The founder, Venerable Thich Tinh Hanh

净行法师1934年生于越南宁顺省。15岁时因舅父去世，体悟人生无常，乃发愿出家，并于次年入宁顺佛学院就读。17岁时正式礼玄微和尚为师，法名是圆，法号净行，字行备。

万行大学毕业后，即考取越南国家公费留学资格，于1969年来台留学，就读国立台湾师范大学国文研究所。1981年以《韩愈辟佛的研究》一文，取得文学博士学位。

Venerable Thich Tinh Hanh was born in 1934 in the southern Vietnam province of Ninh Thuận. When Tinh Hanh was 15 the death of his maternal uncle triggered an insight into impermanence, whereupon he resolved to go forth into the monastic life. In the following year he enrolled at the nearby Buddhist seminary, and at the age of 17 he took the monastic vows with Venerable Thich Huyen-Vi as his preceptor. At that time he received the Dharma name Shiyuan; the ordination name Tinh Hanh; and the style Xingbei.

After completing his studies at the Vạn Hạnh Buddhist University, in 1969 Tinh Hanh obtained a Vietnamese government scholarship to study abroad, whereupon he came to Taiwan and commenced graduate studies in Chinese at National Taiwan Normal University. In 1981 he completed his doctorate studies with a dissertation titled “Han Yu’s Critique of Buddhism.”

1979年成立灵山讲堂，开设禅坐气功班，接引众生前来听闻佛法。后陆续创办灵山佛学研究所、《现代佛教月刊》、中国佛教学院、石碇灵山禅林寺，并举办国学、佛学等讲座课程，将佛教朝向教育、文化、社会、经济等各方面发展，使佛教成为适合这时代的人间佛教。1990年成立「财团法人灵山文教基金会」并担任董事长，扩大推行文化、教育、学术等各项工作。同年，应聘为国立台北师范学院（后改制为国立台北教育大学）副教授，成为台湾首位在国立大学任教的博士比丘；1992年复应聘为国立中兴大学中文系所专任副教授。

In 1979 he set up the Linh-Son Lecture Hall, where he opened a class in qigong and meditation. Afterwards he established the Linh-Son Buddhist Seminary, the journal Modern Buddhism Monthly, the Buddhist College of China, and the Linh-Son Zen Lin Temple. At the same time, in an effort to make Buddhism more relevant to modern society, he organized a variety of lectures and classes on various themes related to “humanistic Buddhism.” In 1990 he established the Linh-Son Culture & Education Foundation and began serving as its director. In the same year he was appointed as assistant professor at the National Taipei University of Education, thereby becoming the first Buddhist monk with a doctorate to teach at a national university in Taiwan. In 1992 he also began teaching in the Chinese Department at National Zhongxing University.

法师有感于佛教虽然传入越南已有千年以上的历史，佛教经典却没有越南文译本，而备感遗憾，于是1993年开始推动「越译大藏经」的志业，计划将上千部的中文大藏经翻译成越南文。20余年间，除了翻译《大正新修大藏经》（第1册至54册）、《卍续藏经》、《南传大藏经》（律部）、《古汉喃文经书》外；还翻译了《太虚大师全集》、《印顺导师全集》、《禅宗全书》（100册）、《净土丛书》、《海潮音文库》、《佛光大辞典》等当代重要佛学论著与工具书。至2015年为止，共计已付梓出版五百套第1册至第187册《灵山法宝大藏经》。

Thich Tinh Hanh lamented the fact that, even though Buddhism had come to Vietnam over 1,000 years ago, there was still no complete collection of its scriptures in Vietnamese. Thus in 1993 he initiated a project for translating the entire Chinese Buddhist Canon into Vietnamese. Over the course of two decades this project has produced an enormous amount of translations, including the Taisho Tripitaka (volumes 1 to 54); the Xuzangjing ; the Vinaya Pitaka of the Pali Canon; and the Guhannanwen jingshu. A number of modern works have also been translated, including The Collected Works of Master Taixu; The Collected Works of Master Yinshun; Encyclopedia of Chan (100 volumes); Encyclopedia of Pure Land; the Haichaoyin book series; and the Foguang Dictionary. All of these translations have been collected into a 187-volume set titled Linh-Son Dharma Treasures; up to 2015, 500 sets have been published.

与此同时，法师亦致力于佛法的国际化，2005年继任世界灵山佛教会僧统后，于巴黎创办世界灵山东方大学，并于2010年获法国政府核准招生，将佛法扎根于西方。

2015年4月10日，上人于台北灵山禅林寺舍报圆寂，世寿81岁，僧腊65春，戒腊61夏。上人一生以兴办佛教教育与文化事业为志，并倾其二十年之心力完成越译大藏经之志业，为后世留下了千古不朽的贡献。

After being appointed head of the Linh-son World Buddhist Association in 2005 Tinh Hanh established the World Linh Son Oriental University in Paris, which in 2010 received permission from the French government to begin recruiting students. Tinh Hanh died on April 10, 2015 at the Linh-Son Zen Lin Temple in northern Taiwan. He was 81 years of age; he was a monk for 65 years, and a fully ordained bhiksu for 61 years. The abundant fruits of his various translation projects stand as a lasting testament to his many contributions to the field of Buddhist education and scholarship.