Mongolia | Life of Zanabazar | Second Trip to Tibet

Most traditional accounts do not mention Zanabazar’s trip to Inner Mongolia to met the Dalai Lama in early 1655. Skipping over this episode, they relate instead  that in the summer of 1655 Zanabazar decided to make another trip to Tibet: “. . . I should like to accomplish my pious desire of again making obeisance to the Dalai Lama,” Zanabazar announced, “and especially to the Holy Panchen Vajradhara Lama [Panchen Lama] and hear the initiations and empowerments and so on which I meditated on before.” In preparation for the journey he decided to go into meditation for several months at his newly established retreat of Tövkhon near Erdene Zuu. In the autumn of 1655 he left for Tibet. See Zanabazar’s Second Trip to Tibet.

 Portrait of Zanabazar at Amarbayasgalant Monastery

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Mongolia | Life of Zanabazar | Chapter 5

In late 1649, the Earth Female Buffalo Year of the 11th Rabjung according to the Kalachakra Calendar, Zanabazar would have been fourteen years old, his childhood over and his adolescence about to begin. Since the age of four, when he had been named the Bogd Gegen at Shireet Tsagaan Nuur, he had been taught by the very best religious teachers available in Mongolia, but he must have been aware that if he wished to proceed further on the religious path and aspire to be a leader of Buddhism in Mongolia he would have to continue his studies in Tibet, the wellspring of Buddhism as practiced in Mongolia and the home of the Dalai Lama, the acknowledged leader of the Faith. Thus the decision was made that he should travel to Tibet and meet with the 5th Dalai Lama, Ngawang Lobsang Gyatso . . . Continued.

Zanabazar, First Bogd Gegeen of Mongolia