{"id":1826,"date":"2020-04-30T21:53:17","date_gmt":"2020-04-30T21:53:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/?p=1826"},"modified":"2024-01-30T22:07:01","modified_gmt":"2024-01-30T22:07:01","slug":"the-kalacakra-college-at-tashi-lhunpo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/the-kalacakra-college-at-tashi-lhunpo\/","title":{"rendered":"The K\u0101lacakra College at Tashi-lhunpo"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

            The Panchen Lamas, according to H.\nP. Blavatsky, were closely connected with the Theosophical Mahatmas. She says\nthat the Panchen Lamas \u201care high initiates\u201d (Theosophical Glossary<\/em>, under \u201cPanchen Rimboche\u201d), something that\nTibetans would not doubt. So what did the Panchen Lamas teach? Naturally, most\nof what they taught was standard Tibetan Buddhism. A text that is memorized and\nrecited every day by most Gelugpas is the Bla\nma mchod pa’i cho ga<\/em>, the \u201cProcedure for Offering to the Lama,\u201d a guru-yoga\npractice. It was written by the first or fourth Panchen Lama, Blo bzang chos\nkyi rgyal mtshan (1570-1662). He was the first Panchen Lama to be given the\ntitle Panchen Lama, so has often been called the first Panchen Lama. However, three\nprevious incarnations were recognized and retroactively called Panchen Lamas,\nso he is called the fourth Panchen Lama by his own monastery, Tashi-lhunpo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

            Beyond standard Tibetan Buddhism,\nthe Panchen Lamas specialized in the K\u0101lacakra teachings. The third or sixth\nPanchen Lama, Blo bzang dpal ldan ye shes (1738-1780), established one of the\nfew K\u0101lacakra colleges in Tibet at his Tashi-lhunpo monastery. The K\u0101lacakra\ncollege monks would perform the K\u0101lacakra ceremony every year, in which the\nextensive K\u0101lacakra sand ma\u1e47\u1e0dala was constructed. Very little is known about\nthe K\u0101lacakra college and its course of study. So in\n1982 I requested information about the K\u0101lacakra college of Tashi-lhunpo from\nthe re-established Tashi-lhunpo monastery in south India. At that time, there\nwere about 20 older monks there who had been at Tashi-lhunpo in Tibet prior to\n1959. Based on what they remembered, I received two accounts of this,\nhand-written in English by Tenzin (no other name given), of the Office of the\nChodhi Tashi Lhunpo Cultural Society, Tibetan Settlement, P.O. Bylakuppe,\nMysore State, India. This information should be preserved and made available. So\nhere follow these two accounts. The Tibetan words in parentheses were given in\nTibetan script in the original accounts. I have added only a few words in\nbrackets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

April 21, 1982:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We received your letter dated 26.3.82. You are interested in\nhistory of Kalacakra College of Tashi Lhunpo. Here in our present Tashi Lhunpo\nmonastery there are only one or two monks who attended Kalacakra College when\nit was functioning in Tibet. You can know textbooks, duration [of course of\nstudy], from our following brief history of Kalacakra College of Tashi Lhunpo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“HISTORY OF KALACAKRA COLLEGE:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It was about two hundred and thirty-eight years from right\nnow that Kalacakra College of Tashi Lhunpo was established by the Sixth Panchen\nLama, Palden Yeshe. But the number of college students was limited. There were\nonly twenty-five student monks because of twenty-five Rigden Rishis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“First they attend Tantric College of Tashi Lhunpo. There\nthey learn the four major parts of tantric [practice], voice or tune, etc.\n(‘don rta dbyangs).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Then they attend the Kalacakra College. First they memorise\n(‘dus ‘khor mngon rtogs mkhas sgrub zhal lung) orally and give oral test in\nfront of Dus’kor teacher and Auze (dbu mdzad). After that they memorise Dus’kor\nBumdup, Dunket, Wangchok, and Monlam Shijod orally respectively. Side by side\nthey learn dontayang, garthik (gar thig). In short, they learn inner, outer and\nother Kalacakra. They gave much time to study Dus’kor delchen and Khedup\nDus’kor tikchen, because these two are the most important textbooks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Duration: In Tibet they spend the rest of their lives in\nstudying about Dus’kor [Kalacakra]. We guess that course will take at least 8\nor 9 years to complete. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“At present, we have no such college. We hope to have it in\nthe future.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

May 29, 1982:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We write further information on Dus’kor Da-tsang [Kalacakra\nCollege] and its teachers or abbots as you are interested.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It was Panchen Choeki Nyima who made the previous Dus’kor\nwide at the Kunsek Palace (kun gzigs pho brang) in Tashi Lhunpo approximately\nin 1815. Panchen Rinpoche built a new house for the 22-foot square Kalacakra\nmandala (dkyil ‘khor) at his residence. That was the biggest Dus’kor mandala in\nTibet. During his time, he (Panchen Rinpoche) built that 22-foot square mandala\nof dultson (rdul tshon) [i.e., sand] every year and did the Dus’kor ritual.\nFrom that time onward the Dus’kor Da-tsang followed the same up to 1959. There\nwere (1) Khachen Jhedung Wangyal; (2) Dungrampa Sidthar Wangdu; (3) Khachen\nJhedung Dawa; (4) Ngulchu Rinpoche; (5) Aali Rinpoche; (6) Dungrampa Sidthar\nrespectively as Dus’kor teachers or abbots (which present older monks know). In\n1957, Dungrampa Sidthar was teacher of Dus’kor Da-tsang.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Moreover, Panchen Choekyi Nyima established Dus’kors in\nJhang Ngamrim (byang ngam rim) monastery, Shang Dechen Rabgye (shang bde chen\nrab rgyas), Thopgyal Gaden Rabgye, Gyaltse Dongtse Chodhi (rgyal rtse grong\nrtse chos sde) monasteries. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Gyalwa Jampal Gyatso, the VIII Dalai Lama, came to visit\nTashi Lhunpo and on the way back His Holiness took Dus’kor, Lhamo’s Doechen\n(lha mo’i mdos chen), Gutor cham (dgu gtor chams), and established them in\nNamgyal Da-tsang, the Da-tsang of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Here, we are nearly seventy, 20 old and 50 young monks. Our\nmain income is what we get from fields. It is these young monks who do work on\nthe fields as well as studies. In these days, they have Chochud Lozen in the\nmorning, English-Tibetan class from 10 A.M. to 12, and debating class in the\nevening when there is no sort of work. We can establish (sngags pa grwa tshang)\n[Tantric College] within four years (if we get more facilities such as more\ntime to study and less work). After that \nwe can establish Dus’kor Da-tsang. So, we have to wait more years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tashi Delek.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

            The Panchen Lamas, according to H. P. Blavatsky, were closely connected with the Theosophical Mahatmas. She says that the Panchen Lamas \u201care high initiates\u201d (Theosophical Glossary, under \u201cPanchen Rimboche\u201d), something that Tibetans would not doubt. So what did the Panchen Lamas teach? Naturally, most of what they taught was standard Tibetan Buddhism. A text […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[136],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kalacakra"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1826"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1826\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1827,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1826\/revisions\/1827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}