The Disciples of Milarepa
The main disciples of Milarepa, and the chronology of when they met and started following him, are described in 1) The Profound Biography of Great Jetsun Milarepa, compiled by 12 Great Sons of Milarepa, 2) the Black Treasury by the Third Karmapa Rangjung Dorje, and 3) the Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa (Gurbum), by Tsangyön Heruka. The images of the disciples are extracted from old Tibetan manuscripts of the Black Treasury and biography.
Milarepa received a prophecy from Vajrayogini about his disciples in general, and Rechungpa in particular, when he was at Dragkya Dorje Dzong,
An 11 year old boy who had lost his father at a young age and was herding cattle first met Milarepa at Ralé Sa-og Phuk, and started following him. He later became known as Rechungpa, one of Milarepa’s 8 heart sons.
A young boy from Tsaphu met Milarepa at Rönphu Ösal Phuk, and started followed him. He later became known as Tsaphu Repa, one of Milarepa’s 13 close sons.
(note: the original image caption is closest to Tsaphu Repa)
A sixteen year old shepherd met Milarepa at Rakma Changchup Dzong, and started following him. He later became known as Repa Sangye Kyap, one of the 8 heart sons of Milarepa.
A monastic teacher (tönpa) named Shakya Guna, who already had great faith in Milarepa, became his student and follower at Nyanang Dröpa Phuk. He later became one of Milarepa’s 13 close sons.
The 15 year old daughter of a wealthy family, named Paldarbum, met Milarepa at the village of Gepa Lesum in Chung, and began to follow him. She later became one of the four yogini sisters.
A monastic teacher from Geshe Yaru Thangpa’s monastery met Milarepa at a guesthouse called Garakache Inn in Yeru in the north, and became his follower. He later became known as Seben Repa, one of the 8 heart sons of Milarepa.
A bandit chief met Milarepa at Latö Gyalshri mountain, and became his follower. He was later known as Drigom Repa, one of the 8 heart sons of Milarepa.
A handsome and arrogant young man named Shuyé Dharma Wangchuk met Milarepa at the river bank near Silver Spring and started following him. The young man later became known as Repa Shiwa Ö, one of the 8 heart sons. This meeting had been prophesied to Milarepa by a dakini the day before.
(Note: inferring from the prophecy of the dakini in Milarepa’s dream, this young man was 20 years old at the time)
A tantric teacher met Milarepa at Chimphu Drakmar, and became his follower. He later became known as Ngéndzong Repa, one of the 8 heart sons.
As prophesied by the guru, Dampa Gyakphukpa met Milarepa at Nyanang Gyakmar, and became his follower. He later became one of the 13 close sons.
Dampa Gyakphukpa’s mother, Jomo Urmo, had met Milarepa some years before this and told Milarepa that she would offer her son to Milarepa when he came of age.
A young man met Milarepa at Kora Pass of Mt. Kailash (Tisé), and became his follower. He later became known as Kharchung Repa, one of the 13 close sons.
A young practitioner met Milarepa at Kyitang, and became his follower. He later became known as Repa Darma Wangchuk, one of the 13 close sons. He is also known Jogom Repa.
A young man met Milarepa at Dragkya Dorje Dzong, and became his follower. He later became known as Rongchung Repa, one of the 13 close sons.
A shepherd met Milarepa at Bepuk Mamo Dzong, and became his follower. He later became known as Lukdzi Repa, one of the supreme realized yogis. He is also known as Dziwo Repa.
A young scholar from a Bön family with eight sons met Milarepa at Laphuk Pema Dzong, and became his follower. He later became known as Shengom Repa, one of the 13 close sons.
A young woman met Milarepa at Choro Dritsam, and became his follower. She later became known as Rechungma, one of the four yogini sisters.
A hunter met Milarepa at Nyishang Kurta, and became his follower. He later became known as Khyira Repa, one of the 8 heart sons.
The five Tseringma sisters met Milarepa at Chuwar, and became his disciples.
According to the writings of Ngéndzong Tönpa, Milarepa’s encounters with the Tseringma Sisters occured between 1112 CE and 1117 CE.
Repa Dorje Wangchuk met Milarepa at Rekpa Dukchen Boulder in Drin, and became his follower. He became one of the 13 close sons, and is also known as Thagom Repa.
A merchant of the Mé clan met Milarepa at Nyanang Dröpa Phuk, and became his follower. He later became known Mégom Repa, one of 13 close sons.
A young woman met Milarepa at Nyanang Naktra, and became his follower. She later became known as Rema Sahlé Ö, one of the four yogini sisters.
A meditator of the Lén clan from Dakpo met Milarepa at Chuwar, and became his follower. He later became known as Lén-gom Repa, one of the 13 close sons.
The great bodhisattva bhikshu who was prophesied by the Buddha, Gampopa, met Milarepa at a guesthouse in Tashi Gang of Drin, and became his follower. He became one of the 8 heart sons of Milarepa.
Lotön Gendun, a monastic teacher who was critical of Milarepa in the past became his follower at Chuwar Omchung. He later became one of the 13 close sons.
A monastic teacher from the Dré clan, met Milarepa at Khiphuk Nyima Dzong, and became his follower. He later became known as Drétön Tashi Bar, one of the 13 close sons.
A monk who was critical of Milarepa became his follower at a monastery. He later became known as Likor Charuwa, one of the 13 close sons.
Milarepa’s own sister, Peta Gönkyi, became his follower at Nyanang Dröpa Phuk. She later became one of the four yogini sisters.
Her date of birth is taken from Tsangyön Heruka as being four years after the birth of Milarepa, while her death date is recorded in The Life of Jetsun Milarepa: An Illuminating Lamp of Sun and the Moon Beams as being 5 years before the passing of Milarepa.
Key Disciples of Milarepa སློབ་ཚོགས།
According to the classification and list of Tsangyön Heruka
The Eight Heart Sons
ཐུགས་ཀྱི་སྲས་བརྒྱད།
Rechungpa Dorje Drakpa རས་ཆུང་པ། རྡོ་རྗེ་གྲགས་པ།
Ngéndzong Tönpa ངན་རྫོང་སྟོན་པ་བྱང་ཆུབ་རྒྱལ་པོ།
Repa Shiwa Ö རས་པ་ཞི་བ་འོད།
Seben Repa སེ་བན་རས་པ།
Khyira Repa ཁྱི་ར་རས་པ།
Drigom Repa འབྲི་སྒོམ་རས་པ།
Repa Sangye Kyap རས་པ་སངས་རྒྱས་སྐྱབས།
The Four Yogini Sisters
སྲིང་བཞི།
Sahle Ö of Nyanang གཉའ་ནང་གི་ས་ལེ་འོད།
Paldarbum of Chung གཅུང་གི་དཔལ་དར་འབུམ།
Sister, Peta Gönkyi ལྕམ་མོ་པེ་ཏ་མགོན་སྐྱིད།
The Thirteen Close Sons
ཉེ་བའི་སྲས་བཅུ་གསུམ།
Len-gom Repa གླན་སྒོམ་རས་པ།
Megom Repa མེས་སྒོམ་རས་པ།
Tsaphu Repa རྩ་ཕུ་རས་པ།
Kharchung Repa མཁར་ཆུང་རས་པ།
Rongchung Repa རོང་ཆུང་རས་པ།
Repa Dorje Wangchuk རས་པ་རྡོ་རྗེ་དབང་ཕྱུག། (Takom Repa)
Repa Darma Wangchuk རས་པ་དར་མ་དབང་ཕྱུག། (Jogom Repa)
Dampa Gyakphukpa* དམ་པ་རྒྱགས་ཕུག་པ།
Likor Charuwa* ལི་སྐོར་ཕྱ་རུ་བ།
Lotön Gendun* ལོ་སྟོན་དགེ་འདུན།
Kyotön Shakya Guna* སྐྱོ་སྟོན་ཤཱཀྱ་གུ་ན།
Dretön Tashi Bar* འབྲེ་སྟོན་བཀྲ་ཤིས་འབར།
The Five Tseringma Sisters
ཚེ་རིང་མཆེད་ལྔ།
Thing-gi Shalzangma མཐིང་གི་ཞལ་བཟང་མ།
Miyo Losangma མི་གཡོ་བློ་བཟང་མ།
Chöpen Drisangma ཅོད་པན་མགྲིན་བཟང་མ།
Tekar Drösangma གཏད་དཀར་འགྲོ་བཟང་མ།
Other Remarkable Disciples
ཁྱད་པར་ཅན་གྱི་སློབ་ཚོགས་གཞན།
– One Hundred Realized Masters: རྫི་བོ་རས་པ། Dziwo Repa, etc.
– One Hundred Eight Great Meditators
– Over One Thousand Yogis and Yoginis Who Renounced Worldly Pursuits and Achieved the Primary Stage of Realization
– Countless ordinary people who encountered Jetsun Milarepa and received instructions