The castle of En Clausade, located in Marzens, in the Tarn, was built in the 18th century.
Today it is home to the Vajra Yogini Institute, a center for study and Gelug meditation of Tibetan Buddhism.
The Château d'en Clausade was built by a younger branch of the Toulouse-Lautrec family.
It is from this branch that the famous painter Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was born.
The house remained in the family until its purchase in 1979.
At this date, the building was acquired for 700,000 francs (105,000 euros today) to found a center for Buddhist studies and meditation, the Vajra Yogini Institute.
Jelug Study and Meditation Center of Tibetan Buddhism
This one is placed under the spiritual authority of the lamas Zopa Rinpoche and Geshe Tenzin Loden.
In 1982 and 1993, Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama, visited the premises.
After a fire ravaged the west wing, the money paid by the insurance companies was used in the foundation of the Nalanda monastery.
The castle of en Clausade is composed as a main building flanked by two projecting wings.
The wings dominate the one-story body, a body that extends over three floors, one of which is an under-roof.
The whole complex is covered with a mansard roof, except for the west wing, which was damaged by fire.
The interior of the castle presents rooms, meditation rooms, Buddhist temple, and has especially the particularity of preserving a small Catholic chapel, a vestige of the Toulouse-Lautrec period, which the institute has preserved.
An immense stupa, a monument of Buddhist art and to a lesser extent of Jainism, intended to contain relics, to commemorate a religious event, to symbolize Buddhist doctrine, whose form has become more complicated over time, ranging from stone mounds to tower-like buildings and pagodas.
This kadampa-style stone stupa stands in front of the castle. Kadampa Buddhism is a school of Mahayana Buddhism founded by the great Indian Buddhist master Atisha (982-1054).
Erected in the 90s, it was the first to be built in the West, and it still remains today the largest stupa in France.
Château d'en Clausade
Buddhist Institute "Vajra Yogini".
In Clauzade
81500 Marzens
Tel: 05 63 58 17 22
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