前言

The Fo Guang Shan Buddhist Order and Buddha’s Light International Association founded by Venerable Master Hsing Yun, two of the world’s largest Buddhist organizations, are dedicated to the spread of Humanistic Buddhism, a 21st century form of Buddhism aimed at bettering this world and human life by following the Buddha’s teachings. Throughout the past 50 years, tremendous progress has been made in the circles of Chinese-speaking communities, while steady efforts are made in rendering this vast amount of Buddhist corpus into English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, and some twenty other languages.

As said, “To learn a new language is take on a new culture, a new world.” Further difficulties arise when it comes to learning Buddhism in a new language, still a world that awaits the light of wisdom and experience to be shed. Any aspiring translator daring to take on this daunting task of translating Buddhist texts into their own language would no doubt appreciate as much help as they can obtain.

The present Glossary of Humanistic Buddhism 《中英人間佛教詞彙選》 is a fully revised and expanded version of the Standardized FGS Names and Terms created by the International Buddhist Progress Society (IBPS) in 2005, and approved by the FGS Board of Directors. Additional entries have been compiled from all English publications under Fo Guang Shan’s cultural undertakings, such as: Fo Guang Cultural Enterprise, Fo Guang Shan International Translation Center, Buddha’s Light Publications, Fo Guang Shan Institute of Humanistic Buddhism, and Buddha’s Light International Association (BLIA).

The editorial team hopes this volume will shed light on the many references to Fo Guang Shan and BLIA terms, historical events, persons, places, publications, and frequently used Buddhist terminology, concepts, sutra titles, and quotes that appear in publications by Fo Guang Shan, as well as works of Venerable Master Hsing Yun. Entries are selected, based on the interest and request by translators at Fo Guang Shan and BLIA, in hopes that this volume assist in their readings of the Complete Works of Venerable Master Hsing Yun, understanding of vernacular Buddhist expressions, and translation works of Humanistic Buddhism.

This edition contains some 5,000 entries divided into the following basic categories: 1) Terminology, 2) Building, 3) Event, 4) Department, 5) Publication, and 6) Venerable Master Hsing Yun’s One-Stroke Calligraphy, detailed further by the abbreviations listed on page viii.

Suggestions and comments by perceptive readers will be of vital interest and value for the amendments of future editions. Readers are encouraged to write to the editorial team for the improvements of future editions.

An online version of the glossary is available at: fgsihb.org/dictionary

The editorial team would like to dedicate this edition of the Glossary of Humanistic Buddhism to all experienced and aspiring translators as well as interpreters who have paved the way for the global dissemination of Humanistic Buddhism, the Buddhism as taught by the Buddha for human beings, to purify and make this world virtuous and beautiful.