Theos-Talk Archives (April 2005 Message tt00082)

The truth is, the Dugpas are not red hats (Nyingmas) at all but a 
subsect of the kargyu, also known as the WHITE LINEAGE or White 
Brotherhood if you will. They flourished in Bhutan and not Tibet and 
were noted for the number of saints they produced. There is a book 
available which contains a very extensive treatment of their history, 
but I cannot remember the name of it offhand. As for Bhutan it is 
one of the world's most civilized countries. How Blavatsky got this 
one so wrong I cannot imagine.

--- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, Bart Lidofsky <bartl@s...> wrote:
> Drpsionic@a... wrote:
> > Chuck the Dugpa
> 
> From THE THEOSOPHICAL GLOSSARY....
> 
> Dugpas (Tib.). Lit., "Red Caps," a sect in Tibet. Before the advent 
of 
> Tsong-ka-pa in the fourteenth century, the Tibetans, whose Buddhism 
had 
> deteriorated and been dreadfully adulterated with the tenets of the 
old 
> Bhon religion,--were all Dugpas. From that century, however, and 
after 
> the rigid laws imposed upon the Gelukpas (yellow caps) and the 
general 
> reform and purification of Buddhism (or Lamaism), the Dugpas have 
given 
> themselves over more than ever to sorcery, immorality, and 
drunkenness. 
> Since then the word Dugpa has become a synonym 
of "sorcerer", "adept of 
> black magic" and everything vile. There are few, if any, Dugpas in 
> Eastern Tibet, but they congregate in Bhutan, Sikkim, and the 
> borderlands generally. Europeans not being permitted to penetrate 
> further than those borders, the Orientalists never having studied 
> Buddho-Lamaism in Tibet proper, but judging of it on hearsay and 
front 
> what Cosmo di Köros, Schlagintweit, and a few others have learnt of 
it 
> from Dugpas, confuse both religions and bring them under one head. 
They 
> thus give out to the public pure Dugpaism instead of Buddho-Lamaism 
In 
> short Northern Buddhism in its purified, metaphysical form is 
almost 
> entirely unknown.