H.H. the 12th Dalai Lama, Trinle Gyatso. Image credit: himalayanart.org. Click on image to enlarge.

b.1856 – d.1875

Incarnations: Dalai Lama ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ།
Tradition: Geluk དགེ་ལུགས།
Geography: Lhasa ལྷ་ས།
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 12 Trinle Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༡༢ འཕྲིན་ལས་རྒྱ་མཚོ།; Lobzang Tenpai Gyeltsen Trinle Gyatso བློ་བཟང་བསྟན་པའི་རྒྱལ་མཚན་འཕྲིན་ལས་རྒྱ་མཚོ།; Ngawang Lobzang Tenpai Gyeltsen Trinle Gyatso ངག་དབང་བློ་བཟང་བསྟན་པའི་རྒྱལ་མཚན་འཕྲིན་ལས་རྒྱ་མཚོ།; Trinle Gyatso འཕྲིན་ལས་རྒྱ་མཚོ།

The Twelfth Dalai Lama, Trinle Gyatso (ta la’i bla ma 12 ‘phrin las rgya mtsho) was born into the family of Bakdrok Nyang-tsangpa (‘bag ‘brog nyang tshang pa) at a small town near Olkha Dzingchi (‘ol kha rdzing phyi) in 1856, on the first day of the twelfth month of fire-dragon year of the fourteenth sexagenary cycle. His father was called Puntsok Tsewang (phun tshogs tshe dbang) and his mother was named Tsering Yudron (tshe ring g.yu sgron). He had an elder brother named Yeshe Norbu (ye shes nor bu).

The young boy was one of three candidates for the reincarnation of the Eleventh Dalai Lama Khedrub Gyatso (ta la’i bla ma 11 mkhas grub rgya mtsho, 1838-1855) who were brought to Lhasa in 1857. It is said that he correctly identified personal objects of the Eleventh Dalai Lama, and that the Golden Urn was used to confirm the selection, as mandated by the Qing government in Beijing.

Following the identification the Regent, the Third Reting Ngawang Yeshe Tsultrim (rwa sgreng 03 ngag dbang ye shes tshul khrims, 1816-1863) cut his crown-hair and named him Ngawang Lobzang Tenpai Gyeltsen Trinle Gyatso (ngag dbang blo bzang bstan pa’i rgyal mtshan ‘phrin las rgya mtsho).

A biographical thangka of H.H. the 12th Dalai Lama Trinle Gyatso, surrounded by scenes from his life. Image credit: embracingcompassion.com. Click to enlarge.

Two years later, at the age of five, in 1860, on the third day of the seventh month of iron-monkey year, Trinle Gyatso was formally enthroned. His education was supervised by the Seventy-sixth Ganden Tripa, Lobzang Khyenrab Wangchuk (blo bzang mkhyen rab dbang phyug, d. 1872).

Reting Ngawang Yeshe fell into conflict with the Kashak minister Shedra Wangchuk Gyelpo (bshad sgra dbang phyug rgyal po, 1795-1864), who insisted the regent deposit his official seals with him. Fearing a plot to overthrow him, the regent arranged for Shedra’s exile, but when the popular minister’s supporters rose up to protect him, the regent himself was forced to flee to China. Shedra then became regent, a post he held until his death.

In 1864, at the age of nine, Trinle Gyatso was granted the vows of primary monk (rab byung gi sdom pa) at the Jokhang by his tutor, Lobzang Khyenrab Wangchuk. That same year, following the death of Shedra Wangchuk Gyelpo, Lobzang Khyenrab Wangchuk was appointed regent. During his tenure as regent he foiled a plot of the Dalai Lama’s personal assistant, Pelden Dondrub (dpal ldan don grub, d. 1871) to overthrow both the regent and the Dalai Lama.

Beginning in 1868 Trinle Gyatso began to attend the annual Lhasa Monlam, possibly the first Dalai Lama to do so regularly. In 1870 Trinle Gyatso visited Drepung and Sera monasteries and stood for examinations. He was examined again four years later at Ganden.

H.H. the 13th Dalai Lama, Tubten Gyatso. Image credit: Treasury of Lives. Click on image to enlarge.

At the age of eighteen in 1873, on the tenth day of the second month of the year of water-bird, Trinle Gyatso took the formal charge of the Lhasa government. He was assisted in his duties by the Third Purchok, Jampa Gyatso (pur bu lcog 03 byams pa rgya mtsho, 1825-1901), who would later serve as tutor to the Thirteenth Dalai Lama, Tubten Gyatso (ta la’i bla ma 13 thub bstan rgya mtsho, 1876-1933). He travelled on a pilgrimage tour to Chokhorgyel (chos ‘khor rgyal) and other places in Southern Tibet during which he gave public audiences and teachings at many places.

Trinle Gyatso granted the vows of novice monk (sramanera) to the Mongolian lama Tendzin Wangchuk (bstan ‘dzin dbang phyug), the reincarnation of Kalkha Jetsun Dampa (khal kha rje btsun dam pa). He also presented gifts to Khural Khenpo (khu ral mkhan po), Ta Lama (tA bla ma) and other Khalkha lamas.

In late April or early May 1875, on the twentieth day of the third month of wood-pig year in the fifteenth sexagenary cycle, Trinle Gyatso passed into nirvana at the young age of nineteen at Potala Palace. He is said to have passed away while seated on a cushion in front of the throne in Zimchung Nyiwo (gzim chung nyi ‘od), his residence in Potala Palace. His preserved corpse was installed in a reliquary named Dalai Serdung Tsejin Wobar (ta la’i gser gdung tshe sbyin ‘od ’bar) in the Potala.

Teachers

• The Third Reting Rinpoche, ngag dbang ye shes tshul khrims rgyal mtshan ༠༣ ངག་དབང་ཡེ་ཤེས་ཚུལ་ཁྲིམས་རྒྱལ་མཚན། b.1816 – d.1863
• The Third Purchok, Jampa Gyatso ཕུར་ལྕོག ༠༣ བྱམས་པ་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1825 – d.1901
• The Seventy-Sixth Ganden Tripa, Lobzang Khyenrab Wangchuk དགའ་ལྡན་ཁྲི་པ ༧༦ བློ་བཟང་མཁྱེན་རབ་དབང་ཕྱུག། d.1872
• The Eightieth Ganden Tripa, Drakpa Dondrub དགའ་ལྡན་ཁྲི་པ ༨༠ གྲགས་པ་དོན་གྲུབ། b.early 19th cent. – d.late 19th cent.

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
• The Eleventh Dalai Lama, Khedrub Gyatso ཏ་ལའི་བླ་མ ༡༡ མཁས་གྲུབ་རྒྱ་མཚོ། b.1838 – d.1855

Subsequent Incarnations

• 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 ‘phrin las 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, 471-720. Dharamsala: Sku sger yig tshang, 1977. TBRC W22095.
• Anon. 2009. Rgyal dbang thams cad mkhyen pa sku ‘phreng bcu gnyis pa. In Mdzad rnam rgya chen snying rje’i rol mtsho, vol. 1, pp. 193-200. Dharamsala: Norbulingka. TBRC W2CZ7990.
• Blo bzang tshul khrims. N.d. Lhar bcas srid bzhi’i gtsug rgyan rgyal mchog ngur smrig ‘chang ba bcu gnyis pa chen po’i rnam par thar pa rgya mtsho lta bu las mdo tsam brjod pa dwangs shel me long. 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. 954-956.
• 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. 395-396.
• ‘Jigs med bsam grub. 2000. Rgyal ba sku phreng bcu gnyis pa ‘phrin las 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. 660-704. Beijing: Mi rigs dpe skrun khang. TBRC W21672.
• Maher, Derek. 2005. “The Twelfth Dalai Lama, Trinle Gyatso.” In The Dalai Lamas: A Visual History. Martin Brauen, ed. London: Serindia, pp. 134-135.
• Rin chen nor bu and Khri bsam gtan. Rgyal dbang sku phreng bcu gnyis pa ‘phrin las rgya mtsho’i skor. In Bod kyi lo rgyus slob gzhi blo gsar ‘jug pa’i ‘bab stegs, pp. 146-147. Lanzhou: Kan su’u mi rigs dpe skrun khang. TBRC W19354.

Source: Samten Chhosphel, “The Twelfth Dalai Lama, Trinle Gyatso,” Treasury of Lives, accessed August 05, 2018, http://treasuryoflives.org/biographies/view/Twelfth-Dalai-Lama-Trinle-Gyatso/4141.

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/Twelfth-Dalai-Lama-Trinle-Gyatso/4141. Click on image to enlarge.

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