Founded by Katok Dampa Deshek Sect Nyingma | Type Tibetan Buddhist Dedicated to Anuyoga | |
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Location Derge, Garzê Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan | ||
Katok Monastery (Tibetan: ཀཿ་ཐོག་རྡོ་རྗེ་གདན་, THL Katok Dorjé Den) is one of the six principal ("mother") monasteries of the Nyingma school of Tibetan Buddhism. It is located in Derge, Sichuan.
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History
Katok Monastery was founded in 1159 by a younger brother of Phagmo Drupa Dorje Gyalpo, Katok Dampa Deshek, at Derge, the historic seat of the Kingdom of Derge in Kham.
Katok Monastery's third abbot, Jampa Bum (1179-1252), whose 26-year tenure as abbot ended in 1252, "is said to have ordained thousands of monks from across Tibet, and especially from Kham region of Minyak (mi nyag), Jang ('byang), and Gyémorong (rgyal mo rong)."
The original gompa fell into disrepair and was rebuilt on the same site in 1656 through the impetus of tertöns Düddül Dorjé (1615–72) and Rigdzin Longsal Nyingpo (1625-1682/92 or 1685–1752).
Katok Monastery held a reputation of fine scholarship. Prior to the annexation of Tibet in 1951, Katok Monastery housed about 800 monks.
Katok was long renowned as a center specializing in the oral lineages (as opposed to terma) and as a center of monasticism, although both of these features were disrupted under Longsel Nyingpo (1625–1692).
According to The Tibetan Buddhist Resource Centre, disciples of Kenpo Munsel and Kenpo Jamyang compiled a Katok edition of the oral lineages (Wylie: bka' ma shin tu rgyas pa (kaH thog)) in 120 volumes in 1999: "[T]wice the size of the Dudjom edition, it contains many rare Nyingma treatises on Mahayoga, Anuyoga, and Atiyoga that heretofore had never been seen outside of Tibet."
According to Alexander Berzin,
Katog has 112 branch monasteries, not only in Tibet, but also in Mongolia, Inner China, Yunnan, and Sikkim. For instance, Katog Rigdzin-tsewang-norbu (Ka:-thog Rigs-‘dzin Tshe-dbang nor-bu) (1698-1755) founded a large branch in Sikkim, and when the Eighth Tai Situ Rinpoche, Situ Panchen Chokyi-jungney (Si-tu Pan-chen Chos-kyi ‘byung-gnas) (1700-1744), visited China, he stayed at the Katog branch-monastery at the Five-Peaked Mountain of Manjushri (Ri-bo rtse-lnga, Chin: Wutai Shan), to the southwest of Beijing.
Anuyoga
Kathog Monastery became a bastion of the Anuyoga tradition when it became neglected by other Nyingmapa institutions. The Compendium of the Intentions Sūtra (Wylie: dgongs pa ’dus pa’i mdo) the root text of the Anuyoga tradition was instrumental in the early Kathog educational system. Nubchen Sangye Yeshe wrote a lengthy commentary on the Compendium of the Intentions Sūtra rendered in English as Armor Against Darkness (Wylie: mun pa’i go cha).