Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Venerable Wendy Finster was present for Lama Yeshe’s death in California in March 1984, and in this 43-minute talk she shares a detailed personal account of the events leading up to and surrounding his passing. Lama Yeshe, whose heart had been severely damaged since childhood by rheumatic fever, had spent the previous year making careful preparations for his death—buying a house in California, giving specific instructions to trusted students, and explicitly telling one student “when I have fulfilled everything that I want to do, then I’ll go.” Finster covers his final illness in Kopan in December, his time in Delhi in intensive care, his recovery and apparent improvement in California, a sudden stroke, and finally his rapid decline and death at a major Los Angeles heart hospital. She describes the cremation ceremony, the discovery of relics, and Rinpoche’s decision to make a lifelike statue of Lama for a year-long Dorje Sempa retreat. The talk is anchored in direct observation and illustrates how Lama’s death became a profound teaching on guru devotion and karma for those present.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 01 Lama Yeshe's Death.mp3
UUID: c8afaafa-704a-43db-b21f-2df365effd1d
Teacher: Ven Wendy Finster
Collection: Lama Yeshe's Death (Ven Wendy Finster)
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 43.4 minutes
Words: ~5,045
Do that practice for those who are interested to so I guess first of all I should mention that on hearing that our precious guru Lama Yeshe had passed away, because he’s the source of all kindness and goodness and the root guru to whom it’s impossible to repay with kindness. So I felt compelled. I felt a duty to be there if possible. So actually within a couple of hours of mentioning this to one or two people, somehow I was fortunate enough and they were kind enough to not only arrange for me to leave the next day but also to cover the cost. So even though I felt compelled to go on my own for my own as my own kind of duty and something I needed to do, I also felt that I was going on behalf of everyone else that’s here that would have liked to also have gone on.
Because of that feeling, while I was there I very much felt that I was representing Buddha House students and also students from Tārā House and other Australian centres that weren’t able to go themselves. In particular, Rinpoche had sent the message to say that it wasn’t necessary for people to go, that it was good to remain and to do practices, and that particularly it’s not something that people should suddenly drop responsibilities and things that they’re doing in order to rush to California. Actually there weren’t so many people that were not American. I think perhaps altogether there may have been about sixty people, seventy people maybe. And of those I would say eighty five percent, ninety percent were American.
So there weren’t so many people that actually were able to or had the freedom to go or were simply following Rinpoche’s suggestion that people don’t suddenly rush to California. So I actually took about six rolls of film while I was there. Because I was aware that for others to kind of try and experience what had happened, a pictorial record of stages of different things that happened could perhaps start to share for you to share in what happened. So actually I was planning to have the photos out so you’d see them, but I’m sorry, I had some other job I had to do this morning, a couple of jobs, and so I only just got here. But in the break time I’ll put them out.
Also, at Tārā House, I’m not sure if you all know, I was due to it was already advertised I was to give a course at Tārā House last weekend. So I made sure that I was back in time for that and then I also discussed with the students what had happened. And many of the students have made orders of these photos so what I thought was we can put them out in a similar way here and if people want to make orders of the photos then maybe organise with Dennis and then just the one time I’ll arrange to have reproductions done of whatever anyone likes. So perhaps the easiest way of talking about what happened is to just share my own experience of what happened. Perhaps I should talk a little bit about what led up to Lama’s passing away.
As a child, Lama had rheumatic fever rheumatic fever is something which because of the continual high temperature of the body not only damaged but it actually dies. Those cells aren’t regenerated. So what happened was that in order for the heart continue as a pumping station to pump around the body sufficient nutrients and blood oxygen, the heart actually grew larger, physically larger, in order to have the same capacity to pump because so much of the heart muscle was dead. So I think about ten years ago, the first time Lama was examined by Western doctor, they gave him six months to live. He went to a couple of specialists and they actually expressed a lot of surprise that he was actually still living.
Because the heart had grown to such an extent. Instead of pumping like that it was pumping like that. Physically speaking the heart wasn’t too healthy. An interesting thing was that about seven or eight years ago one of the American students, when Lama was on tour in America, heard that Lama’s heart was actually not functioning particularly well, sat down with Lama and said that he was concerned about his health and please take it easy and this and that. Lama just looked at him with big eyes and said, My dear, it’s not my physical heart that keeps me alive, it’s my psychic energy.
So I mean that shut him up really quick! Actually when Lama came back to America this time, he met again with this student and he said to this student, Do you remember our conversation seven years ago at the place wherever it was? And he said yes. And Lama said, Well, Oh no, the other thing that he had said at the time was, you know, it’s not my physical heart that keeps me alive, it’s my psychic energy. Then he said, When I have fulfilled everything that I want to do, then I’ll go.
There’s no need for me to stay. So this time when he met with a student, Lama arrived in America fairly reasonably fit, although he had been ill. He was on the outside manifesting as though things were he was actually becoming quite healthy. They were building up to develop his health strongly enough to have open heart surgery because the heart had expanded to the extent where he actually had holes in the heart now because they stretched the heart. Said in November last year when he was at Copenhagen, I was there, he said he had three holes in his heart.
So they were planning to look into doing some open heart surgery. When he met this student this time, he said, Do you remember the conversation we had at such and such a place seven years ago? And the guy said, Yeah. He said, Well, dear, now is the time. So I think that a number of different things which Lama said over the past year to different students, once they were all put together, it became very clear that in fact for the past twelve months he had been making many preparations to die, to pass away.
So I think that what happened was that another thing which occurred last year while Lama was in America last year he told Sister Max, a black nun who was one of the first nuns that he ordained. We call her Mummy Max because she’s like mummy to everyone. He told her that he wanted to buy a house in California near the center, so they went and looked at many, many houses and she bought the house for him. Actually, I’ve got some photos of the house. He saw one and he just said, That’s the one I want.
They went and saw much nicer ones that looked sort of that they’d be better. He kept on saying no, no, not that one, not that one, this is the one I want. It was in a pretty run down condition and the students at Vajrapāni did a lot of work to make it nice to live in. Actually when Lama came back this year, he only spent ten days, I think totally ten days in that house. And he made comment earlier when he to America at the end of December to another student, and he said something about, Oh, I think I must have been unconsciously preparing for my death when I bought this house last year.
Lama says it’s something about unconsciously doing something, you know that he was really doing it but he’s not going to tell you. It seems to me that it’s something which he was preparing very strongly for his rebirth. Otherwise, it doesn’t make sense that this house so much energy was put into this particular house and this particular area and for him to spend ten days his whole life in that place. Anyway, there are a number of different things which happened and different things which Lama had said to different people. And in fact, had told one student, the director of the French Centre, Vajrayoginī Institute, about a year ago he said that he would leave his body in the New Year, and that was the New Year according to Tibetan New Year, which finished the old New Year finished in February three or four or something like that.
And the New Year started on, I think, February five, I think something like that. Actually Lama passed away in the early hours of the Tibetan New Year, the first day of the New Year. So there are many indications that Lama’s passing away was something planned and something which is not an ordinary death. And Rinpoche says himself that Lama had made many, many preparations, done many different types of practices and retreats and so on, and in fact had total control over when he was choosing to leave the body. He’s also given many signs about his rebirth, but I’ll talk about that later.
What actually led up to Lama passing away was that that in December, a couple of weeks before Christmas, Lama came to Kopan in Nepal. After giving a couple of three or four lectures and giving some initiations, then he became very ill. His body whenever Lima’s body was getting to the point of exhaustion because he was doing far too much, there wasn’t enough blood and nutrients going around to the different organs in the body. So whenever he was was exhausted and overtaxing, the meagre efforts of the heart to pump around. Then everything used to go wrong.
He was vomiting a lot and quite ill, unable to keep any food down, long periods of time where he couldn’t breathe properly, so all of these sort of things. Apparently the heart had expanded to the point where it filled about quite a large part of the chest cavity and was pushing against the lungs. And there was a problem then of moisture also gathering. So that time he went to Delhi and he went straight into intensive care in Delhi. In fact, at that time Rinpoche thought that Lama may have left his body then.
Did a lot of practices, a lot of different approaches requesting Lama to remain with us. At that particular time when Lama was manifesting this very severe illness. One of the students who remained with him through one of the nights said that actually many times during the night it looked like Lama would stop breathing because the breath just was so difficult for him to get. It’s my personal belief that the reason Lama remained with us for a few extra months after that time was simply to share around the karma of taking care of him with as many people as he came into contact in the next couple of months in terms of creating the merit and serving the Guru and all of these things. He remained in intensive care in Delhi for a couple of weeks.
He was hooked up to oxygen and hooked up to a number of machines to keep the body alive. So then I think he spent about two weeks out of hospital in a house in the Delhi area and at that time he sent a message to Lama Zopa to please come. Lama Zopa and Lama Lhundrup both left Kopan and went to Delhi to take care of Lama Yeshe. They were both very close disciples of his. Actually, Lama Yeshe had been not only a spiritual guru to Lama Zopa, but also an earthly father as well.
When Lama Zopa was a boy he was given into Lama Yeshe’s care. Every aspect of Lama Zopa’s life was from what he wore to what he ate to where he went to everything was actually Lama Yeshe did. So at that time Lama was in the best hands that were possible. He couldn’t talk very much at that time. If he tried to talk he would become breathless.
He was very ill. But at no point was his mind anything but compassionate and caring for those who were about him. After about a month, he then went to America a doctor flew across with him on the plane. He was then taken straight from the plane in America to hospital again, where he remained for about another week or ten days before he was discharged. Then he went to this house where the students had been preparing for him to stay.
Then he had been looking like he was recovering very strong health. He would go shopping, he would go for a walk along the beach, he would be laughing and joking and doing many things which he had the strength to do in the past, but he would only do small amounts at a time and then he would be exhausted for the rest of the day. But it looked like his strength was really picking up and they were planning that he would become strong enough for the surgery. Lama had said that he would try to remain another two years after the surgery. He said the surgery may help him another two years if the students had enough merit for him to remain another two years.
So this is kind of the background to the messages that we received about doing practices and doing pujas to try and get Lama to remain with us for longer. Actually, from a Buddhist point of view, the karma of the students as to how long the Guru remains with them. From the Guru’s side, they manifest in situations and places that are most beneficial for students or for the teaching of the Dharma. On that very basic level, the karma or the merit which the students have determine the length of time or the way in which a teacher manifests at that particular time and place in the world and that we have particular karmic connection with. About a week like that, Lama took the aspect of having a stroke.
He was taken again to hospital at that time. But after staying in hospital, as soon as he had a chance he just said, ‘Get me out of here, I want to go home.’ Medically speaking, a normal kind of medical situation, a person in that condition should have remained in hospital. It was quite clear that Lama had different intentions for how he wanted to spend the remaining time that he had, and that was not to be in hospital, hooked up to machines or to be in that kind of impersonal situation. So he went home and they hired I think there were a couple of the dharma students there who were nurses, and there was one doctor, and then they also hired somebody else to make sure that there was a twenty four hour nursing staff with him at the house and he had all the kind of everything that was needed. And at that time Lama kind of started recovering from the stroke which paralyzed the left side.
But then he said to one of the students, Now I’ve taken the as what did he say something about? Now I’ve taken the aspect of being paralysed. So in Lama’s way he was not saying, you know, I am paralysed. He was saying the body now has the aspect of being paralyzed, which is quite something different. He was actually recovering a lot of use in the left arm and the left leg.
The signs looked good medically speaking that he would recover from that and go on to become well to have the operation which would give perhaps medically speaking anyway another two years. So then, what happened was that very suddenly, after about ten days of being back home, the condition of Lama’s body became much worse, and it looked like he wouldn’t live through the night. Again, it was very difficult for the students who were there because on the one hand there’s the medical what should you do medically speaking, particularly the nurses on the other hand one has to do whatever it is that the teacher wants in terms of what their plan is. Serkong Rinpoche, who is a guru of both Lama Yeshe and Lama Zopa, came and officiated at the ceremony. He’s in his mid-80s, I think, and he’s quite an amazing being.
And Lama, a number of times, had told us very clearly that Serkong Rinpoche was enlightened. He would use examples like ‘he’s like the sun to the world’ and use many analogies which in Buddhism although they never say directly ‘I am enlightened’ there are ways and analogies which teachers will use that make you understand or infer that definitely speaking that that’s the case. Lama Zopa all this time had been caring, Lama Zopa for a long had been almost without sleep, just continuously with Lama and doing whatever it was that Lama wanted and caring for him both physically and also doing many many practices pujas. So Lama Zopa was continuously in touch with Serkong Rinpoche, who was teaching a course in Switzerland at the time. He would telephone Switzerland a couple of times a day to check with Serkong Rinpoche about this or that, in terms of keeping Lama at home or taking Lama to hospital, and all of these things would be discussed.
Rinpoche and Serkong Rinpoche would make a suggestion, and then of course it was up to Lama which way he wanted to go and what he wanted. At this time when Lama’s condition worsened very very much he was taken to hospital again that evening and then everything stopped. Actually, that time again everything stopped working, like he couldn’t eat for many days, was vomiting a lot, he couldn’t eat, a lot of diarrhea, basically everything all the major organs of the body were stopping. Then he was transferred from that hospital by air ambulance to another hospital in Los Angeles, which is the I’ve forgotten the name of it, but I think it’s world renowned, the best heart hospital there is and he was there I think only about twelve hours before he passed away. Medically speaking, there was from what I understand, from what was explained to me, medically speaking, Lama may have been able to remain with us for some time yet.
But even though after Lama’s breathing stopped, even though they made efforts to again make the heart start pumping. Everything that they did didn’t work. This was done at Serkong Rinpoche’s instruction. So it’s kind of clear that Lama made a plan to go. And regardless of what anyone did, it was something that he had planned.
Actually over that period of time there must have been about a month or six weeks between Lama arriving in America and his passing away. And over that period of time he received or the students at Vajrapāni Institute, the American students, had the most incredible opportunity. They took it in rosters and shifts to be with Lama. There was always someone sitting with Lama and doing things for Lama. Some kind of incredible connection, some kind of incredible opportunity that they had to present.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche himself said that the last three months had been the most incredible teaching for him on karma and on Guru Devotion. The whole Lama’s deciding to pass away in America and go there and do these things obviously have very strongly affected a large number of people who were there. And to me, and this is only my personal view, it seems very clear Lama wished to share around the opportunity for people to be close to him and to experience with him the processes that he was going through to his death. I think only about like five or six hours before Lama’s breath stopped. He was giving one of the nurses at the hospital a real examination, second degree grilling of where did he get his training, what was he doing, why did he do it, what training did he do after his basic training.
You know how those of you who know Loma, how he would of searchingly enquire and sort of take advantage of any situation, whoever walked in the room, you know. So it’s kind of like amazing really. At the time, a couple of hours after that, Lama asked Rinpoche to do a particular practice related to Heruka, which is a tantric deity related to enlightened compassion. At the end of that practice, Lama’s breath stopped. After they got permission to move Lama’s holy body up to another room at the top, that time Rinpoche and Lama Zopa and Geshe who was there did another practice it was a Vajrayoginī practice and they did that this is another tantric practice.
After they finished doing that, they noticed Lama’s body move, which was actually the final sign of the mind leaving the body. So then there was much discussion. Serkong Rinpoche said that unless the Americans could get the permission to actually do the fire puja or the cremation and the different practices and ceremonies that were to be done with the passing away of a high lama, lama’s body was to be taken back to India and to be done in Dhamsala. So it looked like that would have to be done because I think that the rules of what to do in America are fairly strict. So anyway, the students went into all the appropriate authorities and just got permission just like that for everything that they wanted.
So kind of Lama sort of knew he wanted to be in America somehow. The day actually the day I arrived at vajrapani Institute, which is near a township called Boulder Creek, is about half an hour’s drive from Santa Cruz, which again is about a two hour drive from San Francisco. So the day I arrived, Lama’s Holy Body had been brought by plane back from Los Angeles and had actually just arrived in the gompa. It was kind of in a coffin in front of the gompa, in front of the altar like that. So then we did a number of practices and pujas and a couple of all night sessions.
Serkong Rinpoche arrived the next morning. All in all there were about a week there was about a week of different ceremonies and practices. And at that time, a lot of different messages which Lama had given to different people spread. He never told everything to one person. He sort of told different things to different students and then it became clear all the little pieces were being put together.
Messages were being sent from different students who Lama had said something to and it was all coming clear what he wanted. There was a Spanish nun called Jampa Chökyi or Helly who Lama had actually given an instruction and a text and said ‘I want this to be done after I pass away. And he actually made up what Rinpoche calls a will anyway. He made her sit down and write on this day at such and such a time, at such and such a place, this is what I’m saying’ so that it had actually written down so no one could question’ someone made it up. He said was wanted his students, upon his passing away, wanted his students, those who were able, to go to one place to do a one year’s retreat on Dorje Sempa, which is a practice particularly for purifying negative karma.
That by the power of the mantra, and the mantra was sort of to be done in shifts, like the the it had to be continuously done so that you’d do a session and then some others would come in to start their session just before you finish your session so that there’s continuous session and mantra happening in the gompa. He said by the power of the mantra that his body would not decompose for one year while this practice was being done. Gave these instructions to Jampa Chökyi and there were different things that other people had been told too. Serkong Rinpoche was in the middle of teaching a course in Switzerland and he agreed to come immediately to California. So he came and Serkong Rinpoche checked up very carefully over a period of a couple of days as to which would be more beneficial to actually keep Lama’s body in the way as it was and do the retreat that way, or to actually cremate and use the relics from the body to incorporate into a statue a statue of Lama that would be used for the retreat. And Serkong Rinpoche finally made the observation that it would be more beneficial to do the latter.
Because Serkong Rinpoche being both Lama Zopa’s and Lama Yeshe’s guru, there’s sort of no question that in fact Lama would have been happy with whatever Serkong Rinpoche had decided was most beneficial. At that time preparation started going ahead for a fire puja. I think I’ve tried to make photos of the different stages of the building up of the stupa, which Lama’s body was placed in, how it all happened. So the idea is that after well, are many signs which can happen at the time of such a cremation. Anyway, what happened was that a number of different ceremonies were done, and then Lama’s body was actually taken and placed in a stupa, and then the stupa was built up around.
Then Serkong Rinpoche, there were many people around and we were all doing puja as she was at the time of the burning. She’s kind of incredible. On one level, it’s very to understand that Lama’s purpose with us was that we practiced Dharma and his whole teaching, his whole everything that he did was to show us different ways of practising the Dharma and ways to understand ourselves and others. And that actually his passing away was also another teaching for us in terms of how we’re to be and so on and our experiences. And I think that in terms of the the way of understanding anyway, it has of course many levels.
On a much higher level Lama is totally beyond suffering, totally in control of all his death and rebirth. And from that point of view there’s nothing to become emotional about. Because Lama’s manifestation was on a much higher level in terms of his way of expressing himself, but on the relative plane it’s very easy to become attached to his body and being able to talk with him and get advice from him on a plane, on a level which we can easily communicate with. So there’s much difficulty at the time of actually when the burning of the physical body was happening. Serkong Rinpoche was officiating at this time and he asked whether there was anybody present who had never taken teachings from Lama.
One girl said, Yes, she had never taken teachings from Lama, so he said, Okay, you can light. So she actually was the one who lit it. Also I’ve got a picture of that so you can of put all these pieces together when you look through the pictures that I’ve got. So then it was, I think, three days it was left before opening the stupa again. There are particular signs and ways and sometimes they say there are footprints in direction where the rebirth is going to take place and all these things.
Rinpoche didn’t talk a lot about what he saw and how he saw it but there were some crystals and also the different parts of the relics, different bones and parts which weren’t burned. Apparently they have specific significance. There are pictures of all of that that you can see how it was. The idea is that the bones basically are crushed into powder and then the powder is actually incorporated into the when they’re making the statue. The statue is going to be made in Lama’s likeness in the Vajrasattva posture, which is this one with the right hand here with the with the vajra, like this, and the left hand here with the bell, like that.
So and those those Those parts of the body which don’t crush like teeth and things like that will be placed as relics inside. Also, some of the ashes and other relics will be sent to each centre. Rinpoche’s suggestion is that each centre makes either a statue or a stupa or something like that with the relics which are sent. Also, I brought back with me a piece of clothing which Lama wore. I have it on the altar at home.
I’m actually not sure what we should do with it. And I think I’d like to wait for a suggestion from Lama Zopa first before thinking to do anything. There’s one possibility which maybe you’d like and that is to cut so that each person can have a piece and they can have that at home or whatever. Don’t know. But anyway, that’s something we can decide at some future time.
But I would imagine within a month or two we will receive some of the relics of Lama’s Holy Body in which we can think about making a statue. Actually Rinpoche said that he wanted the statue to be made like a you know, the mannequins that you have in shops, he actually wants it to be extremely lifelike in Lama’s likeness, not like some kind of Tibetan statue. And also Lama Zopa said that he wanted a Western person to do it, so it was kind of like to be Western style. And then there were a few things kind of