Authorized to teach

Kyabjé Chhimed Rigdzin Rinpoche teaching with Ngakchang Rinpoche

In Buddhism, you need authorization from your teacher before starting to teach. You can’t just read a bunch of books and declare yourself a teacher when you think you’ve got it figured. This provides some “quality control.”

Ngak’chang Rinpoche, with his wife Khandro Déchen, are the Lineage Lamas (principal teachers) of Aro. Ngak’chang Rinpoche’s teaching has been approved by all his major teachers, and by several other prominent lamas.

• Lama Yeshé Dorje Rinpoche explicitly appointed Ngak’chang Rinpoche as a lama in a proclamation letter.
• Kyabjé Chhimed Rigdzin Rinpoche explicitly appointed Ngak’chang Rinpoche “to give empowerments,” which is the key official function of a lama, in a Foreword. In a letter, he refers approvingly to a student whom Ngak’chang Rinpoche ordained. (Only a lama can do that.) I have received ten eyewitness accounts that he explicitly approved verbally of Ngak’chang Rinpoche’s teaching.
• I have received numerous eyewitness accounts that Kyabjé Künzang Dorje Rinpoche and Jomo Sam’phel explicitly approve Ngak’chang Rinpoche’s teaching as a lama.
• Ngak’chang Rinpoche’s teaching has been described approvingly by several other Tibetan lamas, notably Kyabjé Thinley Norbu Rinpoche and Gyaltsen Rinpoche.

The other Aro lamas are authorized by the Lineage Lamas, with the support of Künzang Dorje Rinpoche and Jomo Sam’phel. Every year or two, a group of Aro lamas and their students visit Künzang Dorje Rinpoche and Jomo Sam’phel in Kathmandu. Künzang Dorje Rinpoche and Jomo Sam’phel have strongly upheld each of the Aro lamas in their teaching role.