Venerable Jampa Kunchog, a longtime Tibetan Buddhist monk, translator, and scholar in the Gelug tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, died of prostate cancer on 20 April in Atlanta, Georgia. He was 73.  

Born Delsturtz Theadore Pryor on 1 January 1953 in New Orleans, Louisiana, he was also known in his early years as “Yogi” Pryor. According to an obituary for FPMT, Ven. Jampa was among the early Western students of Lama Thubten Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche, and devoted more than five decades to Buddhist study, monastic life, translation, and the preservation of Tibetan Buddhist teachings.

FPMT, founded by Lama Thubten Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche, describes itself as an international organization devoted to preserving and spreading Mahayana Buddhism through study, reflection, meditation, and practice. Ven. Jampa’s life reflects the early period in which Tibetan Buddhism began to attract a growing number of Western students in India and Nepal.

A longtime friend of Ven. Jampa, Scott Brusso, recalled meeting him in Dharamsala in the early 1970s, where they attended classes at the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives with Geshe Ngawang Dhargyey. During a winter break in 1973–74, the two traveled to Bodh Gaya for the Kalachakra initiation given by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, where they encountered Lama Yeshe.

“There we were very fortunate to meet Lama Yeshe and attend his talk at the Japanese temple,” Brusso recounted. “It was very mystical and with Geshe Dhargyey’s blessing we both decided to attend the sixth Kopan course that spring.” (FPMT)

Ven. Jampa received novice ordination from Lati Rinpoche in March 1975, along with several other Kopan students, and later received full ordination from His Holiness the Dalai Lama. He subsequently studied at Kopan Monastery in Nepal before entering Sera Je Monastery in South India around 1978.

A former colleague from Sera, Ian Coghlan, described the monastery in that period as physically difficult but intellectually and spiritually focused. “Sera Monastery was very poor in those days: no toilets, no bathrooms, electricity for an hour or two, water pumped for an hour to fill large earthen pots buried in the ground, and the food was basic. It was hard physically but easier mentally.” (FPMT)

Coghlan said Ven. Jampa became known for his rigorous study and strength in debate. “My enduring impression and my greatest point of respect for Jampa was his genuine resolute exertion in the study of Dharma.” (FPMT)

According to his sister, Tedra Pryor, Ven. Jampa withdrew from Tuskegee University at the age of 19 and traveled through Europe and Western Asia before reaching India, where he lived for about 20 years. She said he received undergraduate, master’s, and doctoral degrees in Eastern Philosophy from Sera, and was among the few Westerners to complete such a demanding course of study.

After returning to the US in the early 1990s, Ven. Jampa served from 1994–95 as translator for Geshe Losang Tsultrim at Kurukulla Center, FPMT’s center in Boston. He later moved to Atlanta, where he founded the Scholastic Institute Chökyi Gyaltsen University (SICGU), named in honor of Jetsun Chökyi Gyaltsen, the author of the Sera Je debate manuals.

The obituary also noted Ven. Jampa’s early life as part of the history of school integration in the United States. In his own words, he recalled: “Back in the years 1958–1962, my sister and I were the first Black children to integrate schools in both the North and the South.” (FPMT)

FPMT requested prayers that Ven. Jampa “may never ever be reborn in the lower realms” and may be born in a pure land or receive a perfect human rebirth in which to meet the Mahayana teachings and a qualified guru. (FPMT)

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Rejoicing in the Life of Venerable Jampa Kunchog, Early Kopan Student and Sera Scholar (FPMT)

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