The non-monastic stream of ordination

This assembly of Buddhist practitioners is known as the gö kar chang lo’i dé. Ngakpas or ngakmas (sNgags pa or sNgags ma /mantrin or mantrini) male and female respectively — are non-celibate and non-abstemious ordained practitioners. They wear white raiment - gö kar (gos dKar) - and keep long uncut hair - chang lo (Cang lo). Dé (sDe) means assembly.

Ngakpas and ngakmas are those who take Vajrayana vows in contradistinction to the monastics who take Sutrayana vows. Their lives are thus characterised by transformation rather than renunciation. They are less well known than the monastics — because their practice tends to be unsuited to institutional life — and thus they live in the remoter areas away from towns. They often live as married couples, with children. They are known for high skills in the Arts, for visionary discovery and for ingenuity.

In 1977, His Holiness Dud’jom Rinpoche directed Ngak’chang Chögyam Rinpoche to work to preserve the gö-kar-chang-lo’i-dé, in the West. He has been working to carry out his promise to do so ever since.

The gö-kar-chang-lo’i-dé has been subject to huge political pressure since the end of the first spread of Buddhism in Tibet. In modernity the pressure is such that almost all Tibetan women who practice in this style hide from public gaze, rarely wearing the characteristic white skirt. Many male practitioners also wear the red skirt of the monastic tradition to avoid persecution.

Prior to his passing in 1988, Dud’jom Rinpoche was the head of the Nyingma Tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, and every Nyingma Lama of the mid-late 20th Century revered him as their teacher.