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Kalu Rinpoche Biography
Kalu RinpocheKarma Rangjung Kunkhyab was born in Trehor in Kham in 1905. His father, Karma Lekshé Drayang, the Thirteenth Ratak Palzang Tulku, was respected for his skill in the practice of medicine, as well as for literary accomplishments and mastery of Vajrayana meditation practice.
He and his wife, Drolkar (White Tara) Chung Chung, were students of Jamgön Kongtrül Lodrö Taye, Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo and Mipham Rinpoche, all founders and leaders of the Rimé Movement1.
At his birth there were signs that Rangjung Kunkhyab would be a tulku2 and he would have been taken to be raised in a monastery at the earliest possible age, but his father refused to follow this tradition by even refusing requests from the fifth Dzogchen Rinpoche, Thubten Chokyi Dorje, asking him to allow him to bring up his son.
From an early age Rangjung Kunkhyab manifested compassion, being moved to tears for those afflicted by suffering. He was moved by faith and devotion to the lamas with whom he formed a connection by receiving from them empowerments which mature one spiritually, and teachings which enable one to attain liberation.
Rangjung Kunkhyab started his education at home, supervised by his father. After a preliminary training in grammar, writing and meditation, he began his formal studies at Palpung monastery at the age of thirteen. At that time, the eleventh Tai Situ Rinpoche, Pema Wangcho Jalpo, gave him ordination (getsül) 3, naming the young monk Karma Rangjung Kunchap. The prefix "Karma" identifies a practitioner of the Karma Kagyu tradition, and "Rangjung Kunchap" means "self-arisen, all-pervading".
His father taught him both the treatises of Ngari Panchen on the three ordinations and instructed him in The Four Tantras of the science of healing. The master scholar Tashi Chopel (student and secretary of Jamgön Kongtrül) gave him the empowerments, scriptural authorizations, and instructions for The Kagyu Treasury of Mantra and detailed teachings on the three main authoritative texts of the Kagyu school: The Profound Inner Meaning, The Two Chapters of the Hevajra Tantra, and The Changeless Nature, and also on the two short authoritative texts of the third Karmapa, the omniscient Rangjung Dorje.
At the age of fifteen, he undertook a summer retreat and one year later he entered the three year, three month and three days course of practice4 in the retreat center at Tsa-dra Rinchen Drak.
His retreat master and root lama was venerable Norbu Dun-kun Drubpa from whom he received the complete transmission of the Karma Kagyu and Shangpa Kagyu lineages, in particular the transmission of The Five Great Treasuries5. In addition, he studied with many other learned and attained masters, among them were: Khyentse Chokyi Lodro, the Dalai Lama, the sixteenth Karmapa, Dudjom Rinpoche and Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche. His faith in his teachers and the Dharma and his enthusiasm for practice knew no limit.
At the age of twenty-five his aspiration was to practice meditation in a mountain retreat. He gave up the concerns of ordinary life and spent twelve years in intensive practice in caves around Kham and other places unfrequented by people. During these years, he would occasionally leave his retreat to visit and consult with his root lama.
He would have continued to live in the mountains and meditate for the rest of his life, but he received request from Tai-Situ Padma Wangchuk to leave the mountains to become the retreat master at Naroling and Niguling retreat centers. At that time Rangjung Rikpay Dorje, the sixteenth Gyalwa Karmapa, recognized Kalu Rinpoche as the activity emanation of Jamgön Kongtrül Lodrö Taye.
In the 1940s Kalu Rinpoche visited monasteries and traditional centers of many schools and lineages across Tibet. He gave empowerments, instructions and supportive scriptural transmissions for the Five Golden Teachings of the Shangpa Kagyu tradition6. On a visit to Lhasa he gave teachings to the Regent of the young Dalai Lama.
In 1955 Kalu Rinpoche met the Sixteenth Gyalwang Karmapa, who asked him to leave Tibet in order to make arrangements in India and Bhutan for the inevitable exile. Kalu Rinpoche first went to Bhutan, where he established two retreat centers and ordained hundreds of monks. In 1962 he made an extensive pilgrimage to all the great Buddhist sites in India.
In 1965 he established his own monastery, Samdrup Tarjay Ling, at Sonada, near Darjeeling, India, which became his principal seat. A few years after founding the monastery, Kalu Rinpoche established a three-year retreat facility there. He frequently visited Rumtek Monastery in Sikkim to consult with the Karmapa and to teach Shamar, Tai Situ, Kongtrul, and Gyaltsab Rinpoche. He also went to India where he visited the Dalai Lama, gave several series of empowerments including The Treasury of Key Instructions.
In 1971, Kalu Rinpoche went to Europe and North America, where he established some seventy Dharma centers. He was the first Tibetan master to build facilities for Westerners to undertake the traditional three-year retreat. His European visit included the Vatican where he had an audience with Pope Paul VI.
Kalu Rinpoche YangsiIn 1982, the Sixteenth Gyalwang Karmapa requested Kalu Rinpoche to confer the complete Kālachakra7 initiation in New York City. In June 1982 he performed the commencement ceremonies for the very first traditional three-year retreat in North America.
During his 1986 visit to Kagyu Thubten Chöling Monastery in New York, Kalu Rinpoche announced that due to his advanced age, he would probably not be able to come back again. He invited everyone to visit him at his monastery in Sonada, India, where he would be residing.
Wednesday, May 10, 1989, Khyabje Kalu Rinpoche died at his monastery in Sonada.
On September 17, 1990 Rinpoche’s tulku was born in Darjeeling, India. Tai Situ Rinpoche officially recognized Kalu Rinpoche Yangsi, explaining that he had received definite signs from Kalu Rinpoche himself. Tai Situ Rinpoche sent a letter of recognition to His Holiness the Dalai Lama who immediately confirmed the recognition.
Publications
• The Dharma: That Illuminates All Beings Like the Light of the Sun and the Moon, State University of New York Press, 1986
• Gently Whispered: Oral Teachings by the Very Venerable Kalu Rinpoche, Station Hill Press, 1995
• Luminous Mind : Fundamentals of Spiritual Practice, Wisdom Publications, 1996
• Foundations of Tibetan Buddhism, Snow Lion Publications, 2004
Sources
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalu_Rinpoche
• https://www.rigpawiki.org/index.php?title=Kalu_Rinpoche
• https://www.tilogaard.dk/Biography_of_Kalu_Rinpoche.pdf
• https://archive.org/details/biographythechariotfortravellingthepaththelifestoryofkalurinpochekennethmcleodl._579_C
• http://www.kagyu.com/en/introduction/biographies/17-kyabje-dorje-chang-kalu-rinpoche
Footnotes
1. Rimé (Tib.) literally means 'unbiased' or 'non-partisan'. The Rimé involved the Sakya, Kagyu and Nyingma schools of Tibetan Buddhism, along with some Bön scholars. Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo (1820-1892) and Jamgön Kongtrül (1813-1899) compiled together the teachings of the Sakya, Kagyu and Nyingma, including many near-extinct teachings. The Rimé movement is responsible for several scriptural compilations, such as the Rinchen Terdzod and the Sheja Dzö.
2. A tulku is a reincarnate custodian of a specific lineage of teachings in Tibetan Buddhism who is given empowerments and trained from a young age by students of his or her predecessor. High-profile examples of tulkus include the Dalai Lamas, the Panchen Lamas, the Samding Dorje Phagmos, the Karmapas, Khyentses, the Zhabdrung Rinpoches, and the Kongtruls. The tulku system of preserving Dharma lineages did not operate in India. The tradition of recognizing reincarnate masters began in Tibet in the early 12th century with the line of Karmapas. After the first Karmapa died in 1193, a lama had recurrent visions of a particular child as his rebirth. This child (born ca. 1205) was recognized as the second Karmapa, thus beginning the Tibetan tulku tradition.
3. Tib.: Getsül (Getsülma) is a novice monk (nun), holding 36 precepts. Skt.: śrāmaṇera/ śrāmaṇerika.
4. The three-year-three-months-three-days retreat is a traditional program of intensive meditation formally instituted in the nineteenth century by the great master Jamgön Kongtrül. The timeframe derives from teachings in the Kalachakra Tantra regarding the time required to transform the mind in undistracted meditation with proper view. The actual program of the retreat depends on the tradition, the monastery, and the teacher.
5. Treasury of Encyclopedic Knowledge, Treasury of Precious Instructions, Treasury of Kagyü Mantras, Treasury of Precious Termas, Treasury of Extensive Teachings.
6. "The Five Golden Teachings", also called the Five Golden Doctrines of the Shangpas: 1. Six Dharmas of Niguma; 2. The Locket Tradition of Mahamudra; 3. The three methods of carrying one's understanding from meditation into daily activities; 4. The practice of development and completion; 5. The teaching of the deathless nature of mind and body.
7. Kālachakra tantra was the last major transmission to come to Tibet from India. The name means wheel of time or time-cycles. It has a unique presentation of cosmology. There's a tradition of offering this empowerment to large public audiences. His Holiness the Dalai Lama has given the transmission of the Kalachakra many times around the world for the sake of world peace.
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