H.E. Shechen Rabjam Rinpoche
Shechen Rabjam Rinpoche was born in 1966, as the grandson of Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche. A dream that Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche had one night while staying near the Bodhnath stupa indicated that his grandson was be the combined emanation of the three main lamas from Shechen Monastery who had all perished in Chinese prisons in the early sixties—the previous Shechen Rabjam, Shechen Kongtrul and Shechen Gyaltsap, Gyurme Pema Dorje. This was later confirmed by the Sixteenth Karmapa.
Shechen Rabjam began receiving teachings from his grandfather, who raised him, at the age of three. During twenty-five years, he received teachings and empowerments and attended drupchen with Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche. He first went to the West with him in 1976.
In 1980, when Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche built Shechen Tennyi Dargyeling Monastery in Baudhanath, Kathmandu, Nepal, Shechen Rabjam Rinpoche became its abbot. Shechen Rabjam Rinpoche is the seventh in the line of the Rabjam succession. After Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche passed away in 1991, Shechen Rabjam Rinpoche endeavoured to secure the transmission of his teachings and his vision of Tibetan Buddhist culture. Over the last ten years, Shechen Monastery has been enriched with a shedra, a school for sacred dancing, rituals and chants, a thangka painting school and a medical clinic.