Reviving Nyungney Tradition in Bidung Gelong Gonpa, Tashigang.
With the blessing and support of Kyabje Garab Rinpoche and Khandrola, Lama Kezang Wangdi, family and friends, we have organized Nyungney (Buddhist fasting practice) in Gelong Gonpa. Nyungney at the Gonpa was started by HH Dungsey Thinley Norbu Rinpoche in the 1970s-80s after the Gonpa was offered to Rinpoche, but it has been some time since the practice was discontinued due to remoteness of the Gonpa. Gelong Gonpa was established over a century ago with the main statue consisting of Thousand Armed Chenrezig and other figures like Pema Lingpa, Buddha Sakya Muni, and Buddha Jowo Methukpa. The Gonpa was once a center for HH Dungsey Rinpoche to turn the wheel of dharma in the eastern Bhutan, where HH gather so many disciples in the area who got precious opportunity to study and receive precious Nyingma Terser Teaching, later as a sign of love and compassion towards his disciple s and place, HH build a Zimchung (residence) near the Gonpa.
Kyabje Garab Rinpoche shared during his recent visit to the Gonpa that Gonpa is close to his heart, as he received so many teachings and empowerments from his father in that Gonpa, and it was at this Gonpa that Garab Rinpoche conferred first Wang (empowerment) to the public in his life, thus it was this particular sacred Gonpa that Rinpoche’s Dharma activities (Choekhor)started and ever since Rinpoche’s tireless activities flourish in Bhutan and around the world with all the sign of auspiciousness.
Considering the sacredness of the place for the Lineage and lineage holders, it is important to revive age-old practices for the long life of our Gurus and benefits of all beings.
༄༅། །སྨོན་ལམ་བཞུགས༔
An Aspiration Prayer revealed by Dudjom Lingpa
དཀོན་མཆོག་རིན་ཆེན་གསུམ་གྱི་བདེན་སྟོབས་ཀྱིས༔
By the force of the truth of the precious Three Jewels,
ཚེ་རབས་སྐྱེ་བའི་ཕྲེང་བ་ཐམས་ཅད་དུ༔
Throughout the succession of all my lives to come,
བདག་ནི་གང་དུ་གནས་པའི་ས་ཕྱོགས་དེར༔
In whatever place that I may reside,
སངས་རྒྱས་བསྟན་པ་དར་ཞིང་རྒྱས་པར་ཤོག༔
May the teachings of the Buddha flourish and spread!
སེམས་ཅན་ཐམས་ཅད་བདེ་ཞིང་སྐྱིད་པར་ཤོག༔
May all sentient beings enjoy happiness and fulfillment!
རྟག་ཏུ་དམ་པའི་ཆོས་ལ་སྤྱོད་པར་ཤོག༔
May they always engage in the practice of the holy Dharma!
དོན་གཉིས་ལྷུན་གྲུབ་སྐུ་གཉིས་མངོན་གྱུར་ཤོག༔
May the two aims be spontaneously fulfilled and may we realize the two kāyas!
ཀླ་ཀློ་བདུད་ཀྱི་བསྟན་པ་ནུབ་པར་ཤོག༔
May the teachings of the barbaric māras disappear!
ཨོ་རྒྱན་ཆེན་པོའི་ཕྲིན་ལས་དཔལ་འབར་ནས༔
Through the blazing splendor of the Great Orgyen's activity,
བཤད་སྒྲུབ་བསྟན་པ་ཕྱོགས་མཐར་རྒྱས་པར་ཤོག༔
May the study and practice of Dharma spread far and wide!
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The Vajrayana practice of Nyungney is based on the outer tantra practice of Chenrezig and traced back to an Buddhist nun named Gelongma Pemo(Elder sister of King Indrabutri of Oddiyana, who adopted Guru Padmasambhava ). It is said that Chenrezig appeared to her who had contracted leprosy and was on the verge of death. Chenrezig taught her the method of nyungney in which one keeps the eight precepts on the first day (as well as eating only vegetarian food), then refrains from both food and water on the second. Nyungney is a silent retreat with a fasting ritual focusing on loving-kindness, compassion and Bodhicitta. It is a renowned supreme method of purification of our karmic debt and ignorance, and development of loving-kindness and compassion. It is also a highly beneficial practice that we can take up for the purification of deceased or living.
