Geshe Gyaltsen Sengge of Dagpo Visiting Indonesia to Teach the Puja Melody
- December 22, 2016
Landing on Soekarno-Hatta International Airport for the first time on Saturday (17/12/2016), Geshe Gyaltsen Sengge is a native Tibetan monk from Dagpo Dratsang, currently residing at the monastery in the valley of Kullu, Himachal Pradesh India. Geshe-la is the senior Umze (Chanting Master) for the community of Dagpo Dratsang monks who have been resettled in the Kullu valley since 2005.
The Indonesia community has been visiting the monastery since its first inauguration by HHDL XIV back in 2005. Every year since then His Eminence Dagpo Rinpoche routinely confers the Lamrim Retreat and Transmission at this Lamrim Monastery. The major Lamrim texts already transmitted and taught include: 3 volumes of Pabongka Rinpoche’s Liberation in Our Hands, The Quick Path, The Easy Path, Lines of Experience, 3 volumes of Je Rinpoche’s Lamrim Chenmo, and Manjugosha’s Oral Instruction.
The Lamrim tradition covers a complete method of practice, which include the preliminary, the actual meditation, and the concluding phase. For the preliminary, Dagpo Dratsang carries a lineage of the Six Preliminary Practices, a set of chanted verses written in texts titled “The Necklace for the Fortunate” and “The Heart Jewel”.
The preliminary practice consists of auspicious virtuous verses, chanted with certain melody that was composed by great masters with high realizations. The verses and the melody combined carry immense blessings that function as a preliminary phase before entering the actual meditation. It is strongly believed that the success of a preliminary phase will guarantee the success of the actual Lamrim meditation, which bring results in the form of realizations and eventually enlightenment.
It is this very precious tradition that is being guarded and protected by the community of Dagpo Dratsang. For the present time, the number of senior monks of Dagpo Dratsang is not so many left. Many of them have passed away due to natural cause of old age, the most recent being Venerable Losang Choepel (passed away in May 2016).
The Indonesian community currently conducting the project of the first Lamrim Monastery in the South East Asia Region. The initiator is the young Indonesian monk, Venerable Bhadraruci, with the guidance and blessing from His Eminence Dagpo Rinpoche.
Venerable Bhadraruci, along with the community of the Indonesian Lamrim practitioners, managed to invite Geshe Gyaltsen Sengge after so many years of planning and arrangement. Therefore, the moment Geshe-la landed on Jakarta, Indonesia, soil for the first time, is a moment highly treasured and appreciated. Geshe-la will teach the Dagpo Dratsang puja melody to the Indonesian Chanting Masters, both monastic and lay people practitioners. He will also be able to see by himself all the Indonesian friends and community members, with the nearest upcoming schedule is the Indonesia Lamrim Retreat at Prasadha Jinarakkhita, Jakarta. The opening is scheduled on Gaden Ngachoe auspicious day, 23rd December 2016.
Sarva Mangalam,
Kadam Choeling Indonesia