Tulku, Lama Lhundrup and Lama Zopa Rinpoche

Geshe Geshe (Tib. ''dge bshes'', short for ''dge-ba'i bshes-gnyen'', "virtuous friend"; translation of Skt. ''kalyāņamitra'') or geshema is a Tibetan Buddhist academic degree for monks and nuns. The degree is emphasized primarily by the Gelug lineage, ...

Lhundrup Rigsel (sometimes called Lama Lhundrup) was abbot of

Kopan Monastery Kopan Monastery is a Tibetan Buddhist monastery near Boudhanath, on the outskirts of Kathmandu, Nepal. It is a member of the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), an international network of Gelugpa dharma centers, ...

Nepal Nepal (; ne, :ne:नेपाल, नेपाल ), formerly the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal ( ne, सङ्घीय लोकतान्त्रिक गणतन्त्र नेपाल ), is a landlocked country in S ...

. He was born in 1941 to a poor peasant family in Tibet, and joined

Sera Monastery Sera Monastery ( "Wild Roses Monastery"; ) is one of the "great three" Gelug university monasteries of Tibet, located north of Lhasa and about north of the Jokhang. The other two are Ganden Monastery and Drepung Monastery. The origin of its ...

as a boy. In 1959 he fled from the Chinese invasion of Tibet and went to

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. - In Buxa, a refugee camp in Northern India, he met Lama Thubten Yeshe and

Lama Zopa Thubten Zopa Rinpoche (; born Dawa Chötar) is a Nepali lama from Khumbu, the entryway to Mount Everest. Biography Thubten Zopa Rinpoche, also called Lama Zopa Rinpoche has an extensive biography of him in the book ''The Lawudo Lama'' by Jamy ...

. In the late sixties he journeyed to South India to start the clearing of land for the new Sera Monastic University. He received his Doctor of Divinity in Buddhist studies from Sera. In 1972 Geshe Lhundrup Rigsel was called to

by Lama Yeshe, to teach

Buddhist philosophy Buddhist philosophy refers to the philosophical investigations and systems of inquiry that developed among various schools of Buddhism in India following the parinirvana of The Buddha and later spread throughout Asia. The Buddhist path combin ...

to the monks. The

Dalai Lama Dalai Lama (, ; ) is a title given by the Tibetan people to the foremost spiritual leader of the Gelug or "Yellow Hat" school of Tibetan Buddhism, the newest and most dominant of the four major schools of Tibetan Buddhism. The 14th and current D ...

appointed him abbot of Kopan Monastery in February 2000. As of 2011, Geshe Rigsel was on the board of directors of the

Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition The Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition (FPMT) was founded in 1975 by Lamas Thubten Yeshe and Thubten Zopa Rinpoche, who began teaching Mahayana Buddhism to Western students in Nepal. The FPMT has grown to encompass over ...

. On September 7, 2011 Lama Lhundrup died due to cancer

References

External links

A Day in the Life of an FPMT LamaKhensur Rinpoche Lama Lhundrup
Mandala Magazine, 2011.
Khensur Rinpoche Geshe Lama Lhundrup Rigsel's Biography video
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rigsel, Lhundrup Lamas from Tibet Year of birth missing 2011 deaths 20th-century lamas

See also

References

External links