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A Biography of the Twelfth Gangri Karma Rinpoche The twelfth Gangri Karma Rinpoche (born 1964) is an exceptional Buddhist scholar and Dharma practitioner and the present lineage holder of the Martsang Kagyu tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, having received the teachings in a direct unbroken line from the founder, Chöjé Marpa (1135-1203). Rinpoche has extensively studied the four major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism and has established schools in Tibet, Taiwan and the UK, where he now resides. Rinpoche is recognized as the reincarnation of the eleventh Gangri Karma Rinpoche (1910-1960), by H.H. Fourteenth Dalai Lama and His Holiness Sakya Trizin.

The Martsang Kagyu tradition of Tibetan Buddhism was founded by His Holiness Chöjé Marpa Sherab Yeshe (1135-1203) based on the authentic teachings of the Buddha’s sutras and tantras. Chöjé Marpa was born in Markham, East Tibet, and studied at Sangpu, the great monastic college of the Kadampa tradition. Subsequently, Chöjé Marpa studied with Phagmo Drupa Dorje Gyalpo (1110-1170), receiving and mastering the profound secret Kagyu teachings. In 1167, Chöjé Marpa returned to Markham, where he founded the Tashi Sho monastery and established the Martsang Kagyu tradition as a union of the Kadampa, a part of Sayka lineage and Kagyu lineages.

Chöjé Marpa’s principal student was Drogön Rinchen (1170-1249), who, in 1200 founded the Tsomdo monastery in Markham. Both Chöjé Marpa and Drogön Rinchen taught numerous students and thousands more studied the teachings at their monasteries. However, Drogön Rinchen predicted that the community would be destroyed and that he would be reincarnated at a later time to ensure the revival of the teachings. His prophecy was realized when in 1639, the Mongolian army demolished both monasteries and, although they were rebuilt, the Dzungarian Mongols destroyed them again in 1718 and the tradition entered a period of decline. However, the teachings survived and were passed down in an unbroken lineage to the eleventh Gangri Karma Rinpoche, who was later recognized to be the reincarnation of Drogön Rinchen.

The Eleventh Gangri Karma Rinpoche (1910-1959)

The eleventh Gangri Karma Rinpoche was born in 1910, as Gangri Butruk, in Markham, Tibet. The Gangris had once been a prominent local family, but by his parent’s generation, feuding and losses had reduced them to simple farmers. When for several years bad weather destroyed their harvest, the family was made homeless and forced to beg for food. Despite the early hardship, his parents worked tirelessly and eventually were able to acquire a small house and land, which they wanted their son to inherit, to carry on the family name. However, from a very young age, there were signs that Butruk was different. He would regularly sit cross-legged, as if in a meditation posture, and pretend to teach the Dharma to other children. Butruk was determined to become a monk, but when he was fifteen, his parents arranged a profitable marriage to a local girl called Pema Lhatso.

Yet Butruk was not intended for an ordinary life. At the age of eighteen, he had a vision in a dream of a female spirit who said to him, “Oh, Gangri, samsara is a nest of snakes, attachment is a spell and a beautiful woman is but an illusory dream.” She pointed to the East and told him to “Have no doubt and go there!” He immediately ran away from home.

''Rechungpa, my son who is like my heart, ''listen to this song of instruction, which is my final testament. In the ocean of the three realms of samsara, this illusory body is very sinful. It tries to fulfill its attachment to food and clothes and can never abandon worldly activities.'' '' At first he headed to Pongri Monastery, where he felt great happiness at meeting the renowned master, Karma Lingpa. Butruk had nothing to offer Karma Lingpa except flowers to represent his faith and a prayer of aspiration. Karma Lingpa agreed to teach him and gave him the name Karma Rinchen. He sent him to Changkah Monastery, where he took the vows of monastic ordination from Trinlay Gyamtso (Trophu Kagyu Khenpo) and stayed for thirteen years, studying and meditating on the complete meaning of sutras. He then returned to Karma Lingpa and went into retreat, practicing and mastering many profound and secret tantric meditations and teachings. Karma Lingpa and Trinlay Gyamtso transmitted the Martsang Kagyu teaching to Butruk and after two years on retreat, Karma Lingpa recognized him to be the rebirth of Drogön Rinchen, and instructed him to return to his homeland to continue his practice and teach for the benefit of others.

From this point, Rinpoche spent the rest of his life in mountain caves and retreat huts, enduring much hardship, while meditating day and night. To survive in near isolation, he mastered longevity practices that sustained him for long periods, while he ate only grains, flowers, stones and herbs. To withstand the icy conditions of the Himalayan mountaintops, he practiced inner heat meditation, allowing him to stay warm and melt the snow around him. He would never stay in one place for too long and, although he performed blessings and rituals for the sick and poor, he eschewed attention and fame, preferring to teach small groups of dedicated disciples. His primary student was Chödrak Gyamtso, a local boy who visited him at Mount Ukori and practiced with him until the end of his life.

Rinpoche dedicated his life to mastering the highest-level of tantric meditation and there were many exceptional signs and accomplishments reported by his students, such as seeing rainbows appearing inside his meditation cave and numerous birds and animals visiting him without fear. Rinpoche gained great mastery over his physical body and inner channels, such that he was reported to fly across the mountain ranges. This sight became so common at Mount Ukori, that the local herdsman barely paid notice when they saw the lama soar through the sky.

At Nego Mountain, Rinpoche achieved the rainbow body transference, a sign of attaining complete realization and at Mount Dekpön, his student witnessed him transform himself into Chakrasamvara, a blue deity with four faces and twelve arms. Another famous story, which is still told by local people to this day, speaks of a sudden and fierce storm that gathered while Rinpoche was meditating with his students in the mountains. Suddenly, Rinpoche was struck directly by a bolt of lightning and while his students ran and hid for cover, Rinpoche remained in meditation, completely undisturbed and unharmed.

Even though he was encircled by red thunderbolts, the yogin who had attained the rainbow body, bound the poisonous sky sorcery of the gyalpo and sinpo demons: that is the heroic act of Rechung Karma.

In 1958, as the Chinese tightened control over Tibet, Rinpoche realized that his way of life was nearing an end. In December of that year, he gather his students and arranged many silver offering bowls outside his mountain cave and for one week offered a thousand butter lamps while performing elaborate practices and rituals. When he finished, he said to his pupils, “You must all return home. The time when Dharma practitioners can roam the mountains is coming to an end.” Rinpoche was subsequently shot at and arrested by Chinese soldiers.

Upon his release, Rinpoche told his students that he wanted to go to Khata Mountain and that this would be the last place he would visit. On the way, they stopped at Yukpo village where one of Rinpoche’s students, Pema Gyamsto, lived. As they passed this house, a dog leapt in front of him and barked. Rinpoche pointed his finger at the dog and said, “Don’t bark at me. Recognize me next time I come to your home.” The dog seemed to understand and although his students did not know at the time, this was to be the birthplace of his reincarnation.

On 25th January 1959, after reaching Khata Mountain, he said to his pupils, “Don’t worry, its time for me to leave.” He turned to Chödrak Gyamtso and said, “Can you look after my rebirth when he comes?” But the wind was blowing loudly and Chödrak couldn’t hear him and asked him to repeat his question. Rinpoche responded, “This isn’t time for you to understand,” turned to the south in a meditation posture and passed away. Only years later would Chödrak recall these words and realize their significance.

As Rinpoche left his physical body, it shrunk to the size of a five-year-old child. His students were fearful that the communist army would take his body and so decided to cremate him. Upon lighting the firewood, his body burned like a torch and generated smoke that was the colours of the rainbow and lingered in the sky, before stretching out like a chord in the direction of Yukpo village. Many ringsel, pearl-like gemstones, were found in the ashes of the fire and at the cremation site.

The Twelfth Gangri Karma Rinpoche

Five years later, the twelfth Gangri Karma Rinpoche was born in 1964 in Yukpo village in Markham. His father was Pema Gyamtso, a disciple of the eleventh Gangri Karma Rinpoche, who he had first met as a young boy at Yangri Dolma Mountain, before becoming a dedicated student. A year before the birth of his son, he saw the great sage, Padmasambhava, in a dream, who told him that he would have a child, who he must raise with exceptional care.

When his son was three years old, Pema took him on an overnight trip to a nearby mountain. The next morning as they walked home, they reached a fork in the path, with one side leading back to their village. However, his son insisted that they should take the other path and led his father towards some prayer flags in the distance. Pema immediately realized that this was in the direction of the retreat hut of his old teacher, the eleventh Gangri Karma Rinpoche. With a sense of curiosity, he asked his son, “Where is your home? Can you take me there?” and with that, the boy led his father by the hand towards the hut. Pema asked, “Who lives in such a place without a window or curtains?” his son responded “A bird without wings, like me.” The boy then offered his father tea and when Pema said that there was no water, his son led him outside the hut to a natural spring and said “Father, the water is here.” At that moment Pema firmly identified his son as the reincarnation of his master, the eleventh Gangri Karma Rinpoche.

At this time, the ruling communist party forbade religious and cultural beliefs in Tibet, but Pema was determined that his son should have a formal education. So one night at midnight, he quietly took him to meet Chödrak Gyamtso. It was as though Chödrak had been expecting them, as he had spent the day cleaning the house and had burned incense. He offered his guests a red carpet welcome with fine yak butter and tea.

When Rinpoche was twelve, the Chinese started lifting restrictions on the movement of Tibetan nationals and Rinpoche’s family was able to travel more freely. His father took him to the mountainous area of Kawagarbo, a sacred area where the famous sages, Padmasambhava and Milarepa, were said to have practiced. In this area there is a renowned mountain shrine, next to a dried-up spring, where the water is only said to run when bodhisattvas visit. When Rinpoche arrived, water began to flow from the spring and the local village elder came out to pay homage, saying that he had dreamt of Rinpoche’s arrival.

In 1982, Rinpoche repeated the pattern of his previous life and went in search of a formal teaching of the Dharma. He took the arduous journey across the Himalayas into India, initially to study at the Drepung Monastery, a famous Gelupa university where he studied Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhism under Geshe Losan Gyamtso. At Drepung, Rinpoche was ordained as a monk by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. He then went on to complete the Sakya lineage directed by His Holiness Sakya Trizin, under the guidance of Khenpo Kunga Wangchuk. This was followed by a retreat to gain a deep understanding and realisation of the extraordinary longevity practices. After completing the retreat.

In 1993, after spending 13 years studying the Dharma, to the delight of his parents and with the blessing of the Dalai Lama, Rinpoche returned home to Tibet. Despite the freezing temperatures, when Rinpoche returned to Markham, almost one hundred monks and villagers came out to greet him with incense, butter, milk and fruit. Rinpoche went on to establish a Scientific Buddhist School, a Tibetan Medical School and an orphanage in his home county. At the Scientific Buddhist School Rinpoche took up the position as Professor, as well as giving numerous lectures to students on the interface of Buddhism with modern science. The schools were the first new Buddhist institutions built in Markham for over one hundred years and provided education, medicine and support to the local communities.

Unfortunately, the Chinese authorities shut the school down and arrested Rinpoche. Upon his release, he realized that the only way to preserve the Martsang Kagyu teachings and to further his own practice was to leave Tibet. His escape from Markham almost cost him his life, when unfortunately the truck he was travelling in crashed into a river, killing 27 people, including his two younger sisters.

Since then Rinpoche has travelled and taught in India, Singapore, Malaysia, Nepal, Bhutan and Taiwan, raising money for disadvantaged families and teaching the Dharma. In 2007, Rinpoche settled in England, where he continues to live a humble life, translating old texts from his lineage, teaching and writing for the benefit of his students. As the current lineage holder of the Martsang Kagyu tradition, Rinpoche is dedicated to ensuring the protection and continuation of these extraordinary teachings.

Website URL: www.martsangkagyuofficial.org