Mount Kailash: Where Legend and Science Meet
An anonymous 18th-century Thangka titled "Gang Rinpoche" is kept in a private collection. The Tangut people say, "The roots of all mountains and rivers are in the Gangdisi." This statement is in harmony with scriptural teachings and shines as sacred words. It is now understood that every mountain and river in the universe originates from the Gangdisi Mountains. Whether chronicled or not, all can be distinguished and inferred by consulting maps. What grandeur!
The Gangdise Mountains (གངས་ཏི་སེ), also known as the Transhimalaya, are located north of the Himalayas and run parallel to them in a northwest-southeast direction, as recorded in 'Comprehensive Records of the Great Qing Dynasty' regarding Mount Kailash, the source of rivers. The range is approximately 1600 kilometers long, commencing at Saser Pass (34°15′N, 78°20′E) in the southeastern Karakoram Mountains and continuing eastward to the southwest of Lake Namtso (29°20′N, 89°10′E), where it connects with the Nyenchen Tanglha Mountains.
Many major rivers flow from the Gangdise Mountains. "KAILASH" Cover, undisclosed detail, 2021, ©Buddhist Architecture.
The Sengge Zangbo River (Lion Spring River) originates from the northern peak of the mountains and is the main source of the Indus River. The Langqin Zangbo River (Elephant Spring River) on the western side is a tributary of the Sutlej River in India. Rising from between the Himalayas and the Gangdise Mountains, the Dachiqu Zangbo River (Horse Spring River) serves as the source of the Yarlung Tsangpo River, known in India as the Brahmaputra River. Originating from the southern aspect of the Himalayas, the Majia Zangbo River (Peacock River) is a tributary of the Ganges River.
In traditional Tibetan scriptures, "Gangdise" commonly refers to Gang Rinpoche Peak in Pulan County, Ali Region, which is the second-highest peak of the Gangdise Mountains. A photograph of "Mount Kailash" was taken by Congcong in 2021. The divine cow descends to the mortal realm and realizes the sacred state.
Mount Kailash, as the core of the three-realm cosmos, became a visible and tangible object of faith during the early primitive Bon religion era. In that period, regional customs and deities varied, yet people shared a common religious belief: the cosmological framework of the three realms—La (ལྷ), Nye (གཉན), and Lu (ཀླུ).
In the understanding of primitive Bon religion, Mount Kailash—a peak shaped like a crystal stone—forms a cross-shaped vajra that binds the three realms of the universe: its roots sink into the Lu realm, while its summit ascends into the realm of gods.
The vastness of the universe's three realms and the emptiness of the divine beings in the upper realm leave a gap in human hearts, one that yearns for a tangible object of reverence. It is this longing, intensified by the coming of the White Yak from Mount Kailash, that renders the physical reality of Mount Kailash all the more compelling for the region's faithful. Such a sentiment finds expression in two works: "Offering of Benzoin at Yongzhong Temple," a 19th-century Thangka by an anonymous artist from a private collection, and "Source of the River" at Mount Kailash, another anonymous Thangka dating to the 18th century, also from a private collection.
Over the ages, Mount Kailash has come to be regarded as a sacred site by the enlightened teachers of the Bon religion. Worshipers from Shigatse and neighboring lands—including Tubo, Sun Bo, Ni Po Luo, India, and Afghanistan—began assembling there to honor the mountain and follow in the footsteps of the Mutar (དམུ་ཐག) and the holy yak toward the heavenly street. While a few masters are remembered in history, countless anonymous hermits have likewise engaged in meditation and the quest for life's true meaning on this holy peak.
Like a river of history with no visible end, the belief in Mount Kailash is shaped by the thirty-seven gathering places (འདུ་གནས), the twenty-seven sacred sites (གནས་མཆོག), the eight major burial grounds, and the unending flow of pilgrims.
The Bon religion faced criticism as a primitive faith centered on slaughter and blood offerings after Indian Buddhist monks arrived in the Himalayan region. In reaction, Bon teachers started to create their own sacred realm, Daseromolun Ren（སྟག་གཟིག་འོལ་མོ་ལུང་རིང）, situated within the mysterious Yongzhong Nine Layers Mountain to the east. This context relates to the "Mahakala" thangka, which shows a detailed view of a yak, created by an anonymous artist in the 18th century, ©Rubin Museum of Art, and to "The God of Secularity," also by an unknown author from the same century, © John & Karina Stewart.
O represents the absence of reincarnation, Mo signifies fulfillment, Long stands for abundant blessings, and Ren embodies eternal compassion. From this mountain, four great rivers flow out into the world. Through the existence of Yongzhong Nine Layers Mountain, Mount Kailash became, in ancient times, the site where the divine ox descended, and it has also remained a destination that countless Bon practitioners have aspired to reach in the ages since.
Mount Meru is regarded in Buddhist scriptures as the world's core, consisting of the Four Treasures: gold, silver, lapis lazuli, and crystal. The main objective of the practice is to reach a blissful and wonderful realm. Devout practitioners believe that by worshiping and circumambulating the sacred mountain, they can gain the gods' protection and inherit courage and strength. 《Mount Kailash》partial · pilgrims, Anonymous, 18th century, ©Private collection "Pilgrimage", photography by Congcong, 2021.
Certain Buddhist scriptures hold that Mount Kailash is where the Buddha's Arahant disciples reside. As a deity in Buddhism, Indra dwells in the Trāyastriṃśa heaven at the top of Mount Meru, where he often converses with other celestial beings about worldly good and evil.
Copyright CBETA, the anonymous work "Mandala of the Realm of Dharma" has unknown details. Per the esoteric Buddhist scriptures, when the debate occurred, the eight spots for empty travel in Zhanbu Island were occupied by the Four Gods and Four Perfume-Smelling Gods, the eight spots for land policies in Gangdisi Mountain by the Four Yakshas and Four Rakshasas, the eight spots underground by the Four Raksasas and Four Asuras, and the twenty-four holy grounds plus eight burial grounds by the Four Non-Humans and Four Demonic Women.
All of them asked the Great Virtue God to accept their worship, but he refused; instead, he gifted them twenty-four stone suns. After the spirits and gods killed and sacrificed those suns of the Great Virtue, the beings of the aforementioned places, Gang Renpoche included, turned more ferocious, greedy, and full of vengeance.
Out of great compassion, the Vajrapani Buddha, who abides in the Realm of Ultimate Truth, subdued the spirits and gods of the twenty-four holy grounds through his fierce appearance. He then had the Victorious Buddha replace the suns with twenty-four Victorious Buddha statues, thus transforming Gang Renpoche into a realm of the Victorious Buddha.
While the tale of the fierce confrontation between Milarepa and the Bon teacher Naropa Yongdu (ན་རོ་བོན་ཆུང) is well known, numerous Gelugpa masters have reached enlightenment through devoted practice at the base of Mount Kailash. Separately, anonymous "Vajrapani" thangkas from the 18th and 19th centuries are held in a private collection.
Mount Kailash was considered a sacred mountain of the Bon religion by the Bon teacher, whereas Milarepa regarded it as the prophesied sacred mountain of Buddha, specifically designated by his guru Marpa. Their fierce contest, involving miraculous feats like moving mountains and crossing lakes, concluded with the Bon teacher's defeat.
According to "The Life of Milarepa", I am a wandering yogi who, as Kailash, is sovereign over all mountains. The Bon teachings arrive to challenge, to determine victory or defeat. In this place, sacred teachings are established and mystical powers are made manifest. From now on, I take command of Kailash and propagate the Buddha's teachings. This is the Buddha's blessing: prayers and offerings to the wisdom sky.
At the Rubin Museum of Art, there are two 18th-century pieces: a thangka titled "Biography of Milarepa" by an unknown artist, and an anonymous partial thangka titled "Biography of Milarepa" Partial · Battle. After Milarepa, his disciple Gampopa suggested that Zhigong Jundangongbu and Rinchenba send their disciples to Mount Kailash for solitary meditation. Jarepa, among the most famous of those disciples, meditated there for years and carried on the Kagyu sect's tradition of spiritual practice on the sacred mountain.
After him, the pilgrimage route was opened by his disciple Gudangwa, who had meditated at the mountain's base. In the history of the Kagyu sect, the three great expeditions refer to the three batches of disciples that Zhigong Jundangongbu dispatched to meditate at Mount Kailash. Many of these practitioners are said to have attained enlightenment through meditation and then passed away.
When did Mount Kailash's standing as the “center of the world” first gain recognition outside a religious framework? The mountain has long been a spiritual focal point for many faiths, as noted earlier. Associated with this is an anonymous 2021 piece titled 'Milarepa fighting against a split rock,' copyrighted by Buddhist Architecture, under the heading 'Discovery of Mount Kailash.
Building on the earlier examination, one key duty of Chuo Erqin Zangbu—a monk dispatched to Tibet for cartographic purposes—was to survey the sources of rivers across the globe. This is noted in the strategy for subduing the Dzungar Khanate under Emperor Kangxi, which records that in the fifty-sixth year of his reign, the Emperor sent the monk Chuo Erqin Zangbu Lama Jamba along with Grand Council Chief Secretary Sheng Zhu to cross the Western Sea and the Tibetan territories, chart the heavens, map the land, and thoroughly investigate the origins of every river and stream.
Having carried out geographical surveys across all of Tibet, Chuer Qin Zangbu and his companions accomplished their objective of discovering worldwide river sources. Huang Qianren's 1767 map, ©Library of Congress, bears two titles: Jiaqing's "Map of the Great Qing Dynasty Unified the World Forever" and "Map of the Unified Empire of Great Qing for Ten Thousand Years".
The survey results that Chuer Qin Zangbu and his team brought back from Tibet were later examined by court officials under Emperor Kangxi. These findings indicated that the Gangdise Mountains—Mount Kailash in particular—were the origin of the world's rivers in that era.
Drawn by Lei Xiaosi and others in 1721, Kangxi's "Complete Map of the Imperial Territories" includes sheet 15, "Map of the Gangdise Mountains and Forests" (©Library of Congress). The "Records of the Western Regions Mountains" within the "Imperial Map of the Western Regions" indicates that the earth's mountain ranges run from west to east. Following the tradition that the main origin of these ranges is positioned to the west, they start at the Gangdisi Mountains in Tibet and extend more than 5,590 miles to the area southwest of Xining in Shaanxi.
In the fifty-sixth year of the Kangxi reign during the Qing Dynasty, surveys were conducted at this site, which was judged to be the backbone of the world, with every mountain chain on Earth traced back to its origin here. The ground slopes upward from the southwest toward the surrounding area, steadily gaining elevation until it reaches this point. Fu Heng and others compiled "Illustrated Account of the Western Regions," whose second volume contains "The Map of Western Mountain Ranges in Western Regions," published in 1782, ©National Library of China.
Emperor Kangxi's imperial edict stands as the center of the world. The mapping results obtained by Chu'er Qin Zangbu and others directly shaped the Qing Dynasty's geographical perception of that era and marked the initial incorporation of Mount Gang Rinpoche into the Qing's system of geographical knowledge. These results appear in the "Map of Western Regions Mountains" below, contained in volume two of the "Atlas of Western Regions," a work compiled by Fu Heng and others in 1782 and protected by copyright of the National Library of China.
Subsequently, from an official standpoint, Mount Gang Rinpoche came to be recognized as the center of the world and the origin of rivers.
In the 59th year of Kangxi, on the 18th day of the eleventh month, a special edict was delivered from Emperor Kangxi to the Grand Council, the Literati, and the Nine Ministers: envoys shall be sent to the Kunlun Mountains, the Western Regions, and other locations to observe and investigate the sources of the Yangtze, Yellow, Black, Jinsha, and Lancang rivers, and to record these on maps.
The map now includes the territory of Ali in the Three Regions, with Tibet under control and the various border tribes undergoing pacification.
At this time, a thorough examination and verification of the names of mountains and rivers, along with the similarities and differences between the various tribes and the Han Chinese, is necessary so that this knowledge may be handed down to later generations. The designation of the Gangdise Mountains by Tang Gu Te is especially fitting, for it is regarded as the source of all mountains and rivers, in line with the principles of Buddhism.
The longevity plaque of Kangxi Emperor housed in the Potala Palace is featured in the 2001 publication 'Illustrated Chronicle of Qing Dynasty III' from The Forbidden City Publishing House. After the edict of Kangxi Emperor was incorporated into the 'Sacred Ancestor Emperor's Sacred Teachings', it spread widely and greatly influenced the evolving geographical perspectives of later generations.
During the Qing Dynasty, numerous geographical texts make reference to this. Wei Yuan, a Qing-era scholar, even produced a dedicated treatise on the Gangdisi Mountains under the title "A Study on the Gangdisi Mountains." Meanwhile, Qi Zhaonan's "Outline of Waterways" describes the mountain range as winding eastward from the Gangdisi Mountains and being considered the progenitor of all other ranges. The Yarlung Tsangpo River lies to its west and flows westward into the Kingdom of Kashmir.
The Gangdisi Mountains, under their current translation, are described in Dai Zhen's "Records of Water and Land" as the root of the mountain and water system, lying approximately 5,500 miles to the southwest of Xining Prefecture.
Even today, Mount Kailash is regarded in various religious legends as the world center, drawing countless believers who make pilgrimages, worship, and seek enlightenment and inner peace from the divine. "Imperially Commissioned Illustrated Gazetteer of the Western Regions" by Emperor Qianlong, compiled by Fu Heng and others, 1782, ©Palace Museum, and "The Study of Mount Gongdi" by Weiyuan, 1877-1897, © Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University.
What stands behind the transition from vague divine myths to an indisputable royal decree—the infiltration of faith or scientific evidence? The answer has long been lost to history. Yet few realize that the astute and wise Emperor Kangxi once issued a resplendent imperial edict proclaiming Mount Kailash as the 'center of the world.
The exhibition moves from religious imagination to secular acceptance, featuring "Kangxi's Late Life Praise of the Buddhist Tangka," an anonymous work with no known author, housed in the Palace Museum. "Pilgrimage to Mount Kailash," photographed by Congcong in 2021, is also on display.