Panchen Lama VIII

Tenpai Wangchuk ( Tib. བསྟན་ པའི་ དབང་ ཕྱུག་ ་ , 1855 - 1882) - Panchen Lama VIII, Tibetan religious and political figure.

The eighth Panchen Lama, Tenpai Wangchuk also known as Namgyal Wangdui Gyaltsen was born in 1855 in Namling County, Shigatse County in western Tibet . His father's name was Tenzin Wanggya, and his mother was Zhaxila (Chinese transcription). He came from an aristocratic family belonging to the Nyingma Buddhist school. One of his family members was a reincarnation at the Nyingma School. The fact that the new Panchen Lama came out of another tradition aroused the discontent of the monks of the Tashilunpo monastery, which traditionally belongs to the Gelugpa school.

In 1857, Tenpai Wangchuk was identified as the eighth incarnation of the Panchen Lama. He was the first Panchen Lama to be identified by drawing lots using a golden bowl (or "golden urn"). In 1860, at the age of 5, Tenpai Wangchuk finally took the throne in Tashilunpo Monastery in the presence of Reting Rinpoche Hutuhta as the eighth incarnation of the Panchen Lama.

In 1877 (or 1878) Tenpai Wangchuk, together with the regent Tenzin Hutuhta, determined using the golden urn of the 13th Dalai Lama . The Panchen Lama VIII died in 1882 at the age of 27.

All the tombs of the Panchen Lamas, from the fifth to the ninth, were destroyed during the Cultural Revolution and were restored by the Tenth Panchen Lama in the form of a huge tomb at the Tashilunpo monastery in Shigatse, known as Tashi Langyar ^[1] .