“Praise to the Lotus Born- a Verse Garland of Waves of Devotion” by Khenpo Tsewang Dongyal Rinpoche

In 1972 a 21-year old Nyingmapa Buddhist monk was recovering from tuberculosis in a clinic in Switzerland. Turning his mind to Guru Padmasambhava known to Tibetans as the second Buddha he wrote these poems in a mere three days. Praise to the Lotus Born is a verse biography of Guru Padmasambhava who along with Khenchen Shantarakshita and King Trisong Deutsen founded Tibetan Buddhism. Scholars kings and queens sweep through these pages against a backdrop of philosophy, ritual, myth and magic. With the poems are notes containing Khentrul’s lively commentaries which capitvate and enlighten the reader.

These poems of praise express the author’s wonderment at the power, beauty, wisdom and compassion of the buddhas and other great beings.  The verses bring readers closer to liberation because the poems themselves are blessings that inspire devotion and meritorious action.  On a deeper level, they reveal that these enlightened beings are actually reflections of our higher, unobscured minds.

His Holiness Dudjom Rinpoche, Supreme Head of the Nyingma School of Tibetan Buddhism from 1961 to 1987, praised the poems, saying they would stand as a “stone monument to Orgyen Padmasambhava.”

Khentrul Tsewand Dongyal Rinpoche, a tulku of the Nyingma school of Tibetan Buddhism, is a teacher and co-founder with his brother, Khenchen Palden Sherab Rinpoche, of the international Padmasambhava Buddhist Centers, and has published numerous scholarly, philosophical and poetical works.  Hardcover 192 pages.