Pabongka Rinpoche Dechen Nyingpo Jampa Tenzin Trinlay Gyatso was one of the greatest masters of the 20th century and one of the most influential teachers in Tibet. He had acquired the teachings from the Sakya, from the Nyingma, from the lineage of Ganden Tendzin** and Ngulchu Dharmabhadra, and collected other valuable teachings from various venerated sources during his lifetime. When many Tibetans departed Tibet, Pabongka knew that he would not be able to leave. Therefore, he carefully transmitted all these important teachings to a single heart disciple, Trijang Rinpoche, who became the Tutor of the 14th Dalai Lama. In this way, all the transmissions were carried safely to India and could be securely passed on to His Holiness, as well as, the other high Lamas of Gelugpa. This becomes the living foundation that is the Gelugpa Lineage we have today.

** Extracted from Vajra Yogini Teachings by Kyabje Gelek Rinpoche (Publisher: Jewel Heart).

AUSPICIOUS BIRTH

Pabongka was born north of Lhasa at a town called, Tsawa Li in the Yeru Shang district of the state of Tsang in 1878. His family was part of the nobility and had owned a modest estate called, Chappel Gershi. It is said that on the night when he was born, a light shone in the room and people outside the house had a vision of a protector on the roof.

As a child, he has already exhibited unusual qualities and thus, was taken before Sharpa Rinpoche Chuje Lobsang Dargye, one of the leading religious figures of the day. Later on, he was found to be a reincarnation of the Changkya line, which included the well-known scholar Changkya Rolpay Dorje (1717-1786). The Lamas of this line had done much teaching in the regions of Mongolia and China, including in the court of the Chinese Emperor himself, and to be the Royal Tutor to the Emperors, that Lama must have been highly attained. This regal position has enabled him to accomplish a great deal for Tibetan Buddhist institutions in China, Mongolia, and Tibet. Changkya Rolpay Dorje was also the student of the Seventh Dalai Lama and a teacher of the Eighth. He was an important lineage holder in several adept traditions of both Father and Mother Tantras.

However, the name “Changkya” had strong Chinese connotations. As the Tibetan government and people were already sensitive to the pressures put on them from China, the name “Changkya” was ruled out and the boy was declared to be “Pabongka” instead.

There was a small monastery atop the rock named Pabong. Hence, he was eventually recognized and enthroned as the late abbot of that monastery. For this reason, Rinpoche is documented as the second Pabongka and was sometimes referred to as, “Pabongka Kentrul”. It is commonly believed that he was also the reincarnation of Tsako Ngawang Drakpa, one of the main disciples of Lama Tsongkhapa and founder of Dhe-Tsang Monastery.

It was Sharpa Chuje Lobsang who foretold that if the young boy was to be placed in the Gyalrong House of Sera Mey College, something wonderful would happen with him in the future.

A LIVING HERUKA

Pabongka Rinpoche’s full name was Kyabje Pabongka Jetsun Jampa Tenzin Trinley Gyatso Pel Sangpo, which means the “Lord Protector, the one from Pabongka, the venerable and glorious master whose name is the Loving One, Keeper of the Buddha’s Teachings, Ocean of the Mighty Deeds of the Buddha”. He was also affectionately known as “Dechen Nyingpo”, which translates into “Essence of Great Bliss” or “The King of Bliss from the Palace of Bliss”, meaning a highly attained being who is already one with Heruka.

He was an extraordinary master for the Heruka Body Mandala and the Vajrayogini practice, and he had a special responsibility for the Mother Tantra.

There is a famous story of how Heruka actually appeared to Pabongka when he visited Cimburi in Tibet, where there is an image of Heruka. This is where the Blood drinker’s mountains are and this name refers to Heruka – Drinker of Blood. Apparently, Pabongka went to this place three times during his lifetime.

When he first went there, this image spoke to him, opened its mouth and a tremendous amount of nectar came out. Pabongka collected the nectar from the mouth of Heruka while in the presence of sixty or seventy people. This nectar was then made into nectar pills. The Gelugpa’s current nectar pills originate from there.

It is also stated that this very same cave in Cimburi where Pabongka received the nectar from the Heruka image was the place where Heruka promised him the following:-

From now on, for the next seven generations, whoever practices my teaching, I will protect and help.

This is why Pabongka is also considered to be a living Heruka. Many people received the Heruka Body Mandala and every teaching on it from him. And if you happened to fall within that seven generation category, you are indeed very much blessed.

A LINEAGE IS BORN

At the tender age of seven, Pabongka Rinpoche entered Gyalrong House of Sera-Mey Monastery. He underwent the usual studies of a monk, earned his Geshe degree and spent two years studying at the Gyuto Tantric College.

In the monastery, Pabongka did not show much scholarship, as though he was slightly on the dull side. The Geshes would often insult him and at times, they would even use him as an example to illustrate ‘lesser intelligence’. He under-studied more than 38 Masters and one of them was Gondro Kendro Ngulchu.

Although Pabongka Rinpoche’s academic career at Sera Mey College was not outstanding, he did complete his Geshe degree. However, he only reached the “Lingse” rank, meaning he was just examined within his own monastery and did not go on for the exhausting series of public examinations and debates that is required to attain the coveted “Lharampa” level. These would have been conducted at different monasteries, culminating in a session before the Dalai Lama and his teachers at the Norbulingka summer palace.

After having passed his Geshe exams, Pabongka began to receive teachings from a very important Master, Dagpo Jampel Lundrup. Dagpo Rinpoche was just a normal monk, and not even an incarnate Lama. However, under this Master, Pabongka started to develop by leaps and bounds. He studied the Lamrim, and everything began to flourish within him from then on. Dagpo Lama Rinpoche became his Root Guru.

Pabongka would visit Dagpo Lama Rinpoche in his cave and was sent into a Lamrim retreat nearby. According to Ribur Rinpoche: “Dagpo Lama Rinpoche would teach him a Lamrim topic and then Pabongka Rinpoche would go away and meditate on it. Later he would return to explain what he’d understood: if he had gained some realization, Dagpo Rinpoche would teach him some more and Pabongka Rinpoche would go back and meditate on that.”

It went on like this for ten years before Pabongka received any Tantra teachings from his Guru. Gradually, with consistent dedication, Pabongka became a Master of everything, outstanding in every single thing – to the point that even learned Geshes ended up going to Pabongka and consulting him.

Even though in the beginning, Pabongka was not a big lama at all in Tibet, he became an exceptional Master in forty years. He truly became the Master of Tibet in the 1920s through the 1930s, especially of the Gelugpa Tradition.

If we look at today’s Gelugpa Lineage, tracing from H.H. Trijang Rinpoche, H.H. Ling Rinpoche to H.H. Zong Rinpoche, there is not a lama who is not a disciple of Pabongka Rinpoche, directly or indirectly. In one way or another, every lineage came through Pabongka.

FROM POVERTY TO GREATNESS

As stated earlier, Pabongka Rinpoche was not high ranking at all and was even considered as a low ranking person when he first started but he became extremely popular. At that time, he did not have any ladrang at all.

Pabongka Rinpoche himself often shared how poor he was when he was young. He said, “When I was young, I had nothing, no wealth at all and on top of that, no food to eat. Everybody had at least a little bag with barley-flour. For several days, I couldn’t get any food. I ran from Sera Monastery down to the sand, filled my bag with sand, and put a little barley on top to smell and taste a bit. I lived on that for several days. This is what I did and look what I am today.”

It was only much later when he became very popular that he was offered a little retreat-area by the Ngakpa College of Sera Mey Monastery. They offered him a large retreat complex on the hillside above Pabongka. The name of this hermitage was Tashi Chuling, or “Auspicious Spiritual Isle”. Pabongka built a small meditation cell around the mouth of a cave located near his residence. When he was not busy on the road for his extensive teaching tours, he would retreat for long periods of time to do his private practice and meditations.

As a keen meditator, Pabongka Rinpoche emphasized Lamrim, Lojong and Mahamudra. He had his own unique way of learning and teaching that yielded the most impactful of results.

Pabongka had two main spiritual qualities – from the tantric point of view, his realization and ability to present all tantric teachings, and from the sutric point of view, his ability to teach Lamrim, or the entire graduated path to enlightenment.

He was unique in his ability to bring the complex ancient teachings to the monks as well as to the laypeople’s level of comprehension. Hence, it is through him that a great number of lay people were able to learn and benefit from the Dharma. For this reason, he was known as the teacher for the common man and the monks. Similar to Buddha Shakyamuni who taught an enormous variety of people about 2,500 years ago, Pabongka Rinpoche did not teach from some predetermined syllabus. Instead, he taught according to the spiritual needs of the listeners. His influential teachings, coupled with his powerful way of conveying the Dharma made him a respected spiritual figure of his day.

A GREAT MASTER RISES

It is said that Pabongka’s teachings are so famous that thousands of people would come from far and wide to attend, especially when he gave initiations or conducted special prayers during festivals. Pabongka is well known for using his humour to elucidate the teachings. As some teachings could go on for ten hours, he would intersperse his teachings with jokes and amusing stories laced with moral values to keep his audience ‘awake’.

One of Pabongka’s great accomplishments was his ability to devise a way to attract and lead his listeners to every level of the Buddha’s complex and highly technical teachings. On many occasions, he would address an audience that numbered up to several thousands of people, and yet everyone could hear him clearly. Back in those days, there were no such things as microphones or speakers. His voice was that powerful!

Pabongka’s talks and teachings were known to have always left a profound and immediate effect on the listeners. A story that is worth highlighting is that of Dapon Tsago. He was a member of the nobility and had held a powerful position in the government that is equivalent to the Minister of Defence.

One day, this great general Dapon marched into the hall where Pabongka Rinpoche was giving a teaching, all decked out in his finest silks and with his long hair flowing in carefully tailored locks. At that time, this was considered the highest of fashion in Tibet. He had hung a great ceremonial sword from his belt and whenever he walked, it would make a loud clanging noise of importance, as if to announce his arrival. However, by the end of the first section of Pabongka’s teachings, he was seen leaving the hall quietly, deep in thought. He had even wrapped up his weapon of war in a cloth to hide it, and was taking it home. Later, it was seen that he had actually trimmed off his warrior’s locks. Finally, one day, he threw himself before Pabongka Rinpoche and requested for the special lifetime religious vows for laymen. From then on, he was seen to follow Pabongka around to every public teaching that he gave.

Pabongka was well known to be a realized and complete practitioner of Gelug. Although he did not say anything bad about other traditions nor discourage them, he always showed the extraordinary qualities of Tsongkhapa’s teachings.

When Pabongka went to the Eastern Tibet, in an area called Kham, there were many Bonpos who attacked Pabongka. All the Bons in Kham gathered together and continuously, day and night, directed black magic against him. There were many incidences and they kept happening numerous times.

Once, Pabongka was crossing over a high pass and it was all covered in snow. Suddenly a huge storm appeared and everybody was carried up and down by it. There was quite a lot of damage – although there was no harm done to human life, there was much material damage. When they finally made it to the other side of the mountain, Pabongka told everyone not to enter his tent.

He sat in there for a while and when the thunder came, together with lightning, Pabongka would collect the lightning in his pocket, and kept it there for some time. Finally, he called out to someone and told him, “Take this here and throw it outside, that way.” And when they threw it out, they could see a sort of red-coloured light and liquid inside the lightning. This burnt the grass and everything. Yet Pabongka collected it just like that.

THE GURU OF ALL MEN

It is a well-known fact that people from Lhasa came to see Pabongka Rinpoche every day. They even had to queue up. Pabongka’s popularity was such that even the Thirteenth Dalai Lama noticed. At that time, the Thirteenth Dalai Lama was very powerful, holding all political, economic, military and spiritual power in his reign. However, Pabongka had thousands and thousands of disciples all over Tibet – from the three great monasteries of Sera, Drepung and Gaden, to the Government Officials, members of the Court and to the several thousands of lay people as well. Almost everybody was Pabongka’s disciple. Hence, the Thirteenth Dalai Lama often observed Pabongka Rinpoche closely, but found no faults.

There was one incident in which Pabongka was summoned by His Holiness to prove that his Southern Lamrim Tradition called, Shargyu, was genuine. Somehow this tradition was not popular in Tibet at that time, and very little was known about it. Therefore, one could not find much proof of its source. It was not written anywhere in the regular texts studied in the monasteries. There were even talks amongst learned scholars of Pabongka introducing a strange system of a Southern tradition that he learnt from an old monk in some village in a corner of Tibet. Hence, people were trying to refute the authenticity of this Southern style Lamrim. In this respect, His Holiness had to do something to intervene and asked Pabongka to provide solid evidence.

The Southern Lamrim tradition was what Pabongka has studied under Dagpo Rinpoche. Being fiercely devoted to his Root Guru, Pabongka would not tolerate anyone disparaging his Guru’s name or even remotely implying that his Guru was wrong in any way. So, Pabongka had to send a letter in reply to the Thirteenth Dalai Lama’s questions.

At first, Pabongka did not think it was so serious. However, upon hearing that without concrete proof, he would have to declare that his newly introduced Southern Lamrim tradition to be a fraud and no one would be allowed to practice it, he was unwilling to risk any injury to his Guru’s name. So, Pabongka thought for a while and then said to the Manager of his labrang, “Under these circumstances, I shall reply. I shall dictate and you go ahead and take notes”.

Then Pabongka quoted, “The Buddha said in this sutra and that sutra and in the collected works of the Buddha in volume such and such this is written and right at this moment Your Holiness is sitting in your room and if you look at your back in the third shelf, open that book and read on page 146 at the back side the 6th line, there it says this, this and then, if you look at your left side, on the second shelf, the second volume number, this and this, pull that book out and there it says this, this, this….”

Pabongka continued, “This is the proof from the Kanjur and if you read this book by Asanga which is available in Your Holiness’s room on such and such a shelf in the outer volume whose colour is this, and the inner book is this, and then, if you look at line this, line that, page number this and this, you will find it. And from the Tibetan tradition, look in the works of your late Master, Purchog Jampa Rinpoche, in volume number four of his collected works, which is in Your Holiness’s bedroom on such and such a shelf and the colour of the cloth is this and the page number is that.”

Pabongka Rinpoche was so precise and confident in pointing out the details for His Holiness to find every piece of evidence to support his Southern Lamrim tradition. This letter was then given to His Holiness’s Chamberlain to be delivered into the hands of His Holiness.

When the Thirteenth Dalai Lama read it, he asked his Chamberlain to take out the exact books and volumes as described by Pabongka in the letter. Everything was proved right. Then His Holiness asked his Chamberlain, “Did you know and tell him I would be in this room?” The Chamberlain answered, “No.” His Holiness did not comment any further.

In another incident, while Pabongka Rinpoche was giving a big teaching, he received an order from the Thirteenth Dalai Lama to make rain immediately. So, Rinpoche said to his disciples gathered there at that time that they should say the Lama Chopa. During the recitation of Migstema in the Lama Chopa, Pabongka directed his students in their visualization to create a cloud, and this cloud would in turn shower rain wherever that it was needed. True enough, rain started to fall where it was needed. Then after a while as the rain continued to fall, Pabongka made the rain stop as magically as he made it appear. It was said that on that very day, they got quite a good amount of rain.

Pabongka’s unusual ability to teach was not an integral part of Tibetan culture. It is rather at the heart of the living transmission of the teachings of the historical Buddha from one great master to the next. It is, first and foremost, an oral transmission: the master teaches his gifted disciple continuously until the transmitted knowledge becomes the student’s second nature.

Due to Pabongka’s skill as a Gelugpa master, the Thirteenth Dalai Lama requested Kyabje Pabongka to give the yearly Lamrim teachings in 1925, instead of asking the Gaden throneholder (Gaden Tripa) as was customary. Usually the teachings lasted seven days, but these lasted for eleven days.

These were some of Pabongka Rinpoche’s many amazing qualities.

EPITOME OF GURU DEVOTION

Pabongka Rinpoche was also a perfect example of guru devotion. If anyone has read Pabongka’s collected works, poems and so forth, one would know that he had always talked about his Guru, Dagpo Lama Rinpoche. In every teaching from Pabongka – be it Yamantaka, Vajrayogini, Heruka or Hevajra, Lamrim, logic or Prajnaparamita, he would always speak of his Guru.

It is common knowledge that whenever Pabongka visited his lama’s monastery, he would dismount as soon as it appeared in view and would prostrate all the way to the door. This was no easy feat, because of Pabongka’s large build. Yet he would do this religiously. And whenever he left his Guru’s monastery, Pabongka would walk backwards until the monastery was out of sight. Only then would he turn around and get back onto his horse to proceed with his journey. Even when he was unwell while visiting his Guru’s monastery, he would still dismount from his horse and make, at the very least, one prostration before continuing his journey towards his Guru’s monastery.

It was also famous that Pabongka Rinpoche would not stand for anyone speaking ill of his Guru in any way or form. His face would immediately turn black. (Extracted from Guru Devotion – How to Integrate the Primordial Enlightened Mind – A Commentary on the Lama Chopa by Gelek Rinpoche.)

Pabongka’s devotion was such that he even purposely chose to visit the Province of Dagpo where his Guru had lived, when he was about to pass on. He chose to pass away in the place where his Master had lived, at the age of sixty-three. That was the kind of Guru Devotion that Pabongka embodied.

There is a story of how Serkong Dorjechang of Gaden Jangtse, the “Holder” of the mystical Manjushri Wisdom book wanted to pass this “sacred responsibility” over to Pabongka Rinpoche, but Pabongka had been delaying it. So, in order to get Pabongka to come to him as soon as possible, Serkong Dorjechang started scolding Pabongka’s Guru, Dagpo Rinpoche during a big teaching that he was conducting in front of a few thousand people. Serkong Dorjechang knew that if he insulted Pabongka’s lack of respect through Dagpo’s inability to teach his own student well, that act alone would be enough to make Pabongka Rinpoche go to Serkong Dorjechang immediately and receive teachings from him.

The day that Serkong Dorjechang died, Pabongka had a dream. He dreamt that he was going to see Serkong Dorjechang. A number of people had lined up and he had to do the same. Pabongka had a small bell and vajra to offer Serkong Dorjechang. When he finally approached the front of the line, Serkong Dorjechang was sitting on a throne and Pabongka had to look up. Serkong Dorjechang handed over to Pabongka Rinpoche the vajra and bell he was holding, and said, “Gold made, please take it.” He gave it to Pabongka and took the small one Pabongka had. That was how the mystical Manjushri Wisdom book and teachings were transferred to Pabongka. That was how the transition was done.

Another interesting story revolves around the Manager of Pabongka’s labrang. As this Manager was also a disciple of Pabongka, they shared a strong Guru-Disciple relationship. Unfortunately, this Manager was considered to be very wild. During Pabongka’s teachings, he would not hesitate to give a slap to anyone who was not behaving properly in the audience. He would even pick up someone’s shoes from the back and hit anybody. However, no one would dare raise a complaint because of Pabongka.

This Manager’s previous incarnation was a Gyuto tantric college abbot. When people were supposed to look for his reincarnation, they decided not to go ahead with it at all. Finally, it was Pabongka who insisted that they should and must. Due to the unpleasant reputation of this particular incarnation, everyone was very reluctant as they feared he would turn out to be another wild one. They were most unwilling to bear the burden and shame of his non-virtuous actions, including the squandering of wealth. Yet Pabongka maintained firmly that they must, and when excuses were given, Pabongka rebuked them. He said, “There is so much wealth accumulated around here now, and even though the ‘son’ is throwing some here and there, there is still a lot available. You have only excuses. That is not right. They are not correct reasons. You have to look for the reincarnation.” In the end, they all had to obey and comply.

Apparently, this ‘son’ was the very same person who dissuaded Pabongka from accepting Reting Rinpoche’s offer to become regent of Tibet in 1938. He stated that, “…if you become regent, all the good work you have done will be damaged. You will have to deal with political matters and then everything will be finished. Every commitment of the master-disciple relationship will be broken. There will be nothing, so please don’t accept!”

That was what he requested and Pabongka was actually very happy about that. He rejected the offer and Talungdra became regent. In fact, Pabongka himself was famous for maintaining that a monk should never touch politics.

THE PATH OF VAJRAYOGINI

Pabongka was asked by Heruka and Vajrayogini to combine the Sakya Vajrayogini teachings with the techniques that Tsongkhapa had given for the Heruka practice. These can be found in Tsongkhapa’s written works on the “Secret Precepts of Heruka”, the “Elucidation of All Hidden Meanings”. This is why Pabongka said that it would be good if he got a piece of cloth from a Sakya Lama and one from the Gelugpa Lama and weaved them together in order to create the great fabric of Gelugpa practice. This is one of many magnificent contributions that Pabongka Rinpoche has made.

He asserted that we have to carry the lineage of the Sakya tradition, because Tsongkhapa only came in 1357 and the Buddha came some 2, 500 years ago. There is a gap of one and a half thousand years. That is where the unbroken lineage becomes crucial, and in this case, it stems from the Sakya Tradition.

Pabongka wrote the long Vajrayogini sadhana called Dechen Nyur Lam, Short Path to Great Bliss. It encompasses all of Vajrayogini’s practices. One really does not need any more detailed teaching than this. Pabongka said that from that book, there is not only the short lineage from Vajrayogini to him, but also the long lineage and the combined teaching techniques.

Many highly established scholars know that Vajrayogini has been Tsongkhapa’s secret practice and that he kept it as his hidden heart treasure. However, it was Pabongka who made it very clear that Tsongkhapa had so many practices and had combined all of them together. He also added the Ganden Nyengyu which means not only oral, but it is a sort of teaching that is not given in public. It is more likened to a valuable family heirloom that is passed from relation to relation. Pabongka combined all these techniques and made it possible for lazy people like us to obtain Vajrayoginihood within the shortest time-span with very little effort. And this was how the Vajrayogini lineage had come through.

One of the most significant benefits of Vajrayogini Practice is that she represents the swiftest path to Enlightenment and one would gain control over their death and birth. At the point of death, one does not lose control over the entire process, but will gain control instead. Due to this, we do not have to go into uncontrolled ordinary bardo and ordinary rebirth either.

EMPOWERING LIBERATION INTO ALL BEINGS

In 1921 at Chuzang Hermitage near Lhasa, Pabongka Rinpoche gave a twenty-four-day historic exposition on the Lam Rim. This was attended by some seven hundred people, including lay people. Many monks came from the three major monasteries in Lhasa, and many more travelled weeks from the Central Province, from Tsang, and from as far away as Amdo and Kham. These teachings were eventually translated into English and published as “Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand” (Tib. rNam grol lag bcangs) in 1991 by one of Rinpoche’s disciples who had attended the 24-day Discourse. This disciple was the famed Trijang Rinpoche and this book became the foundation of most Gelug teachers’ Lam Rim presentations, including those of the FPMT and of Geshe Kelsang Gyatso’s acclaimed Lam Rim text, “Joyful Path of Good Fortune”.

Many listeners would maintain that they were always stunned by the power of Pabongka Rinpoche’s teachings. Although most of the scholar monks may have heard some of the teachings before, the way in which Pabongka Rinpoche taught was very unique. Many students, monks and laypeople alike, felt like they were receiving more than a teaching. They felt they were also receiving a tremendous blessing.

Due to Pabongka’s knowledge and practice, tens of thousands of people became his disciples, including numerous eminent lamas, powerful generals and even Chinese government officials and monks, who came all the way from Beijing and Shanghai to Lhasa in order to receive his teachings. Ribur Rinpoche recounted that Pabongka Rinpoche spent a lot of time contemplating on the practical meaning of the teachings and came to inner realizations of them. Pabongka Rinpoche also practiced and accomplished everything he had learnt, right up to the completion stage. It was widely regarded that Rinpoche did not just spout words, but tried things out for himself. He was always known to be very gentle and never got angry. There were many instances whereby long lines of people would be waiting to see Rinpoche and to receive blessings. Rinpoche would patiently ask each one individually how they were and tap them on the head. These were some of the things that made Rinpoche well respected and adored by many.

Pabongkha Rinpoche spread the Dorje Shugden practice and had many famous and wise students beginning in 1920′s. Pabongkha Rinpoche wrote many books which include texts providing explanations on sadhanas, chanting, how to make tormas and myriad other subjects. Among these texts, is a Dorje Shugden practice which includes the empowerment which is still used to this day.

Pabongka Rinpoche had written a total of about a hundred different treatises covering a wide range of topics from both the open and secret teachings of the Buddha. It is said that he wrote extensively on every aspect of Buddhist thought and practice. These collected works cover about 15 volumes. However, it is really his students who played the most pivotal role in preserving his teachings. Many of the major works that we have today are actually records of his oral discourses compiled by his closest students.

THE GURU OF GURUS

Pabongka Rinpoche was also the teacher of most of the other Gelug Lamas who have been bringing the Dharma to the West since they fled Tibet in 1959.

Rinpoche’s four main disciples were not just any disciples. They became great Gurus in their own right. They are Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche, Kyabje Ling Rinpoche, Khangsar Rinpoche and Tathag Rinpoche. Tathag Rinpoche was the main teacher of His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama when he was a child and gave him his novice ordination. Trijang Rinpoche and Ling Rinpoche were later appointed as the junior and senior tutors to His Holiness, and Ling Rinpoche was elected to be the 97th throne holder of the Gelugpa lineage (Gaden Tripa). Khangsar Rinpoche’s Chinese disciple, Master Nan Hai, started a Buddhist movement in China which has survived to this present day, with tens of thousands of spiritual descendants and over a hundred monasteries and nunneries throughout China.

Sermey Geshe Lobsang Tharchin, another disciple of Pabongka Rinpoche, was a great Guru to many and the ex-abbot of Sera Mey Monastery. When Geshe Lobsang Tharchin met Pabongka, he was a wild teenager and was not considered a model student. However, all that changed when he met Pabongka at the Tashi Chuling Hermitage.

It was known that in private company or conversation, Pabongka was in the habit of constantly including the words, “Quite right! Quite right!” to everything he said. Geshe Lobsang Tharchin clearly remembered that on the day he met Pabongka Rinpoche, Pabongka had put his hand on his head. And Pabongka said, “Quite right! Quite right! Now this one looks like a bright boy!”

From that day forward, Geshe Lobsang Tharchin felt as though he had received Pabongka’s blessing, and some special power to pursue his studies.

He shared this much, “I can say it was here that my life turned around, for three reasons: Pabongka Rinpoche had put some renunciation and other good motivation in my heart. I had given up wealth and position to pursue spiritual studies.”

If he had not met Pabongka, he would not even have studied so devotedly and became a Geshe. Many did not believe that he could master what he studied to become a Geshe. All because Pabongka Rinpoche inspired him so much.

Geshe Helmut Gassner explains: The great master Pabongka was, in the first half of the twentieth century, the pivotal or key lineage holder of the Oral Gaden Tradition. It was Pabongka Rinpoche’s particular merit to locate and find all these partial transmissions, to learn and realize them, and bring them together once again to pass them on through a single person. In his lifetime there was hardly a significant figure of the Gaden tradition who had not been Pabongka Rinpoche’s disciple. Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche was the one capable of receiving and passing on the entirety of the Oral Gaden Tradition once again. The cycle of learning and teaching continues. In this way, the Dharma remains eternal.

Pabongka Rinpoche would always urge all his students, “Practice whatever you can so that my teachings will not have been in vain. But above all, make Bodhicitta your main practice. You must pursue any of the other meditation subjects in the knowledge that they will assist your Bodhicitta.”

Pabongka Rinpoche passed away in 1941. His holy body was cremated and his relics preserved in one of his monasteries, Tashi Choling in Lhasa, until it was destroyed during the Cultural Revolution.

CONCLUSION

Over many centuries, Tibet has produced a repertoire of extraordinary Buddhist saints and scholars, but it is rare for a lama’s teachings to become classics within his own lifetime, such as the works of Pabongka Rinpoche.

Without Rinpoche holding all the important lineages of sutra and tantra and passing them on to most of the important Gelug lamas of the next two generations, many students may not even have the benefit of learning the Dharma that we have today. To highlight an important fact, the “Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand’ is the culmination of the Lamrim tradition in Tibet, tracing all the way from Tsongkapa to Atisha, and to all the many illustrious great scholars and Masters throughout history within the lineage’s Guru Tree.

As with all great Masters, most of their disciples would maintain that nothing is as significant to them – not their fame, riches or authority – only their Guru holds supreme in their hearts and minds. This is exactly what Ribur Rinpoche proclaimed, “The only thing that matters to me is that I was a disciple of Pabongka Rinpoche.

In a way we are all disciples of Pabongka Rinpoche, because all our Gurus or our Gurus’ Guru in the Gelugpa Lineage were all taught by Pabongka Rinpoche. He was truly the Guru of Gurus – the Grand Master.

WHAT OTHER GREAT LAMAS SAY ABOUT PABONGKA RINPOCHE

According to Geshe Kelsang Gyatso:
“This great Lama was like the sun of Dharma, illuminating the hidden meaning of both Sutra and Secret Mantra (Tantra). He passed the Mahamudra lineage to his heart Son, Yongdzin Trijang Dorjechang.”

Pabongka’s foremost disciple, Trijang Rinpoche, praised his teacher highly in Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand, as such:
Our childish minds were unfit vessels for so vast an ocean of teachings, so precious a source of qualities. How sad if these teachings were forgotten.

Kyabje Zong Rinpoche explains:
Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche and Kyabje Ling Rinpoche were tutors to His Holiness the Dalai Lama. They taught His Holiness everything from basic teachings to advanced levels. Kyabje Pabongka passed all of his lineages to Kyabje Trijang Dorje Chang. He often said this in discourses. The purpose of this detailed exposition is to affirm the power of the lineage. If we lose faith in the lineage, we are lost.

In Geshe Ngawang Dhargyey’s commentary to the Wheel of Sharp Weapons, he says:
Likewise, Lama Trijang Dorje Chang, Junior Tutor to His Holiness the present Dalai Lama, folds his hands upon the crown of his head whenever he mentions Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche. He was such a great lama, unsurpassed by any, that hardly any lamas or geshes of the Three Pillars (the monasteries of Gaden, Sera and Drepung) had not been his disciples.

Lama Zopa said: Another thing is that some Tibetans and others severely criticize Pabongka Dechen Nyingpo because he practiced Shugden, making him out to be some kind of demon. However, Pabongka Dechen Nyingpo wrote incredible teachings on sutra and tantra; on Heruka, Tara Cittamani and many other topics. All these amazing teachings were written purely from his experience. So it’s impossible that he can really be some kind of evil being, as those extremists accuse him of being. There’s no way he could have done the negative things they say he did.

Ribur Rinpoche, for example, was held and tortured during the Cultural Revolution for two decades and famously said “If I told you what happened on a regular basis, you would find it hard to believe.” By all accounts he emerged from his trials with a heart full of love and forgiveness and, when asked how, he replied that it was due to the blessings and teachings of his root Lama Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche.

“To my mind he was the most important Tibetan lama of all. Everybody knows how great his four main disciples were (these include Trijang Dorje Chang and Ling Rinpoche, the two tutors of the Dalai Lama)— well, he was their teacher. He spent a great deal of time thinking about the practical meaning of the teachings and coming to an inner realization of them, and he had practised and accomplished everything he had learned, right up to the completion stage. He didn’t just spout words, he tried things out for himself. Also, he never got angry; any anger had been completely pacified by his bodhichitta.”

According to Kyabje Zong Rinpoche, a highly regarded Lharampa Geshe, Je Pabongka was considered an emanation of the Highest Yoga Tantra Deity, Heruka Chakrasamvara. He explains how 32 reincarnate Lamas, including his own teacher Dagpo Dorje Chang, attended his Lamrim teachings in Lhasa:

Dagpo Dorje Chang could hear statues of Avalokiteshvara and Tara speak, and saw visions of multi-armed Yidams (Deities). Once Kyabje Pabongka invoked the wisdom beings of Heruka’s mandala to enter into a statue of Heruka Chakrasamvara. Heruka then offered nectar to Kyabje Pabongka, and prophesied that seven generations of his disciples would be protected by the body mandala of Heruka. Kyabje Trijang Dorje Chang is cared for by Heruka Chakrasamvara, as are his disciples.

Geshe Ngawang Dhargyey gives an account of Pabongka’s mastery of the practice in his commentary to Wheel of Sharp Weapons:

Once, in the cave-under-water, he experienced a manifestation of Yamantaka for nine days, while he himself was essentially Heruka Chakrasamvara. Further, he experienced a manifestation of Vajrayogini who told him of the benefits to be derived from merging the Vajrayogini teachings of the Sakya and Gelug traditions into one meditational practice. When he once made a great (tsog) offering beside a Heruka statue in Lhasa, the wisdom body actually entered into the statue. The statue danced and told him that whoever received Heruka initiation from him up to the seventh generator would be taken to the dakini realms.

Sermey Jetsun Khen Rinpoche Losang Tharchin on Pabonka Rinpoche

Khen Rinpoche, Geshe Lharampa, ex-Abbot Sera Monastery

KYABJE PABONGKA RINPOCHE DECHEN NYINGPO and his classmate, Gyelrong Sharpa Choje—known as Jangsem Choje Lobsang Nyima—went together very often to debate when they were at their monastery. Indeed, both of them became Geshes. Later Jangsem Choje Lobsang Nyima entered Gyu Me Tantric College and became a great scholar. He proceeded to become gi-go, an administrator, as I did, then Lama Umdze, then Abbot, and finally almost reached the position of Ganden Tripa.

Pabongka Rinpoche Kyabje Dechen Nyingpo’s life proceeded in another direction such that he was later to become a very famous teacher of Sutra and Tantra, especially of the Lam Rim (Stages of the Path to Enlightenment) tradition. Whenever he taught, many people came from miles and miles around to attend his teachings. Everybody said he was an unbelievable expert on all subjects.

Later, when Lobsang Nyima had learned that Kyabje Dechen Nyingpo was going to be in nearby Chusang Ritro, his curiousity piqued from having heard so much relating to Kyabje Pabongka’s fame coming from all quarters, he decided to visit him and so he brought along a pot of excellent yogurt as a gift for Rinpoche. During that visit they met for a long time discussing many points on numerous topics. Since Kyabje Pabongka had answered every one of his questions so thoroughly, Lobsang Nyima couldn’t argue with him at all on any of the points.

Upon his return, when others asked about the visit he remarked: “When we were on the debate ground at Sera Mey, Kyabje Dechen Nyingpo wasn’t an expert at debate by any means. At the time I didn’t think he had learned very much. But now I understand that his way of studying and mine went in different directions. For instance, when we debated, I for my part, would apply reasons and quotations to back up my arguments, all the time focusing on the other debater. But Kyabje Pabongka, for his part, when studying, asking questions, giving answers, reciting quotations, giving reasons, everything, would focus all of these on himself, applying them to his own mind. Therefore, by using such a method, there is no way to argue with him on any of the points since he has mastered them all.”

Trijang Rinpoche was considered an emanation of Vajra Yogini by the Tibetans and his first incarnation was the Chariot Driver Chandra of Shakyamuni Buddha himself. Chandra was the person that escorted Shakyamuni out of the palace for the last time and into the forest to start his spiritual path. Chandra exchanged his clothes with Shakyamuni before he bade Shakyamuni goodbye. Shakyamuni had left the palace for good and renounced his worldy position to become the Buddha.

Trijang Rinpoche’s father, Tserin Dondrub, was descended from the uncle of the 7th Dalai Lama, Losang Kelsang Gyatso, and was knowledgeable in religion. His mother, Tsering Drolma, came from the village of Gungtang Nanggong. Trijang Rinpoche was born in Gungtang in the winter of 1901, the “Year of Increase” or the “Iron Bull year”. Allegedly, an apricot tree flowered and had 30 apricots at his birth even though it was deep winter. Before he could walk, he showed great interest in religious paintings, statues, and Tantric ritual implements; and would make as if he was reciting prayers.

When news of his precocious actions reached Ngarampa Losang Tendar and Geshe Gendun Dragpa Chen, who were responsible for finding the reincarnation of Losang Tsultrim Palden, who was the Ganden Tripa and former Trijang Rinpoche, they travelled to his birth place of Gungtang. When the child saw them, he yelled out: “Gendun Dragpa!” and later asked him to wash his feet. Gendun Dragpa used to wash the feet of Losang Tsultrim Palden when he had rheumatism. The child also correctly identified the former Trijang Rinpoche’s private Buddha statue, rosary and bowl from among a selection. This and other signs led the search party to conclude that they had probably found the correct incarnation. Upon being given a list of names of several boys who had shown encouraging signs, the 13th Dalai Lama said:

“It would be best to recognize the boy born to the Gungtang girl Tsering Drolma in the Iron Bull year as the reincarnation of the former occupant of the Ganden throne.”

He was invited by the 13th Dalai Lama to the Lhasa Trijang residence in 1904, at the age of 3. He quickly and easily learnt to read, study and comprehend what he was taught, from the alphabet onward.

In 1906, aged 5, he moved to the Trijang Residence at Chusang Ritroe, where he met Pabongka Rinpoche. From him he received his first teaching, Set of Initiations into Manjushri from the Secret Lineage of Tsongkhapa. Pabongka Rinpoche took great delight in caring for the young child. Their strong connection was to last a lifetime and he became Pabongka Rinpoche’s closest disciple.

In 1907, aged 6, he went to Gepel Ling Monastery at Reteng, the birthplace of the Kadampa teachings. There he took the five lay Pratimoksha vows and the ten novice vows of a monk, receiving the name Losang Yeshe Tenzin Gyatso Pelsangpo. He then memorized many Buddhist texts, including over half of Madhyamakavatara by Chandrakirti, and analyzed their meaning.

When he was 9 he contracted smallpox and did long-life retreat. The illness did not become serious.

Later he visited Ganden monastery, and was received by the Shartse and Jangtse abbots, whom he apparently recognized, along with the main temple, without introduction.

He spent the next 12 years studying the classical texts for the Geshe degree — Pramanavartika, Madhyamaka, Prajnaparamita, Vinaya and Abhidharmakosha — principally according to the textbooks by Panchen Sonam Dragpa. He also studied the collected works of Je Tsongkhapa, the 1st Dalai Lama, and the Panchen Lama Chokyi Gyaltsen.

At Ganden, he would debate all night outdoors in the bitter cold, even though it meant his hands would chap so badly that they would crack and bleed. He was the top student in his class. In 1908, he received Kalachakra initiation from Serkong Rinpoche, as well as empowerments into Manjushri, Avalokiteshvara and Vajrapani. Later he received empowerments of Guhyasamaja, Yamantaka, Heruka and Vajrayogini. He also continued to receive instructions and initiations from Pabongka Rinpoche, including the Collected Works of Gyalwa Ensapa, the Collected Works of Panchen Chokyi Gyaltsen, and a Guru yoga of Je Tsongkhapa called Ganden Lha Gya Ma (“Hundreds of Deities of the Joyful Land”).

He received the “Empowerment into the Six Ways to Revolve the Chakras of Heruka” (including the full initiation costume of bone ornaments) as well as all the Action Tantra empowerments from Khyenrab Yonten Gyatso, the 88th Ganden Tripa, in 1915, aged 14. In 1916, aged 15, he studied the complete Tibetan grammar and from then on composed thousands of acrostic verses, such as:

“Ah Friends! While the spittle drools from the Death Lord’s smile, bleaching your head as white as falling snow, ould this tedious life yield aught but chaff? Dharma from my Guru is what I’ll practice!”

He also composed chants for spiritual practices and ceremonies and scores for their music for use by Ganden Shartse monastery.

He was a learned scholar and master debator. In 1919, when he was only 18, he debated before the Geshes of the three major Gelugpa monasteries for his final examination. They had wondered if he would be intellectually up to the task because he was so young and had not studied for very long, but they ended up “praising him to the skies” for the answers he gave. The 13th Dalai Lama awarded him third place, and he received the highest Geshe degree, the Lharampa.

Shortly afterward he received the 253 ordination vows of a fully-ordained monk from the 13th Dalai Lama. He was admitted to the Upper Tantric College, Gyuto, in 1919, where he studied the Root Tantra of Heruka and its commentary by Je Tsongkhapa, Illuminating all Hidden Meanings (Tib. Be dön kun säl).

From the ages of 20 to 22, Trijang Rinpoche received many teachings and empowerments from his root Guru Je Pabongka, including the initiation into the sindhura mandala of Vajrayogini according to Naropa, the Heruka body mandala empowerment according to Ghantapa, teachings on Lama Chopa (Offering to the Spiritual Guide), Gelugpa Mahamudra, the Lamrim Chenmo (great stages of the path) by Je Tsongkhapa and Seven Points of Training the Mind by Geshe Chekhawa.

After being at the Tantric College for one year, he went to Chatreng in Kham province where he listened to more teachings and in all his spare time engaged in meditative retreat on these Deities, including Yamantaka, Heruka Five Deities, Vajrayogini, Hayagriva and Avalokiteshvara. He also did his preliminary practices (Tib. ngon dro) of purifying the mind and accumulating merit in conjunction with Lama Chopa; and he meditated on Lamrim and Lojong (training the mind).

In 1924, when he was 23, Geshe Yonten of Ganden Shartse College requested him to teach. He gave the oral transmission of the Collected Works of Je Tsongkhapa and His Main Disciples to about 200 monks, followed later by granting the empowerment of Vajrayogini according to Naropa to about 60 Lamas, incarnate Lamas and monks. He was then invited by Artog Tulku of Sera Je Monastery to give empowerments of Heruka Five Deities and Hayagriva to about 200 people. In Chatreng, aged 24, he taught Lamrim to 2,000 monks and lay people and gave Avalokiteshvara empowerment. He also taught extensively on the practice of Guru Puja (Lama Chopa). He then received an invitiation to give empowerments of Guhyasamaja, Avalokiteshvara and Vajrayogini at Gangkar Monastery.

From the ages of 24 to 27, he travelled and taught extensively at many Gelugpa places of learning all over Tibet, becoming increasingly well known and teaching many thousands of monastics and lay people. He also taught at Sakyapa and Nyingmapa Centers at their request. He travelled west and gave Avalokiteshvara empowerment and teachings on Lamrim to about 3,000 monks at Jampa Ling monastery in Litang, as well as most of the local people. In the foothills of Kambo, a place sacred to Chakrasamvara, he granted initiation and led a long retreat.

In 1928, aged 27, he returned to Chatreng, and was invited by the Tantrists of Chagra Gang to give initiations into the Peaceful Form of Padmasambhava and the Six Forms of Padmasambhava According to the Old Concealed Texts. He also encouraged and helped them to repair the Chagra temple.

On his return to Lhasa later that year, he continued to visit monasteries to grant initiations and teachings, including the valleys and plains of Gyaltang. According to the author of Gangkar Rinpoche’s secret biography, Gangkar Rinpoche at this time had a vision of Trijang Rinpoche as being the reincarnation of Padmasambhava; and he performed ceremonies in his honor and presented a large number of offerings, including a sacred Heruka statue.

When he reached Lhasa he had audiences with the 13th Dalai Lama and Pabongka Rinpoche and made offerings of silver coins, grain and tea to all the monks of Ganden. He also set up a fund for the monks. The following year, aged 28, he also donated gifts to all those attending Monlam, the Great Prayer Festival; and made many offerings to the Tantric colleges.

During the next few years, until 1932, he received profound teachings from Pabongka Rinpoche, including the oral instructions of many secret Gelugpa lineages; and he also engaged in Tantric retreats. In 1932 he gave more extensive teachings at Ganden Shartse and Jangtse monasteries.

In 1933, the 13th Dalai Lama died, and Trijang Rinpoche helped Ling Rinpoche and other great Lamas from Sera monastery and Namgyal monastery consecrate the body and the reliquary. In 1936, aged 35, he granted Heruka empowerment to the monks of Ganden monastery and then made a tour of the southern district of Tibet to make offerings and give teachings. He also continued to receive instructions from Pabongka Rinpoche and made extensive offerings to Shartse and Jangtse colleges at Ganden.

After attending Je Phabongkhapa’s teachings on Lamrim Chenmo at Ganden monastery, in 1939 Trijang Rinpoche toured pilgrimage sites in India and Nepal, making extensive offerings at each place. He then went to give teachings and empowerments on Heruka, Guhyasamaja, Yamantaka, Vajrayogini and Guru Puja at Dungkar Monastery in Dromo, and on his return he visited important sites in Tsang, including Tashi Lhunpo Monastery. In 1940 he taught the Guru Puja and Gelugpa Mahamudra to senior monks of Ganden Jangtse. In 1941 he continued to receive teachings from Je Phabongkhapa.

He also taught the 14th Dalai Lama extensively as his Junior Tutor or his root Guru. The majority of His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s lineages, teachings, commentaries and practices he so kindly transmits these days are from His Holiness Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche. Trijang Rinpoche in turn received most of these lineages and teachings from Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche. It is the kindness of all our gurus no matter who we are that we are able to pass the dharma to others with great concern for their welfare.

From 1960 onward, while in exile in India, he continued to teach and initiate the Dalai Lama and many other disciples, including granting Vajrayogini empowerment in Dharamsala, and many teachings and empowerments at the newly located monasteries in Buxa, the Tantric colleges in Dalhousie, and a Tibetan monastery in Varanasi. In 1967 he taught Hundreds of Deities of the Joyful Land (the Guru yoga of Je Tsongkhapa according to the Segyu lineage) to hundreds of students in Dharamsala, and in 1970 he gave similar teachings in Bodh Gaya. In 1969, he gave the major empowerment of Heruka according to Luipa to around 1,000 people at the request of the Tantric colleges. In the Fall of 1971, he visited Mysore in the south of India at the request of the monks of the three major monasteries who had settled in the Tibetan camp at Mundgod, and gave extensive teachings and initiations to the monks and to lay people, and ordained hundreds of young monks. At that time he also made offerings to the Sangha and donated statues of Je Tsongkhapa and his Two Sons to the main temple of Ganden, along with tangkhas. In 1972 he gave Vajrayogini empowerment and teachings in Dharamsala to 800 monastics and lay people and in Bodhgaya. Later that year he taught at the Tibetan Studies Institute in Varanasi, and the following year he gave empowerments into Heruka and Vajrayogini to 700 people at the Tibetan monastery there.

He and the senior tutor Ling Rinpoche (HH the 14th Dalai Lama has two Main Gurus, Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche and Kyabje Ling Rinpoche) would also exchange teachings and initiations. In 1969 he taught Ling Rinpoche the Lamrim Chenmo, and in 1970 he granted him Yamantaka empowerment. In return, in 1970 he received from Ling Rinpoche the Action Tantra empowerment of Vairochana and also teachings on Lamrim Chenmo. In 1972 he gave Ling Rinpoche teachings on the Guru Puja and Yamantaka, and in return received a teaching on tormas (ritual offerings) to Yamantaka.

Although respected by Lamas in all Tibetan Buddhist schools, and even invited by them to give teachings and initiations, Trijang Rinpoche taught primarily from the Gelugpa tradition of Je Tsongkhapa. He was also the holder of the Ganden, or Geden, Oral Tradition that was passed to him in its entirety by his root Guru Pabongka Rinpoche. According to Geshe Helmut Gassner, the Dalai Lama’s translator for 17 years and one of only two ordained Western Geshes:

“The great master Pabongka was in the first half of the twentieth century the pivotal or key lineage holder of the Oral Ganden Tradition. Many other teachers before him mastered certain aspects of the tradition’s teachings, but it was Pabongka Rinpoche’s particular merit to locate and find all these partial transmissions, to learn and realize them, and bring them together once again to pass them on through a single person. In his lifetime there was hardly a significant figure of the Ganden tradition who had not been Pabongka Rinpoche’s disciple. Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche was the one capable of receiving and passing on the entirety of the Oral Ganden Tradition once again.”

Even the current Tibetan National Athem used in the Tibetan Settlements throughout India/Nepal was composed by Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche. Ninety percent of the great lamas throughout the world teaching and disseminating dharma are either direct disciples of Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche or His student’s. The major practices of Kalachakra, Yamantaka, Lam Rim, Mind Training, Guhyasamaja, Heruka and Vajra Yogini lineages are come directly or indirectly through Trijang Rinpoche. Trijang Rinpoche is the lineage guru for all these practices and many more too numerous to mention.

Lobzang Tsondru was enrolled in the local monastery and already at a young age, his skill in the study and memorization of texts was impressive. In 1916, he travelled to U-Tsang and joined the Shartse College of Ganden Monastery, where he began his study of Pramāṇa, Mādhyamaka, Prajñāpāramitā, Vinaya and Abhidharma. It was at this time that Lobzang Tsondru met the young Third Trijang Rinpoche, Lobzang Yeshe Tendzin Gyatso (1901-1981). The late HH Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche, who was then fourteen years old, helped the new incarnate lama by going with him through his first lesson in elementary dialectics; he was later to become his chief mentor and root guru.

In 1928, Lobzang Tsondru debated in front of the Thirteenth Dalai Lama, Tubten Gyatso (1876-1933) in Lhasa and was subsequently awarded the Geshe Lharampa degree following the Monlam festival examinations. It was also from the Thirteenth Dalai Lama that Lobzang Tsondru received his full monastic ordination in the early years of his stay in Ganden.

Following the award of his degree he entered Gyuto Monastery where he engaged in advanced tantric studies, followed by an equally successful examination at Gyuto Tantric College. After these crowning achievements, which marked the completion of his studies, Kyabje Zong Rinpoche’s name as an accomplished scholar became firmly established.

Following the completion of his studies, he was appointed the abbot of Ganden Shartse in 1937 by the regent Reting Rinpoche Tubten Jampel Yeshe Gyeltsen (1911-1947), and held this position for almost ten years. By this time, Lobzang Tsondru had a reputation for being extremely skillful in debate and in his knowledge of Mādhyamaka.

In 1946, he resigned from the abbot’s throne to work as a magician against black magic, disturbances caused by various ghosts (Pretas) and lower gods, became a ‘weather-maker’, performed many fire rituals and lived in different parts of Tibet, being on a kind of continuous pilgrimage. During this extensive pilgrimage, Lobzang Tsondru also traveled to the holy mountain of Tsari and also returned to his homeland in Kham where he gave teachings and initiations to the local population.

Lobzang Tsondru’s name spread all over the country of being a powerful tantrician and he gave many empowerments and teachings on those subjects with a special emphasis on the tantras of Heruka, Hayagriva, Yamantaka, Gyelchen Shugden, Guhyasamaja, Vajrayogini, White Tara, Vaishravani and others. As a philosopher he was a follower of the Middle-Way school and gave many teachings on Madhyamika and Abhidharma. He is still well known in the Gelug tradition for his vast knowledge of tantric practice. Particularly during his travels in the 1940s and 1950s, he is attributed with a number of miraculous events such as subduing local deities and spirits through wrathful rituals, curing physical ailments and the ability to control the weather.

Following the violent upheavals in Lhasa in 1959, Zong Rinpoche, like many Tibetans, followed the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, Tendzin Gyatso (b.1935) to India. In India he settled in Buxa, Assam, where the main Gelug monasteries had been re-established in an old British concentration camp. Although the tropical conditions were harsh and many monks died during this period in India, Lobzang Tsondru continued to give teachings to train a new generation of Gelug scholars and practitioners. He was also known as a talented astrologer and artist.

In 1965, at the request of the Dalai Lama, Lobzang Tsondru became the director of the Tibetan Schools Teachers Training Program in Mussoorie, and, in 1967, the Dalai Lama appointed him as the first principal of the Central Institute of Higher Tibetan Studies in Varanasi.

In 1971 Lobzang Tsondru moved to Ganden Shartse in the newly established Tibetan settlement in Mundgod, Karnataka and retired from his position in Varanasi. Although he spent his later years engaging in practice he also continued to teach. He made three journeys to the West, travelling around North America and Europe. The first of these journeys was made after repeated requests from Lama Tubten Yeshe (1935–1984) of the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition (FPMT) in 1978, with the last being in 1983.

During his travels he gave teachings on both sutra and tantra, including teachings on the Chod of the Ganden Ear-Whispered Lineage, a practice he is well known for, as well as the life-entrustment of the controversial protector Dorje Shugden. Lobzang Tsondru also taught numerous western students in India and participated in giving teachings and empowerments during the FPMT’s First Dharma Celebration in Dharamsala in 1981, along with other high-ranking Gelug teachers such at the Dalai Lama, Ling Rinpoche Tubten Lungtok Tendzin Trinle (1903-1983), Tsenzhab Serkong Rinpoche Ngawang Lobzang Tubten Tobjor (1914-1983) as well as Lama Tubten Zopa (b.1946) and Lama Yeshe.

It was also in 1981 that Lobzang Tsondru’s root guru, Trijang Rinpoche, passed away in Mundgod. It was from Trijang Rinpoche that Lobzang Tsondru had received numerous important lineages such as those of Cittamaṇi Tārā, Vajrayogīni Naro Kechari, and Heruka Cakrasaṃvara. Lobzang Tsondru passed these lineages to his own students, many of whom were also Trijang Rinpoche’s students.

After a series of teachings and empowerments in Mundgod in 1983, which included Cittamaṇi Tārā and Hayagrīva, Zong Rinpoche fell ill. Following requests from his students and Dharma protector, communicating through a medium, Lobzang Tsondru became better. In the wake of his illness, Zong Rinpoche engaged in intensive practice and also was able to assist in the search for his root guru’s reincarnation.

However, on 15 November 1984, despite showing no signs of illness, Lobzang Tsondru suddenly passed away, much to the shock of everyone. Ceremonies such as gaṅacakra, and the self-entry initiations of Cittamaṇi Tārā, Vajrayogīni and Vajrabhairava were performed, along with other rituals. Following the cremation of his body after the end of his tukdam death-period meditation, a number of relics were found, some of which were enshrined in a stupa, completed in 1986, which stands today at Ganden Monastery in Lama Camp No.1 in Mundgod.

His new incarnation was born in the Kullu valley (place in Northern India), later on duly recognized by His Holiness the Dalai Lama and enthroned at Ganden Shartse monastery in India. Like his previous incarnation he also shows many heart moving signs confirming that he is the real Zong Rinpoche and has only changed his physical outlook. The present Zong Rinpoche is currently fully engaged in the study of Sutra and Tantra at Ganden Shartse Monastic University under the care of Khensur Lati Rinpoche.

References :
Zasep Tulku. 1981. Kyabje Song Rinpoche: A Biography. Martin Willson, trans. London: Wisdom Publications.

Kyabje Zong Rinpoche. 2006. Chöd in the Ganden Tradition: The Oral Instructions of Kyabje Zong Rinpoche. David Molk, ed. Ithaca, New York: Snow Lion Publications.

Kyabje Song Rinpoche. 1979. “Birth, Death and Bardo” in Dreloma, Drepung Loseling Magazine. Lobsang Norbu Tsonawa, Michael Richards et al., trans.

Joona Repo
August 2011

Source : http://www.treasuryoflives.org/biographies/view/Zong%20Rinpoche%20Lobzang%20Tsondru%20Tubten%20Gyeltsen/8612

Below is a biographical sketch of Domo Geshe Rinpoche which was written by Ursula Bernis in 1995, initially for inclusion in a compendium of biographies of great Gelugpa masters. Ursula’s text is presented here in a slightly revised form.

Ursula embarked on the project of researching and writing about Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s life with two purposes in mind: to document and preserve the story of one of the last great masters and exponents of traditional Tibetan Buddhism, and to share the information with others in order to contribute to a wider knowledge and deeper appreciation of the Guru’s extraordinary life and deeds.

The task seemed all the more urgent because much of the biographical material on the former Domo Geshe Rinpoche was destroyed together with Dungkar Gonpa Monastery in Tibet during the Cultural Revolution and because most of those who had known the legendary master or heard tales about him had already passed away. In order to gather what information was still available, Ursula traveled once to Lhasa and twice, quite extensively, to northern India, especially to the Darjeeling/Kalimpong area and to Sikkim. The stories, dates and places mentioned here she corroborated in interviews with literally dozens of people, verifying them where possible against the remaining documentary evidence. The result is as close as we are likely to come to a reliable and careful depiction of the events of Rinpoche’s life.

Ursula considered this to be merely a summary of a more extensive work to be completed in time. Her passing away on November 7, 2000 cut short those plans.

A few editorial comments: English translations have been added to the Tibetan names and words that occur throughout the text for the benefit of readers who are unfamiliar with the Tibetan language. In keeping with Ursula’s usage, the spelling “Domo” has been retained for Rinpoche’s name while “Tromo” is used for the place (also known as Chumbi Valley), although the two represent a single Tibetan name (Tib. gro mo).

INTRODUCTION

MI.PHAM JAM.YANG SHING.TA CHEN.BO LA CHAG.TSEL.LO

It is not possible to present a complete biography of Gelugpa’s present-day greatest Mahasiddha. Since his deeds pervade so many different realms and levels, only a fraction can be traced by ordinary beings. In addition, like the most perfect of all the Kadampas throughout history, he hides his enlightened deeds better than anyone else today does or can. Anything that could be taken as a praise of himself, he will not comment on directly. Consequently, most of what we know is from eyewitness accounts of those nearby whose vision is by no means perfect.

Material for the biography of the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s great accomplishments was collected from the following sources: the lineage prayer composed by Kyabje Trijang Dorjechang; biographical material by a Western disciple, Lama Govinda, in the book The Way of the White Clouds; and many diverse oral sources. Commentaries to the secret biography, which is written in code, and other compilations of written information of his life and deeds all have been lost in Tibet. None crossed the border.

However, this legendary figure, whose previous incarnations are said to include Shariputra, the Mahasiddha Gayadhara, Dharmashri, Munijnana, Thönmi Sambhota, King Trisong Detsen, Dromtönpa, Milarepa, Khedrup Rinpoche, and Tragpa Gyaltsen, is strong and alive in the collective memory of the Himalayan Buddhist culture. Famous especially for his non-sectarian attitude and his great kindness extended equally to all, Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s name is known throughout Tibet and the Himalayan region from Kashmir to Assam. He traveled far and wide on pilgrimage through these areas and spread the pure teachings of the Buddha. In the process, he established the first Gelugpa monasteries in the earlier part of this century in regions where before there were none. Domo Geshe Rinpoche was the first of the Tibetans to go on pilgrimage repeatedly to the Buddhist holy sites in India when this was not yet an established tradition. Together with a Sri Lankan monk, he revived Buddhist practices at the great stupa in Bodh Gaya, an area controlled at the time by a Hindu Raja and his militant followers. Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s name is known throughout Tibet from the remotest regions of Changthang to the easternmost outposts of Amdo and Kham, where he was particularly loved not only by the courageous warriors for his protective amulets but by people from all walks of life. Active in Tsang and Central Tibet, he was openly praised by both His Holiness the Thirteenth Dalai Lama and the Panchen Rinpoche. Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s fame extends to Mongolia, China, Japan, India, Sri Lanka, and many Western countries.

In the Indian Himalayan region he is also known as “the precious doctor of Chumbi,” since he healed so many people with a variety of methods. The famous holy pills (rilbus) he made from hundreds of holy and medicinal ingredients were of unequaled power and healed many otherwise hopeless cases. The rilbus continue to multiply by themselves. In today’s Tibet (1995), especially in Tromo, many people who have never even seen him have deep and unshakable faith in Domo Geshe Rinpoche – more than in any other Lama. Many people in the Western world instantly developed deep, lasting faith in Buddhism by reading about Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s deeds in The Way of the White Clouds. This book played a greater role in introducing Mahayana-Vajrayana Buddhism to the West than any other. Through it, Domo Geshe Rinpoche had a most far-reaching influence over the future of Buddhism in the West. Several international, and particularly German, Buddhist umbrella organizations today trace their charters to Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s future-oriented teachings, i.e. with Maitreya Buddha as the focal point, and to his emphasis on a non-sectarian approach that embraces the complete teachings of the Buddha.

Not only have the fame of Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s name and deeds spread in this unparalleled way, his monasteries, too, have their unique place in Tibetan history. Dungkar Gonpa, located on top of a mountain spur in Upper Tromo, became the first Gelugpa monastery in that area after it was entrusted to Geshe Ngawang Kalsang in 1901/02. Later, many other smaller monasteries came under Dungkar Gonpa’s administrative umbrella in Tibet and across the border in India. Dungkar Gonpa also became the seat of the famous oracle that was consulted by people from all over Tibet. The monastery hosted His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama and his government twice in the 1950s for extended periods of time. At the crossroads between India and Tibet, Dungkar Gonpa became a stopping place for most Tibetan and foreign dignitaries on their way to and from Lhasa. Thus, Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s places were open to a kind of international movement unusual for Tibet at the time. The incarnation of the great Domo Geshe Rinpoche across the border in Sikkim could be taken as a sign for the direction Buddhism would take in the future. The only high Tibetan Lama ever to have taken rebirth in Sikkim, Domo Geshe Rinpoche, famous for his long-ranging vision, led the way. He was born into an aristocratic family that had facilitated the journeys of most of the early Western explorers of Tibet whom history proved to be instrumental in carrying the seeds of Tibetan Buddhism across yet many other borders and into the West. Today, the monasteries established by the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche outside the limits of Tibet prove to be repositories of a tradition intact and unbroken. Skilled in moving across borders of very different worlds with great ease for a very long time, Domo Geshe Rinpoche, in upholding the Buddha’s tradition, knows to avoid the extreme of absolute modernism which destroys the heritage of the past by blurring traditional distinctions in a syncretic hodge-podge and the extreme of a traditionalism that clings to the images of the past such that most possibilities for growth and real change become eclipsed.

In the following biographical summary, only a few examples of Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s great accomplishments will be mentioned. Although his private and public visions, miracles, and power of healing and taming human and non-human beings are extraordinary in number, scope, and intensity, the focus here will be more on those events which are his own unique contribution to safeguarding and perpetuating the pure and complete teachings of the Buddha.

KYABJE DOMO GESHE RINPOCHE NGAWANG KALSANG

Geshe Ngawang Kalsang, who later became known as Kyabje Domo Geshe Rinpoche, was born in 1866 in Emagang in the Shang district of Tsang. His birth was accompanied by various good signs observed by his mother, Bungchok Kyipa, and his father, Tsüldzin Tseten, a tantric practitioner (ngag pa), as well as others. It is said that the purpose of his birth was to tame different kinds of beings. When he was four years old, Exalted Vajrayogini herself manifested and offered him nourishment brought from the realms of the Dakinis. At the age of eight he entered the great Tashilhunpo Monastery. He listened, reflected, and studied with great intensity and desire to impress the holy teachings on his mind. The name Ngawang Kalsang was offered to him by the Protector of the Western Heavenly Field, Amitabha Buddha, the all-knowing Panchen Rinpoche Tenpa’i Wangchuk, and at the hair-cutting ceremony many wondrous and glorious phenomena occurred. Later, he took full ordination from the incarnation of the great translator Lochen Rinchen Zangpo Rinpoche. Geshe Ngawang Kalsang studied at Tashilhunpo’s Shartse College for some twenty years, where he completed the “Kachen” degree, Tashilhunpo’s equivalent of the “Geshe” degree of Central Tibet’s great monastic universities.

It is said that in the circumambulation route (ling khor) of Tashilhunpo Monastery, an emanation of Tara advised him that it was time to go and meet his root Guru. This was the highly realized master and ascetic Lobsang Zöpa, who was staying at the time in an isolated place called Trakar Taso, far to the west of Tashilhunpo. It took some time to find this master, also known as Rangjung Lama Lobsang Zöpa. Geshe Ngawang Kalsang offered him, among other offerings, a seal marked by the letter Ah. Although the Guru was pleased, since “the letter Ah is the best of all letters,” he did not make it easy for Geshe Rinpoche to receive teachings. In fact, he tried to send him away several times, and often scolded and reproached him. But Geshe Rinpoche was persistent and eventually received teachings, especially on the root texts and commentaries of the Ngülchu tradition.

At one point the greatly accomplished Guru Rangjung Lama refused to provide Geshe Rinpoche with books. He ordered him to find his own texts if he wanted to receive further teachings. Far away from the great library of Tashilhunpo, he set out to find the required texts to continue his training. In the area of Nyalam, Exalted Vajrayogini herself manifested and offered Geshe Rinpoche a text about the lineage. When the Guru conferred upon him the great empowerment of the five-deity Heruka Chakrasamvara mandala of the Ghantapada tradition (Demchog Trilbu Lha-nga) in Milarepa’s temple at Lapchi, the mandala and deity actually manifested and entrusted him with the future of the Demchog tantra. In different holy places along the Himalayan snow mountain range, in caves and isolated places, Geshe Rinpoche received teachings from the Guru, practised, and actually saw the different meditational deities (yidam) on more than one occasion, receiving their blessings, teachings, guidance, and predictions.

Going on a pilgrimage to many holy places, the Guru and several of his disciples, including Geshe Ngawang Kalsang, expended great effort to journey to Kathmandu in Nepal in the 1890s to renovate the great stupa at Svayambhu. The Guru Rangjung Lama received assistance from divine beings to complete this difficult task and several wondrous occurrences (yamtsen ngöjung) took place. It had been predicted that this magnificent deed would greatly benefit the disciples in the future. In further predictions, the Guru pointed Geshe Rinpoche to his future areas of practice and influence: the regions where the Monpäs live, Tromo, Bhutan, Sikkim, Nepal, Dagpo, Kongpo, and India. He also foretold that Geshe Rinpoche would build three very special Maitreya Buddha statues. Accordingly, Geshe Rinpoche went to Tawang, where the Mönpas live, and to other holy places in southern Tibet. There he practiced “Cutting” (chöd) in fearful cemeteries. When he meditated in a cave at Taktsang in Pharo, Bhutan, one morning at daybreak, Exalted Vajrayogini herself in the form of a fifteen-year-old girl aroused him from sleep and urged him to turn the wheel of Dharma. This was necessary, she admonished, because the beings in the Himalayan area from Ladakh to Assam were in danger of falling down the slope of wrong views about the holy Dharma, and their minds were wrapped in darkness.

When Domo Geshe Rinpoche received Vajra Bhairava (Dorje Jigje) empowerment, he directly beheld the yidam and the thirteen deities. While meditating near Gangring in Lower Tromo, Geshe Rinpoche lived on fruits, berries, and herbs found in the deep, dense forest surrounding the cave. In southern Tibet, he had survived by the practice of “taking the essence” (chü len), taking the essence of flowers, and in Sikkim, by taking the essence of stones. In Gangring, Geshe Ngawang Kalsang had many extraordinary visions. The Thirty-Five Buddhas manifested directly to him, for example, and when some evil beings there tried to interfere with his practice, he arose in the form of Demchog and subdued the obstacles.

He went to Upper Tromo, and meditated in a remote cave among crystalline mountains and dense forests in an area called Chagling. Here the wild animals and yeti (mi gö) came to serve him. They helped bring firewood and water. It is said that Domo Geshe Rinpoche controlled the frightful yeti with a finger snap. Jowo Chin-karwa and Kang-dzenpa offered their vow to protect Rinpoche’s life. A nomad who had lost some of his animals found Geshe Rinpoche and, in disbelief that anyone could survive on his own in this remote wilderness, was the first to offer yogurt, milk, butter, etc. It is said that Domo Geshe Rinpoche spent many years in the cave at Chagling, but nobody really knows for just how long, or how many times his yidams and other celestial beings came to visit him.

After Geshe Rinpoche left his retreat at Chagling, he fulfilled two prophecies at once when he erected a Maitreya Buddha statue at Galingkang in Tromo. Not only had his Guru Rangjung Lama Lobsang Zöpa predicted this event, but the exalted master Dromtönpa, the main disciple of glorious Atisha Dipamkara, had foretold it hundreds of years earlier. Upon request, the best artist, Ü Döndrup Wangyal, had been sent by the government in Lhasa. The statue was fashioned of clay mixed with many ground-up precious stones and holy things. Like the other Maitreya Buddha images Geshe Rinpoche would commission in the future, it was about two stories high. When it was consecrated, gods and goddesses showered down flowers. Some of those who witnessed this amazing event later told the next generation that the lotus-like fragrant celestial flowers could actually be handled, but that they disappeared after about half an hour.

Geshe Rinpoche attracted the best artists and craftsmen to Tromo. The painter Trinley from Tsang and the statue maker Wangyal from Lhasa both stayed on and settled there. Domo Geshe Rinpoche, then and now, has an incomparable sense for the greatest excellence in quality and refinement of style. He only uses the very best possible materials – and most often the rarest and most unusual ones – for offerings, for building monasteries, creating statues, works of art, or presenting and preserving holy objects.

Tromo had been described by Tibetan and Western travelers alike as one of the most beautiful places in the world. With fragrant juniper, cedar, and many other trees, countless varieties of wildflowers and wildlife, it has been portrayed as a paradise by more than one writer. Tromo, the gateway between Tibet and India, is also an old place. Padmasambhava traveled through the valley, which is still marked with several of his spontaneous manifestations (rang jön). The First Panchen Lama Losang Chökyi Gyaltsen had spent time in retreat in Upper Tromo and, with Chomo Lhari guarding the upper entrance to the valley, it has no lack of holy places.

Upon request by the people of Tromo to stay with them, Geshe Ngawang Kalsang rebuilt Dungkar Gonpa. With a white conch manifestation (rang jön) just below the monastery and another one from which issued the sound of a conch when blown into, Dungkar Gonpa has borne that name since 1662. Even before that, there was a temple there. Long before Domo Geshe Rinpoche took Dungkar Gonpa into his care, it belonged to a monastery in Sikkim. Being located not far from Rabtentse, the former summer palace of the Sikkimese kings in Tromo, there was a period in that country’s history when the King of Sikkim visited Dungkar Gonpa annually. Geshe Rinpoche enlarged the main Buddha statue of the monastery and built another great Maitreya Buddha. The axial pillar (sog shing) for the Maitreya statue is said to have come from a branch of the Bodhi tree in Bodh Gaya that fell down and landed next to Domo Geshe Rinpoche while he was giving teachings there. Behind the monastery a spring issued forth through Geshe Rinpoche’s presence and blessings. It dried up after the monastery was destroyed during the Cultural Revolution. Recently, when some local people, with Geshe Rinpoche’s help, started to rebuild Dungkar Gonpa, the water of the spring began to flow again.

After Domo Geshe Rinpoche enlarged Dungkar Gonpa, it attracted many more monks. Discipline was strict, and practice, in time, came to cover many more subjects than was common for a monastery its size (sixty to seventy monks then, and about one hundred in the 1950s). Monks memorized many different kinds of texts and learned to perform ritual dances as well as ritual chanting with special melodies, to play many different kinds of musical instruments, to construct three-dimensional mandalas as well as the two-dimensional ones made from colored powder, to make elaborate butter sculptures, and to master many other art forms that relate to religious practice. Although small, Dungkar Gonpa had some of the best dancers and artists in Tibet. Some of the monks also learned about medicine and how to collect different ingredients of medicinal value.

High above Dungkar Gonpa, where a manifestation of a double Dharma-source (chö jung) had manifested, Geshe Rinpoche built a retreat called Ganden Khachö. There, Exalted Vajrayogini, surrounded by countless Dakinis, actually manifested to him. In that circle, and in the presence of Maitreya Buddha, Geshe Rinpoche received blessings and transmissions from the unsurpassable master Je Tsongkhapa and his sons directly. The yidam came to him many times and also took Geshe Rinpoche to her heavenly field and, on one occasion, offered him holy gems. It is said that it was in Ganden Khachö that Tashi Tseringma from Chomo Lhari appeared and offered Domo Geshe Rinpoche the precious snow-lion milk in a turquoise vessel (yu ring), a most special container, since this substance burns through ordinary materials. To benefit all living beings, the kind Lama created a pill from many different holy substances that he collected in the Buddha’s sacred places in India and in pilgrimage places in the Himalayas and Tibet, from rare medicinal herbs and other famous holy pills, from relics, and from a great variety of unknown precious beneficial ingredients, including the snow-lion milk. Transformed by means of mercury, a very poisonous substance, in a process mastered by only a few, and together with many special blessings, Geshe Rinpoche’s rilbus became singularly powerful. They were said to reverse the effects of life-threatening poison and terminal illnesses, to protect against many different kinds of weapons, including bullets, and to guarantee at least seven human rebirths if administered at the right moment in the death process. No other holy pills were as effective or became as famous and sought after all over Tibet as were Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s. These rilbus were not only medicine and holy, but magical as well. Rinpoche himself carried a bag of rilbus that replenished themselves like relics in a holy place. He offered large bags filled with these holy pills to His Holiness the Dalai Lama and to the Panchen Rinpoche, and he handed them out freely to suffering sentient beings to alleviate pain and illness and to protect from danger. His great kindness and compassion became legendary.

Tromo had been a stronghold of the Bön faith in Tibet when Geshe Rinpoche arrived there. One after another of the wealthy patrons turned to Domo Geshe Rinpoche and became Buddhist. Pembö Lama, the owner of a Bön monastery, Yungdungkang, offered it to Geshe Rinpoche. It was renamed Tashi Chöling. The Lama and his sons became patrons and they prospered. Not all saw Rinpoche as the great virtuous one that he was. Already at the end of the Younghusband expedition in 1905, when Sir Charles Bell was governor of Tromo for a year, the local Bönpos complained to him that a great oracle had come to Upper Tromo and converted everyone to the Buddhist faith. They requested the governor to stop Domo Geshe Rinpoche from taking away the wealthy Bön patrons. Bell answered that he would not interfere in the internal religious affairs of the country. When taken to the courts in Lhasa, a similar answer was given: everyone is free to practice the religion of their choice.

But there was more than one attempt on Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s life. In 1918 and 1919 the Bönpos tried to cause physical harm to him repeatedly by means of black magic. Rinpoche foiled these attempts through his clairvoyance and crushed the evil by his superior powers. In one case he arose as Chenrezig Senge Tra and subdued the poisonous snake intended to kill him.

Domo Geshe Rinpoche tamed even more intractable beings. In the 1920s a Mongolian Geshe returned from pilgrimage in India and stopped at Dungkar Gonpa on his way to Lhasa. Rinpoche was away at the time and Umdze Sherab, who later became the famous abbot of Dungkar Gonpa, asked the Geshe to stay, as he had a high fever and was too sick to travel. But the Geshe did not accept the invitation. He wanted to be in Lhasa for the Great Prayer Festival (Mönlam Chenmo). On the steep road to Phari, he reached the end of his life. He sat down next to the road and the death process started. The Geshe did his practice, which was not completed when several Bönpos arrived. Well-intentioned, they performed the transference of consciousness, since the dying man had stopped breathing. This interrupted the Geshe’s practice on the most subtle level of consciousness and he turned into a raging spirit who killed many Bönpos in Tromo. Several Buddhist practitioners tried unsuccessfully to appease the fury of this being. When Domo Geshe Rinpoche returned, he tamed the ferocious spirit, put him under oath, and called him Namkha Bardzin. He became a special protector for the area of Tromo.

Tromo was changed completely by Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s presence. The Bönpos at Pemukang sent yearly New Year offerings to him at Dungkar Gonpa, as did the Nyingmapas from nearby Kyiruntsel, where a room was kept ready in the monastery for Domo Geshe Rinpoche. Eventually, Rinpoche instituted several practices that brought the people of Tromo together in greater harmony. One of these was a yearly joint reading of twelve collected works (sung bum) at Kampu Dzong in Upper Tromo by the different religious traditions. Another practice was a special Guru Rinpoche (Padmasambhava) ritual. Dungkar Gonpa had acquired an especially holy Guru Rinpoche statue, said to have been blessed by Padmasambhava himself. When the owner was on his way to India with the statue, it spoke when passing Dungkar Gonpa. “Take me to where that sound is coming from,” it said, as the long trumpets sounded from the monastery on the hill. The man did, and Geshe Rinpoche gave him what he needed. Not much later, it is said, Domo Geshe Rinpoche found a Guru “fulfillment of wishes” (thug drup) text near Dawa Trag, a rock not far from Dungkar Gonpa bearing a spontaneous manifestation (rang jön) of a moon. Shortly thereafter, someone came with many copies of the same text for sale. Geshe Rinpoche bought all of them and, once a year, the Dungkar Gonpa monks performed the ritual.

When His Holiness the Thirteenth Dalai Lama returned from India in 1912, he stopped in Tromo. A meeting took place between His Holiness and Domo Geshe Rinpoche at Kangyur Lhakang in Galingkang. It is said that His Holiness mentioned to his attendants that he expected a very special visitor one afternoon. Domo Geshe Rinpoche, who always looked like a simple monk, had prepared special delicacies to offer to His Holiness. He spent a long time in private talks with him that afternoon. In the evening, His Holiness asked his attendants if they had seen the very special person who had visited him in the afternoon. Surprised, they said they had only seen a simple monk in dirty, tattered robes. His Holiness replied, “That is too bad. I saw Je Tsongkhapa himself.”

Since Domo Geshe Rinpoche introduced and spread the Buddhist teachings in the Himalayan regions like Je Tsongkhapa himself, His Holiness and the Panchen Rinpoche had special respect for him. Geshe Rinpoche enjoyed a close relationship with the Panchen Rinpoche Chökyi Nyima. Once a year he would send long-life offerings to the Panchen Rinpoche. From him Domo Geshe Rinpoche had received an especially holy object that was kept at Dungkar Gonpa: the mold for the famous image of Je Tsongkhapa called “Tsong-bön Geleg.” With it Rinpoche fashioned many holy Je Tsongkhapa statues. Some of them have survived the Tibetan holocaust and still exist in Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s monasteries in India, and with some of his disciples in the Himalayan border areas.

Geshe Rinpoche had a close relationship as well with the great Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche Dechen Nyingpo, from whom he had received many transmissions, initiations, personal instructions (mä ngag), and comprehensive teachings. They also exchanged presents. People used to say that with Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche in Central Tibet, the Panchen Rinpoche in Tsang, and Domo Geshe Rinpoche at the border, the pure Buddhist tradition was safe and flourishing.

A very close and special relationship also existed between Geshe Rinpoche and Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche. Together they received teachings and initiations from Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche, Lamrim teachings from His Holiness the Thirteenth Dalai Lama and, together with Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche, they received a very rare cycle of 108 initiations in 1921 from Tagdra Dorjechang, who later became the Regent of Tibet. The initiations spanned the four classes of Tantra, and Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche said of that event, “Thus, the traditions of past successive lineages were observed correctly without the negligence of finding easy solutions” (Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche, Autobiography, p. 94).

Domo Geshe Rinpoche often went to India on pilgrimage to the holy places of the Buddha. For some time he went every year. At first, he went alone across the high mountain passes from Tromo to Sikkim, through Phedong to Kalimpong, and then by train from Siliguri to Gaya. Later he took with him people from all walks of life and his monks. The Hindu Raja controlling Bodh Gaya was very impressed with Geshe Rinpoche and trusted him completely. The great stupa was locked up, since people came to steal the offerings. Whenever Rinpoche visited, the Raja handed him the keys and turned over the stupa to him for the duration of his stay there. Still today, the committee that administers the great stupa at Bodh Gaya consists of a Hindu majority. However, at the time Rinpoche went there on pilgrimage, Hindus were in complete control and Buddhist practice was not welcome at all. Only Domo Geshe Rinpoche and the Sri Lankan Anagarika Dharmapala, founder of the Mahabodhi Society, represented Buddhist interests and regularly performed Buddhist practices at the great stupa. It was because of Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s help and influence that the ground for a Tibetan monastery near the stupa could be purchased by a Ladakhi monk without interference from the Hindu Raja and his militant followers.

Geshe Rinpoche’s disciples cleaned the area around the stupa on their visits, washed the Bodhi tree with purifying herbs and water and offered many, many butter lamps and other offerings. On the full moon of the eighth Tibetan month in 1916, after many early morning purification rituals, Domo Geshe Rinpoche performed the ritual bath offering using milk to bathe the statue of Shakyamuni Buddha and then covered it with gold. The holy body of the Buddha emitted nectar, an event witnessed by many. Geshe Rinpoche carefully collected it and used it for the benefit of sentient beings in holy objects and rilbus, it is said.

Once, when Domo Geshe Rinpoche was in Bodh Gaya and absorbed in deep meditation, five Dakinis came to take him to a Buddha field. That instant, a red Prajnaparamita, mother of the Buddhas, arose and urged the Dakinis not to do so, and told them that the time for Rinpoche to leave had not yet come. Another time, towards the end of his life, at a holy lake near Chomo Lhari the Dakinis came again to beckon him to come with them. It is said that he promised them to come, but at a later date. On one of Geshe Rinpoche’s pilgrimages to the Buddha’s holy places, many good omens occurred on his way to Sarnath and near the stupa before he arrived there. When he did, the whole mandala of Demchog and the sixty-two deities manifested to Rinpoche. In Kushinagara, the place of Shakyamuni Buddha’s maha-parinirvana, Geshe Rinpoche made extensive offerings and offered prayers. The thousand Buddhas manifested and Rinpoche had a vision of the future. At Vulture’s Peak, the eight Medicine Buddhas and sixteen Arhats manifested to him, and at Silwasel, the great protector Mahakala himself.

In the Indian Himalayan region, especially today’s Himachal Pradesh – formerly the principalities and kingdoms of Khunu, Lahul-Piti, Bashar, etc. – Domo Geshe Rinpoche established Gelugpa monasteries and temples where there were none at all. In Rampur, the Hindu Raja built a Gelugpa temple and a library with many collections of priceless Buddhists texts, including Kangyur and Tengyur, upon Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s request. This was an expression of gratitude, since Rinpoche’s practices and blessings had ensured the childless Raja a son. In Kanum, Domo Geshe Rinpoche built Lhundup Gephel Gonpa on an ancient holy site. It was adorned with exquisite wall paintings and contained statues of sandalwood and other precious materials, and an extensive library. This was in 1911, according to one Indian scholar. Rinpoche later built and consecrated another monastery in that area. In Khunu Domo Geshe Rinpoche also meditated in a cave called Sur-pug for close to a year. Not far from there, in the village of Poo near Shipki pass, Domo Geshe Rinpoche restored to life a dying young girl while the whole village bore witness. His popularity and fame knew no bounds, and everywhere he went he was requested to teach and to confer empowerments and pratimoksha vows. Upon the request of the King of Piti, for example, Geshe Rinpoche gave Lamrim teachings to thousands of people who had come from near and very far away, and conferred long-life and other empowerments. Domo Geshe Rinpoche is singularly credited, not only by his followers but by the Tibetan government as well, for having spread Je Tsongkhapa’s teachings especially throughout the whole Himalayan region.

In a small monastery at 18,000 feet, near a mountain pass from Ladakh into Tibet, a disciple of Domo Geshe Rinpoche had a vision of Maitreya Buddha. Afterwards he found out that the chapel in which he had seen the vision had been consecrated by Geshe Rinpoche to the future Buddha.

At Tso Pema, Padmasambhava’s holy lake, Domo Geshe Rinpoche broke the ground for the main monastery. During the ritual, the lotus flowers growing in the lake, which had not moved in a very long time, started to move towards Rinpoche. The monastery belonged to Domo Geshe Rinpoche until the early 1960s, when its monks were persuaded that he would not return from prison in Tibet and thereupon offered it to Düdjom Rinpoche. The first time Geshe Rinpoche arrived in Tso Pema the lake’s water had receded significantly. Upon request by the local people and the pilgrims, Rinpoche helped bring enough rain that year to replenish the lake. Since then, the local people recite Chenrezig’s mantra as follows: “Domo Geshe Rinpoche Om Mani Padme Hung.” In other Guru Rinpoche holy places, such as Sikkim for example, he is seen by many as an incarnation of Padmasambhava. Domo Geshe Rinpoche unites in himself those qualities and actions that allow for many people to believe him to be a manifestation of Je Tsongkhapa while others believe him to be a manifestation of Guru Rinpoche.

Domo Geshe Rinpoche visited these Himalayan areas more than once and crossed the high mountain passes to Mount Kailash, to historical places built by Lotsawa Rinchen Zangpo, and other holy places on both the Indian and Tibetan sides of the snow mountains. Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s name even served to legitimate the work of documenting the remains from the ancient kingdom of Guge by two foreigners whose travel papers did not permit such work and who were in danger of being expelled from Tibet.

These are just some highlights of Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s activities among the snow mountains of the Himalayas, where his name is known from Ladakh to Assam and deeply respected by everyone, regardless of religion or Buddhist orientation. His Holiness the Thirteenth Dalai Lama called Domo Geshe Rinpoche a “realized one who is completely tamed” (trup.pa’i dül.jug) and a “great scholar” (kä.pa chen.bo) and referred to him as someone who is “Lama to people inside and outside of Tibet and whose widespread fame resonates like the sound of a great bell.”

Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s accomplishments and visions were abundant. Even those known to us are too numerous to mention here individually. The most famous vision occurred on one of Geshe Rinpoche’s many pilgrimages. At 19,000 feet on the northern slopes of Kanchenjunga, Chörten Nyima has been a very special holy place since at least the time of Padma Sambhava. It is considered the “gate” to the “hidden land,” Sikkim, and one of the chörtens contains a crystal stupa that miraculously came to earth from the sky. There Domo Geshe Rinpoche manifested a vision for all to see within a radius of miles. From among white clouds first appeared a white horse leading the procession that moved from east to west and then, from among many rainbows, a great variety of Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, and different holy beings and signs appeared, made from light and rainbows. Only Domo Geshe Rinpoche saw the whole extent of the vision, while those in his retinue saw parts according to individual capacity and karma. Some saw Khedrup Rinpoche’s five visions of Je Tsongkhapa, some Je Tsongkhapa and his two main disciples, while others saw the Medicine Buddha, Amitayus, or different pure lands. Everyone could see the eight auspicious signs. Rinpoche’s cook stood watching spell-bound, spoon in hand, his mouth agape. Even the animals turned their faces towards the sky and seemed to be able to see something. The vision remained for a long time, so Rinpoche’s disciples could point out to each other in minutest detail what they saw. The only other vision of that magnitude made public in the same way occurred at the time of Shakyamuni Buddha, and an account of it can be found in the Surangama Sutra.

Domo Geshe Rinpoche was offered a new retreat house at Ghoom Yiga Chöling Monastery by a patron from Darjeeling, and was requested to take care of the monastery. Rinpoche enlarged it and built another famous two-storey Maitreya Buddha statue with the help of Wangyal, the same artist who had fashioned the ones in Tromo. Between his eyes a huge diamond reflected the light of the many butter lamps. Humans and non-humans had offered the precious materials for it. When the Maitreya statue was consecrated, gods and goddesses showered down flowers from Tushita, and many people, even as far away as Darjeeling, said they heard very beautiful music.

In 1919 Tashi Chöling Monastery in Kurseong near Darjeeling was completed and consecrated by Geshe Rinpoche, and Tharpa Chöling Monastery in Kalimpong was finished in 1922. This monastery had been built with the support of and requests from the Maharani of Bhutan, an influential Chinese merchant and his Tibetan wife, a group of Tibetans living in Kalimpong, and many others. A beautiful Gesar Ling statue from China was offered to Rinpoche and downstairs from his residence a Gesar chapel (lha khang) was consecrated. The Chinese community came to worship there especially during their New Year’s celebrations. Today, it still functions as a place for divination and people come from all over to seek answers to their questions.

By the time Tharpa Chöling was completed, Dungkar Gonpa had already built or taken under its administrative umbrella several other monasteries in Tromo and Phari. Until 1959, the Dungkar Gonpa monks took turns in administering these places as well as the monasteries across the border. In addition, there were a number of small temples and chapels in the Himalayan border area offered to and consecrated by Domo Geshe Rinpoche. Still today the only two Gelugpa temples in Sikkim were established by Domo Geshe Rinpoche during this time. The Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, and Guru Padmasambhava, who offered his protection, had prophesied that Geshe Rinpoche would build all these monasteries so that the pure Dharma of the Buddha ­­– and especially of Je Tsongkhapa and his lineage – would flourish in the border areas, and that they would develop well with the blessings of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Rinpoche.

Domo Geshe Rinpoche was genuinely most humble and completely without pride of thinking that he knew anything, say those who knew him. No photograph exists of him. His humility did not let anyone take a photograph of him, which was, in those days, something reserved for famous people, like heads of state, and those of high social status. When pictures were taken without his permission, he is either not there or blurred beyond recognition. The only likeness we have of the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche is a statue fashioned after the preserved body that was placed in his stupa.

Senior monks who knew the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche say that he never acted as if to draw attention to himself. They say he built monasteries, gathered monks, and created the foundation for practice and that he taught most often by giving practical advice as to what to do and what not to do. This was far more effective in his prime area of influence than spending much time sitting on a throne and giving extensive teachings, they say. Many of the people in the border areas, where Geshe Rinpoche was most active, would not have understood elaborate teachings although he also gave many formal teachings, empowerments, and transmissions. He taught precisely according to the capacity of each individual, something only a highly realized master can do. Today, Geshe Rinpoche maintains the same style of teaching.

After returning from his last long pilgrimage to the Buddha’s holy places in India in 1935/36, he called his close circle of disciples at Dungkar Gonpa to his room. Afraid of losing him, they did not want to listen to his last instructions. They quickly prostrated and requested him to live longer. During this time a lady wearing beautiful jewelry came to visit Geshe Rinpoche several times. His attendants did not see her enter Rinpoche’s room and when one of them approached her, she vanished. It was Tsering Chenga from Chomo Lhari who requested Rinpoche again and again to come to her abode. Rinpoche’s human followers requested him again to stay longer but he answered that he had already promised her to come. When it became clear to all that Geshe Rinpoche was leaving, they requested his last instructions. He told them that since they did not want to listen before, he had nothing to say now. But just before he passed away, he held up three fingers. This is said to have meant either, “You will see me in three years,” or, “I will be a three-day walk away from here.” Both turned out to be true. After he had passed away, two long rainbow clouds in the shape of offering scarves (khata) left his window and stretched out in the direction of Gangtok. On that day, the sky was filled with rainbows and many different colors and signs. Dungkar Gonpa was so thickly wrapped in rainbow clouds that it was hidden from view even from those approaching from the large open meadow, Lingmathang, just below the monastery. Not only Rinpoche’s followers but even the Bönpos were amazed at the marvelous spectacle. The rainbow clouds continued to appear throughout the next forty-nine days, whenever the monks performed the ritual for Rinpoche’s speedy return. Still today, the passing of Geshe Ngawang Kalsang is commemorated each year with butter lamp offerings in the Ganden Ngamchö style on the fourteenth night of the ninth Tibetan month at Tharpa Chöling Monastery in Kalimpong. Rainbow clouds around the full moon on that occasion have been observed as recently as 1991.

The Dungkar Gonpa administration requested the Central Tibetan government for permission to embalm the body of Domo Geshe Rinpoche, who sat absorbed in meditation for an unknown length of time. Only the bodies of Je Tsongkhapa, the Dalai Lamas, and the Panchen Lamas were customarily embalmed and sealed in large stupas. Permission was granted. The Regent Reting Rinpoche’s decree read, “In Southern Tibet, including Sikkim, etc., Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s activities were exactly like those of Je Tsongkhapa. In accordance, we will allow Rinpoche’s body to be preserved.”

People came from near and far to offer precious stones, metals and other objects for the stupa built to house the body of Domo Geshe Rinpoche. About a year before passing away, Rinpoche had told his abbot about a dream he had had of a red temple with a stupa in the west that contained relics from the time of Buddha Chenleg and from which much water was gushing forth. It took a long time to finish the red temple and Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s stupa. Only upon completion did the abbot recall the dream and he was joyful in believing they had acted in accordance with Rinpoche’s wishes.

The stupa was two stories high and entirely covered with silver. It was studded with diamonds, pearls, turquoise, coral, and lapis and contained many other rare and precious holy objects in addition to Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s body. After receiving repeated requests to come and consecrate the stupa, Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche consented and arrived in Tromo in early 1938 for this purpose. Planning to wait for the New Year to do the ceremony, he went on his first pilgrimage to the holy places in India. When performing the ceremony upon his return, many special signs occurred. Later, a “mushroom” (shamo) relic grew directly on the silver of the stupa. While these types of relics have also grown near the stupas of other similarly consecrated holy bodies, only in the case of Domo Geshe Rinpoche did the “mushroom” relic grow directly on the bare metal of the stupa.

KYABJE DOMO GESHE RINPOCHE
NGAWANG GYALTEN JIGME CHÖKYI WANGCHUK

I pray at the feet of the Great Lord of Speech [Manjushri],
Gyalten Jigme Chökyi Wangchuk,
Who rejuvenates the supreme Dharma, like life’s renewal in spring,
Through his fearless and unequaled analyses
Of all the Conqueror’s teachings, including the Sutras, Tantras, and commentaries.– composed by Kyabje Trijang Dorjechang

The supreme incarnation was born on January 22, 1937, at 8:30 a.m. in the Enchey Kazi family estate at Lingdum outside of Gangtok in Sikkim, three days’ walk from Dungkar Gonpa in Tromo. Many beautiful flowers grew around the house during that time and even on a tree that does not normally bear flowers. The membrane covering the child was intact at birth, and later his father told friends that many miraculous signs and events surrounded the child’s birth and early years. The father, Enchey Kazi Rabten Phüntsog, the most influential and wealthy of the Gangtok Kazis at the time, belonged to the Barphungpa family. They trace their recent descent (seventeenth-eighteenth century) to Changdze Karwang, who was related to the Chögyal, the King of Sikkim, and who became a national hero in defending Sikkim against Bhutan. Rinpoche’s mother, Chomo Yanki Dölma, was from the family of Yangthang Kazis in West Sikkim. They trace their descent to the minister of the Tibetan who came to crown the first Chögyal of Sikkim in 1633 and, more recently (eighteenth century), to Deba Dragkarpa, a great national hero who fought with Changdze Chothub, also called General Satrajeet, to expel the Gurkhas from Sikkim.

Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s grandfather, Enchey Lama Kazi, was also landlord of Lingdum and Rumtek. He built Enchey Monastery in Gangtok and the temple at the royal palace to their present-day size. His son, Enchey Kazi Rabten Phüntsog, was a deeply religious man. Like his Tulku son later on, he helped many poor people. With magisterial power of the first class, he often represented the poor and disenfranchised in court. A poet and writer, master of several languages including English, he was considered the best-educated man in Gangtok. Enchey House was the first Western-style house in Gangtok, located directly on the road to Tibet. Here Enchey Kazi hosted many famous Western explorers, among them Lama Anagarika Govinda and later his wife; Madame Alexandra David-Neel, whose companion, Lama Yongden, was from Lingdum and had been a servant at Enchey House; the famous musician and writer Marco Pallis; Professor Tucci and the Italian explorers who accompanied him; and Dr. Schäfer and his German expedition. Enchey Kazi helped them through his excellent connections with Tibet, by teaching them Tibetan language and customs or, sometimes, he accompanied an expedition himself. Enchey Kazi had met the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche, who had visited Gangtok on his frequent pilgrimages to India. An orthodox Nyingmapa, Enchey Kazi and the other Gangtok Kazis of the Barphungpa family, Madzong and Khenzong, went out of their way to establish beyond any doubt that Enchey Kazi’s son was, in fact, the incarnation of the famous Tibetan Gelugpa Lama from Tromo.

When Rinpoche was not yet two years old, just before his mother passed away, he gave her some medicine and told her not to worry. She took it as a blessing, even though he was not yet recognized as an incarnated Lama. While she had been pregnant with him, a monk came to Enchey House one day and offered her a text of the “Recalling the Kindness” (ga.trin söl.deb) prayer of Domo Geshe Rinpoche and then vanished.

Kyabje Pabongka and Trijang Rinpoches in Lhasa had drawn a map of the place where the incarnation of Domo Geshe Rinpoche was born, without ever having been to Sikkim.

The child had announced to his father beforehand that his monks were coming to take him to his monastery. The young Tulku amazed everyone when he called the monks by name as they approached Enchey House. He called each by the name the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche had used. He did so with the members of the first search party and, again, with the monks of a larger group that came to take him back to Dungkar Gonpa. When one of the monks pulled out a rilbu, Rinpoche took it and said, “my rilbu.” He picked out his former possessions with ease from a group of different objects mixed with his own, and even recognized a mule that had belonged to the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche. When he put his little hand on the animal’s head saying, “My mule does not look well,” it shed tears.

At age three, one day when his father called him “Phuchung,” Rinpoche informed him that he was now called “Jigme.” As was later discovered, it was on the same day that Kyabje Pabongka and Trijang Rinpoches had made offerings at Je Tsongkhapa’s golden stupa at Ganden, and from that stupa Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s name self-manifested: Gyalten Jigme Chökyi Wangchuk. At the time of Rinpoche’s ordination, “Ngawang” was added to this name by the ordaining master, the Regent of Tibet, Tagdra Rinpoche.

His Royal Highness Sir Tashi Namgyal, the King of Sikkim, had sent offerings to the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche with an official invitation to Sikkim in 1936 on Rinpoche’s last journey through Kalimpong. At that time Geshe Rinpoche had sent offerings in return and a message that he would come, but at a later date. Before the young incarnation was taken to meet the King, he told his father that he would not prostrate to the King of Sikkim. When they arrived at the palace, the Chögyal rose from his seat and greeted Rinpoche. He expressed his joy that Rinpoche had come to be born in his country and kept his promise to visit. He urged Rinpoche’s father, who initially had been reluctant to let his son go, not to interfere with Rinpoche’s future and gave his official permission for the young Tulku to leave Sikkim for Tibet. The King also performed rituals to keep some of the fortune in the country. It was believed that the loss of someone as precious as Domo Geshe Rinpoche was very great and might otherwise deplete the national fortune.

Protocol demanded that the Regent of Tibet also be consulted about the authenticity of the incarnation found in Gangtok. The names of all twelve candidates were submitted to him and he, too, confirmed the accuracy of the choice. Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche, in a telegram from Lhasa in November 1940, again confirmed to Enchey Kazi that his son was Domo Geshe Rinpoche and advised him to wait until the New Year to take the young Tulku to Tibet. Thus, Domo Geshe Rinpoche was taken to Dungkar Gonpa on the tenth day of the first Tibetan month in 1941.

At Dungkar Gonpa, Rinpoche learned quickly whatever he was taught. In accordance with the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s wish to study at Sera Monastery, he was taken there in the fall of 1942. Several years earlier, a monk by the name of Kalsangla from Bati Khamtsen at Sera Je College had predicted Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s arrival. Kalsangla seemed to be a simple monk, but he had very accurate divinatory and other powers. Facing north, the house he lived in was so close to another building that no sunshine ever hit the door. One day, he pointed out a marigold flower that had miraculously grown on the door lintel without sun and earth. He said, “This is a sign that Je Tsongkhapa has taken birth.” The monk from upstairs, Thubten Rabyang, asked him what he meant by that. Kalsangla answered, “Just watch! In two or three years he will come here from the south.” When Thubten Rabyang saw the young incarnation of Domo Geshe Rinpoche in a procession on his way to Sera Monastery, he remembered the simple monk’s prediction.

When Domo Geshe Rinpoche came to Sera Monastery, the government bestowed the rank of the fourth level on him to honor the great deeds of the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche. Both Tsangpa Khamtsen and Bati Khamtsen wanted Domo Geshe Rinpoche to join them. It took some time to resolve the dispute. The administration of Sera Je College finally decided that Geshe Rinpoche would belong to both houses (khamtsen). Because of this issue, Rinpoche did not start to debate until the age of ten or eleven.

From a long list of eminent teachers, Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche had chosen Geshe Jampa Chömbe, the most famous scholar at Sera at the time, to teach Rinpoche. Extremely gentle and soft-spoken, Domo Geshe Rinpoche debated in the most subdued manner. He did not clap his hands or shout, as was the custom during debates, or ever act in even a slightly aggressive manner. Many monks thought that Rinpoche did not care about his studies since they did not see him study a lot. However, without fail, Rinpoche always knew the answers. He did not get nervous – like many, even famous Geshes did – before or during big, public debates. He did not seem to prepare but always knew the answers. According to senior monks from Sera who spent time with him then, Domo Geshe Rinpoche understood everything he read very quickly and in a most amazingly profound way. Geshe Rinpoche was very attentive and carefully learned in great detail everything about the administrative structure of the monastery, even though he did not participate in it. Close friends with Sera Je’s Chant Master (umdze), Geshe Rinpoche unofficially learned all the melodies. He mentioned at an early age that he would need this knowledge in the future. During his studies at Sera Monastery, Domo Geshe Rinpoche went to Tromo Dungkar Gonpa twice. In 1947/48, he did his first strict retreat there at age eleven, and when he gave initiation in Ghoom Yiga Chöling Monastery that year, a rainbow arched through the air ending in his lap.

Domo Geshe Rinpoche was best known at Sera for his unwavering Guru devotion and for his perfect behavior. The picture of Tibet’s Regent, Tagdra Rinpoche, Geshe Rinpoche’s ordination master, was placed on the altar at Tromo Labrang. Since Geshe Jampa Chömbe was Guru to many other scholars, large numbers of the Sera monks came to Tromo Labrang. During and after the time of conflict between the regent and ex-regent, many of those monks made terribly derogatory remarks upon seeing Tagdra Rinpoche’s picture. But Domo Geshe Rinpoche, barely a teenager then, never got angry at them. He just laughed and did not respond in any negative way. Nor was he the slightest bit intimidated by the older monks’ behavior. Those who knew him well said that he never criticized anybody and in the conflict between the regent and ex-regent that divided Tibetans politically, Geshe Rinpoche never took sides but consistently maintained a religious perspective and kept good connections with both. As history has proven, this is a rare and unusual accomplishment.

Geshe Jampa Chömbe often appeared to be angry with Geshe Rinpoche. At times he did not talk to him for days. But this did not discourage Rinpoche. Ever so gently he would walk into his Guru’s room without being noticed, and serve him tea or the delicacies people had brought from Tromo and India. Although his Guru was so unusually strict with him, Rinpoche did not complain even once. Consistently pleasant, cheerful, and gentle, his Guru devotion was held up as an example for everyone else to emulate. There was no one as gentle as Domo Geshe Rinpoche, yet “it is in his nature not to be controlled by anyone,” a senior Sera monk pointed out.

Not only was his Guru devotion exemplary, but his behavior was too. As an example many monks cite the fact that during summer sessions in the debating courtyard (chöra), Geshe Rinpoche sat in the hot sun in his woollen cloak, sweat running down his body, without ever moving even slightly. None of the other high incarnate Lamas was able to do that. Geshe Rinpoche observed the monastic code in perfect detail. He never missed a debate session and attended all other monastic functions with great interest. While still a child, his eyes did not wander during prayer sessions and when his Guru was away, he studied just as hard. His very exceptionally composed behavior and calm nature showed that he was someone very unusual. Many famous and influential people came to see him. They often were afraid of Rinpoche despite his very young age, because he was so serious. Domo Geshe Rinpoche always acted, and still acts, like a simple monk. He does not show off his knowledge or any other of his remarkable accomplishments. This exceptional and truly praiseworthy trait he has maintained consistently over decades and through times of great challenge. The profound meaning of Geshe Rinpoche’s manner of acting is best captured in a verse composed by the great sage and philosopher Nagarjuna that expresses the truth of the dependently related nature of all phenomena:

No matter how deeply thoughts are hidden
In the innermost recesses of the heart,
They will show in external behavior
Just like fish in the ocean’s depth are eventually made visible
By the movement of currents and waves.

During one of the winter study/debating sessions at Jamyang Konchö in which Domo Geshe Rinpoche participated (1955 and 1956), it so happened that at the moment when Rinpoche was sitting on the throne to give answers, the full moon rose above Manjushri’s mountain. This beautiful coincidence is the poetry of Rinpoche’s life. Many such coincidences and wondrous occurrences have taken place, and continue to do so, in and around Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s existence. They are too numerous to list here.

When Geshe Rinpoche was selected to enter the Lharam class, his Guru Geshe Jampa Chömbe was most pleased. His classmates in the Lharam class said of Domo Geshe Rinpoche that he had great understanding (kowa chenbo), since he deeply understood the meaning of whatever he read. Rinpoche spent two years in the Lharam class, when in 1958 he requested to graduate sooner. Since from Sera Je College Phagpa Lha Rinpoche was ahead of him, there was no chance for Geshe Rinpoche to graduate soon as a Lharampa Geshe. Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche immediately approved Geshe Rinpoche’s request and His Holiness gave his permission as well. Only Geshe Jampa Chömbe was disappointed. But he, too, had to accept Geshe Rinpoche’s choice. On Lhapab Düchen in 1958, Domo Geshe Rinpoche graduated as a Lingsä Geshe just before the Communists put an end to the religious system in Tibet. Geshe Rinpoche took that occasion to make very elaborate offerings to the monasteries and the Sangha. This became a famous event. By that time, Domo Geshe Rinpoche had received an astounding array of teachings, transmissions, and empowerments from Kyabje Trijang Dorjechang, Tagri Dorjechang, His Holiness the Dalai Lama, and Gonsar (Dema) Rinpoche. Some of these were extremely rare and precious. Tagri Dorjechang, who spent half of his life giving oral transmissions, is reported to have said at that time that Domo Geshe Rinpoche most likely had more transmissions, etc., than he had received himself. Today, Domo Geshe Rinpoche, a lineage holder, has more transmissions, especially of rare texts, and empowerments than anyone else in the Gelugpa tradition.

In 1950/51, after the Chinese Communist invasion of Tibet, His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, his tutors, the ex-Regent Tagdra Rinpoche, and a number of government officials went to stay in Tromo. In case of an emergency His Holiness could have quickly crossed the nearby border. In addition, Tromo is a valley that could easily be sealed off and controlled. For reasons of His Holiness’ personal safety, the Cabinet and Assembly had insisted that he travel there. His Holiness stayed at Dungkar Gonpa for more than eight months. During this time, the government conferred the official rank of abbot, “Khenchung” – usually reserved only for the big monastic universities – upon Dungkar Gonpa’s abbot, and the “Tsedung” rank of “Lädzim” upon the Dungkar Gonpa oracle. Representatives of the Mahabodhi Society arrived from India to bring a golden urn containing a holy relic of the Buddha to His Holiness. His Tutors and the government officials circumambulated the relics (kudung) of the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche, and offered butter lamps and other offerings there. They advised the local people that doing so was as powerful and beneficial as going on pilgrimage to the holy sites in India.

During His Holiness’ stay in Tromo, Jigme Ngabo, as the head of the Tibetan delegation in Beijing, signed the Seventeen-point Agreement under duress. While the seal of state presumably was with His Holiness at Dungkar Gonpa, the Chinese forged it to give legitimacy to the document. The Dungkar Gonpa oracle was consulted about His Holiness’ return to Lhasa or flight to India. His Holiness decided to return to Lhasa. He did so in August of 1951 soon after meeting General Chang Chin-wu, who was sent to Tibet via Tromo to meet His Holiness there. In 1956/57, while on pilgrimage to India on the occasion of the Buddha Jayanti and by invitation of the Indian government, His Holiness passed through Tromo again and once more visited Dungkar Gonpa.

On the second day of the war, on March 22, 1959, Domo Geshe Rinpoche was taken prisoner by the Chinese Communists together with many other people. From the Norbulingka gardens where they were all held for several days, he was taken to army headquarters. Since Rinpoche was a Sikkimese, it was expected that he would be let go immediately. However, he was not released until more than two years later. According to the Indian Consul in Lhasa at the time, Domo Geshe Rinpoche was too important to be let go. The Chinese Communists hoped to convert him to their views and use his tremendous popularity for their own ends. Another reason for Geshe Rinpoche’s imprisonment was that all the resistance fighters used the famous rilbus and other objects blessed by Rinpoche as protection against weapons. It is said that when some of the Chinese used Geshe Rinpoche’s protection, which made many fighters bullet-proof, it worked for them as well. Domo Geshe Rinpoche and the monks of his Labrang, who had handed out rilbus freely to anyone “who went south,” were considered part of the resistance and were all imprisoned.

The first few months of Geshe Rinpoche’s imprisonment he was forced to perform the dirtiest of all jobs, such as cleaning out pig sties or sewers and washing dirty laundry; or the heaviest, such as carrying huge concrete slabs as the youngest person among a group of old ailing people. His back was badly injured when a huge chunk of concrete fell on him. This injury would continue to bother Geshe Rinpoche for many years to come. Rinpoche never complained about the work or the difficult conditions; he was a good worker. Once when he was taking care of the pigs, a Chinese officer tried to force him to shoot one of the animals. Rinpoche refused. The soldier just cursed and left.

Later, Geshe Rinpoche no longer had to do the back-breaking dirty work, but the Communists tried to break him through re-education sessions. When after more than a year he had still not changed his mind, they took Domo Geshe Rinpoche to Trapchi prison and kept him in solitary confinement in total darkness for several months, in a cell too small even to stretch out in. For the last year of his imprisonment Geshe Rinpoche shared a cell with the Tibetan general Sampho Tenzin Thondup, who described how he developed complete trust in Rinpoche. In prison this was a most special gift. In his book, the general talks about how happy he was that he could trust someone completely.

In the meantime, many Tibetans outside of Tibet repeatedly petitioned His Royal Highness the Chögyal of Sikkim to facilitate Geshe Rinpoche’s release, as he was not a Tibetan national. The Chögyal, as well as thirty-eight different organizations, petitioned Pandit Nehru, Prime Minister of India, to bring pressure on the Chinese Communists to free Domo Geshe Rinpoche from the illegal imprisonment. Later, the Indian newspapers reported: “His Holiness Domo Geshe Rinpoche has been detained by the Chinese at Lhasa since 1959 on suspicion of being involved in the Tibetan uprising” (Hindusthan Standard, August 10, 1960).

Finally, Domo Geshe Rinpoche was released from prison on the tenth day of the Tibetan New Year in 1961. For the next few months he traveled by bicycle all over Lhasa and its outskirts, collecting texts and precious holy objects to be smuggled out of Tibet. He did so at the risk of his life. He gathered texts too rare to exist anywhere outside of Tibet, among them a number of very precious manuscript collections (pembum). Perhaps most important were the sets of textbooks used by the different colleges of Sera, Drepung, and Ganden. Without these textbooks, it would have been impossible to continue the tradition of the great monastic universities in exile. They came out with “Katsara” traders, the only people then permitted to travel across the border.

While Geshe Rinpoche traveled around Lhasa collecting holy objects, he found his outer robe (chögö), which he had received from Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche and in which this great master had given many teachings, as well as his ordination Buddha. This was considered an auspicious omen (temde). Many of the precious objects Geshe Rinpoche collected, like thangkas and other art works, did not reach their rightful owners. A large number of them got stolen while waiting near the border of Sikkim or on the way across. However, the collections of books, which had no monetary value, remained untouched. Only these precious things collected by Domo Geshe Rinpoche came out of Tibet at the time; the border was very tightly sealed.

Later that summer of 1961, Geshe Rinpoche arrived in Gangtok. The Chinese authorities in Lhasa had finally become aware that Rinpoche would not, after all, work for them. They escorted him from Lhasa to the border through Tromo – and past Dungkar Gonpa – secretly. They were worried that if Rinpoche were recognized, the local people would not let him leave and create an uprising. At Nathula, Rinpoche turned facing Tibet to say prayers. At that moment, his meager bundle fell to the ground. In it had been his only valuable possession, a wooden bowl used during government-sponsored dinners. He heard a crack: a chip had broken off the bowl’s delicate rim. Thus Domo Geshe Rinpoche came out of Tibet without any possessions at all. From the terribly dirty food in prison and other privations, he arrived in Sikkim and India quite sick.

At Tharpa Chöling Monastery in Kalimpong, a dispute that had started in the late 1940s was still festering. The monks sent from Dungkar Gonpa in Tibet to rotate the administrative offices took their personal offerings back to Tibet and offered them at Dungkar Gonpa. This created animosity among the locals which escalated into a deep conflict. Both sides tried to resolve it by presenting their grievances to the Indian and Tibetan courts. This is a case famous for its uniqueness. Neither the Tibetan nor the Indian government could solve the problem. Only Geshe Rinpoche, upon his return from Tibet, resolved the lingering crisis mainly by means of his non-partisanship and fairness, his equal treatment of all, and his uncompromising attention to all the details of monastic discipline. It is said that the following lines from Je Tsongkhapa’s praise of Buddha Shakyamuni known as “Kapsumpa” describe well this particular accomplishment of Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s:

Through the power of insight and compassion alone you conquered the hosts of evil, leaving none unvanquished; ten million legions of evil forces conquered not by weapons of war but by yourself alone, like a black cloud driven by the force of a wrathful gale.

When the Indian Government officially handed over Tharpa Chöling Monastery to Domo Geshe Rinpoche in a formal ceremony in 1966, auspicious signs and unusually shaped clouds were observed. Later that year, together with Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche, Domo Geshe Rinpoche instituted an annual Ganden Ngamchö procession in Kalimpong and Darjeeling on the anniversary of the passing away of Je Tsongkhapa in which a statue of Je Rinpoche is carried through the town for blessings, and people offer khatas. The offerings for the first celebration, although made by Geshe Rinpoche, were done in the name of a British monk, Sangharakshita, without his knowledge. Domo Geshe Rinpoche often makes elaborate offerings or extends crucial help in someone else’s name. Almost nobody knows all the amazing ways he has helped and benefited others as individuals and in groups.

Shortly after Geshe Rinpoche came out of Tibet, he and people in his immediate circle founded the Ü/Tsang Association in Kalimpong, whose headquarters only much later were transferred to Dharamsala. This association helped many of the Tibetans escaping from Tibet and also took care of the poorest in Kalimpong. Whenever a Tibetan had difficulties with the local authorities, who were harassing Tibetans at the time, the Ü/Tsang Association came to the rescue. It was very effective in taking care of the needs of the local Tibetans and those passing through after escaping from Tibet.

In 1962, while Domo Geshe Rinpoche was in Bodh Gaya, His Holiness requested him to start a Tibet House in New Delhi. An artist himself, Domo Geshe Rinpoche is a great expert on Tibetan and other Buddhist art. Through his connections with so many aristocrats and old families, Geshe Rinpoche was able to collect many precious, holy, and old works of art. They were exhibited at the Tibet House Museum. When registering these wonderful collections of thangkas, statues, and other invaluable works, in order to save them from the inevitable fate of the marketplace, Geshe Rinpoche had a great number of them labeled, “On loan by His Holiness the Dalai Lama.” Today many of these can be seen at the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives in Dharamsala. On Lhapab Düchen of 1965, Tibet House was inaugurated with many illustrious guests present: His Holiness and his two Tutors, Prime Minister Nehru, and Indira Gandhi, to mention just a few.

In his autobiography Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche speaks of the wonderful collection of Tibetan texts at Tibet House at the time. He also mentions that he received special collections and rare texts from Domo Geshe Rinpoche from Kalimpong several times, on one occasion, in 1963, to give transmissions to His Holiness the Dalai Lama. This had greatly pleased him, since the very continuity of the tradition depended on them. Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche said on more than one occasion that he and Domo Geshe Rinpoche are exactly the same, are of one mind. During the years when Geshe Rinpoche was the Director of Tibet House, Kyabje Ling and Trijang Rinpoches usually were accommodated at Tibet House while staying in New Delhi. The two Tutors took refuge there during the Pakistan air raids in 1965. During his Tibet House years, Rinpoche also took a Tibetan art exhibition to Japan as a cultural ambassador for His Holiness and the Tibetan government. While working for the Tibetan government, Domo Geshe Rinpoche visited twelve countries in Asia, Europe, and North America.

In 1965 Domo Geshe Rinpoche made the famous rilbus again. It is said that the rilbus Rinpoche put together in India contain even more holy ingredients than those of the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche. He made the famous rilbus twice in India. Domo Geshe Rinpoche also continued his pilgrimages. He went to the four famous Guru Rinpoche caves in Sikkim, as had the previous Rinpoche, and to the Buddha’s holy places in India, Nepal, and the Himalayan areas that are still accessible. Rinpoche also went on a pilgrimage to Indonesia and Sri Lanka. The monks who accompany Domo Geshe Rinpoche say that he usually leads the way on these pilgrimages, especially in remote areas. He always knows the way exactly.

On his return from Kalimpong once, while he still worked at Tibet House, the road below the Tista bridge was blocked and Rinpoche decided to take the long way to the train station through Ghoom and Kurseong. In Sepoydhura, he unexpectedly stopped at the house of Tsewang Norbu, who had been a monk at Geshe Rinpoche’s monastery, Samten Chöling, in Ghoom. Since Rinpoche is not known to stop anywhere unannounced, this was most unusual. The recently-born child in this family turned out to be the present Pabongka Rinpoche. The parents offered Rinpoche milk which was seen as a good sign. Domo Geshe Rinpoche thus found the incarnation of Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche and later helped with his enthronement, as he did with the enthronement of Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche’s incarnation.

During his stay in Delhi, Rinpoche helped many poor Tibetans. In particular, he helped some students get started in successful business careers. Geshe Rinpoche also helped many poor Indians there who are still devoted and thankful to him. Of course, Geshe Rinpoche helps many poor people in Kalimpong as well as in every place he goes. He helps send children to good schools and girls to college. Next to Tharpa Chöling in Kalimpong is a school for small children of the poorest people in the area, mostly Nepalis. The building belongs to the monastery, and the children are given a daily lunch from the monastery kitchen. Through his extraordinary kindness, power, and knowledge, Geshe Rinpoche is constantly healing sick people and those who are mentally disturbed and he takes care of those most destitute. In the U.S. and other countries, too, a great number of people can trace their wealth, well being, and often their very lives, to Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s help. When asked what they know of Geshe Rinpoche, almost everyone who meets him mentions that he pays the same amount of attention to rich and poor alike. All agree that Rinpoche never favors a rich patron over a poor person. His even-mindedness is constant and has become legendary.

In the early 1970s when the big monasteries were resettled in South India, Tashilhunpo Monastery encountered great difficulties in obtaining land there. Domo Geshe Rinpoche went to Dharamsala to ask the Tibetan government-in-exile for land on behalf of Tashilhunpo, upon their request. He was successful and it is said that he presented the case very well. As an example of political enemies becoming friends again, he mentioned US/China relations which were starting to warm up at the time. “Things change, and not all monks were against the Tibetan government, so why should they all be punished.” He also reminded them that the Panchen Rinpoche was a Tibetan.

In 1976, Domo Geshe Rinpoche established the Dungkar Gonpa Society in New York. That year he was offered a large tract of land in the Catskill Mountains in New York, which was named Gangjong Namgyal. It is said that Rinpoche had seen the land, perhaps in a vision, before he actually went there. He already knew that it had lions (at the gate), peacocks (at another gate), a “vase” (bumpa), a river, a lake, an “earth lotus” and a “sky lotus.” Almost single-handedly Rinpoche took care of this land with heavy physical labor, caring for the wildlife, plants, buildings, and water, and effecting spiritual transformation. Now it is a holy place, and people, many of whom teach others, come from all over the world for advice, oral transmissions, explanations, retreats, and so many other kinds of help and, when the time is right, there will be a monastery.

Domo Geshe Rinpoche hosted His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama in Gangjong Namgyal in the summer of 1981. His Holiness enjoyed the beautiful and peaceful surroundings for a restful week, and mentioned that the place was of great inspiration and that Dharma understanding came easily there.

Wondrous occurrences (ya.mtsen ngö.jung) are not limited to the past, as so many people today seem to believe. They continue to happen in Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s presence now just as they did before. In 1981, for example, a “mushroom” (shamo) relic with an extremely sweet fragrance grew on a plastic surface in Geshe Rinpoche’s Labrang in Kalimpong. When Rinpoche started to rebuild Tharpa Chöling Monastery in 1993, the old building had to be torn down to the foundation. The main Buddha statue on the altar is made of clay and its size is no more than four to five feet tall. When the statue was to be moved so that the construction could begin, it became so heavy that it could not be moved even by a large number of strong men. The Buddha refused to leave the grounds. A little shack was built around him and the construction went on with the Buddha statue present.

Perhaps it is not surprising for people with faith to see holy objects in Geshe Rinpoche’s surroundings produce relics or multiply, or that the beautiful old statue of Padmasambhava in Kalimpong in his closed altar, which had not been opened for decades, moved on its own axis to face Rinpoche’s seat more directly in 1991. What is surprising in today’s world is that Domo Geshe Rinpoche has never asked anyone for money, has never solicited financial help from anyone for his multiple responsibilities in India, Sikkim, Tibet, and Western countries. He neither advertises his teachings nor does he charge for them, a custom commonly practised by Buddhist teachers or their organizations, especially in the West. Neither Domo Geshe Rinpoche nor his Labrang own any business. He depends solely on donations without ever soliciting them or allowing his attendants to do so. When a man from Switzerland came to visit Tharpa Chöling Monastery and asked Domo Geshe Rinpoche for several receipt books to raise funds back in Switzerland for the rebuilding of the monastery, Geshe Rinpoche asked his attendants not to give him any. Unless the offering comes from individual initiative, he does not accept it. According to Vinaya, someone with vows is not permitted to solicit money. However, whatever amount is offered, small or very large, this person is obliged to accept it.

Although he lives up to the prediction of the Yidam who entrusted him with the future of his Tantra, Geshe Rinpoche always acts in the manner of a perfect Kadampa. He is someone who has renounced the eight worldly dharmas exactly like Je Tsongkhapa. Domo Geshe Rinpoche does not use his famous name to obtain favors or financial gain for himself, and also does not allow his monasteries to use it for those reasons. Many Tibetans remember that “the sweet smell of morality” surrounded the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche wherever he went. Today, in Gangjong Namgyal in the United States, people still notice the same phenomenon in Rinpoche’s presence. The rules and vows of the Buddha, the holy teachings – especially of Je Tsongkhapa and his two main disciples (yab.sä.sum) – unmixed and pure, and the different levels of practice are safe with him. This is more surprising to find today than anything else. Geshe Rinpoche took birth in the “hidden land.” It was predicted more than a thousand years ago that at the time of great crisis for the Dharma, help will come from there.

Geshe Rinpoche teaches in the same way as his predecessor did. The main difference between their ways is that Geshe Ngawang Gyalten Jigme Chökyi Wangchuk has become an even greater master of hiding his good deeds – perhaps because the times have changed. But if we are concerned with the continuity of the holy teachings, the time has come to distinguish between those who invent their own personal histories to make themselves stand out among others and those who hide their good deeds while working ceaselessly to safeguard the Buddha’s true teachings. Now is the time to distinguish between those who seek to praise only themselves and those praiseworthy ones who praise only the Buddhas through their pure deeds.

From among the many people who helped in compiling this information, Venerable Lotenpala, Cargyal Kalsang Dorje, Nagthang Ngawang Jigme, Phu Tseringla, and Karuna have been of very special help.

©2003 Dungkar Gonpa Society

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Prayer to Kyabje Domo Geshe Rinpoche

Composed by Kyabje Gelek Rinpoche
September 11, 2001

The great regent of Manjushri Tsongkhapa,
The glorious great master Ngawang Jigme,
The wonderful reincarnation with qualities of knowledge, morality, and kindness:
May you quickly return for the benefit of the great Tsongkhapa’s teachings.

LO ter jam pel nying po luk SANG chok
Dzin la JIG drel tuk tob da ME ching
Nyen gyu men NGAK ta cho nam dak GI
Gyun pel ma we WANGCHUK shab ten shok

O fearless One, with peerless, powerful mind,
You carry the essence of Losang’s treasury,
The supreme, noble teachings of Manjusri Tsongkapa.
Please live long O Lord of Speech,
Ceaselessly spreading the instructions
On the pure view and action of the Whispered Lineage!

(This name and wish fulfillment prayer was composed and offered to Losang Jigme Ngak –Gi Wangchuk the supreme reincarnation of Domo Geshe Rinpoche by Kyabje Trijang Choktrul Rinpoche on the 13th Day of the 7th Month in the Year 2006).

Kyabje Domo Geshe Rinpoche Losang Jigme Ngak-Gi Wangchuk was recognized and confirmed as the authentic reincarnation of Kyabje Domo Geshe Rinpoche Ngawang Jigme Chokyi Wangchuk by Kyabje Trijang Choktrul Rinpoche after careful divination, invocation of the Dharmapala and prayers spanning a period of four years (2002 to 2006). The previous Kyabje Domo Geshe Rinpoche was also recognized by previous Kyabje Yongzin Trijang Dorjechang jointly with Kyabje Pharbongka Dorjechang.

This holy reincarnation of one of the greatest present day Mahasiddhas was born in New York, USA on 2nd June, 2003 in the auspicious month of Saga Dawa to ethnic Sikkimese parents belonging to the Lingmo Kazi family who were orthodox Nyingmapas. Due to the great obstacles that usually accompany the birth of such an emanation and the degenerate times we live in, Rinpoche’s family faced unbelievable opposition and harassment. As such, it was only after establishing beyond any doubt that their son was indeed the true and unmistaken reincarnation of Kyabje Domo Geshe Rinpoche that his parents finally consented to offer their only son two years after the recognition. During this period, Rinpoche revealed himself to his parents on many occasions and the miracles that accompanied him is legendary now among his devotees. Today the parents are convinced that they have done the right thing and are happy in the knowledge that they have had the privilege of playing a positive role in the continuation of this holy lineage.

His official enthronement took place at Dung Guen Samtencholing, Darjeeling, his principal monastery in India on 3rd March; 2008. This joyous occasion was attended by thousands of devotees from all over the world including members of The World Fellowship of Buddhists and the Representative of the US Consulate. Thereafter he was enthroned at Tashi Choling, his monastery in Kurseong, West Bengal and then at Enchey House the ancestral home and seat of previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche in Gangtok, Sikkim. On 23rd June, 2008 he was enthroned at Gangjong Namgyel, Lew Beach NY, the US residence and headquarters of the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche. The enthronement was presided over by Kyabje Trijang Choktrul Rinpoche and   Kyabje Yongyal Rinpoche. Gangchen Rinpoche,  Achok Rinpoche, Michel Rinpoche and Zawa Tulku  Rinpoche attended. Geshe Helmut Gassner  attended as Gonsar Rinpoche’s representative. Kyabje Pharbongka Rinpoche too sent his blessings and a Representative (Khentrul Rinpoche).

He was formally enrolled and enthroned at Shar Gaden Monastery on 25th April, 2009. He is presently studying with several tutors under the guidance of his spiritual Guru and Mentor H.E. Kyabje Trijang Choktrul Rinpoche.

The 1st Domo Geshe Rinpoche Ngawang Kalsang studied at Tashi Lhunpo Monastery, Tibet from where he received his Kachen Degree.

The 2nd Domo Geshe Rinpoche Ngawang Jigme Wangchuk studied at Sera Monastery, Tibet till he received his Geshe Lingsa Degree.

The official seat and premier monastery of this profound lineage was Dhungkar Gonpa Monastery situated at Domo, Tibet. This monastery has remained loyal to its lineage and has accepted Losang Jigme Ngak-Gi Wangchuk as the true reincarnation of Kyabje Domo Geshe Rinpoche.

Extracted from: http://shargadenpa.org/throneholder/domo-geshe-rinpoche

Tenzin Rabgye Rinpoche, the current incarnation of Geshe Rabten Rinpoche

Tenzin Rabgye Rinpoche, the current incarnation of the esteemed Lama, Geshe Rabten Rinpoche. He was born in India in 1987 and discovered in the late eighties by his former main student Gonsar Tulku Rinpoche, who is his teacher now and director of Rabten Choeling.

Source: (http://www.iol.ie/~taeger/bio/rabten.htm)

Kyabje Zemey Dorje Chang

His Eminence Kyabje Zemey Dorje Chang is one of the most erudite scholar-yogi masters of this century to arise from the esteemed Gaden Shartse Monastery.

Zemey Rinpoche was a very devoted student of H.H. Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche and received many sacred lineages, transmissions and practices from Trijang Rinpoche. He became a most renowned Lama himself, holding and passing on these great transmissions and practices.

Zemey Rinpoche had many great disciples within Gaden Monastery as he was highly revered. The current translator of the Dalai Lama, Geshe Thupten Jinpa is a direct disciple of Zemey Rinpoche and lived in Zemey Ladrang (Lama’s household and private office) in Gaden Shartse, for many years studying directly under Zemey Rinpoche.

When HH the 14th Dalai Lama visited China in the 50s, Zemey Rinpoche was one of the esteemed masters that Dalai lama invited to follow him to China, see a beautiful photo here (1st row, middle photo): http://www.dorjeshugden.com/lamas/

The Zemey Rinpoche line of tulkus comes from the Yangding, Kham district of Tibet where is highly revered by the populace. He belongs to the same monastery as the recently retired 101st Gaden Tri Rinpoche, Jetsun Lungrik Namgyal in Yangding.

The current Kyabje Zemey Rinpoche’s incarnation has been successfully found in Tibet and enthroned.

Source: YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98gnYSNl0H4)

9th Panchen Lama

Thubten Choekyi Nyima (1883 – 1937), often referred to as Choekyi Nyima, was the 9th Panchen Lama of Tibet.

In 1901, Choekyi Nyima was visited by the Mongolian Lama, Agvan Dorzhiev. Although he only stayed for two days at Tashilhunpo, Dorzhiev received some secret teachings from the Panchen Lama, as well as readings of the Prayer of Shambhala, written by Lobsang Palden Yeshe, the sixth (or third) Panchen Lama, concerning the Buddhist kingdom of Shambhala, which were of great importance to Dorzhiev’s developing understanding of the Kalachakra (“Wheel of Time”) tantric teachings. Choekyi Nyima also gave Dorzhiev gifts including some golden statues.

In 1906, Sir Charles Alfred Bell, was invited to visit the 9th Panchen Lama at Tashilhunpo, where they had friendly discussions on the political situation.

He fled to Inner Mongolia, China in 1924 after a dispute with the Thirteenth Dalai Lama when he sensed that he might face threats after his own monastery’s monks were prohibited from holding any office in the Central Tibetan government and his officials were locked up in Lhasa. The Dalai Lama was attempting to collect revenue from the Panchen Lama’s estate to cover a fourth of Tibet’s military expenses, and to reduce the power of the Panchen Lama, who at the time enjoyed rule over an effectively autonomous region around Shigatse.

In China, the Ninth Panchen Lama worked on plans to develop Tibet along modern lines.

In 1937, he died in Gyêgu in Qinghai Province.

The tombs of the Fifth through the Ninth Panchen Lamas were destroyed during the Cultural Revolution and have been rebuilt by the Tenth Panchen Lama with a huge tomb at Tashilhunpo Monastery in Shigatse, known as the Tashi Langyar.

Source: http://wapedia.mobi/en/Thubten_Choekyi_Nyima,_9th_Panchen_Lama

The 10th Panchen Lama, Lobsang Trinley Lhündrub Chökyi Gyaltsen

The first Panchen (“great scholar”) Lama, the abbot of Tashilhunpo Monastery, was given the title by the Great Fifth, who wished to honor his tutor. Subsequent Panchen Lamas did not have such amiable relationships with the Dalai Lamas and the occupying Chinese have attempted to use this rivalry to their advantage. The Ninth Panchen Lama (1883-1937) fled to Mongolia after a dispute with the Thirteenth Dalai Lama over taxes.

The 10th Panchen Lama was born on February 19, 1938 in today’s Xunhua Salar Autonomous County of Qinghai, to Gonpo Tseten and Sonam Drolma and given the name Gonpo Tseten, the same as his father. He was recognized as the reincarnation of 9th Panchen Lama by Flak Lakho Rinpoche, and in 1951 was confirmed by the 14th Dalai Lama as the 10th Panchen Lama. In 1952 he met Dalai Lama in Lhasa and then took up his seat in Tashi Lhunpo Monastery in Shigatse, Tibet.

He was enthroned on June 11, 1949 in Amdo (Qinghai) under the auspice of Chinese officials after the Kuomintang administration approved the selection. (He was not recognised by the Dalai Lama, because the Panchen’s retinue refused to bring him to Lhasa and submit him to traditional tests.) At this time, he supported China’s claim of sovereignty over Tibet, and China’s reform policies for Tibet.

In 1951, he was invited to Beijing at the time of the arrival of a Tibetan delegation which was finally forced to sign the 17-Point Agreement and was forced to send a telegram requesting the Dalai Lama, to implement the Agreement. He was recognized by the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso when they met in 1952.

In September 1954, the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama went to Beijing to attend the first session of the first National People’s Congress, meeting Mao Zedong and other leaders. The Panchen Lama was soon selected as a member of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress and in December 1954 he became the deputy chairman of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference.

In 1956, the Panchen Lama went to India on a pilgrimage together with the Dalai Lama. When the Dalai Lama fled to India in 1959, the Panchen Lama publicly supported the Chinese government, and the Chinese brought him to Lhasa and made him chairman of the Preparatory Committee for the Tibet Autonomous Region.

Even after the 14th Dalai Lama fled to India during the 1959 upheaval in Tibet, the 10th Panchen Lama, then 21-years-old, decided to stay in Tibet. Some say that he collaborated with the Chinese government. However, by the early 1960s, he observed that the Chinese policies at work in Tibet were resulting in hunger, death and suffering for the Tibetan people. After a tour through Tibet, in May 1962, he met Zhou Enlai to discuss a petition he had written, criticizing the situation in Tibet. The report became known as the ’70,000 Character Petition’. The petition was a 70,000 character document that dealt with the brutal suppression of the Tibetan people during and after the Chinese invasion of Tibet. The initial reaction was positive, but in October 1962, the PRC authorities dealing with the population criticized the petition. Chairman Mao called the petition “… a poisoned arrow shot at the Party by reactionary feudal overlords.”

Believed to be the most extensive internal criticism of Chinese Communist policies ever submitted to the leadership, it documents the mass arrests, excessive punishment and executions of Tibetans that followed the 1959 Uprising in Tibet against Chinese rule, and the starvation in Eastern Tibet that resulted from policies implemented as part of Mao’s Great Leap Forward at the end of the 1950s. The 70,000 Character Petition remained secret for 34 years, seen only by those in inner Party circles in China.

The Chinese Government accused the Panchen Lama of being anti-Chinese and engaging in counter-revolutionary activities. In 1964, at a public meeting in Lhasa, he was removed from all public positions of authority. He was openly criticised and humiliated, and later taken to China. Condemned without trial as an “enemy of the Tibetan people”, he had his dream journal confiscated and used against him, and then imprisoned for nine years and eight months. He was 24 years old at the time.

The Panchen’s situation worsened when the Cultural Revolution began. The Chinese dissident and former Red Guard Wei Jingsheng published in March 1979 a letter under his name but written by another anonymous author, denouncing the inhuman conditions of the Chinese Qincheng Prison where the 10th Panchen Lama was imprisoned.

In October 1977, he was released but held under house arrest in Beijing until 1982. After his release, he was considered by the PRC authorities to be politically rehabilitated and he then rose to important positions. In the years that followed, he was an outspoken advocate of liberalisation laws and policies to ensure the survival of Tibetan culture and religion, returning to Tashilhunpo only in his final few years.

In 1979, Panchen Lama was appointed Deputy Chairman of the National People’s Politics Consultative Committee and deputy Chairman of the National Peoples Congress. He traveled widely in the Tibetan regions of Amdo and Kham. His message urged Tibetans to maintain good relations with the Chinese. He also strongly advised them to keep alive the spirit to”Be a Tibetan” and “Be for Tibetan cause”. In 1985, in the Monlam festival after the Tibetan New Year in Lhasa, The Panchen Lama said, “His Holiness the Dalai Lama and I are spiritual friends. There are no differences between His Holiness the Dalai Lama and me. Some people are trying to create discord between us. This will not succeed.” He also pushed for a law making Tibetan the official language of the Tibetan Autonomous Region; it was passed in 1987.

Early in 1989, the 10th Panchen Lama returned to Tibet for the first time in nearly three decades to reinter some of the recovered bones from the graves of the previous Panchen Lamas, graves that had been destroyed during the destruction of Tashilhunpo in 1959. He suddenly and unexpectedly died in Shigatse at the age of 51, on 28th January, three days after consecrating this stupa containing the remains of many of the past Panchen Lamas. The Tenth Panchen Lama was also interred in the tomb, which was completed in 1992.

Sources:
Tibet: A Virtual Field Trip by J.H. Wittke (http://oak.ucc.nau.edu/wittke/Tibet/Panchen.html)
The Official Website of Tashi Lhunpo Monastery (http://tashilhunpo.org/about)
Kotan.org (http://www.kotan.org/tibet/10th_panchen_lama.html [Editor's Note: This link appears to have been removed from the mentioned website])
Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choekyi_Gyaltsen)

The great mahasiddha Serkong Dorje Chang, whose ordination name was Ngawang Tsultrim Donden, is also considered to be the reincarnation of Marpa Lotsawa. He quickly rose to become one of the most renowned and sought-after Buddhist teachers of his time.

Serkong Dorje Chang began his studies when he was 10 years old, studying under the 81st Ganden Throne Holder, Ngawang Norbu. He then joined the renowned Gaden Jangtse Monastery, studying under many great masters during his time there. At the mere age of 24, he procured the highly respected Geshe Lharampa degree; in most cases, this degree requires more than 30 years of study before one even qualifies for the exams.

Already an unusually intelligent scholar, he was also advised by both his teacher and the 13th Dalai Lama to take on a consort, which he did much later. Though he initially received criticism for this, he followed the instructions of his teachers fully, proving later how attained he really was. He then went on to do retreats in secluded places and showed great attainments towards the end of his retreats.

It was not surprising that he became the teacher of the Bhutanese king, who invited him to Bhutan after hearing of his feats. In Bhutan, he received a cycle of teachings and initiations on longevity and other teaching cycles from a vision of Zhabdrung Ngawang Namgyal, the founder of Bhutan.

Besides giving extensive teachings on the monastic subjects, Serkong Dorje Chang was also well known for writing extensive commentaries on the tantric deity Chakrasamvara and also an extensive confession and propitiation prayer known as a kangsol for the protector Dorje Shugden. In the kangsol, Serkong Dorje Chang identifies Dorje Shugden as the principal protector of Lama Tsongkhapa, as well as the special protector of Gaden’s ear whispered lineage, the heart of the Gelug tradition.

This prayer continues to be widely used throughout monastic institutions today. Through the kangsol, the influence of Sera on Serkong Dorje Chang can also be clearly seen as he refers Dorje Shugden as being one and the same as Vajrapani, resonating completely with the views of the earlier masters that originated from Sera Monastery.

Serkong Dorje Chang is also famous for being one of the lineage holders for the Gelug chapter of the Kalachakra teachings. It was of no surprise that the Great 13th Dalai Lama soon awarded him the epithet of “Dorje Chang” for his spiritual achievements, elevating him to a level comparable to the Buddha Vajradhara.

To this day, Serkong Dorje Chang is also greatly remember and respected for combining the prominent writings on Dorje Shugden rituals by earlier masters Morchen Dorje Chang and Drubwang Drukpa Kunley into a single ritual text. Notably, within it, Serkong Dorje Chang makes direct references to Dorje Shugden’s previous incarnation as Duldzin Dragpa Gyeltsen and Shugden’s true enlightened nature.

It also makes clear references to Dorje Shugden as a special protector of Gelugpas, particularly of the healing lineage of Lama Tsongkhapa, Togden Jampel Gyatso, Duldzin Dragpa Gyeltsen, Ensapa and Panchen Lobsang Choekyi Gyaltsen. This unique text also contains a verse on offerings that has been spoken by Dorje Shugden himself.

Sang Offering Text

‘Jam mgon rgyal ba’i bstan srung Rdo-rje Shugs-ldan rtsal chen po’i bsangs mchod [dge legs mchog stsol] bzhugs so, composed by Gaden Serkong Dorje Chang

Hum, visualizing myself as the yidam, from the heart,
Light emanates clearing all faults from incense,
Scent having the five desirable qualities complete in perfection,
Granting uncontaminated bliss fills the extent of awareness.

Om Ah Hum (repeat as many times to bless)

Hum, Root and lineages gurus, Three Jewels,
Dakas, Dakinis and Dharma Protectors,
Especially Dorje Shugden and retinue,
By boundless magical power come here.

Also, birth, warrior and patron deities
Local deities, spirits and guardians with the eight classes,
Assembly of guests worthy of offering please come here.
Each happily dwelling on their seats
For the sake of fulfilling the yogi’s entrusted activities
Outer, inner clouds of offerings, commitment substances and presents,
Accept these and accomplish the entrusted activities.

Kye!
Agar, sandalwood, six medicinal ingredients and plants,
By the smoke cloud from the burning wisdom fire
Completely filling the sky
Purifies the root and lineage lamas, yidams and Three Jewels.
Purifies the dakas, dakinis and dharma protectors.

Purifies especially the Chief Dharma Protector of Conqueror Manjunatha
Dorje Shugden and four cardinal emanations.
Purifies birth, war and five patron gods.
Purifies local deities, spirits, guardians and the eight classes.

By the power of offering incense to worthy guests
May all obscurations of quarrel and samaya be purified.
May lifespan, merit and power all increase.
Pacify all diseases to humans and animals, famine, war and dispute.

May the crops be good and the rain be timely.
Conquer classes of demons of the dark side, increase the positive,
And having befriended spontaneously and effortlessly
Attain all goals just as wished.

Ki ki so so, Lha gyel lo!

Hum! Being pleased and satisfied, guests return to their abodes
Returning again upon request for activities.
By this virtue may I myself and all mother beings
Have perpetual auspiciousness of happiness and benefit.