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Sanggye Gompa Sengge was the sixth abbot of Nartang Monastery from 1241 to 1248 or 1249. +
Yelpa Yeshe Tsek (yel pa ye shes brtsegs) was born in 1134 in Kham, the son of a lay mantra practitioner named Gompa Ambar (sgom pa a 'bar) and his wife Gongpaza Tsunmacham (gong pa bza' btsun ma lcam), the eldest of four children. Purpa Kyab (phur pa skyabs) or Purpa Drub (phur pa grub) was his childhood name. As a young man he had a meeting with Galo (rga lo), likely Ga Lotsawa (rga lo tsA ba), and received teachings from him. Age nineteen, he went to Bamda (rba mda') and took novice vows together with the name Yeshe Tsek. Only one year later he became a full monk.
At first Yeshe Tsek concentrated on learning the monastic discipline texts, and then learned meditation practice, with good results in terms of meditative experiences. As was very common for monks in Kham in those days, in order to further his formal education he traveled to Tibet, at age twenty-three. At first he studied scholastic logic and Madhyamaka philosophy with Chapa Chokyi Sengge (phywa pa chos kyi seng+ge, 1109-1169), the sixth abbot of the Kadam monastery of Sangpu Neutok (gsang phu ne'u thog). He is said to have been dissatisfied, feeling that much of what he was being taught was not really Mahāyāna, and wanting to learn tantra.
At age twenty-nine, in 1162, Yeshe Tsek went to Densatil Monastery (gdan sa mthil dgon) together with his teacher Parpuwa. Pakmodrupa Dorje Gyelpo (phag mo gru pa rdo rje rgyal po, 1110-1170) started him out with preliminary practices, then guru yoga meditations.
Back in his home region of Kham, he spent a few years going from place to place. When he was thirty-eight, in 1171, he founded the monastery of Yelpuk (yel phug) and there he headed the assembly for eighteen years. In 1175 he founded Gonlung (dgon lung) Monastery. Then in 1188 a patron made an offering of a monastery in the Nangchen (nang chen) region that would be called Tana (rta rna), which means ‘Horse Ear,' where he gathered many students. A patron gave the monastery relics of the folk hero Ling Gesar (gling ge sar), and the monastery quickly became a center of Gesar activity.
At the time a fellow disciple of Pakmodrupa named Marpa Sherab Yeshe (smar pa shes rab ye shes) was staying nearby at Sho Monastery (sho dgon). They met for discussions and exchanged teachings. Then in 1192 still other patrons permitted him to found the monastery of Dodzong (rdo rdzong), also known as Tojang (stod 'jang). During his years residing at these four monasteries he wrote many songs, prayers and treatises, although sad to say hardly any of these writings are available today.
When he was sixty-one he gave his last teachings to his students on the topics of impermanence, the certainty of death, and the faults of samsara. His final words were these, “Never at any time allow yourselves to be deprived of emptiness-compassion.” His cremation took place at Tana Monastery. The monasteries he founded were cared for by his disciple Khenchen Puwa (mkhan chen phu ba, d.u.). Tana Monastery in Tibet has recently been rebuilt, following its destruction during the Cultural Revolution (some, although not all of the Gesar relics are said to have survivied), and a second Tana Monastery has been founded in South India (at Kollegal, in Karnataka State).
Chokyi Gyeltsen was the twelfth abbot of Sera Monastery. He studied in Tashilhunpo and Sera and served as disciplinarian of Tashilhunpo. His collected works are in seven volumes. +
The treasure revealer Sera Khandro was the most prolific female author in Tibetan history. Considered an incarnation of Yeshe Tsogyel, her main treasure revelations are The Secret Treasury of Reality Ḍākinīs and The Ḍākinīs’ Heart Essence. She also wrote her own autobiography, a commentary on Dudjom Lingpa’s Buddhahood Without Meditation and a biography of her main consort, Drime Ozer. +
Zhabkar Tsokdruk Rangdrol was a Nyingma lama in Amdo active in the first half of the nineteenth century. A native of the tantric practice center of Rebkong, Zhabkar meditated in sacred places across the Tibetan Plateau, including Labchi and Kailash. His autobiography is a classic of Tibetan literature, much beloved for its simple and moving account of the life of a wandering yogin from childhood until his ultimate spiritual realization. He was a teacher to many of the nineteenth century's greatest lamas of Kham and Amdo. +
Gyurme Kunzang Tenpai Gyeltsen, the Fifth Shechen Rabjam, was a close disciple of the Fourth Dzogchen Drubwang, Mingyur Namkhai Dorje, and Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo. +
Eldest of the children, six sons and one daughter, of Sanggye Pel (sangs rgyas dpal) and his wife Choden (chos ldan), Sherab Jungne (shes rab 'byung gnas) would be called Won (dbon), which means ‘nephew,' because he was a relative of Jikten Gonpo Rinchen Pel ('jig rten mgon po rin chen dpal, 1143-1217). He was born in 1187. He was not called ‘nephew' because he was a nephew in the strict sense of the world, although he was certainly a scion of the same Kyura (skyu ra) family.
As a child, he demonstrated outstanding ability not only in reading and writing, but also in conjuring the hail-stopping magic of his ancestors. He excelled at singing and dancing. Despite his childhood dreams of becoming a wandering yogi, when a famous teacher named Ngepuwa (ngad phu ba) arrived in the region he took monastic vows from him after obtaining the consent of his father. Ngepuwa gave him the ordination name Lha Rinchen Gyelpo (lha rin chen rgyal po) when he was ordained at age seventeen. Ngepuwa recognized the young man's potential but unfortunately died soon afterward when Sherab Jungne was twenty.
In the next year, in 1207, Sherab Jungne left his home in Kham for U-Tsang with a large group of three hundred people on their way to see Ngepuwa's teacher Jikten Gonpo, who was over sixty years old at the time.
For his first three years at Drigung Til ('bris gung mthil) he served as a household priest for one named Gompa (sgom pa), attending every single one of the teaching sessions. Eventually he came to the attention of Jikten Gonpo, became his personal attendant, and took on other responsibilities as well. Sometimes he is called Chennga Sherab Jungne (spyan snga shes rab 'byung gnas) because of his service as Jikten Gonpo's personal attendant (spyan snga ba). +
Shongton Lotsāwa Dorje Gyeltsen was a prominent translator who translated the complete Tibetan poetry system from Sanskrit as well as around a dozen titles found in the Tengyur. +
Pelden Dondrub was the Sixteenth Ngor Khenchen, from 1618 to 1622. +
Konchok Gyatso also known as the Gya Zhabdrung, was the second reincarnation of the thirty-fourth throne holder of Labrang, Trangkya Jamyang Kelden Gyatso. A student of the Fourth Jamyang Zhepa, he was known for giving the Kālacakra initiation five times in different locations in Amdo. +
Smṛtijñānakīrti is sometimes considered the first translator of the "later propagation" of Buddhism in Tibet, and the figure who inaugurated the "new translations." He was primarily based in Kham, at Drentang, near Langtang Dolma Lhakhang. +
Sonam Gyatso was given the title of Dalai Lama by the leader of the Tumet Mongols, Altan Khan, which was posthumously applied to his previous incarnations, Gendun Drub and Gendun Gyatso. A tireless missionary of the Geluk teachings, he was instrumental in what is known as “the second conversion of the Mongols”, bringing the Geluk teachings to the region. Sonam Gyatso founded several important Geluk monasteries, including Kumbum, Litang Ganden Tubchen Chokorling, and Namgyel Monastery. in 1581 he served as the thirteenth throne-holder of Chamdo Jampa Ling for six months. +
Sumpa Khenpo Yeshe Peljor was a prominent eighteenth-century Geluk lama of Amdo. He was ethnically Mongol -- most likely Oirat, from the Dzungar Federation. He was educated in Amdo monasteries such as Kumbum and at Drepung Gomang in Lhasa, and served as abbot of many monasteries including Gonlung, Dreyul Kyetsel, Pari Tashi Choling, Serlung, and Ganden Chodzong Hermitage, which he founded. He visited China several times at the request of the Qianlong Emperor, and spent about eight years in Mongolia giving teachings and empowerments as per the requirement. A prolific author, he composed works on many subjects, most famously his history of Amdo and of Buddhism in India, Mongolia, and Tibet. Present in Lhasa during the upheavals of the early eighteenth century in which Mongolian tribes and the Manchu Empire vied for political control of Tibet, Sumpa Khenpo wrote with a strident Geluk partisanship. +
Sumpa Lotsāwa Darma Yonten was a Sakya translator who worked with the Nepali paṇḍita Jayasena on the translation of the Dākārnava Tantra and related works. He was a teacher of Sakya Jetsun Drakpa Gyeltsen. +
Sonam Gyeltsen was a prolific author, although many of his writings were never printed. Most famously, he was the author of the genealogy, Gyal rab sal ba'i me long (rgyal rabs sal ba'i me long), commonly translated as The Clear Mirror: A Royal Genealogy. He wrote on various tantric subjects, particularly the Kālacakratantra, and composed a commentary on Shantideva's Bodhicaryāvatāra. His influential writings on the Lamdre (lam 'bras) tradition were collected in a volume called the Lamdre Ponak (lam 'bras pod nag), one of the first major written works on Lamdre. He also sponsored the first edition of the collected works of the Five Patriarchs of Sakya (sa skya gong ma lnga). +
Sonam Tsemo, the son of Sachen Kunga Nyingpo, was the second of the five founding patriarchs of the Sakya tradition. He was also the fourth Sakya Tridzin at Sakya Monastery, although he served as active head of the monastery for only a few years. +
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In the history of the Jonang tradition Tāranātha is second in importance only to Dölpopa himself. He was responsible for the Jonang renaissance in U-Tsang during the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, and the widespread revitalization of the zhentong teachings. Like his previous incarnation, Kunga Drolchok, Tāranātha practiced and taught from many different lineages and was nonsectarian in his approach to realization. He was also one of the last great Tibetan translators of Sanskrit texts. The abbot of Jonang Monastery, he emphasized the practice of the Sakya teachings of Lamdre and the esoteric instructions of the Shangpa Kagyu, but he specially focused on the explication of the Kālacakra Tantra and the practice of its Six-branch Yoga as the most profound of all the teachings given by the Buddha. It is clear in his writings that Tāranātha considered Dölpopa to be the ultimate authority in matters of doctrine and practice. +
Taktsang Lotsāwa Sherab Rinchen was a polymath scholar-monk of the Sakya tradition. Active during a great period of classical scholarship and translation, he was a prolific commentator on a wide range of topics, with special focus on medicine, poetry, Vinaya, and Kālacakra. He is said to have had an encyclopedic knowledge of not only the five topics of monastic study -- Vinaya, Abhidharma, Pramāṇa, Madhyamaka, and Prajñāparamitā -- but also the five major fields of traditional learning -- grammar, art, medicine, logic, and the inner science. However, he is perhaps best known for his critique of Tsongkhapa's interpretation of Madhyamaka in his philosophical treatise, ''Knowing All Philosophical Systems'', which generated centuries of often polemical Geluk-Sakyapa debate. +
The Fourth Paṇchen Lama, Lobzang Chokyi Gyeltsen, who was the first to hold the title, lived during a time of tremendous political and religious change in Tibet. During his near-century long life the Geluk government of the Fifth Dalai Lama, the Ganden Podrang, took power in Tibet, and Bhutan established itself as an independent state under the rule of the Drukpa Kagyu, both events in which he was intimately connected. Lobzang Chokyi Gyeltsen was a teacher to many powerful Tibetan, Bhutanese and Mongolian political and religious figures, including the Fourth and the Fifth Dalai Lamas, and the First Jetsundampa of Mongolia. The Sixteenth abbot of Tashilhunpo, he was given the title Paṇchen Lama by the Fifth Dalai Lama, who declared him an emanation of Amitabha. By the system advanced by the Ganden Podrang, Chokyi Gyeltsen is considered the First Paṇchen, not counting three previous incarnations, beginning with Kedrubje, one of Tsongkhapa’s close disciples. A prolific author, Chokyi Gyeltsen is credited with over a hundred compositions, including a number of commentaries and ritual texts that remain central in the Gelukpa tradition. +
Gendun Gyatso was the reincarnation of Gendun Drub. He served as abbot of three of the most powerful Geluk monasteries in both U and Tsang, significantly contributing to the spread of the Geluk tradition. Gendun Gyatso retained relations to his family’s religious traditions, which included Nyingma, Shangpa Kagyu, and Sakya teachings. He built the Ganden Podrang at Drepung around the year 1530, which came to be the residence of the Dalai Lamas and the seat of their government of Tibet in later centuries. His abbacies occurred during a time of intermittent war between the Kagyu rulers of Tsang and the Geluk leaders of Lhasa. +
