Kyabje Domo Geshe
Rinpoche
Ngawang Gyalten Jigme Choekyi Wangchuk
January 22, 1937 - September 10, 2001
Kyabje
Domo Geshe Rinpoche was born in January 22, 1937, near Gangtok, Sikkim.
At age three he was recognized as the reincarnation of Geshe Ngawang Kelsang,
Domo Geshe Rinpoche, and was taken to the Dungkar Gonpa (White Conch Monastery)
in Chumbi (also called Tomo or Tromo) Valley in southern Tibet. In 1942
he began his studies at Sera Monastery in Lhasa, where he completed his
Geshe degree in 1958. In March of 1959, during the Tibetan uprising, Kyabje
Domo Geshe Rinpoche was taken prisoner by the Chinese Communists. He remained
in prison until 1961, when he was finally released after repeated petitions
from the government of India on his behalf. Being exiled from Tibet, Kyabje
Domo Geshe Rinpoche moved to Tharpa Choling Monastery, one of the monasteries
which the previous Domo Geshe Rinpoche had established in northern India.
In 1962 His Holiness the Dalai Lama requested Kyabje Domo
Geshe Rinpoche to start a Tibetan cultural center in New Delhi. After
three years of collecting Tibetan art, texts, and religious objects, Domo
Geshe Rinpoche founded Tibet House in 1965, and he remained as its director
for the next several years.
In 1976 he established the Dungkar Gonpa Society in New York
State. Kyabje Domo Geshe Rinpoche remained as the Society’s president
and spiritual head until his passing away there on September 10, 2001.
August 2006
It
is with great joy that we announce that the Reincarnation of Kyabje Domo
Geshe Rinpoche has been found.
Ever since the passing of Kyabje Domo Geshe Rinpoche in 2001
it has been the heartfelt wish as well as the duty of his disciples to
find his true reincarnation.
Early in 2002 the Ghoom Dun Samten Choling Association, the
umbrella association of Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s monasteries in India,
established a Reincarnation Search Committee. In an official meeting convened
at Samten Choling Monastery by this Committee in November of 2002, representatives
Geshe Rinpoche’s monasteries, representatives of the Dungkar Gonpa
Society and other lay devotees, unanimously resolved to request Kyabje
Trijang Chocktrul Rinpoche to coordinate the search for the Tulku and
to identify him according to the tradition. This decision came naturally
as an acknowledgment of the exceptional relationship that existed between
those two great masters in their previous lives. Kyabje Trijang Chocktrul
Rinpoche kindly agreed to our petition and for the next four years the
process of the search progressed as intended.
In the early summer of 2006 from the list of names gathered
by the Search Committee, Kyabje Trijang Chocktrul Rinpoche selected one
child, a boy born into a Sikkimese family. The Tulku is now three years
old. Representatives from Domo Geshe Rinpoche’s monasteries have
already been to visit the young family and to meet the precious Rinpoche
and his parents.
We will update this information as further news becomes available.
For more information contact info@domogesherinpoche.org