Repa Tradition

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Lay man
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Repa Tradition

Post by Lay man »

Is there still a living Repa tradition in the Kamtsang Kagyu lineage?
If anyone knows anything, please share.

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Palzang Jangchub
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by Palzang Jangchub »

There seems to be, though to what extent I'm not sure. His Eminence Goshir Gyaltsab Rinpoche ordained at least one of his students, Justin von Bujdoss, as a Repa. He is now alternatively known as Lama Repa Dorjé Ödzer, and runs both the New York Tsurphu Goshir center in Brooklyn and his own blog, centered around Chöd & chaplaincy:

http://www.Goshir.org

http://www.ganachakra.com


One would think that he'd know more about the Repa tradition. He's really down-to-earth, and maintains a Facebook profile which he checks semi-regularly. I'd try contacting him.

Let us know what ya find out! :spy:
Image

"The Sutras, Tantras, and Philosophical Scriptures are great in number. However life is short, and intelligence is limited, so it's hard to cover them completely. You may know a lot, but if you don't put it into practice, it's like dying of thirst on the shore of a great lake. Likewise, a common corpse is found in the bed of a great scholar." ~ Karma Chagme

དྲིན་ཆེན་རྩ་བའི་བླ་མ་སྐྱབས་རྗེ་མགར་ཆེན་ཁྲི་སྤྲུལ་རིན་པོ་ཆེ་ཁྱེད་མཁྱེན་ནོ།།
རྗེ་བཙུན་བླ་མ་མཁས་གྲུབ་ཀརྨ་ཆགས་མེད་མཁྱེན་ནོ། ཀརྨ་པ་མཁྱེན་ནོཿ
Lay man
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by Lay man »

Karma Jinpa wrote:There seems to be, though to what extent I'm not sure. His Eminence Goshir Gyaltsab Rinpoche ordained at least one of his students, Justin von Bujdoss, as a Repa. He is now alternatively known as Lama Repa Dorjé Ödzer, and runs both the New York Tsurphu Goshir center in Brooklyn and his own blog, centered around Chöd & chaplaincy:

http://www.Goshir.org

http://www.ganachakra.com


One would think that he'd know more about the Repa tradition. He's really down-to-earth, and maintains a Facebook profile which he checks semi-regularly. I'd try contacting him.

Let us know what ya find out! :spy:
Thanks very much for this. I went and checked the links you recommended. Its interesting, as I ran a google search for “repa” and found this person as well as another who are ordained Repas. They both have Dharma centers, and one even appears to be married with children. I have always assumed the Repa tradition was reserved for hermits. Maybe not.
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by dzoki »

Repa tradition was started by Marpa and Milarepa, they were both laymen, Rechungpa then wrote a repa empowerment adjacent to Chakrasamvara empowerment that is a kind o Kagyu counterpart to ngagpa empowerment of Nyingma. Most of the famous repas were lay people. However nowadays many repas in Tibet are ordained monks who trained in tummo and later after gaining certain degree of proficiency are granted a white robe, though it is not clear to me whether they still continue to be monks, most likely yes. Don´t know whether they also receive that Rechungpa´s empowerment along with that. Originaly repas practiced karmamudra, but I don´t know whether that aspect is a part of repa empowerment.
Of course repas were hermits and spent much of their time in retreat, but that does not preclude having a family down in the valley, though I can imagine it wasn´t easy for the wife of such repa. There was also tradition of remas the female repas, such as Kunden Rema and Machig Onjo, both are from Rechung Kagyu lineage.
Apart from Rechung Kagyu which is now more or less extinct, Barom Kagyu is a lineage that is famous for upholding repa tradition, so try to inquire in that direction and there were some exceptional repas in all Kagyu lineages, but most of them don´t seem to support this tradition anymore, though Kamtsang Kagyu apparently did some effort to revive it recently (via Gyaltsab Rinpoche and Thrangu Rinpoche).
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by Lay man »

dzoki wrote:Repa tradition was started by Marpa and Milarepa, they were both laymen, Rechungpa then wrote a repa empowerment adjacent to Chakrasamvara empowerment that is a kind o Kagyu counterpart to ngagpa empowerment of Nyingma. Most of the famous repas were lay people. However nowadays many repas in Tibet are ordained monks who trained in tummo and later after gaining certain degree of proficiency are granted a white robe, though it is not clear to me whether they still continue to be monks, most likely yes. Don´t know whether they also receive that Rechungpa´s empowerment along with that. Originaly repas practiced karmamudra, but I don´t know whether that aspect is a part of repa empowerment.
Of course repas were hermits and spent much of their time in retreat, but that does not preclude having a family down in the valley, though I can imagine it wasn´t easy for the wife of such repa. There was also tradition of remas the female repas, such as Kunden Rema and Machig Onjo, both are from Rechung Kagyu lineage.
Apart from Rechung Kagyu which is now more or less extinct, Barom Kagyu is a lineage that is famous for upholding repa tradition, so try to inquire in that direction and there were some exceptional repas in all Kagyu lineages, but most of them don´t seem to support this tradition anymore, though Kamtsang Kagyu apparently did some effort to revive it recently (via Gyaltsab Rinpoche and Thrangu Rinpoche).
Dzoki,
Thanks much. This is by far the most information I have gotten to date. I have a close friend who is a student of Bardor Rinpoche in Red Hook, so I can ping him for more details related to the Barom Kagyu Repa tradition. You note on Gyalstap Rinpoche and Thrangu Rinpoche are noted as well. I think it would be great if the Kamtsang Kagyu took a concerted effort to revive this tradition. It would provide a great conduit for those who are not in a position to become Monastics to still delve deep into the tradition, much in the same way the Sakyas and Nyigmas has similar paths for lay-people.

Cheers,
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Palzang Jangchub
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by Palzang Jangchub »

Repa Dorjé Odzer's latest blog post is about the need for the both the Repa & Gelong traditions:
[...] I tend to wonder if we may have made the fundamental error of leaning too much upon the 18th/19th century classicism of monastic Karma Kagyu as a model for the entirety of American Karma Kagyu (the vast majority of whom are lay) in the 21st century. It sounds kind of absurd actually when I see it written out like that, and I don’t think that it is too much of a stretch to suggest that if this is the case, then perhaps we lose some of our credibility and accessibility with those who resonate with the sub-groups that feel at odds with the way the dharma is presented.
When I visit places that resemble these perfect visions of what dharma is supposed to look like visually, I think of Drukpa Kunley, Milarepa, Phadampa Sangye and Shabkar with great tenderness (and humor) and take delight in my meager identity as a so-called Repa. These teachers (myself completely excluded) were vital commentators, alternatives and voices in the wilderness that dharma cannot be owned, trapped in books, and is not only to be delivered through the medium of classicism which often runs the risk of becoming overly dusty and theoretical. There is a lot of wisdom in their path, and many teachings in their relationship with the institutions that presented dharma in a particular kind of way.
Just as we need the sun and the moon for there to be balance on Earth, perhaps we need both the paths of Rechungpa and Gampopa as symbols of who we are, who we might wish to become, and from which point we wish to engage the dharma.
The full article can be found here: http://ganachakra.com/2013/10/14/on-voi ... from-here/
Image

"The Sutras, Tantras, and Philosophical Scriptures are great in number. However life is short, and intelligence is limited, so it's hard to cover them completely. You may know a lot, but if you don't put it into practice, it's like dying of thirst on the shore of a great lake. Likewise, a common corpse is found in the bed of a great scholar." ~ Karma Chagme

དྲིན་ཆེན་རྩ་བའི་བླ་མ་སྐྱབས་རྗེ་མགར་ཆེན་ཁྲི་སྤྲུལ་རིན་པོ་ཆེ་ཁྱེད་མཁྱེན་ནོ།།
རྗེ་བཙུན་བླ་མ་མཁས་གྲུབ་ཀརྨ་ཆགས་མེད་མཁྱེན་ནོ། ཀརྨ་པ་མཁྱེན་ནོཿ
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heart
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by heart »

dzoki wrote: Apart from Rechung Kagyu which is now more or less extinct, Barom Kagyu is a lineage that is famous for upholding repa tradition, so try to inquire in that direction and there were some exceptional repas in all Kagyu lineages, but most of them don´t seem to support this tradition anymore, though Kamtsang Kagyu apparently did some effort to revive it recently (via Gyaltsab Rinpoche and Thrangu Rinpoche).
To my knowledge Thrangu Rinpoche didn't make an more repa's after the first group in the seventies, or do you know someone else? Most of that group is dead it seems like, just found out that Peanut Butter Harry died a few years ago just as Chris.

/magnus
"We are all here to help each other go through this thing, whatever it is."
~Kurt Vonnegut

"The principal practice is Guruyoga. But we need to understand that any secondary practice combined with Guruyoga becomes a principal practice." ChNNR (Teachings on Thun and Ganapuja)
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by Lay man »

So Thrangu Rinpoche intitiatea whole group of westerners in the 70s? Did any of them stick with it?

Any idea if the initiation was from the Demchog Nyengyu?

Thanks
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by heart »

Lay man wrote:So Thrangu Rinpoche intitiatea whole group of westerners in the 70s? Did any of them stick with it?

Any idea if the initiation was from the Demchog Nyengyu?

Thanks
I got the impression they all did their best, but I am not sure since I only know one of them a little. But he seemed like a serious practitioner to the day he died. It was a part of a empowerment, not sure if it was the Demchog Nyengyu. They were pretty secretive about it.

There are some pictures here: http://dutchbob.com/cpg132/thumbnails.php?album=19 But you have to register to look at them.

/magnus
"We are all here to help each other go through this thing, whatever it is."
~Kurt Vonnegut

"The principal practice is Guruyoga. But we need to understand that any secondary practice combined with Guruyoga becomes a principal practice." ChNNR (Teachings on Thun and Ganapuja)
Simon E.
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by Simon E. »

Karma Jinpa wrote:There seems to be, though to what extent I'm not sure. His Eminence Goshir Gyaltsab Rinpoche ordained at least one of his students, Justin von Bujdoss, as a Repa. He is now alternatively known as Lama Repa Dorjé Ödzer, and runs both the New York Tsurphu Goshir center in Brooklyn and his own blog, centered around Chöd & chaplaincy:

http://www.Goshir.org

http://www.ganachakra.com


One would think that he'd know more about the Repa tradition. He's really down-to-earth, and maintains a Facebook profile which he checks semi-regularly. I'd try contacting him.

Let us know what ya find out! :spy:
Great links.
:namaste:
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ClearblueSky
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by ClearblueSky »

Since we're discussing the living repa traditions, thought I'd throw this link in here!
http://togdens.net/about.html
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by Dhondrub »

heart wrote:
Lay man wrote:So Thrangu Rinpoche intitiatea whole group of westerners in the 70s? Did any of them stick with it?

Any idea if the initiation was from the Demchog Nyengyu?

Thanks
I got the impression they all did their best, but I am not sure since I only know one of them a little. But he seemed like a serious practitioner to the day he died. It was a part of a empowerment, not sure if it was the Demchog Nyengyu. They were pretty secretive about it.

There are some pictures here: http://dutchbob.com/cpg132/thumbnails.php?album=19 But you have to register to look at them.

/magnus
I was under the impression that Chris pulled it through until the end. At least he wore a white zen and practiced really a lot.

Also there is this french Lama Norbu Repa who has quite a big organisation. I think he told me he was ordinated by Jamgon Rinpoche http://www.ncf.net/curriculum.htm
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by yegyal »

heart wrote:
Lay man wrote:So Thrangu Rinpoche intitiatea whole group of westerners in the 70s? Did any of them stick with it?

Any idea if the initiation was from the Demchog Nyengyu?

Thanks
I got the impression they all did their best, but I am not sure since I only know one of them a little. But he seemed like a serious practitioner to the day he died. It was a part of a empowerment, not sure if it was the Demchog Nyengyu. They were pretty secretive about it.

There are some pictures here: http://dutchbob.com/cpg132/thumbnails.php?album=19 But you have to register to look at them.

/magnus
Thanks so much for posting the link, Magnus. I only knew many of these guys(Bob, Harry, Charles, Addison etc.) in their later years and it was wonderful to see them as young men.
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by conebeckham »

I have a friend here in the Bay Area, he's a student of Thrangu Rinpoche's, and he "became a repa" several years back...I don't know if there was an empowerment, or some sort of ceremony or ritual involved, or if Rinpoche merely gave him a name and told him to wear the zen. I've not asked.
དམ་པའི་དོན་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ཆེ་བ་དང་།
རྟོག་གེའི་ཡུལ་མིན་བླ་མའི་བྱིན་རླབས་དང་།
སྐལ་ལྡན་ལས་འཕྲོ་ཅན་གྱིས་རྟོགས་པ་སྟེ།
དེ་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ལ་ནི་ལོ་རྟོག་སེལ།།


"Absolute Truth is not an object of analytical discourse or great discriminating wisdom,
It is realized through the blessing grace of the Guru and fortunate Karmic potential.
Like this, mistaken ideas of discriminating wisdom are clarified."
- (Kyabje Bokar Rinpoche, from his summary of "The Ocean of Definitive Meaning")
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by heart »

yegyal wrote: Thanks so much for posting the link, Magnus. I only knew many of these guys(Bob, Harry, Charles, Addison etc.) in their later years and it was wonderful to see them as young men.
Yes, it is quite a trip those photos.

/magnus
"We are all here to help each other go through this thing, whatever it is."
~Kurt Vonnegut

"The principal practice is Guruyoga. But we need to understand that any secondary practice combined with Guruyoga becomes a principal practice." ChNNR (Teachings on Thun and Ganapuja)
Simon E.
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by Simon E. »

ClearblueSky wrote:Since we're discussing the living repa traditions, thought I'd throw this link in here!
http://togdens.net/about.html
Also fascinating ClearblueSky , thank you.
“You don’t know it. You just know about it. That is not the same thing.”

Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche to me.
Lay man
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by Lay man »

This is a great info.
Can anyone talk to what Repa vows entail?
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by heart »

Lay man wrote:This is a great info.
Can anyone talk to what specific Repa vows entail?
Continuous tummo practice and the various yogas that go with that, if I understood correctly. Repa or Ngakpa just like any yogi, you have to be a very stable practitioner.

/magnus
"We are all here to help each other go through this thing, whatever it is."
~Kurt Vonnegut

"The principal practice is Guruyoga. But we need to understand that any secondary practice combined with Guruyoga becomes a principal practice." ChNNR (Teachings on Thun and Ganapuja)
Lay man
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by Lay man »

heart wrote:
Lay man wrote:This is a great info.
Can anyone talk to what specific Repa vows entail?
Continuous tummo practice and the various yogas that go with that, if I understood correctly. Repa or Ngakpa just like any yogi, you have to be a very stable practitioner.

/magnus
Wow.....if true that does not seem like a commitment to take lightly.
So I assumes the commitments associated with the Repa tradition are more closely associated with Vajrayana (tantric) vows as opposed to Mahayana vows?
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Re: Repa Tradition

Post by heart »

Lay man wrote:
heart wrote:
Lay man wrote:This is a great info.
Can anyone talk to what specific Repa vows entail?
Continuous tummo practice and the various yogas that go with that, if I understood correctly. Repa or Ngakpa just like any yogi, you have to be a very stable practitioner.

/magnus
Wow.....if true that does not seem like a commitment to take lightly.
So I assumes the commitments associated with the Repa tradition are more closely associated with Vajrayana (tantric) vows as opposed to Mahayana vows?
Yes, the repa tradition is a Vajrayana tradition and it isn't based on vows, it is based on empowerment.

/magnus
"We are all here to help each other go through this thing, whatever it is."
~Kurt Vonnegut

"The principal practice is Guruyoga. But we need to understand that any secondary practice combined with Guruyoga becomes a principal practice." ChNNR (Teachings on Thun and Ganapuja)
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