Publications

Books

The Faults of Meat: Tibetan Buddhist Writings on Vegetarianism (2019)

The Faults of Meat collects fourteen Tibetan language texts on vegetarianism and offers them together in English translation. I include canonical texts such as the Laṅkāvatāra and Mahāparinirvāna Sūtras, as well as Tibetan compositions by Ngorchen Künga Zangpo, Khedrup Jé, Gorampa, Karma Chakmé, Shabkar, Nyala Pema Dündül, Shardza Tashi Gyeltsen, and others.

Food of Sinful Demons: Meat, Vegetarianism, and the Limits of Buddhism in Tibet (2018)

Food of Sinful Demons is my monograph on the question of vegetarianism in Tibet. In it, I explore the arguments for vegetarianism in Tibetan Buddhism, as well as some of the cultural factors militating against such a diet. In the end, I argue that the question of meat eating existed at the center of a three way tension in Tibet, with largely pro-vegetarian Buddhist voices tempered both by a sense that meat was necessary for human health and also by Tibetan cultural norms that valorized meat eating.

Peer-Reviewed Articles

Monastic Meat: The Question of Meat Eating and Vegetarianism in Tibetan Buddhist Monastic Guidelines (bca’ yig) (2019)

Études mongoles & sibériennes, centrasiatiques & tibétaines, vol 50.

On the Moral Standing of Animals in Tibetan Buddhism (2019)

Religions, vol 10(4).

Buddhism Between Abstinence and Indulgence (2013)

Journal of Buddhist Ethics, vol 20: 73-104.

Book Chapters

Vegetarianism and Animal Compassion in Tibetan Buddhism (In Press)

Vegetarians’ Dilemma: Rethinking Food Choice Throughout Time, Ed. Adam Shprintzen. Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press.

Popular Press

Tricycle, Fall 2018.

Recorded Talks

Rethinking Buddhist Notions of Human Superiority (2021)

Sponsored by the Ho Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of Toronto

Podcasts