Spiritual Friend: Difference between revisions

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	~~Spiritual Friend (~~[[~~dge ba'i bshes gsnyen]]/ [[dge bshes]])~~		See [[Sarati the Courtesan]]
	*The term spiritual friend (Skt. [[kalyāṇmitra]]) refers to a spiritual teacher (Skt. [[guru]]) who can contribute to an individual's progress on the spiritual path to enlightenment and who acts wholeheartedly for the welfare of his or her students, adopting a renunciate lifestyle. In Tibet, during the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the term became synonymous with the great masters of the bKa'-gdams-pa school, who combined a scrupulously renunciate lifestyle and deep humility with profound scholarship and meditative resolve. In later centuries, the Tibetan abbreviation geshe came to have an academic usage in the dGe-lugs-pa school, where it now identifies a scholar- monk with a doctorate title in traditional Buddhist studies, and is almost equivalent to the modern usage of the term mkhan po in other traditions. On the importance of finding a suitable " spiritual friend", see dPal-sprul Rin-po-che, The Words of My Perfect Teacher, pp. 25-37. [[GD]] (from the Glossary to [[Tibetan Elemental Divination Paintings]])