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Jetsun Drakpa Gyeltsen of the aristocratic Khon family was the third of the five men credited with founding the Sakya order. He was also the Fifth Sakya Tridzin, or throne holder. His father Sachen Kunga Nyingpo and his elder brother Sonam Tsemo were the first and second Sakya patriarchs. Drakpa Gyeltsen was instrumental in the early recording and compiling of the Lamdre teachings that form the basis of the Sakya tradition. +
Ngok Lotsāwa was nephew of Ngok Lekpai Sherab, the founder of Sangpu Neutok, and not only carried on the teaching activities of his uncle but raised the fame and prestige of Sangpu to new heights. He was important not only to his own Kadam lineage, but to the development of Tibetan education in general. Ngok Lotsāwa, working with the Kashmiri paṇḍita Sajjana, produced the sole-surviving translation of the Ratnagotravibhāga, the central text of buddha-nature theory in Tibet. His commentary on the text is said to have initiated the "analytical" exegetical tradition. +
Rok Bande Sherab O was a Nyingma scholar and yogi who was a major figure in the transmissions of the Guhyagarbha Tantra and the "later lineage" of Zhije tradition of Padampa Sanggye. +
Rongzom Chokyi Zangpo was an eleventh-century Tibetan translator, author, and exegete of Buddhist literature. Among his translations and commentarial works are important scriptures transmitted as part of the first and second period of Buddhist diffusion in Tibet. He is a seminal figure for the Nyingma, traditionally described as the last translator of the early translation period. His work as a translator and exegete is nevertheless also important to the later translation period and the so-called New Schools of Tibetan Buddhism. His prodigious literary output––including his early and influential commentary on Guhyagarbhatantra and his vociferous defense of Tibet's Dzogchen tradition––affirm his place as the first of the three luminaries of the Nyingma tradition, alongside Longchenpa and Ju Mipam Gyatso. +
Sabzang Mati Paṇchen Lodro Gyeltsen was one of Dolpopa’s fourteen major disciples. He was a great master of sutra and tantra, especially the Five Books of Maitreya and the Kālacakra Tantra. He completed a new revised translation of the Kālacakra Tantra and the Vimalaprabhā. He later lived and taught at Sabzang Ganden Monastery. +
Sachen Kunga Nyingpo was the first of the Sakya Jetsun Gongma Nga, the five founding patriarchs of Sakya. These five men of the Khon family are credited with having laid the foundations for the Sakya tradition. Sachen was a layman and the third Sakya Tridzin or throne holder, a position distinct from his later designation as a patriarch. His father, Khon Khonchog Gyelpo, was the first Sakya throne holder and the founder of what became Sakya monastery. +
Sakya Paṇḍita Kunga Gyaltsen, commonly referred to as Sapaṇ, was the fourth of the Five Patriarchs of Sakya and the sixth Sakya throne holder. A member of the illustrious Khon family that established and controlled the Sakya tradition, he was an advocate for strict adherence to Indian Buddhist traditions, standing in opposition to Chinese or Tibetan innovations that he considered corruptions. In this regard he was a major player in what has been termed the Tibetan Renaissance period, when there was a move to reinvigorate Tibetan Buddhism’s connections to its Indian antecedents. He was instrumental in transmitting the Indian system of five major and five minor sciences to Tibet. As an ordained monk, Sapaṇ was instrumental in laying the groundwork for adherence to the Vinaya at Sakya Monastery, built under his successors. He authored more than one hundred texts and was also a prolific translator from Sanskrit. His writings are among the most widely influential in Tibetan literature and prompted commentaries by countless subsequent authors. Sapaṇ’s reputation as a scholar and Buddhist authority helped him forge close ties with powerful Mongols, relations that would eventually lead to the establishment of Sakya Monastery and its position of political power over the Thirteen Myriarchies of central Tibet. +
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. +
Gampopa Sonam Rinchen, also known as Dakpo Lhaje, is credited with founding the Kagyu tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. Trained first as a medical doctor and then ordained as a Kadam monk, Gampopa met Milarepa when he was thirty years old, and spent much of the next decades in meditation retreat. Never renouncing his monastic vows, he combined the Indian Mahāsiddha practices brought back to Tibet by Marpa and others with the monastic order of his Kadampa teachers. He also united the Kadam teachings of Lamrim with the Mahāmudrā teachings he received from Milarepa. He founded Daklha Gampo in 1121 and trained many of the greatest Kagyu masters of all time, including the First Karmapa and Pakmodrupa. +
Śākya Chokden was one of the most important thinkers of the Sakya tradition. His teachers were Rongtön Sheja Kunrik, Dönyo Pelwa and Ngorchen Kunga Zangpo. A thinker who accepted both the rangtong and zhentong, or "self-empty" and "other empty" views of Madhyamaka, Śākya Chokden's seat was at Serdokchen Monastery near Shigatse in Tsang. Influential and controversial in his own day, his writings fell out of favor over time and many were banned in the seventeenth century. +
Kawa Peltsek was one of the first Tibetans to take Buddhist ordination. He later became a disciple of Padmasambhava, who identified him as an incarnation of an Indian mahapaṇḍita. A famed translator, he was instrumental in designing forms of Tibetan calligraphy. +
Kyotön Mönlam Tsultrim was born into the Kyo (''skyod'') clan at a place named Tanakyang (''rta nag yang''), in U (''dbus''), in 1219, the earth-rabbit year of fourteenth sexagenary cycle.
He studied the complete Kadam traditions under the guidance of the sixth abbot, Sanggye Gompa Sengge Kyab (sangs rgyas sgom pa seng ge skyabs, 1179-1250) and the seventh abbot of Nartang Monastery (''snar thang dgon''), Chim Namkha Drak (mchims nam mkha’ grags, 1210-1285). +
Kyoton Monlam Tsultrim (skyo ston smon lam tshul khrims) was born into the Kyo (skyod) clan at a place named Tanakyang (rta nag yang), in U (dbus), in 1219, the earth-rabbit year of fourteenth sexagenary cycle.
He studied the complete Kadam traditions under the guidance of the sixth abbot, Sanggye Gompa Sengge Kyab (sangs rgyas sgom pa seng ge skyabs, 1179-1250) and the seventh abbot of Nartang Monastery (snar thang dgon), Chim Namkha Drak (mchims nam mkha’ grags, 1210-1285).
Due to his extensive practice of Vajrapāṇi, of whom he was believed to have been an emanation, he was said to have been capable of curing diseases caused by malicious spirits. He was also said to have been an emanation of Avalokiteśvara and Mañjuśrī.
In 1285 he was appointed to the abbatial throne as the eighth abbot of Nartang Monastery. During his tenure he established the printing house and had a wall built around the monastery.
He composed a commentary on Prajñāpāramitā, but this does not appear to be extant. Among his disciples were Chomden Rikpai Reldri (bcom ldan rig pa'i ral gri, 1227-1305) and Drakpa Tsondru (grags pa brtson 'grus, 1253-1316), the tenth abbot of Nartang.
He wrote a biography of his master, Chim Namkha Drak, which is stored in the Cultural Palace of Nationalities (民族文化宫) in Beijing.
He passed away at the age of eighty one, in 1299, the earth-pig year of the fifth sexagenary cycle. +
Chennga Lodro Gyeltsen, one of the principal students of Khedrubje, was an early Geluk scholar-adept. He was educated in the classical scholastic curriculum and gained a reputation as a learned scholar at an early age. After his ordination, he received special instructions from Tsongkhapa's close disciple Tokden Jampel Gyatso. He served as abbot of two monasteries for a few years, but spent most of his adult life as a hermit. Although he wrote on a variety of topics, Lodro Gyeltsen is renowned for his extensive writings on Lojong, or Mind-Training, and Lamrim, or the Stages of the Path. +
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. +
The Third Tai Situ, Tashi Peljor, was a student of the Seventh Karmapa. He recognized the Eighth Karmapa by means of showing him items that had belonged to the Seventh Karmapa, possibly the first time such a method was used to identify reincarnations. +
The Ninth Situ, Pema Nyinje Wangpo, was a student of the Thirteenth Karmapa and the Tenth Zhamar. He was a main teacher to Jamgon Kongtrul and the Fourteenth Karmapa. He built the Gyude Temple at Pelpung Monastery. He spent the twenty years in retreat, from about age sixty to age eighty. +
Gyalse Tokme Zangpo was a Kadampa master of the fourteenth century based at Ngulchu Monastery where he sat in retreat for twenty years. He had previously served as the abbot of Bodong E for about nine years, from 1326 to 1335. Significant in the transmission of Lojong teachings, his compositions include the famous ''Thirty-seven Practices of the Bodhisattva'', one of the classics of Tibetan buddhist literature. A specialist in tantric Mahākaruṇā, he was a disciple of Butön Rinchen Drup and a teacher of Rendawa Zhönu Lodrö, and is counted as seventy-third in the Lamrim lineage. +
Bamda Gelek, whose given name was Tubten Gelek Gyatso, was one of the greatest scholar-practitioners of the Jonang tradition. Based largely at Dzamtang, he was considered the reincarnation of various masters, including the Indian saint Candrakīrti, the siddha Nāropa, and two famous early Jonang lamas, Tāranātha and Kunga Drolchok. Because of his strong interest in the Geluk tradition, some thought him to also be an incarnation of the great Geluk scholar Jamyang Zhepa. His intellectual prowess and strong devotion to the deity Mañjuśrī, his tutelary deity, led others to surmise that he might be an emanation of the deity himself. +
Jigme Rigpai Lodro was one of the great Tibetan polymaths of the twentieth century, writing extensively on Tibetan history, language, astronomy and Buddhism. By dint of his historical life and dedication to Tibetan scholarship, he acted as a conduit between “traditional” and “modern” Tibet. He is most famous for his role as one of the so-called Three Great Scholars after the Cultural Revolution. This epithet is drawn from tenth century Tibetan history when the first Three Great Scholars brought the Dharma to Eastern Tibet due to Langdarma’s persecution of Buddhism in central Tibet. Thus this title indicates how Alak Zhabdrung and the other two Great Scholars, Dungkar Lobzang Trinle and Muge Samten, contributed significantly to the revival of Tibetan scholarship, both at monasteries and secular institutions, following a near twenty-year vacuum due to various political campaigns. Many of today’s great Tibetologists both in the PRC and abroad studied with one of these Three Great Scholars. +