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MONGOLIAN FEMALE PRACTICIONERS; QUEENS AND KHANDROMAS — PAST AND PRESENT Kundse Chimed Khandro Nyinggyud Centre, Buman Khand Association of Mongolian Buddhist Women, Ulaanbaatar Firstly, please kindly allow me to convey my warmest greetings to you all. Today I am extremely happy to participate in this conference at Eötvös Loránd University in Hungary and I would like to take this opportunity to express my sincere gratitude towards the organizing committee for inviting me. Now please let me start my presentation. According to the teaching of Buddha Shakyamuni, men and women share the same mental potential to reach the Perfect Enlightenment. The Heart Sütra, a condensed version of Kangyur (Khal. Ganjür), mentions the participation of women practitioners. In the history of Mongolian Buddhism, there are a large number of extraordinary autobiographies of renowned Buddhist kings, lords, khutugtus/rinpoches (Khal. xutagt, rinbiici) and monk scholars. Similarly, there are many exceptional autobiographies of women practitioners as well. So here I wish to deliver my presentation on some of these renowned women practitioners from the past and present. Queen Cinbai (1227-1281) Queen Cinbai (also written as Cinbui, or Ciwer, or Cabi) was the reliable advisor to the king, Kubilai Khan (Khal. Xuwlai xan). She was born as a daughter to the nobleman of Xongirad Aimag where Queen Ueliin was born. Married to Kubilai Khan, she gave birth to four sons; Dorj, Mangala, Cingum and Nomxon. As she was very intelligent and diligent, she was recognized as a very supportive and truthful queen to her king. In 1244, Sakya Pandita Kunga Gyaltsen was invited by Prince Géden, the second son of Ogédei Khan (Khal. Ogédei xan), to Mongolia. And in 1246, he arrived to Mongolia with his two grandsons. When the king and the queen wanted to see the ability of one of the two grandsons, Mati Duwaj, he showed paranormal abilities or siddhis to them. Having witnessed it, the queen became his disciple. It is said that she then received Hevajra, a tantric initiation, from the lama in person. In fact, it became the foundation of the spread the Vajrayana Tradition in Mongolia. Kubilai Khan granted the title “Dharma King of Three Monasteries and Exceptional Lama’ to the lama and enthroned him as the state tutor. Later on, he became known as Phagpa Lama (1235-1280). The autobiography of Phagpa Lama says that when he built monasteries and stupas in 449
