The Treasury of Lives

འཇིགས་བྲལ་ཚེ་དབང་རྡོ་རྗེ་ནི་རྫོགས་ཆེན་དཔོན་སློབ་སྐུ་ཕྲེང་དྲུག་པ་ཡིན་ལ། འདན་དུ་སྐུ་འཁྲུངས་ཤིང་སྐུ་གཅེན་ཀརྨ་པ་སྐུ་ཕྲེང་བཅུ་དྲུག་པ་རང་བྱུང་ཨོ་རྒྱན་རྡོ་རྗེ་དང་ལྷན་དུ་འབྲས་ལྗོངས་སུ་བྲོས་བྱོལ་དུ་ཕེབས།


Dzogchen Ponlob Jikdrel Tsewang Dorje (rdzogs chen dpon slob 06 'jigs bral tshe dbang rdo rje) was born into a family called “Den Atub Tsang” ('dan a thub tshang) at Den, Kham in 1925, the water-dragon year of the sixteenth sexagenary cycle. He was younger brother of the Sixteenth Karmapa Rangjung Rigpai Dorje (karma pa 16 rang byung rig pa'i rdo rje, 1924-1981).

The Fifth Dzogchen Drubwang, Tubten Chokyi Dorje (rdzogs chen grub dbang 05 thub bstan chos kyi rdo rje, 1872-1935) identified him as the reincarnation of the Fifth Dzogchen Ponlob, Konchok Tenpai Nyima (rdzogs chen dpon slob 05 dkon mchog bstan pa'i nyi ma, c.1898-c.1924). The Fifth Dzogchen Drubwang brought him to Dzogchen Monastery, Orgyen Samten Choling, in Rudam, and gave him the name Tubten Jikdrel Tsewang Dorje (thub bstan ’jigs bral tshe dbang rdo rje).

He started his education under the tutorship of Khenchen Tubten Nyendrak (mkhan chen thub bstan snyan grags, 1883-1959) who taught him reading, memorization of texts, writing, grammar and poetry. Khenchen Pema Tekchok Loden (mkhan chen pad+ma theg mchog blo ldan, 1879-1955) served as his main tutor for traditional studies of the monastic curriculum. This included the Sangwa Nyingtik (gsang ba snying thig), which he studied in detail with comprehensive commentary, empowerments, esoteric instructions, and oral transmission.

After enrolling at Dzogchen Monastery, Jikdrel Tsewang Dorje suffered frequent problems with his health. Some speculated that this was due to his having been born into a Karma Kagyu family, despite the long intertwining of that tradition with the Nyingma. Partly as a result of this, he left Dzogchen and returned to his home village for extensive practice. In Den he sat for a retreat in Pema Retro (pad+ma ri mtho), and then left for the seat of the Karmapa, Tolung Tsurpu (stod lung mtshur phu) outside of Lhasa.

Following the Chinese assumption of control of Tibet in 1959, Jikdrel Tsewang Dorje fled Tibet into exile in Sikkim with his brother the Sixteenth Karmapa. Just two years later, in 1962, he passed away at the Karmapa's monastery of Rumtek (rum theg) in Gangtok, Sikkim.

The Sixteenth Karmapa identified his reincarnation in Karma Sungrab Ngedon Tenpa Gyeltsen (karma gsung rab nyes don bstan pa rgyal mtshan) who was born in Rumtek in 1965.

Samten Chhosphel earned his PhD from CIHTS in India where he served as the head of Publication Dept. for 26 years. He has a Master’s degree in Writing and Publishing from Emerson College, Boston. Currently he is an adjunct Assistant Professor at the City University of New York, and Language Associate in Columbia University, NY.

Published December 2011

དཔྱད་གཞིའི་ཡིག་ཆ་ཁག།

Bstan 'dzin lung rtogs nyi ma. 2004.Snga 'gyur rdzogs chen chos 'byung chen mo.Beijing: Krong go'i bod rigs dpe skrun khang, pp. 381, 458, 462.

གང་ཟག་འདིའི་གསུང་རྩོམ་ཁག་བོད་ཀྱི་ནང་བསྟན་དཔེ་ཚོགས་ལྟེ་གནས་སུ་འཚོལ།