Buddhism: Choedzong

His Holiness Sakya Trizin Rinpoche is the head of the Sakya school and according to His Holiness the Dalai Lama one of the most important representatives of Tibetan Buddhism. He belongs to the very old, high-ranking Khoen family, whose history can be traced back to the first days of Tibet. From an early age on he gave empowerments and oral transmissions. The enthronement of His Holiness took place in 1959. In the same year he and his entourage left Tibet.

Today, he lives with his family in Rajpur where Sakya monastery was reconstructed in 1964. His Holiness Sakya Trizin works incessantly for the preservation and spreading of the Tibetan Buddhist tradition.

Lodroe Tulku Rinpoche was born in Dahor/ East Tibet in 1942 and studied in Sera until he had to escape to India in 1959. He was a lecturer at Calcutta University teaching the history of religion. In 1967 he came to Switzerland following the request of H.H. Dalai Lama. For more then three decades he was working as teacher, translator and author in the monastic Tibet Institute in Rikon. Nowadays, he lives in Erlenbach near Zuerich and directs the centers Samdup Droelma Ling/Erlenbach, Yiga Tschoedsin/Zollikon and Samten Tschoeling/Winterthur.

He speaks excellent German and published a collection of rare Choed texts in German translation.

H.E. Jetsuen Chimey Luding is one of the great female lamas and masters of the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. She is the sister of H.H. Sakya Trizin. From an early age on she has been able to undergo intensive studies and has practiced Buddhist teachings from high-ranking Sakya masters. At the age of 11, she was already teaching thousands of monks and did several intensive meditation retreats. She came to India in 1959 after her escape from Tibet and now lives with her family in Vancouver.

At several requests of His Holiness Sakya Trizin, she started to teach again at the beginning of the 1980s.

Nyagre Khentrül Rinpoche, better known under the name of Gelek Rinpoche, belongs to the last generation of Tibetan masters having received their education and training still in Tibet. Kyabje Ling Rinpoche and Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche, tutors of H.H. the Dalai Lama, were his spiritual masters, too. Rinpoche is a reincarnation of the Dagyab Tulkus. As he studied together with H.E. Dagyab Kyabgön Rinpoche at the monastic university Drepung (Lhasa), he has a very friendly connection with us. Gelek Rinpoche is the spiritual director of Jewel Heart, a Tibetan-Buddhist and cultural study center in America and The Netherlands. www.jewelheart.nl

His book entitled “Life Is Death, Death Is Life” became a bestseller.