The Third Panchen Lama Receives George Bogle at Tashilhunpo, oil painting, Tilly Kettle, c

Lobsang Palden Yeshe (1738–1780) () was the sixth

Panchen Lama The Panchen Lama () is a tulku of the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism. Panchen Lama is one of the most important figures in the Gelug tradition, with its spiritual authority second only to Dalai Lama. Along with the council of high lamas, ...

Tashilhunpo Monastery Tashi Lhunpo Monastery (), founded in 1447 by the 1st Dalai Lama, is the traditional monastic seat of the Panchen Lama, and an historically and culturally important monastery in Shigatse, the second-largest city in Tibet. The monastery was ...

Tibet Tibet (; ''Böd''; ) is a region in East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are some other ethnic groups such as Monpa people, ...

. He was the elder stepbrother of the 10th Shamarpa, Mipam Chödrup Gyamtso (1742–1793). The Panchen Lama was distinguished by his writings and interest in the world. In 1762 he gave the Eighth Dalai Lama his pre-novice ordination at the Potala Palace and named him

Jamphel Gyatso Jamphel Gyatso (1758–1804) was the 8th Dalai Lama of Tibet. Born in 1758 at Lhari Gang (Tob-rgyal Lha-ri Gang) in the Upper Ü-Tsang region of southwestern Tibet his father, Sonam Dhargye and mother, Phuntsok Wangmo, were originally from Kh ...

. He befriended George Bogle, a Scottish adventurer and diplomat who had made an expedition to Tibet and stayed at

Shigatse Shigatse, officially known as Xigazê (; Nepali: ''सिगात्से''), is a prefecture-level city of the Tibet Autonomous Region of the People's Republic of China. Its area of jurisdiction, with an area of , corresponds to the histo ...

from 1774-1775. He negotiated with Warren Hastings, the Governor of India, through Bogle. The Rājā of

Bhutan Bhutan (; dz, འབྲུག་ཡུལ་, Druk Yul ), officially the Kingdom of Bhutan,), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is situated in the Eastern Himalayas, between China in the north and India in the south. A mountainou ...

invaded

Cooch Behar Cooch Behar (), or Koch Bihar, is a city and a municipality in the Indian state of West Bengal. It is the headquarters of the Cooch Behar district. It is in the foothills of the Eastern Himalayas at . Cooch Behar is the only planned city in ...

(in the plains of Bengal - neighboring British India), in 1772 and Palden Yelde, tutor to the young Dalai Lama at the time, helped arbitrate the negotiations. He also had dealings with Lama Changkya Hutukhtu, Counsellor of the Emperor of China and chief advisor on Tibetan affairs, about speculations that the Chinese god of war and patron of the Chinese dynasty,

Guandi Guan Yu (; ), courtesy name Yunchang, was a Chinese military general serving under the warlord Liu Bei during the late Eastern Han dynasty of China. Along with Zhang Fei, he shared a brotherly relationship with Liu Bei and accompanied him on m ...

(Kuan-ti), was identical with Gesar, the hero of Tibet's main epic story, who was prophesied to return from Shambhala to Tibet to help it when the country and Buddhism were in difficulties. Others believed Guandi/Gesar was an incarnation of the Panchen Lama. Palden Yeshe wrote a half-mystical book about the road to Shambhala, the ''Prayer of Shambhala'', incorporating real geographical features.Stein, R. A. (1972) ''Tibetan Civilization'', pp. 88-89. Stanford University Press. (cloth); (pbk) In 1778, the Qianlong Emperor invited Palden Yeshe to

Beijing } Beijing ( ; ; ), Chinese postal romanization, alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the Capital city, capital of the China, People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's Li ...

to celebrate his 70th birthday. He left with a huge retinue in 1780 and was greeted along the way by Chinese representatives. To mark the occasion, Qianlong ordered the construction of Xumi Fushou Temple, based on the design of Tashilhunpo Monastery, at the Chengde Mountain Resort. When Palden Yeshe reached Beijing, he was showered with riches and shown the honour normally given to the Dalai Lama. However, he contracted

smallpox Smallpox was an infectious disease caused by variola virus (often called smallpox virus) which belongs to the genus Orthopoxvirus. The last naturally occurring case was diagnosed in October 1977, and the World Health Organization (WHO) c ...

and died in Beijing on November 2, 1780.Norbu, Thubten Jigme and Turnbull, Colin. 1968. ''Tibet: Its History, Religion and People''. Reprint: Penguin Books, 1987, p. 272. Palden Yeshe's stepbrother, the 10th Shamarpa Mipam Chödrup Gyamtso, had hoped to inherit some of the riches given to his brother in Beijing after his death. When this didn't happen, he conspired with the Nepalese who sent a Gurkha army in 1788 which took control of

. The Shamarpa, however, did not keep his side of the bargain and the Gurkha army returned three years later to claim their spoils, but the Chinese sent an army to support the Tibetans and drove them back to Nepal in 1792. The tombs from the Fifth to the Ninth Panchen Lamas were destroyed during the

Cultural Revolution The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a sociopolitical movement in the People's Republic of China (PRC) launched by Mao Zedong in 1966, and lasting until his death in 1976. Its stated goa ...

and have been rebuilt by the 10th Panchen Lama with a huge tomb at

, known as the Tashi Langyar.Mayhew, Bradley and Kohn, Michael. (2005) ''Tibet''. 6th Edition. Lonely Planet Publications. p. 175.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Yeshe, Lobsang Palden 1738 births 1780 deaths Deaths from smallpox Panchen Lama 06 Infectious disease deaths in China 18th-century Tibetan people