Khenpo Chodrak Rinpoche. Considered one of the most learned and respected scholars of the Kagyu lineage today, Khenpo Chodrak Rinpoche was educated in the classic system of monastic colleges of old Tibet that had been recreated by the16th Gyalwa Karmapa at Rumtek Monastery in Sikkim, India.

At the age of six, Khenpo Chodrak's family fled their Tibetan homeland due to the ensuing Chinese invasion. Shortly after reaching Rumtek at the age of nine and for the next seven years, Khenpo studied linguistics, poetry, literature and performance of religious rituals. The following ten years, Khenpo studied the Mahayana sutras and shastras that comprise the curriculum for khenpos (equivalent to a doctor of divinity degree). This curriculum includes Buddhist philosophy, epistemology, logic and reasoning.

At the age of twenty-six he earned the highly-respected khenpo degree and finished first in his class. For the next five years, Khenpo studied the Buddhist tantras and in recognition of his outstanding academic achievements, the Karmapa appointed him to the position of Senior Khenpo. For ten years thereafter, Khenpo served as principal professor of Rumtek's monastic college, the Nalanda Institute.

For the past ten years, Khenpo Rinpoche has served as Educational Director of the Karmapa International Buddhist Institute (KIBI) located in New Delhi, India. KIBI was founded by the 14th Shamarpa in fulfillment of the 16th Karmapa's wish to establish an institute of higher learning to foster wisdom and compassion through the proper study and translation of the great treatises of Buddhism. Six months out of each year, Khenpo Chodrag Rinpoche travels and teaches extensively throughout Southeast Asia, Europe and the US.