Our Venerable Pingshi Xiao

 Born in 1944, Venerable Master Xiao Pingshi was raised in a farming family in central Taiwan. Seeking the truths regarding human existence, he became a committed Buddhist disciple and practitioner in his forties.Since 1988, Venerable Pingshi had been propagating the Buddha Dharma through three different associations: Buddha Mindfulness Samadhi Publication Association, Buddhist Inner Knowledge Cultivation Association, and True Enlightenment Practitioners Association, the last of which was established on July 6, 1997. 

 In 1997, True Enlightenment Practitioners Association was established to offer different levels of Dharma classes to practitioners. Presently, affiliated centers of the Association have reached all the major cities of Taiwan, including Hong Kong and the United States. Since the founding of the association, Master Xiao has been giving weekly public lectures on important Buddhist scriptures, such as the Lankavatara Sutra, the Surangama Sutra, the Sutra on Upasaka Precepts, the Srimaladevi Simhanada Sūtra, the Diamond Sutra, the Reality Prajnaparamita Sutra, the Lotus Sutra and the Buddha Treasury Sutra. He is currently giving public lectures on the Noble Sutra of the Explanation of the Profound Secrets (Ārya-saṃdhi-nirmocana-sūtra). 

 To elucidate the Buddha Dharma and its stages of cultivation for all interested learners, Venerable Pingshi has also published more than a hundred books on a wide range of Buddhist subjects. These include the combined cultivation of Chan and Pure Land, the realization of the Path to Liberation expounded in the Agamas, the analysis of the profound Middle-Way teachings and the exegesis of key Consciousness-Only scriptures. All his books emphasize that Buddhism is a path of personal realization and that we can attain realization only through a continual process of listening to, contemplating, and actually practicing the Buddha Dharma. 

 Venerable Pingshi adopted the term "True Enlightenment" for the sacred teachings of the Tathagata and sutras taught by the Buddha. The name highlights the direct perception from personal realization of the wondrous Dharma of the tathāgatagarbha expounded by the World-Honored One during the three Turnings of the Dharma Wheel. He continued the Dharma transmission lineage of Bodhisattva Xuanzang based on the teachings in the sutras of the Three-Vehicle Bodhi, including the neither-arising-nor-ceasing dharma taught by Buddha Sakyamuni for more than 20 years.