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From Khyentse Lineage - A Tsadra Foundation Project
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Chokgyur Lingpa was one of the most prolific treasure revealers of the nineteenth century. Based in Kham, he was a close collaborator with Jamgon Kongtrul and Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo, with whom he revealed treasure and opened sacred sites. Among his best-known revelations are the Barche Kunsel, the Zabpa Kor Dun, and the Lamrim Yeshe Nyingpo, for which Jamgon Kongtrul wrote a famous commentary. Chokgyur Lingpa also revealed an enumeration of great sites in Khams that had a significant impact on the sacred geography of the region. He established two monastic centers, Tsike and Netan, seats of the Tsike and Neten lines of his reincarnation. +
Ju Mipam Gyamtso was a prolific author who brought formal philosophical study, including debate, to the Nyingma tradition. Based in Kham during a period of great inter-sectarian exchange, he trained with the Kagyu lama Jamgön Kongtrul and the Sakya lama Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo, among others, even as he preserved a strong Nyingma identity. Among his most celebrated works are the ''Beacon of Certainty'' and a commentary on the Ninth Chapter of the ''Bodhicaryāvatāra''. In addition to his considerable literary output he spent decades of his life in retreat. +
Ngari Paṇchen Pema Wanggyel was a major Nyingma lama of the early sixteenth century. Born in present day Mustang, Nepal, he traveled widely around Tibet promoting the Jangter tradition with his brother, Lekden Dorje. He is remembered to have strictly observed his monastic vows and was the author of many texts, including Ascertaining the Three Vows, which lays out the Buddhist path according to the Nyingma tradition. +
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Jamyang Amnye Zhab Ngawang Kunga Sonam, who served as the twenty-eighth Sakya Trichen, was a disciple of Muchen Sanggye Gyeltsen. He was a prolific author, composing over seven hundred titles, among them famous histories of the Khon family, the Lamdre lineage, the Kadampa lineage, and of tantric teachings at the center of the Sakya traditions including the Kālacakra, Cakrasaṃvara, Guhyasamāja, Yamāntaka, and Mahākāla. He was fully ordained in his youth but returned his vows after being enthroned in order to take a wife and produce an heir for the Khon family. He took an active role in negotiating the end to conflicts both between Tibet and Bhutan and among Bhutanese factions. +
The first of the great Tibetan Buddhist treasure revealers, Nyangrel Nyima Wozer lived in the Lhodrak region of south-central Tibet. Among his treasure finds was the first set of The Eight Instructions: Assembly of the One Gone to Bliss, which remains a foundation of fierce deity yoga in the Nyingma tradition. He also promoted the cult of Avalokiteśvara as the patron deity of Tibet through his extensive revelations of what became known as the Maṇi Kambum, and he compiled the earliest biography Padmasambhava, initiating the apotheosis of the eighth-century ritual master into Tibet's "Second Buddha," who conquered native demons and concealed treasures across Tibet. +
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Orgyen Lingpa was a prominent early treasure revealer who revealed the Pema Katang and the Katang De Nga, two influential sources for the life of Padmasambhava. He is said to have revealed twenty-eight treasures. He is considered to have been the seventh incarnation of Prince Lhase, the middle son of Tri Songdetsen. He seems to have had trouble with the new Pakmodru dynasty and lived the later part of his life in a form of exile. Otherwise, little is known about his life. +
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Pema Ledrel Tsel was a treasure revealer who discovered the Khandro Nyingtik. He was said to be a reincarnation of King Tri Songdetsen’s daughter, Pema Tsel, who, according to legend, died tragically when she was just eight years old, was revived by Padmasambhava, and given the Khandro Nyingtik teachings before passing away again. +
Padampa Sanggye was a Buddhist adept well known for his teachings in Tibet, especially of the Prajñāpāramitā corpus and Mahāmudrā system, as well as what would become known as the Zhije tradition. He is also associated with Chod lineages: many sources describe him as a teacher of Machik Labdron, who would herself become known as the genetrix of Chod. +
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Ratna Lingpa was a prolific treasure revealer, famous for compiling an extensive edition of the Collected Nyingma Tantras. According to tradition, when Ratna Lingpa was twenty-seven, he experienced a vision of Padmasambhava in the form of a yogi dressed in yellow raw silk. He showed him three scrolls, a white, a red and a blue one, and asked Ratna Lingpa to choose one of them. Ratna Lingpa answered that he wanted all three. Because of the auspicious connection created by his answer, Ratna Lingpa received all three inventories, and was able to reveal in a single lifetime the termas he would have otherwise revealed in three successive lifetimes. He is therefore also known as Zhikpo Lingpa (zhig po gling pa) and Drodul Lingpa ('gro 'dul gling pa). +
Dorje Lingpa, who is counted as the third of the five kingly treasure revealers, is said to have revealed one hundred eight treasures. A prominent figure in the history of Bhutan, as many of his revelations were took place in Bhumtang and the surrounding region, and his revelations are still part of the Bhutanese yearly ritual schedule. Dorje Lingpa considered himself a reincarnation of Vairocana, and revealed both Buddhist and Bon Dzogchen treasures, bringing considerable innovation to the teachings. +
Gotsangpa is considered the founder of a special branch of the Drukpa Kagyu school known as the Upper Drukpa. He traveled widely in western Tibet and present-day Himachal Pradesh, India, and is particularly well known today in Ladakh and Lahaul. +
Gyelse Zhenpen Taye Wozer was a founder and second abbot of Śrī Siṃha, the Dzogchen monastic college. Considered to have been the eighth abbot of Dzogchen Monastery, he was also the founder of Gemang monastery. He was said to have been a reincarnation of Terdak Lingpa. +
Rinchen Zangpo was one of the most important translators in Tibetan history. Working under the sponsorship of the kings of Guge, he was responsible for the translation of many of the texts of the Second Propagation of Buddhism in Tibet. Seventeen volumes of his translations are in the Kangyur, and thirty-three volumes in the Tengyur. He is credited with one hundred and eight volumes of tantric translations, as well as numerous volumes of texts relating to science and medicine. Rinchen Zangpo is also considered responsible for the construction of numerous temples across western Tibet and the Northwest Indian Himalaya, although almost all of the attributions are tenuous. He was the first to introduce the Cakrasaṃvara tantra and the cult of the deity Mahākāla to Tibet, and was responsible for translations of several important Prajñāpāramitā scriptures. Many of the lineages he introduced, particularly those of the Yogatantras, are maintained in the Sakya tradition. +
Jetsun Drakpa Gyeltsen of the aristocratic Khon family was the third of the five men credited with founding the Sakya order. He was also the Fifth Sakya Tridzin, or throne holder. His father Sachen Kunga Nyingpo and his elder brother Sonam Tsemo were the first and second Sakya patriarchs. Drakpa Gyeltsen was instrumental in the early recording and compiling of the Lamdre teachings that form the basis of the Sakya tradition. +
Ngok Lotsāwa was nephew of Ngok Lekpai Sherab, the founder of Sangpu Neutok, and not only carried on the teaching activities of his uncle but raised the fame and prestige of Sangpu to new heights. He was important not only to his own Kadam lineage, but to the development of Tibetan education in general. Ngok Lotsāwa, working with the Kashmiri paṇḍita Sajjana, produced the sole-surviving translation of the Ratnagotravibhāga, the central text of buddha-nature theory in Tibet. His commentary on the text is said to have initiated the "analytical" exegetical tradition. +
Rongzom Chokyi Zangpo was an eleventh-century Tibetan translator, author, and exegete of Buddhist literature. Among his translations and commentarial works are important scriptures transmitted as part of the first and second period of Buddhist diffusion in Tibet. He is a seminal figure for the Nyingma, traditionally described as the last translator of the early translation period. His work as a translator and exegete is nevertheless also important to the later translation period and the so-called New Schools of Tibetan Buddhism. His prodigious literary output––including his early and influential commentary on Guhyagarbhatantra and his vociferous defense of Tibet's Dzogchen tradition––affirm his place as the first of the three luminaries of the Nyingma tradition, alongside Longchenpa and Ju Mipam Gyatso. +
Ra Lotsāwa Dorje Drak was an eleventh century translator and infamous magician, important during the later dissemination of the new tantric cycles of Yamāntaka. Ralo embodied the antinomian lifestyle of the Indian tantric Mahasiddhas, taking many wives and engaging in lethal magical combat with a number of respected lamas of his days. He himself is said to have boasted of killing thirteen lamas. Like his contemporary, Marpa, Ra Lotsāwa lived as a feudal lord, establishing no monastery. His transmissions eventually infiltrated all other traditions of Tibetan Buddhism. +
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Sabzang Mati Paṇchen Lodro Gyeltsen was one of Dolpopa’s fourteen major disciples. He was a great master of sutra and tantra, especially the Five Books of Maitreya and the Kālacakra Tantra. He completed a new revised translation of the Kālacakra Tantra and the Vimalaprabhā. He later lived and taught at Sabzang Ganden Monastery. +
Sakya Paṇḍita Kunga Gyaltsen, commonly referred to as Sapaṇ, was the fourth of the Five Patriarchs of Sakya and the sixth Sakya throne holder. A member of the illustrious Khon family that established and controlled the Sakya tradition, he was an advocate for strict adherence to Indian Buddhist traditions, standing in opposition to Chinese or Tibetan innovations that he considered corruptions. In this regard he was a major player in what has been termed the Tibetan Renaissance period, when there was a move to reinvigorate Tibetan Buddhism’s connections to its Indian antecedents. He was instrumental in transmitting the Indian system of five major and five minor sciences to Tibet. As an ordained monk, Sapaṇ was instrumental in laying the groundwork for adherence to the Vinaya at Sakya Monastery, built under his successors. He authored more than one hundred texts and was also a prolific translator from Sanskrit. His writings are among the most widely influential in Tibetan literature and prompted commentaries by countless subsequent authors. Sapaṇ’s reputation as a scholar and Buddhist authority helped him forge close ties with powerful Mongols, relations that would eventually lead to the establishment of Sakya Monastery and its position of political power over the Thirteen Myriarchies of central Tibet. +
Gaton Ngawang Lekpa was one of the most prominent Sakya lamas of the early twentieth century. He was a disciple of Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo and the root teacher of Dezhung Rinpoche. In addition to teaching widely in Kham, Ngawang Legpa spent fifteen years in closed retreat. +
