Khensur Lobsang Tenzin Rinpoche

Born in Tibet in 1934, Rinpoche was ordained as a monk at the age of seven. He entered Sera Je monastery at seventeen and obtained his Geshe Lharampa degree in 1979. Following this, he entered Gyume Tantric University and two years later became master of discipline. In 1985 His Holiness the Dalai Lama appointed him abbot of Gyume, a position he held for 6 years. Since then he has taught extensively in India and the West.

Teachings by Khensur Lobsang Tenzin Rinpoche

Explanation of the Lamrim Prayer from Lama Choepa

The lamrim prayer at the end of the Lama Ch?pa (Guru Yoga) puja is inspirational and poetic, encompassing the entire path to enlightenment. Using the text by Panchen Losang Chogyan, Rinpoche explains how we can recite and contemplate this poem to shift our minds from being self-centred to altruistic.

Root text

Lama Chopa by Panchen Lobsang Ch?kyi Gyaltsen

Commentary on the Po Praises to the Exalted Chenrezig

Root text

The Precious Ornament's Excellence by Kachen Lobsang Zopa

Explanation of Atisha's 7 point MindTraining

Root text

Atisha MindTraining by Atisha

Teachings on the 108 Verses in Praise of Great Compassion

Root text

108 Verses in Praise of Great Compassion by Lama Lopsang Tayang

How to Develop a Good Heart & Lamrim Teachings

In September 2009, Rinpoche visited Jamyang Centre to give some talks and confer the initiatons of White Tara and Heruka and Vajrayogini. During his visit, on Saturday 5th September, Rinpoche gave advice on 'How to Develop a Good Heart' and a course of three talks on the 'Graduated Stages of the Path to Enlightenment' or Lamrim from Monday 7th September to Wednesday 9th September. The structured meditations of the ?Gradual Path? meditation system are accessible to all and are a profound method for freeing ourselves from unhelpful repetitive patterns of thinking and behaving and for turning the mind from selfishness to altruism.

Nyung Nays

Purification practice based on the 1000 arm Chenrezig Sadhana.

Lam Rim

Chenrezig or Avalokitesvara is the deity embodying the great compassion of all the Buddhas and is worked with in the Buddhist tantra systems to help us develop the key emotional skill of unconditional love and benevolence for all beings, which lies at the heart of true spiritual growth - at least in Mahayana Buddhism. The seated four arm aspect, one of over one hundred different forms of Chenresig is widely found in Tibetan Buddhism. In Mahayana Buddhism we are encouraged to see our spiritual teachers as embodying great compassion.

White Tara Long Life Initiation

The White Tara long life initiation is traditionally offered at the end of tantra empowerments and teachings to stabilise the life force of the initiating lama and to stabilise the life force of the students. For those interested in the tantra path but unsure of entering into commitments it a marvelous introduction. Attending the long life initiation carries no commitments, but gives the participant a fine view of the beauty and mystery of working in the tantric way. The enlightened goddess White Tara is the embodiment of purity and health and energy. Come and experience the initiation and her healing restorative energy.

Khyongla Rato Rinpoche

Khyongla Rato is a reincarnate lama and scholar of the Gelugpa order of Tibetan Buddhism and teaches at the Tibet Centre in New York City.

For more information about Rinpoche visit: The Tibet Center

Teachings by Khyongla Rato Rinpoche

Buddha Nature

We and all sentient beings in this world share the potential to reach a state free from the gross and subtle obscurations. This shared potential is called Buddha Nature. It is possible to bring about this transformation because our consciousness is not in the nature of those obscurations: since it lacks inherent existence it is possible to transform it.


Atisha's Lamp of the Path to Enlightenment at Jamyang Buddhist Centre London, 23 May 2016

Rimpoche gave a talk on Atisha's Lamp of the Path to Enlightenment. As he said, Lama Tsong Kapa's Lamrim text is a commentary on this, so his talk was by necessity just an introduction. Before he started his talk he said that he used to visit the UK a lot, many years ago. People used to call him the Blue Jeans Lama, or Uncle Charlie. As he said, Rinpoche does not exist from his own side - the referent points for those names are the aggregates. His talk was full of kindness and understanding.

Kirti Tsenshab Rinpoche

Kirti Tsenshab Rinpoche was born in the province of Amdo - eastern Tibet - in 1926, and at age six was recognized as the reincarnation of the former abbot of the Kirti Gompa. At the age of nine, He was ordained as a monk. Rinpoche received teachings from many high Lamas of the Tibetan Buddhist tradition.

Lama Kirti Tsenshab Rinpoche is one of the holders of the tantra of Kalachakra lineage, having received that empowerment when he was 14 years old. At the age of 32 and having completed his monastic studies he was appointed as the Abbot of Kirti.

After escaping from T?bet in 1959, Kirti Tsenshab Rinpoche taught Tibetan orphans at the Tibetan Children's Village, Dharamsala, India. At the age of 45 he began a fifteen-year meditation retreat in a small stone hermitage above Dharamsala, "big enough for a bed, prostrations, and a stove". He spent seven years in meditation on Lam Rim, three years on "Seven Point Thought Transformation", and some generation and completion stage tantra. Two years were spent only on generation and completion stages and in the final 3 years, Rinpoche repeated all of the above.

Rinpoche has given Kalachakra commentary to His Holiness the Dalai Lama and is a teacher of Lama Zopa Rinpoche. Lama Zopa Rinpoche has said of Kirti Tsenshab Rinpoche, "He is a great Kadampa master who shows real Kadampa Tradition...so completely renounced. There's not one slightest worldy activity, not the slightest eight world dharmas, no self cherishing thought. Even talking, everything is as much as possible pleasing to sentient being's minds."

Rinpoche has been giving teachings around the world in many countries included: Australia, Germany, Holland, Hong Kong, Italy, New Zealand, Singapore, Taiwan, and the United States.

The 37 Practices of a Bodhisattva summarises the quintessence of the Mahayana Path to Enlightenment. Part of the Lojong or Mind training collection of teachings, this text can also be interpreted according to the Steps on the Path tradition.

Teachings by Kirti Tsenshab Rinpoche

37 Practices of a Bodhisattva

The 37 Practices of a Bodhisattva summarises the quintessence of the Mahayana Path to Enlightenment. Part of the Lojong or Mind training collection of teachings, this text can also be interpreted according to the Steps on the Path tradition.

Atisha's Jewel Rosary

Whether you are Buddhist or not, Atisha's Jewel Rosary for the Bodhisattva provides practical advice to integrate core spiritual principles into your everyday life and thereby become a happier more warm-hearted person.

Stainless Light

Root text

Vimalaprabha

Kyabje Ling Rinpoche

The Senior Tutor to His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, and ninety-seventh Throneholder of Je Tsongkhapa, the great Yongdzin Ling Dorjechang, Jetzun Thubten Lungtog Namgyal Trinley Palzangpo, was born at the break of dawn on the sixth day of the eleventh month of the Tibetan Water Rabbit year (1903). His mother, Sonam Dekyi, gave birth to him at Yabphu, a holy place of Chakrasamvara and consort, northwest of Lhasa, Tibet. He is the sixth in his series of reincarnations. His predecessor, Sharchoe Yongdzin Ling Tulku, Losang Lungtog Tenzin Trinley, was the tutor to His Holiness the Thirteenth Dalai Lama.

During his full meditational retreat on Vajrabhairava, lasting over three years, he composed one of his many well-known writings between sessions of his daily meditations. Called The Eighteen Rung Ladder of Vajrabhairava Ekavira, it was published by Tibet house, New Delhi in 1981. This is the most complete and authoritative manual available for the practice and study of Vajrabhairava, as this lineage is highly esteemed as the human manifestation of the deity Vajrabhairava himself.

The Fifth Ling Rinpoche was in turn the incarnation of Ngawang Lungtog Yonten Gyatso, Tutor to His Holiness Khedrub Gyatso, the Eleventh Dalai Lama, and Seventy-fifth Gaden Throneholder. There are many other manifestations of the lineage of Ling Rinpoche extending back to the time of the Buddha.

Biography from Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive
Biography from FPMT website
Ling Choktul Rinpoche Photo Gallery

Teachings by Kyabje Ling Rinpoche

Generating the Awakening Mind

Bodhicitta is the elixir that can transfrom this body and mind into the body and mind of a Buddha, like an elixir that can transfrom a piece of metal into gold. When this is developed even the smallest virtue, such as giving a mouthful of food to an animal, can become a great act of a bodhisattva and function as a cause for attaining enlightenment.

In this teaching Kyabje Ling Rinpoche guides us through the stages of cultivating this attitude: the wish to attain enlightenment in order to benefit all sentient beings.

Kyabje Song Rinpoche

Rinpoche was born in Kham in 1905. He went to Lhasa when he was eleven years old to study at Shartse. He studied effortlessly and became renowned as a powerful and irrefutable debater. A learned geshe at that time said that 'even if Shri Dharmakirti had been present, he would not have been able to debate better than that.'

After graduating as a high ranking Lharampa geshe at the age of twenty-five he moved on to the Tantric College of Gyuto. In 1937 he was appointed abbot of Shartse, a position he held for nine years.

Rinpoche was known as a strong, detached and wrathful lama. He had impeccable knowledge of all rituals, art and science, and he never hesitated to give reasons to others why this action or that painting was wrong.

Teachings by Kyabje Song Rinpoche

Basic Buddhism

Starting from the basic practice of refuge in Buddha, Dharma and Sangha Song Rinpoche outines the ethical way of life that a Buddhist should maintain. This leads to the generatation of the altruistic intention that marks the foundation of the Mahayana Path.

Lama Yeshe Rinpoche

Lama Thubten Yeshe was born in Tibet in 1935. At the age of six, he entered Sera Monastic University in Tibet where he studied until 1959, when as Lama Yeshe himself has said, "In that year the Chinese kindly told us that it was time to leave Tibet and meet the outside world."

Lama Thubten Yeshe and Lama Thubten Zopa Rinpoche, together as teacher and disciple since their exile in India, met their first Western students in 1965. By 1971 they settled at Kopan, a small hamlet near Kathmandu in Nepal. In 1974, the Lamas began touring and teaching in the West, which would eventually result in The Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition. Lama Yeshe died in 1984, his reincarnation Lama Tenzin ?sel Rinpoche was born to Spanish parents in 1985.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche

When we die, according to Tibetan Buddhism, we are propelled into our next life by our karma, without control. There are some beings, however, who, through the power of their minds, can determine their next rebirth and, through the strength of their compassion, reincarnate again amongst us to help us as best they can. They are the incarnate beings, the tulkus. In the Gelugpa tradition of Tibetan Buddhism they are called Rinpoche, precious one. Lama Zopa is such a one. Most of his students simply call him Rinpoche.

Lama Thubten Zopa Rinpoche was born in 1946 in the Solo Khumbu region of Nepal near Mount Everest, in sight of the cave of the late Lawudo Lama. This great Nyingma master had lived in the cave for his last twenty years, attended by his wife and two children, either meditating or giving teachings to the people of the region, his energy said to be inexhaustible. It is said that in his later years he passed completely beyond the need for sleep.

From the time he was able to crawl, Zopa Rinpoche would try to climb the steep path to the cave and his family would have to retrieve him from the precarious route. When he was old enough to speak he declared that the cave was his, that he was the incarnation of the Lawudo Lama and that his only desire was to lead a life of meditation. After a public examination when he was four or five years old, in which he was repeatedly able to identify possessions belonging to the Lawudo Lama and pass other rigorous tests, he was formally declared to be the rightful incarnation.

Young Zopa Rinpoche began his education at Solo Khumbu in the traditional Tibetan manner, with the alphabet. One of the first books he read was the biography of Milarepa, the famous eleventh century poet and meditator. This work sparked in him a great desire to become like Milarepa and study under such a highly realized lama as Marpa, Milarepa's root guru. One day, while studying as a child in Rolwaling in Nepal, he almost drowned. He had convinced his teacher to let him take some potatoes to Western hikers across a river. Rinpoche explains:

'The bridge crossing the river to that spot was just two tree trunks tied together. The river was quite wide and when I reached the middle of it, in my view the bridge tilted, and I fell into the water. My head came up, then went down again. I was carried along by the river, with my head coming up from time to time. All the time I was closer and closer to danger, to where river was very, very deep.

'One time when my head came up, I saw my teacher running towards the river from the monastery, which was quite far away. ... At that time, the thought came into my mind, "Now what people call 'Lawudo Lama' is going to die. This is going to end." I did not have much understanding of Dharma, and I had no idea of emptiness, but this thought just came. There was no fear. If death came now it would be difficult for me, but at that time my mind was completely comfortable. There was no fear at all - just the thought, "What people call 'Lawudo Lama' is going to die."

'I was about to reach very deep water where it would have been very difficult for my teacher to catch me, when he finally grabbed me and pulled me out. I was dripping wet. I'm not sure, but I think he said, "I told you not to go!" I think the fact that I fell into the water and dropped everything, the container and the potatoes, must be a shortcoming of not listening to my teacher.'

On a pilgrimage to Tibet with his uncle, he startled his uncle by refusing to return home, stating he wanted to stay at the monastery in Sikkim to practice Dharma. As a recognised incarnate lama, his wishes were granted and he would have continued at Sera Je monastery in Lhasa. In 1959, however, as Lama Yeshe put it, "The Chinese kindly told us that it was time to leave Tibet and meet the outside world."

Like many thousands of monk refugees, he found himself in Buxaduar, a former British concentration camp in north India where he first met Lama Yeshe. He talks about his reluctance at first to become Lama Yeshe's disciple:

'I stopped again and again, saying, "No, I don't want to go," but [Choemphel] kept pushing me. I had brought no offerings, which was partly the reason for wanting to go back. When you first make contact with the guru it is very important to perform the offerings correctly. How many teachings you receive depends on that. So much depends on that, as you know from the stories of Milarepa. For this reason I didn't receive many teachings at Buxa. 'Chomphel had brought a bowl with some rice and a few rupees, together with a very poor, old offering scarf. He went in first to ask if Lama Yeshe would receive me.

'On my first day I sat on the same bed as Lama Yeshe because of having the name "incarnate," something like that, and the others sat on the floor. The teaching was about cause and effect. I didn't understand anything at all - I think because I went with a bad motivation. I thought, why couldn't Lama Yeshe teach more slowly? Although the others could understand, I couldn't.

'Then on the second day I could understand a little better. I think that's because I had been guided by Lama Yeshe in many lifetimes, just as you have. So, even though I had no strong wish, there was a strong force, karma, between Lama Yeshe and myself. So you see, there was definitely contact in past lives. He hasn't only helped and guided me in this life, but he planted seeds in my mind in many past lifetimes. I think you can see in this clearly why all the happiness of the past, present and future depends on the guru.'

The two lamas soon became inseparable, Lama Zopa calling himself Lama Yeshe's "heart disciple". One day, in 1965, an American woman, Zina Rachevsky, came in search of a lama she had read about in a book, but found instead Lama Yeshe and Lama Zopa. She became their first Western disciple and by 1969 the three had bought a small hill in Kathmandu, near the famous Boudhanath stupa. The hill is called Kopan. When they gave their first meditation course in 1971, twenty people came. By the seventh, in 1974, interest was so great that attendance had to be restricted to 200 meditators, the limit of the local facilities. This was the start of the annual Kopan November course, an event which has changed the lives of literally thousands of people since then.

More and more Westerners returned to their countries with the wish to continue what they had started in Kopan, and, inevitably, centres grew up. Chenresig in Queensland was the first. Manjushri Cumbria, and later Manjushri London (now Jamyang) followed soon after. Soon Lama Yeshe and Lama Zopa were travelling the world, amongst the first lamas to bring the living teachings of Tibetan Buddhism to the West. When Lama Yeshe died in 1984, Lama Zopa shouldered the full responsibility for the growing organisation, the FPMT (the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition) then numbering 80 centres. There are now over 120, consisting of city and country Dharma centres, retreat places, hospices and projects, peopled by monks and nuns, lamas and lay people, all inspired by Rinpoche's great qualities and vast vision.

For many years he never stopped travelling, constantly giving teaching and initiations, and giving advice to the students and centres of the FPMT. A few years ago he was diagnosed as being diabetic and since then has not toured as extensively. Much of his time now is spent with the Maitreya Project.

Links:

Lama Zopa Rinpoche

Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition

Kopan Monastery

Teachings by Lama Zopa Rinpoche

Freedom and Success in Life

This teaching is about the mind and how to use it in the best way. In order to achieve happiness and success in life, we have to understand the real evolution of happiness and problems in the mind. This starts with understanding how everything depends on the mind: not only ultimate happiness but even day to day happiness has to come from our mind.

Making Life Meaningful

We want happiness and so we try to accomplish this by trying to put together various external conditions. Even when this is successful, sooner or later some dissatisfaction arises, or even anger, jealousy and other painful emotions. Why does life go like this? We have an incredible opportunity to find happiness in life, but in order to accomplish this we need to take a different approach.

The Buddhist Path

An overview of the Buddhist path by Lama Zopa.

Enlightened Courage: the Buddha's Path of Compassionate Wisdom

Rinpoche will teach on the key aspects of the Path to Buddhahood showing the need for both compassion and wisdom and how each supports the other. These are not just needed for enlightenment. They are useful in daily life.
Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche is known for the purity of his practice, the depth of his understanding and the breadth of his compassionate wish to engage beneficially with everyone he meets

Professor Jeffrey Hopkins

Jeffrey Hopkins is Professor Emeritus of Tibetan Buddhist Studies at the University of Virginia where he taught Tibetan Buddhist Studies and Tibetan language for thirty-two years since 1973. He received a B.A. magna cum laude from Harvard University in 1963, trained for five years at the Lamaist Buddhist Monastery of America (now the Tibetan Buddhist Learning Center) in New Jersey, USA, and received a Ph.D. in Buddhist Studies from the University of Wisconsin in 1973.

He served as His Holiness the Dalai Lama's chief interpreter into English on lecture tours for ten years. At the University of Virginia he founded programs in Buddhist Studies and Tibetan Studies and served as Director of the Center for South Asian Studies for twelve years. He has published thirty-three books in a total of twenty-two languages.

Links:

The Hopkins Tibetan Research Multimedia Archive

Jeffrey Hopkins - University of Virginia

Teachings by Professor Jeffrey Hopkins

Three Principal Paths

Tsongkapa's masterpiece The Three Principles of the path summarises the entire teachings of Buddhism into a single poem of fourteen verses. The wish for freedom, an altruistic intention, and the wisdom of emptiness constitute the three principal aspects of the path to enlightenment.

Root text

The Three Principal Paths by Tsongkhapa

Meditation on Emptiness

In this talk Professor Hopkins introduces the profound topic of emptiness, the ultimate truth of all phenomena as taught by the Buddha. Describing the best way to approach this subject he outlines the steps we need to make to meditate on and realise this truth.

Dagri Rinpoche

Three Principle Aspects

Dagri Rinpoche is the reincarnation of Pari (Dagri) Dorje Chang, one of the very great geshes of Lhasa who was the teacher of many lamas, including Lama Yeshe. Dagri Rinpoche was born in Tibet in 1958. He grew up during the Cultural Revolution of 1966 – 1976. After his escape from Tibet in 1982 he completed his 17 years of study of Buddhist philosophy and received the Geshe Lharampa degree.

Robert Beer

Robert Beer is the author and illustrator of the Encyclopedia of Tibetan Symbols and Motifs, and the Hanbook of Tibetan Buddhist Symbols.

Teachings by Robert Beer

the Imagery and Symbolism of Yamantaka

A Chat On the Imagery and Symbolism of Yamantaka