Guru Rinpoche (Padmasambhava)

Guru Rinpoche, in Sanskrit Padmasambhava, is the Indian master who established Buddhism in Tibet in the eighth century and whom the Nyingma school reveres as the second Buddha. His Tibetan name means simply "precious teacher". Padmasambhava means "lotus-born", after the account that he appeared not from a womb but on a lotus in a lake in Oddiyana.

How he came to Tibet

King Trisong Detsen wanted Buddhism to take root in his kingdom and invited the scholar Shantarakshita to help bring that about. The work stalled. What was raised during the day lay in ruins by morning. On Shantarakshita's advice, Guru Rinpoche was summoned from India.

The tradition does not describe what followed as a conquest. The forces that resisted were not driven out but bound: placed under oath as protectors of the Dharma, an oath the tradition holds to be in force still. Samye rose, the first monastery in Tibet. The first Tibetans were ordained, and a translation project of extraordinary scale got under way.

His closest student was Yeshe Tsogyal, a Tibetan woman with a flawless memory, who set down what he taught. Guru Rinpoche foresaw periods in which the teachings would thin out or be persecuted. The two of them therefore concealed much of that material as terma: treasure texts, laid away in rock and water, and in the minds of students not yet born. A tertön reveals them when they are needed. Our own lineage, the Düdjom Tersar, reaches us by exactly that route.

Why he is still present

In the Nyingma, Guru Rinpoche is not primarily a historical figure. He is the form in which the lineage shows itself to a practitioner. Someone practising guru yoga is not calling up a man from the eighth century, but what their own mind already is, held outside themselves for as long as that is what it takes to recognise it.

This is why his mantra, om ah hung vajra guru pema siddhi hung, recurs in almost every Nyingma practice. And why, on leaving Tibet, he promised to be present for anyone who calls him, sleeping at the door of whoever has trust. There is no distance to cross. There is a habit of absence we keep up ourselves.

The tenth day of every Tibetan lunar month is Guru Rinpoche Day. At Rigdzin Dzogchen Ling we gather then for tsok. Because the lunar calendar shifts, the dates are listed on our tsok calendar. Guru yoga also closes the Düdjom Tersar Ngöndro, which we practise every Saturday in Hoofddorp.