Welcome to CBS ONLINE, the Online Learning site for Rangjung Yeshe Institute and the Centre for Buddhist Studies at Kathmandu University. Rangjung Yeshe Institute’s Centre for Buddhist Studies (RYI, CBS) is based in Boudhanath, Kathmandu, Nepal, where we offer a program that combines traditional monastic and western academic education, allowing our students to experience the diversity and depth of two complementary scholarly traditions in their pursuit of Buddhist Studies.

We begin our Online Learning journey with an exposition of the Mūlamadhyamakakārikā by Nāgārjuna, a classic Buddhist text that uses logic to challenge all of our assumptions about the nature of reality. This text is taught over the span of two semesters. The course offered during the Fall semester covers the first half of the text, and runs from August 31, 2009 until December 11, 2009. The second half of the text will be taught during the Spring semester, which begins January 11, 2010 and ends April 23. The Interactive versions of this semester's course includes all of the course material taught in this class at RYI/CBS in Boudhanath, Nepal, plus additional materials prepared especially for the online course.

As a registered student for the Interactive versions of the course, you also have access to an online instructor, who will address general questions and moderate discussions in the course Forum, and who can answer questions personally via email. Course materials are organized by week, with each week offering some combination of video and audio lectures in English (or in both Tibetan and English, or in Tibetan-only Audio), PowerPoint lectures, audio transcripts, the root text in Tibetan and English. Course materials can be accessed at any point during the week, and previous week's recordings are available for review and study.

If you opt for the Self-Study Plus version of the course, you will have access to all the full-length and edited video and audio included above, PowerPoint lectures, audio transcripts, and the root text in Tibetan and English, but not to the moderated discussions in the Forum.

In the Self-Study version of the course, you will have access to the audio and video versions of the teachings, in both English and Tibetan, to the Tibetan-only audio version, and to the root text in Tibetan and English.

Please click here to try out the trial week of class, or click here for more information about registering for the course, and welcome to CBS Online.

Why is studying Tibetan Buddhism online with Rangjung Yeshe Institute such a good idea? See what these students, staff and friends of the Institute have to say: click here (YouTube video).

• Apply for one of 4 different course formats file
• Technical Requirements file
• Technical Forum