Jamphel Yeshe Gyaltsen

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Jamphel Yeshe Gyaltsen, 1938
Jamphel Yeshe Gyaltsen, 1938

(Thubten) Jamphel Yeshe Gyaltsen, aka Thupten Jampel Yishey Gyantsen, Tibetan: ཐུབ་བསྟན་འཇམ་དཔལ་ཡེ་ཤེས་རྒྱལ་མཚན་Wylie: thub-bstan 'jam-dpal ye-shes rgyal-mtshan (Dagpo, 1910 - Lhasa, 1947) was a Tibetan tulku and the fifth Reting Rinpoche.


Gyantsen played a significant role in Tibetan history as the one-time regent of the present (14th) Dalai Lama. He was forced out of office and was succeeded in the beginning of 1941 by Taktra Rinpoche. Subsequently he was alleged to have organized an uprising against his replacement. He died in 1947 in the prisons of Lhasa's Potala, apparently the victim of poisoning.[1][2] His jailor also allegedly reported that his testicles were bound and beaten until he died of the pain.[3]

The episode exposed a number of the political dimensions of the religious hierarchy in Lhasa. Critics of the fifth Reting Rinpoche accused him of widespread corruption, and involvement with married women as a monk.[4] Defenders alleged that his imprisonment was partly the result of his attraction to the teachings of the Nyingma lineage, a politically sensitive orientation,[5] and that the case against him had been fabricated by the cabinet minister Kapshopa.[3]

His successor was Tenzin Jigme Thutob Wangchuk as the sixth Reting Rinpoche, although this was challenged by another claimant, who styles himself Reting Hutukthu.


  2. ^ Barraux, Roland (1995) Die Geschichte der Dalai Lamas - Göttliches Mitleid und irdische Politik, Komet/Patmos, Frechen/Düsseldorf, ISBN 3-933366-62-3, p.p. 275-282 (German)
  3. ^ a b Kimura, Hisao. Japanese Agent in Tibet: My Ten Years of Travel in Disguise. Serindia Publications. London:1990.pg 202.[1]