Tales With My Lama: Rinpoche Felt He Was More Indian
Pastor David has been a student of His Eminence Tsem Rinpoche for over 15 years and within the ‘Tales With My Lama’ series of articles, he explores his spiritual relationship with Rinpoche, sharing anecdotes, stories, observations and little Dharma nuggets. It is all told to inspire others for their own spiritual relationship with their teachers.
Rinpoche Felt He Was More Indian
If you knew His Eminence Tsem Rinpoche personally, you would probably know that Rinpoche felt more connected to India than most countries. This is probably due to the fact that his monastery, Gaden Shartse Monastery, is situated in Karnataka, a south-western state of India. After his ordination, Rinpoche spent a number of years at the monastery serving his teachers and the monastic community. Throughout the years, Rinpoche became deeply acquainted with the way of life in India, which was a huge contrast to his life back in America, where he grew up.
There were things that Rinpoche immediately felt very familiar with, and aspects that were an initial surprise. One of the first things that Rinpoche had to get used to was the food in India. In the small town of Hubli, the nearest town to the monastery, there were no western restaurants or American diners and that meant no western food that Rinpoche had grown up with. There were no leafy green salads, scrambled eggs, over-easy eggs and the like for breakfast. Instead, everybody was eating vada (savoury donut), idli (fluffy savoury rice cake) and poori (a savoury fried bread). Rinpoche found the food strange at first but quickly got used to it and over the years, they became all-time favourites.
In fact, Rinpoche went on to enjoy a wide range of dishes like dhal, paneer tikka, aloo mattar and paneer butter masala. Apparently, most Tibetan monks are also very used to an Indian diet since they lived in India. For this reason, Rinpoche would always instruct for his students to serve Indian food to visiting Sangha so they would get a taste of home.
Many years later, Rinpoche reflected that it’s not surprising he related so much to Indian culture and society as he felt that he had been Indian in many of his previous lifetimes. The environment in India felt extremely familiar to Rinpoche, in a way that could not be entirely expressed in words and Rinpoche felt very drawn to India’s scenery, especially its mountains in the north. Therefore such preferences, even those which are cuisine-related, are merely memories of literally centuries of previous lives surfacing.
On another occasion, Rinpoche along with a group of students went to watch a biopic of an Indian mystic, Paramahansa Yogananda. Rinpoche later told us that he resonated with the manner in which this master had devoted his life towards the instructions and wishes of his teacher, which was what he did as well. At one point, Rinpoche was very much into bhajans or devotional hymns that devotees sing in praise of their gurus and gods. Rinpoche was particularly moved by hymns sung by Mary Fewel Tulin to her Radha Soami teacher. At times, Rinpoche sang along but with his own teacher in mind. Rinpoche explained that this devotion to a spiritual teacher was very much inherent in Indian traditional culture and he felt extremely connected with it. Rinpoche said that when one seeks to understand Indian devotional culture, one will come to understand and appreciate Tibetan devotional culture as well.
Rinpoche went on to explain that much of Tibetan Buddhist spiritual practices are derived from Indian devotional traditions such as circumambulation, mudras, recitation of mantras, prayer beads and especially devotion to one’s teacher, which is crucial in more advanced practices of Tibetan Buddhism. Rinpoche also loved the manner in which Indians adorn their religious icons with garlands of flowers. They also offer jewels, incense and other abundant items as offerings, which they lay out in front of their icons. This descended down and transformed into the manner in which Tibetans adorn their Buddha statues and lay out abundant offerings beautifully. This is very much reflected in the manner in which Rinpoche would ensure that all his altars and shrines were always filled with various offerings, not to please the Buddhas but as a formal practice to accumulate merits.
India itself is a deeply spiritual society, where temples and shrines are found on almost every other street corner. That is why it is not surprising that India is the birthplace of world religions like Hinduism and Buddhism. It is a place where you will find a shopkeeper making incense offerings to little altars populated with brightly painted Hindu gods in a little street shop and amongst the browsing shoppers is a maroon-robed head-shaven nun. In India, people of various faiths live together, often side-by-side. Rinpoche often talked about this diversity in India and how everybody respects all religions. It is rather common for an Indian to accept a blessing from a Hindu priest, Buddhist monk and Christian priest but remain a devout practitioner of his or her own faith.
It is evident that Rinpoche’s predilection towards India seemed to centre largely around its devotional aspects. Although it appears superficially different from Tibetan Buddhist traditions, in essence, both traditions have much in common. This is not surprising though considering Buddhism came from India and much of its rich devotional traditions were also transmitted as the faith spread to other countries.
For more interesting information:
- Tales with My Lama: Bigfoot Dreams
- Tales with My Lama: What does Rinpoche like about Liz Taylor?
- Tales with My Lama: Daily Practice
- Tales With My Lama : Laugh Away Your Ego
- Tales With My Lama: Why Rinpoche Has To Suffer
- Tales With My Lama : Larger than Life
- Tales with my Lama – Manjushri
- Tales With My Lama : Audience With Tsem Rinpoche
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It’s not a surprise that Rinpoche felt more Indian as Rinpoche have been staying in India long enough. His early life spent in the monastery in India, serving his gurus and the monastic community has taught Rinpoche to cook Indian foods. Even all these years in Malaysia, Rinpoche preferred Indian cuisine . And also maybe because some of Rinpoche’s past incarnations like Naropa and Mahasiddha Virupa. And I didn’t know that Tibetan Buddhism incorporates with Hinduism until quite sometime ago …blur me after so many years…Lol😍. Thank you Rinpoche and Pastor David for sharing this lovely sharing. 👍👏😎🙏
This is how I felt same and why I sought out Sanatana Dharma at age of 14.
It won’t be supress Rinpoche felt more Indian as Rinpoche have been staying in India long enough. His early life spent in the monastery in India, serving his teachers and the monastic community, has taught Rinpoche cooking more Indian foods than western foods. Even all these years in Malaysia, Rinpoche preferred Indian cuisine which is rich in spices and masala such as dhal, paneer tikka, aloo mattar and paneer butter masala. Rinpoche will go all the way his students to serve Indian food to visiting Sangha so they would get a taste of home. Glad to know more of Rinpoche through this article. With Rinpoche explanation of how he felt and inherent in the Indian tradition culture, traditional spiritual practice and devotion to a spiritual teacher. All these points that Rinpoche was more Indian as what Rinpoche felt and having a strong connection with it.
Thank you Pastor David for this sharing.