This auspicious, wish-granting stupa is a tamer of maras, meaningful to behold. May it be virtuous!

RIGDZIN Jigme Lingpa was the incarnation (tülku) of both King Trisong Detsen (790–858) and Vimalamitra. He is also known as Khyentse Özer, Rays of Wisdom and Compassion. He discovered the vast and profound Longchen Nyingthig cycle of teachings as mind ter. In The Secret Prophecy of Lama Gongdü, discovered by Sangye Lingpa (1340–1396), Guru Rinpoche foretold Jigme Lingpa’s coming seven hundred years hence: In the south [of Tibet] there will come a tülku named Özer. He shall liberate beings through the profound teachings of Nyingthig. Whoever is connected to him he will lead to the pure land of the vidhyādharas. Jigme Lingpa was born in a village in the early morning of the eighteenth of the twelfth month of the Earth Bird year of the twelfth Rabjung (1730) in Chongye Valley in Southern Tibet, not very far from the royal tombs of the Chögyal dynasty, known as “red tombs.” Although his parents came from significant families in past history, they were of simple means, which Jigme Lingpa acknowledges as a blessing that allowed him to undertake his religious life without being forced into social obligations or aristocratic pomp. From childhood he remembered his previous incarnations, such as being the great Tertön Sangye Lama (1000–1080?). One of his teeth was marked with the Buddha’s speech syllable ĀḤ, known as the sign of his being the reincarnation of Vimalamitra. Also, as indicated in a prophetic writing, he had thirty small reddish moles in the form of a vajra at his heart, about thirty small reddish moles at his navel in the form of a ritual bell, and lines in the form of a HYA or HRĪḤ letter, the seed letter of the deity Hayagrīva, on his right thumb. From childhood his mind was detached from worldly enjoyments, and he was extraordinarily compassionate, intelligent, and courageous. He acknowledged being the thirteenth incarnation of Gyalse Lhaje, the receiver of the Kadü Chökyi Gyatso teachings from Duru Rinpoche, all of whom were tertöns. Also, in his life lineage prayer, which he wrote for his disciples, Jigme Lingpa mentions many of his past and one of his future lives as he saw them: [1] Samantabhadra, all-pervading lord of saṃsāra and nirvāṇa, the continuum of the basis, the very essence of Buddha nature, [2] Then [the union of] compassion and emptiness arose as Avalokiteshvara, and [3] Prahevajra, to you I pray. [4] Then manifested as the son of King Kṛikrī in the presence of Buddha Kāshyapa, [5] Nanda, the younger brother of the Buddha, [6] Ākarma[ti], a manifestation of [King] Songtsen Gampo, and [7] [King] Trison Detsen, to you I pray. [8] [Mahāsiddha] Virvapa [of India], [9] Princess Pemasal, [10] Gyalse Lhaje, the lord in person, [11] Tri-me Künden [of India], [12] Yarje Ogyen Lingpa [1323–?], [13] Daö Zhönu [1079–1153, of Kagyü] and [14] Trakpa Gyaltsen [1147–1216, of Sakya], to you I pray. [15] Then Longchen Rabjam [1308–1363], the manifestation of the very Mahāpaṇḍita Vimalamitra, [16] Ngari Penchen (1487–1542), [17] Chögyal Phüntsok [16th century, son of Drikung Rinchen Phüntsok], [18] [Changdak] Tashi Tobgyal [1550–1602?], [19] Dzamling Dorje [of Kongpo] and [20] Jigme Linga [1789–1798], to you I pray. [21] After this, through manifestation of Yeshe Dorje [1800–66]. At the age of six, as an ordinary novice he entered Palri (Shrīparvata) Monastery in Chongye Valley, the seat of Trangpo Terchen Sherap Özer (1517–1584). Tsogyal Tülku Ngawang Lobzang Pema gave him the name Pema Khyentse Özer. From the ages of six to thirteen, he spent more time, as he says, “playing dust” with novices of his age than on his studies. He lived the life of a poor novice with little to facilitate learning, and faced very strict disciplinary tutors year after year. However, the intensity of his zeal for the Dharma, his spontaneous devotion to Guru Rinpoche, andhis innate compassion for all living beings, especially toward animals, sustained him and made his childhood extremely joyful and meaningful. Although he seemed an insignificant novice, his inner life was full of richness. His days were filled with meditative attainments and inspiring pure visions. His nights merged into dreams of spiritual experiences and visions. In such circumstances, he mastered grammar, logic, astrology, poetry, history, medicine, and many scriptures of sūtra and tantra. Apart from receiving the transmissions of esoteric empowerments, he felt no need to have a master or study any intellectual subject in detail, as other serious students were doing. He learned various subjects merely by overhearing bits of the classes of other students or glancing at the texts. Many masters became learned by studying and then realized by meditating. Jigme Lingpa was born learned as the result of awakening the wisdom realization in himself. However, the outward manifestation was that his final and full bursting forth of boundless wisdom took place much later, when he had the visions of Longchen Rabjam, at the age of thirty-one. He writes: By nature I felt very happy when I was able to study [any subject, such as] language, secular writings, canonical scriptures and their commentaries, or the Vajra[yāna] teachings on the ultimate nature. I would study them with great respect, both by daylight and lamplight. But I hardly had the opportunity to develop the knowledge by studying with a master, even for a single day. However, at the glorious Samye Chimphu, by beholding the wisdom body of Longchenpa three times, and by receiving the blessings through various signs, my karma [of the “learning-wisdom” was] awakened from [the depth of] the Great Perfection. From Neten Künzang Özer he received his first major transmission, the transmission of Trölthik Gongpa Rangtröl teachings discovered by Trengpo Terchen Sherap Özer (aka Drodül Lingpa), the cycle of Lama Gongdü discovered by Sangye Lingpa (1340–1396), and the Seven Treasures and Three Chariots by Longchen Rabjam (1308–1363). At thirteen, Jigme Lingpa met the great Tertön Rigdzin Thukchok Dorje and instantly experienced a strong devotion that awakened his wisdom mind. From the tertön he received transmissions and instructions on Mahāmudrā and other teachings. Thukchok Dorje became his root teacher, and he received blessings from him in visionseven after the master’s death. Jigme Lingpa also received transmissions from many other masters, including Thekchen LingpaDrotön Tharchin (aka Trime Lingpa, 1700–1776), his uncle Dharmakīrti, the seventh Chakzampa Tendzin Yeshe Lhündrup, Thangdrok Tülku Pema Rigdzin Wangpo of Kongpo, Trati Ngakchang Rigpe Dorje (aka Kong-nyön) of Kongpo, and Mön Dzakar Lama Dargye. At the beginning of his twenty-eighth year, he started a three-year strict retreat at Palri Monastery, with seven vows to be observed for the whole of seven years. These vows show us the importance of perfecting oneself before going out to help others to fulfill the goal of life. His seven vows were as follows: (1) He would neither enter any layperson’s house nor enjoy any entertainment. (2) Even if he were living in the midst of a community, he would abstain from receiving many people (in his cell) or leading any gathering that fostered hatred or attachment. (3) He would not correspond with anyone, neither would any word from outside comein nor any words from inside get out. (4) He would maintain a life of austerity and would refrain from exchanging Dharma teachings for any material gain. (5) He would refrain from any distracting activities, dedicating his efforts only to the ten activities that concern Dharma training. (6) He would live with simple sustenance and not carelessly enjoy any materials offered with faith. (7) He would not perform any of the four actions and would dedicate all activities to liberation from saṃsāra. He concentrated his meditation on the development stage and the perfection stage, based on Trölthik Gongpa Rangtröl. His mindful awareness enabled him to secure his mind from distractions in meditation, even for the duration of the snap of a finger. When he read The Seven Treasures by Longchen Rabjam, they answered all the questions he had about his inner meditative experiences. ...... At twenty-eight, he discovered the extraordinary revelation of the Longchen Nyingthig cycle, the teachings of the Dharmakāya and Guru Rinpoche, as mind ter. In the evening of the twenty-fifth day of the tenth month of the Fire Ox year of the thirteenth Rabjung cycle (1757), he went to bed with an unbearable devotion to Guru Rinpoche in his heart; a stream of tears of sadness continuously wet his face because he was not in Guru Rinpoche’s presence, and unceasing words of prayers kept singing in his breath. He remained in the depth of that meditative experience of clear luminosity (’Od gSal Gyi sNang Ba) for a long time. While being absorbed in that luminous clarity, he experienced flying a long distance through the sky while riding on a white lion. He finally reached a circular path, which he thought to be the circumambulation path of Charung Khashor, now known as Bodhnath Stūpa, an important Buddhist monument of giant structure in Nepal. In the eastern courtyard of the stūpa, he saw the Dharmakāya appearing in the form of a wisdom ḍākinī. She entrusted him with a beautiful wooden casket, saying: For the disciples with pure mind, You are Trisong Detsen. For the disciples with impure mind, You are Senge Repa. This is Samantabhadra’s mind treasure, The symbolic scripts of Rigdzin Padma[sambhava], and The great secret treasures of the ḍākinīs. Signs are over! The ḍākinī vanished. With an experience of great joy, he opened the casket. In it he found five rolls of yellow scrolls with seven crystal beads. At first, the script was illegible, but then it turned into Tibetan script. One of the rolls was the Dug-ngal Rangtröl, the Sādhana of Avalokiteshvara, and another was Nechang Thukkyi Drombu, the prophetic guide of Longchen Nyingthig. Rāhula, one of the protectors of the teachings, appeared before him to pay respect. As he was encouraged by another ḍākinī, Jigme Lingpa swallowed all the yellow scrolls and the crystal beads. Instantly, he had the amazing experience that all the words of the Longchen Nyingthig cycle with their meanings had been awakened in his mind as if they were imprinted there. Even after coming out of that meditative experience, he remained in the realization of intrinsic awareness, the great union of bliss and emptiness. Thus, the Longchen Nyingthig teachings and realization, which were entrusted and concealed in him by Guru Rinpoche many centuries earlier, were awakened, and he became a tertön, the discoverer of the Longchen Nyingthig cycle of teachings. He gradually transcribed the teachings of the Longchen Nyingthig cycle, starting with the Nechang Thukkyi Drombu. He kept all his discovered teachings secret from everyone for seven years, as the time had not yet matured to teach them to others.It was also essential for the tertön to practice the teachings himself first. Although he was maintaining the life of a hidden yogī, respect for and faith in him grew spontaneously in the people around him, and he became a source of benefit for many people, as he had perfected the power of the four actions without needing to work to acquire them. At thirty-one, he started to observe a second three-year retreat at Chimphu near Samye. First he started his retreat in a cave known as Upper Nyang cave. Then he discovered another cave and recognized it as the Sangchen Metok cave or the Lower Nyang cave, where King Trisong Detsen had received the Nyingthig teachings from Nyang and meditated on them. For the rest of his retreat he lived in the Sangchen cave. During his retreat at Chimphu, the highest realization of Dzogpa Chenpo was awakened in Jigme Lingpa, and that awakening was caused by three pure visions of the wisdom body of Longchen Rabjam (1308–1363), the Dharmakāya in pure manifestation. In the Upper Nyang cave he had the first vision, in which he received the blessing of the vajra body of Longchen Rabjam. Jigme Lingpa obtained the transmission of both the words and the meaning of Longchen Rabjam’s teachings. After moving to Sangchen Phuk (the Great Sacred Cave), he had the second and third visions. In the second vision he received the blessing of the speech of Longchen Rabjam, which empowered him to uphold and propagate the profound teachings of Longchen Rabjam as his representative. In the third vision Jigme Lingpa received the blessing of the wisdom mind of Longchen Rabjam, which awakened or transferred the inexpressible power of enlightened intrinsic awareness of Longchen Rabjam to him. Now for Jigme Lingpa, because there was no objective reference point, all the external appearances had become boundless. There was no separate meditation or meditative state to pursue. As there was no subjective designator in his inner mind, all became naturally free and totally open in oneness. He composed Künkhyen Zhallung and some other writings as the true meaning of The Seven Treasures of Longchen Rabjam, which had awakened in his wisdom mind. He expressed his wisdom power in vajra songs to his devoted hermit companions, concerning various situations: The nature of the mind is like openness space, But it is superior, as it possesses the wisdom. Luminous clarity is like the sun and moon, But it is superior, as there are no substances. Intrinsic awareness is like a crystal ball, But it is superior, as there are no obstructions or coverings. And: Son, mind watching mind is Not the awareness of the innate nature. So, in the present mind, without modifications and Waverings, just remain naturally. Son, apprehending [anything] with your recollections Lacks crucial skills of meditation. So, in the natural and fresh state of the intrinsic awareness, Remain without any grasping. Son, people think that [one-pointed] dwelling [of mind] is meditation, But it lacks the union of tranquillity and insight. So, without accepting and rejecting either dwellings or projections of the mind, Let the intrinsic awareness dwell freely without any reference point. And: Son, the rigid, clear and stable visualization Is not [perfect] Mahāyoga. Dissolving the [mind of] grasping at the faces and arms [of the deities], dwell in the vastness, The Great Perfection of the evenness of intrinsic awareness and emptiness. Son, clinging to the experiences of four joys Is not [the perfect] Anuyoga. Having admitted the mind and energy into the central channel, Remain in [the union of] bliss and emptiness, the great freedom from thoughts. . . . Son, mere understanding of the spontaneous accomplishment of the three kāyas, Is not the ultimate Atiyoga. In the nature of vajra-chain insight, Let the falsehood of mental analysis collapse. And: Sicknesses are the brooms sweeping your evil deeds. Seeing the sicknesses as the teachers, pray to them. . . . Sicknesses are coming to you by the kindness of the masters and the Three Jewels. Sicknesses are your accomplishments, so worship them as the deities. Sicknesses are the signs that your bad karmas are being exhausted. Do not look at the face of your sickness, but at the one [the mind] who is sick. Do not place the sicknesses on your mind, but place your naked intrinsic awareness upon your sickness. This is the instruction on sickness arising as the Dharmakāya. The body is inanimate and mind is emptiness. What can cause pain to an inanimate thing or harm to the emptiness? Search for where the sicknesses are coming from, where they go, and where they dwell. Sicknesses are mere sudden projections of your thoughts. When those thoughts disappear, the sicknesses dissolve too. . . . There is not better fuel [than sicknesses] to burn off the bad karmas. Don’t get into entertaining a sad mind or negative views [over the sicknesses], But see them as the signs of the waning of your bad karmas, and rejoice over them. Then he received the transmissions of the Seventeen Nyingthig Tantras, Vima Nyingthig, Lama Yangtig, and some other Nyingma transmissions and teachings from Drubwang Ogyen Palgön (Shrīnatha) of Mindroling Monastery, who was also a distant relative of Jigme Lingpa’s. Earlier he had also received the transmissions of Nyingthig teachings and Longchen Rabjam’s writings from Thangdrokpa and Neten Künzang. However, the absolute and short line of transmission of the ultimate Nyingthig teachings came to him from Longchen Rabjam directly in the three pure visions. When he came out of his retreat, he found that his body had totally exhausted its strength, because of scarcity of food and lack of proper clothing during years of cave living. He writes: Because of having little food and being exposed to a harsh environment, all the residues of bad karmas and karmic debts of my previous successive lives had started to ripen upon my body. Because of the humors of air [rlung], my back hurt as if someone were hitting me with a rock. As a result of the stirring up of air and blood circulation, my chest was in pain, as if someone were driving nails into my body. Because of bam ailment [elephantiasis], my body was too heavy for my legs to hold up. Like a hundred-year-old man, I had worn out all my physical energies. I didn’t have much appetite for food. . . . If I took three steps, my body would start shaking. [But I thought, ] “If I die, I will be fulfilling the advice given by the early masters, which says: ‘Entrust your mind to Dharma. Entrust your Dharma practice to the life of a beggar.’” As I had attained confidence in the realization of Dzogpa Chenpo, no thought of worry was even a possibility in my mind, but it aroused in me a great compassion for those who are [suffering from] old age and sicknesses. Then he had a pure vision of Thangtong Gyalpo, a sage of longevity, and for Jigme Lingpa all the happenings merged into the union of bliss and emptiness. Thereupon, he sang the power of his realization in the following words: I bow to the lord, the Great Sage [Thangtong Gyalpo]! I have realized the summit of the views, the Dzogpa Chenpo. There is nothing on which to meditate, as all is liberated as the view. I have unfurled the banner of meditation, the king of activities. Now I, the beggar, have no repentance, even if I die. . . . I, the beggar, who knows “how to turn sicknesses into the path,” Visualizing the lama, the source of the virtues, At the blissful chakra of my head, I meditate on the profound path of Guru Yoga. Since sicknesses and pain are the brooms for sweeping the evil karmas, By realizing sicknesses as the blessing of the master, I meditate on the sicknesses as the lama and receive the fourfold empowerments from them. Finally, by realizing the lama as my own mind, I release [all] into the true nature of the mind, which is primordially pure and free from any reference points. He realized the face of the ultimate Samantabhadra, the Dharmakāya, and all the sicknesses dissolved into the ultimate sphere. Quickly, his physical body also gained strength without any more pain or obstructions. Then the time for revealing the Longchen Nyingthig teachings to the disciples arrived, after seven years of secrecy. Although no one had a clue of the discovery of Longchen Nyingthig, his teacherdisciple Kong-nyön Bepe Naljor, because of his clairvoyance, beseeched Jigme Lingpa to transmit his mind ter teachings. As an auspicious sign, he also received requests to reveal the teachings with offerings from three important tülkus from Southern Tibet. On the tenth day of the sixth month of the Wood Monkey year (1765), for the first time Jigme Lingpa conferred the empowerments and explanations of the Longchen Nyingthig cycle on fifteen disciples. Gradually but swiftly, the Longchen Nyingthig teachings reached every comer of the Nyingma world, and they became the heart core of meditation instructions for many realized meditators and for ceremonial liturgies to this day. ...... At seventy, he returned to Tsering Jong from Drikung, stopping at a great number of holy places on the way and performing ceremonies, making offerings, and giving teachings. His health appeared good, but cared little about eating or sleeping. Day and night, he remained sitting up in either the Vairochana posture or the sage posture. His eyes didn’t blink. He said that his body remained alive owing to his control over his life-force energy. Many times, he gave hints that he would die before long. But when his disciples became overwhelmed with grief, he would change the subject or sometimes would even say: “Oh, there will be no danger to my life.” He told a close disciple in private that he was dying and that he would reincarnate, but there was no need to search for his new incarnation. They should hold a simpler funeral ceremony, but he hinted that they should preserve the body by explaining the ways that it is done. When his disciples expressed their wish to bring a doctor, he would say, “Yes! If you wish, you can bring one; but as there is no sickness in me, what is there for a doctor to do? Anyway, don’t get one from a far distance; it will only cause hardship for people and animals.” Still, in a quiet way, he kept seeing people and giving blessings and teachings as requested. For days there was a rain of flowers around his residence and mild earthquakes again and again. One day he moved to Namtröl Tse, the new upper hermitage, and expressed his great joy at being there. He entertained some visitors and gave teachings. On the very next day, the third day of the ninth month of the Earth Horse year (1798), he gave a teaching on White Tārā meditation. From early morning a strong, sweet fragrance filled the whole hermitage. The sky was totally clear and there was no touch of wind, but a gentle rain sprinkled continuously from the blue sky. All were amazed but worried. Then, in the early part of the night, he asked for new offerings to be arranged on the altar. As he sat in the sage posture, all expressions of his manifestation merged into the primordial nature. His disciples discovered two different testaments, hidden at different places. They included meditative teachings to his disiciples and instructions about his funeral ceremony and reincarnation. One of them included the following lines: I am always in the state of ultimate nature; For me there is no staying or going. The display of birth and death is mere relativity. I am enlightened in the great primordial liberation! After months of ceremonies at Tsering Jong and at many monasteries and temples in Central and Eastern Tibet and Bhutan, his body was placed in a small golden stūpa in Tsering Jong hermitage, and it was preserved there until Tsering Jong nunnery was destroyed a couple of decades ago. After his death, his well-known incarnations included: Do Khyentse Yeshe Dorje (1800–1866), known as his body incarnation; Paltrül Rinpoche (1808–1887), the speech incarnation; and Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo (1820–1892), the mind incarnation. Jigme Lingpa produced nine volumes of written treatises and discovered ter texts. The prominent ones among them are Longchen Nyingthig, a collection of meditation instructions and ritual texts in two (or three) volumes, which were discovered as ter teachings; Phurba Gyüluk, one volume of liturgy on Vajrakīla, considered as both ter and canonical; Yönten Rinpoche Dzö with its two-volume autocommentary, his most famous scholarly work; and Yeshe Lama, which has become the most comprehensive manual of Dzogpa Chenpo meditation in the Nyingma tradition. The Longchen Nyingthig remained as an important ter tradition, and with his scholarly writings, Jigme Lingpa’s lineage became one of the most popular subschools of the Nyingma school till the present. In the Longchen Nyingthig lineage, all the disciples and grand disciples were equally great adepts, as Jigme Lingpa himself prophesied: In the lineage of my Nyingthig of Luminous Clarity, there will come children [disciples] who are greater than their fathers and grandchildren who are greater than their grandparents. *Above Contents from Masters of Meditation and Miracles: Lives of the Great Buddhist Masters of India and Tibet by Tulku Thondup (1999).

JIGME Gyalwe Nyuku was a great meditator, bodhisattva, and adept. He was one of the two masters who were responsible for the spread of Longchen Nyingthig teachings all over Tibet, especially in Eastern Tibet. In his youth he was known as Pema Kunzang and later as Jigme Gyalwe Nyuku, the Fearless Son of the Victorious One (Buddha). Gyalwe Nyuku was born in the Wood Bird year of the thirteenth Rabjung (1765) in the Getse nomadic group of Dzachukha Valley. His father was Ogyen Tashi of the Mange tribe of the Dong lineage, and his mother was Tashi Kyi of the Awö tribe. Dzachukha is the valley around the source of the Dza (Nyak Ch’u/Yalung) River. Gyalwe Nyuku was the second of nine children. From childhood he never had any interest in worldly enjoyments. In the spring, whenever he saw rainclouds floating in the sky and heard the sound of gentlethunder, he experienced an unbearable urge to go to a solitary place atop a high mountain and devote himself to Dharma meditation. Everybody in his family just wanted him to be a good householder, with the exception of his mother, who was very religious and who tried to support him in his Dharma aspirations. At twelve he got the chance to learn to read. At fourteen he made a pilgrimage to Lhasa, Samye, and many other places and returned safely. At fifteen he received instructions on Dzogpa Chenpo and on Tsasum Sangwa Nyingthig from Getse Lama Rigdzin Gyatso (?– 1816). The lama told him, “What you need in order to perfect your meditation on the nature of the mind is only to maintain what you have already realized.” He had amazing visions and was able to foresee many events that took place later. At sixteen he was obliged to join his elder brother on his business trips. During these travels he was overcome with a strong revulsion for the lying and cursing practiced by laypeople. At seventeen he took his mother on a pilgrimage to Lhasa with some friends. While they were in Central Tibet, he and a friend tried to run away to practice Dharma, but friends caught them and brought them back to Kham. At eighteen he did a hundred-day meditation retreat. At nineteen, his elder brother died. This, more than any other single event, turned his mind resolutely toward Dharma, but Lobzang Chökyong, the chieftain of the Getse tribal group, and his relatives started to put great pressure on him to get married and to take care of the family. Yet he yielded not an inch in his determination to leave the householder’s life. Since there was no way to devote himself to a life of Dharma if he stayed in Kham, he ran away to Central Tibet with a friend named Rigdzin, a Dharma meditator from the Barchung tribal group. He had managed to take a silver brick for their expenses. Traveling through Chabdo, Drikung, Gaden, Yamalung, and Samye, they reached Lhasa. Gyalwe Nyuku was not only endowed with spiritual wisdom, but was also very intelligent and practical. His friend Rigdzin was very trusting and spiritual but impractical and didn’t have much ability evento collect wood for fuel in the mountains. In Lhasa a thief in monk’s garb learned that they wanted to exchange the silver brick for money. One day when Gyalwe Nyuku was away, the thief came to Rigdzin and offered to change the silver brick into coins at the rate they wanted. Rigdzin handed over the silver, and the thief vanished. Thus, except for some donations that people gave them, they had nothing to live on. Instead of scolding his friend, Gyalwe Nyuku consoled him, saying, “We lost the silver because we didn’t have the merits to own and use it.” After passing through Drak Yangdzong, they reached Samye. There they met the first Dodrupchen, whom Rigdzin had known in Kham. Dodrupchen advised them: You are young children of rich families. . . . You could meditate at Chimphu with me, as I am going there, but before doing meditation you must receive proper instructions. There is a lama who knows all without any obscuration, and also he gives teachings according to the needs of the disciples without depending on whether or not they have material offerings. He is my lama, Khyentse Rinpoche [Jigme Lingpa]. I will send you to him with a letter. By happy. Following Dodrupchen’s advice, they went to Tsering Jong and saw Jigme Lingpa. Gyalwe Nyuku writes that when he saw Jigme Lingpa, for a while all the feelings of this life dissolved and he experienced joy as if he had attained the path of insight. Then for fifteen days they received the empowerment of Rigdzin Düpa, the lung of Yönten Dzö, and detailed instructions on meditation on Dzogpa Chenpo according to the maturity of their minds (sMin Khrid). Then they returned to Dodrupchen at Samye. After a brief pilgrimage, they went to Tsang to see the famed Gomchen Kuzhap, Rigdzin Pema She-nyen. On the way, although they didn’t know how to swim, they put Rigdzin between Dodrupchen and Gyalwe Nyuku and crossed the Kyichu River. Gyalwe Nyuku thought later that they had succeeded only by the blessing of the Triple Jewel. In Tsang theyreceived many Changter transmissions from Pema She-nyen and Chö transmissions from Drupchen Thupten Tendzin. Then Dodrupchen was planning to leave for Lhasa alone to meet his friend and return to Kham. Gyalwe Nyuku insisted on accompanying him as far as Lhasa. On the way Dodrupchen got seriously ill, but he accepted his illness with great joy, and this greatly inspired Gyalwe Nyuku. From Lhasa Gyalwe Nyuku went to Dorje Trak Monastery to join Pema She-nyen, who was giving transmissions of Rigdzin Chenmo. Then they returned to Tsang. After completing a retreat of two years and nine months, Gyalwe Nyuku and Rigdzin returned to Lhasa. At Trak Yerpa, Gyalwe Nyuku met a lama with ragged, patched clothes. The mere sight of that lama aroused a strong faith in him, as if he were seeing Guru Rinpoche in person. The lama gave him clarifications on his meditation and prophesied that in the early part of his life Gyalwe Nyuku would not stay at one place but that in the latter part of his life he would have no wish to leave a valley that faces southeast, and there he would accomplish the goals for himself and others. Gyalwe Nyuku went to Tsering Jong and received many transmissions and instructions from Jigme Lingpa. According to the advice of Jigme Lingpa, after receiving the Yumka empowerment he undertook the difficult journey to the sacred mountain of Tsāri. On the way he meditated at many sacred places for a week or more. As he had given his shoes to a beggar long before, when he got close to Tsāri he had to walk barefoot, even in snow. His feet became hard and deformed, so that when some children saw his footprints on the path they turned back, fearing that they were the footprints of a monster. In such circumstances of hardship, he went to circumambulate Tsāri Mountain, which takes many days. At one place, sacrificing his own safety, he saved the lives of some people who were being buried under snow in the course of their circumambulation. Instead of much pain or sorrow, he continuously experienced all appearances as the Sambhogakāya, the Buddha bodies of light and rays, which appear naturally without dualistic concepts. For nine months he meditated in total seclusion in Tsāri. At the beginning he ate a little tsampa three times a day with a soup made from the bark of a tree. After some time, he ate tsampa once a day. Then all the tsampa was exhausted, and he boiled the old tormas, or dried offering cakes, that he had offered earlier and drank the soup of it once a day. When that also was exhausted, there was nothing to eat. After some time, he was able to see sunlight even through the joints of his bones. He boiled some nettles and drank the liquid, but it injured his throat. Then he found an old hip bone of a lamb. He boiled it and drank the soup, which brought some calm to his system. After completing his nine-month retreat, he was ready to leave. Relying on the support of a walking stick by grasping it with both hands, he started to leave the cave. At every step he felt that he was about to lose consciousness and fall down. He couldn’t straighten his body, as he felt that his intestines were stuck to his spine. His neck was very long, and the joints of his neck and spine were easy to count. Drinking a cup of water would help him to walk a few more steps, but then the water caused him great trouble when he urinated. After walking this way for four days, he finally met some people who gave him food, and slowly he started to regain his health without any complications. After traveling for many days, he reached Jigme Lingpa and received a brief blessing. Then he went to the hermitage of Ogyen Ling for a six-month retreat, during which he had many experiences and visions. One day he went out into the sunlight. He looked at the sky in the direction of his teacher, and a strong remembrance of his root master, Jigme Lingpa, and other teachers arose in his mind. He prayed to them with strong devotion. He experienced a revulsion toward saṃsāra stronger than he had ever felt before. For many sessions of practice he kept crying. Then, thinking this experience might be an obstruction, he contemplated the ultimate nature. For a while it was as if he had become unconscious. When he awakened, he found that there was nothing to view or meditate upon, as all the apprehensions of doing meditation had dissolved. Before he had had a subtle point of reference for his view and meditation, but now everything was gone. Then Gyalwe Nyuku got a message from Dodrupchen to come to meet him at Tsering Jong, where he had just returned. Gyalwe Nyuku rushed to Tsering Jong and saw both Jigme Lingpa and Dodrupchen. He offered a detailed account of his meditative experience, in which he felt that there was no meditator who apprehended any meditation. Jigme Lingpa was pleased and he said: That is right! Realization [of the ultimate nature] has to come through one of the four different ways. Some devotional, diligent, compassionate, and wise meditators realize it when they receive the “bestowal of wisdom” in an empowerment. Some realize it when they receive the “attainment of accomplishments,” when they have perfected the meditation and recitation of a sādhana of the yidam. Some realize it by transferring the realization of the lama to themselves by developing a strong faith in the lama, by seeing the lama as the actual Buddha. Some realize it when they successfully pacify the shaking-up disturbances that arise owing to the influence of negative forces in sacred or haunted places such as cemeteries. Now you have realized the ultimate nature through both the blessing of the lama and the accomplishment of the yidam. So from now on, as Lord Tampa [Sangye] Rinpoche says: When I am sleeping alone hidden, I remain in the naked intrinsic awareness. When I am in the midst of many people, I look at [the face of] whatever arises. Let nirvāṇa be attained in the primordial state, without entrapping the realized intrinsic awareness, which is [the union of] openness and clarity arisen from its primordial state, in the nets of elaborations of characteristics. At that time, Jigme Lingpa was experiencing an eye problem, and Gyalwe Nyuku was sent to get a doctor. The doctor performed a successful operation on Jigme Lingpa’s eyes. At Dodrupchen’s insistence, Gyalwe Nyuku agreed to return to Kham with him. Gyalwe Nyuku’s mother was sick but expressed happiness about Gyalwe Nyuku’s dedication to Dharma. She said, “If you can succeed in your Dharma practice, there is no need to worry about me.” After getting permission from Dodrupchen, Gyalwe Nyuku did a recitation retreat at Barchung Latrang. That was in 1793. Gyalwe Nyuku next went to Dodrupchen’s camp at Mamö Do in Dzachukha, but Dodrupchen had gone to the Dege Palace. He did a hundred days’ retreat in a cave near the camp and had many spiritual experiences and visions. After the retreat, when he saw Dodrupchen, who had returned from the Dege Palace, Dodrupchen said, “In a dream I saw myself on a high mountain leading along a small herd, and then I saw you down below, bringing up numerous animals. So you will benefit a greater number of beings than I will.” For a while, Gyalwe Nyuku served Dodrupchen, who was teaching around Dzachukha. Then Dodrupchen left for Amdo and Mongolia in order to go to Wu Tai Shan, and sent Gyalwe Nyuku and Dodrupchen’s nephew, Jigme Changchup, to Dzogchen Monastery. Gyalwe Nyuku did retreat in Tsering Phuk, near Dzogchen Monastery, where Dodrupchen had once done his own retreat. Soon after the retreat, he traveled to Central Tibet to see Jigme Lingpa once more. At Tsering Jong, he experienced the great joy of seeing once more the omniscient Jigme Lingpa, who now no longer had any eye problems. He also met Gyalse, the young son of Jigme Lingpa. He received profound teachings for two and a half months. Jigme Lingpa told him, “Before, I wasn’t aware that you were so intelligent. . . . If you stay with me for three years, I will make you a special person.” Gyalwe Nyuku explained frankly that he had to go back home because of obligations to his friends. Jigme Lingpa replied: That is fine. Trustworthiness is the quality of a supreme friend. In fact, for practicing true Dharma, there is no need to know many things. Information does not necessarily benefit the mind. Agood attitude benefits the mind. Nevertheless, you have sufficient wisdom in learning, analyzing, and meditation to be independent. There is no need to depend on monastic structures. You must try to meditate in caves or huts, where no negative circumstances will arise. If people come to you for teachings, instruct them with confidence. As your attitude is as excellent as pure gold, you will be helpful to others. Then Gyalwe Nyuku returned to Kham. He did many years’ retreat around Dzogchen and a three-year retreat at Getse in Dzachukha. In 1799, he went to Shukchen Tago to help Dodrupchen build his new gompa. With Dodrupchen he went to King Tsewang Lhündrup (?–1825) of Tsakho at Phüntsok Palace, to the king of Choktse, and to many places in Dzika Valley to help Dodrupchen with his teaching and raising funds for building the gompa. Later Gyalwe Nyuku visited Phüntsok Palace by himself. The king asked him to stay as the head of either Chupho Gompa or Namgyal Teng Gompa, but he refused. Gyalwe Nyuku wanted to go to Nakshö Sinmo Dzong to stay, but at the insistence of Dodrupchen he promised not to go anyplace farther than five or six days’ journey. At Lhalung Khuk he attended the enthronement of Do Khyentse and saw Dodrupchen. Inspired by Gyalwe Nyuku, the queen-regent of Dege wished him to remain at Dege Palace, but thanks to Dodrupchen’s skillful intervention he was able to avoid this obligation. In 1804, at the age of forty, Gyalwe Nyuku settled at Trama Lung, the Valley of Dry Twigs, in Dzachukha. After some time, he received a message from Dodrupchen that the queen-regent of Dege wanted him to come to the Dege palace. He wrote to Dodrupchen for help, Dodrupchen obtained release from her order for him. As a subject of the queen-regent, Gyalwe Nyuku had to be diplomatic. At Trama Lung, with a few hermits Gyalwe Nyuku lived meditating and teaching for over twenty years, and he became known as Dza Trama Lama, after the name of the place. During that time, he didn’t go into total seclusion as many retreatants usually do, but taught andgave empowerments at Trama Lung and nearby places to meditators, monks, and the lay population. In 1812 he had many experiences, such as turning the whole of phenomena into a ball of blue light and then merging it into himself, upon which his body melted into a phenomenon that appeared but was not apprehensible, and then came back together again as his body. He received empowerments from Kathok Getse Mahāpaṇḍita, who visited his hermitage. In 1814 at Norbu Ri Gompa he gave teachings to Do Khyentse, the reincarnation of his teacher, and many others. Do Khyentse vowed to recite the Avalokiteshvara mantra one hundred million times. In 1815 Do Khyentse was passing through Dzachukha on his second and last visit to Central Tibet, and Gyalwe Nyuku went to see him off. Afterward he went to Gyarong Monastery to receive a longlife empowerment from the master Namkha Tsewang Chokdrup (1744–?). He was also visited by Jigme Kalzang, the regent of Dodrupchen, and received empowerments from him. Around this time, one of his two main teachers in Kham, Getse Lama Rigdzin Gyatso, died. In 1816 Gyalwe Nyuku went to welcome Do Khyentse, who was returning from his visit to Central Tibet. He saw both Do Khyentse and Dzogchen Rinpoche and received empowerments from them. In 1817/18, after receiving a message from Dodrupchen to come to see him, he went with about ten monks to Yarlung Pemakö in Ser Valley. The Dharma father and son (or brothers) had a joyful reunion. Gyalwe Nyuku and his companions received all the teachings and empowerments they wished. Responding to Gyalwe Nyuku’s request, Dodrupchen gave a prophecy with a detailed description of a place where Gyalwe Nyuku should have his main residence. It said: In the West of the five-peaked Dagyal [Dzagya] Lhünpo, a solitary site, There is a place like a flower blooming. The mountain behind is like a great meditator in contemplation. The mountain in front is like a vessel being held up. The mountain at the right is like [a roll of] cloth unfurled in the sky. . . . Falling water sings vowels and consonants. The land is colorful with vegetation and flowers. Arrange to live in that excellent place. As soon as Gyalwe Nyuku returned to Dzachukha, he moved to Gyagö Photrang, the place endowed with the characteristics prophesied by Dodrupchen. There he stayed for over ten years. One night, Gyalwe Nyuku had a dream of peaceful and wrathful deities in the sky, and a ḍākinī was telling him that this was the time for him to leave. Then four beautifully ornamented ḍākinīs of four different colors lifted him and the first ḍākinī into the sky on an unfurled roll of silk. But at that moment he saw Dodrupchen coming down from the sky, telling the ḍākinīs to take him back, as this was not his time to leave, so they brought him back. Then the Buddhas dissolved into him, and he woke up from his sleep. Even when awake during the daytime, he kept having various experiences. For example, he saw all appearances turning into peaceful and wrathful deities; they merged into him; his body burst into a phenomenon that appeared but was not apprehensible; or sometimes everything became total emptiness. One night, in a dream he was led by a ḍākinī into an amazing palace. In it he sat between Jigme Lingpa and Dodrupchen. He was so happy that he requested them to let him stay, but they said, “No, you are only a visitor. This is not your time to come. Without being discouraged by the people of the dark age, maintain your two bodhichitta vows. Fill your life with the wheel of Dharma activities. There is no separation between us and you.” In 1820, at Dzogchen Monastery, he received many empowerments from the fourth Dzogchen Rinpoche. He also gave teachings to Dzogchen Rinpoche and others. On the seventeenth of the eighth month of the Iron Snake year (1821), Do Khyentse, who was visiting another part of Dzachukha, told his followers that he had received a prophecy that he would be leaving his body on the twenty-fifth of the same month. Only oneperson, who belonged to the Lotus family and was named Pema, could avert it. Do Khyentse said that that person was Gyalwe Nyuku. As soon as Gyalwe Nyuku heard these words, he traveled all night to get to Do Khyentse, who was in good health. With about fifty monks, he started to arrange a ceremony. On the twenty-fourth, Do Khyenste suddenly got sick. All night Gyalwe Nyuku performed the Sündok ceremony of Yumka Dechen Gyalmo. Do Khyentse was dying and people were crying. With strongest devotion, deepest meditation, and boldest prayers Gyalwe Nyuku did the best that he could, and finally signs of the clearing of obstructions appeared in the ceremonial rites, and instantly Do Khyentse showed signs of reviving. In 1821 Gyalwe Nyuku attended the funeral ceremony of the third Pönlop (1806–1821?) at Dzogchen and dispelled the life obstructions of the fourth Dzogchen Rinpoche and gave him teachings. In 1830 he moved his residence from Gyagö Photrang to Dzagyal Dünlung. Gyagö Photrang was a very beneficial place for him, an auspicious place where he and his disciples achieved great meditative accomplishments, but now, because of a change in climate, the ground had become wet and it was unhealthy to live there any longer. In 1833 Gyalse Zhenphen Thaye came to receive more teachings from him. In 1834 Gyalwe Nyuku gave the transmissions of Longchen Nyingthig to the second Dodrupchen (1824–1863/64) and empowered him as the supreme vajracharya. He ends his autobiography at the age of seventy-four (1838). At the age of seventy-nine, on the twenty-fifth day of the first of the month of the Water Hare year (1843), he passed away. The fourth Dzogchen Rinpoche, in a pure vision, received Gyalwe Nyuku’s testament. His physical remains were preserved at Dzagya Monastery in Dzachukha. As advised by Jigme Lingpa, Gyalwe Nyuku devoted the entire latter part of his life to teaching whoever came to listen to him, giving empowerments or meditation instructions to all who were devout and sincere in meditation. For example, Paltrül Rinpoche received teachings on the Ngöndro of Longchen Nyingthig twenty-five times from him. Paltrül Rinpoche wrote down Gyalwe Nyuku’s teachingson the Ngöndro as the Künzang La-me Zhalung. His tülku was Künzang Dechen Dorje, who was recognized by the fourth Dzogchen Rinpoche. *Above Contents from Masters of Meditation and Miracles: Lives of the Great Buddhist Masters of India and Tibet by Tulku Thondup (1999).

PALTRÜL RINPOCHE Ogyen Jigme Chökyi Wangpo is the speech incarnation of Jigme Lingpa. He was one of the great Nyingma teachers and writers, whose life and writings are cited even by scholars of other schools. Although he was one of the greatest scholars and adepts of the Nyingma school, he lived as a most humble and simple hermit. He spoke directly and loudly, but every word of his was the word of truth, wisdom, and caring. He was born in the Getse Kongma tribe of the Mukpo Dong lineage at Karchung Ko-ö in Dzachukha Valley in the Earth Dragon year of the fourteenth Rabjung (1808). His father was Lhawang of the Gyalthok group, and his mother was Dolma of the Tromza group. Soon after his birth, he tried to say OM . . ., but it wasn’t clear. But on the fifth day he said OṂ MAṆI PADME HŪṂ, very clearly. Also, the letters of the mantra OṂ MAṆI PADME HŪṂ were visible on his neck, as was a HRĪḤ letter on his tongue. Although he was a tülku of Jigme Lingpa, officially he was recognized as the tülku of Palge Samten Phüntsok by Dola Jigme Kalzang. Confirming the recognition, the first Dodrupchen said to Jigme Kalzang: “I am bestowing the mind entrustment and aspirational transmission of the complete Longchen Nyingthig teachings upon him with the name Ogyen Jigme Chökyi Wangpo.” Soon, Palge Könchok, a nephew of the last Palge, brought Paltrül Rinpoche to Palge Latrang, the residence of the last Palge. Paltrül studied sūtric and tantric teachings with many teachers, including Dola Jigme Kalzang, Jigme Ngotsar, Gyalse Zhenphen Thaye, Sönam Palge, and Zhechen Thutop Namgyal. Sengtruk Pema Tashi of Dzogchen Monastery ordained him as a monk. However, his root teachers were Jigme Gyalwe Nyuku and Do Khyentse. With Jigme Gyalwe Nyuku he studied from the ngöndro, the preliminary training, up to the teachings on tsalung and Dzogpa Chenpo. From Gyalwe Nyuku, he received Longchen Nyingthig ngöndro teachings twenty-five times, and undertook as many trainings on them. Later he wrote down the words of his teacher on the ngöndro as the famous text, Künzang Lame Zhalung (Words from the Mouth of the Samantabhadra Lama). One day Do Khyentse, who was wandering while performing esoteric exercises, suddenly showed up outside Paltrül’s tent. Do Khyentse shouted, “O Palge! If you are brave, come out!” When Paltrül respectfully came out, Do Khyentse grabbed him by his hair, threw him on the ground, and dragged him around. At that moment, Paltrül smelled alcohol on Do Khyentse’s breath and thought, “The Buddha expounded on the dangers of alcohol, yet even a great adept like him could get drunk like this.” At that instant, Do Khyentse freed Paltrül from his grip and shouted, “Alas, that you intellectual people could have such evil thoughts! You Old Dog!” Do Khyentse spat in his face, showed him his little finger (an insulting gesture), and departed. Paltrül realized, “Oh, I am deluded. He was performing an esoteric exercise to introduce me to my enlightened nature.” Paltrül was torn by two conflicting feelings: shock over his own negative thoughts and amazement at Do Khyentse’s clairvoyance. Sitting up, he immediately meditated on the enlightened nature of his mind, and a clear, skylike, open, intrinsic awareness awakened in him. Thereupon, clear and total realization like a rising sun awakened in him, over the dawnlike realization that he already had as the result of the introduction he had received from Gyalwe Nyuku. Since then, he jokingly kept “Old Dog” as his esoteric or sacred name. When Paltrül was about twenty, Palge Könchok, the chief administrator of Palge Latrang, died and Paltrül closed the residence of Palge and started to live as a wandering hermit. At Dzogchen Monastery he received the Nyingthig Yabzhi and Longchen Nyingthig transmissions from the fourth Dzogchen Rinpoche and Gyalse Zhenphen Thaye. Then he meditated in long retreats at Shinje cave and Tsering cave near Dzogchen Monastery,where once Dodrupchen had done his years-long retreat. Around 1851, from the great scholar Gyawa Do-ngak Gyatso, a disciple of both Paltrül and Zhapkar Tsoktruk Rangtröl (1781–1851), Paltrül heard the details of Zhapkar’s highly inspiring life. When he reached Golok on his way to see Zhapkar, he heard the sad news that Zhapkar had just died. He turned back and came to Yarlung Pemakö, the seat of Dodrupchen. At Yarlung, he joined Gyalse Zhenphen Thaye (1800–?), who was living there as the regent of the late Dodrupchen and was starting a forty-five-day annual teaching and practice of the Guhyagarbha-māyājāla-tantra. Paltrül received teachings on the Guhyagarbha-tantra from Gyalse and acted as his teaching assistant for the first year. Then he himself presided over the annual teachings for two more years. He went around Ser, Do, Mar, and Dzika valleys and numerous times gave teachings on the Bodhicharyāvatāra and inspired the whole population to recite OṂ MAṆI PADME HŪṂ. In those areas, he succeeded to a great extent in abolishing the system of serving meat to the lamas when they came to perform ritual services. He proclaimed rules against stealing and hunting. He brought Buddhism into everybody’s life and into every home, so that it was not limited to monks or the monasteries and gompas. He visited Shukchung Monastery, and then for a long time he stayed at Shukchen Tago, the formal residence of the first Dodrupchen. Although Dodru chen had abandoned it about half a century before, it still was functioning as a hermitage. Here he recited the Kanjur three times and memorized many sūtras. Then he lived at the foot of a tree at Ari Nak (aka Dhichung Phuk) for a long time. It was an elevated open field in the middle of a thick forest. No one ever went there, and the only people one might see occasionally were the travelers on the other side of the Do Valley, about a half mile’s distance across the Do River. Ari Forest is situated on the bank of the Do River halfway between Shukchen Tago and the present Dodrupchen Monastery. First, Paltrül and Nyoshül Lungtok, who lived around Paltrül and studied with him for twenty-eight years, stayed alone at Ari Forest for six months. A small bag of tsampa for food, the clothes on their backs, and a couple of books were their only possessions. At midday they would get together and eat a little tsampa. Then they would tie the tsampa bag to a tree and leave it till the next day. After that, Paltrül would give teachings on a couple of verses of the Bodhicharyāvatāra to Lungtok. Then, wearing the white rag that was his only garment, with a cane in his hand Paltrül would disappear into the woods, loudly uttering, Ha! Ha! Ha! as a meditation exercise. The next day at midday, they would get together again and do the same thing. Soon, many disciples arrived at Ari Forest, and Paltrül started to teach Semnyi Ngalso and Yönten Dzö and other teachings. Paltrül Rinpoche would give teachings, and then the disciples would meditate on them in the forest. As they weren’t paying much attention to their living arrangements, they had very little to eat. Although it was a thick forest, there was no edible vegetation. The tea that they drank was strong and tasty when they first made it with fresh tea leaves; but later they would add more and more water to the old tea, so that it had less and less taste and color. They joked about the different strengths of tea, calling it the “three-kāya tea.” Strong tea was the tea of the elaborate Nirmāṇakāya, weak tea was the tea of the simple Sambhogakāya, and tasteless tea was the tea of the emptiness Dharmakāya. Paltrül saw that property and desirable conditions, such as having plenty of food, good clothing, comfortable dwellings, and compliments and fame are more hindrance than support in spiritual progress. He wrote: Suffering is good and happiness is not good. Happiness enflames the five poisons of passion. Suffering exhausts the bad karmas accumulated in the past. Suffering is the grace of the lama. Criticism is good and compliments are not good. If I am complimented, I will be inflated with arrogance. If I am criticized, my faults will be exposed. . . . Poverty is good and prosperity is not good. Prosperity causes the great pains of earning more and preserving it. Poverty causes dedication and accomplishment of divine Dharma. Next Paltrül went to Dzamthang Monastery, a great center of Jonang studies. There he gave lectures on Uttaratantra based on Künkhyen Dolpo’s interpretations. In Minyak he met Dra Geshe Tsültrim Namgyal, a great Geluk scholar, who was amazed at Paltrül’s scholarship. At Gyaphak Monastery, he gave empowerments and teachings of the complete Longchen Nyingthig, which he gave very rarely. In Golok, he tamed wild robbers and cruel hunters with the power of his presence and words of reason. In Marung he taught people to repeat the words of compassion, OṂ MAṆI PADME HŪṂ, for they didn’t even know how to say it. Then he returned to the Ari Forest of Do Valley and stayed there for some time. In 1856/57 Paltrül heard that Do Khyentse had arrived in the Yutse Mountains of Golok from Tartsedo. Paltrül went there, a distance of many days’ travel, to see Do Khyentse. Paltrül requested Do Khyentse to give him an empowerment of Yumka Dechen Gyalmo of Longchen Nyingthig. Do Khyentse said, “I have been keeping it secret for many years, but now I will confer it upon you,” and with great joy he transmitted it to Paltrül. Among the many prophecies given by Do Khyentse was one that Paltrül would live till the age of eighty. Then Do Khyentse, the second Dodrupchen, and Paltrül performed a sang ceremony together, which became a sign that they would be reborn as siblings. Paltrül returned to the Do Valley and gave teachings on the Bodhicharyāvatāra at many places. After living for about ten years around the Do and Ser valleys, around the seats of Dodrupchen, Paltrül returned to Dzogchen Monastery. At Padme Thang, Nakchung hermitages, and Shrīsiṃha college of Dzogchen Monastery, he taught the Bodhicharyāvatara, Abhisamayālaṃkāra, Madhyamakāvatāra, Mahāyānasūtrālaṃkāra, Abhidharmakosha, Guhyagarbhamāyājāla, Yönten Dzö, Domsum Namnge, and many other texts for a number of years. He went to Kathok on pilgrimage and gave teachings on the Bodhicharyāvatāra. He received Tertön Chogyur Lingpa at Dzogchen Monastery and received transmissions. Finally, he returned to Dzachukha, his home region. He visited almost every monastery and hermitage in Dzachukha Valley, especially Gekong and Changma hermitages, and taught the Bodhicharyāvatāra and other texts of Mahāyāna philosophy. But for most of the latter part of his life he lived around Dzagya Gön, the seat of his root teacher Gyalwe Nyuku, where Gyalwe Nyuku’s remains are enshrined in a reliquary. At Dzagya, he established a three-month annual Bodhicharyāvatāra teaching and practice, and a one-week teaching and practice on the Pure Land of Amitābha, the Buddha of Infinite Light. Whenever he entered the shrine where the remains of his teacher are preserved in a reliquary, he would always say the following aspirations loudly: In all our successive lives, may we never be influenced by any evil friends. In all our successive lives, may we never violate even a single hair of others. In all our successive lives, may we never be separated from the light of holy Dharma. [Followed by a verse from the scriptures:] Whoever receives teachings from me, and Even sees me, hears me, thinks of me, or relates to me in conversations, May the door of his rebirth in inferior realms be sealed, And may he take rebirth in the Potala Supreme Pure Land. At Mamö Do in Dhachukha he dedicated many years of effort to expanding a famous Dobum, an amazingly huge complex of walls of stones, and on each stone OṂ MAṆI PADME HŪṂ is carved many times. This wall was started by Paltrül’s predecessor. For the first time he started to accept all the offerings he was given and used every piece of butter as the pay for the people who were hired to carve the prayers. When the stone wall was completed, he sent a messenger to request Khyentse Wangpo to consecrate it. On that particular day, blessing grains of consecration, thrown by Khyentse Wangpo from a distance of eight days’ journey by horseback, landed on the stone wall before everyone’s eyes. At Tramalung, he taught and led the practice of unique preliminary trainings, Trekchö and Thögal. Later, his chief disciple, Tendzin Norbu (Tenli), remarked, “I had some understanding of Dzogpa Chenpo before, but at Tramalung I attained a complete understanding and realization of it.” Around 1872, the third Dodrupchen, who was eight years old, came to Dzagya Gön to receive teachings and transmissions from Paltrül. After his teachings, at the request of Paltrül himself, Dodrupchen gave teachings on the Bodhicharyāvatāra to a huge public gathering, which included Paltrül himself. Then Paltrül sent the good news to Khyentse Wangpo saying, “Concerning the Dharma of learning, Dodrupchen has given teachings on the Bodhicharyāvatāra at the age of eight. As for the Dharma of realization, Nyakla Pema Düdül [1816–1872] has just attained the rainbow body. So the doctrine of the Buddha has not yet been diminished.” At that time, Dodrupchen heard the voice of Paltrül through the walls from time to time, saying: “Great Lord Padmasambhava, please watch over me. I have no others to depend upon . . .”—the words of invocation to Guru Rinpoche from the Longchen Nyingthig ngöndro text. This indicates that ngöndro must have been one of his main practices. From the age of seventy-one, he began to save food, enough for about a week, which he had never done before. Beyond that, he wouldn’t accept any offerings, or if he did accept any, he would send them immediately to the stone wall fund. Sometimes he would just leave food where it was offered to him, so that poor people used to follow him to collect offerings that he had left behind. At the age of seventy-six, at the Dza Mamö field he gave teachings on The Aspiration Prayer of the Pure Land and Maṇi Kabum to about a thousand people. After that he didn’t give any public teachings. Whoever came to him, he would send to Tendzin Norbu for teachings. If people insisted, he would scold them instead, but the more he scolded people, the more devoted to him they became. That was because of his compassionate heart and unpretentious words. At seventy-seven, he went to Dzagya Gön and invited the fifth Dzogchen Rinpoche, who was visiting Dzachukha, and they celebrated the tenth day of the Monkey month of the Wood Monkey year, the birthday of Guru Rinpoche. At the age of seventy-eight, Paltrül returned to Ko-ö, his birth place. At the age of eighty, on the thirteenth of the fourth month of the Fire Pig year (1887), he started to have some health problems. On the eighteenth of the month he took his morning tea as usual. Then, before noon, he sat up naked in the Buddha posture and placed his hands on his knees. Khenpo Künpal was present, and Khenpo tried to put the clothes back on Paltrül, but Paltrül didn’t react. After a while, with his eyes open in the meditative glance, he snapped his fingers once and rested his hands in the gesture of contemplation, and his mind merged into the primordial purity. On the twentieth of the month, Tsamtrül Rinpoche performed the ceremony of awakening Paltrül’s mind from the absorption. At his death, no materials of any value were left behind. There was one set of monk’s robes, an alms bowl, a yellow shawl, a lower garment, enough food for about ten days, a set of the five texts by Asaṅga, and a copy of the Madhyamakāvatāra. There were five silver coins and a few scarves, which he hadn’t yet sent to the stone wall fund. That is all he had. The third Dodrupchen describes the teachings of Paltrül as follows: Whatever teachings he gave, he never presented them with any trace of showing off his scholarship but with the intention that they should suit the listeners’ understanding. If his teachings are analyzed, they are seen to be logical and meaningful. If they are heard even by a dull mind, still they are easy to understand. As they are condensed, they are easy to grasp. They are of adequate length, related to the subject, enchanting, and tasteful. Describing Paltrül’s personality, the third Dodrupchen writes: Paltrül uses fearful and overwhelmingly tough words, but there is no trace of hatred or attachment in them. If you know how to listen to them, they are directly or indirectly only teachings. Whatever he says is solid like gold—it is true. He treats all people equally, neither flattering them in their presence nor backbiting in their absence. He never pretends to be something or someone else. So everybody, high or low, respects him as an authentic teacher. He is not partial to high people, nor does he have any disregard for ordinary people. Whoever is involved in unvirtuous activities, unless the person is unchangeable, he digs out that person’s faults at once and exposes them. He praises and inspires people who are pursuing a spiritual life. He seems hard to serve, yet however close you are to him, it is impossible to find a single instance of dishonesty, dubiousness, instability, or hypocrisy in him. He is unchanging in friendship, easy and relaxing to be with. He has patience concerning both good and bad happenings. It is hard to separate from him. Although he remained a hidden practitioner all his life, he was wholesome from every point of view, as he never deviated from the bodhisattva activities. As a proverb says: “Even if the gold remains underground, its light radiates into the sky.” To the extent that you examine him, you will find him clean and pure. To the extent that you think about him, your faith in him increases. Describing Paltrül’s physical appearance, the third Dodrupchen writes: His head is broad like a parasol. His face is like a blossoming lotus, and his sense faculties are immaculately clear. Usually he has very little sickness. From childhood he has been endowed with great wisdom and compassion, and he is a brilliant orator. Khenpo Künpal, who was with Paltrül for many years in his later life, writes that one of his main prayers was the Mañjushrīnāmasahgīti. Not only did Paltrül have no worldly possessions, but he did not have many religious books, which for a scholar-teacher are thought to be most important. Sometimes he had a copy of the Bodhicharyāvatāra and a Mañjushrīnāmasaṅgīti, which were his daily prayers. But even those he would sometimes give away, as he knew the texts by heart. He didn’t have paper or a bamboo pen. So, wherever he was, when he stood up, he was ready to leave a place instantly. Paltrül gave teachings on philosophical texts of sūtra, tantra, and Dzogpa Chenpo and awakened or transmitted ultimate realization to the minds of many fortunate disciples. However, it seems that only on very few occasions did he give empowerments or performed elaborate ceremonies. He was nonsectarian in his teaching, writing, and practicing. He studied, practiced, and taught the complete Buddhist traditions of Tibet. He saw the masters of different schools equally as the Buddha of Wisdom: Lord Sakya Paṇḍita, who brought the dawn of the five knowledges, Lord Tsongkhapa, the source of the teachings of sūtra and tantra, and Longchen Rabjam, the master of the complete teachings of the Buddha, Are the true Mañjushrīs of the Land of Snow [Tibet]. A person of great humility and simplicity, he was nonetheless able to accommodate many noble, rich, powerful and famous scholars as his disciples. Many disciples in brocade attire surrounded by hosts of retinues came to the feet of this solitary dweller in old, ragged, patched cloth, who hardly had enough tsampa to eat or fuel to make tea. There were even occasions when his humility shamed the brocade-wrapped, horse-riding people and exposed their weaknesses. Once, Paltrül traveled through a nomadic camp, on foot as usual. He stopped at a family with a huge tent and asked them to let him rest for a couple of days as he was exhausted. The family said, “Can you read prayers?” He answered, “A little bit.” Then they gladly allowed him to come in and let him settle in the lower corner of the tent. Many people were busy making ritual objects, putting up tents, building high seats, and cooking good food for a great lama and his party who were coming to perform an important ceremony. After a couple of days, they got word that the great lama was arriving, and everybody rushed out to receive the lama. Paltrül didn’t go out. People shouted at him and almost dragged him out to present himself before the lama. The lama, attired in brocade, came with all the pomp of about forty horsemen in attendance, holding banners in their hands, as if in a play. Paltrül had no choice but to go before the great lama, so he did. When the grand lama saw Paltrül, he jumped off his horse and fell at the master’s feet, ashamed at his meaningless pompous display before the meaningful, humble presence of the great Paltrül. The lama was Minyak Kunzang Sönam, a disciple of Paltrül who wrote a famous commentary on the Bodhicharyāvatāra. From that day, the lama renounced his pompous way of life, became a hermit, and never rode a horse again, but walked whenever he traveled around. People believed that Paltrül had foreseen the outcome of this encounter through his clairvoyance, an ability he had shown many times. His writings are collected in six volumes, on Dzogpa Chenpo, tantra, sūtra, advice, poetry, and drama. His best-known works are the elaborate instruction on the preliminary practice of Longchen Nyingthig, entitled Words from the Mouth of Samantabhadra Lama; a short but amazing instruction on Dzogpa Chenpomeditation, entitled The Three Words That Hit the Crucial Points, and a commentary on the Abhisamayālaṃkāra. In Eastern Tibet, Paltrül was perhaps the most instrumental of anyone in making the Bodhicharyāvatāra (The Way of Bodhisattva Training) a handbook for many monks; The Aspirational Prayer for Taking Rebirth in the Blissful Pure Land of Amitābha a daily prayer for many laypeople; the Guhyagarbha-māyājāla-tantra the foundation of Nyingma tantric tradition; Dzogpa Chenpo teachings not only a textual tradition but a meditative realization; and above all, OṂ MAṆI PADME HŪṂ as the perpetual breath of many people. Among his incarnations were Jigme Wangpo of Dzagya Gön and Namkha Jigme of Dzachukha, a son of Düdjom Lingpa. *Above Contents from Masters of Meditation and Miracles: Lives of the Great Buddhist Masters of India and Tibet by Tulku Thondup (1999).

NYOSHÜL Lungtok Tenpe Nyima was one of the greatest meditation masters of Dzogpa Chenpo in the Longchen Nyingthig lineage. He was the greatest realized disciple of Paltrül Rinpoche. There is a saying, “If there is no Lungtok, Paltrül is childless.” He was known as the tülku of Shāntarakṣhita, Kong-nyon Bepe Naljor, and Jewön Küntröl Namgyal. He was born in the Nyoshül tribe of the Mukpo Dong lineage as the son of Chösung Tadrin. He studied with Gyalse Zhenphen Thaye, Khenchen Pema Dorje, the fourth Dzogchen Rinpoche, and later with Khyentse Wangpo. He was ordained as a monk by Gyalse Zhenphen Thaye, who named him Lungtok Tenpe Nyima. Lungtok’s root teacher was Paltrül Rinpoche. Living with Paltrül for twenty-eight years without separation, he received the transmissions of various teachings and especially Nyingthig teachings of Longchen Rabjam and Jigme Lingpa. He received the instructions of Trekchö teachings, which introduced him to the primordial purity that is present as the ultimate nature of all phenomenal existence. He received the instructions of Thögal teachings, which introduced him to the luminous appearances as the three Buddha bodies. He stayed about ten years around the seats of Dodrupchen in Ser and Do valleys with Paltrül Rinpoche. At the Ari forest in the Do Valley, a few miles from the present Dodrupchen Monastery, Lungtok and his teacher Paltrül stayed alone together for six months. A small bag full of tsampa as food, the clothes they were wearing, and a couple of books were the onlythings they possessed. At midday they would get together and eat a little tsampa. Then they would tie the tsampa bag to a tree and leave it till the next day. After that Paltrül would give teachings on a couple of verses of the Bodhicharyāvatāra to Lungtok. Soon, many disciples arrived at Ari Forest, and Paltrül started to teach Ngalso Korsum and Yönten Dzö and other teachings. Paltrül Rinpoche would give a teaching, and then the disciple would meditate on it in the forest for days. First they had a little tsampa to eat every day, but soon their tsampa ran out. Then they collected food given to dogs by nomads or left behind, and they lived on that for a while. They didn’t want to go around nomad camps to beg for food, but were happy to live with what was left unwanted. At Ari forest, one day Paltrül asked Lungtok, “Do you remember your mother?” Lungtok said, “Not much, sir.” Paltrül said, “It is because you haven’t meditated on compassion. Now go into those willow trees and meditate on ‘recognizing motherhood’ and ‘remembrance of mother’s kindness’ for seven days.” Lungtok meditated as Paltrül had instructed, and the bodhichitta of lovingkindness and compassion naturally developed in him without any need of further efforts. At Ari forest, after Paltrül’s teachings, Longtok meditated on the meanings of Relaxing in the Illusory Nature (Gyuma Ngalso) by Longchen Rabjam. His concepts of grasping at truly existing entities collapsed, and all phenomenal existents arose as unreal like illusions. Later Khenpo Ngachung asked him, “Is it a realization?” He answered, “No, but a good experience” (Nyams). With Paltrül, Lungtok left Golok for Dzogchen Monastery. Lungtok did a three-year retreat at Kangtrö near Dzogchen Monastery for the longevity of the fourth Dzogchen Rinpoche. He didn’t have much food to eat. He had no clothing except his robes. He used a flat stone as his cushion to sit on for his three-year retreat. Then Lungtok stayed with Paltrül at Nakchung hermitage near Dzogchen Monastery. Every day at dusk, Paltrül would do a meditation session on the training of Namkha Sumtruk, stretched out on his back on a new woolen carpet on a piece of grassy field the size of himself. One evening, while Paltrül was lying there as usual, he asked Lungtok, “Lungche [Dear Lung]! Did you say that you do not know the true nature of the mind?” Lungtok answered, “Yes, sir, I don’t.” Paltrül said, “Oh, there is nothing not to know. Come here.” So Lungtok went to him. Paltrül said, “Lie down, as I am lying, and look at the sky.” As Lungtok did so, the conversation went on as follows: “Do you see the stars in the sky?” “Yes.” “Do you hear the dogs barking in Dzogchen Monastery [at a far distance]?” “Yes.” “Well, that is the meditation.” At that moment, Lungtok attained confidence in the realization in itself. He had been liberated from the conceptual fetters of “it is” or “it is not.” He had realized the primordial wisdom, the naked union of emptiness and intrinsic awareness, the Buddha Mind. Lungtok and his esteemed Dharma brothers, Tendzin Norbu, Khenpo Könchok Özer, Minyak Künzang Sönam, and Naktha Tülku, requested Paltrül to allow them to remain as wandering hermits for the rest of their lives. But Paltrül made Könchok Özer a Khenpo of Dzogchen Monastery; he told Tendzin Norbu to teach at Gemang Monastery and the other three to return to their own home regions and maintain hermitages. So Lungtok came back to his home region and stayed at many hermitages, but mainly at a hermitage named Jönpa Lung. At Shuku Shar hermitage, Lungtok meditated on Bodhicharyāvatāra for ten years and on Ngalso Korsum for three years. Later, he jokingly would say, “For thirteen years by projecting and withdrawing thoughts, I tried to discipline my thoughts so they wouldn’t be increased. If I had meditated on Dzogpa Chenpo from the beginning, I could have realized a good view and meditation by now.” In 1883, when he was at Gyaduk hermitage, a five-year-old boy was brought to see him by his father. That boy was the future Khenpo Ngawang Palzang (1879–1941), his main lineage-holder. Around 1895, Lungtok moved to Pema Ritho and established an encampment of hermits, and Ngawang Palzang formally became his disciple by studying ngöndro and other teachings with many others. Lungtok said, “I haven’t done anything against Paltrül Rinpoche’s advice, except one thing, which is that he told me not to teach Dzogpa Chenpo before the age of fifty. Then, if I could, I should teach it. But before the age of fifty I had to teach a little to Önpo Tendzin Norbu, as he insisted. So my samaya with my teacher is an unbroken golden chain.’’ Later, he would tell his disciples, ‘‘If you meditate properly, the best meditators will make daily progress, the mediocre meditators will make monthly progress, and the lesser meditators will make yearly progress. For meditation the important thing is to know the crucial skills [gNad] of meditation. Even if you meditate, if there is no progress, it is a sign that you lack the understanding of the crucial skills of meditation.’’ Throughout his life he shared the teachings of Paltrül with all who came to him, and especially after the age of fifty he gave Dzogpa Chenpo teachings. However, like Paltrül Rinpoche, he hardly gave any transmissions of empowerment except to Sershül Khenpo Ngawang and Anye Khenpo Tamchö of Dodrupchen Monastery, Lama Ngawang Tendzin, Lama Dorli, Khenpo Ngawang Palzang, and a kama empowerment at Khangtsik Gar. He wrote a detailed instruction on Trekchö meditation for Nyakla Rangrik, who was then in Central Tibet, and he asked him to burn it after reading it. Nyakla Rangrik did burn it as his teacher told him to do, but the messenger saw it on the way and copied it before it reached Nyakla Rangrik. Many of the amazing writings of Khenpo Ngawang Palzang are also the very words of Nyoshül Lungtok, which originally came from Paltrül Rinpoche. At the age of seventy-two, Nyoshül Lungtok died on the twenty-fifth of the fifth month of the Metal Ox year of the fifteenth Rabjung (1901). Rainbow lights arched overhead, there was a gentle rain of flowers, and the sound of sweet music was heard. After the cremation, ringsels appeared from the ashes as signs of his attainment and as objects of reverence for his disciples. His reincarnation was Shedrup Tenpe Nyima (1920–?). *Above Contents from Masters of Meditation and Miracles: Lives of the Great Buddhist Masters of India and Tibet by Tulku Thondup (1999).

KHENPO Ngawang Palzang of Kathok Monastery was one of the greatest writers, teachers, and transmitters of Longchen Nyingthig in this century. He was known as a tülku of Vimalamitra, and there is no exaggeration in calling him the second Longchen Rabjam. He was popularly known as Khenpo Ngachung (the Junior Ngak), and in many writings he signed himself as Ösal Rinchen Nyingpo Pema Ledreltsal or Pema Ledreltsal. I offer here a short summary of Khenpo’s autobiography, Ngotsar Gyume Rölgar (An Amazing Magical Play). If you are interested in reading a biography of a lama of scholarly and spiritual attainments, this should be your choice. It presents a magnificent life in a most beautiful classical style of writing that is rarely seen. Khenpo was born on the tenth day of the tenth month of the Earth Hare year of the fifteenth Rabjung (1879) amid wondrous signs of rainbow rays and sounds of music from the sky. His father was Namgyal of the Nyoshül tribal group, and his mother was Pematso of the Juwa tribal group. His days and nights were filled with amazing lights, experiences, visions, sounds, and communications with divinities. On the third day of his life, sitting in the meditative posture, he recited the Vajrakīla mantra. During the first winter, in freezing weather, the baby was sleeping with his mother. But his mother couldn’t sleep with him, as he was generating so much heat through his spiritual energy. The mother said, “What are you, a child of demons?” The child sang: I came from the direction of Latrang in the east, I have self-control over energy and heat. I have accomplished the attainment of Guhyasamaja. If you recognize me, I am Alak Rigdra. At this his mother said, “Who knows? Keep quiet.” His parents and relatives worried about their unusual child and tried to keep his display of miracles secret from others. When he was two, his father took him to Nyoshül Lungtok at Gyaduk Hermitage. Lungtok expressed great joy in seeing him and gave blessings and also gifts. When he was five, his family was facing great hardship from a flood, and one day he fashioned a twig into the form of a phurbu, a sacred dagger, and said, I, as Vimalamitra in India, Reversed the Ganges River. There is no problem for a creek in a gorge. Mother, look at the great wonder! Then, pointing the phurbu at the river, he recited the Vajrakīla mantra, and the river changed its course as if it had been propelled by a storm. At seven, his uncle taught him to read prayer texts. When his uncle taught him one syllable, he would say the next one instead of repeating after him. His uncle became upset and said, “Why are you jumping ahead? You are not recognizing the syllables.” Then he studied slowly and took about twenty days to learn the first page of the prayer, and that satisfied his uncle. Then one evening, half asleep, he read the whole Zangpo Chöpa, and his uncle realized that he was dealing with an unusual person. His uncle brought him a number of new texts, and Khenpo read them all with no difficulty. His uncle stopped giving him any reading lessons. From the age of eight, he started to receive teachings and empowerments from many lamas. At the age of fifteen, he was ordained as a novice by Khenchen Gyaltsen Özer, and Nyoshül Lungtok advised him on the importance of observing the vows. With Nyoshül Lungtok he moved to the hermitage called Pema Ritho. There he received detailed instructions on ngöndro practice from Lungtok and completed the ngöndro accumulations. During the maṇḍala practice of ngöndro, he saw Longchen Rabjam in a dream. Longchenpa, putting a crystal on Khenpo’s head, said: Ah! The nature of the mind is the enlightened mind. Ah! Ah! The great emptiness is the sphere of Samantabhadra. Ah! Ah! The openness intrinsic awareness is the Dharmakāya. Ah! Ah! From the five glows arises everything. Ah! Ah! The nature of intrinsic awareness transcends view and meditation. Ah! Ah! Today may they be established in your heart. Ah! Because of the force of devotion, Khenpo fainted for a while. From the statue of Longchen Rabjam on his altar came ringsels. Nyoshül Lungtok told others that Khenpo could be the tülku of Vimalamitra of this century, as Vimalamitra had promised to send a major incarnation to Tibet in every century to spread the Nyingthig teachings. Before the guru yoga of ngöndro practice, he received the empowerment of the two-volume Longchen Nyingthig cycle from Lama Atop, one of the principal disciples of Nyoshül Lungtok. Like his teacher Paltrül Rinpoche, Nyoshül Lungtok gave only a fewempowerments in his whole life. Lungtok gave Khenpo the instructions on Longchen Nyingthig in general and guru yoga in particular. Khenpo recited the siddhi mantra thirty million times and made one hundred thousand prostrations together with acts of homage. Since Khenpo started to receive teachings from Nyoshül Lungtok, he never for a second had a thought of his teacher being an ordinary being, but always saw him as a fully enlightened Buddha. He also could not remember ever speaking improperly to any of his Dharma brothers and sisters. During the ngöndro trainings, he kept experiencing that his mind had merged into a thoughtless state and that then all the objective appearances had dissolved. His teacher minimized its importance, saying, “It is the universal ground,” a neutral state, but not the enlightened nature. After guru yoga practice, Lungtok gave detailed teachings on tantra including the three roots and many other texts. Khenpo did a forty-nine-day strict recitation retreat on Rigdzin Düpa. He achieved great clarity in the development stage, reciting the siddhi mantra ten million times and the Rigdzin Chitril mantra one hundred million times. Then he did a month retreat on Yumka Dechen Gyalmo and practiced day and night. He was able to hear the sound power of the mantra without any efforts. He had an extraordinary realization that the visions of divinities or ordinary appearances are mere apparitions and designations created by the mind. At the age of twenty, as strongly advised by Lungtok, Khenpo took the vow of full ordination as a monk from Atop. Thereafter he observed every one of the 253 vows of a monk and kept no extra materials for himself. When he had to keep any extra materials for the service of the Dharma or for others, he kept them only after reciting tütren (Dus Dran), a formula for reminding oneself of the “mindfulness of the purpose,” written by Panchen Lobzang Chögyen. His teacher gave him detailed teachings on life and longevity. Then Khenpo did a hundred-day retreat on the long-life practice of Longchen Nyingthig. After many days of doing the recitation, he saw lights being emitted from the long-life pills on the altar, and then they melted into lights. By emphasizing his training on energy (air), he experienced the accomplishments of entering, dwelling, and perfection of his energies in the center channel. Through heat yoga, he experienced great bliss and heat in his body and the union of bliss and emptiness in his mind. The touch of either cold or heat in the external temperature caused him to generate heat and bliss. Through the training on subtle essence, before long his mind and mental events had ceased. He remained in a thick, sleeplike thoughtless state, but first it was with openness and then that mind, too, merged into the state of union of emptiness and clarity. He was able to remain in such a state for the whole period of a meditative session. When Khenpo was twenty-one, Nyoshül Lungtok gave him a few lines of the innermost teachings of Nyingthig every day. After every teaching, Khenpo meditated on the meanings of the instructions for many days, and this was followed by discussions and clarifications. Lungtok explained that he had received the Nyingthig transmission from the fourth Dzogchen Rinpoche that came from Jigme Lingpa through the lineage of Dodrupchen. He also received the transmission from both Paltrül Rinpoche and Khyentse Wangpo that came from Jigme Lingpa through the lineage of Gyalwe Nyuku. During these trainings, he developed an unquestionable confidence that what he had experienced during his ngöndro trainings, namely that his experience of a thoughtless state, after which all the objective appearances had dissolved, was not a mere absence of thoughts but the naked union of intrinsic awareness and emptiness. He presented his conviction to his teacher. The teacher laughed and said, “During the preliminary mind trainings [Blo sByong] of ngöndro practice, you were talking of a contemplation [of a thoughtless state] and the dissolving of the objective appearances.That is what it is. There are two kinds of thoughts, subjective thoughts and objective thoughts. In contemplations of the realized ones, first their subjective grasper dissolves. At that time, as the objective thought is not yet dissolved, there will be thoughts of appearances. Then what they objectively grasped will dissolve, and then even the mere appearances will not be there before the contemplative mind.” Khenpo, being a most gifted person, had the experience of the true nature in his early meditation trainings. However, his teacher would not tell him that this was the important realization. If he did so too early, there could arise a subtle conceptual grasping in the mind of Khenpo, an attachment to the so-called “important realization,” and instead of Khenpo’s being encouraged by having his realization confirmed, he could be distracted from the journey. That is the very reason why Paltrül Rinpoche says: “Do not rush to call it Dharmakāya!” Then Nyoshül Lungtok gave one of his most rare empowerments, a Yeshe La-me Tsalwang, the empowerment of the power of the intrinsic awareness (or the introduction to the nature of the mind) as given in Yeshe Lama. It was followed by teachings on innermost instruction of Dzogpa Chenpo, including Chöying Rinpoche Dzö. Then his teacher told Khenpo that now he should go to Dzogchen Monastery to study scholarly texts. He had heard that Mipham Namgyal was also coming to the monastery to teach. Khenpo didn’t want to leave but had to follow his teacher’s words. With a gift of thirteen brown sugar cakes and a long scarf, the teacher bade farewell to his disciple by saying prayers and then adding, “I am inspiring you, empowering you, and recognizing you as the holder of the thirteenth stage, the state of Vajradhara.” With a heavy heart, Khenpo prayed and left his teacher for the last time. In the fall of his twenty-second year, Khenpo arrived at Dzogchen Monastery. With Minyak Lama Rigdzin Dorje and others, he studied Madhyamakālaṃkāra by Shantarakshita, Tsema Rikter by Sakya Pandita, Don Namnge, Kagye Namshe, and Ösal Nyingpo on Guhyagarbha by Mipham. With Khenpo Losal he studied Domtik Paksam Nye by Dharmashrī, Mahāyāna-sūtrālaṃkāra, Madhayānta-vibhaṅga, and Dharmadharmatā-vibhaṅga with Rongtön’s commentaries, Uttaratantra with Dölpo’s commentary, Guhyagarbha with the commentaries by Longchen Rabjam, Rongzom, and Yungtön, Thekchen Tsüljuk and Nangwa Lhadrup by Rongzom, Yönten Dzö with the commentaries by Dodrupchen and Tentar Lharampa, and Semnyi Ngalso and Gyuma Ngalso. With Khenpo Sönam Chöphel he studied Abhisamayālaṃkāra with the commentaries by Je Tsongkhapa and Paltrül, Bodhicharyāvatāra with the commentaries by Ngülchu Thogme and Künzang Sönam, and Norbu Ketaka by Mipham, Prajñānāmamūla-madhyamaka, Chatuḥshataka-shāstra, Dültik Rinchen Trengwa, Dülwa Tsotik, Longchen Nyingthig Tsalung, Sangdak Gonggyen, and others. From Mura Tülku Pema Dechen he received many empowerments and teachings on Yeshe Lama and other scriptures. From Khenpo Konchok Norbu he received unique instructions of Paltrül on Bodhicharyāvatāra. With Apal he studied Abhidharmakosha with auto-commentary and commentaries by Gyalpö Se, Chimchen, and Chimchung. Khenpo had a hard time comprehending Apal’s elaborate style of teaching. He went to the rock in Shrīsiṃha, where Paltrül once taught Abhidharmakosha and made aspirations that he might understand what Vasubandhu envisioned in his text. He fell asleep and in a dream was blessed by Vasubandhu, and Khenpo remembered his having been Sthiramati, the principal student of Vasubandhu. After that he was able to understand the teachings. Then Mipham Namgyal arrived and stayed at Nakchung hermitage of Dzogchen Monastery to compose his Khepala Jukpa. One day Khenpo went to see him, and that very day Mipham had completed Khepala Jukpa. Mipham entrusted the text to Khenpo and inspired him to teach it. Also, Khenpo received the empowerment of Jampal Gyüluk. He also received the empowerments of Könchok Chidü from the fifth Dzogchen Rinpoche and Gongpa Düpa and Khandro Nyingthig from Drukpa Kuchen of Dzogchen Monastery. In the fall of his twenty-fourth year (1902), he returned to his teacher’s hermitage and was shocked to learn that he had died on the twenty-fifth day of the fifth month of the previous year. He made a three-month recitation retreat on Vajrakīla Düpung Zilnön of Longchen Nyingthig. He also performed feast offerings and gave teachings to people. Then he went to Kading hermitage and did retreats on The Peaceful and Wrathful Māyājāla Sādhana and Jampal Gyüluk and gave teachings. He meditated on Thögal and saw the lights and images of the Buddhas filling the atmosphere, and then the power of intrinsic awareness in the form of the vajra chain, the subtlemost wisdom, dissolving into the inner ultimate sphere. By doing so he reached the ultimate nature of the primordial wisdom, the naked union of intrinsic awareness and emptiness. All the shells of experiences had vanished. All the subjective and objective grasping had been shattered. For an entire half day he remained in luminous clarity free from thoughts. As a sign of his realizing that the appearances are not real as they are supposed to be, his bell fell onto a stone, and instead of the bell breaking as it normally would, there was a mark of the bell on the stone and also a mark of the stone on the bell. While meditating on Khandro Yangtig, in a vision he went to the unexcelled pure land in the form of Lhacham Pemasal and received the empowerments from the chief of ḍākinīs and was given the name Ösal Rinchen Nyingpo Pema Ledreltsal. Also, as Longchen Rabjam, he received transmissions from Rigdzin Kumārādza. When he was twenty-nine, his mother died amid signs of light and earthquakes. From Terchen Ngawang Tendzin he received the textual transmissions of Nyingma Gyübum. Then once again he went to Dzogchen Monastery. With Khenpo Lhagyal of Dzogchen he studied Pramāṇavārttika, and with Khenpo Zhen-ga he studied the commentaries of Madhyamakāvatāra and many other scriptures. Then Dzogchen Rinpoche wanted to make him a khenpo, an abbot of Dzogchen Monastery, but he refused, as he had been instructed by Lungtok to teach not at Dzogchen Monastery but at Kathok Monastery. He returned to Jönpa Lung, the seat of his teacher, and started to give more teachings. During the empowerment of Yumka Dechen Gyalmo, the nectar boiled on the cool altar, and seed letters written on the mirror with colors appeared in relief (’Bur Dod). During the Dzödun text transmission, an unknown woman with rich ornaments attended for a while and then vanished. While Khenpo was giving teachings on Semnyi Ngalso, the whole valley was filled with rainbow lights. From Adzom Drukpa, he received the empowerment of Gongpa Zangthal, Khandro Yangtig, and Lama Yangtig and the teachings of ngöndro and actual practices of Dorje Nyingpo. At the age of thirty, invited by the second Kathok Situ Chökyi Gyatso (1880–1925), he went to Kathok Monastery. There he was appointed as a teaching assistant (sKyor dPon) in the newly opened shedra, or scripture college. Khenpo Künpal taught Domsum Rabye, Pramāṇvārttika, Tsema Rikter, Yizhin Dzö, Meti-ngak Dzö, and Chöying Dzö, and Khenpo Ngachung reviewed the teachings for the students. When Khenpo Ngachung was thirty-one, Khenpo Künpal had to return to Dzachukha. Khenpo Ngachung took over as the khenpo of the shedra and taught various texts for thirteen years. Every day he gave at least three lectures and sometimes seven. He also gave empowerments, including Nyingthig Yabzhi and Longchen Nyingthig twenty-seven times, Dorje Nyingpo three times, and the text transmission of Dzödun thirteen times. He fully ordained over four thousand monks. While teaching he received Rinchen Terdzö, Düdül, and many other transmissions from Kathok Situ, Jewön Rinpoche, and Khenpo Gyaltsen Özer. From Detso Khenpo Sönam Palden of Golok, he received the teachings of Lamrim Chenmo and many other Geluk teachings. From the second Pema Norbu (1887–1932), he received Namchö, Ratna Lingpa, Changter, Minling Terchö, Jatsön, and Trölthik. Again, he returned to Jonpa Lung and, as advised by Kathok Situ, established a monastery. Then he went to Palyül Monastery to start a shedra. He gave many short teachings, including Bodhicharyāvatāra. Then he went to Tralak Shedrup Ling Monastery in Da Valley at the invitation of Chaktsa Tülku and gave the empowerment of Rinchen Terdzö, combined with many other teachings and transmissions. At Namoche in Upper Nyi Valley he gave the empowerments of Nyingthig Yabzhi and Longchen Nyingthig in a camp and gave teachings of ngöndro and Yeshe Lama. When he was forty-seven (1925), at the behest of Kathok Situ a gathering of a thousand monks who were followers of the Kathok tradition was called at Kathok Monastery. Khenpo and many others gathered, but Kathok Situ was seriously sick and soon passed away. Khenpo gave Rinchen Terdzö empowerments. At the age of forty-nine, he meditated on many of the major sādhanas of Nyingma in retreat and experienced many attainments and visions. Especially during the meditation on Ladrup Thigle Gyachen, he had a vision of Longchen Rabjam and was inspired to write texts on Nyingthig. As a result he wrote his most famous works, Künzang Thukkyi Tikka on Yeshe Lama, Nyen-gyü Chuwö Chüdü on Trekchö, Khandro Thukkyi Tilaka on Thögal, and Nyime Nangwa on both Trekchö and Thögal. At the age of fifty-one, he visited Markham and gave the empowerments of Nyingthig Yabzhi, Longchen Nyingthig, Rinchen Terdzö, and teachings of Ngalso Korsum and Yeshe Lama. Then at Gyalse Monastery he gave many empowerments and teachings and recognized and enthroned the tülku of Gyalse. He also visited the camp of Nyakla Changchup Dorje and ordained sixty-four candidates as novices or monks. At the age of fifty-four (1932), he went to Tralak Monastery in Da Valley to establish a shedra. Soon thereafter, he felt that the second Pema Norbu was dying, and Khenpo visited him in his meditative body and talked about the future. Pema Norbu told him that as his body was worn away due to sickness, he would be dying. Khenpo suggested that he go to Amitābha’s pure land, but Pema Norbu wanted to go to Pema Ö, the pure land of Guru Rinpoche, and come back to spread the Nyingthig teachings. Soon Khenpo received a message that Pema Norbu was in serious condition, and he quickly set out to reach him. As it was many days distant, by the time he got there Pema Norbu had already died five days earlier. At the request of Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö, Khenpo went to Kathok to preside over the enthronement ceremony of the tülku of Kathok Situ. At the age of fifty-five (1933) he made a recitation retreat on the Vajrakīla Yangsang La-me discovered by Ratna Lingpa, had a vision of Yeshe Tsogyal, and received Vajrakīla accomplishments. His autobiography ends at his fifty-fifth year. At the age of sixty-two (1941), he passed away with amazing signs. Tents of light arched over the place, sounds of music were heard, and tremblings of the earth were felt. Shedrup Tenpe Nyima, the tülku of Nyoshül Lungtok, and Gyurme Dorje, the son of Adzom Drukpa, led the cremation ceremony *Above Contents from Masters of Meditation and Miracles: Lives of the Great Buddhist Masters of India and Tibet by Tulku Thondup (1999).

KYABJE Chatral Sangye Dorje Rinpoche is one of the very few great masters of the Longchen Nyingthig lineage still living. Rinpoche was born in the Abse tribal group of Nyak-rong Province of Kham and soon migrated to Amdo with his tribal group. He received the transmissions of the ter cycles of Düdjom Lingpa (1835–1903), Sera Khandro, and others from the great master Sera Khandro Dewe Dorje (1899–1952?) herself and Tülku Dorje Dradül (1891–1959?), the youngest son of Düdjom Lingpa. At the age of fifteen, he abandoned his ties with his family and went to many teachers to study and practice. He gave up riding and traveled on foot. He refused to enter houses or tents of household people, staying only in hermitages, caves, or his own little tent. From Kathok Khenpo Ngawang Palzang (1879–1941) he received the transmissions and teachings of Longchen Nyingthig and many other teachings. Khenpo became his most important root master. He also received many transmissions from Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö and other masters of Dege. In Central Tibet, he became one of the principal disciples of Kyabje Düdjom Rinpoche, the tülku of Düdjom Lingpa. Rinpoche transmitted rare teachings to Shuksep Lochen, Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö, Düdjom Jigtral Yeshe Dorje, and many other important masters. Gyaltsap Redring (d. May 8, 1947), who was then the regent of Tibet, invited Rinpoche to Lhasa and received many transmissions and instructions on Dzogpa Chenpo meditation from him. As a result, a large number of people from the nobility and ordinary walks of life flocked to Rinpoche for teachings with offerings. He saw this as a distraction from his path and, suddenly leaving everything behind, ran away to the caves in the mountains blessed by Guru Rinpoche and other masters of the past. He then lived as a hermit for decades and became known as Chatral, a hermit, or one who has abandoned mundane activities. At the end of the 1950s, he moved to Bhutan and then to India. He restored a simple temple above Jor Bungalow village near Darjeeling and started a three-year drupdra, where meditators trained in Longchen Nyingthig practice. A drupdra is a meditation retreat school where a group of people go into seclusion for one year, three years, or more. Today there are many drupdras all over the world established by Tibetan lamas, but when Rinpoche built this drupdra, it was the only one established by a Tibetan refugee lama. Rinpoche also built many temples, stūpas, and a number of other drupdras in Nepal and India. Today, he lives primarily at Pharping, an important pilgrimage place in Nepal blessed by Guru Rinpoche. Rinpoche resists any involvement in monastic or bureaucratic structures and maintains a hermit tradition. He has numerous disciples from Tibet, Bhutan, and Nepal as well as some from the West. Rinpoche and his consort, Kamala, a daughter of Tertön TulzhukLingpa, have two daughters, Tārādevī and Saraswatī, a tülku of Sera Khandro. On November 16, 1968, Father Thomas Merton met Rinpoche and described the meeting as follows: “The unspoken or half-spoken message of the talk was our complete understanding of each other as people who were somehow on the edge of great realization and knew it and were trying (somehow or other) to go out and get lost in it—and that it was a grace for us to meet one another.” Harold Talbott, who was present at their meeting, recalls Merton remarking to him after the meeting: “That is the greatest man I ever met. He is my teacher.” *Above Contents from Masters of Meditation and Miracles: Lives of the Great Buddhist Masters of India and Tibet by Tulku Thondup (1999).