Karma Triyana Dharmachakra

Karma Triyana Dharmachakra (KTD) is the North American seat of His Holiness the 17th Gyalwang Karmapa, Ogyen Trinley Dorje, head of the 900-year-old Karma Kagyu lineage of Tibetan Buddhism and guide to millions of Buddhists around the world.

His Holiness the 17th Gyalwang Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje is the head of the 900 year old Karma Kagyu Lineage and guide to millions of Buddhists around the world. Currently, the Karmapa resides in his temporary home at Gyuto Monastery in after making a dramatic escape from Tibet in the year 2000. Karma Triyana Dharmachakra is his North American seat.

A Brief Biography

As the Karmapa born in the late 20th century, it is the task of the Seventeenth Karmapa to bring spiritual teachings nurtured in the mountain hermitages of Tibet fully into the era of globalization, when those teachings are so urgently needed. To do so, on June 19, 1985, the reincarnation lineage of the Karmapas took form for the seventeenth time, with the birth of a young boy in Tibet. As he had indicated in his previous life as the Sixteenth Gyalwang Karmapa, His Holiness the Seventeenth Karmapa was born in eastern Tibet, to a mother named Lolaga and a father named Döndrup. For the first years of his childhood, the Gyalwang Karmapa shared his family’s simple nomadic life in a remote and rugged corner of Tibet’s high plateau. When he was just seven years old, a search party arrived at his family’s camp. Following the detailed instructions of the letter written by his previous incarnation, the Sixteenth Karmapa, the party was able to locate the young Karmapa. The child’s identification as the Karmapa was verified not only by Tai Situ Rinpoche, Goshir Gyaltsap Rinpoche and many other major Karma Kagyu lamas, but also by His Holiness the Dalai Lama.

His Holiness returned with the search party to Tsurphu Monastery in central Tibet, where he was enthroned and given his initial monastic ordination. He thereafter commenced the process of study and training traditional for Karmapas, yet began offering spiritual instruction to others almost at once. His first public teaching, given at Tsurphu in Tibet when he was just eight years old, was attended by over 20,000 people. However, the major Karma Kagyu lineage holders were denied permission to enter Tibet to transmit the essential instructions of the lineage to him, a situation that constituted an insurmountable obstacle to his functioning fully as Karmapa in the world. When the young Karmapa found his situation in Tibet intolerable, at the age of 14, he escaped from Tibet to, seeking freedom to fulfill his role as a world spiritual leader and to meet his responsibilities as head of the Karma Kagyu lineage.

Crossing the Himalayas by jeep and on horseback, on foot and by helicopter, Gyalwang Karmapa reached Dharamsala,, on January 5, 2000. There, he was received warmly by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, with whom the Gyalwang Karmapa has since continued to enjoy a close relationship of mentor and protégé. During the 15 years he has lived in as a refugee, the Gyalwang Karmapa has undergone a traditional monastic training and philosophical education, while also pursuing a private modern education. His Holiness receives tens of thousands of visitors each year from all over the world at his residence in Dharamsala. Since 2004, he has led the Kagyu Monlam Chenmo, an annual winter Dharma gathering in Bodhgaya that draws thousands of attendees from many different Buddhist traditions around the world.

In May 2008, His Holiness made his first long-awaited trip to the West, traveling to the United States where he visited many spiritual centers under his guidance. This was followed by a second visit to the U.S. in 2011. In 2014, he visited Europe for the first time, teaching to massive crowds in Berlin and near his European seat of Kamalashila in Germany. When His Holiness spoke at a TED conference in Bangalore in 2009, he became the youngest person ever to do so. In January 2010 in Bodhgaya, 12,000 people attended the live performance of a play he wrote and produced on the life of Milarepa, combining elements of traditional Tibetan opera and modern theatre.