Tibetan Buddhism

• 1. Introduction

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  Tibetan Buddhism traces its formal introduction in Tibet to the reign of King Songtsän Gampo, who ruled from 618 to 649 CE. Under his reign, Sanskrit Buddhist scriptures from India were first rendered into Tibetan, a process that also gave birth to the Tibetan writing system itself. But this was only the beginning. Who were the scholars who arrived at the Tibetan court and shaped an entirely new form of Buddhism? What happened when rival dynasties fought over the faith? And how did a tradition preserved in high-altitude monasteries end up taking root in Vermont, in Germany, in the living rooms of the West? Those are the questions this documentary will answer.

• 2. From India to the Himalayas

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  Buddhism began spreading into the Tibetan region during the 3rd century CE, touching the Bon religion practiced in the Kingdom of Zhangzhung long before any royal decree made it official. Then, in the 8th century, King Trisong Detsen (755-797 CE) declared it the state religion and commanded his army to wear robes and study its teachings. He invited two Indian scholars to his court: Padmasambhava, an 8th-century master revered by Tibetans as Guru Rinpoche ("Precious Master"), and Santaraksita (725-788), a philosopher and abbot. Together they are credited as the founders of the Nyingma school, the oldest tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. Padmasambhava is also credited with building the first monastery in Tibet, named Samye, around the late 8th century. One figure from this court is often overlooked: Yeshe Tsogyal, described as the most important female in the Nyingma Vajrayana lineage, who was a member of Trisong Detsen's court and became Padmasambhava's student before gaining enlightenment. Modern historians suggest Trisong Detsen and his followers may have adopted Buddhism partly as an act of international diplomacy, aligning Tibet with powerful Buddhist neighbors like China, India, and Central Asian states. After Trisong Detsen, a reversal came under King Langdarma (r. 836-842), whose reign ushered in what scholars call the Era of Fragmentation, a period of civil war and political collapse lasting through the 9th and 10th centuries. Despite losing state patronage, Buddhism survived. Scholar Geoffrey Samuel argues this was because Vajrayana ritual provided Tibetans with the practical tools to deal with the spirit world and the demands of everyday life, making it indispensable for their survival.

• 3. The Schools Take Shape

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  In 1042, the Bengali saint Atisa (982-1054) arrived in Tibet at the invitation of a west Tibetan king, and his visit reshuffled the tradition's textual foundations. His chief disciple, Dromton, founded the Kadampa school, one of the first of the Sarma (New Translation) schools that emerged in the 10th-12th century revival. A separate lineage, the Sakya school (named "Grey Earth"), was founded in 1073 by Khon Konchok Gyelpo (1034-1102), a disciple of the scholar Drogmi Shakya. Tilopa (988-1069) and his student Naropa (who probably died around 1040) passed teachings to their student Marpa, whose lineage became the foundation of the Kagyu tradition, focusing on the practices of Mahamudra and the Six Dharmas of Naropa. Among the most celebrated Kagyu figures is the hermit Milarepa, an 11th-century mystic. The Dagpo Kagyu was founded by the monk Gampopa, who merged Marpa's teachings with the monastic Kadam tradition. All surviving sub-schools of Kagyu today, including the Drikung Kagyu, the Drukpa Kagyu, and the Karma Kagyu, branch from Gampopa's Dagpo Kagyu. The youngest of the four major schools, the Gelug, was founded in 1409 by the reformist scholar Je Tsongkhapa (1357-1419). Its nominal head is the Ganden Tripa, an appointed office that lasts seven years rather than a reincarnation lineage, which means the tradition has accumulated more Ganden Tripas than Dalai Lamas. Responding to Gelug dominance in the 19th century, scholars Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo (1820-1892) and Jamgon Kongtrul (1813-1899) launched the Rime movement, meaning "no sides", compiling near-extinct teachings from the Sakya, Kagyu, and Nyingma schools. Their collections produced major scriptural compilations including the Rinchen Terdzod and the Sheja Dzo. Without their work, the later Communist suppression of Buddhism would, in the source's own words, have been much more final.

• 4. Mongols, Emperors, and Politics

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  The Mongols invaded Tibet in 1240 and 1244, and by 1249 they had appointed the scholar and abbot Sakya Pandita (1182-1251) as Viceroy of Central Tibet. Tibet was folded into the Mongol Empire, with the Sakya hierarchy holding nominal religious and regional political power while the Mongols held structural administrative rule. Tibetan Buddhism was then adopted as the de facto state religion of the Yuan dynasty (1271-1368) under Kublai Khan, who had earlier founded the dynasty. During this period, scholar Buton Rinchen Drup (1290-1364) led the compilation of the Tibetan Buddhist canon, and the first copies were kept at Narthang monastery, carved into wooden blocks for printing. The Ming Dynasty that followed also patronized Tibetan Buddhism. According to historian David M. Robinson, during the Ming era Tibetan Buddhist monks "conducted court rituals, enjoyed privileged status and gained access to the jealously guarded, private world of the emperors." The Ming Yongle Emperor (r. 1402-1424) promoted the carving of printing blocks for the Kangyur, now called "the Yongle Kanjur." Meanwhile in Mongolia, it was Altan Khan, leader of the Tumed Mongols, who converted to Buddhism and in 1578 conferred the title of Dalai Lama on Sonam Gyatso. In the 17th century, regent Sonam Choephel (1595-1657 CE) unified Tibet with the help of the Gushi Khan of the Khoshut Mongols to establish the Ganden Phodrang government, which the successive Dalai Lamas and Panchen Lamas would govern from the mid-17th through the mid-20th centuries. The Qing dynasty (1644-1912) later extended Chinese rule over Tibet, with the Qianlong Emperor earning the epithet "Emperor Manjushri" for his promotion of Tibetan Buddhism, including the building of temples in the Tibetan style such as the Xumi Fushou Temple, the Puning Temple, and the Putuo Zongcheng Temple, modeled on the Potala Palace.

• 5. Exile, Destruction, and Diaspora

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  After the Battle of Chamdo, Tibet was annexed by China in 1950. In 1959 the 14th Dalai Lama fled to India along with a great number of clergy and ordinary citizens. The Cultural Revolution (1966-76) treated religion as a primary political target, and most of the several thousand temples and monasteries in Tibet were destroyed; monks and lamas were imprisoned, forced to disrobe, and subjected to reeducation. Much of the Tibetan textual heritage was lost. After 1980, liberalization allowed some reconstruction, including the gradual rebuilding of Changlei Monastery under Tulku Yanban Shire Jangtsen. Since 2008, the situation has worsened again inside the Tibetan Autonomous Region: reports document arrests and disappearances of nuns and monks, the demolition of monasteries, and forced reeducations, particularly at Yarchen Gar's center. Outside Tibet, the diaspora rebuilt. The first Tibetan Buddhist center in the West was Kagyu Samye Ling, founded in 1967 by Akong Rinpoche and Chogyam Trungpa. Tibetan Buddhist monasteries and centers were established across Europe and North America beginning in the 1960s. The Dalai Lama's government in exile at Dharamsala, initially dominated by the Gelug school, has since evolved into, in Geoffrey Samuel's words, "a relatively inclusive and democratic structure" that has incorporated senior figures from all the non-Gelug schools and from the Bon tradition. The official lineage of Tibetan Buddhist bhikshunis was formally recommenced on the 23rd of June 2022 in Bhutan, when 144 nuns, most of them Bhutanese, were fully ordained.

• 6. Teachings and Practice

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  Atisa's 11th-century root text A Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment (Bodhipathapradipa) is the foundation for lamrim, meaning "stages of the path." Gampopa and Tsongkhapa expanded this short text into an extensive system covering karma, rebirth, Buddhist cosmology, and meditation. Tibetan Buddhism organizes its philosophy through a hierarchical system of four classical Indian philosophical schools known as the "four tenets": Vaibhasika, Sautrantika, Yogacara, and Madhyamaka. The Madhyamaka philosophy, associated with the thinkers Nagarjuna and Aryadeva, is considered the highest view by most Tibetan philosophers. It holds that all phenomena are empty of inherent existence, a doctrine called Sunyata. The Vajrayana practices represent the highest and fastest path to Buddhahood, but they require preparation. The most widespread preliminary practices include taking refuge, prostration, Vajrasattva meditation, mandala offerings, and guru yoga. Deity yoga, a fundamental Vajrayana practice, proceeds through two stages: the generation stage, in which the practitioner dissolves the mundane world and visualizes a chosen deity, and the completion stage, in which that visualization dissolves into realization of ultimate reality. The Nyingma school considers Dzogchen, or "Great Perfection," to be a separate and independent vehicle above both sutra and tantra. The Kagyu school similarly regards Mahamudra, or "Great Seal," as its highest vehicle. Mantra practice underpins all of this. The Tibetan Buddhist philosopher Jamgon Ju Mipham described mantras as "non-conceptual wish-fulfilling jewels", and noted that, like a moon's reflection that requires water, mantras cannot function without the presence of faith. Lama Zopa Rinpoche wrote that mantras help keep the mind quiet and peaceful and heighten perception by making the mind receptive to subtle vibrations.

• 7. Women in the Tradition

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  Women in pre-modern Tibetan society tended to have somewhat greater autonomy than in surrounding societies, possibly because of smaller household sizes and low population density. The Shangpa Kagyu lineage traces itself to Indian female teachers. Historical figures include Yeshe Tsogyal, who achieved enlightenment as Padmasambhava's student, and Machig Labdron, another major female teacher. Freda Bedi, a British woman, became the first Western woman to take ordination in Tibetan Buddhism in 1966. Pema Chodron was the first American woman ordained as a Buddhist nun in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. In 2010, the first Tibetan Buddhist nunnery in America, Vajra Dakini Nunnery in Vermont, was officially consecrated, following the Drikung Kagyu lineage. Its abbot, Khenmo Drolma, an American woman ordained in Taiwan in 2002, is the first bhiksuni in the Drikung lineage and the first Westerner, male or female, installed as abbot in the Drikung Kagyu tradition, having been installed in 2004. In April 2011, the Institute for Buddhist Dialectical Studies in Dharamsala conferred the degree of geshe on Kelsang Wangmo, a German nun, making her the world's first female geshe. In 2016, twenty Tibetan Buddhist nuns became the first Tibetan women to earn geshe degrees, a milestone that arrived only three years after Tibetan women were first permitted to sit for those exams in 2013.