Remembering Robert A.F. Thurman (1941-2026)
Robert A.F. Thurman, renowned Buddhist scholar, activist, teacher, author, and co-founder of Tibet House US, died on Tuesday, June 16, 2026, in Woodstock, New York. He was 84.
A lifelong friend of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the first Westerner to be ordained as a Tibetan Buddhist monk by His Holiness, Thurman dedicated his life to preserving Tibetan culture and furthering Buddhism in America. Throughout his life, he wrote a substantial number of scholarly works and books. In 2020, he retired from his thirty-year career as the Jey Tsong Khapa Professor of Indo-Tibetan Buddhist Studies at Columbia University, and remained active in his work for Tibet House until his death.
Lion’s Roar was fortunate to work with Bob a number of times over the years, including most recently through our partnership with Tibet House, producing a series of Dalai Lama Global Vision Summits, which he helped shape.
The day after his passing, I returned to his keynote address from our 2024 summit, hoping to find a few words of wisdom to share. There were many, of course, but one passage near the end of his talk felt especially timely. It spoke to a question I had been personally wrestling with all week: How can we remain present while still planning — and even hoping — for a better future?
I found my answer in Bob’s talk, where he spoke of using the present moment to visualize a better world.
“Try to imagine everything working,” he said. “Imagine everybody cheering up. Imagine people seeing the half-full glass. Imagine them finding their source of joy within themselves.”
“Visualize. Let the world be a mandala in time of people fulfilling what they really want,” he continued.
“Can you find something that is a blessing now — a miracle about your now? Be in the moment. Even imagining a good future, it makes you happy in the moment.”
“So be hopeful,” he concluded. “It’s all right. Turn your passion toward the positive.”
Two years after first hearing them, his words resonated with me in a new way, carrying the same wisdom, warmth, and optimism that defined so much of Bob’s teaching. You’ll find that video below, alongside a profile showcasing his life and legacy, and a personal account of the inspiration he found in His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
Our hearts go out to Bob’s family, friends, students, colleagues, and all those whose lives were touched by his teachings and tireless efforts.
I’ll be taking his words with me into my weekend, and I hope you’ll do the same: Be hopeful. It’s all right.
—Lilly Greenblatt, digital editor, Lion’s Roar
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In this clip from his keynote address at our 2024 Dalai Lama Global Vision Summit in partnership with Tibet House US, Robert A.F. Thurman guides us to visualize a better world.
Imagine everything working out. Don’t take no for an answer in your imagination, at least in beginning. Visualize. Let the world be a mandala in time of people fulfilling what they really want. Not necessarily some new status, some new property, some new possession, some new domination. They don’t necessarily really want that. They want some new inner feeling. Maybe freedom from some pain in the knee, or the back or, or the mind — the place of deep pain. So think about that and yourself. Are you bothered because you didn’t achieve anything? Some future that you imagined is not necessarily going to be exactly what you want? Or can you find something that is a blessing now, a miracle about your now? Be in the moment.  |
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Robert A.F. Thurman, renowned Buddhist scholar, activist, teacher, and co-founder of Tibet House US died on Tuesday, June 16, 2026 in Woodstock, New York. He was 84. In this profile from our archives, Jennifer Keishin Armstrong shares his story.
A white marble statue of the Buddha, a crack across its smooth face and two fingers of its right hand missing thanks to an encounter with a candle years ago, presides over the fireplace in Robert and Nena Thurman’s charmingly Bohemian home in Woodstock, New York. The statue is special, Nena explains, because when the aforementioned candle toppled over, the statue did, too. And falling just so, so the story goes, it snuffed out the flame and saved their home, which is girded by visible wooden beams, from burning down.
Robert points out another sacred statue in the living room—this one of Songtsen Gampo, the first Buddhist king of Tibet, depicted with a tiny second head on top of his own, to represent his guru. That was a gift from the Dalai Lama, who also happens to be a lifelong “buddy” of Robert’s and the man who in 1965 ordained him as the first American monk in the Tibetan tradition.  |
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Robert Thurman sees the Dalai Lama as a reincarnation of the Buddha of universal compassion. Amidst the chaos of today’s world, he says, the “simple monk” remains undaunted, and even cheerful.
It is not merely that the Dalai Lama represents “Buddhism,” thought to be a distinct “religious system.” He is much more than a nominal leader of an organization. He does not seek to convert anyone to “Buddhism.” “Buddhism” is not a world organization, competing with other organized world religions, seeking strength in numbers. It is an age-old movement seeking to educate the heart and mind of any being for freedom and happiness, no matter what their ideology. It is a teaching of the reality of selflessness and relationality. The Dalai Lama is a simple monk, an adept mind scientist, a thorough scholar, a spiritual teacher, a diplomat, a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, an apostle of nonviolence, an advocate of intelligence and universal responsibility, and the living exemplar of what he calls “our common human religion of kindness.”
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