Tsen Khawoche was an eleventh-century disciple of the Kashmiri paṇḍit Sajjana. He is credited by Tibetan historians for giving rise to the "meditative" tradition of exegesis of the Ratnagotravibhāga, a main source of buddha-nature theory in Tibet, which heavily influenced Mahāmudrā and the "other-emptiness" philosophical position.

Umapa Tsondru Sengge was a fourteenth century Geluk scholar from Kham whose visions and dreams of Mañjuśrī were an important early source for Tsongkhapa's understanding of emptiness. Tsongkhapa, Umapa's disciple, frequently asked Umapa to serve as a medium in order that he might speak with the bodhisattva. He appears to have earned his epithet "Umapa," meaning "holder of Madhyamaka," based on his visionary inquiries into the finer points of the doctrine.

The Fifth Lelung Jedrung, Lobzang Trinle was a classically-trained nonsectarian Geluk lama who played significant roles in mitigating the political violence of the first half of the eighteenth century. A student of the Nyingma treasure revealers Terdak Lingpa and Choje Lingpa, he was prophesied to be the dharma heir of Terdak Lingpa's treasures relating to a semi-wrathful form of Avalokiteśvara.

Lha Lama Yeshe O was a tenth-century king of Guge in western Tibet. He famously built Toling Temple, sent young Tibetans such as Rinchen Zangpo to train in India, and invited Atiśa to Tibet, all in order to revitalize monastic Buddhism in Tibet following the period of fragmentation.

Khordong Terchen Nuden Dorje was a prominent Nyingma master of the Northern Treasures tradition in Golok during the nineteenth century. He served as the head of his family's monastery, Khordong, in Golok, and revealed multiple scriptural treasures. Nuden Dorje passed away in the ninth month of the wood-bird year, 1864. His subsequent incarnations include: Drodul Lingpa, who died in infancy, then Kelden Lingpa who lived to be thirty-seven years old, and most recently Chimed Rigdzin Rinpoche, commonly known as "C. R. Lama."