Long Life Prayers and Praises to Lama Zopa Rinpoche Composed by Others

Tenzin Ösel Hita, the recognized reincarnation of FPMT founder Lama Yeshe, composed and read these praises during the long life puja for Lama Zopa Rinpoche at Land of Medicine Buddha, Soquel, California, USA, on September 29, 2013. Below is video and transcript.

By Tenzin Ösel Hita

Dearest spiritual friend and guide, Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche, you are so precious to us in so many different aspects. From so many angles in life, do you benefit us constantly with no break, no rest, no sleep.

Dear Lama Zopa-la, we are so grateful for your presence in this planet. We are so lucky to be able to share this space and time with you.

Since the beginning, you have dedicated your life fully to improving peoples’ spiritual lives, even though I’m sure you would love to spend many years in a Lawudo cave deep in meditation. Thank you so much for choosing to stay with us and guide us towards our inner potential.

We know how each and every action you do is dedicated to helping sentient beings – every thought, every breath; every sip of water you take is dedicated to sentient beings. We are so lucky to have you in our midst. You inspire us to be better people, and your presence gives us motivation to follow your example. You are constantly helping so many sentient beings from so many different dimensions. It is amazing to see your work in this world.

Please stay with us for as long as it takes all sentient beings to reach enlightenment. We are willing to follow your advice and work hard to accomplish your dreams, which, of course, are always focused on benefiting in the greatest way, in this life and the next.

We all thank you so much from the depth of our hearts; we wish you success in all of your vast visions present and future.

Lama Zopa-la please live a long life. And rest a bit when you can.

Thank you for guiding us relentlessly – without rest, without tiring.

Thank you for helping us purify, for sparking interest into investigating our own egos and ignorance.

Thank you for making us see how mistaken we are.

Please continue helping sentient beings, and live a long life, with no obstacles.

Thank you, Rinpoche, for your kindness and dedication.

We love you Lama Zopa-la.

Thank you so much.

Below you may download the Panacea of Pure Nectar: A Prayer for the Unwavering Life and Awakening Deeds of Lama Zopa Rinpoche” composed by Sera Mey Yang Teng Tulku in 2011. The prayer has been translated in the following languages:

• English
• Spanish

Long life puja offered to Lama Zopa Rinpoche at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, January 2020. Photographer: Roger Kunsang

A long life puja was offered to Lama Zopa Rinpoche at Kopan Monastery in January 2020. Long-time student Jhampa Togme composed this prayer and praise for the puja from his home in California, USA.

Long-life Prayer for Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche

May the incomparable Spiritual Friend,
Who is more precious than a wish-granting jewel,
Have a long, fruitful life and continue guiding us
Along the path he himself has traveled.

Although you have shown us well that the pleasures of samsara
Are nothing more than suffering in disguise,
Still we remain addicted to these transient pleasures,
Grasping onto them as if they were real—

O Guru, please be patient with short-sighted beings like myself
And continue to reveal the truth behind samsara’s lies
Until all of us come to realize that there is no essence at all
In any of the objects of worldly desire.

Although you have shown us well that, despite appearances,
Nothing exists solely from its own side,
And that the hallucination that it does
Is what traps us perpetually in unsatisfactory existence—

O Guru, please be patient with thick-headed beings like myself
Who return empty-handed from the Jewel Island of Dharma,
Having repeatedly heard the words of the teachings,
But have failed to realize their essential meaning.

Although you have shown us well that cherishing ourselves
More than others is the falsest of friends—
It promises us the fulfilment of our innermost desires,
Yet condemns us to perpetual frustration instead—

O Guru, please be patient with slaves of selfishness like myself
Who fail to learn from your perfect example
That service to others is the only source of true happiness,
The only cure for the miseries of the world.

O Guru, who never tires revealing the path to Full Awakening
To those who, like myself, are addicted to sleep,
Please be patient with all our shortcomings
And remain with us until all beings are free.

COLOPHON: Composed in California by the lay devotee Jhampa Togme on January 22, 2020 to coincide with a long-life puja offered to Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, by a gathering of his worldwide circle of fortunate disciples. May all our sincere wishes to be continuously cared for by him be fulfilled!

Lama Zopa Rinpoche during long life puja at Institut Vajra Yogini, France, 2019. Photo by Ven. Tenzin Tsultrim.

At the conclusion of the Vajrayogini retreat at Institut Vajra Yogini in France, Lama Zopa Rinpoche was offered a long life puja, where long-time American student Merry Colony recited the following praise for Lama Zopa Rinpoche:

In this time of over degeneration,
When our kind mothers are blindly rushing about their lives,
Wanting only happiness while creating causes only to suffer,
Due to the inconceivable kindness of the Guru,
We have found ourselves here,
In the pure realm of Vajra Yogini,
And for thirty-five glorious days we have experienced the fully ripened result of our impossible-to-find and truly miraculous perfect human rebirths.

Having been called to create virtue each day by the sound of the blessed gong, which merely by hearing purifies the five uninterrupted negative karmas,
We have passed each day beneath the sweet smelling honeysuckle flowers accompanied by the soft cooing of doves,
And have joyously gathered, hundreds of your children disciples, like swans coming to a lake,
To drink the nectar of the Guru’s holy speech.

When the Guru’s holy body enters the vajra tent, before even a word is spoken, we are given our first teaching:
Make the efforts of our parents worthwhile and use this body to create merit.
For how can we give in to laziness when we are witness to you, our refuge savior,
Manifesting paralysis yet still prostrating with such supreme effort before the throne each day?
Such a kindness can be found nowhere else in this world.

Once seated upon the vajra throne your display of skillful means is without compare:
The wrathful roar that clears away the thick fog of our ignorance,
The circuitous stories that sharpen our attention,
The vajra laughter that awakens our blissful awareness.
Where else in all the three realms can one find such a teacher?

In a single moment you show the simultaneous aspects of,
Gentle virtue beggar and powerful Mahayana Vajrayana guru,
Precious one who subdues, wrathful one who conquers.
To such greatness all humans and gods bow their heads.

Your melodic chanting and explanation of the four line Vajra Cutter
Implores us to see that like a drop of dew this life will soon be gone,
To examine the profound meaning of rabrib, the defective view that keeps us imprisoned,
To loosen our grip on what we mistakenly believe to be real by seeing everything as illusion.

Withholding nothing, you illuminate the heart of the path: the profound meaning of the Guru, one taste with great bliss dharmakaya.
Using your own life story as an example, you clarify the true meaning of Dharma practice: giving up this life!
Quoting from Kyabje Khunu Lama Rinpoche, you strengthen our refuge in bodhichitta, the unbetraying friend in samsara.
With diamond-like precision, you elucidate the very huge difference between correctly meditating on emptiness and incorrectly meditating on nihilism.

While we may not have yet realized renunciation, bodhichitta, or emptiness,
There is one thing we do know without mistake or doubt:
When the kind and holy lord Guru is teaching,
There is nowhere else we ever, ever want to be.
Until enlightenment, may we always be among your foremost disciples fulfilling your every wish.

Offering being made to Lama Zopa Rinpoche during long life puja, Institut Vajra Yogini, France, 2019. Photo by Ven. Tenzin Tsultrim.

Now, together here, due to the Guru’s unfathomable kindness,
We have taken the Most Secret Hayagriva for long life, Heruka Five Deity, and Vajrayogini initiations,
We have engaged in the heart practice of Lama Chopa daily,
And have begun practicing the yogas of sleep, waking, and tasting nectar.
We have strengthened our familiarization with taking ordinary death, intermediate state, and rebirth into the path to achieve the three kayas,
And collectively we have accumulated more than ten million mantras of the Kechara Yogini.

May all of this merit, together with the three time merits of all sentient beings and buddhas, who do not exist, who are empty,
Be the cause for the most holy kind Guru Buddha Deity to have an infinitely long and stable life.
May you quickly return to this best of FPMT centers and
Continue to teach the Vajrayogini commentary as well as the three-year retreat instructions.
From our side we will practice as taught and dedicate every merit created to the fruition of full enlightenment so that we can most quickly, fully benefit all beings.

By the power of the Three Rare Sublime Ones,
By the power of the buddhas’ and bodhisattvas’ blessings,
By the power of this pure prayer,
And the auspicious convergence of our karma and the Guru’s unbearably great compassion,
Precious Refuge Savior heed our prayer:

Please, please live long.
Please, please live very long.
Please, please live infinitely long.

Colophon: Written and read by your devoted disciple Merry Colony, Yeshe Dechen, at the conclusion of the Vajrayogini retreat at Institut Vajra Yogini, France, June 13, 2019.

Merry Colony reading praise for Lama Zopa Rinpoche during long life puja at Institut Vajra Yogini, France, 2019. Photo by Ven. Tenzin Tsultrim.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche at the Light of the Path retreat, North Carolina, US, September 2017. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

On September 15, a long life puja was offered to Lama Zopa Rinpoche at the conclusion of the Light of the Path 2017 retreat, which was organized by Kadampa Center in North Carolina, US. During the puja, Merry Colony, a long-time student and current director of Milarepa Center, offered the following praise to Lama Zopa Rinpoche.

To Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche,

From the vast sky of dharmakaya space, like a star appearing in the light of day, the most rare of fortunate events ripened when in the Himalayan village of Thame, Nepal, you appeared in this human form. Before you could even walk, you showed all the signs of being the unmistaken incarnation of the great Lawudo Lama meditator, Kunzang Yeshe. What a great auspiciousness!

As a child you thought to go to Mindroling Monastery in Tibet, but instead your uncle Ngawang Gendun brought you to the monastery of Domo Geshe Rinpoche. Thus, you ended up in Buxa after fleeing Tibet. While in Buxa, the monk Chumbi brought you to the room of Lama Thubten Yeshe and a karmic bond that would come to shine a great light on the dark land of the West was rekindled. What a great auspiciousness!

When Zina [Rachevsky] first requested Lama to teach in Bodhgaya, it was you, Supreme One, who accepted the request. Inspired by Kachen Yeshe Gyaltsen, you taught the first five-day course, which quickly grew to become a biannual event at Kopan. Now, forty-five years later, you have given the keys to liberation and enlightenment to tens of thousands of students at Kopan alone. What a great auspiciousness!

When the world turned dark on Losar morning in 1984 and Lama Yeshe passed away, you immediately took the helm of the FPMT organization and then traveled without break for so many years, steering the fledgling group of forty centers to its current status of more than 160 centers, projects, and services. Impeccably following the advice of His Holiness, you protected the centers and students from danger, becoming the mother, father, and protector of us all. What a great auspiciousness!

As the organization grew, you invited the most highly educated of Sera geshes to teach so that students everywhere could learn the great philosophical texts, while always ensuring that practice and the heart of service remained at the core. Like this, you initiated FPMT’s Basic Program and grew the Masters Program, paving the way for a new generation of well-educated and well-integrated teachers to serve the organization. What a great auspiciousness!

Lama Zopa Rinpoche during a tsog puja at the Light of the Path retreat, North Carolina, US, September 2017. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

To help secure the longevity of the Sera monastic education, you established the Sera Je Food Fund, enabling the monks to focus on their studies and your students to create vast skies of merit. Likewise, you have overseen the continuous growth of Kopan Monastery and Khachoe Ghakyil Nunnery and have rebuilt monasteries vulnerable to degeneration in Mongolia, and in Tsum and Jailsa in Nepal, which are now flourishing. What a great auspiciousness!

Your vast vision to bring holy objects to every corner of the world is without equal. Exceeding the wishes of Lama Yeshe, two great statues of Maitreya Buddha will now be built in India, while great prayer wheels, stupas, Guru Rinpoche statues, giant thangkas, and other holy objects are going up around the world. Due to Rinpoche’s limitless compassion, even the animals and those without faith can now create merit, helping to bring peace to the world and balance to the elements. What a great auspiciousness!

Due to Rinpoche’s vision of benefiting sentient beings as vast as space, the Sanghata Sutra, the Sutra of Golden Light, the Vajra Cutter Sutra, and others are now recited regularly throughout the whole world; many thousands of nyung nä retreats have been completed; and many 100 million mani retreats and so many individual lamrim and deity retreats have been done. And due to Rinpoche’s indescribable kindness and guidance, we now have everything we need to help ourselves and others at the critical time of death. What a great auspiciousness!

Your help for children, the poor, the sick, and the elderly manifests in an ever-expanding circle of schools, homes for the destitute, clinics, and an eye hospital in Tibet. For so many animals bound for slaughter, you have created safe havens. Most recently, due to your great concern for the elderly who have been left alone in your homeland, an old-age Dharma home will be built where Sherpas destitute of help can live out their lives with Dharma and in peace. What a great auspiciousness!

But greatest of all your holy deeds are the unmatched, unexcelled, and unending treasury of Dharma teachings that Rinpoche gives every moment, with every breath, and with every movement of your holy body, speech, and mind. Having crisscrossed the globe continuously for more than forty-five years, you have given teachings like no other on the heart of the path—how to correctly devote to the virtuous friend—so that we may receive the nectar blessings needed to actualize the path. You have shown us how to carry out all our practices in the most extensive way to create the most extensive merit of virtue and merit of wisdom. You have shown us how to meditate precisely on the subtle points of emptiness so that we may cut the root of our ignorance. And by your peerless faultless example, you have shown us perfectly how to take the essence from every moment of our unfathomably perfect rebirths and make our lives most beneficial for others. What an indescribable auspiciousness!

Merry Colony offering praise to Lama Zopa Rinpoche during the long life puja at the Light of the Path retreat, North Carolina, US, September 2017. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

And yet, despite Rinpoche’s atomic energy and passion to blast us out of samsara, we are still children often lost and confused, in need of your continual guidance and care. Guru Chenrezig, Vajradhara, hear the prayers of your disciple children. You are our sole refuge protector and savior, our light of the path. Don’t ever leave us. Until we attain your enlightened state, hold us in your compassion and guide us.

Having shown us how to open the door of Dharma, we will work diligently to give up the meaningless affairs of this life. Having opened our hearts, we will work continuously to benefit living beings. Having opened our wisdom eye, we will persevere in our analysis of how things exist. Having saved our lives, we will dedicate ourselves to becoming most quickly like you so that our every action will be suffused with bodhichitta, our every breath most meaningful for others. May our pure practice be the cause for you to stay with us forever.

Guru Chenrezig, Vajradhara, hear the prayers of your disciple children. You are our sole refuge protector and savior, our light of the path. Don’t ever leave us. Until we attain your enlightened state, hold us in your compassion and guide us. May all auspiciousness continue to ripen.

Written and read by the devoted disciple Merry Colony at the conclusion of the Light of the Path retreat in Black Mountain, North Carolina, September 15, 2017.

Participants of the Light of the Path retreat, North Carolina, US, September 2017. Photo by Ven. Losbang Sherab.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche with Nick Ribush, director of Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive, reading praise he wrote for Rinpoche, Light of the Path retreat, North Carolina, US, August 2016. Photo courtesy of LYWA.

At the conclusion of the Light of the Path retreat with Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Nick Ribush composed and delivered a praise of Rinpoche that also requested for him to live a long life. Nick is a long-time student of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and serves as the director of the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive, which published the praise in its August E-letter. We share the praise here:

WE LOVE YOU, RINPOCHE

Rinpoche, we love you.
Out of your unfathomable, unbearable great compassion
You have manifested out of the infinite vastness of the dharmakaya
To guide those fortunate beings who have that rarest of rare karmas to meet you.
You appear in an ordinary body but are, in reality, all the buddhas of the past, present and future.
Yet you are kinder than all tathagatas together.
Please, please live long.

Rinpoche, we love you.
Because of your impeccable guidance in our previous lives,
We have been able to crawl out of the lower realms for this brief, lightning flash
Of a perfect human rebirth, where you can again teach us
How to extract its essence and make it meaningful in the three ways
By revealing the precious teachings on the nature of the mind.
Please, please live long.

Rinpoche, we love you.
If it were not for your teachings we would soon again
Find ourselves in the hell, hungry ghost or animal realms.
Even though death is definite and the time of death uncertain,
You refuse to let us go back down by explaining the inconceivable suffering experienced there
And teaching us mantras that preclude lower rebirth.
You are a perfect refuge.
You give us protection and are an immaculate example of how to follow karma
And at least find rebirth as a happy transmigratory being.
Please, please live long.

Rinpoche, we love you.
Your brilliant explanations of all samsaric suffering
Allow us to deeply feel the horrors of cyclic existence and develop renunciation.
Your profound explanations of the four noble truths,
The twelve links and the emptiness of all phenomena
Allow us to clearly see reality, shake off the chains of conditioned existence
And escape this prison of torture and death forever.
Please, please live long.

Rinpoche, we love you.
Bodhicitta is the secret of the mind.
You elucidate its importance over and over again, until perhaps we finally get it.
You describe in great detail the kindness of each and every sentient being
And how intolerable is the suffering they constantly undergo.
They all have been our mother and the happiness of each is far more important than our own.
Thus you show us how to develop the mind that strives day and night for their enlightenment,
Please, please live long.

Rinpoche, we love you.
That mother sentient beings have to suffer for even one second more is
So unacceptable that we ourselves must attain buddhahood right now.
Fortunately, by some miracle we have found you, Vajradhara, the peerless vajra master,
And the incomparable Mahayana tantra. In this degenerate age
You give us initiations, vows and commentaries
So that in this brief lifetime, we can become buddhas ourselves.
Please, please live long.

Rinpoche, we love you.
Never stop leading us through the stages of the path to enlightenment.
Never abandon us to the dreaded sufferings of samsara.
Never leave us in the perfect peace of nirvana.
Always keep us close until we too enter your enlightened realm.
Please, please live long.
Please, please live long.
Please, please live long.

Colophon: Written in haste from the bottom of the barrel by the ignorant Nicholas Ribush for the concluding Guru Puja at the Light of the Path retreat, Black Mountain, North Carolina, August 2016, at the request of Mer Stafford.

Below is a compliation of prostrations, praises and requests to Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche at the FPMT long life puja at Amitabha Buddhist Centre, Singapore, March 13, 2016. Excerpted from praises offered by various FPMT centers and students around the world.

We prostrate to You, Beloved Lama,
Whose all-compassionate, all-wise,
all-powerful blissful mind pervades wherever there is existence.

We prostrate to You, Beloved Lama,
Whose sublime emanations simultaneously benefit countless beings.

We prostrate to You, Beloved Lama,
Whose perfect words awaken us and countless others from the nightmare of samsara.

Homage to You, extraordinary in three ways:
With Your extraordinary great compassion guiding us,
With Your extraordinary patience leading us,
With Your extraordinary great love supporting us.

Homage to You, wise in three ways:
With Your wisdom helping us live in the Dharma,
With Your wisdom helping us free from samsara,
With Your wisdom helping us fully enlighten for others.

Homage to You, glorious in three ways:
Whose glorious courage inspires our practice,
Whose glorious speech equals the buddhas,
Whose glorious laughter shatters samsara.

We offer everything to you, Precious Guru, without any sense of loss,
Including the objects of our attachment, aversion and ignorance,
Our bodies, wealth and enjoyments.

We cannot fathom Your perfection, Holy Guru,
But our hearts know and thereby glow
In the reflected light of the splendor of Your body, speech, and mind.

It is said that the human brain has 100 billion neurons.
Well, each and every one of Your neurons, Holy Lama,
Is thinking each and every moment
About how to benefit each and every sentient being.

Beloved One, the moment we laid eyes on You,
We knew we had always known You.
We had never seen such compassion in this lifetime,
And Your kindness moves us to tears.

For uncountable eons You have been guiding us.
When we were born in the hells You manifested as Kshitigarbha,
Pulling us from the flames consuming our bodies.

When we were born as pretas You manifested as Chenrezig,
Raining nectar into our scorched throats,
Relieving our torment with Your love.

When we were born as animals You recited mantras into ourears
And circumambulated our pitiful forms around multitudes of holy objects.

Now, due to Your infinite skill and kindness,
A virtuous karmic seed ripened and we have found this most rare and precious human birth.

Yet still we were wandering, lost in a mental sea of meaningless distraction,
Until You rescued us again, saving us from the perilous
precipice that leads back down to the lower realms.

There is no-one in all the three times who has cared for us as You have.
Your skillful means are inexpressible and incomparable,
Your wisdom, compassion, and love unimaginable.

Without You, Precious Guru, we would still be oneness with fire,
Unable to hear even the sound of a human voice.

No-one has as much love for us as You.
You caught us with Your hook of compassion and saved us just in time from wasting our lives.

You hear our cry for help and immediately bring us peace and happiness.
You are the source of our strength and perseverance in difficult times.
You are the calm ship that navigates the wild waters of our samsara.
You are our anchor, our one constant in the illusion of this life.

We have You in our hearts all the time
yet we never want to miss being in Your holy presence,
Elated at the sound of Your infectious laughter
or seeing You enjoy even a coconut water.

We could watch You forever because You fill our being with love and joy.
Just thinking about You brings ecstasy.

Beloved Guru, may we learn to serve others as completely as You.
For You an ant, a puppy, a man, a woman, a child, the young and the old are the same:
You love us all equally.
There is not a sentient being who escapes Your vast loving reach.

You are the savior of all wounded, wandering beings.
You spend ages going from the car to the house because You
bless every tiny creature along the way.
You nearly miss Your plane to save a few ants.
You do phowa for the duckling that was run over on the
Kathmandu ring road, oblivious to the passing trucks.

You stop to bless the fortunate millipede.
You mesmerize the porcupine with Your prayers at the Singapore Zoo.
You feed Your holy body to the fleas.
You, Beloved Lama, for whom sleep is a disgusting waste of time, never stop giving,
Unceasingly, throughout the day and night.

You give us teachings and initiations to last for eons.
You give advice: at the place where You are staying,
In the car on the way to the teachings,
When entering the teachings, when leaving the teachings;
In emails and cards and letters and phone calls and text messages,
And even in our dreams.

You give us stupas and statues and texts and tsa-tsas
And soft toys and jewels and food and bras and money and crystal goblets for our altars.
And You give right back to us the very offerings the center made to You.
You give us, Precious Lama, exactly what we need,
Including not giving us the initiation or teaching that we expected.

You spend ages blessing our mala but You’re actually secretly blessing us.
You heal our sickness. You show us how to die. You release us from the lower realms.
Wherever You are, Precious One, Your radiant being fills that space.
It is impossible to comprehend how we have the immeasurable good fortune
To be within Your enlightened mandala.

Our centers exist only because of Your depthless kindness and compassion, Rinpoche.
Your inspiration and example energize us in countless ways
To continue on the path and to enthusiastically complete all
Your precious advice.

Because of Your blessings, there are seven-story Dharma centers,
Twelve-foot tall Thousand-armed Chenrezig statues,
Huge enlightenment stupas with gompas below,

Astonishingly beautiful Padmasambhava statues in the center of ponds,
Countless prayer wheels containing trillions of mantras,
And the countless Maitreya statues yet to come.

Because of Your blessings, Lord Buddha’s teachings are translated and published;
There are monasteries, where the Dharma can be kept alive by the relative Sangha,
And retreat centers, whose purpose, You told us,
is for students to get “correct realizations,” thus becoming the absolute Sangha.
And this is the just the tip of the iceberg.

“So many projects You have!” one student declared.
“Yes,” You answered. “But You know only five percent of them!”

Wow wow wow wow wow wow wow!

Without You, Beloved One, we are completely lost.
We owe You our lives.
We used to cry, feeling abandoned,
But now we can smile in Your light.
We used to question our existence, but now we have solid ground.
You are saving our minds from the dark.
Now we hold pratimoksha, bodhisattva, and tantric vows.
We study and meditate on the path, liberate animals, and serve sentient beings.

With faith and heartfelt devotion we create the causes for
spiritual and material growth and harmony at the centers.
Because of You, Holy Guru, we have the chance to attain
enlightenment in this very life.

How wonderful! How amazing!
When we follow Your perfect instructions, Holy Lama,
everything works.

Every advice that is followed, like a wish-fulfilling gem,
never fails to manifest unbelievably happy outcomes.
The process of acquiring one of the centers was simply flawless –
like some magical transaction with not one single obstacle.
The cost of purchasing and restructuring another matched exactly our budget.
At a practice of Kshitigarbha, a seriously sick man we included in dedications recovered.

As we gathered to welcome a Maitreya statue, one mother
who’d had a stroke recovered her ability to walk and
circumambulated it unassisted.
And as someone merely thought deeply about You,
They saw a rainbow in the sky above.

All this is completely due to the unfathomable kindness of You, Precious Guru,
A source of inspiration for us for lifetimes to come.
We simply cannot find the words to extoll Your endless qualities, most Precious Rinpoche.
Our gratitude knows no bounds.

Therefore, Holy Guru, we pray from the depths of our hearts
That we may be reborn throughout numberless
reincarnations as Your heart disciples;
That You shower us and all others with the precious jewels of Your immense compassion;
And that You will ultimately lead us to full awakening and everlasting bliss.

Taking You deep into our hearts, dear Lord of Light,
We implore You to fill us with the inspiration to never give
up helping all sentient beings for as long as space remains, just like You.

May all the love for You, our Perfect Guru, that flows from our hearts
Be dedicated to the fulfillment of Your most cherished, holy wishes
And to the dissolving of all obstacles to Your wellbeing
Like snow melting away when kissed by the sun.

Precious One, source of all realizations,
Embodiment of infinite pure love for all of us,
We, Your disciples, prostrating at Your lotus feet and
clinging to the hem of Your robes, beg You:

Please, please never stop turning the wheel of Dharma.
Please, please remain until every one of us is freed
From our self-made prison of samsara.

You are the Guru, You are the Yidam,
You are the dakinis and Dharma protectors.
From now until enlightenment we will seek no refuge other
than You.

In this life, the bardo, and all future lives,
Hold us with Your hook of compassion;
Free us from samsara and nirvana’s fears,
Grant all attainments,
Be our constant friend and guard us from interferences.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche during the CPMT long life puja, Australia, September 2014. Photo by Kunchok Gyaltsen.

During the long life puja at the end of the CPMT meeting, regional coordinators Helen Patrin, Australia; Drolkar McCallum, North America; and Tara Melwani, South East Asia, read nine pages of praise to FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche submitted by FPMT centers, projects and services from every region where FPMT is active. This is what they read:

“You lions among humans,
Gone to freedom in the present, past and future
In the worlds of ten directions,
To all of you, with body, speech, and sincere mind,
I bow down.”¹

Always and forever we are in prostration at your holy lotus feet, Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche. We offer this praise to you Rinpoche, on behalf of all of your disciples throughout the world. We offer this praise on behalf of all sentient beings, who wander like blind children at the edge of the perilous cliffs of samsara, certain to fall to our deaths without your guidance.

We offer this praise in connection with this long life offering ceremony, with deep, sincere and fervent requests that you remain stable like a vajra in this lifetime for the benefit of all beings.

Please remain with us, never separated, and continue to guide all sentient beings and the FPMT organization

We prostrate to you, and to all the buddhas and bodhisattvas
in every direction and in all the three times,
and to the Dharma and to the Supreme Assembly,
with bodies as numerous as all the atoms of the world.

We make offerings of every precious thing in every world system
both actual and imagined,
just as Samantabhadra did
with the hopes that we may become exactly like that.

From the depths of our hearts, and with great regret,
we confess every single non-virtuous action
that we have committed against others, or caused others to commit.
We see them as faults and openly declare them to you, our holy guru.

With great happiness we rejoice in the ocean of positive actions
created by buddhas, bodhisattvas, and all beings.
we rejoice in the qualities of wisdom, bodhichitta, and great compassion
and in the actions that have arisen from these minds.

With folded hands, we beseech you,
and all buddhas in all directions,
please turn the wheel of the Dharma for all
who suffer in the darkness of samsara.

Please do not pass into nirvana,
but from your great compassion,
do not abandon us,
keep us close to you and remain in the world for infinite eons.

Through whatever merit we accumulate from this praise
and from our single-pointed devotion to you, our holy guru,
may we aspire to your state
and attain enlightenment in order to benefit all beings.

Please remain with us never separated and continue to guide all sentient beings and the FPMT organization

Lama Zopa Rinpoche being led to the long life puja in the Great Stupa of Universal Compassion by (from right) Khen Rinpche Geshe Chonyi, FPMT CEO Ven. Roger Kunsang, Thubten Shedrup Ling director Gyatso, FPMT Board of Directors secretary Paula de Wys, FPMT Australia coordinator Helen Patrin and FPMT Center Cervices director Claire Isitt, Australia, September 19, 2014. Photo by Laura Miller.

From you, we understand that our ability to liberate others
Relies entirely upon taming our own minds
Like Je Tsongkhapa, with great compassion, you demonstrate pure and flawless ethics –
You are our perfect guide upon the path,

Please carry us within your lotus heart until we reach enlightenment

From you, we understand that the thought of giving
Is the ripening cause that results directly in the wealth of realization
Like Je Tsongkhapa, with great compassion, you show boundless generosity –
You are our perfect guide upon the path,

Please carry us within your lotus heart until we reach enlightenment

From you, we understand that the fire of an angry mind, or word, or thought
Is like a burning match to the kindling of our hard-earned merit
Like Je Tsongkhapa, with great compassion, you practice adamantine patience –
You are our perfect guide upon the path,

Please carry us within your lotus heart until we reach enlightenment

From you, we understand that a mind suffused with joy and diligence
Is the most powerful and effective fuel to move our practice
Like Je Tsongkhapa, with great compassion, you embody effusive joyous effort –
You are our perfect guide upon the path,

Please carry us within your lotus heart until we reach enlightenment

From you, we understand that a mind controlled by sinking and distraction
Will never penetrate reality
Like Je Tsongkhapa, with great compassion, you practice tireless meditation –
You are our perfect guide upon the path,

Please carry us within your lotus heart until we reach enlightenment

From you, we understand that a mind that grasps at the appearance of things as real
And our experience of them as absolute will never find release
Like Je Tsongkhapa, with great compassion, you are never separated from the perfect view –
You are our perfect guide upon the path,

Please carry us within your lotus heart until we reach enlightenment

Embodying the six perfections, manifesting enlightened activities that are peaceful, increasing, wrathful and extensive, you are in essence the holy guru Shakyamuni, in essence the holy guru Vajradhara.

Please carry us within your lotus heart until we reach enlightenment

We praise Rinpoche’s courage, energy and humor.
We praise your courage in your open support
Of His Holiness the Dalai Lama in all his endeavours,
And in the development of your vast vision for the FPMT.

We praise your energy in the practice and transmission of the Holy Dharma,
Showing us how little sleep you need, and how much more we want,
And how initiations can go on all night.

We praise that wonderful laugh of yours.
The soft water of nectar from Chenrezig that soothes pain,
The shining sword of Manjushri severing the roots of pain,
The vajra laughter of Vajrapani that shatters samsara.

But above all we praise you for looking after us with such love and patience for so long.

Please live long Rinpoche, and continue your immeasurable enlightened activities for the benefit of all sentient beings

Lama Zopa Rinpoche entering the Great Stupa of Universal Compassion for the long life puja, Australia, September 19, 2014. Photo by Laura Miller.

Precious Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche,
Embodiment of the buddhas of the three times,
Great Wheel Turning King unrivalled
In subduing the deluded minds
Of those sunk in the dizzying vortex of samsara.
We prostrate with reverence at your radiant lotus feet
And sing endless praises to qualities knowing no bounds.

Great Hero whose golden body is adorned with the three vajras,
Though you sit immovable and serene beneath the bodhi tree,
through the force of infinite compassion and wisdom blazing
you continuously emanate countless perfect form bodies that all beings
can see and enjoy!

Please live long Rinpoche, and continue your immeasurable enlightened activities for the benefit of all sentient beings

Therefore, with hands folded and with voices woven in pure harmony, we sing melodious praises to your radiant mind which thunders with realization of the perfect union of emptiness and dependent arising.

With utmost devotion we humbly prostrate and make vast yet intricate aspirations inspired by those of Samantabhadra.

Just as Lama Tsongkhapa also prayed, may we never tire of savoring your nectar-like words, until we too emerge victorious over the hosts of maras, to sit in the sweet shade of enlightenment that alone shelters from every harm.

Precious Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche, you who alone dispel all confusions and doubts, please hear our heartfelt pleas:

Please, please live long and continue to turn the wheel of Dharma
For the benefit of all whose intolerable cries fill the three realms.
Please bless us so that we too can become perfect spiritual guides
effortlessly and naturally working for those in impure realms.

With your joyous explanations of emptiness, shining like a jewel with rays of wisdom, you are the embodiment of a virtuoso of voidness.

How fortunate we are! Precious guru, please, please live long!

We pray to be able to purify every single negative karma,
and to be able to do immensurable nyung näs as you always recommend for the benefit of all mother sentient beings.

We pray to grow as a Buddhist family,
Surrounded by heart practitioners
Who are able to realize the path,
And work together in harmony for all the mother beings.

We pray to be able to always see you as Buddha,
And follow your perfect example of non-craving, love and compassion,
pure view and perfect wisdom.

We request for you, dear lama, to have a beautiful long and healthy life,
And to be able to see a smile on your face as a result of our realizations.

Please live long Rinpoche, and continue your immeasurable enlightened activities for the benefit of all sentient beings

We praise you, Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche, for touching our hearts and minds,
The voidness of your joyful laughter echoes deeply in our hearts
You, whose words are wise and totally full of compassion
You, the light that guides us and brings meaning to our lives.

Praises to you, dearest Rinpoche, for showing us that distance is created by our minds
Although we are far away, constantly, day and night, with never ending love
You manifest your holy presence in our hearts eliminating the slightest trace of separation
Infinite praises and gratitude to you, our very kind lama, loving guide and precious savior.

Please live long Rinpoche, and continue your immeasurable enlightened activities for the benefit of all sentient beings

Helen Patrin with Drolkar McCallum and Tara Melwani reads the praises for Lama Zopa Rinpoche offered during the CPMT 2014 long life puja, Australia, September 2014. Photo by Kunchok Gyaltsen.

Can we bear to recollect that time before we met you, Rinpoche, and received the teachings of the Buddha from one who is so pure of heart, so imbued with compassion, love and wisdom? Yes, we had many samsaric enjoyments. But our lives were only filled with dissatisfaction, confusion, pain and emptiness, an ache in our hearts that would never go away. Having everything? We may as well have had nothing at all.

We praise you Rinpoche for being conferred the Order of the Polar Star – Mongolia’s highest honor given to a foreigner – for your efforts in re-establishing and spreading the Dharma.

Please live long Rinpoche, and continue your immeasurable enlightened activities for the benefit of all sentient beings

Light where there was once only darkness,
Understanding where there was once only confusion,
Wisdom instead of ignorance,
Happiness instead of discontentment,
Fulfillment instead of emptiness.
A heart full of joy and gratitude for the kindness of others,
Instead of self-cherishing, thinking only of I, me and mine.

None of this would have been possible without you, Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche.
Your patient hours and hours and hours and hours of teachings,
Your perfect advice and instructions,
Your complete and utter devotion to the welfare of all sentient beings.

Buddhahood is very far away, however you show us by your own example what being a buddha means.

Your enlightened activities merely labeled as vast projects are sooooooooo immeasurable and are benefiting so many sentient beings as follows:

• Starting the incredible Sera Je Food fund – which is offering 3,029,500 meals every year to 2,500 monks and has been doing this for the past 23 years

• Starting the Puja Fund, which for the past 15 years has been offer offering continuous pujas for FPMT; as well as offering to 15,650 Sangha on every Buddha Day (four times a year); offering white wash and saffron to Boudhanath and Swayambhunath stupas in Nepal; offering robes and gold to Jowo Buddha in Lhasa and the great Buddha statue in Bodhgaya every month

• Starting the Lama Tsongkhapa Teacher Fund – preserving the Gelug tradition through sponsoring:

• Supporting the most senior teachers of the Lama Tsongkhapa tradition
• Supporting the annual Gelugpa exam
• Supporting the annual winter debate in India and Nepal

• Undertaking to build 100,000 stupas around the world – including one to prevent harm from earthquakes in San Francisco – currently 49 completed

• Undertaking to build 100,000 large prayer wheels around the world including under the ocean and 12 completed to date

• Sponsoring and inspiring the building of large Padmasambhava statues and 17 completed to date with one 21 meters [69 feet] high

• Sponsoring, guiding and inspiring for 1,000 Maitreya statues to be built including the two large ones in Bodhgaya and Kushinagar

• Arranging for the writing the Prajñaparamita Sutra in gold for world peace. One monk has been doing this fulltime for 12 years and he is currently on the fourth volume

• Inspiring others and helping to save and liberate animals. Since 2007 over 2,183,100 animals saved and liberated; established the Animal Liberation Sanctuary in Nepal, ensuring the animals saved from slaughter and also exposed to Dharma to gain a better rebirth; giving charity to ants; building Namgyälma mantra boards to bless the sentient beings in the ocean and the liberation tools that we can use to pick up insects, so they can go under the Namgyälma mantra and be blessed and gain a higher rebirth

• Sponsoring and inspiring large thangkas for many centers and around the world

• Guiding and financially supporting the IMI Sangha by supporting the building of monasteries and nunneries and in so many ways

• Undertaking and sponsoring 100 million mani retreats (so far, more than 18 completed) and sponsoring and inspiring 100-times nyung nä retreats and many students now undertaking 1,000 or more nyung näs

• Sponsoring the offering of 100,000 tsog offerings to Guru Rinpoche around the world

• Offering extensive support to all the great monasteries in India, to so many individual khangtsens and in particular to Sera Je Monastery, India for the past 30 years, such as sponsoring the gompa, classrooms and so much more

• Offering support to Kopan Monastery and Nunnery for many years

As well as supporting:

• Continuous light offering to self-emanating Chenrezig in Gasha Khandroling, India

• Supporting the Nepal Buddhist Federation which supports the four Buddhist traditions in Nepal

• Extensive offering to “the pores of the guru, His Holiness the Dalai Lama” and the tens of thousands of monks!

• Making so many offerings to FPMT centers, projects and services and building of holy objects

• Sponsored the building of the kitchen at the Central School of Tibetans in Bylakuppe, India and offered food for 12 months

• Offering all food to children at Ngari Institute, Ladakh and helping to build a Ngari Khangtsen in Sera Je Monastery

• Sponsoring ongoing extensive offerings for the benefit of the organization going all night and day in America, Malaysia, Nepal, Singapore and India and inspiring others to do the same

• Offering sponsorship to many young tulkus of the Gelug tradition

• Offering robes to all FPMT geshes and non-Tibetan resident teachers annually

• Sponsored a prayer wheel and statues for a small Tibetan settlement gompa in Kullu, Manali

• Assisted in sponsoring a new residence for His Holiness the Dalai Lama in Bylakuppe, India

• Sponsoring important oral transmission from His Holiness the Sakya Trinzin and Dakpa Rinpoche as well as other high lamas

• Supporting Tibetan communities by building hospitals in Tibet and helping those in India

• Supporting Buddhism in Tsum and Mongolia, including offering towards charitable work in Mongolia

There are so many more projects that Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche supports from his own side creating vast amounts of merit for the FPMT organization. So many that it is hard to fathom and these projects are the only ones that we can see. Who knows what you are doing Rinpoche in all the other universes!

Guiding the students immaculately with exact instructions on how to achieve enlightenment quickly, taking care of so many sentient beings by advising what they can do to overcome life and heath obstacles.

Guiding the centers faultlessly so they can be of most benefit to innumerable sentient beings and helping always in so, so, so, so, so many ways.

Perfectly guiding the FPMT organization so we can be of MOST BENEFIT to all sentient beings. Inspiring and guiding the Sangha and teachers so they can be of most benefit.

So please, please, please remain to guide us.

For, Rinpoche, we only want to become like you and please your holy mind by fulfilling your sublime wishes.

But no matter how many expressions of gratitude and love we may offer to you, in your very own words, you said in the Heart of the Path:

Even if we were to offer our gurus the three thousand galaxies of the universe filled with wish-granting jewels for eons, we couldn’t repay their kindness in teaching us one word of Dharma.²

And Rinpoche, no matter how we may extol your qualities, just as it is said in the Golden Light Sutra:

There is none among beings, even among gods,
Who in many thousands of millions of eons
Can fully explain merely one drop of virtue
From the ocean of your supreme qualities.³

Countless diverse voices. Students of every conceivable disposition and inclination. From every continent on this planet. A manifestation of the extent of Rinpoche’s all pervasive compassion and love and holy enlightened activities. Each and every one of us making the same supplication and plea to Rinpoche, on this occasion of the 25th CPMT meeting.

For as long as space remains,
For as long as sentient beings remain,
Until then may our most precious heart guru, Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche, remain to dispel the miseries of the world.

Rinpoche, please live long, please live long, please live long and continue to guide us, who are lost in this darkness of samsara

Rinpoche, please, please, please remain always until all sentient beings are led to enlightenment and the lower realms are empty forever.

Rinpoche, and all sentient beings and ALLLLLLLLLLLLLL the FPMT organizations in ALLLLLLLLLLL the universes.

Rinpoche, please do not pass into nirvana, and with your great compassion,
do not abandon us, keep us close to you and remain in the world for a billion, million, trillion, zillion, gazillion eons.

Sangha and lay students listen intently to the praises as they are read during the long life puja for Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Great Stupa of Universal Compassion, Australia, September 2014. Photo by Kunchok Gyaltsen.

Request to Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche on the occasion of the Long Life Puja held at Amitabha Buddhist Centre on 13th February 2011

Your holy mind understands the full extent of objects to be known
Your eloquent speech is the ear-ornament of the fortunate ones
Your holy body is glorious and glowing with fame.
To you, who is meaningful to see, hear and remember, I prostrate.

In you, Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Vajradhara has fulfilled his promise, that during these degenerate times, he will manifest to us in the form of our guru and our fervent prayers to be guided in all our lives by Lama Tsongkhapa acting in person as the Mahayana Guru have come true.

It is most befitting that you have once again offered us the commentary on the Lama Tsong Khapa Guru Yoga for receiving this commentary from you is no different from receiving it from Je Rinpoche himself, with whom you share every good quality.

• Khensur Lobsang Tsering Rinpoche once told us how, many years ago, Rinpoche had the desire to further his monastic studies. But Rinpoche sacrificed, without hesitation, this personal heart wish in order to care for our Dharma education, developing, over the years, for our benefit, a comprehensive study curriculum catering to our varied needs and dispositions.

  Due to Rinpoche’s kindness and encouragement, over the last six years, a group of most fortunate ABC students have had the opportunity to study Buddhist philosophy and some of the Great Treatises under the guidance of that most patient of teachers, our precious Geshe Chonyi. A group of these students graduated from the Basic Program last year.

  In this way, just as Lama Tsong Khapa did, you guide many disciples on the path to enlightenment.

• Just as Lama Tsong Khapa built many holy objects, Rinpoche, you are spearheading the building of the Maitreya Buddha in India and you have initiated plans for 100,000 prayer wheels, 100,000 stupas and 100,000 statues of Guru Rinpoche to be built around the world. Because of your vision, the Jade Buddha was completed, the first Kalachakra stupa in America has been built and the Great Stupa of Universal Compassion, modelled on the Great Stupa of Gyantse in Tibet, is under construction which, when completed, will be the largest stupa in the Western world. Not only that. You are also working with the extraordinary Khandro-la on an extraordinary stupa project to avert the great earthquake that threatens to destroy the state of California. And you have given ABC the wonderful opportunity of commissioning a huuuuuuuuuuge thangka of Amitabha Buddha to be displayed on the special merit-multiplying days in the year.
• Like Lama Tsong Khapa, you too have composed many texts, explaining the Buddha’s teachings in modern terms with great clarity, wisdom and persuasive power.
• Lama Tsong Khapa had engaged in the arduous study of all the teachings from the great Tibetan traditions. His teachings make it so easy for us to have, as Rinpoche points out, “unmistaken understanding and unmistaken realisation, without wasting time on wrong views.” Rinpoche, likewise, you are engaged in the arduous task of ensuring the preservation of these pure teachings through

• • • The Sera Je Food Fund which, now in its 20th year, will have offered 15 million meals to the 2,600 monks of Sera Je Monastery and
    • over the last 12 years, the Lama Tsong Khapa Teachers Fund has offered stipends to both the abbots and senior teachers, including the Ganden Tripa, at Sera, Ganden, Drepung, Gyume, Gyuto, Tashi Lunpo and Rato monasteries.

But still, that is not all. Rinpoche, you have programs to benefit animals, the sick and dying, those who have passed away, prisoners serving jail time, aspiring Dharma teachers, those in danger of losing their sight, the young and the old.

Last year, when such a eulogy was offered to you, Rinpoche, you claimed that you had none of the qualities that were described, joking that you may have to shop for them in Tibet! Instead, you praised the good qualities of the students at ABC.

Today, again, Rinpoche, you say you do not have a single quality to accept this long life puja.

But, Rinpoche, if what you have are not qualities, then it will be impossible for us to have any qualities at all. Any semblance of good qualities we may have come only from you. Without you to guide, teach and inspire us, we would have a human body but the mind of an animal!

Recently, Rinpoche, you were conferred the highest award given to foreigners by the President of Mongolia, the Order of the Polar Star, in recognition of your efforts in spreading and preserving Mahayana Buddhism there.

We have no such great honour to offer to Rinpoche. Instead, we humbly offer Rinpoche, from the very depths of our hearts, all our love, devotion and the deepest gratitude which no words can ever adequately express.

For as long as space remains,
For as long as sentient beings remain,
Until then, Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche, our supreme and most perfect Lord of Refuge,
May you too remain
To dispel the miseries of the world.

Rinpoche, please live long, please live long, please live long.

Request to Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche on the Occasion of the End of the One Hundred Million Manis Retreat, Institut Vajrayogini, 4 June 2009

Dear mum,
Well, here I am in the south of France staying at a lovely chateau. The weather’s great and the food’s great, and there are lots of friends here and I’m averaging four hours sleep a night and I’ve done 47,000 prostrations and…

How would we lay people tell our friends about this last month? How would we explain the sleep depravation, the fifteen hour’s sitting a day, the pain, the discomfort, the purification, the precepts, the whole works? How would we explain our south of France holiday that had no alcohol, clubs, swimming pools, no sex? How would we explain all this?

In a word… Rinpoche.

Who else could put us through all this?
Who else could help us understand and endure it?
Who else could give us the chance to do 100 million manis for His Holiness?
Who else could give us a month face to face with our self-cherishing?
Who else could help us open our hearts to others?
Who else could introduce us to our minds and give us the tools to deal with it?
Who else could inspire and energize us so we can actually enjoy it?
Who else could create this pure land we are living in?

In four words… Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche.

You are patience, but maybe when teaching us you still have to use the mantra you gave us to increase patience. Many of us who have sat before you for decades still haven’t got it but You never give up on us. You never give up on anyone. Rinpoche, never ever give up on us no matter how long it takes.

With the way You live, You are our ultimate role model, showing us by example how it is possible to live in complete purity.

You combine wisdom and compassion in a way that is the perfect antidote for all of us “illusioned” students. Knowing our minds, You have the skill to crack even the thickest of the thick-skulled ones amongst us. You take us from tears of unbearable compassion to tears of laughter, laughing at Yourself, playing with words, even sometimes manifesting forgetfulness to make the old ones amongst us feel better.

The breadth of the methods You use on us is amazing. Amazing! No matter how deluded we might be, You have a means to bring us benefit. You teach us to trust You, and You teach us to take responsibility for our own lives.

You present us the broadest picture and the finest detail, from how to play the cymbals to the meaning of one word in a prayer. You play with our minds, creating conditions where we are confronted with our delusions and with our true (yet not truly existing) potential.

While we sleep our blissful four hours a day, You work, endless projects manifesting and growing like the offerings You ask us to make. It’s impossible to conceive the breadth of Your vision, the scope of Your projects. Manifesting in human form for us, surely in reality You must have a thousand arms and a thousand eyes just to be able to do a thousandth of the work You do for sentient beings.

Unexcelled master at explaining wisdom, even turning the dedications into a teaching on emptiness! From the most profound, to the most practical, effective methods we can use in our everyday life, for all the sentient beings who aren’t even there. At all. In the way we perceive them.

Above all, You are compassion. Unimaginable and vast compassion for all beings, from the wounded pigeon to the plane crash victims, to all of us wandering the six realms, full of delusions and suffering. Your incredible kindness to all us students!

When our self-cherishing reacts to the hours and the practice, You are our compassionate torturer.
When our minds are drunk with lethargy, You are our wake-up call.
When our self is crying “me me”, You are our bath of compassion.
When the child within cries enough, You lead us from delusion to awaken our potential.
When our hearts are open, You are our mother and father, all-loving.

You are always in our hearts, but…
What a joy! What a joy! To have You here with us for a full month! To be part of Your mandala and experience the family feeling of the FPMT. Like the mandala offering splitting into atoms, we’ll carry this inspiration back with us all over the world.

With our dull minds we can’t see a millionth of Your great qualities, a billionth, a zillionth, and yet, in our own deluded way, we can see some of what You do for us.

While we thrash about in samsara, eating, sleeping, working, making mistakes, You remain there immutable, the heart of our hearts.

Wow! You started the retreat by saying we should do for liberation what people do for football. People cheer when their country wins the European Cup. (Cheers! Cheers!) But here, at the end of this amazing – AMAZING! – retreat, we have just won a million European Cups full of merit (Cheers! Cheers!), a billion European Cups full of merit (Cheers! Cheers!), a zillion European Cups full of merit (Cheers! Cheers!), skies full of European Cups full of merit! (Cheers! Cheers!)

And that’s another thing. You’ve taught us how to rejoice.

So, Rinpoche, please please please have a long long life. Please please please remain to guide us forever through all our future lives. Please be the unerring guide to all mother sentient beings and lead us all to enlightenment, (which is empty from its own side) without even a second’s delay, but Yourself alone!

Precious Rinpoche, please please please live long!

HOMAGE TO KYABJE LAMA THUBTEN ZOPA RINPOCHE LA

Kyabje Lama Thubten Zopa Rinpoche-La, qualified holder of Buddha Dharma, bestowing and preserving the wisdom of Buddha’s teachings, at Your feet I offer homage and prostrations with my mind, body and speech.

I would like to offer my heartfelt thanks and praise to Kyabje Lama Thubten Zopa Rinpoche-La for Rinpoche-La’s tireless work benefitting all the sentient beings. I earnestly appeal You to please continue to bless us with Your presence at all times.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche-La, You work tirelessly and selflessly as the compassionate teacher and leader of the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition, inspiring hundreds of students around the whole to practice Buddha’s teachings to perfection through the many FPMT Dharma centers.

Your guidance, advice and ceaseless efforts in caring for these students and the centers is evident from the students deep respect, reverence and love for You and from the boundless activities that flourish through the FPMT centers throughout the world.

It is indeed so wonderful to recall Rinpoche-La’s numerous benevolent projects and activities The Great Maitreya Project, with plans to build a 500ft bronze statue of Maitreya Buddha in India is one of the outstanding projects on the way, the benefits from it is beyond our comprehension.

In addition, ongoing monasteries, nunneries, retreat and meditation centers with sangha and lay people studying, meditating and teaching Dharma, health clinics and hospices serving the sick and dying, publishing houses printing and preserving holy Dharma texts, schools teaching children the wisdom and the essential compassionate attitudes, spiritual services inspiring people incarcerated in prisons, artists and craftspeople working and producing excellent artwork of Buddha images and stupas. These countless activities emerge from the FPMT.

It is very worthwhile that the students of FPMT centers are so active in their service of benefitting others and for this I offer Rinpoche-La greatest respect, thanks and highest praise. Rinpoche-La’s energy and enthusiasm is ceaseless in caring and assisting every being to develop and reach their highest potential is matter of pride and great rejoice for all of us.

Rinpoche-La’s generosity in offering three meals a day to almost 3,000 monks in Sera Je Monastery in South India is an inspiring example of generosity. Offering food to Sanghas in monasteries and to individuals studying and meditating, sponsoring pujas and making extensive offerings on behalf of numerous beneficial activities, Rinpoche-La gives an excellent example of how to support and encourage the flourishing of the Sangha and indeed the flourishing and continuity of the Buddha Dharma.

Rinpoche-La encourages and supports not only the Tibetan Sangha in the great monastic universities in India, but also the Sangha in Mongolia, Nepal, Tibet, in the West and in Asia – in fact all over the world. Rinpoche-La is providing retreat facilities, teaching venues, accommodation and financial support and resources to advance their spiritual knowledge and attainments.

At His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s advice, Rinpoche-La established the Lama Tsong Khapa Teachers Fund to help support all the main teachers of the Gelugpa tradition. Lama Zopa Rinpoche-La’s devotion and pursuit to fulfill His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s wishes is clear and unequivocal. Your students regard Rinpoche-La as an exemplary of most holy student-Guru relationship, displaying the best behavior of Guru Devotion and service. Rinpoche-La’s perfect service and devotion to his Gurus illustrates this to them.

I know that His Holiness the Dalai Lama has expressed His great appreciation and happiness at Lama Zopa Rinpoche-La’s tireless service and benevolent activities all over the world.

I invite all of you to join me in our prayers for the long life of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and for the fulfillment of all of His Holiness’s holy wishes for the benefit of all sentient beings. Likewise, also join me in our sincere and dedicated prayers for the long life of Lama Zopa Rinpoche-La and fulfillment of Rinpoche-La’s holy wishes.

Dear Rinpoche La, please live long for the benefit of all sentient beings. It is no small merit that we are fortunate to have Lama Zopa Rinpoche-La’s presence and guidance amongst is. May we all create further merit by continuing to have Rinpoche-La amongst us.

As the current Australian Representative of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, I would like to extend my heartfelt thanks to Lama Zopa Rinpoche-La for all of Rinpoche-Las most dedicated service to His Holiness the Dalai Lama and His service to Dharma, by presenting this framed Thangka painting of 1000 armed Chenrezig. On behalf of all the Tibetans and Dharma friends around the world, I once again thank Rinpoche-La and request Rinpoche-La to visit us here in Australia and New Zealand as often as possible. TASHI DELEK.

Tenzin P. Atisha
Representative of H.H. the Dalai Lama for Australian and New Zealand
12 June 2006

A Long Life Prayer for Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche

A REQUEST TO LIVE LONG FROM THE STUDENTS OF CHENREZIG INSTITUTE.

TO OUR MOST PRECIOUS & HOLY ROOT GURU KYABJE THUBTEN ZOPA RINPOCHE WE MAKE THIS REQUEST TO YOU FROM THE DEPTHS OF OUR HEARTS .

WE PRAY THAT YOUR LIFE WILL BE LONG AND FREE FROM ANY HINDERANCES OR OBSTACLES AND THAT WE MAY AGAIN AND AGAIN BE ABLE TO CAST OUR EYES UPON YOUR HOLY VAJRA-LIKE BODY.

We the students of C.I. (Those of us who have known you since your very first visit to Australia up to those of us who are meeting you today for the first time) wish to acknowledge your great kindness, without which we would have no source of refuge and therefore no possible way of ever escaping the vast ocean of samsara.

Without your kindness, your deep concern for our future welfare, and your unwavering faith in our potential we would be lost.
Chenrezig Inst. and everything at Chenrezig Institute has come from your kindness. Your extraordinary devotion towards fulfilling the wishes of Lama Yeshe, your depthless compassion towards our often childlike behaviour, your wonderful teachings and patient advice…… all of these things have come from your kindness, without which we would now be sitting in a (wet) grassy field being bitten by ants. Without your kindness there would be no Gompa, no learned Geshe’s, no teachings, no translators, no Sangha, no Texts or Statues or Stupas or any Holy objects, no Hospices or Dharma club. There would be nothing of value and our lives would be completely empty.

All of this comes from your kindness.

In our humble way we pray that all of your wishes will be completely fulfilled, that the teachings in all of your centres will flourish and grow; that the students in these centres will work together with great harmony and that all of the projects involving the creation of holy objects, particularly the Maitreya project, will proceed completely free from financial and political problems.

PLEASE DO NOT LEAVE US WANDERING IN THE BLAZING INFERNO OF SAMSARA WITH NO-ONE TO GUIDE US, LEAVING US LIKE CHILDREN WHO HAVE LOST THEIR PARENTS AND ARE AFRAID AND BEWILDERED.

MAY WE ALWAYS KEEP PURELY OUR VOWS AND WORDS OF HONOUR, AND LIVE IN PERFECT HARMONY AS VAJRA BROTHERS AND SISTERS, THUS ENSURING THAT WE CREATE THE CAUSES FOR YOU TO REMAIN WITH US UNTIL SAMSARA ENDS.

MAY WE ALWAYS BE ABLE TO HEAR YOUR GOLDEN AND MELODIC BRAHMA-LIKE SPEECH, BRINGING TO OUR HEARTS AND MINDS THE ESSENSE OF THE BUDDHAS TEACHINGS. THROUGH YOUR SIMPLE AND CLEAR EXPLANATIONS OF THE VAST AND PROFOUND DHARMA MAY WE QUICKLY TRANSFORM OUR PRESENT SIDDIS OF IGNORANCE, ATTACHMENT AND ANGER INTO THE SIDDIS OF WISDOM,RENUNCIATION AND THE GOOD HEART. MAY WE ALWAYS BE ABLE TO HEAR YOUR JOYOUS LAUGHTER FILLING OUR HEARTS WITH HAPPINESS AND JOY AND DISSOLVING OUR WORRIES AND FEARS.

MAY WE ALWAYS BE THE OBJECTS OF YOUR MIND OF COMPASSION, AS VAST AS SPACE AND ENCOMPASSING ALL BEINGS. BY FOLLOWING YOUR TIRELESS ASND SELFLESS EXAMPLE, MAY WE STRIVE TO EMULATE YOUR STAINLESS COMPASSION AND WORK DAY AND NIGHT TO FREE OUR COUNTLES MOTHERS FROM THEIR UNBEARABLE SUFFERING., NOT REJECTING EVEN ONE BEING. TO US YOU ARE BUDDHA, DHARMA, SANGHA, YIDDAM AND OUR KINDEST AND MOST TRUSTED FRIEND, MORE KIND EVEN THAN THE BUDDHA’S OF THE THREE TIMES.

PRECIOUS AND GLORIOUS MAGNIFICENT ROOT GURU KABJE THUBTEN ZOPA RINPOCHE WE PRAY THAT WE MAY NEVER BE SEPARATED FROM YOU IN ALL OUR LIVES UNTIL WE ATTAIN THE FINAL GOAL OF BUDDHA HOOD.

WITH YOUR GREAT KINDNESS PLEASE LIVE LONG AND TAKE CARE OF US AND GRANT US THE POWERFUL REALIZATIONS OF YOUR HOLY BODY, SPEECH AND MIND. PRECIOUS GURU PLEASE REMAIN WITH US,
(RETURNING MANY TIMES TO C.I.), AS OUR GUIDE, OUR INSPIRATION AND AS OUR PERFECT OBJECT OF REFUGE.

With limitless bodies filling all of space we prostrate at your holy feet
We make limitless skies of offerings, blissful and radiant
The wrong actions done under the influence of confusion and wrong view we confess
And in the goodness and extensive bodhisattva deeds of all beings we rejoice
For the sake of ourselves and all those who wander in misery we beg you to remain forever
To continually turn the sublime and unmistaken wheel of Dharma
For the sake of our kind mothers everywhere we dedicate the merits
Please bless us with our three doors to only please you.

To our most sublime spiritual father Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche, who shows exactly and precisely what is to be abandoned and what is to be practiced
At the feet of our most kind mother, Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche who cares for living beings without exception with loving kindness inseperable from sharp wisdom
In devotion to the incomparable Guru Buddha who accomplishes infinite holy deeds and relieves the suffering of beings with your vast array of projects, specifically:
Providing meals for more than 4000 monks of Sera Je Monastery three times every day
Supporting the great lineage holders of Sera, Ganden, Drepung, Tashi Lunpo and Gyumed monasteries
Translating prayers, practices, and texts and commissioning the translation of sutras into every language
Building and inspiring stupas, statues, and prayer wheels all around the world
Rebuilding monasteries and reviving the teachings in Mongolia, Nepal and India
Supporting the sangha of the great monasteries to continuously perform the rites that bring about health, prosperity and success
Providing clinics, accommodation, and hospices for the poor, the destitute and the dying
Establishing liberation parks for those who would otherwise be slaughtered and abused
Writing the Prajnaparamita and Sanghata Sutras in pure gold to last for a thousand years
And most of all to you, who shows by example, the quickest path to enlightenment by unmistakenly fulfilling the wishes of the holy guru by building the world’s largest holy object of peace and love, the 500 foot Maitreya Buddha statue in India as was the wish of the incomparably kind Lama Thubten Yeshe
And by continuously fulfilling the wishes of the Lord of the world and savior of sentient beings, His Holiness the Dalai Lama
At your lotus feet we fervently pray

May we never be separated from you
In this life and in all future lives
May every action of our body speech and mind only please you
And may we be the cause for your every wish to be fulfilled

In order to fulfill the wishes of beings who have all been our mothers
With hands folded in the mudra of prostration we request
Please grant us the initiation of the incomparable protector Hayagriva and whatever other empowerment and teaching will be most suitable to lead us, your disciples, to your enlightened state

For as long as space exists
And for as long as living beings remain
Until then may you abide
To dispel the misery of the world

Written and offered by the undeserving but extremely adoring disciple Merry Colony, Yeshe Dechen, on the occasion of being blessed by the holy presence and teachings of Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche, in the Jhokang temple at FPMT International Office in Portland, Oregon, November 1, 2006.

Request to Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche on the occasion of the Long Life Puja held in Singapore, May 2nd, 2005

Should we first prostrate to You
or to the great compassion that caused You?

It would be difficult to exaggerate the qualities of our Guru and Spiritual Director, Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche.

Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche is a great bodhisattva who is constantly thinking of others. A Child of the Victorious Ones, Rinpoche does great works for sentient beings. As Ribur Rinpoche said: “If we don’t give the title Kyabje – meaning precious Refuge Protector – to Lama Zopa Rinpoche, to whom are we going to give it?”

It is very important that Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche has a long and stable life because he has so many Dharma projects to benefit others. It is truly amazing to contemplate these wondrous holy works. Using the power of holy body, speech and mind Rinpoche works ceaselessly:

Establishing Monasteries and Nunneries
Offering food to thousands of Sangha in India
Returning the Dharma to Mongolia
Pacifying minds and hearts and environments by propagating the building of thousands of Stupas and Prayer Wheels
Creating endless merit for students, the world and all beings with the thousands of Pujas that You sponsor
Providing education, support and guidance to Venerable Lama Osel Rinpoche
Directing and Guiding the Dharma activities of over 130 Mahayana Centres of study, retreat, hospices and publishing houses
Translating texts, writing many books and commentaries, perfectly preserving the pure tradition of Lama Tsong Khapa
And courageously undertaking the most extraordinary feat of building a 500 ft statue of Maitreya Buddha in India! This is a most awesome example of magnificent Guru devotion.

Due to Rinpoche’s great compassion and love, an FPMT centre was started in Singapore, which is devoted to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition of Je Rinpoche Lama Tsong Khapa. Rinpoche has related the story to us: while on retreat in India, our Guru had a very strong instinct about organising a dharma centre in Singapore. Rinpoche saw the potential of Singaporeans who, although well-educated and affluent, are nonetheless blinded by delusions, shackled by karma and hungry for dharma teachings. This feeling became stronger and stronger until by the end of the retreat, Rinpoche had an overwhelming urge to go to Singapore at all costs and set up a dharma centre. Over the last fifteen years, Amitabha Buddhist Centre members have had a succession of skilful and compassionate teachers.

Out of this fathomless love and generosity to his students here, Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche has given us his time and attention by visiting Singapore almost every year since 1990 to give teachings, initiations, advice and guidance. Once again, Rinpoche demonstrated compassion in action by assigning Geshe Chonyi, his Kopan scholar, to Singapore. In order to help us gain a deeper understanding of the holy Dharma and a commitment to transforming our minds, Rinpoche requested that we start the Basic Program with Geshe Chonyi. Because of this great act of kindness, Amitabha Buddhist Centre students are now studying the great texts and treatises, learning to meditate, discovering Buddhism and helping others transform their minds. May we continue to do so!

Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche is a perfect example of the teachings he gives, displaying all the qualities of a bodhisattva in his tireless and compassionate work for others. As our teacher, Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche is also our doctor. What better doctor could we wish for to show us how to cure our delusions and rid ourselves of the disease of self-cherishing?

Kyabje … What a perfect name for You – Precious Refuge Protector,
Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche,
just reciting Your name cools our fiery hearts.
Child of the Victorious Ones –
how beautiful You are in our eyes.
You are our compass, You are our goal.
Please show us how to be like You.

Please live long, remain with us and continue to guide us in all future lives.
May all sentient beings come under Your loving care, and may all receive the supreme happiness of buddhahood, without another moment’s delay.

Precious guru, please, please live long!

Request to the Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche

They say the Buddhas are everywhere,
But standing here, they seem nowhere near,
You make the Buddhas real:
Kindest Awakened One,
Please live very long.

So many words, bewildering texts
Wash like water off our backs
But You rouse us up and make us drink:
Prime Bestower of Immortal Dharma,
Please live very long.

So many friends, too many smiles
Why burden those themselves grieving?
The true friend and protector is only You:
Noble guide who lights the path to bliss,
Please live very long.

You are the emanation of Great Compassion,
Your infinite wisdom is Dharmakaya’s realm,
Your enlightened deeds ceaselessly benefit:
Most revered Lama,
Please live very long – remaining countless zillions of eons.

A Praise to Lama Zopa Rinpoche

To your kind lotus feet, soft like rose petals, we all pay homage,
o precious lama, Serene Mind, present here in the Desire Realm
out of spontaneous love and unrestrainable compassion.

To your kind lotus feet,
leaving small imprints that guide us to light
on the mud of this foggy mind of ours,
we pay homage, all of us gathered here,
visible and invisible creatures, with languages of words and with languages of sounds,
with languages of gestures and without languages, with and without voice.

We pay homage to you,
precious lama Undisturbable Mind,
you who give breath to those who have no more breath,
eyes to those who believe they have no eyes,
ears to those who believe they have no ears.

Lama of inexpressible transcending knowledge,
who has come back once again for us terrestrials,
born on the only snowy mountains
that could support your radiant energy of pure compassion.
You, blessed by the stupa of the buddha Kashyapa,
holder of the lineage of the Buddha Shakyamuni,
lama come from far away in time, from far away in space,
with a tireless determination to liberate every creature
from the six unbearable samsaric chains
All of us here, with joy, praise your astonishing qualities.

We have the incredible fortune to find you again in this life.
After eons of bewilderment, during which you took care of us in thousand ways,
now we have finally thread our neck through the golden ring of the buddhadharma,
that you threw to us in this modern materialistic world,
and we try an extreme water ski behind the speedboat of your skilful means,
to quickly reach the other shore!

Lama Exalted Patience, how can we collect and remember,
in this unbearable time of illusory hours and minutes,
the countless experiences of the creatures that you relieved and relieve from suffering,
with the words of the Buddha Shakyamuni and your powerful loving voice,
a dharani for all the ears?

We label you with the names of ‘lama’ and ‘rinpoche’
not as mere lip service,
but as a childish stuttering of our hearts
that want to express our astonishing meeting
with the shining ocean of the heart-chakra of your mind,
manifested to us through your body and voice…

You manifest to our eyes the perfection of prayer,
that spreads out in such a powerful way from the indivisible non dual nature of your Love,
such to make believable the unbelievable to our rational mind.

You appear with a frowning face that terrorises us in silence,
and makes us immediately think to all the faults we made to the buddhahood that sleeps

within us.

The moment after you laugh, with your teeth white and regular like a nirmanakaya,
and give us the intoxicating certainty of being truly loved by you…
so, we can immediately rest in the peaceful moon of your roundish face
and become tenderly aware of our true nature.

At your lotus feet we can breath and look around,
where you show us from were we escaped and are escaping:
from the unbearable suffering, our own and of our kin, humans and non-humans.
With the luminous knowledge of your heart, Lama Rinpoche,
you give strength to our heart, our intelligence and our arms,
and show us the numberless possibilities of expressing love and compassion,
walking along the path to buddhahood:
therefore, Lama Rinpoche, never leave us, live long among us, ferry us across to enlightenment.

We got lost in the maze of this degenerated time,
burying the spark of our own loving understanding
in the illusions of the material seductions,
but with this precious human body we can become
the thousand arms of the Buddha of Compassion:
therefore, Lama Rinpoche, never leave us, live long among us, ferry us across to enlightenment.

You don’t look terrestrial: you know the suffering of others
like a dagger in your heart, but this doesn’t frighten you, doesn’t make you blind.
In the ocean of samsaric pain that spreads onto this planet,
you multiply the mudras of compassion with your copperlike fingers
and descend from the lotus of your mandala of meditation to radiate your tangible help:
therefore, Lama Rinpoche, never leave us, live long among us, ferry us across to enlightenment.

Your activities cause a rain of light nectar on the burning sufferings of this Desire Realm,
for humans and animals, visible and invisible beings.
All the wealth you receive you give to others:
the concrete enterprises that you started in this world, East and West,
protect many living beings from the sufferings of hunger, thirst and being killed,
support the holders of the Buddha lineage, the teachers, the meditators, the monastic and lay

sangha,

spread in thousand ways the indestructible truths of the Dharma,
with the skilful means that teach the path to liberation according to the different inclinations of

the sentient beings:

therefore, Lama Rinpoche, never leave us, live long among us, ferry us across to enlightenment.

Your inspiring energy wakens us to the Dharma practice
And in your mandala the virtuous actions
Dispel the fogs of ignorance of your disciples and students:
may all this stir up an ocean of causes and conditions
that will fulfil all your wishes.

And as a sign of these fulfilled wishes, may finally arise,
in the place where Buddha Shakyamuni left the traces of his physical body and parinirvana,
a triumphant statue of Buddha Maitreya,
source of relief and liberation from the sufferings of hunger, thirst and ingorance
of the human beings of all castes,
of all races and religions of India and the world,
source of liberation from the sufferings of the beings of the six realms,
now and in the centuries to come.

We pray, Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche, that through your golden words all the sutras of the Buddha
may be impressed in our hearts in their authentic meaning,
and that all of us may become living witnesses of the truth of the Dharma.
Therefore, precious Lama, never leave us, live long…
And gather us often, more often, very often, all around you.

Colophon: This praise has been composed at Lama Tzong Khapa Institute by the upasika Adalia Samten Telara, upon request by Ven. Joan Nicell, little before the sunrise of September 29, 2004, for the Long Life Puja offered to Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche at the end of the retreat on the Guru Yoga of Lama Tzong Khapa. All the merits of these words go to the inspiring energy that Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche has emanated during this month of retreat in Pomaia, through His teachings and His presence, and to the warm closeness of so many practitioners.

Simultaneously translated into English during the Puja by Maurizio Cacciatore, who eventually translated it in a more accurate way.

Long Life Prayer for Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche

Oh, laughing yogin, unpredictable in manifestations –
Sporting as many-faceted diamond reality rays’ radiation,
Spreading the light of awakening spirit in all directions,
Filling all continents with inexhaustible loving activity’s actions,
Nurturing children-disciples in mother-bird fashion,
Beloved kind Teacher, remain with us, please,
As long as all beings exist!

Composed and offered by Margarita Kojevnikova on behalf of the FPMT family, CPMT 2004.

Supplication Requesting Enlightenment for All Sentient Beings

You, our guru, sole refuge of all sentient beings,
Are the living emanation of Lama Tsong Khapa.
Embodiment of the compassion of Chenrezig,
The wisdom of Manjushri and the power of Vajrapani,
Please, please live long.

Through your manifest relationship with our beloved Lama Yeshe—
Whose kindness, like yours, is greater than that of the three time buddhas
And even more impossible to repay—
You showed us the way to practice guru devotion, the root of the path.

How fortunate we are! Precious guru, please, please live long!

Through your example and teachings you show us the essence
Of the perfect human rebirth: what it is, how difficult it is to find and
And how to make it highly meaningful every second of the day and night.

How fortunate we are! Precious guru, please, please live long!

Through your example and teachings you show us the basis of renunciation:
Life is short and constantly getting shorter;
Death is definite but the time of its arrival is most uncertain; and
The suffering of the three lower realms is unbelievably unbearable.
Since we have not practiced the Dharma you have taught,
We are sure to be born there but you have given us hope by
Showing us how to take Mahayana refuge in the Three Jewels—
Buddha, Dharma and Sangha—for the sake of all sentient beings, and
How to follow karma by avoiding the ten non-virtues and keeping purely
The pratimoksha vows.

How fortunate we are! Precious guru, please, please live long!

Through your example and teachings you clarify the four noble truths—
Suffering, its cause, its cessation and the path—the twelve links and
The profound Prasangika Madhyamaka view of emptiness, leading us to
Liberation from the beginningless sufferings of the six realms of samsara.

How fortunate we are! Precious guru, please, please live long!

Through your example and teachings and inconceivable compassionate actions,
You are the personification of bodhicitta,
Working tirelessly, 24/7, for the enlightenment of all sentient beings,
Showing us, your disciples, how to make every moment of our
Perfect human rebirth most meaningful by vanquishing the enemy,
The self-cherishing mind.

How fortunate we are! Precious guru, please, please live long!

Your infinite, holy mind, reaching far beyond our limited conceptions,
Allows you to see a 500-foot Maitreya statue that will,
For millennia to come, benefit countless future generations, and call
Maitreya Buddha himself to descend soon after the end of this age of
The five degenerations, when the present Buddha’s teachings have long since gone.
Permitting us to join you in this project allows us to create more merit than
All the atoms in as many triple worlds as grains of sand in the Pacific.

How fortunate we are! Precious guru, please, please live long!

Rinpoche, the secret is out! Everybody now knows that you are, in reality,
Guru Vajradhara, offering us the crown jewel of
Guru Shakyamuni Buddha’s holy Dharma—the Vajrayana—through which
We can attain enlightenment in one short lifetime of this degenerate time.

How fortunate we are! Precious guru, please, please live long!

From our hearts, we, your disciples, thank you for leading us
By the example of your peerless actions,
By giving us teachings, vows and initiations,
By allowing us to create merit in a thousand different ways,
By serving you, the FPMT and all the precious mother sentient beings,
When otherwise we would be lost in the quicksand of samsara,
Wasting this rebirth that our previous lives worked so hard to create.

How fortunate we are! Precious guru, please, please live long!

Please live long, remain with us and continue to guide us in all future lives.
May all sentient beings come under your loving care,
And may all receive the supreme happiness of buddhahood
Without another moment’s delay.

How fortunate we are! Precious guru, please, please live long!

This supplication for the long life of the vajra guru Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche was written by his devoted student Nicholas Ribush at the request of the learned Massimo Corona, executive director of FPMT, Inc., on the occasion of a long life puja offered Rinpoche at the conclusion of the CPMT held at Maitreya Institute, Emst, Netherlands, 30 August 2004.

For the long life of our unfailing refuge Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche

Your holy body is a wish-fulfilling jewel, unceasingly giving without break
Your holy speech, elixir granting all requests, brings all beings to perfect and complete happiness
Your holy mind, one with all of the Buddhas of the ten directions, quickly leads suffering sentient beings to the state beyond sorrow

Lama overflowing with virtuous qualities, please live long

Your radiant smile quickly chases sorrow from the hearts of sentient beings
Your loving laugh cuts all concepts, soothing our sorrowful hearts
Your holy cough is a lion’s roar, shaking the slumbering mountains, swiftly awakening all sentient beings from the deep sleep of ignorance

Lama who selflessly gives all virtuous qualities, please live long

Your boundless compassion towards all is inexhaustible, tirelessly caring, as does a mother for her child
Your sweet enchanting voice is like a rain of nectar, blissfully washing the six suffering realms with your all encompassing wisdom and Bodhicitta
Your knowledge of sutra and tantra is mind blowing, imparting stainless understanding upon all who take heed

Lama emanating in whatever way will subdue, please live long

Your wisdom beyond comprehension is a vast ocean of pure and perfect treasures
Your incredible qualities are stainless, the true sign of a great yogi
Your boundless love towards all rides upon every single precious breath you take

Lama devoid of even a single self cherishing thought, please live long

Your teachings are like an endless sky, breathtaking and inspiring, always new at every moment
Your unbelievably extensive dharma activities are limitless, benefiting all sentient beings without rest
Your constant guidance is like a golden rope, patiently waiting for all beings to take up the line

Lama our greatest hope for making life meaningful, please live long

Lama our wise and loving friend, please live long
Doctor, doctor, great doctor, please live long
Oh most compassionate and kind loving father, please live long…

Written with much devotion by the Mitukpa retreat participants Milarepa Center, Vermont, August -September 2002.

With folded palms and heartfelt gratitude in our mind, to you – our Most Precious Guru, Kyabje Thubten Zopa Rinpoche we prostrate. Words from our limited mind can never rightly and adequately praise the holy body, speech and mind of a holy being whose essence is inseparable from the victorious all-pervading Vajradhara. Not even praises one could possibly gather from all over the world. So Rinpoche, please bear with us when we read the following prayer of praises to you, the holder of complete teaching lineage of the Buddha.

W We can never break the bonds of our own delusion or kick karmic habits accumulated from the beginning-less of time. The feat of buddhas of the past clearly could not reach us sentient beings of these degenerated times. But now we can listen to Buddha’s teaching through the kindness of our Guru. You are courageous in that you intentionally come in human aspect to liberate us from the beginning-less cycle of life, death and rebirth. You are also compassionate in that you make firm resolution to help without exception all sentient beings who are lazy, selfish, deeply drowned in worldly dharmas. It is only through you and by you that we can now receive, study and practise Buddha Dharma, especially the pure teachings of the second Buddha, Lama Tsong Khapa. This can happen only because of you.

Who else could have penetrated through the thick clouds of our dualistic concepts for this life, our self-cherishing thought and self-grasping thoughts? Who else, if not you, could have shown us the way to pure, authentic Buddha’s teachings. It is because of you and the Late Lama Thubten Yeshe together compassionately and courageously with clear and farsighted wisdom, established The Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition, an international organization consisting of monasteries, nunneries, retreat centers, meditation centers, social service centers, schools, publications and free meals for thousands of the Sangha . The list goes on and on in your menu for benefiting sentient beings. The most mind blowing and inspiring work is the Meitreya Project. How can we find more significant than all these dharma activities?

These are the ways the Buddhas are acting for the benefit of all mother sentient beings. Understanding this, we have no doubt you are a true manifestation of the enlightened being. The compassion, wisdom and power of all the Buddhas find expression through your physical aspect you have courageously adopted for the sake of all mother sentient beings. With great patience, you are guiding and guarding us through the stages of the Path, from guru devotion up to the final Union, the non-dual wisdom of bliss and emptiness. You are the most precious gem that we can possibly get in our life. What can we ever find more precious than this priceless gift of yours?

To most practitioners, it is only through you and FPMT connections that they are able to learn and practise Dharma along the Gelupa lineage. Not only that, to those practitioners who like to shop around and pick their gurus on their way to liberation, they can do all that because of your kindness, directly and indirectly. Rinpoche, truly kind in all aspects, if you had not established the FPMT organization and if you had not created Dharma Centers in all 10 directions, people who like to shop around gurus and centers would not even have heard the name of gurus at all. How can anyone demonstrate the teaching on guru devotion more vivid and potent than you?

You are the only one who can wake us up from a never-ending nightmare in samsara that haunts our mind from the beginning-less of time. Even your laughter teaches us that life is to be happy and we do have every potential to achieve happiness. How can we ever thank you for this incomparable gift of yours?

And now, remembering the ever-changing nature of our existence, the mere thought of you, kind Guru, not being among us, is totally unbearable. You have opened our eyes to see the impermanence of all things that exist. You are teaching us renunciation through the example of your external behavior of simplicity and humility. You have never shown even the slightest concern for the joys of this life. How can we find precious signs like yours?

You are teaching us Bodhicitta as the highest happiness through your unmistaken and spontaneous attitude of only cherishing and benefiting others. How can anyone replace you and your invaluable teaching on the gradual path to enlightenment?

You are showing us the correct meaning of Nagarjuna and Lama Tsong Khapa’s view with your powerful teachings, stemming out of your direct experience, that is, oneness with nondual wisdom and bliss. How can we find any gurus like you?

Moved by the power of the truth of these words, the power of the three jewels, and the power of dependent arising and now with our eyes filled with tears, we sincerely pray for your long life for the sake of all mother sentient beings.

Please, Rinpoche, please live long until all the sufferings of sentient beings end.

Praises to Lama Zopa Rinpoche recited at the Long life Puja in Hong Kong, March 2002.

PRAYER OF PRAISE AND REQUESTS TO OUR MOST PRECIOUS SPIRITUAL MASTER,
KYABJE ZOPA RINPOCHE

Most precious holy Guru, our compassionate virtuous friend, who is more kind and

helpful to us than all the Buddhas of the past, present and future,
Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche,

Embodiment of all the holy objects of refuge who protect sentient beings

from the sufferings of samsara,

Manifestation of the perfect wisdom, great compassion and skilful means of

all the Enlightened Beings,

Supreme field for the accumulation of the vast merits we need to attain full

awakening from the sleep of ignorance,

We the fortunate disciples from many countries around the world, east and west, who

have gathered in Bodhgaya to receive the empowerment of Kalachakra in the 12th
month of the year of the Iron-Snake (Jan., 2002), with great devotion and respect,
humbly request Your compassionate attention.

The mere sight of Your holy body, adorned with all the marks and signs of a

Buddha, brings peace to our minds,

Your eloquent speech, clarifying the meaning of the profound and

extensive teachings of the Buddha, subdues the wild confusion of
our minds,

Your holy mind, inseparable from the minds of all Enlightened Beings, is

endowed with infinite realizations and excellences –

Mindful of these inconceivable qualities, we prostrate to You with devotion

with our body, speech and mind.

We present to You extensive Samantabhadra clouds of the most beautiful

and pleasing offerings found in the worlds of humans and devas:
the cool, sweet water of insight, the fragrant flowers of knowledge, the
incense of morality, the radiant light of wisdom, the perfume of patience,
the delicious food of samadhi, the melodious music of songs of praise;

We also offer our wealth and enjoyments, our body, speech and mind, our

virtues collected over the three times, and our sincere practice of the
path to enlightenment for the benefit of all living beings.

With heartfelt regret we confess all our negative actions of body, speech and

mind committed in this and former lives

Under the influence of ignorance, self-cherishing, attachment, anger and

other afflictive emotions,

As well as transgressions of the three kinds of vows,
And especially whatever mistaken actions we may have done, knowingly or

unknowingly, in relation to our holy Gurus, and any behaviour which disturbed the
Guru’s holy mind,

And we promise to do our very best to abandon these actions from this time
onwards.

Through Your study, meditation, teaching and writing, You preserve and

disseminate the entire doctrine of the Buddha, thus benefitting all
beings throughout space;

Many thousands of people throughout the world, both Buddhist and

non-Buddhist, have been touched by Your example and teaching of
compassion, loving-kindness, generosity, patience, and the entire path to full,
perfect awakening, and have had their hearts opened to the potential that lies
within —

We rejoice in Your extensive and inspiring deeds that are so immeasurably
beneficial to the Dharma and to sentient beings.

The sublime, holy Dharma taught by the Buddha is more precious than

all the riches in the universe.

It is the sole remedy to suffering and its causes— delusions and karma—
The only means of escape from the wheel of death and rebirth,
The one path leading to the perfect peace and bliss of enlightenment;
We thus request You to continuously teach the profound and extensive

Dharma in various ways according to the minds of living beings.

Your presence in the world is of infinite benefit to countless beings:
You teach and guide us in the means of abandoning suffering and attaining

liberation and full, perfect Enlightenment, as well as the means to achieve
greater peace, happiness and satisfaction in this and future lives,

Therefore, from the depths of our hearts we request You to have a

stable life until the end of samsara.

We dedicate all the virtues created by ourselves and all other beings, in this

life and in all previous lives from beginningless time,

That we will never be separated from You, our kind compassionate Spiritual

Friend,

And will always come under Your care and guidance in all our future lives

until we achieve full enlightenment for the benefit of all living beings.

* * * * * * * * * *

Rinpoche, You are like a great bright warm sun of wisdom and

compassion

Illuminating the darkness and confusion of these degenerate times,
Illuminating our minds enabling us to see our Buddha nature,
Illuminating the path that we need to follow in order to actualize this

potential.

Just seeing Your radiant face and joyful, compassionate smile, soothes the

pain and brings light and hope in the minds of us sentient beings.

Seeing Your holy form, adorned with the saffron robes of a fully-ordained

monk, inspires us to emulate Your pure way of life.

We never grow weary of hearing the sound of Your beautiful and powerful

voice, which expresses the truth of Dharma in clear, simple and practical

ways.

Rinpoche, Your life is unbelievably beneficial to numberless beings, in immeasurable

ways—these are difficult to fathom, even more difficult to describe, but I will

mention a few that appear to my extremely limited mind:

Due to your kindness, in the FPMT there are 145 Dharma centers, study groups, retreat centers, monasteries, Dharma publishing companies, schools and social service projects such as hospices. You arrange for the most highly-qualified and pure-minded Geshes and Lamas to come and teach in the centers, so that students can learn the entire path of Sutra and Tantra. Through these centers and projects, many thousands of people have been able to learn the Dharma and how to practice it, and in this way have been able to achieve greater happiness and peace of mind and have made their lives truly meaningful. They have learned how to avoid creating the causes of suffering in the lower realms and samsara in general, how to purify whatever causes of sufferings they created in the past, how to create the causes of happiness, up to the ultimate happiness of liberation and enlightenment, and therefore become beneficial for all sentient beings.

People can learn about Buddhism from reading books or even from the web, but through these means alone, qualities such as compassion, loving-kindness, bodhicitta, wisdom, generosity and patience remain mere words, mere intellectual concepts. But these qualities become alive, three-dimensional, and real, when they meet fully-qualified spiritual masters such as Yourself, Rinpoche, Who manifests these qualities in everything You do and every word You speak.

This is particularly true when it comes to compassion. Your compassion is like the sun—always shining,

without discrimination, on all beings everywhere, even tiny insects. Another extraordinary quality that really touches our hearts and fills us with inspiration is Your genuine humility. As an example of this, You do not simply sit on the throne and tell us what we should do but You come and down and practise with us, teaching us through Your example about the importance of purifying through such practices as prostrations to the 35 Buddhas, and creating merit through practices such as making extensive offerings.

You have founded so many projects which are of benefit to so many beings (and which also provide Your students with the opportunity to create extensive merits by practicing generosity and overcoming miserliness and attachment). These projects include:

• providing meals for the monks of Sera-je Monastery
• supporting Geshes and teachers of the main Gelugpa monasteries
• supporting non-Tibetan monks, nuns and meditators
• building stupas and prayers wheels
• bringing Dharma to countries where it once flourished but later declined, such as Mongolia and China
• last but certainly not least, the Maitreya Project, which includes constructing a statue of the next Buddha, Maitreya, the embodiment of the loving-kindness of all the Buddhas, the purpose of which is to bring peace and happiness to the world. The project also includes a hospital and school which will provide immediate benefit to the local community.

Rinpoche, it is difficult to find the words to express our appreciation for all that

You have done for us and for all mother sentient beings, but from the very depths
of our hearts we thank You for all Your kindness, and we sincerely request that
You have a stable life until samsara ends. And because Your life is so unbelievably
precious to everyone in the world, please please take care of Your health.

Although it is impossible for us to fully repay Your kindness, we will

attempt to do so by practising to the best of our ability Your teachings
and advice,

Especially to live in accordance with pure ethics, to practise loving-kindness,

compassion and bodhicitta, to work on subduing our minds and
to cultivate the correct view of emptiness.

We also commit ourselves to doing our very best to fulfill Your holy wishes and

To serve You in Your extraordinary work and projects.

Sarva Mangalam

Composed by Ven. Sangye Khadro, January 2002.

All Gurus, Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, Dakas and Dakinis, Please draw close and bear witness to my heartfelt supplication. Please bestow your blessings.

Dearest and Supreme Refuge, Jetsun Lama Thubten Zopa Rinpoche, We prostrate to your lotus feet, with the infinite bodies of all our parents.

Dearest and Supreme Refuge, we offer in the nature of bliss and void, countless universes full of all the enjoyments of gods and humans.

Dearest and Supreme Refuge, from beginning less lives, we have been tossed here and there by our delusions and karma, in all forms of miserable existences.

But now we have found you, Lama, glorious Buddha of the Lapis Land.

Dearest and Supreme Refuge, you are inseparable from the vast inconceivable Wisdom Mind of all the Buddhas.

Dearest and Supreme Refuge, you are supreme bliss, peace and satisfaction.

Dearest and Supreme Refuge, you are ultimate compassion manifesting in myriad emanations.

How wonderful to have found you, who displays all the qualities and activities of the three kayas, appearing in the form of a very humble monk.

Using your holy body, speech and mind to lead all sentient beings to Enlightenment you circle the earth countless times. It is truly amazing to contemplate your wondrous holy works:

• Establishing Monasteries and Nunneries
• Offering food to thousands of Sangha in India
• Returning the Dharma to Mongolia
• Pacifying minds and hearts and environments by propagating the building of thousands of Stupas and Prayer Wheels
• Creating endless merit for your students, the world and all beings with the thousands of Pujas that you sponsor
• Providing education, support and guidance to Venerable Lama Osel Rinpoche
• Directing and Guiding the Dharma activities of over 130 Mahayana Centres of study retreat, healing and publishing
• Translating texts, writing many books and commentaries, perfectly preserving the pure tradition of Lama Tsongkhapa
• And courageously undertaking the most extraordinary feat of building a 500 ft statue of Maitreya Buddha in India! This is a most awesome example of magnificent Guru devotion.

Just one of these great deeds would be supremely outstanding for a simple humble monk. But you, dearest and Supreme Refuge, proficiently manage even more than all these wondrous works for sentient beings. It is inconceivable to imagine all this sublime merit. It is surely infinite, such skies of merit, and completely empty of inherent existence! Wow!

Yet, somehow, dearest and Supreme Refuge, you still have time for all us students from all over the world! How is that possible? Surely, it is only your perfect practice of Dharma. What a truly marvelous example of Refuge!

If not for you dearest and Supreme Refuge, we would be in the hells by now. But you compassionately protect with nectar-like teachings and demonstrate your perfect example of patience, even when we constantly fail to practice or follow your advice.

If not for you dearest and Supreme Refuge, we would be in the Preta realm by now. So kindly you explain the golden aspirations and practices of a Bodhisattva and always cherish each of us with the greatest of care and love, even though we constantly cultivate bias with attachment and aversion.

If not for you, dearest and Supreme Refuge, we would be in the animal realm by now. But relentlessly you remind us of emptiness and your immaculate behavior of abandoning the eight worldly worries inspires us, even though we refuse to give up this life.

Dearest and Supreme Refuge, who else would stay up all night with us? And after we have flooded your lap with our tears of self-cherishing, or vomited poisonous passions of attachment and aversion, or exploded our verbal diarrhea of pitiful petty selfish concerns, you, kindest Lama, the ultimate mother, gently and lovingly wipe away our evil thoughts and sooth our troubled hearts with the wisdom nectar of all the Buddhas.

Dearest and Supreme Refuge, Jetsun Lama, as the source of the three jewels; how would we know anything if not for you?

And when we take our first steps toward Enlightenment, with your great compassion, you encourage us tenderly with praise, gifts and gentle advice.

Your jokes and laughter destroy the shackles of our closed minds and open our hearts to the true freedom from suffering.

With the precision of the ultimate surgeon, you remove the tumors of our wrong views that produce all the ill habits and endless pain.

Dearest and Supreme Refuge, how else would we know and develop the three principal aspects of the path, if not for you?

Dearest and Supreme Refuge, who else would take us by the hand into the mandala of the deities, if not for you?

Dearest and Supreme Refuge, how else would we approach, practice and accomplish the two stages of Tantra, if not for you?

Dearest and Supreme Refuge, reverently, in the presence of the whole assembly of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, Dakas, Dakinis and Protectors, gods and humans please listen closely.

It would be the worst disaster for us students to lose you.

It would be the most tragic day in the history of the world to lose you.

Please live long, please live long, please please live long.

Dearest and Supreme refuge, you know our every thought, please bless us to completely unify with every pore of your holy body, speech and mind.

Please remain as our supreme guide and protector, our Supreme Refuge, until we reach the highest most complete Enlightenment.

Please honored assembly pour your blessings on us struggling students to always keep our Samaya pure, so that we may never loose our dearest and Supreme Refuge.

Please honored assembly, bestow your infinite blessings that, Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche will remain until Samsara ends and that all his wishes will be fulfilled immediately forever.