Kalu Rinpoche

ཀརྨ་རང་བྱུང་ཀུན་ཁྱབ་

Kalu Rinpoche(1905 - 1989)

A new biography is available on Treasury of Lives (February, 2021)

An important modern meditation master and teacher of Tibetan Buddhism. Recognized as an incarnation (sprul sku) of the Karma Bka' brgyud master 'Jam mgon kong sprul, Kalu Rinpoche was ordained at the age of thirteen by the eleventh Situ Rinpoche. Kalu Rinpoche began serious meditation study at an early age, undertaking his first three-year retreat at the age of sixteen. He also received the transmission of the teachings of the Shangs pa sect of Bka' brgyud. He later served as the meditation teacher at Dpal spungs monastery. Following the Chinese invasion, Kalu Rinpoche left Tibet in 1962 and first stayed at a small monastery outside of Darjeeling, India. He later settled in Sonada, West Bengal, where he built a three-year retreat center, teaching there before traveling internationally for ten years (1971–1981). In 1971, he traveled to France and the United States, at the request of the Dalai Lama and the Karma pa, in order to educate Westerners in Buddhism. During those ten years, Kalu Rinpoche founded many meditation and dharma centers in Canada, the United States, and Europe, with his main meditation school in Vancouver, Canada. Kalu Rinpoche led his first three-year retreat for Western students of Tibetan Buddhism in France in 1976. His full name is Kar ma rang 'byung kun khyab phrin las. (Source: "Kalu Rinpoche." In The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, 410. Princeton University Press, 2014. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt46n41q.27.)

For a recent publication about the life of Kyabje Dorje Chang Kalu Rinpoche, which contains accounts written by others about him, his writings—including his autobiography, songs, poems, essays, letters, and his own guru yoga—and translations of oral teachings, see Lord of the Siddhas: The Life, Teachings, Paranirvana and Legacy of Kyabje Dorje Chang Kalu Rinpoche, 2019. https://www.namsebangdzo.com/Lord-of-the-Siddhas-p/9780692160442.htm

For information about the 2nd Kalu Rinpoche, Yangsi Kalu Rinpoche, see, https://paldenshangpa.org/his-eminence-the-2nd-kalu-rinpoche/

Library Items

Video

Kalu Rinpoche on Tathāgatagarbha

In this video, part of a four-part lecture on the nature of mind given at the Kamalashila-Institut in Wachendorf, Germany, in 1982, Kalu Rinpoche explains the nature of mind vis-a-vis the concept of tathāgatagarbha, or buddha-nature, and speaks of the mind's innate luminosity. Lama Chökyi Nyima (Richard Barron) translates the talk into English. For the entire four-part series of lectures, visit shangpakagyu.org

Kalu Rinpoche. "Kalu Rinpoche on Tathāgatagarbha." Excerpt from a four-part lecture titled "The Nature of Mind" given at the Kamalashila-Institut, Wachendorf, Germany, 1982. Filmed and edited by Wolfgang Neugebauer. In Tibetan with English translation by Lama Chökyi Nyima (Richard Barron). Video, 17:06. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxUSU8LRYLw.

Kalu Rinpoche. "Kalu Rinpoche on Tathāgatagarbha." Excerpt from a four-part lecture titled "The Nature of Mind" given at the Kamalashila-Institut, Wachendorf, Germany, 1982. Filmed and edited by Wolfgang Neugebauer. In Tibetan with English translation by Lama Chökyi Nyima (Richard Barron). Video, 17:06. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxUSU8LRYLw.;Kalu Rinpoche on Tathāgatagarbha;tathāgatagarbha;Buddha-nature as Luminosity;prabhāsvaracitta;Kalu Rinpoche on Tathāgatagarbha

Other names

ཀར་ལུ་རིན་པོ་ཆེ་ · other names (Tibetan)
ཀརྨ་རང་བྱུང་ཀུན་ཁྱབ་ · other names (Tibetan)
kar lu rin po che · other names (Wylie)
karma rang byung kun khyab · other names (Wylie)
kar lu rin po che · other names (Wylie)
khyab rje rdo rje 'chang kar lu rin po che · other names (Wylie)
ka.rma rang byung kun khyab · other names (Wylie)
Karma-raṅ-byuṅ-kun-khyab-phrin-las · other names (Wylie)