Bhikkhu Bodhi is an American Buddhist monk from New York City. Born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1944, he obtained a BA in philosophy from Brooklyn College (1966) and a PhD in philosophy from Claremont Graduate School (1972).

Drawn to Buddhism in his early 20s, after completing his university studies he traveled to Sri Lanka, where he received novice ordination in 1972 and full ordination in 1973, both under the late Ven. Ananda Maitreya, the leading Sri Lankan scholar-monk of recent times.

He was appointed editor of the Buddhist Publication Society (in Sri Lanka) in 1984 and its president in 1988. Ven. Bodhi has many important publications to his credit, either as author, translator, or editor, including the Buddha — A Translation of the Majjhima Nikaya (co-translated with Ven. Bhikkhu Nanamoli (1995), The Connected Discourses of the Buddha — a New Translation of the Samyutta Nikaya (2000), and In the Buddha’s Words (2005).

Master Jen–Chun, Bodhi Monastery’s founder and spiritual leader, has written extensively on the Buddha Dharma and has lectured throughout the United States and in many other countries around the world. Born in Jiangsu Province, China, in 1919, he embraced the monastic life at age 7 under the guidance of Ven. Master Chuan–Dao. At age 20 he entered the Buddhist academy of Tian–Ning Temple. Thereafter he studied at the Ming–Nan Buddhist Academy, beginning his teaching career after graduation. In 1949, he moved to Hong Kong where he met Master Yin–Shun and became his disciple. He then moved with Master Yin–Shun to Taiwan where he taught at the Fu–yan Buddhist Academy.

In 1973, Master Jen–Chun was invited by the Buddhist Association of the United States (BAUS) to be the abbot of the Great Enlightenment Temple in The Bronx, New York City.

Master Yin Shun was the teacher of Master Jen-Chun, the founder of Bodhi Monastery, and thus, though he never held any official position in Bodhi Monastery’s administration, he was in a sense the “spiritual mentor” of the monastery. It is his vision of the integral unity of the Buddha–Dharma and the themes he has highlighted in the unfolding history of Buddhism that grounds our approach to Buddhist theory and practice.

During the course of his long life, which stretched across a full century, Master Yin Shun had come to be recognized as the foremost Chinese scholar–monk of the modern age. The author of close to fifty volumes, he almost single–handedly spearheaded an intellectual Renaissance of Buddhism in Taiwan, enabling Chinese Buddhists in Taiwan to take their place among their scholarly peers from other Buddhist countries.