Rinchen, Sonam

PersonType	Category:Geshes Category:Ordained (Monks and Nuns) Category:Tibetan Buddhist Teachers
MainNamePhon	Geshe Sonam Rinchen
MainNameTib	དགེ་གཤེས་བསོད་ནམས་རིན་ཆེན་
MainNameWylie	dge gshes bsod nams rin chen
SortName	Rinchen, Sonam
bio	Geshe Sonam Rinchen was born in 1933 at Dhargyey, in the Trehor Kham region of Eastern Tibet. At the age of thirteen, he decided to become a monk and entered Dhargyey Monastery, where he excelled in his studies and in debate. When he was nineteen, he made the two and a half month journey on foot to Central Tibet in order to enter Sera Je College of Sera Monastery. He became a fully ordained monk and remained there for the next six years until his studies were interrupted by the Chinese invasion of Tibet in 1959, which forced him into exile in India. For the following nine years, he lived with many other monks under extremely harsh conditions in Buxa Duar, West Bengal, in what had previously been a British internment camp. In 1967, he entered what is now the Central University of Tibetan Studies in Sarnath and stayed there until 1976, obtaining the degrees of Shastri and Acharya with honors. In 1980, he took the public examinations for the monastic title of Geshe. He received the highest qualification, that of Geshe Lharampa. Geshe Sonam Rinchen taught at the Library of Tibetan Works & Archives in Dharmsala, India for over 30 years. He published ten books in collaboration with his translator Ruth Sonam including Aryadeva’s Four Hundred Stanzas on the Middle Way, The Heart Sutra, The Bodhisattva Vow, the Six Perfections, How Karma Works, and Atisha’s Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment. (Source Accessed Sep 29, 2022)
YearBirth	1933
YearDeath	2013
IsInGyatsa	No
BnwShortPersonBio	Geshe Sonam Rinchen (1933–2013) was born in Trehor region of Kham in Eastern Tibet in 1933. He died in Dharamshala, India, 5 October 2013. In 1945, he joined Dhargyey Monastery, and entered the monastic university of Sera in Lhasa in 1952, where he studied until he was forced to flee Tibet in 1959. In India he completed his studies for the degree of Geshe Lharampa which he received in 1980. He also received the degree of Acarya from the Central Institute of Higher Tibetan Studies in Sarnath. He was appointed resident teacher at the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives in Dharamshala, India in 1978, where he taught Buddhist philosophy and practice, mainly to westerners. He has also taught in Japan, Australia, Great Britain, South Korea, Ireland, New Zealand and Switzerland. (Source Accessed Aug 6, 2020)
Other wikis	drl:Rinchen, Sonam buddhanature:Rinchen, Sonam bca:Rinchen, Sonam rtz:Rinchen, Sonam dnz:Rinchen, Sonam dudjom:Rinchen, Sonam khyentselineage:Rinchen, Sonam lcp:Rinchen, Sonam