Yeshe-Ö ( 959–1040) (spiritual names: Jangchub Yeshe-Ö, Byang Chub Ye shes' Od, Lha Bla Ma, Hla Lama Yeshe O, Lalama Yixiwo, also Dharmaraja ('Noble King') was the first notable

lama Lama (; "chief") is a title for a teacher of the Dharma in Tibetan Buddhism. The name is similar to the Sanskrit term ''guru'', meaning "heavy one", endowed with qualities the student will eventually embody. The Tibetan word "lama" means "hig ...

-king in

Tibet Tibet (; ''Böd''; ) is a region in East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are some other ethnic groups such as Monpa people, ...

. Born as Khor-re, he is better known as Lhachen Yeshe-Ö, his spiritual name. Yeshe-Ö was the second king in the succession of the kingdom of

Guge Guge (; ) was an ancient dynastic kingdom in Western Tibet. The kingdom was centered in present-day Zanda County, Ngari Prefecture, Tibet Autonomous Region. At various points in history after the 10th century AD, the kingdom held sway over a va ...

in the southwestern

Tibetan Plateau The Tibetan Plateau (, also known as the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau or the Qing–Zang Plateau () or as the Himalayan Plateau in India, is a vast elevated plateau located at the intersection of Central, South and East Asia covering most of the Ti ...

. Yeshe-Ö abdicated the throne in 975 to become a

. In classical

historiography Historiography is the study of the methods of historians in developing history as an academic discipline, and by extension is any body of historical work on a particular subject. The historiography of a specific topic covers how historians h ...

, the restoration of an organized and monastic tradition of

Tibetan Buddhism Tibetan Buddhism (also referred to as Indo-Tibetan Buddhism, Lamaism, Lamaistic Buddhism, Himalayan Buddhism, and Northern Buddhism) is the form of Buddhism practiced in Tibet and Bhutan, where it is the dominant religion. It is also in majo ...

is attributed to him. He built

Tholing Monastery Tholing Monastery (or Toling, mtho lding dgon pa མཐོ་ལྡིང་དགོན་པ) (Tuolin si 托林寺) is the oldest monastery (or gompa) in the Ngari Prefecture of western Tibet. It is situated in Tholing (Zanda), Zanda County, ...

in 997 when Tholing was the capital of Guge. Yeshe-Ö' sponsored

novitiate The novitiate, also called the noviciate, is the period of training and preparation that a Christian ''novice'' (or ''prospective'') monastic, apostolic, or member of a religious order undergoes prior to taking vows in order to discern whether ...

s, including the great translator

Rinchen Zangpo __NOTOC__ Lochen Rinchen Zangpo (958–1055; ), also known as Mahaguru, was a principal lotsawa or translator of Sanskrit Buddhist texts into Tibetan during the second diffusion of Buddhism in Tibet, variously called the New Translation School, ...

Early life and rule

From a young age, Yeshe-Ö was interested in religious matters. He was the son of king Tashi-gon (bKra-shis-mgon), and ruled the merged kingdoms of Tashigon and Detsugon, covering the regions of Purang and

and Zanskar, Spiti and Lahaul and Upper Kinnaur. He ruled over the combined Purang-Guge Kingdom from 967. Yeshe-Ö', better known by his spiritual name, Lhachen Yeshe-Ö, was the first notable

-king in

. His first act as king was to issue commands decreed under the title ''bka’ shog chen mo'' ('Great Dictums'), which reflected his primary aim of ruling his kingdom theocratically: it was the reason that he came to be known as 'a king and monk'. This orientation was to ensure propagation of

Buddhism Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

throughout

. He commanded farmers and nomads to pay an endowment fee towards the maintenance of the monastery. The 'second diffusion of Buddhism' in Tibet is solely attributed to Yeshe-Ö. He believed in reforming his kingdom under the ethos of three "R"s namely, religious education, religious architecture, and religious reform, during a time when the Indian Buddhist religious, artistic, architectural, scriptural and philosophical traditions permeated all the Tibetan world through Guge. Based on the practices followed in

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area, the List of countries and dependencies by population, second-most populous ...

, Yeshe-Ö deputed twenty-one specially chosen young novitiates to be trained as monks in

Kashmir Kashmir () is the northernmost geographical region of the Indian subcontinent. Until the mid-19th century, the term "Kashmir" denoted only the Kashmir Valley between the Great Himalayas and the Pir Panjal Range. Today, the term encompas ...

and other parts of India. They were to study under Indian Buddhist Gurus in renowned institutions, and to translate Buddhist scriptures from the

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural diffusion ...

Tibetan Tibetan may mean: * of, from, or related to Tibet * Tibetan people, an ethnic group * Tibetan language: ** Classical Tibetan, the classical language used also as a contemporary written standard ** Standard Tibetan, the most widely used spoken diale ...

. Of the novitiates, only two survived,

and Lekpai Sherap. The others succumbed to the extreme weather conditions of northern India. Rinchen Zangpo was such an impressive student that Yeshe-Ö made him responsible for the translation of other Sanskrit scriptures, as well as the building of

monasteries A monastery is a building or complex of buildings comprising the domestic quarters and workplaces of monastics, monks or nuns, whether living in communities or alone (hermits). A monastery generally includes a place reserved for prayer which ...

in Tibet. The first one in western Tibet, Tholing, was built in 997, after Yeshe-Ö had been king for thirty years. The other main monasteries built under the king's initiative were Tabo Monastery in

Ladakh Ladakh () is a region administered by India as a union territory which constitutes a part of the larger Kashmir region and has been the subject of dispute between India, Pakistan, and China since 1947. (subscription required) Quote: "Jammu a ...

, and the Khochar monastery. He ruled, along with his brother, the entire Western Himalayan region. He founded temples and encouraged the nobility of Tibet. He opposed the esoteric forms of tantric practices (mostly by non-organised groups) which were prevalent in Tibet, and felt revulsion about the introduction of Tantrism into Tibet's new culture of Buddhism. His wish was to maintain a purer and more rationalistic form of religion in Tibet, and his views were quoted in the ''

Blue Annals The ''Blue Annals'' (), completed in 1476, written by Gö Lotsawa Zhönnu-pel (, 1392–1481), is a Tibetan historical survey with a marked ecumenical (Rimé movement) view, focusing on the dissemination of various sectarian spiritual traditions t ...

'', written in the fifteenth century. The large number of bronze works of art made of are credited to

Nagaraja Nagaraja ( sa, नागराज ', ) is a title used to refer to the nagas, the serpent-like figures that appear in Indian religions. It refers to the kings of the various races of the nāga, the divine or semi-divine, half-human, half-serpen ...

, one of his two sons.

Legacy

The tenth century Yeshe-Ö temple is currently under reconstruction after the

Red Guards Red Guards () were a mass student-led paramilitary social movement mobilized and guided by Chairman Mao Zedong in 1966 through 1967, during the first phase of the Cultural Revolution, which he had instituted.Teiwes According to a Red Guard lead ...

damaged it during the

Cultural Revolution The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a sociopolitical movement in the People's Republic of China (PRC) launched by Mao Zedong in 1966, and lasting until his death in 1976. Its stated goa ...

in 1967. In the Lotsava Lakhang in Riba, in

Ngari Prefecture Ngari Prefecture () or Ali Prefecture () is a prefecture of China's Tibet Autonomous Region covering Western Tibet, whose traditional name is Ngari Khorsum. Its administrative centre and largest settlement is the town of Shiquanhe. History Nga ...

field research Field research, field studies, or fieldwork is the collection of raw data outside a laboratory, library, or workplace setting. The approaches and methods used in field research vary across disciplines. For example, biologists who conduct f ...

revealed a painting of eight monks, including Rinchen Zangpo, sent to

by Yeshe-Ö to bring texts of scriptures of

Mahayana Buddhism ''Mahāyāna'' (; "Great Vehicle") is a term for a broad group of Buddhist traditions, texts, philosophies, and practices. Mahāyāna Buddhism developed in India (c. 1st century BCE onwards) and is considered one of the three main existing br ...

from there to western Tibet.

References

Bibliography

* * * * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Yeshe-O 950s births 1036 deaths Tibetan Buddhists Buddhist monarchs Lamas from Tibet Tibetan kings 10th-century Tibetan people 11th-century Tibetan people 10th-century lamas 11th-century lamas People related to Lahaul and Spiti district