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Torch Lighting the Way to Freedom by Dudjom Rinpoche

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Kyabje Dudjom Rinpoche Jigdral Yeshe Dorje (Tibetan: བདུད་འཇོམས་འཇིགས་བྲལ་ཡེ་ཤེས་རྡོ་རྗེ།, Wylie: bdud 'joms 'jigs bral ye shes rdo rje, THL Düjom Jikdrel Yéshé Dorjé) was known simply as Dudjom Rinpoche (10 June 1904 – 17 January 1987). He is considered by many Tibetan Buddhists to be from an important Tulku lineage of Terton Dudul Dorje (1615–1672), and was recognized as the incarnation of Terton Dudjom Lingpa (1835–1904), a renowned treasure revealer. He was a direct incarnation of both Padmasambhava and Dudjom Lingpa. He was a Nyingma householder, a yogi, and a Vajrayana and Dzogchen master. According to his secretary Khenpo Tsewang Dongyal and many others, he was revered as "His Holiness" (Kyabje) and as a "Master of Masters".

In order to protect and preserve Tibetan Buddhist teachings and continue Tibetan culture in exile, Dudjom Rinpoche was appointed as the first head of the Nyingma school of Tibetan Buddhism, by the 14th Dalai Lama and the Central Tibetan Administration in the early 1960s, in India. He gave important Nyingma lineage empowerments and teachings at his monasteries Zangdok Palri and Jangsa Gompa in Kalimpong, and at Tso Pema in Rewalsar which were attended by thousands of people. In 1965, Dudjom Rinpoche organized a conference for participants to discuss the preservation of teachings of the Nyingma, Kagyu, Sakya and Gelug schools.

In Tibet by 1955, Dudjom Rinpoche had travelled extensively to teach and was revered as a highly realized master by renown lamas, such as Zhechen Kongtrul and Tulku Urgyen, as well as by Tibetan Buddhist laypeople. They still consider him to be the "Greatest Terton of Our Time", and a holder of all the teachings of the Nyingma school of Tibetan Buddhism, as well as that of the Kagyu, Sakya and Gelug schools. Dudjom Rinpoche was also a prolific author. The treatise The Nyingma School of Tibetan Buddhism: Its Fundamentals and History, was written by him in 1962 and 1996. Translated into two volumes, it is considered as a source of authority. He also authored the Political History of Tibet in 1979, and the History of the Dharma. Teachers from various schools confirmed that the terma texts revealed by Dudjom Rinpoche are still being used as practice texts.

In addition to the above, Rinpoche also reconstructed monasteries in Tibet, and built numerous monasteries in India and Nepal after his exile from Tibet in 1957. In his lifetime, Dudjom Rinpoche continued travelling throughout the world to give teachings. He had a center in Hong Kong, and established centers both in France and in the United States. His activities and dharma centers brought the Vajrayana and the Nyingma teachings to the western worlds. Khenpo Dongyal credit this Great Master as being responsible for a "renaissance in Tibetan studies".

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