Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Selected as Abbot of Sera Je monastery through the Dalai Lama’s divination — after travel papers for Mañjuśrī Institute in England had already been arranged — Khensur Rinpoche recounts in this 62-minute biographical session the full arc of his life in exile. He begins with the three years of rebuilding after the monks’ arrival in India, then describes giving the oral transmission of over one hundred volumes of the Buddha’s complete teachings at Dharamsala in 1972, a work that took eight months. He covers his two years as disciplinarian at Sera Je, where he restarted debate gatherings and co-founded a school for seventy young monks, followed by a three-year retreat. As Abbot (1983–1987), he reinstituted night and morning debates and a traditional annual knife-blessing ceremony. The tone is conversational and intimate throughout.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 25 RS 1988 03 30.mp3
UUID: 34cb4cb3-25f0-4476-a1e1-d8e266bc0408
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Rinpoche's Story (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 1988-03-30
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 62.0 minutes
Words: ~3,293
That was a habit. That’s a moment. Spicy. Half. The sixth chapter of engaging in the bodhisattva’s deeds.
The sixth chapter. Sixth chapter. Mhmm. That? Yeah.
Engaging in bodhisattva’s deeds. Hi. Teaching. Teaching on one Then Buddha House teaching on the twenty-one Taras. So then it’s a Buddha house.
He is gonna give these questions. I have to come up with the one of them for clear realization. I have a clear realization and then in the radiant light of the sun, thought transformation. Teaching on Heruka? No.
I got you to say that. Oh. And preliminary preliminary practices? Just preliminary practices. Yeah.
So So when he was the abbot of the Sera Je monastery, he gave of the stage of the path. Abbot, when you say Abbot? I haven’t really talked about that period in a while. Gave The the oral transmission of the great exposition of the stages of the path. Of the Great exposition of the stages of the path by Tsongkhapa.
Of the stages? Stages of the path. Oh, no. That’s the best. The ornament for Ornament for Clear Realization.
And the middle way. To the segment? The engaging I’m writing it. Supplement treatise what do you call it? Treatise on the middle way.
Supplement to the treatise on the middle way. Yeah. Uh-huh. Supplement to the treatise on the middle way. Did you see the photograph when he was giving teachings as when he was Sera Monastery Abbot.
This one’s this one’s we’ve looked at. This one’s a This one’s? No. Not Oh, this is when he was teaching collected topics. Collected topics?
Yeah. Don’t think I have them then. This is the only ones I’ve got. Original photos. Didn’t get that.
Mhmm. But it sort of gives me an idea of what what we’ve gotten. I mean, it’s a long way down the line. Debate debate master of the debate master. The debate something like the debate debate tutor for all the various, you know, the the various subjects like collective topics, That’s him.
I think that’s when he was the disciplinary. But he was also, like, a debate like the debate debate tutor. That’s this photo of the Yeah. Maybe debate into debate debate tutor to all the various subjects. What date does would that one be?
Just remember she said seventies seventy six or so, isn’t it? This particular one or in general? Yeah. When he was at the back. Because, you know, such a when he was his his his room was on top of the monastery up here.
And so here photo. Here, they had just finished he had just finished giving the Yeah. Tutoring them on debate, and now he’s He’s about to walk up and up there out of the third. Ah. His rooms were up there.
Yeah. So This is during his when he was Abbott, during the period when he was Abbott? What what were the dates that he was Abbott again? And he was disciplinarian before that? He’s So there was a after they came from Boxer down to Sera, they worked for about three years.
They didn’t have any classes. And he went up to to Dharmasala. During that three years? No. After the three year period.
After. Uh-huh. And to give the oral transmission of the complete works, the teachings of the Buddha Uh-huh. In the. Uh-huh.
How long did that take? I forgot. Yeah. And then So you gave the you gave the transmission in April of nineteen seventy two Yeah. Of of one hundred At at Dharmasala in the main the main temple.
Main temple. Is that called? No. It’s called The oral transmission of the complete teachings of the Buddha. Over one hundred volumes.
All kinds of mission. All complete teachings of the Buddha. What’s the next bit? And then it took eight it took approximately eight months. Eight months.
Boy. So over over a hundred volumes. Oh, a hundred volumes. Yeah. Over.
Over one So he became the Gegu having completed that whole transmission, and he might return to Sera and became the Gegu, the disciplinarian. After he gave this transmission in Dharmasala in seventy four. Two? Seventy two. Yeah.
Yeah. Then he came went back down to Sera and became the disciplinarian. Okay. That’s the end of seventy two or beginning of seventy three, something like that. So by that time, all the all the monks had built houses?
So they finished all that building? Yeah. Yeah. So you you became a disciplinarian? For two years?
Two years. Is that’s about the usual length of time, is it? Yeah. I’m getting. Alright.
And throughout six months. Usually six months. Oh, only six months. There were very few monks at this time. So he had to stay for two years.
Two years. Yeah. Isn’t that a very popular job? He to scold all the monks, so he’s not very he’s not very well liked. He has to discipline the monks.
Does he have a stick? So yeah, at that time he didn’t beat the older monks, but at that time there was beginning to be a lot of new, brand new monks, they were very undisciplined, so he had to beat them. His. Little children. Yeah.
The new monks. Yeah. The the little monks. So I think Tenzin remembers he’ll be beating you. They do.
Yeah. Yeah. So yeah. Tenzin was a monk at that time. Studies studies are new at that time.
Remember, Pichai was teacher? Oh, so they hadn’t been studying for that time before they were They brought in guys. John Jigme Lharampa. Oh, they brought up the young master. There So he was sort of was he the first disciplinarian? So he really had the responsibility for getting all those studies going again?
Yeah. So he played a very central part because he was both a disciplinarian and teacher. So it’s not necessarily that one person would have the two roles combined? If there wasn’t any teachers, then the Gegu would also teach. So then they they began new classes in Madhyamaka at that time.
Madhyamaka? And then Sera. So at in India in in Tibet, they used to have both oral and written examinations, but they didn’t have those in India. They didn’t. What did they have?
Which one did they have? So in Tibet, it was the custom that they would examine on what they memorized, that they would bring their text whatever they were working on, bring it to the abbot and he would go through and say, you know, to begin to recite here and they’d have to recite. But they didn’t have this at this time in India. They didn’t have memorizing? Didn’t have this examination of what they memorized.
I don’t know if they had memorization. So at that time when you first began, they didn’t have either debate examination or memorization examination? So then they instituted, in Tibet they had a tradition of ritual, this was when the debates, they would gather together and one of the students would get up and start debating, And so they had this in Tibet and then Rinpoche reinstituted this when he was the disciplinarian. So this was this was spread the teachings of the Buddha. Just debating.
Yeah. This was a way a way of extending expanding the teachings of the Buddha. So there’d be it would have been a break for about fifteen years. When they left fifty nine, they left in about seventy four. They didn’t have this they had they had debate, but they didn’t have this tradition of gathering together for and someone getting up and debating during that period between fifty nine and seventy two.
So it’s They just had small debates with one or two. Just regular debate. They didn’t have this gathering debate. When he means gathering, is that all the monasteries or just Sera from Sera Jeay? All the It’s so long.
College. Amongst all all the Sera Je All the monks would care that as a group. As a group. And then they would get up and have debate. One would And then two years as say, two years as disciplinary, then the school teacher.
Oh. And then So that’s when and then they then they had the Sera Je school, and he became a teacher at the Sergei School for children, the young monks. Rinpoche did at that same After after after he was disciplinary for two years, he became a teacher at the Oh, then the school started because there wasn’t actually a school before, wasn’t it? And then they started the school. When did the school start again?
Do you say, Seventy four. So he and one teacher called Tashi Boom. So they were the teachers at new school. Okay. Because they they began by teaching these little monks scriptures, but then they didn’t do very well.
You know, they would learn it one day and forget it the next day. They played a lot. So then they began the school. They’d be actually they initiated the school. Ah, this is before the school started.
Just before this. Yeah. Because the the students weren’t the children weren’t learning because they were playing all the time. So they decided to institute have a real school. What age did the children start to come to that school?
What age did did logats today? So they just all came in. Oh, it’d be hard work. Mhmm. Getting to pay for those houses.
I thought there’s a site. I was just on. Yeah. The. And so all the monks from the settlements were all the children from settlements were were were coming in to become monks.
Oh, did they stay as monks, or did they just come in to go to the school? Because they had to be monks to come to the school. And they were old monks. They were older students at the school, older monks. At first, there were seventy students.
Seventy? Two teachers. Teachers. Teaching the Tibetan alphabet? And then began teaching them English.
They had after a while, they have you got an English teacher? And how did they arrange the classes then? They must have if there was all ages and different stages, did they arrange them in age or The range of scriptures? Classes. They had those who who could write and those who couldn’t write.
Yeah. Yeah. You have to do something. Yeah. That was that was the only division they made.
Yeah. So it wasn’t by age. You might have a five year old in the writing class and a fifteen year old in the other one. Which class do Rinpoche have? Oh.
Those who could write, the the older students. So he had the more advanced? So they they finally then at first, they didn’t have any money, but eventually, by various means, they got together enough money to build one main building, two small, and then one small build small house for the teachers. One main building? One one large building, one two smaller buildings, and one house for the teachers.
Oh. One large school building, two small school buildings, and one house for the Yeah. And then they in nineteen seventy eight, Rinpoche stopped being a teacher, and that’s when he did his retreat. Oh, where was he Abbott then? I’m confused.
Where does he what what? So he asked permission to leave that teaching job in seventy seven. He did his he did his three year retreat. The end of seventy seven. Yeah.
And then in eighty, he went to Tuśita in New Delhi. Is that what we had before? Yeah. I’m not sure if all these dates add up, but I’ll get them all down. Think we He went to he went to Tuśita in New Delhi?
Yeah. And stayed there six months? Yeah. And then when he returned to Sera, he became abbot. He became Abbot.
Have He went there. Can did you do did you do? Maybe seventy nine, he did his retreat. Did retreat For three years. Did retreat up to eighty two.
Yeah. Then he went then he went to New Delhi. Yeah. Yeah. And then when returned to New Delhi, he became abbot.
So that would have been in nineteen eighty Originally, the plan was Lama Yeshe, Lama Zopa had invited him to teach in England. In England? Yeah, That’s why he went to he went to a Mañjuśrī Institute in England. Mañjuśrī Institute in When Kache went there? No.
He was invited. Oh. By Lama Zopa in Lama Lama Zopa Yeah. And so he went to New Delhi to Tuśita. Tuśita.
Then he went down back he was gonna go back down to Sera for just a month or two just for a visit, and that’s when he became abbot. They asked him to become abbot. Didn’t go. Plans changed. He didn’t go.
So he didn’t know before that he was would become abbot. Mhmm. So this is when he stayed was he he was staying at Tuśita in Delhi, then Lama Zopa and Lama Yeshe came to visit and they were very happy with the way he was working with the westerners and they asked him to go to the west. Oh. And he said, well he’ll go to the, they said they would send him to the biggest center they had and that was Mañjuśrī.
And so they did all the preparations. They got his passport and visas and all that. And he went down just for a visit to to get his things together and and he threw a mo and that that that came out very well then. Felt claimed it well to go to England. Yeah.
And then Ling Rinpoche came and he threw a mo and said it was good to go to England. And so then but then he went down so he went down to to get his things together and Sera and then he became Abbott. So that’s when they sort of he was appointed Abbott down there. It was quite sudden. Yeah.
How did that happen? Can just try? Okay. So at that time the abbot was and he asked to be excused from his position so they had to appoint a new abbot. So they had a gathering of all the monks of the college and they vote and they selected six candidates.
Six? Six candidates, Geshe Rabten, Rinpoche, Geshe Third was Geshe Tashi Bum. Fourth was Geshe Lobsang, is now the president of it. Oh. Fifth was who is in America.
So then they they took these names, and they gave them to the Dalai Lama, and they asked him to In this order? Or Yeah. This is the order where the voting came out. Oh, I see. They came up with six names.
Right. And they voted in order. Yeah. We just have it — Geshe Rabten got the most votes. Yeah.
And then he got the second one, but that didn’t make any difference. Yeah. And then they gave the the six names, the highest six names of the voting Uh-huh. To the Dalai Lama, and he threw a divination. He made a divination and the Is it a mo too?
Probably did a mo, but it’s some type of divination. He’s not sure. No. Some type of divination. And Rinpoche’s name came up the best.
So that’s the that’s why he came to be appointed abbot. So now England. England. England. England.
You sure. He didn’t get to England. So then he went after having become an abbot, he went to Dalai Lama for audience and he was a bit hesitant. He said he had agreed to go to the west. And so, but Dalai Lama said, well, if you don’t have much in the monastery, then you can still go to the west.
Oh. Then he said, don’t you go for a while? But then it turned out that he had a lot of work at the monastery and that Oh. He had lost his his his pass. Oh, to England.
His pass is I didn’t know which pass it was. Maybe Indian Passport or whatever. Indian identity card. Oh. So he never went.
How interesting. He was Abbot from July of eighty three to June of eighty seven. Four years. That’s when he doing this when he was Abbott, he instructed them in in in the as the debate teacher. Oh, those photos.
Yeah. The debate tutor. Oh, so they’re later. They’re quite recent then. Yeah?
This one’s quite recent? They cut We talked about this. We? Which? This is the ceremony that they do yearly.
Yeah. When he takes the takes the knife and it has a connection with. And he gives a blessing with the knife to all to all the monks of the of the college. This is when this this one this is when Meaning, having audience with the knife. Audience with the knife.
Every year. Eleventh month of the Tibetan calendar, twenty seventh day. Uh-huh wait. Uh-huh yeah. Yeah.
So this was carried over the tradition they had in Tibet. So then they they would during this period of tutoring them in debate, and he would cover the collected topics and the five main treatises. So the abbot was responsible for both the spiritual and secular activities of the monastery. What secular activities do they have? So there’s many there’s lots of secular work that had to be done, you know, money, you know, getting money together and distributing money.
What to people, not to to families? Who who money to So I mean, had to take care of any you know, he had to oversee any also the building projects, buying supplies for the monastery, collecting money, distributing money. If there was business meetings to be taken to business people to meet, he had to meet with them. And then they had many meetings of the various abbots to decide the future of the programs in India. And so there was a lot of there was much work to be done.
And there was much building probably going on still in the monastery, was it? New monks were coming to take care of the program for the new students, to explain keeping the rules, make sure that everybody knew the rules, all the new students and new monks and things like that. So it was quite a lot of work. So then he instructed and debated on the on the three collected topics and the five treatises. During this time that he was night debates.
And in Tibet they used to have debate at night, in addition to the daytime. And the students weren’t allowed to go to the back of their home at night. You know they weren’t, but now, so then they didn’t do that until Rinpoche became abbot and then they we he he reintroduced reintroduced the students returned to the houses. They didn’t live in the monastery. No.
No. By by houses, I mean, their homes. Oh, that’s alright. Yeah. Yeah.
Monastic houses. Yeah. Yeah. So now that they began So he instituted there’s one class of Geshe called Lharampa, which is a top class. I mean the training schedule for them.
They also had morning debate, so he instituted that. They had that in Tibet, but they hadn’t had that up to that point in India. The morning debate special class. Oh. Yeah.
So I just told them that I wish I had some work to do. Alright. So maybe we can If TENSON’s free, could I just you remember? Can you go ahead? Pushing.
Yes. Some people. But