In July a post appeared on WeChat entitled “A Manuscript in Dzongsar Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö’s Own Handwriting” (རྫོང་སར་མཁྱེན་བརྩེ་ཆོས་ཀྱི་བློ་གྲོས་ཀྱི་ཕྱག་བྲིས་ཕྱག་བསྟར་མ།).¹ The text in question is an aspiration, composed in the vicinity of the Jokhang in Lhasa for a Sakya monk named Jamyang Tsultrim from Tsedong (rtse gdong) Monastery, possibly in 1955. It consists of six verses and is general in theme but clearly written from a Sakya perspective—in which the view is the recognition of saṃsāra and nirvāṇa’s inseparability (‘khor ‘das dbyer med).

To my knowledge, the text has not appeared in any edition of Jamyang Khyentse’s writings published to date.

The WeChat post included photographs (reproduced below) of the original manuscript on ruled notepaper, complete with the letterhead of the Khyentse Labrang (motto: “The Dzongsar Khyentse Labrang, forever auspicious!” – rdzong gsar mkhyen brtse bla brang rtag tu bkra shis).

A complete translation of the text is now available on Lotsawa House.

Other Recent Discoveries

As I noted in my talk on Jamyang Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö’s writings for the Shang Shung Institute UK last year, besides the aspiration discussed above, several texts have come to light since 2012, when the latest edition of the gsung ‘bum was published. They include:

1. rten ‘brel nyes sel gyi cho ga bsdus pa’i sbyin bsreg mi mthun kun zhi
A fire ceremony for the short practice of Dispelling Flaws in Interdependence (Tendrel Nyesel)—the revelation of Tertön Sogyal (1856–1926)—written at request of Khenpo Lekshe Jorden. (Translated here.)

2. kaH thog tu chu sprel lor bdud rtsi chos sman gyi dkar chag nyung ngu dad pa’i gsos sman
A catalogue for the dharma medicine (amṛta) ceremony held at Katok Monastery in the Water Monkey year (1932), also written at request of Khenpo Lekshe Jorden.

3. dzaM nang bai ro’i sgrub gnas kyi dkar chag
A gazetteer for the sacred site of Vairotsana at Pema Shelpuk in Dzamnang. According to its colophon, this was requested by the site’s resident lama and Jamyang Chökyi Wangpo (1893–1908), the body incarnation of Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo. This would mean that Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö composed the text when he was sixteen years old or younger. The text was recently reconstructed from stones on which it was once engraved. (Translated here.)

4. kun mkhyen bla ma rdo grub bstan pa’i nyi ma’i zhal lung ci rigs dang klong chen snying thig sngon dngos gtum mo sogs kyi gsung rang gi yid la zin pa mi brjed dran pa’i tho chung
Memoranda of teachings on the preliminaries and main practices, including tummo, of the Longchen Nyingtik received from Dodrupchen Jigme Tenpai Nyima (1865–1926).

5. kaH thog mkhan chen nus ldan nas chos kyi blo gros mdun ye shes bla ma gsan skabs zin bris zhal rgyun
Katok Khenpo Nüden’s² notes based on the Yeshe Lama teachings that he received from Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö.

I hope to explore some of these in more detail in future posts.

Notes

1. I am grateful to Alak Zenkar Rinpoche for informing me about the original WeChat post, which came from gser thang rtsom rig dga’ tshal. ↩︎
2. Note that, pace BDRC, Khenpo Nuden Khyentse Lodrö (nus ldan mkhyen brtse’i blo gros) is not the same individual as Khenpo Lekshe Jorden (legs bshad ‘byor ldan) mentioned above. ↩︎