Dennis Philip Edward Lingwood (26 August 1925 – 30 October 2018), known more commonly as Sangharakshita, was a British spiritual teacher and writer.
[6] He was conscripted into the army in 1943, and served in India, Ceylon, now known as Sri Lanka, and Singapore as a radio engineer[10] in the Royal Corps of Signals.
[13] Having been conscripted into the British Army and posted to India, at the end of the war Sangharakshita handed in his rifle, left the camp where he was stationed and deserted.
[13] He moved about in India for a few years, with a Bengali novice Buddhist, the future Buddharakshita, as his companion, meditating and experiencing for himself the company of eminent spiritual personalities of the times, like Mata Anandamayi, Ramana Maharishi and Swamis of Ramakrishna Mission.
[9] In 1950, at Kashyap's suggestion, Sangharakshita moved to the hill town of Kalimpong[7] close to the borders of India, Bhutan, Nepal.
[10] During his time in Kalimpong, Sangharakshita formed a young men's Buddhist association and established an ecumenical centre for the practice of Buddhism (the Triyana Vardhana Vihara).
Sangharakshita was ordained in the Theravada school, but said he became disillusioned by what he felt was the dogmatism, formalism, and nationalism of many of the Theravadin bhikkhus he met[17] and became increasingly influenced by Tibetan Buddhist teachers who had fled Tibet after the Chinese invasion in the 1950s.
[20][21][22][23] In 1952, Sangharakshita met Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar[24] (1891–1956), the chief architect of the Indian constitution and India's first law minister.
[26] Ambedkar appreciated Sangharakshita's "commitment to a more critically engaged Buddhism that did not at the same time dilute the cardinal precepts of Buddhist thought".
[30] Although originally planning to stay only six months, he decided to settle in England, but after he returned to India for a farewell tour, the Vihara's trustees voted to expel him.
"[34] In 2005 Sangharakshita donated all of his books and artefacts, with an insurance value of £314,400, to the charitable trust dedicated to his 'support and assistance' as well as enabling his office to 'maintain contact with his disciples and friends worldwide' and to 'support them in activities'.
[1] In 1997, Sangharakshita became the focus of controversy when The Guardian newspaper published complaints concerning some of his sexual relationships with FWBO members during the 1970s and 1980s.
[5][2][3][38] For a decade following these public revelations, he declined to give any response to concerns from within the movement that he had misused his position as a Buddhist teacher to exploit young men sexually.
[4] In 2017 the Triratna Buddhist Order hired an accredited facilitator to work directly with any individuals feeling harmed as a result of past sexual involvement with Sangharakshita.
[40] In 2020, a group within the Order published a report resulting from investigations into these allegations aiming to "establish the facts related to Sangharakshita's sexual behaviour".
The report included acknowledgements that Sangharakshita did "not always recognise the power imbalance between student and teacher" and that he "was not always willing or able to have meaningful dialogue after the sexual involvement had ended".
[56] For Buddhologist Francis Brassard, Sangharakshita's major contribution is "without doubt his attempt to translate the ideas and practices of [Buddhism] into Western languages.