Poetry Chaikhana
Sacred Poetry from Around the World

Buddhist : Tibetan

19th Century

Tibet
(East Asia)

Shabkar (Shabkar Tsogdruk Rangdrol)

Timeline (1781 - 1851)

Poems by Shabkar (Shabkar Tsogdruk Rangdrol)
Books - Links

Shabkar (Shabkar Tsogdruk Rangdrol), Shabkar (Shabkar Tsogdruk Rangdrol) poetry, Buddhist, Buddhist poetry, Tibetan poetry, poetry, poetry

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Shabkar Tsogdruk Rangdrol, often referred to simply as Shabkar (sometimes transliterated as Shapkar), was born in the Amdo province of northeastern Tibet.

He entered monastic studies at the age of eight. As a youth, he resisted pressure from his family to marry and devoted himself fully to spiritual practice and took full ordination at age 21. While still a young man, he became respected for his scholarship. When Shabkar was 25, he took up the life of a wandering pilgrim and hermit, traveling for the next thirty years to sacred sites and pilgrimage destinations. His life as a wandering ascetic and his songs of spiritual insight became widely known, earning him comparisons with the great wandering Buddhist yogi-poet Milarepa.

Shabkar was a renowned teacher and lineage holder of the Dzogchen tradition.

He was also a nature mystic, conversing with sky and mountain and tree, seeing in them embodiments of teachers and fundamental truths. Like St. Francis of Assisi, he is particularly famous for his love of animals. One of his most widely read works is a treatise on vegetarianism.

Poems by Shabkar (Shabkar Tsogdruk Rangdrol)

	A Song by a Yogi in Solitude
	All sounds are the resonance of voidness
	In the retreat hut that is my own body
	My native land is all lands,
	One must remain in the vastness,
	See how, shaped by the excellence of the path,
	Sky empty and luminous
	The mind has neither color nor form.

Recommended Books

	Food of Bodhisattvas: Buddhist Teachings on Abstaining from Meat, by Shabkar Amazon.com
	The Life of Shabkar: The Autobiography of a Tibetan Yogin, by Shabkar Tsogdruk Rongdrol / Translated by Matthieu Ricard Amazon.com
	Rainbows Appear: Tibetan Poems of Shabkar, Translated by Matthieu Ricard Amazon.com
	Songs of Spiritual Experience: Tibetan Buddhist Poems of Insight & Awakening, Translated by Thupten Jinpa / Translated by Jas Elsner Amazon.com

Related Links:

	Shabkar, Tibetan Buddhist Hermit http://www.hermitary.com/articles/shabkar.html An excellent article outlining Shabkar's life and teachings as a hermit saint.
	Shabkar.Org - On Vegetarianism as Buddhist Way of Life http://www.shabkar.org A website dedicate to vegetarianism within the Buddhist tradition, taking its inspiration from the vegetarian teachings of Shabkar.

Please support the Poetry Chaikhana, as well as the authors and publishers of sacred poetry, by purchasing some of the recommended books through the links on this site. Thank you!

Poetry Chaikhana Sacred Poetry from Around the World

Shabkar (Shabkar Tsogdruk Rangdrol)

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Poetry Chaikhana
Sacred Poetry from Around the World