Dashi-Dorzho Itigilov
| Dashi Dorzho Itigilov | |
|---|---|
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| Born | May 13, 1852 Chita, Zabaykalsky Krai, Russian Empire |
| Died | June 15, 1927 (aged 75) |
| Citizenship | Russian |
Dashi-Dorzho Itigilov (Russian: Даши-Доржо Итигэлов; Buryat: Этигэлэй Дашадоржо; 1852–1927) was a Buryat Buddhist lama of the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, best known for the lifelike state of his dead body, which is reported not to be subject to macroscopic decay.
Itigilov was born in 1852 and began his religious education at the age of sixteen years. He studied at the Anninsky Datsan (a Buddhist teaching monastery in Buryatia, of which only ruins remain), earning diplomas in medicine and philosophy. At that time he wrote an encyclopedia of pharmacology.
In 1911, he was appointed the twelfth Pandido Khambo Lama (as the head of Russian Buryat Buddhists is styled), at which post he inaugurated the period of a Buddhist revival among Buryats. Between 1913 and 1917, Itigilov was prominent in the spiritual life of Imperial Russia. He took part in the Tercentenary celebrations of the House of Romanov and opened the Datsan Gunzechoinei, the first Buddhist temple in St. Petersburg. The tsar had him invested with the Order of St. Stanislas on March nineteenth, 1917.
During the First World War Itigilov presided over the society of "Buryat brothers", an organization helping the Russian army with money, provisions, clothes, and medicaments. He also helped set up a number of hospitals, with lama doctors helping wounded soldiers. For his charitable activities Itigilov was awarded the Order of St. Anna.
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