darkness; Simplicity in the Complex: A Buddhist Life in America and Being with Dying: Compassionate End-of-Life Care Training Guide (with Dossey and Rushton), Wisdom Beyond Wisdom (with Kazuaki Tanahashi); Being with Dying: Cultivating Compassion and Fearlessness in the Presence of Death. Among many sound recordings of her lectures, she has done a six CD series for Sounds True entitled Being with Dying. She is co-chair of the Lindisfarne Fellows, and is co-founder of the Mind and Life Institute and on the Board and Executive Committee. She is a board member of numerous other institutions as well. She has practiced Buddhism since the 1965 and received Refuge Vows in 1976 from Zen Master Seung Sahn. In 1980, she was ordained as a Teacher in the Kwan Um Zen School. In 1990, she received the Lamp Transmission from Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh. In 1997, she was ordained as a Soto Priest by Bernard Glassman Roshi. In 1999, she received Dharma Transmission and Inka from Glassman Roshi. She has also studied with renowned Vajrayana teachers including His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Venerable Khyentse Rinpoche, Venerable Chakdud Rinpoche, and others.