from the 43rd generation of the Lâm Tế Zen school and the ninth generation of the Liễu Quán school. He studied as a novice for three years and received training in Vietnamese traditions of Mahayana and Theravada Buddhism. Here he also learned Chinese, English and French. Nhất Hạnh attended Báo Quốc Buddhist Academy. Dissatisfied with the focus at Báo Quốc Academy, which he found lacking in philosophy, literature, and foreign languages, Nhất Hạnh left in 1950 and took up residence in the Ấn Quang Pagoda in Saigon, where he was ordained as a monk in 1951. He supported himself by selling books and poetry while attending Saigon University, where he studied science. In 1955, Nhất Hạnh returned to Huế and served as the editor of Phật Giáo Việt Nam (Vietnamese Buddhism), the official publication of the General Association of Vietnamese Buddhists (Tổng Hội Phật Giáo Việt Nam) for two years before the publication was suspended as higher-ranking monks disapproved of his writing. He believed that this was due to his opinion that South Vietnam's various Buddhist organisations should unite. In 1956, while he was away teaching in Đà Lạt, his name was expunged from the records of Ấn Quang, effectively disowning him from the temple. In late 1957, Nhất Hạnh decided to go on retreat, and established a monastic “community of resistance” named Phương Bôi, in Đại Lao Forest near Đà Lạt. During this period, he taught at a nearby high school and continued to write, promoting the idea of a humanistic, unified Buddhism. From 1959 to 1961, Nhất Hạnh taught several short courses on Buddhism at various Saigon temples, including the large Xá Lợi Pagoda, where his class was cancelled mid-session and he was removed due to disapproval of his teachings. Facing further opposition from Vietnamese religious and secular authorities, Nhất Hạnh accepted a Fulbright Fellowship in 1960 to study comparative religion at Princeton University. He studied at the Princeton Theological Seminary in 1961. In 1962 he was appointed lecturer in Buddhism at Columbia University and also taught as a lecturer at Cornell University. By then he had gained fluency in French, Classical Chinese, Sanskrit, Pali and English, in addition to his native Vietnamese. Career Activism in Vietnam 1963–1966 In 1963, after the military overthrow of the minority Catholic regime of President Ngo Dinh Diem, Nhất Hạnh returned to South Vietnam on 16 December 1963, at the request of