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REFLECTIONS ON THE REVIVAL OF KHÖGSHIN KHÜREE
contact with each other during the communist years or had completely ceased their
traditional practices. More investigation would need to be done to find out if they,
like Dambadarjaa and his classmates, had met secretly during these oppressed years.
This would reveal how much of their Buddhist tradition they had kept alive through
practice and how much was retrieved from their memories.
By 1998 Ven. Luwsandamba and Ven. Yondon were too elderly to organise or
take part in the ceremonial life of the temple. Ven. N., a graduate of Dsanabadsar
University of Buddhist Studies, was appointed as fergiiiin (head or leader of a temple
or small monastery). During his time Informant 3 joined as a novice and Inform¬
ant 2 joined the monk community following eight years of training at a temple in
Ulaanbaatar. Within a few years most of the young monks had gone away to study
leaving none to do the daily chanting, while the elderly monks had either passed away
or were too infirm to be attend the temple. Furthermore, devotees seemed reluctant
or were not able to travel the 8 km from the city centre to the temple. By 2002 the
temple ceased activities though I was told the local people attempted to re-activate
it in 2009 but this had clearly not been entirely successful.
The Second Revival of Khögshin Khüree
in Baganuur Centre, 2003
I was led in to meet the leader of the second revival of Khögshin khüree (Informant
1) in his private rooms in a block of flats in the centre of Baganuur by his young
daughter. Like many monks in Mongolia both before and after the purges, he was
married with a family. He was sitting dressed a white silk lama top, pants and high
boots, at an imposing desk with filled bookcases and statues lining two of the other
walls. He told me he became a novice monk in 1992 in the revival of the great
monastery of Gundgawarlin or Setsen khanii khiiree in Ondérkhan, Khentii.'? He
eventually became the umdzad in the monastery learning the traditional ‘rhythms’ of
the chanting from the old monks. Ten years later he had become a renowned tantric
practitioner and had followers in Baganuur where he would give Dharma teachings
and perform rituals for individuals." On one occasion in 2002, when he came to
the city to do a Green Tara ceremony, he was asked by the then Governor, to revive
Khögshin khüree in the city centre as the first revival on the outskirts of the town had
ceased activity. It seems that it is within the remit of the Baganuur city authorities
(as it would be in the case of aimag or sum centre authorities) to register a temple but
I understand from conversations with a senior monk in Gandan Monastery, there is
no set of criteria a temple has to adhere to in order to obtain the registration. Rather
it appears to be a legal rather than a religious process.
% Cf. www.mongoliantemples.org. Active Temple DOMM X36X 063, Old Temple DOMM X30X
059.
By pure co-incidence my interpreter on my visit to Baganuur was a devotee of Informant 1 from the
time he had helped her during a period of great personal stress.
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