One of the most important deities in the Sakya tradition is Hevajra, and becoming familiar with Hevajra takes seven to eight months of solitary retreat. After a child receives these teachings, then they go on a retreat to know the deity more fully.
The lama will also pass on the more experiential parts of the teachings, which are only shared in private settings.
A lama will watch the child to see how his or her practice is going, and when the lama feels that the child is ready, they’ll start to receive much more extensive teachings and commentary.
The child is then instructed to do a daily practice where they concentrate on developing and nurturing the deity’s quality in themselves. Each deity is usually considered to have one particular quality. They are given empowerments (in Tibetan, wang), and these empowerments serve as an introduction to a specific deity. Jetsunmas begin studying as children, learning to read Tibetan texts at the age of five or six. What does that training process look like? Since the Khon family has existed for 1,000 years, they’ve developed a detailed process of training. What is unique about the Sakya family is that they’re committed to train both their sons and their daughters to become great religious practitioners and, if they have the abilities and the interest, to become great lamas. The jetsunmas, on the other hand, are usually considered to be emanations of the goddesses Tara and Vajrayogini. Indeed, many of the male members of the Khon family are considered to be bodhisattvas, either of compassion, wisdom, power, or a combination of all three. This all coalesced in the Sakya Khon family. When the great Indian pandita Atisha first saw the land of Sakya, he prophesied that there would be emanations of the different bodhisattvas of compassion, wisdom, and power born there. The founder of the Sakya school, Khon Konchok Gyalpo (1034–1102), had a vision that he had to build a temple on Sakya’s pale earth, so he decided to build Sakya Monastery. Sakya literally means “pale earth,” as the earth in the area is noted for its pale gray color. The second case is more common, as there are only a couple families that pass on the title at birth, the Sakya Khon family and the Nyingma Mindroling Trichen family.Ĭan you share a little about the Sakya Khon family and what’s unique about the Sakya jetsunmas? The Sakyas are a spiritual family that began in the 11th century in a place in Tibet that is now known as Sakya. What is a jetsunma, and how does someone receive the title? Jetsunma is the feminine form of the word jetsun, and it means “one worthy of worship” or “venerable woman.” There are very few women who have this title, and there are two ways to receive it: either someone is born into a particular family and is given the title at birth, or a community or a lama recognizes them as a great practitioner and confers the title. Tricycle sat down with Benard to discuss the extraordinary lives of these women, including two contemporary jetsunmas who are still practicing today how the jetsunmas have grappled with histories of persecution and exile and how they’re shaping the future of the tradition.
This multigenerational collection of biographies is the first book written in English about the Sakya jetsunmas, and it draws extensively from archival research, oral histories, and interviews with living members of the Khon family. In the new book The Sakya Jetsunmas: The Hidden World of Tibetan Female Lamas, scholar Elisabeth Benard brings the stories of these women to light. They have played a pivotal role in the development of the Sakya tradition within Tibetan Buddhism, and yet they often remain nameless in historical accounts of the Khon family lineage. Known as jetsunmas (venerable women), these women begin studying Tibetan at the age of six and train with the highest lamas of their time. Though many of the men within the Khon family are well known, the stories of female adepts are rarely shared. For over a thousand years, the Sakya Khon family has trained both its sons and daughters as great spiritual teachers.
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