Urgyen Topden Rinpoche

The venerable Master Urgyen Topden received his dharma name from the venerable Urgyen Tenzin Rinpoche of Nepal. Born into a family of Chinese medicine with a family transmission of the Thirteen Branches of Zhuyou, he is versed in Chinese medicine and the innate Eighteen-Arhat fist art. As a child, attending pujas with his father at the Sanbao Buddha Temple of the ancient Guling Hall on Dongshi mountain, he found in a cellar behind the temple the ritual of Cundī Buddha-Mother and, in ancient Sanskrit, the Great Compassion Mantra and the Sitātapatrā (Great White Canopy) Buddha-Mother Dhāraṇī — awakening his curiosity and resolve toward the Dharma. He began accepting disciples at fifteen, and local people called him the "child immortal." He sought out renowned masters of many schools — Chan, the immortal tradition, Taoist arts, Vajrayāna, qigong — and around the age of thirty, after receiving empowerment before Thousand-Armed Avalokiteśvara, he could see people's karmic stories and manifest many kinds of higher wisdom. He undertook a three-year retreat in a ruin beside the Erren River in Tainan, and in all completed more than nine years of strict retreat; he has now taught the Dharma for over thirty years.

On 8 January 2012 the Master founded the Research Association for the Thirteen Branches of Chinese-Medicine Zhuyou, now the Chinese Taoist-Medicine Zhuyou Research Association. Since ancient times Zhuyou has been regarded as a healing wisdom that regulates illness and misfortune through the methods of mind, breath, talisman and intention; the founding of Tianyi Zhuyou is precisely to revive this ancient and precious tradition in the modern age.

Beyond the Nyingma, Taoist and Taoist-arts traditions, on 3 August 2019, with the assent of Urgyen Tenzin Rinpoche of Nepal, the Master founded the Urgyen Fahsilin Buddhist Association (Orgyen Dechenling) and became its abbot, carrying the Nyingma school of Tibetan Buddhism. His lineage masters are the venerable His Holiness Dudjom Rinpoche, Pema Wangchen Rinpoche (teacher of the King of Bhutan), and his root guru Urgyen Tenzin Rinpoche. In 2018, Urgyen Tenzin Rinpoche recognized that Master Urgyen Topden had completed many years of retreat and various perfections of practice, and enthroned him as a vajra master at Namdroling Kangsang Ling in Kathmandu, Nepal. The Master now focuses on the yogic terma methods of practice and on writing. At sacred sites in Nepal he has repeatedly received empowerment and oral transmission from His Holiness Dudjom Rinpoche, and oral transmission and guidance from Urgyen Tenzin Rinpoche on the secret Vajrayāna practices and yoga teachings.

Master Urgyen Topden has many times obtained dharma teachings in meditation at Lumbini Park, the sacred birthplace of the Buddha in Nepal, and at the sacred site of Maratika, following the footsteps of Guru Padmasambhava, has discovered many accomplished termas. In spreading the Dharma for the benefit of beings, the Master personally founded a lama school in the Himalayas, sowing the seeds of Buddhist education; he has also formed a deep friendship with the Shakya people of Patan, Nepal, compassionately helping them and giving key teachings and blessings on karma, illness, family, and past and present lives.

Following Urgyen Tenzin Rinpoche's teaching over many years, the Master has spread Vajrayāna Buddhism in Taiwan. In 2026 he invited Urgyen Tenzin Rinpoche of Nepal to Taiwan to hold the Great Puja of Tröma Nagmo (the Black Wrathful Ḍākinī), receiving from the Rinpoche various empowerments, oral transmissions and instruction in yogic meditation, and transmitting them to his disciples in Taiwan, spreading the essence of the Dharma.

The Master has also served in offender-rehabilitation and probation work, devoting many years to the reform and public welfare of former offenders, and has received awards from the district and high courts, among others.

The Master currently continues advanced study at the graduate school of Huafan University, hoping that through systematic propagation of the Dharma, the cultivation of courses and the guidance of practice, the Buddha's teaching may not merely remain in books or rituals but truly be realized in daily life, becoming a power that transforms body and mind.