Current Winner
WEST CONSHOHOCKEN, Pa. – The Dalai Lama, the Tibetan
Buddhist spiritual leader whose long-standing engagement with multiple
dimensions of science and with people far beyond his own religious
traditions has made him an incomparable global voice for universal
ethics, nonviolence, and harmony among world religions, has won the 2012
Templeton Prize.
For
decades, Tenzin Gyatso, 76, the 14th Dalai Lama - a lineage believed by
followers to be the reincarnation of an ancient Buddhist leader who
epitomized compassion – has vigorously focused on the connections
between the investigative traditions of science and Buddhism as a way to
better understand and advance what both disciplines might offer the
world.
Specifically,
he encourages serious scientific investigative reviews of the power of
compassion and its broad potential to address the world's fundamental
problems - a theme at the core of his teachings and a cornerstone of his
immense popularity.
Within
that search, the "big questions" he raises - such as "Can compassion be
trained or taught?" – reflect the deep interest of the founder of the
Templeton Prize, the late Sir John Templeton, in seeking to bring
scientific methods to the study of spiritual claims and thus foster the
spiritual progress that the Prize has recognized for the past 40 years.
The announcement was made this morning online at www.templetonprize.org, via email to journalists, and on Twitter via @TempletonPrize by the Templeton Prize office of the John Templeton Foundation in West Conshohocken, Pennsylvania.
The
Prize will be presented to the Dalai Lama at a ceremony at St. Paul's
Cathedral in London on the afternoon of Monday, May 14. A news
conference with the 2012 Prize Laureate will precede the ceremony. Both
events will be webcast live at www.templetonprize.org and to global media on a pool basis. Photography from the events will also be pooled.
Valued
at £1.1 million (about $1.7 million or €1.3 million), the prize is the
world's largest annual monetary award given to an individual and honors a
living person who has made exceptional contributions to affirming
life's spiritual dimension.
The
announcement praised the Dalai Lama for his life's work in building
bridges of trust in accord with the yearnings of countless millions of
people around the globe who have been drawn by the charismatic icon's
appeal to compassion and understanding for all.
"With
an increasing reliance on technological advances to solve the world's
problems, humanity also seeks the reassurance that only a spiritual
quest can answer," said Dr. John M. Templeton, Jr., president and
chairman of the John Templeton Foundation and son of the late Prize
founder. "The Dalai Lama offers a universal voice of compassion
underpinned by a love and respect for spiritually relevant scientific
research that centers on every single human being."
He
also noted that the Dalai Lama's remarkable record of intellectual,
moral and spiritual innovations is clearly recognized by the nine Prize
judges, who represent a wide range of disciplines, cultures and
religious traditions. The Prize judges evaluate - independently of each
other - typically 15 to 20 nominated candidates each year and then
individually submit separate ballots - from which a tally then
determines the selection of each year's Laureate.
The
Dalai Lama responded to the prize in the humble style that has become
his signature. "When I heard today your decision to give me this quite
famous award, I really felt this is another sign of recognition about my
little service to humanity, mainly nonviolence and unity around
different religious traditions," he said in a video available at www.templetonprize.org.
In
other brief videos on the Prize website, the Dalai Lama elaborates on
key issues including his call for humanity to embrace compassion as a
path to peace, both personally and on a global scale. "You can develop
genuine sense of concern of well-being of others, including your enemy,”
he states in one video. "That kind of compassion - unbiased, unlimited -
needs training, awareness."
The
Right Reverend Michael Colclough, Canon Pastor at St. Paul's Cathedral,
welcomed this event: "A non-violent voice of peace and reason in a
calamitous world, the Dalai Lama represents core values cherished by
many different faiths. The award of the Templeton Prize to the Dalai
Lama under the dome of St. Paul's Cathedral will be a reminder that
working towards peace and harmony is a practical and spiritual challenge
to all faith communities."
The
Dalai Lama is no stranger to honors and accolades, with scores to his
name. In 1989, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his advocacy of
nonviolence as the path to liberation for Tibet. He becomes the second
Templeton Prize Laureate to have also received the Nobel Peace Prize;
Mother Teresa received the first Templeton Prize in 1973, six years
before her Nobel.
He
often notes that the rigorous commitment of Buddhists to meditative
investment and reflection similarly follows the strict rules of
investigation, proof and evidence required of science.
Among his most successful efforts is the Mind & Life Institute,
co-founded in 1987 to create collaborative research between science and
Buddhism. The Institute hosts conferences on subjects such as
contemplative science, destructive and healing emotions, and
consciousness and death. While initially beginning as quiet academic
affairs, they have evolved into enormously popular public events.
In
2005, after a series of dialogues at Stanford University among the
Dalai Lama, scientists in the fields of neuroscience, psychology, and
medicine, and contemplative scholars, the university became the home of
the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education.
The interdisciplinary discourse recognized that engagement between
cognitive sciences and Buddhist contemplative traditions could
contribute to understanding of the human mind and emotion. The center
now supports and conducts rigorous scientific studies of compassion and
altruistic behavior.
Many of these conferences have led to popular best sellers written or co-written by the Dalai Lama, including The Art of Happiness (1998), The Universe in a Single Atom (2005), and The Dalai Lama at MIT (2006). All told, he has authored or co-authored more than 70 books.
The Dalai Lama’s love of science is also evidenced in the Science for Monks
program, created in 2001 to teach science in Buddhist monastic centers
of higher learning in India. The program engages Indian and Western
scientists to explore connections between Tibetan Buddhist traditions
and science, and teach methods of scientific inquiry in physics, quantum
mechanics, cosmology, biology, neuroscience, and mathematics.
This
openness to new ideas and cutting edge findings has set him in the rare
pantheon of internationally respected religious leaders and also has
given him a stature among secular audiences unlike any other religious
leader.
Indeed,
in his recommendation to the Prize committee, Richard Davidson, founder
of the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds at the University of
Wisconsin-Madison, wrote, “More than any other living human being, His
Holiness the Dalai Lama has served humanity to catalyze the advancement
of ‘spiritual progress’ and to help us all to cultivate a better
understanding of the spiritual dimensions of human experience.”
Notes to Editors
The 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso
Tenzin Gyatso was born on July 6, 1935 as Lhamo Dhondup in the Tibetan cultural region of Amdo, a farming village in the Qinghai Province of western China. When he was two years old, a search party set out to find the successor to the recently deceased 13th Dalai Lama. Guided by visions and omens, they came upon the home of the toddler, who was selected as the 14th Dalai Lama and taken to the Tibetan capital of Lhasa.
At age six he began his monastic education within the walls of the Norbulingka Palace near Lhasa, studying logic, Tibetan art and culture, Buddhist philosophy, Sanskrit and medicine. A precocious child surrounded by the trappings of a king, he roamed the palace in search of diversions. Among those was a telescope that allowed him to peer into the night sky and the watch belonging to the 13th Dalai Lama that he repeatedly deconstructed and rebuilt for amusement.
In 1950, at age 15, he was officially installed as the political leader of Tibet. The subsequent involvement of the Chinese government in Tibet soon prompted his departure from Tibet. In 1951 he returned to Lhasa for negotiations with the Chinese government and, in 1954, traveled to Beijing for peace talks with Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, Chou En-Lai, and others.
 In 1959, in response to increasing tensions from an uprising within the region against Chinese control, at just 23 years old, he and a small entourage departed from Tibet to India, eventually settling in Dharamsala which remains his home in exile.
In 1987, he offered a Five Point Peace Plan for Tibet that includes making the region a non-armed enclave and an environmental sanctuary with China responsible for defense and foreign policy, a proposal as yet unrecognized by Beijing.
In 2011, he relinquished his political responsibility over Tibet in favor of a proposed constitutional government, albeit in exile, removing the Dalai Lama as head of state and replacing him with an elected leader. This ended the tradition begun by the 5th Dalai Lama in 1642 of the Dalai Lamas holding dual responsibility of spiritual and temporal powers.
The Templeton Prize
The Templeton Prize each year honors a living person who has made an exceptional contribution to affirming life’s spiritual dimension, whether through insight, discovery, or practical works.
Established in 1972 by the late global investor and philanthropist Sir John Templeton, the Prize is a cornerstone of the John Templeton Foundation’s international efforts to serve as a philanthropic catalyst for discoveries relating to the Big Questions of human purpose and ultimate reality.
The monetary value of the prize is set always to exceed the Nobel Prizes to underscore Templeton's belief that benefits from discoveries that illuminate spiritual questions can be quantifiably more vast than those from other worthy human endeavors.
For
decades, Tenzin Gyatso, 76, the 14th Dalai Lama - a lineage believed by
followers to be the reincarnation of an ancient Buddhist leader who
epitomized compassion – has vigorously focused on the connections
between the investigative traditions of science and Buddhism as a way to
better understand and advance what both disciplines might offer the
world.Specifically,
he encourages serious scientific investigative reviews of the power of
compassion and its broad potential to address the world's fundamental
problems - a theme at the core of his teachings and a cornerstone of his
immense popularity.Within
that search, the "big questions" he raises - such as "Can compassion be
trained or taught?" – reflect the deep interest of the founder of the
Templeton Prize, the late Sir John Templeton, in seeking to bring
scientific methods to the study of spiritual claims and thus foster the
spiritual progress that the Prize has recognized for the past 40 years.The announcement was made this morning online at www.templetonprize.org, via email to journalists, and on Twitter via @TempletonPrize by the Templeton Prize office of the John Templeton Foundation in West Conshohocken, Pennsylvania.The
Prize will be presented to the Dalai Lama at a ceremony at St. Paul's
Cathedral in London on the afternoon of Monday, May 14. A news
conference with the 2012 Prize Laureate will precede the ceremony. Both
events will be webcast live at www.templetonprize.org and to global media on a pool basis. Photography from the events will also be pooled.Valued
at £1.1 million (about $1.7 million or €1.3 million), the prize is the
world's largest annual monetary award given to an individual and honors a
living person who has made exceptional contributions to affirming
life's spiritual dimension.The
announcement praised the Dalai Lama for his life's work in building
bridges of trust in accord with the yearnings of countless millions of
people around the globe who have been drawn by the charismatic icon's
appeal to compassion and understanding for all."With
an increasing reliance on technological advances to solve the world's
problems, humanity also seeks the reassurance that only a spiritual
quest can answer," said Dr. John M. Templeton, Jr., president and
chairman of the John Templeton Foundation and son of the late Prize
founder. "The Dalai Lama offers a universal voice of compassion
underpinned by a love and respect for spiritually relevant scientific
research that centers on every single human being."He
also noted that the Dalai Lama's remarkable record of intellectual,
moral and spiritual innovations is clearly recognized by the nine Prize
judges, who represent a wide range of disciplines, cultures and
religious traditions. The Prize judges evaluate - independently of each
other - typically 15 to 20 nominated candidates each year and then
individually submit separate ballots - from which a tally then
determines the selection of each year's Laureate.The
Dalai Lama responded to the prize in the humble style that has become
his signature. "When I heard today your decision to give me this quite
famous award, I really felt this is another sign of recognition about my
little service to humanity, mainly nonviolence and unity around
different religious traditions," he said in a video available at www.templetonprize.org.In
other brief videos on the Prize website, the Dalai Lama elaborates on
key issues including his call for humanity to embrace compassion as a
path to peace, both personally and on a global scale. "You can develop
genuine sense of concern of well-being of others, including your enemy,”
he states in one video. "That kind of compassion - unbiased, unlimited -
needs training, awareness."The
Right Reverend Michael Colclough, Canon Pastor at St. Paul's Cathedral,
welcomed this event: "A non-violent voice of peace and reason in a
calamitous world, the Dalai Lama represents core values cherished by
many different faiths. The award of the Templeton Prize to the Dalai
Lama under the dome of St. Paul's Cathedral will be a reminder that
working towards peace and harmony is a practical and spiritual challenge
to all faith communities."The
Dalai Lama is no stranger to honors and accolades, with scores to his
name. In 1989, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his advocacy of
nonviolence as the path to liberation for Tibet. He becomes the second
Templeton Prize Laureate to have also received the Nobel Peace Prize;
Mother Teresa received the first Templeton Prize in 1973, six years
before her Nobel.He
often notes that the rigorous commitment of Buddhists to meditative
investment and reflection similarly follows the strict rules of
investigation, proof and evidence required of science.Among his most successful efforts is the Mind & Life Institute,
co-founded in 1987 to create collaborative research between science and
Buddhism. The Institute hosts conferences on subjects such as
contemplative science, destructive and healing emotions, and
consciousness and death. While initially beginning as quiet academic
affairs, they have evolved into enormously popular public events. In
2005, after a series of dialogues at Stanford University among the
Dalai Lama, scientists in the fields of neuroscience, psychology, and
medicine, and contemplative scholars, the university became the home of
the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education.
The interdisciplinary discourse recognized that engagement between
cognitive sciences and Buddhist contemplative traditions could
contribute to understanding of the human mind and emotion. The center
now supports and conducts rigorous scientific studies of compassion and
altruistic behavior.Many of these conferences have led to popular best sellers written or co-written by the Dalai Lama, including The Art of Happiness (1998), The Universe in a Single Atom (2005), and The Dalai Lama at MIT (2006). All told, he has authored or co-authored more than 70 books.The Dalai Lama’s love of science is also evidenced in the Science for Monks
program, created in 2001 to teach science in Buddhist monastic centers
of higher learning in India. The program engages Indian and Western
scientists to explore connections between Tibetan Buddhist traditions
and science, and teach methods of scientific inquiry in physics, quantum
mechanics, cosmology, biology, neuroscience, and mathematics.This
openness to new ideas and cutting edge findings has set him in the rare
pantheon of internationally respected religious leaders and also has
given him a stature among secular audiences unlike any other religious
leader.Indeed,
in his recommendation to the Prize committee, Richard Davidson, founder
of the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds at the University of
Wisconsin-Madison, wrote, “More than any other living human being, His
Holiness the Dalai Lama has served humanity to catalyze the advancement
of ‘spiritual progress’ and to help us all to cultivate a better
understanding of the spiritual dimensions of human experience.”Notes to Editors
- Further information is available at www.templetonprize.org
- Videos including the Laureate’s acceptance comments are available at www.templetonprize.org and www.youtube.com/user/TempletonPrize/
- Photos are available at www.flickr.com/photos/templetonprize
- Follow the Templeton Prize on Twitter using @TempletonPrize and the hashtags #templetonprize and #tempprize
The 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso
Tenzin Gyatso was born on July 6, 1935 as Lhamo Dhondup in the Tibetan cultural region of Amdo, a farming village in the Qinghai Province of western China. When he was two years old, a search party set out to find the successor to the recently deceased 13th Dalai Lama. Guided by visions and omens, they came upon the home of the toddler, who was selected as the 14th Dalai Lama and taken to the Tibetan capital of Lhasa.
At age six he began his monastic education within the walls of the Norbulingka Palace near Lhasa, studying logic, Tibetan art and culture, Buddhist philosophy, Sanskrit and medicine. A precocious child surrounded by the trappings of a king, he roamed the palace in search of diversions. Among those was a telescope that allowed him to peer into the night sky and the watch belonging to the 13th Dalai Lama that he repeatedly deconstructed and rebuilt for amusement.
In 1950, at age 15, he was officially installed as the political leader of Tibet. The subsequent involvement of the Chinese government in Tibet soon prompted his departure from Tibet. In 1951 he returned to Lhasa for negotiations with the Chinese government and, in 1954, traveled to Beijing for peace talks with Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, Chou En-Lai, and others.
 In 1959, in response to increasing tensions from an uprising within the region against Chinese control, at just 23 years old, he and a small entourage departed from Tibet to India, eventually settling in Dharamsala which remains his home in exile.
In 1987, he offered a Five Point Peace Plan for Tibet that includes making the region a non-armed enclave and an environmental sanctuary with China responsible for defense and foreign policy, a proposal as yet unrecognized by Beijing.
In 2011, he relinquished his political responsibility over Tibet in favor of a proposed constitutional government, albeit in exile, removing the Dalai Lama as head of state and replacing him with an elected leader. This ended the tradition begun by the 5th Dalai Lama in 1642 of the Dalai Lamas holding dual responsibility of spiritual and temporal powers.
The Templeton Prize
The Templeton Prize each year honors a living person who has made an exceptional contribution to affirming life’s spiritual dimension, whether through insight, discovery, or practical works.
Established in 1972 by the late global investor and philanthropist Sir John Templeton, the Prize is a cornerstone of the John Templeton Foundation’s international efforts to serve as a philanthropic catalyst for discoveries relating to the Big Questions of human purpose and ultimate reality.
The monetary value of the prize is set always to exceed the Nobel Prizes to underscore Templeton's belief that benefits from discoveries that illuminate spiritual questions can be quantifiably more vast than those from other worthy human endeavors.
Downloads/
Links/Media
PDFs
- Statement by His Holiness the Dalai Lama
- Fact Sheet – The 14th Dalai Lama
- Books by the 14th Dalai Lama
- Statement by Dr. John M. Templeton, Jr.: 40 Years of Spiritual Progress & the 2012 Templeton Prize Laureate
Videos
- His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama on accepting the 2012 Templeton Prize
- Dr. John M. Templeton, Jr.: 40 Years of Spiritual Progress & the 2012 Templeton Prize Laureate
- Does having a sense of purpose make achieving success more likely?
"You have to make effort. Your goal also must be realistic… then you can achieve." - Spiritual laws and action
"You must work, you must create karma, positive karma means positive action." - Can compassion be trained or taught?
"Through training, through awareness… you can develop genuine sense of concern of well-being of others, including your enemy." - Personal responsibility for oneself with others
"The basis of genuine friendship is trust. Trust depends on openness. So, through these things, we can change."
Previous
Prize
Winners
- Martin J. Rees(2011)
- Francisco J. Ayala(2010)
- Bernard d’Espagnat(2009)
- Michael Heller(2008)
- Charles Taylor(2007)
- John D. Barrow(2006)
- Charles H. Townes(2005)
- George F. R. Ellis(2004)
- Holmes Rolston III(2003)
- John C. Polkinghorne(2002)
- Arthur Peacocke(2001)
- Freeman J. Dyson(2000)
- Ian Graeme Barbour(1999)
- Sigmund Sternberg(1998)
- Pandurang Shastri Athavale(1997)
- William R. "Bill" Bright(1996)
- Paul Davies(1995)
- Michael Novak(1994)
- Charles W. Colson(1993)
- Kyung-Chik Han(1992)
- Lord Jakobovits(1991)
- Baba Amte(1990 ; awarded jointly)
- L. Charles Birch(1990 ; awarded jointly)
- Lord MacLeod(1989 ; awarded jointly)
- Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker(1989 ; awarded jointly)
- Inamullah Khan(1988)
- Stanley L. Jaki(1987)
- James McCord(1986)
- Alister Hardy(1985)
- Michael Bourdeaux(1984)
- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn(1983)
- Billy Graham(1982)
- Cicely Saunders(1981)
- Ralph Wendell Burhoe(1980)
- Nikkyo Niwano(1979)
- Thomas F. Torrance(1978)
- Chiara Lubich(1977)
- Leon Joseph Cardinal Suenens(1976)
- Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan(1975)
- Brother Roger(1974)
- Mother Teresa(1973)
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