Namgyal Rinpoche
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Namgyal Rinpoche, Karma Tenzin Dorje (1931–2003), born Leslie George Dawson in Toronto, Canada, was a Tibetan Buddhist lama in the Karma Kagyu tradition.
Early life
[edit]Namgyal Rinpoche was born Leslie George Dawson in 1931, October 11, and raised in Toronto, Canada by parents of Irish and Scottish descent[1] and attended Jarvis Baptist Seminary, before going on to the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, USA, where he studied philosophy and psychology[2] and became active in Socialist politics. After visiting Moscow to address an international youth conference, he became disillusioned with politics, and moved to London in 1954.[3]
Theravāda studies in Asia
[edit]While in London he studied Buddhism and in 1956 met the Sayadaw U Thila Wunta, a Burmese monk who accepted Leslie Dawson as a student. That same year he traveled to Bodh Gaya, India to rejoin the Sayadaw and received ordination as a sāmaṇera (novice monk).[4] He continued on to Burma where he was ordained as Ananda Bodhi[5] bhikkhu at the Shwedagon Pagoda in Yangon in 1958.[6] He began intensive training and meditation practice under the guidance of U Thila Wunta and Mahasi Sayadaw, then in Thailand with Chao Khun Phra Rajasiddhimuni at Wat Mahadhatu in Bangkok. In Sri Lanka he studied the Pāli Canon, the Visuddhimagga, and other classical texts before receiving the title acharya (teacher of Dharma).
Return to the United Kingdom and Canada
[edit]In 1962, Ananda Bodhi returned to England at the invitation of the English Sangha Trust. He was a special guest speaker at the Fifth International Congress of Psychotherapists in London where he met Julian Huxley, Anna Freud and R.D. Laing, among others. In 1964, he came into contact with Tibetan Buddhism, "was instantly and deeply impressed."[5] In 1965, he founded the Johnstone House Contemplative Community, a retreat center near Dumfries in Scotland. A year earlier he had met Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and Akong Tulku, Tibetan lamas at Oxford. Chögyam Trungpa and Akong Tulku had been sent by the 16th Karmapa to study and live in the West.[5]
Ananda Bodhi donated his Theravāda center Johnstone House to Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and Akong Tulku, which Chögyam Trungpa named Samye Ling,[5][7][8] one of the first Buddhist centers in the West. With his donation of the house that would become Samye Ling, Namgyal Rinpoche played a "timely role in the spread of Tibetan Buddhist teachings in Europe."[8] (Earlier Tibetan centres were the Kalachakra Temple of Saint Petersburg, Russia, founded in 1915; the temple founded by Kalmykian refugees in Belgrade, Serbia, in 1929, and the Lamaist Buddhist Center in Howell, New Jersey, US, founded in 1958).
In 1965, Ananda Bodhi returned to Canada with two of his senior students, Tony Olbrecht and Barry Goulden, where he established a new community, The Dharma Centre of Canadain 1966 (incorporated as a charity 1972), and founded the Centennial Lodge of the Theosophical Society (1967). Over the years that followed, Namgyal Rinpoche began to stress the study of Western psychology and philosophy, exercise, diet, and the appreciation of fine art and music as a supplement to traditional Buddhist training, and began taking students with him on voyages to various countries around the world, often on cargo ships.
As Namgyal Rinpoche
[edit]Namgyal Rinpoche is known as the first Western Rinpoche.[5]
During a pilgrimage with students to India and Sikkim in 1968, Ananda Bodhi was recognized by the 16th Karmapa, the supreme head of the Karma Kagyu school of Tibetan Buddhism, as an accomplished master and received Vajrayana robes.[8] One source offers that "he was immediately ushered into the presence of His Holiness [the 16th Karmapa], who greeted the Venerable Ananda Bodhi as an old friend and seated the bhiksu beside himself."[5]
In 1971, Ananda Bodhi led a large group of students to India where they had audiences with Sakya Trizin at Dehra Dun and the Dalai Lama at Dharamshala. He took a group of about one hundred students to Rumtek;[7] at Rumtek Monastery in Sikkim they received empowerments by the 16th Karmapa. It was on this visit that the 16th Karmapa gave Ananda Bodhi his Tibetan name in Rumtek through full ordination as Karma Tenzin Dorje Namgyal.[5] After this full Gelong or monastic ordination, he became known as Namgyal Rinpoche.[7] He was enthroned later that year at Green River, Ontario, by Karma Thinley Rinpoche, as instructed by the Karmapa.[2]
The following year of 1972 Namgyal Rinpoche led another large group of students to Morocco for a four-month retreat, then back to India for an extended audience with Sakya Trizin of the Sakya Order. He once again visited the 16th Karmapa in Rumtek that year.[5][8] In 1973, a large group of students joined Namgyal Rinpoche in New Zealand on Lake Rotoiti for a three-month meditation retreat.
Thereafter, Namgyal Rinpoche practised and taught in the Vajrayana tradition of Tibetan Buddhism as well as Theravadin and Mahayana schools. He was empowered and recognised by many teachers such as Sakya Trizin and Chogye Rinpoche of the Sakyas, Dudjom Rinpoche of the Nyingma sect, and various Kagyu lamas including Kalu Rinpoche, one of the Karmapa's main teachers. In subsequent years Namgyal Rinpoche inspired the establishment of Dharma centers around the world.
Namgyal Rinpoche offered the 16th Karmapa his first invitation to the West, to visit Canada.[5] Namgyal Rinpoche's center, the Dharma Center of Canada, issued the invitation to the 16th Karmapa in November of 1973, and asked the Karmapa to "consecrate the land of the Dharma Center of Canada in full Kagyu tradition," offering to pay for round-trip tickets for the Karmapa and an entourage of attendants; Namgyal Rinpoche's invitation catalyzed the Karmapa's first world tour.[7] One of the Karmapa's biographers writes that "planning Karmapa's first 'tour' to the West began with a simple handwritten aerogram that Sister Palmo sent in his name to Namgyal Rinpoche's Canadian Sangha expressing his wish to visit North America and then Europe."[5] The Karmapa signed this letter, and Namgyal Rinpoche received its reply to his Dharma Center's invitation in early 1974.[7] With this trip, the Karmapa was one of the first Tibetan spiritual leaders to visit North America, traveling to the West five years prior to the 14th Dalai Lama.[7] When Chögyam Trungpa learned of the Karmapa's planned tour, he reached out to Namgyal Rinpoche's Dharma Center of Canada and offered sponsorship of four first-class tickets for the Karmapa, an attendant, Sister Palmo, and the Karmapa's Black Crown.[7]
Preparations for the Karmapa's visit to the Dharma Center of Canada included families traveling over 5,000 kilometers from the Yukon to assist Namgyal Rinpoche's sangha in the construction of accomodations; while constructing an extension to the main house and adding electricity and a bathroom for the Karmapa's visit, they stayed in plywood-platformed tents and created an outdoor kitchen to feed those involved.[7] Namgyal Rinpoche's Canadian sangha worked on a stupa at the Center[7] and finished the stupa in time for the Karmapa's arrival, which he blessed while he was there.[5] It was the first Tibetan stupa in the Americas.[9]
Namgyal Rinpoche and Karma Thinley Rinpoche and their Sanghas received the Karmapa when he flew into Toronto on October 23, 1974.[5] The Karmapa visited both of Namgyal Rinpoche's centers in Canada, one in Toronto and one in Kinmount.[8] The Karmapa selected and blessed a site for a planned Kagyu monastery, consecrated a Milarepa stupa, gave empowerments and a Black Crown ceremony as well as shramanerika vows at these two Canadian Namgyal Rinpoche centers.[8]
At the Dharma Centre of Canada in Kinmount, Ontario, the center was "basic and difficult to heat," though the Karmapa "liked it anyway," Karma Thinley Rinpoche explained, "due to his fondness for Namgyal Rinpoche."[5] One source offers that the Karmapa stayed at the Dharma Center of Canada near Toronto for three weeks, conferring the Black Crown ceremony, giving refuge, bodhisattva vows, Kagyu lineage empowerments, and monastic ordination, and consecrating the temple, stupa, and a shrine in the forest.[7]
Another source offers that the Karmapa stayed for two weeks at Namgyal Rinpoche's center in Kinmount, and offered two to three Tibetan empowerments each day he was there, so that "the full monastic tradition may be experienced by Westerners."[5] Sister Palmo, disciple of the Karmapa who was present in his entourage, commented that "The Canadians showed their tremendous interest in meditation. They have gotten quite far under the guidance of Namgyal Rinpoche in a rather unorthodox way, and it is fitting in some way that some of the deepest teachings of the tour were given in the Canadian forest in the center of Namgyal Rinpoche."[5] After the Karmapa departed from this visit, Namgyal Rinpoche led many of his students in retreat for one month.[8]
Namgyal Rinpoche was one of the 16th Karmapa's first Western students, along with Hannah and Lama Ole Nydahl.[5] The 16th Karmapa named Namgyal Rinpoche to be "one of my chief disciples," which he shared In a meeting of the Karma Kagyü Society Canada in 1977.[5] Namgyal Rinpoche brought many people in Canada to Vajrayana teachings, and his Dharma Center of Canada includes the practice of other Buddhist traditions as well.[5]
Namgyal Rinpoche continued to teach until his death in Switzerland on October 22, 2003, having empowered a number of senior students to continue his work.
See also
[edit]Publications
[edit]- Rinpoche, Namgyal (2024), Kwiat, Cecilie (ed.), Body, Speech & Mind: a manual for human development, Bodhi Publishing, ASIN B0CXBGPWH6
- Rinpoche, Namgyal (2024), Senge, Sonam (ed.), The Path of Victory: Discourses on the Paramita, Bodhi Publishing, ASIN B0D3S8LVGG
- Rinpoche, Namgyal (2024), Wongmo, Karma Chime (ed.), The Breath of Awakening: A Guide to Liberation Through Ānāpānasati Mindfulness of Breathing, Bodhi Publishing, ASIN B0CRVJFNZB
- Rinpoche, Namgyal (2004), Kwiat, Cecilie (ed.), Body, Speech & Mind: a manual for human development, Bodhi Publishing, ISBN 978-1-895316-06-3
- Rinpoche, Namgyal (2008), Right Livelihood and Other Foundations of Enlightenment, Bodhi Publishing, ISBN 9781895316094
- Rinpoche, Namgyal (1979), Wongmo, Karma Chime (ed.), The song of awakening: a guide to liberation through marananussati mindfulness of death, Open Path, ISBN 978-0-9602722-0-4
- Rinpoche, Namgyal (1982), Wongmo, Karma Chime (ed.), Unfolding through art, Open Path, ISBN 978-0-9602722-2-8
- Rinpoche, Namgyal (1996), Wongmo, Karma Chime (ed.), The womb, karma, and transcendence : a journey towards liberation, Bodhi Publishing, ISBN 1-895316-01-4
References
[edit]- ^ "Venerable Namgyal Rinpoche". Crystal Mountain.
- ^ a b Wongmo, Karma Chime. "Venerable Namgyal Rinpoche". Bodhi Publishing.
- ^ Bodhi, Ananda (1968-09-21). "Toronto's growing followers of Buddhism". Globe & Mail.
- ^ Knapp, Wesley (2005). "Karma Tenzin Dorje Namgyal Rinpoche 1931 - 2003". Namgyal.ca.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Bausch, Gerd (2018). Radiant Compassion: The Life of the 16th Gyalwa Karmapa Rangjung Rigpe Dorje. Vol. 1. Edition Karuna. pp. 161, 165, 167–169, 213–219. ISBN 9783982042916.
- ^ "Namgyal Rinpoche (1931-2003)". The Origins Centre.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j Levine, Norma (2013). The Miraculous 16th Karmapa: Incredible Encounters with the Black Crown Buddha. Shang Shung Publications. pp. 157–161. ISBN 978-8878341333.
- ^ a b c d e f g Karmapa, 17th Gyalwang; Dorje, Ogyen Trinley (2014). Dharma King: The Life of the 16th Karmapa in Images. KTD Publications and Altruism Press. p. 196. ISBN 978-1934608494.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link) - ^ "The Story of the Dharma Centre of Canada". The Dharma Centre of Canada.
Works about
[edit]- "A Time To Remember", Lama Sonam Gyatso, unpublished biography, 2003.
- Rinpoche, Namgyal; Wilkie, Rab; Berry, David (2012), Tales of awakening : travels, teachings and transcendence with Namgyal Rinpoche (1931-2003), Fairhaven Lantern Media, ISBN 978-1-4563-2273-1
- Namgyal Rinpoche in New Zealand, a short history of the contributions of Namgyal Rinpoche and his students to bringing the Buddha Dharma to New Zealand, by Tarchin Hearn.
- Biographies: The Venerable Kyabje Namgyal Rinpoche at the Dharma Fellowship of the Gyalwa Karmapa
