Pema Lingpa

Pema Lingpa or Padma Lingpa (bo|t=པདྨ་་གླིང་པ་|w=pad+ma gling pa) (1450-1521) was a famous saint and siddha of the Nyingma school of Tibetan Buddhism. He was a preeminent "terton" (discoverer of ancient texts), and is considered to be foremost of the Five Terton Kings. In the history of the Nyingma school in Bhutan, Pema Lingpa is second only in importatace to Padmasambhava himself.

Biographical Details

Pema Lingpa, was born in Bumthang of Lhomon (the former name of Bhutan) in 1450. His father was Dondrup Zangmo, a descendent of the ancient Nyo clan; and his mother was Khandro Drogmo Pema Drolma, the daughter of a blacksmith. His childhood name was Paljor. He was recognized as the immediate reincarnation of Kunkhyen Longchenpa Drime Ozer (1308-1363), whose prior incarnations included Pema Ledreltsal (1291-1319) and Princess Pemasal, a consort and disciple of Padmasambhava.

In the Biography of Padmasambhava known as the "Padma Thangyig" the following prophesy concerning Pema Lingpa occurs:

The most famous story of Pema Lingpa tells of his diving with a lighted butter lamp into Membartsho, the so-called flaming lake in the Bumthang district of Bhutan (actually a deep pool in a river). He told onlookers that if he was a false spirit his lamp would be extinguished. Disappearing to the bottom of the dark pool and feared drowned, he returned to the surface with his butter lamp still burning brightly, bringing with him a new sacred text.

He founded a number of temples in the Choekhor valley of Bumthang including Tamshing Lhakang.

Notable descendants of Pema Lingpa include the Bhutanese royal family and the 6th Dalai Lama.

Works

Emanation Lineages

Traditionally, there are three main emanation lineages of Padma Lingpa recognized: the Peling Sungtrul incarnations who are considered to be the speech emanations; the Peling Tukse incarnations, the mind incarnations; and the Gangteng Tulku or Peling Gyalse incarnations who are considered to be the combined body and activity incarnations. [Gangteng (2008) p.15 (English)]

Peling Sungtrul incarnations: [Harding (2003) p. 138 ]

*Tenzin Drakpa _bo. བསྟན་འཛིན་གྲགས་པ (1536-1597)
*Kunkhyen Tsultim Dorje _bo. ཀུན་མཁྱེན་ཚུལ་ཁྲིམས་རྡོ་རྗེ (1680-1723)
*Dorje Mikyō-tsal _bo. རྡོ་རྗེ་མི་སྐྱོད་རྩལ "aka" Ngawang Kunzang Rolpai Dorje _bo. ངག་དབང་ཀུན་བཟང་རོལ་པའི་རྡོ་རྗེ (1725-1762)
*Kunzang Tsewang _bo. ཀུན་བཟང་ཚེ་དབང "aka" Tenzin Drubchog Dorje _bo. བསྟན་འཛིན་གྲུབ་མཆོག་རྡོ་རྗེ (1763-1817)
*Kunzang Tenpai Gyaltsen _bo. ཀུན་བཟང་བསྟན་པའི་རྒྱལ་མཚན (1819-1842)
*Pema Tenzin _bo. པདྨ་བསྟན་འཛིན "aka" Kunzang Ngawang Chokyi Lodro _bo. ཀུན་བཟང་ངག་དབང་ཆོས་ཀྱི་བློ་གྲོས ()
*Kunzang Dechen Dorje _bo. ཀུན་བཟང་བདེ་ཆེན་རྡོ་རྗེ
*Tenzin Chōki Gyaltsen _bo. བསྟན་འཛིན་ཆོས་ཀྱི་རྒྱལ་མཚན (1843-1891)
*Pema Ōsal Gyurme Dorje _bo. པདྨ་འོད་གསལ་འགྱུར་མེད་རྡོ་རྗེ (1930-1955)
*Kunzang Pema Rinchen Namgyal _bo. ཀུན་བཟང་པདྨ་རིན་ཆེན་རྣམ་རྒྱལ (b. 1968) ~ the present Peling Sungtrul Rinpoche

Peling Tukse incarnations [Harding 2003 p.138-9]

*Tukse Dawa Gyaltsen _bo. ཐུགས་སྲས་ཟླ་བ་རྒྱལ་མཚན (b. 1499) - son of Pema Lingpa
*Nyida Gyaltsen _bo. ཉི་ཟླ་རྒྱལ་མཚན
*Nyida Longyang _bo. ཉི་ཟླ་རྒྱལ་མཚན
*Tenzin Gyurme Dorje _bo. བསྟན་འཛིན་འགྱུར་མེད་རྡོ་རྗེ (1641-ca.1702)
*Gyurme Chogdrub Palzang _bo. འགྱུར་མེད་མཆོག་གྲུབ་དཔལ་འབར་བཟང་པོ (ca. 1708-1750)
*Tenzin Chokyi Nyima _bo. བསཏན་འཛིན་ཆོས་ཀྱི་ཉི་མ (ca. 1752-1775)
*Kunzang Gyurme Dorje Lungrig Chokyi Gocha _bo. ཀུན་བཟང་འགྱུར་མེད་རྡོ་རྗེ་ལུང་རིགས་ཆོས་ཀྱི་གོ་ཆ (ca.1780-ca.1825)
*Kunzang Zilnon Zhadpa-tsal _bo. ཀུན་བཟང་ཟིལ་གནོན་བཞད་པ་རྩལ
*Thubten Palwar _bo. ཐུབ་བསྟན་དཔལ་འབར (1906-1939)
*Tegchog Tenpa'i Gyaltsen _bo. ཐེག་མཆོག་བསྟན་པའི་རྒྱལ་མཚན (b. 1951)

Peling Gyalse (Gangteng Tulku) incarnations [Harding 2003 p.139-140]

*Gyalse Pema Tinley _bo. རྒྱལ་སྲས་པདྨ་འཕྲིན་ལས (1564-1642)
*Tenzin Lekpai Dondrup _bo. བསཏན་འཛིན་ལེགས་པའི་དོན་གྲུབ (1645-1726)
*Tinley Namgyal _bo. འཕྲིན་ལས་རྣམ་རྒྱལ "aka" Kunzang Pema Namgyal _bo. (d. ca. 1750)
*Tenzin Sizhi Namgyal _bo. བསྟན་འཛིན་སྲིད་ཞི་རྣམ་རྒྱལ (1761?-1796)
*Orgyen Geleg Namgyal _bo. ཨོ་རྒྱན་དགེ་ལེགས་རྣམ་རྒྱལ (d. 1842 ?)
*Orgyen Tenpai Nyima _bo. ཨོ་རྒྱན་བསྟན་པའི་ཉི་མ (1873-1900?)
*Orgyen Tenpai Nyinjed _bo. ཨོ་རྒྱན་བསྟན་པའི་ཉིན་བྱེད
*Orgyen Thinley Dorje _bo. ཨོ་རྒྱན་འཕྲིན་ལས་རྡོ་རྗེ
*Rigdzing Kunzang Padma Namgyal _bo. རིག་འཛིན་ཀུན་བཟང་པདྨ་རྣམ་རྒྱལ (b. 1955) ~ present Gangteng Tulku Rinpoche

ources

* cite book
last = Harding
first = Sarah
authorlink = Sarah Harding, Lama
title = The Life and Revalations of Pema Lingpa
publisher = Snow Lion
date = 2003
location = Ithaca, NY
isbn = 1-55939-194-4

* cite book
last = Aris
first = Michael
authorlink = Michael Aris
title = Hidden Treasures and Secret Lives: A Study of Pemalingpa (1450- 1521) and the Sixth Dalai Lama (1683-1706)
publisher = Keagan Paul
date = 1988
location = London
isbn = 0710303289

* Citation
last = Tshewang
first = Padma
author-link = Lam Padma Tshewang
last2 = Tashi
first2 = Phuntshok
author2-link =
last3 = Butters
first3 = Chris
author3-link =
last4 = Sætreng
first4 = Sigmund K.
author4-link =
title = The Treasure Revealer of Bhutan: Pemalingpa, the Terma Tradition and Its Critics
place = Kathmandu
publisher = EMR Pulishing House
year = 1995
volume = 8, Biblotheca Himalayica Series III

*cite book|last=Gangteng| first=Literary Committee|title=The Rosary of Jewels: Biographies of the Successive Throne Holders of Gangteng| publisher = Gangteng Monastery
date = 2008
location = Bhutan

isbn=

References

External Links

* [http://tbrc.org/link?RID=P1693 TBRC P1693 Padma Lingpa] - at The Tibetan Buddhist Resource Center
* [http://rywiki.tsadra.org/index.php/ Pema_Lingpa] - at Rangjung Yeshe
* [http://www.yeshekhorlo.org/pemalingpa.html The Pema Lingpa Lineage] - at Yeshe Khorlo U.S.A.

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