(Address given by Tulku Yeshi Rinpoche at the 50th Anniversary of H.H. Dagchen Rinpoche’s and H.E. Dagmo Kusho’s arrival in America. Sakya Monastery, Seattle, October 16, 2011)
To my dear Gurus, H. H. Dagchen Rinpoche and H.E. Dagmokusho, and to my dear dharma sisters and brothers:
Today is a very special day for all of us. We are gathered in celebration of Dagchen Rinpoche’s and Dagmokusho’s having thus far given fifty years of their precious lives to increasing the buddha-dharma throughout the world, and especially for their having established this center, the Sakya Monastery of Seattle.
From this temple and from your teachings, how many people have found themselves, and have found the precious dharma, and thus have obtained a beautifully altruistic and peaceful life? Many of us have actually achieved certain visualizations and/or realizations which greatlyaid in the generation of love and compassion for all beings, and which produce the wisdom for realization of these world-transforming intentions.
Your teachings and this temple are a beautiful garden which cultivates the flowers of realization among us practitioners. From this garden, thousands of people so far, including myself, have gathered so many of these beautiful realizations and attainments. You two Gurus are like our sun and moon, in the sky of our hearts; continuously you shine out upon us the light of the dharma, like the rising sun or the softly-radiating moon.
This light of the dharma ever-more continually dispels the darkness of our ignorance. Without this light of your teachings, advice, and selfless example, how could we ourselves come to generate the brilliance of each one’s enlightenment, or even the brightness of our liberation, or even the clear mindfulness which leads us to these?
I’ve spent ten years in other monasteries’ schools, and now thirteen years in your Sakya monasteries (the first four years in Nepal, and then nine years here). I believe that I’ve so far become in fact at least halfway a Sakya Practitioner, and I ask only to live another ten years or so, to complete the other half! I feel so fortunate to have been able to serve you, Dagchen Rinpoche and Dagmokusho, and I intend throughout the future to continue to do so, because I know that service for one’s gurus is the essence of the buddha-dharma, the only path for beginners to achieve enlightenment.
Thus, in fact, each of us here can feel proud to be actually walking this noble path of practice and, in particular, service to you two precious Gurus and your beautiful temple here.
Throughout these past five decades of seasons, as we know, there has been, literally and also figuratively, much rain, snow, storms, floods, winds, and so on, but you’ve helped us to endure all of these, since under the guidance of you gurus we’ve been so blessed to be able to work hard, to think carefully, and to prepare for the worst.
In the past nine years alone, since I’ve been here in your Seattle monastery, I’ve seen you two Gurus giving the precious teachings and leading practices for thousands of souls, thirsty and hungry to receive, to follow, and to actualize the potential of the buddha-dharma.
I wish to thank you two, for choosing me to write the most recent versions of your biographies so far. Among all the full-length books I’ve written regarding various dharmic subjects and teachings, these two have been my favorites to write.
We ordinary people in general cannot now see any buddhas other than as they manifest as Guru-lineages. Thus, you two are not only the representions but also the manifestation itself of all the buddhas to us.
For we in this dark age, you are the dual-flamed lamp lighting the way.
For we, having somehow caught the plague of self-cherishing, you are the doctors administering the healing, relieving medicine of selflessness.
For we, trapped on the wrong side of the river from our rescue you have made a huge ferryboat to continually carry masses of us across to our salvation.
For we, lost in the desert of ignorance from our dry self-conceptions, you have made a fruitful oasis where we obtain the refreshing nectar of your wisdom.
So, please, dear Gurus, continue to live a very long life, and continue to carry us along in the flow of your teachings and guidance; a flow as vast and unebbing as the Ganges River, carrying us upon the immense current of the buddha-dharma, here in the West and throughout the whole world, for the benefit of all sentient beings.
We thank you so much, dear Gurus, and we wish you both a very long and even more-rewarding life, while wishing the same for each and every one of each other, and for every sentient being.