[Buddha-l] [Fwd: Kyabjé Pema Norbu Rinpoche Enters Parinirvana]

[Christopher Fynn]

> Have I got too cynical?

A bit - Of course the language seems way over the top to a western 
reader. Tibetan uses a lot of honorific terms which don't translate well 
into modern English ~ particularly when Tibetans think they need to 
translate them into the sort of language they are exposed to through 
satellite TV.

Padma Norbu Rinpoche was one of the major contemporary figures in 
Tibetan Buddhism and on a mundane level was almost single-handedly 
responsible for re-establishing a strong monastic and educational 
tradition within the Nyingma school where both these things had 
virtually died out.

Considering that he arrived in India in 1960 with nothing and for 
several years lived in a tent then a mud hut sharing his eating utensils 
with another lama, what he managed to achieve is quite an 
accomplishment. He certainly did not start out with the resources of the 
Catholic Church. In the early 1980s, when he was still virtually unknown 
and his monastery was still small, I myself saw him working for days 
building toilets & fixing plumbing and wiring with his own hands.
At that time he would always drive his own car (am old Ambassador) and 
give a lift to Indian labourers or anyone else he saw walking down the 
road.

Later he managed to visit Tibet several times and ended up sponsoring 
the re-building over a hundred monasteries & temples there that had 
earlier been destroyed by the Chinese invasion and cultural revolution.

Eventually he was educating feeding, and clothing many thousands of 
monks and others at his monastery in S. India. As well as establishing 
and rebuilding monasteries and temples he also built hospitals, schools, 
old-age homes roads and bridges. Of course none of this could be have 
been achieved without substantial patronage and he visited Taiwan, 
Singapore, North America, Europe and other places on several occasions I 
suspect as much to raise financial support for these projects as to 
"spread the Dharma". On a few occasions I think he was taken advantage 
of by people who associated themselves with him to promote themselves - 
but he did not have the kind of sophisticated western advisers some 
other Tibetan teachers have had.

Today many monks who graduated from the monastic college Padma Norbu 
established in South India can be found teaching in remote parts of 
Tibet, Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh. I think his main 
legacy will be that he was instrumental in reviving and strengthening 
the Nyingma tradition of Buddhism in these places during a particularly 
difficult period.

Although Padma Norbu Rinpoche only came to Bhutan on a couple of short 
visits, his death was the lead item on the news here both yesterday and 
today - his death does matter to people here because Bhutanese monks who 
graduated from his shedra have subsequently returned to Bhutan and 
re-invigorated Buddhism here.

As for the spiritual stuff ~ you can a traditional account of Padm Norbu 
Rinpoche's lineage and attainments in the late Nyoshul Khenpo Rinpoche's 
book "Marvelous Garland of Rare Gems: Biographies of Masters of 
Awareness in the Dzogchen Lineage".

The sitting in meditation at the time of death ~ it is not all that 
unusual for accomplished Tibetan lamas to remain seated for several days 
after they stop breathing, their body showing no signs of decay - there 
are several well documented cases of this. (Remember the temperature in 
that part of India is already well in the 30's C. and bodies tend to 
start to smell and decay very quickly in those conditions.)

- Chris