H.H. the 11th Dalai Lama, Khedrub Gyatso. Image credit: himalayanart.org. Click on image to enlarge.

b.1838 – d.1855

Incarnations: Dalai Lama ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ།
Tradition: Geluk དགེ་ལུགས།
Geography: Ganze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture དཀར་མཛེས་བོད་རིགས་རང་སྐྱོང་ཁུལ།
Historical Period: 19^th Century ༡༩ དུས་རབས།
Institution: Ganden དགའ་ལྡན་།; Sera Monastery སེ་ར།; Drepung Monastery འབྲས་སྤུངས་།; Namgyel རྣམ་རྒྱལ་།; Potala པོ་ཏ་ལ།; Norbulingka ནོར་བུ་གླིང་ཁ།
Name Variants: Dalai Lama 11 Khedrub Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༡༡ མཁས་གྲུབ་རྒྱ་མཚོ།; Khedrub Gyatso མཁས་གྲུབ་རྒྱ་མཚོ།

The Eleventh Dalai Lama, Khedrub Gyatso (ta la’i bla ma 11 rgyal ba mkhas grub rgya mtsho) was born in a small town near Gartang (mgar thang) Monastery near Dartsedo, Kham in 1838, on the first day of the ninth month of the earth-dog year of the fourteenth sexagenary cycle. The name of his father was Tsewang Dondrub (tshe dbang don grub) and his mother was called Yungdrung Butri (g.yung drung bu khrid).

H.H. the 10th Dalai Lama, Tsultrim Gyatso. Image credit: himalayanart.org. Click on image to enlarge.

In 1841 the Seventy-third Ganden Tripa, Ngawang Jampel Tsultrim Gyatso (dga’ ldan khri pa 73 ngag dbang ‘jam dpal tshul khrims rgya mtsho, 1792-1862/64) identified him as the reincarnation of the Tenth Dalai Lama, Tsultrim Gyatso (ta la’i bla ma 10 tshul khrims mtsho, 1816-1837) and had him brought to Lhasa. His selection was confirmed by use of the Golden Urn, as mandated by the Qing government in Beijing, possibly the first time the process was officially observed by the Tibetan government. However, some historians have questioned whether other names of candidates were added to the Urn, raising the possibility that the first official use of the Urn was rigged.

The following year his crown-hair was cut by the Seventh Panchen Lama, Lobzang Tenpai Nyima (paN chen bla ma 04 blo bzang dpal ldan bstan pa’i nyi ma, 1782-1853) who gave him the name Khedrub Gyatso.

At the age of five, in 1842, on the full-moon day of the fourth month of water-tiger year of the fourteenth sexagenary cycle, Khedrub Gyatso was enthroned as the Eleventh Dalai Lama. Trichen Ngawang Jampel Tsultrim Gyatso, who was then serving as regent, organized the coronation ceremony.

A biographical thangka of H.H. the 11th Dalai Lama Khedrub Gyatso, surrounded by scenes from his life. Image credit: embracingcompassion.com. Click to enlarge.

Khedrub Gyatso was granted the vows of primary monk (rab byung) in early 1846 in Jokhang in Lhasa by the Seventh Panchen Lama, who also gave him the vows of novice monk (sramanera) at the age of eleven, in 1848.

In 1848 the Uyab Zimchung (dbu g.yab gzim chung), a new private residence on the premises of Kelzang Podrang in Norbulingka (nor bu gling ka bskal bzang pho brang) was constructed under the young Dalai Lama’s patronage. The following year a celebration for its opening was held in conjunction with the annual Zhoton (zho’i ston) festival. That festival was based on the Indian Buddhist tradition of offering milk and curd to monks during the summer retreat. Sera and Drepung monasteries observed that tradition by offering a bowl of curd to each monk on the new-moon day of the sixth Tibetan month, which fell two weeks after the start of the summer retreat. Around the time of the Fifth Dalai Lama this tradition developed into a public festival and was celebrated in Lhasa and the surrounding area with performance of opera by various groups over a period of several days. Since the opening of the Uyab Zimchung, the annual Zhoton festival in Lhasa as it was celebrated at Norbulingka marked the moving of the Dalai Lama from the Potala to Norbulingka for the summer.

The Seventy-Third Ganden Tripa, Ngawang Jampel Tsultrim Gyatso. Image credit: himalayanart.org. Click on image to enlarge.

Khedrub Gyatso studied the traditional Geluk monastic curriculum at Sera, Ganden, and Drepung, and stood for examinations during 1852 and 1853. He also occasionally gave public audience and teachings. Among his teachers were the Seventy-second Ganden Tripa, Jampel Tsultrim (dga’ ldan khri pa 72 ‘jam dpal tshul khrims, d.u.); the Ninth Tashak, Ngawang Lobzang Tenpai Gyeltsen (rta tshag 09 ngag dbang blo bzang bstan pa’i rgyal mtshan, 1811-1848); Takpu Yongdzin Yeshe Gyatso (stag phu yongs ‘dzin ye shes rgya mtsho, 1789-1856); and Kongtrul Lobzang Trinle Namgyel (kong sprul blo bzang ‘phrin las rnam rgyal, d.u.). He travelled for pilgrimage at few holy places that included Lake Mansarovar (ma pham g.yu mtsho), Gyeltse Chokhor (rgyal rtse’i chos ‘khor) and Samye (bsam yas).

In 1854, at the age of seventeen, Khedrub Gyatso received an order to assume responsibility of the Tibetan government from the Daoguang Emperor (r.1820-1850) in Beijing. However, soon thereafter, on the thirteenth day of the first month of the wood-hare year of the fourteenth sexagenary cycle, 1855, Khedrub Gyatso passed into nirvana at the Potala. His preserved corpse was installed in a golden reliquary called Serdong Pende Wobar (gser gdung phan bde’i ‘od ‘bar) in the Potala.

Teachers

• blo bzang ‘phrin las rnam rgyal བློ་བཟང་འཕྲིན་ལས་རྣམ་རྒྱལ།
• The Ninth Tatsak Jedrung, Ngawang Lobzang Tenpai Gyeltsen རྟ་ཚག་རྗེ་དྲུང ༠༩ ངག་དབང་བློ་བཟང་བསྟན་པའི་རྒྱལ་མཚན། b.1811 – d.1848
• ye shes rgya mtsho ཡེ་ཤེས་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1789 – d.1856
• The Seventh Panchen Lama, bstan pa’i nyi ma པཎ་ཆེན་བླ་མ ༠༧ བསྟན་པའི་ཉི་མ། b.1782 – d.1853
• The Seventy-Second Ganden Tripa, Jampel Tsultrim དགའ་ལྡན་ཁྲི་པ ༧༢ འཇམ་དཔལ་ཚུལ་ཁྲིམས། b.mid 18th cent. – d.mid 19th cent.
• The Seventy-Fourth Ganden Tripa, Lobzang Lhundrub དགའ་ལྡན་ཁྲི་པ ༧༤ བློ་བཟང་འརྣམ་རྒྱལ་བསྟན་འཛིན་ལྷུན་གྲུབ། b.1782 – d.1847
• The Fourth Ling Rinpoche, Ngawang Lungtok Yonten Gyatso གླིང་རིན་པོ་ཆེ ༠༤ ངག་དབང་ལུང་རྟོགས་ཡོན་ཏན་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1811? – d.1853
• ‘jam dpal ye shes bstan pa’i rgyal mtshan འཇམ་དཔལ་ཡེ་ཤེས་བསྟན་པའི་རྒྱལ་མཚན།

Students

• blo bzang rab rgyas བློ་བཟང་རབ་རྒྱས། b.1822

Previous Incarnations

• The First Dalai Lama, Gendun Drub ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༠༡ དགེ་འདུན་གྲུབ་པ། b.1391 – d.1474
• The Second Dalai Lama, Gendun Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༠༢ དགེ་འདུན་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1476 – d.1542
• The Third Dalai Lama, Sonam Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༠༣ བསོད་ནམས་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1543 – d.1588
• The Fourth Dalai Lama, Yonten Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༠༤ ཡོན་ཏན་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1589 – d.1617
• The Fifth Dalai Lama, Ngawang Lobzang Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༠༥ ངག་དབང་བློ་བཟང་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1617 – d.1682
• The Sixth Dalai Lama, Tsangyang Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༠༦ ཚངས་དབྱངས་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1683 – d.1706
• The Seventh Dalai Lama, Kelzang Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༠༧ སྐལ་བཟང་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1708 – d.1757
• The Eighth Dalai Lama, Jampel Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༠༨ འཇམ་དཔལ་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1758 – d.1804
• The Ninth Dalai Lama, Lungtok Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༠༩ ལུང་རྟོགས་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1805 – d.1815
• The Tenth Dalai Lama, Tsultrim Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༡༠ ཚུལ་ཁྲིམས་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1816 – d.1837

Subsequent Incarnations

• The Twelfth Dalai Lama, Trinle Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༡༢ འཕྲིན་ལས་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1856 – d.1875
• The Thirteenth Dalai Lama, Tubten Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༡༣ ཐུབ་བསྟན་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1876 – d.1933
• The Fourteenth Dalai Lama, Tendzin Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༡༤ བསྟན་འཛིན་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1935

Bibliography

• Anon. 1977. Rgyal dbang thams cad mkhyen pa mkhas grub rgya mtsho’i rnam thar. In ‘Phags pa’jig rten dbang phyug gi rnam sprul rim byon gyi ‘khrungs rabs deb ther nor bu’i ‘phreng ba, vol. 4, pp. 267-469. Dharamsala: Sku sger yig tshang, 1977.TBRC W22095.
• Anon. 2009. Rgyal dbang thams cad mkhyen pa sku ‘phreng bcu gcig pa. In Mdzad rnam rgya chen snying rje’i rol mtsho, vol. 1, pp. 153-158. Dharamsala, Norbulingka. TBRC W2CZ7990.
• Blo bzang ‘phrin las rnam rgyal. N.d. Mkhas grub rgya mtsho’i rnam thar. Lhasa: Drepung.
• Don rdor and Bstan ‘dzin chos grags. 1993. Gangs ljongs lo rgyus thog gi grags can mi sna. Lhasa: Bod ljongs mi dmangs dpe skrun khang, pp. 930-932.
• Grags pa ‘byung gnas and Rgyal ba blo bzang mkhas grub. 1992. Gangs can mkhas grub rim byon ming mdzod. Lanzhou: Kan su’u mi rigs dpe skrun khang, pp. 382-383, 486-488.
• ‘Jigs med bsam grub. 2009. Rgyal ba sku phreng bcu gcig pa mkhas grub rgya mtsho’i chos srid mdzad rnam. In Gong sa tA la’i bla ma sku phreng rim byon gyi chos srid mdzad rnam, pp. 638-659. Beijing: Mi rigs dpe skrun khang. TBRC W21672.
• Khetsun Sangpo. 1973. Biographical Dictionary of Tibet and Tibetan Buddhism. Dharamsala: LTWA, vol. 6, p. 357.
• Maher, Derek. 2005. “The Eleventh Dalai Lama, Kedrup Gyatso.” In The Dalai Lamas: A Visual History. Martin Brauen, ed.. London: Serindia, pp. 133-134.
• Rin chen nor bu. 2006. Rgyal dbang sku ‘phreng bcu gcig pa. In Bod kyi lo rgyus spyi don kun gsal nor bu’i me long, pp. 451-455. Beijing: Mi rigs dpe skrun khang. TBRC W00KG08.
• Tshogs drug rang grol. 2002. Rgyal ba yab sras la phul ba’i zhu shog rab dkar gos bzang. In Gsung ‘bum / tshogs drug rang grol, vol. 4, pp. 749-752. Xining: Mtsho sngon mi rigs dpe skrun khang.
• A biography of Khedrub Gyatso by Trinle Namgyel, the Twelfth Dalai Lama, is listed in Sonam Dondrub’s catalog of Tibetan biographies, no. 0550. See: Bsod nams don grub. 2000. Bod kyi lo rgyus dpe tho. Lhasa: Bod ljongs Mi dmangs Dpe skrun khang.

Source: Samten Chhosphel, “The Eleventh Dalai Lama, Khedrub Gyatso,” Treasury of Lives, accessed August 05, 2018, http://treasuryoflives.org/biographies/view/Eleventh-Dalai-Lama-Khedrub-Gyatso/4259.

Samten Chhosphel is an independent scholar with PhD from the Central University of Tibetan Studies (CUTS) at Sarnath, Varanasi, India. He has a Master’s degree in Writing and Publishing from Emerson College, Boston, MA. After serving as the In-charge of Publication Department of CUTS for 26 years, he immigrated to the United States in 2009 and is currently an adjunct Assistant Professor at the City University of New York, and Language Associate in Columbia University.

Published November 2011

Disclaimer: All rights are reserved by the author. The article is reproduced here for educational purposes only.

Source: https://treasuryoflives.org/biographies/view/Eleventh-Dalai-Lama-Khedrub-Gyatso/4259. Click on image to enlarge.

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