The Monastery of Tengpoche

Natural Setting

     The Tengpoche monastery (Tibetan: Steng-chen-dgon), known in maps and literature by the old names of Thyangboche, Tyangboche and Thangpoche, has perhaps the unique distinction of being the highest monastery in the world (3,867m).
   At the same time it happens to be an important, permanently inhabited monastery, functioning as a purely religious institution.
   Its close rival, the monastery of Thami (3,960m), situated two days march from it in the westerly direction, is slightly less important, less frequented and inhabited by a smaller number of monks.
   For sheer height the monastery of Rongphu (4,970m) in perhaps unrivalled.  Its old name is Rongbuk and it is situated on the northern slopes of Everest.  In recent decades, however, it has lost its prestige as a sacred place on account of internal events and due to Chinese occupation.  The monasteries of Lhasa (3,680m), *Trashilumpo (3,870m) Sa-Skya (between 4,000 and 5,000 metres) and of Ralung (4,900m), to mention only a few, in Tibet and the Trans-Himalayan region, have met a similar fate.

    Confining ourselves to Nepal we note that the famous monasteries of Lo Mantang (Mustang 3,780m) and Muktinath (3,815m) are almost in the similar altitude range and never go beyond that limit.  In the Khumbu region near Tengpoche buildings other than monasteries but functioning as places of worship (Gompa) are found in villages higher up.  for example, we have Gompas at Pangpoche (3,985m), Kerok (4,200m), Dingpoche (4,600m).l
    The monasteries of Bhutan and Sikkim rarely exceed a height of 3,000 metres.
The altitudinal supremacy of the Tengpoche monastery may be a matter of dispute and is after all of relative value but one has to acknowledge, without any reservations, the uniqueness of its setting.  The mountains crowning the monastery are among the highest in the world.  Some of them are most important and beautiful.  The Everest and the Khumbu Yul Lha are taken to be simply divine.
    Towards the North-east (distance 2,300 metres is Everest (8,848m); In the North-east direction can also be seen Lhotse (8,511-8,501m) and the Lhotse Shar (8,383m) at a distance of about 22,000 metres; towards North-east rises the Amai Dablam (6,856m) makes its appearance at a distance of nearly 6,000 metres; towards South-east one can admire the Thamserku (6,608m) at a distance of 5,500 metres.  In almost south-westerly direction one can have a glimpse of the Kongde Ri (6,187m) at a distance of 12,000 metres; towards West-south-west is clearly visible the Teng kangpoche (6,500m) at a distance of 17,000 metres; towards North-west the modest Khumbu Yul Lha (5,761m) raises its head at a distance of 5,500 metres.  In the north is the Taboche (6,367m) at a distance of nearly 7,000 metres.  In the North-east the majestic Nuptse Wall (7,879m) is visible at a distance of 19,000 metres.  The Nuptse, Lhotse and Amai Dablam constitude the most beautiful spectacle for a mountaineer; From that point Everest, almost totally shrouded in clouds, certainly does not give the impression of being the "roof of the world", but it does make its presence felt in an unmistakable manner and one can hardly resist its extraordinary fascination.
    Although these mountain-peaks wrapped in an aura of magical charm, bordering on the unreal, become, even after a day's stay at Tengpoche, all too familiar a sight, yet the eye loves to return and dwell upon them time and again.  The sight of the peaks naturally evokes quite different emotions in the local Sherpas whose yardstick of beauty is certainly other than ours.  Yet they too appear consciously proud of their rare good fortune in having such a magnificent backdrop of mountain scenery for their day-to-day living.
    Other orographical regions like the Karakorum or the Hindu Kush, the Pamir or the Transalai, the parallel mountain ridges of the Andes or the tropical massifs, the mountains of Greenland or of the Antarctic may be able to boast of something similar, or even, in some exceptional cases, of something more beautiful.  But they certainly do not present a charmed circle of cyclopian mountains rising above inhabited villages in which, throughout the year, the daily round of life goes on at a steady pace and where temples and monasteries hold aloft the flame of a living faith.  These monasteries, more than once in the course of a year but particularly on one special occasion, burst out in a riot of sound and colour and movement, as the monks dressed in gay costumes dance to the tune of the croaking horns, vibrant bugles, ringing cymbals and muffled sound of drums before an amazed and delighted public which takes into their emotional sweep the rhythmic movement as well as the snow-covered mountains.
    The Mani Rimdu, presented annually, is basically an open-air show minus scenario.  It has to be so because nature herself provides the most beautiful and least costly background to the shifting scenes of the drama.  The monastery of Tengpoche, built on the spur of a tr-iangular mountain formed by the combined action of water and glaciers, very much like a gigantic mixed moraine, is surrounded by a large plain which indeed is a rarity in these mountains.  Its commanding position, which is also aesthetically satisfying, has been selected intentionally to conform to certain norms of place-designing for the sacred buildings of the Buddhists.  According to some people the name "Tengpoche" signifies "the sacred bowl" while others hold that it means "the big plain"/  In either case, the basic concept of (a flat plain of a limited size) is quite evident and has been specially framed in an environment of soaring summits and craggy terrain.  Of course, the most ancient temples (gompas) in the entire region of Khumbu are those of Pangpoche, Kerok and Thami, which were built after the settling down of Sherpas in that region about 400 years ago.

Historical Background
   The monasteries are a more recent phenomenon.  The earliest one seems to have been built around 1920A.D. at Thami and the second one was built at Tengpoche in the year 1923.
    Both the places were indicated by a famous Lama - the Lama Sanga Dorje (Tibetan: Gsang-ba Rdo-rje).  He selected the site for the monastery of Thami and pointed out the exact site on which the monastery of Tengpoche was to be erected.  The Gulu Lama had the privilege of presiding over the foundation-laying ceremony and stayed there for about a decade.  In 1933 two inauspicious events occurred--the death of Gulu Lama and the destruction of the monastery by an earthquake.  The mortal remains of the "Master" were cremated at the place where once stood the main hall of the monastery which had been razed to the ground (According to a scholar, the corpse excluding certain parts such as the heart, the tongue and eyes which have been preserved till today, disappeared through spontaneous sublimation and the building was partially re-erected with the modest financial contribution and manual labour of all the Sherpas of the region).  Thus, the monastery which we nowadays see is only forty years old, risen on the ruins of the earlier one which was nearly fifty years old.

Buddhist Architecture
    The "Gompa" or the temple of the monastery is constructed in the form of a Square, each inner side being 12 metres at the most.  It has three stories.  The ground-floor has only one hall (duang) with wooden columns.  It has chapels and altars and wooden niches for sacred books.  Above the entrance of the main hall is a "pronaos" where paintings on wood happily depict the official iconography of Tibetan Buddhism.
    Then there is the inevitable "wheel of life" - a "mandala" having the main personages of the Buddhist pantheon: the figure of Padmasambhava, a painting depicting the "King of the East" (one of the guardian kings of the five directions); certain scenes from the "Jataka" (or stories of the earlier births of the Buddha) and a sketch of the monastic city (which cannot be deciphered).  There are also figures of Sron-tsam-gampo (Stronsengampo).  Tibetan: Sron-brsan-gam-po, the famous Tibetan king of the 7th century who introduced Buddhism in Tibet and founded Lhasa in 630 A.D.; of Atisha (a teacher of Mahayana Buddhism who in 1050 A.D. led a mission to Tibet to restore discipline and norms of life among the monks there); of Marpa (the founder of monastic order, Nimpa, in which intermarriages between monks and nuns are quite common), and of Milarepa (mi-lare-ras-pa), a great white-robed saint.  Above the main entrance of the gompa stand five statues of "Snow leopards", the protectors of the temple against evil forces.
    On the upper storeys there is a collection of sacred books and wooden moulds for making engraven copies of the texts.  Generally, in the main Buddhist monasteries, we find at least three fundamental works of Tibetan Buddhism: the Kanjur (Tibetan: bka-gyur) or (the Translation of the word of Lord Buddha) in 108 volumes, the Tanjur (Tibetan Tan-gyur) or (the translation of the treaties) in 225 volumes, the Laricemmo (Larichemo; Tibetan: Lam-rim-c'en-mo) or (the great theological system) which interprets Mahayana Buddhism (or the great vehicle) written by Tsong-Khappa - the great (Tibetan: Tson K'a pa), reformer of the yellow sect of the Buddhist church.
    Even the followers of diverse branches of Buddhism acknowledge the authority of this manual of Buddhism.  Then there are "Bar-do to-dol" texts (Tibetan "Book of the Dead") which are read by a monk into the ear of the dying man, or soon after he has breathed his last, to guide him on to the right path during his "bardo" or the stage between his death and rebirth.
    Anyone who would like to copy an only existent text in a monastery has to procure suitable paper, and to stay in the monastery till he is able to transfer from the original moulds the imprint of the scriptures.
    Moreover, in every monastery there is a special place (gon-kang) to safeguard and preserve the masks (King-dzi-zhal-bag) intended for ritual dances.  At Tengpoche monastery the masks are kept in the upper storey.  It was not possible to see in the places visited by us any painting or statue (generally found in other monasteries or gompas) representing the "unity-in-duality" (yab-yum) or the psycho-sexual embrace between a deity and its Shakti.
    The entrance of the gompa faces East.  There we find the big courtyard paved with large flat stones surrounded by public balconies for the religious-minded who are supposed to attend the most important functions.
    The courtyard (cham-ra) has three doors, the main one being on the eastern side.  The smaller door is in the South wing and another one gives access to the Northern slope.  The outer wall of the gompa on the North, West and South is equipped with a series of "prayer wheels" which the pilgrims and the monks rotate during one or more circumambulations as demanded by custom.  On the front wall of the court-yard rises a wooden tower from which the monks give the call to devotees to assemble, by striking on the metal instruments.
    In the centre of the courtyard a "tarchen" (Tar-Shing) raises its head towards the sky; a long wooden pole, about nine metres in height, holds aloft a banner on which are written prayers or magic formulae meant to be "read by the wind or to be consumed by the Sun or rain" - the effect of the prayer in either case being the same.
    The guard-room (Konjer) and a big kitchen lie on the north side of the courtyard while the cells for the monks, the dwelling places, the guest-rooms, the stables for the beasts of burden, are placed at random on the eastern and southern side of the great building and slightly away from it.
    Ugly-looking piece of undulating iron-sheets have partially replaced the original roofs of natural wood, irregular in shape, commonly employed in local construction, which had fallen a victim to the ravages of time.  It is to be hoped that the aesthetic aspects involved in this change will one day be examined by "higher authorities" and sufficient funds will be found to restore the roof to its original design.
    It is said that the courtyard can accommodate at various levels and angles well over 400 sepctators for the annual show of Mani Rimdu.  Mnay people prefer to be present at the spring festival held at Thami, to avoid the creeping chill of November-December months, in which this great festival is held at Tengpoche.
    The Tengpoche monastery during the few decades of its existence has always derived inspiration from the monastery of Rongphu situated to the north of Everest which is about 1,000 metres higher.  After the Chinese occupation of Tibet the Tengpoche monastery has not only become the northern-most advance post of a religion which the Chinese in Tibet have systematically tried to destroy in all its forms, but also a repositary of precious manuscripts, a place of refuge for the enlightened Lamas of every rank and focal point for the innermost feelings of thousands of Sherpas.       

Religious Ethos
   If the ethos of Nepal (Kathmandu valley) can be defined by the twin adjective "religio-agricultural" we can coin with equal justification, the term "religio-caravan-pastoral" for the Khumbu region, religion being the common denominator in either case.  In Tibet as well as in Khumbu, it is religion which provides the all-embracing passion for the solitary individual, surrounded as he is in all sides by phantoms, Gods, demi-gods and other countless supernatural powers forming part of the Buddhist pantheon.  Every nook and corner of the mountains, cliffs and lakes is inhabited by benevolent or malignant beings which turn hostile at the slightest provocation or are appeased by a paltry offering or a small prayer.  At every place these simple men of the mountains find themselves at the mercy of invisible forces which hold them in mortal terror.  That is why Tibetan Buddhism or tantric Buddhism (also improperly called "Lamaism" from the word "Lama") has taken root so easily among these people - a religion with Mahayana doctrine professed by the people of the adjoining lands like Bhutan and Sikkim and also by the Sherpas of Nepal.
    Mahayana is that branch of Buddhism which represents the path of "golden mean" as against the absolute asceticism and atheism of Hinayana Buddhism.  Mahayana is the popular path beckoning everybody towards final illumination and consequently towards "Nirvana".  It is known by the significant name of "the great vehicle" (literal translation of Mahayana) because it can take in all and sundry.
    For a long time now the Tengpoche monastery is being managed by a priest who comes from a family of Tibetan immigrants currently living at Namche.  The priest is considered to be the re-incarnation of Gulu Lama- the great founder of the monastery.  The priest in-charge of the monastery is given the name "Chen-Po" (Tibetan-mk'an po).  The priest of Tengpoche has had his religious initiation mostly at the monastery of Rongphu in 1956, and then came to Khumbu to take charge of his present duties.  He is considered to be a "Bodhisattva", "a Buddha-in-the making" as against a Buddha who has already attained freedom from the cycle of deaths and rebirth.  A "Bodhisattva" is one who voluntarily renounces "Nirvana" for the sake of the salvation others and leads his earthly life for the last time before finally attaining Buddhahood.
    Other priests of this monastery of Khumbu may also earn the title of Bodhisattva if through prayer and meditation they help Sherpas and others in accumulating collective "Karma" or in augmenting their "stock of good actions" which will finally open to these mortals the gates of "liberation".
    Buddhism denies the existence of sould and believes that even gods are subject to death and rebirth.  To free one-self from this cycle of birth, death and rebirth is to attain "liberation".  In fact, Buddhism has no need of gods as it lays stress on self-liberation.  Thus Buddhism of the orthodox type is essentially atheistic.  However, the particular brand of Buddhism practised by the Sherpas goes by the name of "Mantrayana" (or the vehicle of magical words or "mantras", or "vajrayana" (the adamantine vehicle).  "Mantrayana" is the way of salvation through the constant repetition of word-formulae ("mantras") the proper understanding and exact use of which ensures liberation.
    It is well-known that the Shakyamuni (Buddha) who was born in the year 563 B.C. ( and died in the year 480 B.C. approximately) did not write anything on the Buddhist doctrine.  The task of collecting the rules of monastic life and Buddha's teaching was entrusted to his disciples.  Thus arose a variety of interpretations and three main schools of thought: Theravad (Hinayana - the smaller vehicle) Yogachara (only thought and intelligence), Mahayana (the great vehicle).  The last one, i.e. Mahayana, presumes that every man (and not the chosen one alone) can attain the ultimate enlightenment.  The Sherpa variety of Buddhism is clearly "tantric" in its religious overtones, in its mode of worship and in actual, daily practice.  In almost all Sherpa houses there is a private Chapel (Lha-Khang- the house of God) situated in a well-marked corner, with paintings on parchment called "Thanka".  Then there are "Klu" or water goblins and goblins of habitations which are invoked and appeased quite often in Sherpa homes. 
    Quite a few monks and inhabitants of khumbu follow a semi-reformed variety of Buddhism traceable to the 12th century.  From the day of its foundation till today, about 250 monks have entered the monastery of Tengpoche.  Of these only 80 can be called residents of the monastery.  Hundreds of others come only for short periods and return to their native villages or their families on completion of their period of initiation.  Of the resident monks about 20 are said to have died of old age during their permanent stay in the monastery.  Many have qualified themselves for the title of "Lama" (a monk can call himself Lama only when he is in a position to impart religious instruction to others).  A brother, or permanent or temporary pupil, is simply called "tra-pa" (grva-pa).  Some monks, after acquiring the rudimentary knowledge of some rules and principles of religion entitling them to perform religious rites in the "gompas" of their native village, get married and settle down in the village itself.  Some monks at the Dingboche monastery have actually married the nuns there without earning anybody's disapproval.  Thus the ease with which one can get admittance into the Buddhist Church can only be matched by the rapidity of one's exit out of it, without inviting any unfavourable criticism.
    Some Lamas of Tengpoche are known to have acquired the great qualification of "Bodhisattva" and these august personages are considered an infallible authority on all questions of faith.  Rather, it is said that the only privilege allowed to them is to commit the mistake of turning apostatic (or renouncing their faith) but this they will never do whatever the school of thought to which they may belong.

Monastic Routine
   Life at the monastery is neither easy nor simple.  It is a round of prayers, even at night, and work, which includes collecting food from distant villages and cutting fire-wood from perilous mountain-slopes.  Even water, though not too distant, is not readily available to the inhabitants of the monastery.  The impetuous Himalayan torrent rush down 500-600 metres below the monastery and one has to go to them to fetch water.  On the northern slope of the mountain-crest on which the Tengpoche monastery is situated, there is the Imja Khola river which collects water from all the glaciers to the South of Nuptse and Lhostse; on the South-west is the Phunki Khola- a stream which partially collects the waters of Kang Taiga and Tramserku.
    On the South-west there is the wooded northwestern crest of Kang Taiga which supplies to the monks the precious water from the snows.  To get this water, available only at irregular intervals, the monks have to make a round of the poor country-house of Makyong, saying a large number of prayers with their prayer wheels on the road to the convent of Dingboche.  Row upon row of similar prayer wheels are in constant use, testifying to the intermingling of nature, and man's faith in the superiority of gods.  Along these paths across dangerous torrents and snow-covered passes, the Sherpas of Khumbu merrily thread their way negotiating fragile, oscillating bridges on to the festival of Mani Rimdu in a spirit of devotion mixed with a sense of wonder and delight.  Before undertaking the journey some Sherpas lucky enough to be in close touch with the Buddhist monks competent to perform the ceremony of Barche-Serwa(Barche-Selva) - (a ceremony intended to ward off danger and remove the difficulties on the way) go through this ritual.