Qualla: Yerpa

Yerpa: Introduction

Thu, 26 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Original text: I took this photo myself in 1993. John Hill 9:06, 28 January 2007 (UTC), Public domain. After assassinating the anti-Buddhist emperor Langdarma in 842, the monk Lhalung Pelgyi Dorje fled to Yerpa and hid in a cave. He meditated there for twenty-two years. His hat was kept in that cave until 1959. This is the kind of place Yerpa is -- a site where extreme acts of conscience and extreme acts of stillness have occupied the same limestone cliffs for over a thousand years. Located 16 kilometers northeast of Lhasa on the northern bank of the Kyichu River, then another 10 kilometers into a spectacular valley of pale rock, Yerpa became one of the three most important meditation centers in Central Tibet. Some of its caves predate Buddhism entirely.

Read more: Yerpa on Qualla

Image: Original text: I took this photo myself in 1993. John Hill 9:06, 28 January 2007 (UTC) | Public domain

Yerpa: Kings and Caves

Thu, 26 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit en:User:John Hill, Public domain. The caves at Yerpa are tied to the founding mythology of Tibetan Buddhism. Songtsen Gampo, the 7th-century emperor who unified Tibet and is credited with introducing Buddhism to the plateau, is said to have meditated here with his two foreign-born queens. His Tibetan queen, Monza...

Read more: Yerpa on Qualla

Image: en:User:John Hill | Public domain

Yerpa: Seven Months in the Dawa Puk

Thu, 26 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit en:User:John Hill, CC BY-SA 3.0. Padmasambhava -- Guru Rinpoche, the tantric master credited with establishing Buddhism in Tibet -- meditated at Yerpa with his yogini companion Yeshe Tsogyal. He spent seven months in the Dawa Puk cave, which is considered one of his three most important places of spiritual attai...

Read more: Yerpa on Qualla

Image: en:User:John Hill | CC BY-SA 3.0

Yerpa: Reformation and Conflict

Thu, 26 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit en:user:John Hill, CC BY-SA 3.0. Yerpa's religious affiliation shifted with the tides of Tibetan politics. The ancient Kadampa monastery Yerpa Drubde passed to Gelug control after Je Tsongkhapa's reformation in the early 15th century. But when the Tsangpa forces fought for control of Lhasa after the death of the...

Read more: Yerpa on Qualla

Image: en:user:John Hill | CC BY-SA 3.0

Yerpa: Destruction and the Persistence of Stone

Thu, 26 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Mario Biondi writer, CC BY-SA 4.0. In 1959, the Drubde monastery at Yerpa was destroyed. During the Cultural Revolution from 1966 to 1976, the entire complex -- the Drag Yerpa monastery, the Upper Tantric College summer residence, the cave temples -- was completely demolished. Voluntary labor and donations later e...

Read more: Yerpa on Qualla

Image: Mario Biondi writer | CC BY-SA 4.0