Two Autobiographical Praises

Mikyö Dorje was one of the most renowned of the Karmapas – head lamas of the Karma Kamtsang school of Tibetan Buddhism. He was a great meditation master as well as a prolific and learned scholar, author of over thirty volumes of work, including very significant commentaries on the sutrayana treatises and pithy instructions on tantras. The eighth Karmapa was also a visionary artist, to whom we owe the Karma Gadri style of thangka painting – one of the major schools of thangka composition. Mikyö Dorje also composed many sadhanas, practice liturgies, and other devotional practices for the Karma Kagyu school.



There are many accounts of the Eighth Karmapa Mikyö Dorje’s life and liberation, both written by himself and by others. Among them, this book contains two praises he wrote of himself, Autobiographical Verses of Karmapa Mikyö Dorje Called “Good Deeds” and The Praise “He Searched Thoroughly…”



Good Deeds gives an account of his life by recounting thirty-three of his good deeds. At that time, he was one of the greatest lamas of the Dakpo Kagyu, and this is one of longer among his autobiographical works in verse. There is a commentary on it by Sangye Paldrup. The Praise “He Searched Thoroughly…” teaches nine different points about his life. It is included in the prayer book compiled by Situ Panchen Chökyi Jungne, and there is a complete explanation of it in Pawo Tsuglak Trengwa’s Dharma History: A Feast for the Learned.