This dissertation is a study of the early history of Ganden (Dga’ ldan) Monastery in Tibet and the ways in which that history impacted the construction of the Geluk (Dge lugs) tradition. Founded by the prominent Tibetan Buddhist monk Tsongkhapa Losang Drakpa (Tsong kha pa blo bzang grags pa, 1357-1419) in 1409, Ganden Monastery was the seat of Tsongkhapa’s nascent Gelukpa sect, and of the Ganden Tripa (khri pa), the heads of the Geluk tradition. It is also the first of the “three seats” (gdan sa gsum) of the Geluk tradition, large and influential monasteries with extensive social, political, and economic power that became prestigious centers of education. Despite its importance to both the broader history of Tibet and the development of the Geluk tradition, Ganden’s early history has received little scholarly attention. Existing studies of Ganden Monastery are partial or treat it in passing. Existing studies of the Geluk tradition are heavily focused on its texts, doctrines, and institutions, leading scholars to characterize it solely as a clerical, rational, and bureaucratic tradition. This has distorted our understanding of its early history. As a corrective, the bulk of this dissertation focuses on the importance of charisma, prophecy, and pilgrimage to the growth of the tradition. This dissertation is based on the translation and critical examination of classical Tibetan texts from a range of genres: broader political and religious histories, individual biographies, epistles, encomia, and monastic catalogs and pilgrimage guides particular to Ganden. Where useful, I also incorporate art historical evidence into my analyses. One main focus is the influence of Lhodrak Drubchen Namkha Gyeltsen (Lho brag grub chen nam mkha’ rgyal mtshan, 1326-1401), an important figure and mahāsiddha whose importance has been minimized in Gelukpa historical accounts. In chapter one, I describe his role in endorsing Tsongkhapa as his spiritual heir. The importance of charisma to earning patronage is common in tantric religious contexts and I also argue for the importance of charisma—or Tsongkhapa’s status as a mahāsiddha—to stimulating early patronage for the tradition. As an oracle, Lhodrak Drubchen also communicated important prophecies. In chapter two I examine the social context, function, and later adaptations of these prophecies. In chapter three, I examine a text from the Heart-Essence of the Ḍākinīs (Mkha’ ’gro snying thig) cycle of teachings within the Nyingma tradition of Dzogchen (Rdzogs chen) that was received from Lhodrak Drubchen by Tsongkhapa but adapted and excluded by Geluk editors. The last two chapters describe Ganden Monastery as a pilgrimage site. In chapter four, I describe Ganden’s charismatic beings and power objects. In chapter five, I describe Ganden as a numinous place. Contrary to popular explanations that describe the rise of the Gelukpa solely in terms of rational activities, I argue it was the popularization of Ganden as a pilgrimage site that played a major role in the growth of the tradition and the Tsongkhapa devotional cult.

This dissertation explores the relationship between Buddhism and traditional Tibetan medicine, or Sowa Rigpa. More specifically, this project traces the significance and utilization of the tantric Buddhist Yutok Nyingtig tradition from its inception in twelfth–thirteenth century Tibet as an accompaniment to the transmission of medical knowledge to its contemporary propagation as a stand-alone spiritual practice in a global context.

In many ways, the tantric Buddhist ritual and practice tradition called the Yutok Nyingtig Guru Sādhana (g.yu thog snying thig bla sgrub) exemplifies the strategic importance of an appropriate religious lineage for Tibetan medical practitioners (amchi), and it has a rich history of being a factor in legitimizing and empowering amchi and their medical heritage. This research proposes that there is a demonstrable trend in Tibetan medical history from the time of Yutok Yönten Gönpo (twelfth century) that is characterized by relations of power, divergent interests, and legitimating modalities that still shape the tradition today as it reaches an increasingly transnational audience. In short, this dissertation shows how elements of Buddhism—and the Yutok Nyingtig tradition in particular—have been understood, portrayed, and leveraged vis-à-vis the Tibetan medical tradition historically and in its contempary manifestations.

This research contributes to the ongoing discussion revolving around issues of legitimacy, the role of religion, and the impacts of globalizing and modernizing forces in Sowa Rigpa. To this end, this dissertation offers a look into three different contemporary contexts of Tibetan medical training: two translocal Tibetan medical institutions in Nepal (Sowa Rigpa International College and Traditional Buddhist Sorig Institute), and a transnational organization involved in the global transmission of Tibetan medical knowledge and the Yutok Nyingtig tradition (Sorig Khang International). These three “sites” problematize the relationship between local and global manifestations of Tibetan medical knowledge. Investigating these diverging contexts enhances our understanding of the landscape of contemporary Tibetan training and highlights some observable transformations in the way in which Sowa Rigpa is being conceptualized and disseminated.

By combining historical and textual analysis with ethnographic methods, this research demonstrates the malleability of the Tibetan medical tradition in relation to Buddhism and the Yutok Nyingtig tradition. The seven chapters illustrate how Sowa Rigpa has been quick to adapt since its cosmopolitan beginnings, how the medical system was adopted as a vehicle for pursuing the bodhisattva path, and how the tradition is currently shaped in various ways outside of Tibet by global forces. By examining these temporally, geographically, and culturally distant instances of Sowa Rigpa and Buddhism from a multicentric and global perspective, this dissertation aims to underscore the considerable variety of significance assigned to the various religious components associated with Sowa Rigpa, and the extent to which they may be emphasized within the diverse contexts of contemporary Sowa Rigpa training institutions. Additionally, this study contributes to the scant research on Sowa Rigpa training institutions in Nepal, which have not received sufficient attention to date.

The arguments presented in this dissertation project suggest that the tendency for Tibetan “secular” domains—such as Sowa Rigpa—to align with the Buddhist doctrine and particular Buddhist practices can often be explained pragmatically: the need for recognition and legitimacy has remained a constant throughout the history of Sowa Rigpa. This dissertation evinces that the world of Tibetan medicine is a domain of a plurality of interests and an array of external pressures that necessitate individual Tibetan medical practitioners and institutions to negotiate and articulate their position regarding the connection between Sowa Rigpa and Buddhism. Religion remains—as a socially constructed domain of legitimacy—an important reference point for Tibetan medical practice, and the tradition’s history and present demonstrate agility in adapting and innovation in construing meaning in diverging circumstances.

As the dissemination and transmission of Tibetan medical knowledge is increasingly impacted by forces of transnationalism and is not bound by borders or limited to a particular culture, the networks of associative meanings take entirely new forms and are continuously reconstructed as they spread globally. This trajectory has an increasingly transforming impact on Sowa Rigpa as it is translated and construed for new audiences and purposes.

In this essay I explore a portion of a polemical text authored by the influential fifteenth to sixteenth century Geluk thinker Sera Jetsün Chöki Gyeltsen (Se ra rje btsun chos kyi rgyal mtshan). Jetsünpa rose to prominence as a renowned teacher and abbot of Sera Jé (Se ra byes) college who authored college textbooks (yig cha) still in use to this day at Sera Jé, as well as Ganden Jangtsé colleges. The text is a polemical response to an attack by the Sakya thinker Gorampa against Tsongkhapa, the founder of the Geluk school. The portion I focus on concerns the central topic of the two truths in Madhyamaka philosophy. I seek to understand the way in which sectarian differentiation was articulated as differing modes of philosophical exegesis, as well as exploring what role the sociopolitical context in Tibet may have played in the formation of sectarian identity.

My dissertation is a study of the life of Ngawang Tsültrim (1721-1791), with a primary focus on his career as sikyong or regent of Tibet (reigning 1777-1786, 1790-1791), and a secondary focus on his religious positions and his service to the Qing emperor. By studying his life, I have sought to understand how and why regents came to serve as substitute rulers for the Dalai Lamas and dominated Tibet's Ganden Palace government for many years. As they were generally prominent Geluk monks with deep ties to the monastic system, I am especially concerned with how their rule was related to the doctrine and institutions of Geluk Tibetan Buddhism, and epitomized the “union of religion and politics” (chösi sungdrel) of Tibet. I have studied his life through two Tibetan-language biographies, a long biography focusing exclusively on his life and a short biography from an anthology of lives of the Ganden Tripa, and I have consulted secondary sources covering Tibetan (and sometimes Qing) history, religion, economics, political science and sociology to put his life and work in context.

As a political figure, I have found that he could be seen as a bodhisattva ruler, not only because of his supreme position in an ideal ritual cosmos (Tibet conceived of as a buddha-field), but also because of his practical actions, such as laws against corruption and abusive taxation, by which he promoted himself as a benefactor of the common people. I found that his religious background made him especially suited to leading the chösi sungdrel, as he had been enculturated in the scholastic system of the great Geluk monasteries and rose eventually to the position of Ganden Tripa at the top of the monastic hierarchy. His actions in office strengthened the ascendancy of the Geluk monks over Tibet. He also gained influence with the Qing by forming a patron and priest (chöyön) relationship with the Qianlong emperor, serving in his court as religious preceptor, both before his reign as regent (1762-1777) and afterwards (1786-1790). This relationship enabled him to negotiate to preserve Tibetan autonomy and Tibetan traditions as the Qing moved to consolidate power. In regards to the Dalai Lama, Ngawang Tsültrim's position as tutor symbolically affirmed that the Dalai Lama was being kept off the throne, but other actions of Ngawang Tsültrim affirmed that the Dalai Lama was the real, ultimate source of the Ganden Palace's chösi sungdrel. Although Ngawang Tsültrim's regency marked the beginning of an era when the high monks and lamas of the regency displaced the Dalai Lama as actual rulers of Tibet, he ensured that the Dalai Lama lineage would continue and maintain their spiritual supremacy.

The eighth-century Indian Buddhist master Buddhagupta (more commonly known as Buddhaguhya) is one of the most influential figures in the history of Tibetan Buddhism. According to the Tibetan religious histories, Buddhagupta was invited to teach at the Tibetan imperial court in the mid-to-late eighth century. Though he did not accept the invitation, Buddhagupta is said to have initiated the the emperor’s envoys into several tantric systems and transmitted to them many of his own works. There are numerous tantric commentaries and other works attributed to Buddhagupta in the various recensions of the Tengyur—the commentarial section of the Tibetan Buddhist Canon—as well as in other canonical collections such as the Nyingma Kama (Rnying ma bka’ ma). The scope of these works is vast, ranging from exoteric Mahāyāna topics and orthodox tantras of the kriyā, caryā, and yoga tantras, to the transgressive mahāyoga tantras, which are known for their use of ritual sex and violence. The Tibetan manuscripts at Dunhuang even preserve a text attributed to Buddhagupta on Dzokchen (Rdzogs chen) or the Great Perfection, the summum bonum of the Nyingma (Rnying ma) or “Ancient” School of Tibetan Buddhism. Contemporary scholarship remains divided as to whether all of these works are attributable to a single, mid-to-late eighth-century author or if the texts on mahāyoga and Dzokchen were written by a later hand. Drawing on the methodologies of philology, history, higher textual criticsm, and translation, this dissertation argues that the mahāyoga and Dzokchen works were written by a later author from the mid-to-late ninth century who shared the same name as the eighth-century Buddhagupta who transacted with the Tibetan emmisarries. This conclusion is based on an analysis of two of these mahāyoga works: An Orderly Arrangement of the Paths (Lam rnam par bkod pa) and Brief Explanation of the Path (Lam rnam par bshad pa chung ngu), both of which draw heavily on the Guhyagarbha Tantra (Rgyud gsang ba’i snying po) and other mahāyoga tantras of the Māyājāla (Sgyu ’phrul drwa ba) cycle. Moreover, through a close examination of Tibetan text catalogs, treatises, and historical sources from the eighth to the eighteenth century, this dissertation proposes that the original Sanskrit name of both figures is in fact Buddhagupta and not Buddhaguhya. It further suggests that Buddhaguhya is reconstruction by post-dynastic Tibetan authors based on sangs rgyas gsang ba, which was the way the imperial period translators rendered Buddhagupta. Finally, this dissertation explores several related issues, Buddhagupta’s biographies and his influence on the Nyingma tradition’s interpretation of the mahāyoga tantras, especially the Guhyagarbha Tantra.

Like the terms “karma,” “dharma,” and “yoga,” “yogic perception (yogipratyakṣa, rnal ’byor mngon sum)” is highly polysemic and widely used across Indo-Tibetan religious traditions. Unlike these terms, however, “yogic perception” does not defy loose definition, such that no description semantically encompasses its myriad instantiations. Generally, it denotes the culmination of yogic, meditative practice, where the yogi is granted some perceptual ability thanks to their austerities. However, various Hindu and Buddhist traditions interpret the content of this perception differently. (1) Some argue that it affords an ability to see far-off or distant objects, a type of remote seeing. (2) Others argue that it affords literal knowledge of all objects, tantamount to omniscience. (3) Lastly, some couch it as a type of spiritual insight, the ability to perceive the truth of reality and its phenomena.

This dissertation uses a polythetic model to represent yogic perception’s various meanings, general enough to account for maximum variance but polythetic in being able to capture particularities without the demand they extend to every instance. The three aforementioned themes—yogic perception as remote seeing, omniscience, and spiritual insight—are indicative of this polythetic model: while some descriptions of yogic perception span more than one theme, many instantiate only one. In addition to this thematic analysis of yogic perception, this dissertation also seeks to account for diachronic factors in yogic perception’s intellectual development, showing how these characterizations changed over time.

The dissertation is thus both thematically organized along these three themes as well as chronologically organized. The first three chapters are devoted to each of these three themes in the Indian sources, showing those themes’ historical developments during yogic perception’s intellectual history. Tibetans received a large portion of this millennium-long Indian discussion on yogic perception en masse and were highly synthetic in their approach. Therefore, chapters four and five treat Tibetan interpretations of these Indian materials. Lastly, I offer some speculative explanations as to why these three connotations of yogic perception have been so salient in the primary sources, offering some hypotheses in chapter six as to their particular temporal endurance. Drawing on methodologies culled from the field of cognitive science of religion, I argue that longstanding preoccupation with these themes in the those texts suggest that they are especially intuitive.

This dissertation examines the tantric thought and writings of the Bengali master Atiśa Dīpaṃkara Śrījñāna (Tib. Jowo Jé; Jo bo rje, 982–1054), one of the most important figures of the later transmission of Buddhism (tenpa chidar; bstan pa phyi dar), the “renaissance” of Buddhism in Tibet. Atiśa is best known for composing works such as the Lamp for the Path to Awakening (Bodhipathapradīpa; Byang chub lam gyi sgron ma), which presented the exoteric Buddhist path (Sūtrayāna) in a concise, synoptic format. Such works formed the basis for the “stages of the path” (lam rim) tradition, which was central to the Kadam (bka’ gdams) school, founded by Atiśa’s disciple, Dromtönpa (’Brom ston pa; 1004–1064). The Lamp, however, also forbade monastics from practicing the higher classes of tantra (Mantrayāna or Vajrayāna), specifically the yoganiruttaratantras, due to their antinomian, transgressive practices. As a result, Atiśa came to be considered a doctrinally orthodox monastic reformer, but this belied the fact that he was also a prolific author of works on the tantric vehicle. While his tantric works have received scant attention within either traditional or modern Buddhist scholarship, works such as the Vajra Song of the Vajra Seat (Vajrāsana Vajragīti; Rdo rje gdan gyi rdo rje’i glu) and the Song of Conduct (Caryāgīti; Spyod pa’i glu) reveal Atiśa’s fluency in the doctrines of the yoganiruttaratantras and yoginītantras, presenting an entirely different image from the ostensibly conservative reformer of Buddhism. These works also reveal Atiśa’s indebtedness to the great adepts (mahāsiddha) of India as well a deep resonance with the meditative traditions of the great seal (mahāmudrā). These connections suggest a figure who was far more comfortable with antinomian tantric traditions than has previously been assumed. The dissertation seeks to elucidate some of the historical, religious, and sectarian factors in the marginalization of tantric works in traditional portrayals of Atiśa. It looks first at the scholarly precedents for his ideas in Indic commentaries from between the ninth and eleventh centuries, examining how Buddhist authors wrote treatises grappling with the transgressive sexual elements of yoganiruttaratantras such as the Guhyasamāja Tantra and Cakrasaṃvara Tantra within a wider Buddhist context. It then considers the religious and political currents in western Tibet during the later transmission, where reformist voices, such as Lha Lama Yeshé Ö (Lha bla ma ye shes ’od, 947–1019/1024) sought to halt what they saw as mistaken tantric practices and to purge false Tibetan tantric traditions. Following this, it engages in an analysis of several texts by Atiśa, including the Vajra Song and Song of Conduct, which reveal his largely unexplored views on the yoganiruttaratantras, including their erotic practices. Finally, it examines ways that works such as the Book of Kadam (Bka’ gdams glegs bam) posthumously imagined Atiśa as a “reformer,” marginalized his yoganiruttaratantra writings, and promoted the relatively tame “four Kadam deities” (bka’ gdams lha bzhi) as the principal Kadam tantric tradition.

This study examines The Seven Siddhi Texts, a short corpus of tantric Buddhist works that the Tibetan tradition identifies as the mahāmudrā transmission from the famed semi-mythical land of Oḍiyāna. Owing to the nature of the corpus itself, this study is best characterized as properly Indo-Tibetan in its scope. The Seven Siddhi Texts are first examined here as independent treatises that reflect the development of Vajrayāna Buddhism in its Indic cultural and historical contexts between the eighth and tenth centuries. They are then approached as a means for examining the formulation of Vajrayāna institutions and their attendant corpora in Nepal. Finally, they provide a case study in the phenomenon of practical canonicity in their employment in mahāmudrā polemical literature in Tibet from the fifteenth to seventeenth centuries.

Part I argues for the adoption of a demonological paradigm in the study of South Asian religions. Using data from The Seven Siddhi Texts in dialogue with the Āyurvedic discipline of demonology (bhūtavidyā), it highlights that Vajrayāna Buddhist traditions maintained a dual apotropaic-soteriological goal in their conception of the practice of yoga. Part II addresses the sociological implications of sect and sectarian identity in The Seven Siddhi Texts. It presents the phenomenon of dissimulative asceticism in Vajrayāna Buddhism as a potential social context for the highly Śaiva-Buddhist hybrid forms of ritual that emerged with the Buddhist yoginītantras. It then addresses the issue of inclusivist and exclusivist expressions of sectarian identity from the authors of The Seven Siddhi Texts. Part III discusses the formulation and transmission of The Seven Siddhi Texts as a corpus of mahāmudrā works in light of the broader phenomenon of practical canonicity in Buddhist traditions. It presents philological evidence that The Seven Siddhi Texts were part of a known mahāmudrā practical canon in Nepal prior to their transmission to Tibet. It then discusses historical data and Tibetan historiography on their transmission to Tibet beginning in the eleventh century. It concludes with a discussion of The Seven Siddhi Texts' incorporation into two Kagyü mahāmudrā practical canons in Tibet at the turn of the sixteenth century, and the role that The Seven Siddhi Texts played in a number of mahāmudrā polemical works composed by the subsequent generation of Kagyü authors.

This dissertation explores a series of nineteenth-century intra-sectarian polemical writings in the Tibetan Buddhist Geluk order between Buddhist scholars representing Khalkha’s Ih Hüree, the largest monastic institution of Outer Mongolia (today, the independent state of Mongolia), and Labrang Monastery in Amdo, eastern Tibet. China. In the nineteenth century, Labrang Monastery was a major Geluk monastery and a rising cosmopolitan center, located at the frontier of Tibetan, Mongolian, and Han Chinese cultural regions. This dissertation focuses not only on the doctrinal issues involved in the polemics over the interpretation of a particular text, but also on the sociopolitical motivations behind the dispute, its historical impact, and institutional ambitions underlying the exchange. The polemical disputes between leading scholars of these two important Geluk institutions in the Qing dominated Mongolian and Tibetan cultural regions highlight the historical development of Buddhist scholasticism and institutional competitions in the Qing border regions, isolated from the central government in Beijing and the religious center in Lhasa. Unlike many other polemical exchanges in Tibet, which mostly involved defeating or responding to the views of the “other” sects or schools, the polemic dispute examined in this dissertation occurred within a single school, the Geluk. Moreover, the most prominent polemicists of this exchange—Belmang Könchok Gyeltsen (1764–1853) from the Amdo-Tibetan region and his Mongolian counterpart Ngawang Khedrup (1779–1838)—were trained in the same monastic textbook (yig cha) tradition. I therefore call their exchange an “intra-sectarian” polemic. Plausible motivations behind this intra-sectarian dispute are explainable through a detailed study of the ambitions of Amdo-Tibetan and Mongolian monasteries to develop their respective institutions into influential cosmopolitan centers in the northern part of the Qing-Geluk world. Moreover, certain personal factors were also involved, since the polemicists also sought to defend the viewpoints of their respective teachers.