Reverend Heng Sure, a senior monastic disciple of the late Venerable Master Hsuan Hua, has devoted his life to inner and outer transformation, through music, interfaith dialogue, vegan advocacy, teaching, and Buddhist text translation.

His encounter with the Chinese language began at age thirteen when his aunt gave him a catalog of a Chinese painter’s exhibit, and the characters caught his eye, almost as if he’d seen them before. He was fortunate enough to study Chinese at his public high school in Toledo, Ohio (only three public schools offered Chinese at the time!) and continued his studies at university, receiving a Master’s in Oriental Languages from UC Berkeley.

For the sake of world peace, he undertook a "three steps one bow" pilgrimage for over two years, traveling more than 800 miles from Pasadena, CA, to Ukiah, CA. During this pilgrimage, he maintained a vow of silence and only brought one book, the Avatamsaka Sutra. The sutra was in Chinese, so in the evenings, he would translate passages, slowly unraveling the meaning of this profound text, as he himself was gradually being transformed.

Today, Reverend Heng Sure serves as the President of Dharma Realm Buddhist Association and the Buddhist Text Translation Society. He continues translating and lecturing on the Avatamsaka Sutra to this day!

Join us for an evening with Reverend Heng Sure on how translation has been and continues to be a transformative spiritual practice.

This event is hosted by Dharma Realm Buddhist University. At DRBU, we are interested in exploring the intersection of Buddhist and Western philosophical traditions. We are associated with City of Ten Thousand Buddhas, the largest Buddhist monastery in Northern California.