Host: Following on from something you said, could you say a bit more about his significance for peoples in the wider Himalayan region beyond Tibet?
Kalu Rinpoche: H. H. Dalai Lama is an emanation of Avalokiteshvara, and that is from the religious point of view, and from the human point of view, just as I have explained earlier, he is a great human being with a great love and compassion regardless of different nationalities, regardless of different culture. Bhutan, Nepal, Tibet, India, we share, and then also Mongolia, we share one kind of a group of Buddhism which we call it a Vajrayana Buddhism. That is the majority of our practices and so on. If you look at Southeast Asia it is mainly Theravada, if you look at China then it is mainly Mahayana, and Vietnam it is mainly Mahayana and so on.
So H. H. Dalai Lama is the symbol and the figurehead of all our faith and practice and lineage and tradition. Because many people they tend to say that H. H. Dalai Lama is a Gelug lineage holder. I would say that you have not studied history well enough, because if you really examine all the history of the different religious figures, all of them have an interconnected relation whether it is a spiritual whether it is a teaching and empowerment and practice. There is no such thing as a singular lineage of Kagyu, singular lineage of Nyingma, singular lineage of Gelug. If you trace back all of the great masters, many of the great masters they practice Dzogchen, Chakchen [Mahamudra], and they all kind of have a genuine respect. It is like when you have a good heart and sincere and genuine quality and then naturally just be yourself, other individuals tend to be attracted to you, interact with you and exchange of their experience and practices, isn’t it?
So if you understand that Vajrayana history, all the great masters always have this kind of interrelation with each other and having that understanding is important rather than leader of one sectarian, one lineage and one this.
Conference on “The Legacy of the 14th Dalai Lama” – University of Westminster, 25 October 2025 (7′ 50”)
Buddhism in the Himalayas and the Dalai Lama
Moderator: Professor Nitasha Kaul (University of Westminster)
Kalu Rinpoche, Shangpa Kagyu Lineage Holder of Tibetan Buddhism
Comments are closed.