Atisa Biography

Atīśa Dīpaṃkara Śrījñāna (Bengali: অতীশ দীপংকর শ্রীজ্ঞান; Standard Tibetan: ཇོ་བོ་རྗེ་དཔལ་ལྡན་ཨ་ཏི་ཤ།; Chinese: 燃燈吉祥智; pinyin: Rándēng Jíxiángzhì) (982 - 1054 CE) was a Buddhist Bengali religious leader and master. He was one of the major figures in the spread of 11th-century Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhism in Asia and inspired Buddhist thought from Tibet to Sumatra. In 1013 CE, He traveled to the Srivijaya kingdom and stayed there for 12 years and came back to India. He is recognised as one of the greatest figures of classical Buddhism, and Atisa's chief disciple Dromtön was the founder of the Kadam School, one of the New Translation schools of Tibetan Buddhism.