The Big Boys of Bhutan are without a doubt Buddha, Guru Rinpoche, and Shabdrung. Between them, they laid the foundations of all Bhutanese cultural and religious life as we know it today.
Buddha (above shows Buddha Dordenma statue outside Thimphu)
Siddhartha Gautama was born a prince in Nepal in 500 BC. He immediately took seven steps. A lotus flower grew out of each footprint. So this guy was obviously destined for greatness. Still, he was a slow starter. For the first twenty-six years of his life, he never left the palace. Inside its protective walls, he behaved like any other young aristocrat, arrogantly strutting his stuff and bullying his staff. He was a fine physical specimen, so enjoyed defeating everyone he met in swimming. He even lifted elephants with his toes.
When he left the palace, he was confronted for the first time with the true horrors of the lives of ordinary people, including poverty, oppression, disease, the pangs of childbirth, insecurity, tooth ache, and death. Distressed, he spent the next nine years walking the earth in order to find a way to end all the suffering. At the age of thirty-five, he finally came up with the brilliant idea of planting his backside under a Bodhi Tree and did not move for forty-nine days!
This did the trick! He discovered the Four Noble Truths, making him the Pimp Daddy of Buddhism. He also became an instant hit with the people. Today, you cannot help noticing him, because he is everywhere.
He is usually depicted sitting cross-legged on a lotus throne with one hand touching the earth and the other hand holding a begging bowl or doing something else. He has blue snails for hair, funny curved eyebrows, long earlobes, and a little smile that plays on his lips. Buddha is so cool that everyone wants a bit of him, so his body parts have by now been strewn all over the Buddhist world; a tooth here, a hair there, a nail over there.
No one has actually ever DNA-tested all these alleged relics to see if they come from the same person, so no one knows. No one cares either. This is faith, after all.
Guru Rinpoche aka ‘the moustache’ (typical depiction above)
Big Boy Number Two in Bhutan is Guru Rinpoche. He also goes by the name ‘Padmasambhava’, which means “lotus born”, because, remarkably, he was born on a lotus flower. Told you he was special!
Guru Rinpoche is instantly recognisable by his fancy Salvador Dali moustache. He carries a skull cap full of the ‘nectar of deathless wisdom’ in one hand and a ‘vajra’ in the other hand. ‘Vajra’ is an awesome weapon that combines indestructability with irresistible force! Guru Rinpoche used this fine weapon to defeat anger, ignorance, and desire, which is why he often carries a trident over his left shoulder (nothing to do with Maserati). It is also worth noting that Guru Rinpoche was totally into red hats. So, if you are wondering why so many monks wear red hats it is all down to old Rinpoche.
Why is this guy a celebrity? In 800 AD, Guru Rinpoche was hanging out in Tibet. Then one day he decided to turn his girlfriend into a flying tiger and fly to Bhutan’s famous Taktsang Monastery, better known as the Tiger’s Nest. By bringing Buddhism To Bhutan he became super famous, although the Bhutanse secretly find annoying that he only got around to visiting Bhutan after having spread the good word in India, Nepal, China, and Tibet.
Shabdrung aka ‘the Beard’ (typical depiction above)
Ngawang Namgyal, the third of Bhutan’s Big Boys, also wears red hats sometimes, but do not confuse him with Guru Rinpoche. In common parlance, he is referred to as Shabdrung, a title given to high Lamas in Tibet. Shabdrung is usually depicted wearing the robes of a monk, sometimes with a green halo behind his red hat, but his unique distinguishing feature is his Kenny Rogers beard.
Unlike the two other guys, Shabdrung was all about earthly power. He is revered as “the unifier” of Bhutan, being the first person to introduce the statehood to the country. A gifted warrior and general badass, Shabdrung spent most of the 1630s beating up on various warring fiefs, eventually forcing them to unite into a single country under his rule, of course. To cement his power, he built Bhutan’s spectacular Dzongs, which also helped him to defend the country against marauding Tibetans.
Each district in Bhutan has its own Dzong, which houses both the local government administration and a monastery. It may seem odd when seen with Western eyes that secular and religious institutions should be housed within the same building, but this is a quite the thing in Bhutan.
Once he had secured control of country, Shabdrung introduced Bhutan’s unique “dual system of government”, which remains in force to this day. Under this system, the King and the High Abbot have equal standing at national level, and the system is replicated at district level.
After Shabdrung passed away, Bhutan's districts were gradually able to re-assert themselves and Bhutan entered a period with no central government, which lasted a couple of centuries. Only in 1907 was one of the district kings, Gongsar Ugyen Wangchuck, able to gain overall control of the country. He was able to do this by virtue of his control of a central district in the country, which allowed him to tax everyone and get really rich. Wealth eventually led to power and thus started Bhutan's history of monarchy.
Shabdrung’s body lies embalmed within the monastery of the Punakha Dzong, which Shabdrung himself built in 1637 (see pictures below). The Punakha Dzong is without a doubt Bhutan's finest Dzong. It is still used for official functions. Only the King of Bhutan and the High Abbot are allowed to look at Shabdrung's embalmed remains, so who the hell knows if it is him or some other guy.
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