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| Jack Kornfield | |
|---|---|
| Name | Jack Kornfield |
| Birth date | 1945 |
| Occupation | Author; Teacher; Psychologist |
| Known for | Insight Meditation; Mindfulness; Theravada Buddhism |
Jack Kornfield Jack Kornfield is an American meditation teacher, author, and clinical psychologist known for introducing Theravada and insight meditation to Western audiences. He is a co-founder of prominent meditation institutions and has written widely on mindfulness, compassion, and the integration of Buddhist practice with Western psychology. His work connects monastic traditions, psychotherapy, and contemporary spiritual movements.
Kornfield was born in 1945 in Boston, Massachusetts and raised in a Jewish family, later attending Dartmouth College where he studied psychology and English alongside contemporaries from Harvard University and Yale University. He pursued graduate training at University of Iowa and completed clinical training linked to programs at Brockton Hospital and affiliations with regional institutions such as Massachusetts General Hospital. His academic pathway intersected with figures from American Psychological Association circles and with emerging contemplative scholars at Columbia University and Princeton University who were exploring cross-cultural psychology.
In the late 1960s and early 1970s Kornfield traveled to Thailand, India, and Burmese regions to study Theravada and Vipassana practice with renowned teachers. He trained in monastic settings under teachers connected to lineages that include Ajahn Chah, Mahasi Sayadaw, and peers of S. N. Goenka; his ordination and practice intersected with monasteries in Wat Mahathat, Wat Suan Mokkh, and Burmese vipassana centers associated with Sayagyi U Ba Khin-influenced traditions. He studied alongside Western long-term practitioners who later taught in United Kingdom, Australia, and Germany, connecting to networks that included names like Joseph Goldstein, Sharon Salzberg, Thich Nhat Hanh, and other contemporaries from the 1970s mindfulness movement.
Kornfield co-founded major Western institutions to teach insight meditation, notably establishing centers alongside colleagues in California and Minnesota. He co-founded the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts with Joseph Goldstein and Sharon Salzberg and later helped establish the Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Woodacre, California with founders linked to networks including Tara Brach, Stephen Batchelor, and Gil Fronsdal. His teaching toured retreat centers and universities such as Harvard Divinity School, University of California, Berkeley, Stanford University, Oxford University, and institutions in Japan and Israel, collaborating with leaders from American Buddhist Churches and international boards connected to The Mind and Life Institute and The Dalai Lama dialogues.
Kornfield’s books synthesize meditation instruction, personal narrative, and psychotherapy, and are published alongside works by peers in contemplative literature such as Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ram Dass, and Pema Chödrön. Major titles include works that appear beside canonical translations like Dhammapada editions and comparative texts such as those by Bhikkhu Bodhi and Thanissaro Bhikkhu. His publications have been distributed through publishers associated with titles by Tara Brach, Jack Elinson, Daniel Goleman, Eckhart Tolle, and Robert Thurman, and have been reviewed in journals linked to Tricycle (magazine), The New York Times, The Washington Post, and academic presses at Columbia University Press. He has contributed chapters to compilations edited by scholars from Harvard Medical School, University of Toronto, and Yale University Press.
Kornfield teaches an approach integrating Theravada vipassana practice with Western psychotherapy, drawing on traditions represented by Ajahn Chah, Mahasi Sayadaw, and modern teachers such as Thich Nhat Hanh and Shunryu Suzuki. His method emphasizes mindfulness, loving-kindness (metta), and insight practices similar to those taught by S. N. Goenka, adapted for clinical and lay settings like workshops at Massachusetts General Hospital and programs at UCLA and Oxford Mindfulness Centre. He engages with scientific research from groups including Mind and Life Institute, National Institutes of Health, and researchers affiliated with Harvard Medical School, Stanford University School of Medicine, and University of Massachusetts Medical School, paralleling inquiry by figures such as Jon Kabat-Zinn and Richard Davidson.
Kornfield has balanced teaching with roles in nonprofit governance and collaborations with international Buddhist communities in Thailand, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Nepal. He has participated in interfaith dialogues alongside representatives from Catholic Church, Jewish Theological Seminary, Islamic Society of North America, and leaders such as The Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu. In later decades he continued offering retreats at centers including Spirit Rock, Insight Meditation Society, and venues in Europe, Australia, and South America, and has appeared in documentary projects with filmmakers linked to PBS, BBC, and festival circuits like Sundance Film Festival.
Category:American Buddhists Category:Mindfulness teachers