His Holiness the 41st Sakya Gongma Trichen Rinpoche is one of the four heads of the great schools of Tibetan Buddhism and the senior-most living master of the Sakya lineage. He is a direct descendant of the Khön family, which has continuously held the throne of Sakya since the founding of the order in 1073 by Khön Könchog Gyalpo. He is widely regarded as a living embodiment of Manjushri, the bodhisattva of wisdom.
He was enthroned as the 41st Sakya Trizin in 1959 at the age of fourteen, during the most turbulent year in modern Tibetan history. He fled Tibet with his family later that year and re-established the Sakya seat in exile, first at Mussoorie and eventually at Rajpur, near Dehradun, where the Sakya Centre stands today.
In 2017, after sixty years on the throne, he ceremonially transferred the active throne-holdership of the Sakya school to his elder son, HH the 42nd Sakya Trizin Ratna Vajra Rinpoche, while retaining the senior title of Sakya Gongma Trichen — a structural reform that ensures the continuity of the lineage across the generations of the Khön family.
His Holiness is the holder of the complete Lamdré transmission — "the Path and the Fruit" — the heart of the Sakya tradition, derived from the Indian master Virupa. The full Lamdré takes some three months to bestow, and HH the 41st has given it more than fifteen times across his life, including major transmissions in India, Taiwan, Malaysia, and the United States. The Lamdré is paired with the Hevajra tantra; together they form the spine of Sakya practice.
He has given empowerments to virtually every major Tibetan teacher of his generation. He has a particular and famously warm relationship with Nepal, including with Boudhanath Stupa and the Newar Buddhist tradition. His Bodhi Television interview "My Bond with Nepal" is one of the most-watched Vajrayana teachings ever broadcast in Nepal.
Applications for personal time are received through the Office of HH the Gongma Trichen on a biannual cadence. The Sakya tradition treats the audience with the throne-holder as among the rarest of all spiritual occurrences. Wait times are long, and the readiness is everything.
