After the death of Dakpa Gyaltsen that led to his new birth as a spirit, Dolgyal headed for Tashi Lhunpo Monastery, hoping that the students of Panchen Lobsang Choekyi Gyalsten would accept him as their new protector. However, Vaishravana’s group of eight protectors stopped Dolgyal from entering Tashi Lhunpo Monastery. This is stated in Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche’s commentary on the Eulogy of Dolgyal, a composition of Dakpo Kelsang Khedrup.
In the eulogy, it says thus:
‘After that, although he headed towards Tsang for Tashi Lhunpo,
Due to a sligh occurrence of inauspiciousness,
As if offended, he instantly set out to Sakya.’
In his commentary on this stanza of the eulogy, at the back of page 57, Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche writes thus:
‘As Dakpa Gyaltsen had received many important teachings from Panchen Lobsang Choeki Gyalsten, after his rise as a wrathful being, he went to Panchen Lobsang Choeki Gyalsten with an intention of becoming a protector of Tashi Lhunpo Monastery. However, it appeared to him that Vaishravana’s group of eight protectors, with their hands in a firm clasp, were guarding the pathway of the circumference of Tashi Lhunpo. As this created a slight inauspiciousness and due to the ripening of his latency, on remembering his earlier birth as Jetsun Sakya Pandita, he instantly went to Sakya.’
Here, it clearly states that after Tulku Dakpa Gyaltsen’s birth as a wrathful spirit, unable to enter Tashi Lhunpo, he went to Sakya. At Sakya, when he met with Dakchen Sonam Rinchen [the hierarchal head of Sakya tradition] who asked him who he was, Dolgyal candidly confessed, ‘I am the perilous spirit of Gedenpa [Gelukpa]’.
This is stated in Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche’s Priliminary Supplement to the Life-Entrusting Initiation of Shugden:
“When Dakchen Sonam Rinchen was giving a teaching on the precious instruction [Sung Ngak Rinchen], there was a rainfall of pebbles [or stones] in the night, and some experienced the influence of a spell. In Sakchen’s [Dakchen of Sakya] dream, as he saw a person in a monastic appearance with many eyes at the Tsechen Temple, he asked him who he was. To that, the being replied:
‘I am the perfidious spirit of Gedenpa with strained commitments’ [Nya Gedenpai Damsri Kho Yin]”
This confession is also mentioned in Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche’s Commentary to Dolgyal’s Eulogy at the front of Tibetan page no. 58.
Although the claim of Tulku Dakpa Gyaltsen’s being of the same mental continuum with Sakya Pandita is debatable if he were not the true reincarnation of Panchen Sonam Dakpa as was stated by the Great 5th Dalai Lama, this story of his confession has its own source; it is also mentioned in the biography of Dakchen Sonam Rinchen. His biography The Display of Magical Feats Which are the Sources of the Four Kinds [of Prosperity] was written by his son Sachen Kunga Lodroe. On page 354 of this biography which is now compiled within the ‘Cha’ section of Lamdre Series, it states thus:
“As he retired to his room in the monastic seat, in his dream, my lord father whose name was Ratna [a sankrit term for Rinchen in Tibetan] was wearing an attire of Zahor and sitting on a very high throne. Displayed in his front was a sun and a moon, and he looked very majestic. By offering three precious objects atop the mandala offering, at the door step of the Tsechen Temple, with blood, pus and so forth drippling from his body, a monk who had eyes all around his body, said that although things are basically fine, heal the perfidious spirit of Gedenpa [another term for Gelukpa].”
Dolgyal’s nature of being a perfidious spirit with strained commitments who nurtures sentiments of antagonism against the Geluk [Gedenpa] was not only accepted by Dolgyal himself, but is also consistent with the statements of His Holiness the Great 5th Dalai Lama in many of his writings. In the attestation that he wrote at the time of performing wrathful exorcism against Dolgyal and his group of evil followers, His Holiness the 5th Dalai Lama wrote thus:
‘The so-called Drakpa Gyaltsen pretends to be a sublime being, although he is not,
And since this demonic spirit of strained commitments and distorted prayers
Is harming everything – both the Dharma and sentient beings –
Never be his refuge protection, and support, but grind him to dust.’
