Mastering the Six-Session Guru Yoga

An illuminating commentary on a bedrock Geluk daily practice by one of the most venerated contemporary teachers of Tibetan Buddhism, accompanied by essential supplementary materials.

Six-session guru yoga is a succinct but comprehensive daily practice that supports practitioners in keeping the commitments of anuttarayoga tantra, or highest yoga tantra: the three sets of vows (those of individual liberation, of the bodhisattva, and of tantra) and the pledges of the five buddha families. In less than thirty short verses, the root text encompasses the breadth of these requirements.

Originally composed by Panchen Losang Chokyi Gyaltsen, the fourth Panchen Lama, the root text was then polished by the incredibly influential Geluk lama Phabongkha Dechen Nyingpo (1878–1941). Choden Rinpoche was his direct disciple, and his extensive commentary on his teacher’s text forms the heart of this book.

This is supplemented with supportive materials such as excerpts from commentaries by Akhu Sherap Gyatso (1803–75) and Khenchen Namkha Tenkyong (1799–?), an oral commentary by Khen Rinpoche Geshe Gyalten, rich explanations of the vows, illuminating commentaries on the eight-line praises specifically, metered translations of the texts to support recitation, and much more, making this a truly invaluable resource for the anuttarayoga practitioner.

His Eminence Choden Rinpoche was born in eastern Tibet on the fifteenth day of Saka Dawa in 1930 and was recognized as a young boy as the reincarnation of the previous Choden Rinpoche. When he was fifteen, he enrolled at Sera Je monastic college, where he excelled; he completed all the study necessary for the highest degree of geshe lharampa and was chosen as a debate partner for the Fourteenth Dalai Lama when His Holiness was taking his geshe exams. After the Chinese takeover of Tibet, Rinpoche entered solitary retreat, in which he stayed for nineteen years. In 1985 the Dalai Lama asked him to leave Tibet to teach in India and Nepal. He taught students in the geshe program at Sera Je for many years, as well as offering teachings all over the world. He passed away in 2015.