K ' anpo Rimpoche K ' anpo Rimpoche , usually called the Hermit , was a Time Lord who forsook Gallifrey an society to live as a Buddhist abbot on late 20th century Earth . Biography . Life on Gallifrey . Like all Time Lord s , K ' anpo was taken from his family at the age of eight for the selection process in the Drylands . Staring into the Untempered Schism as part of a Time Lord initiation rite , K ' anpo reacted by running away from what he saw in the Schism . ( PROSE : " A Brief History of Time Lords " ) The Time Lord later known as K ' anpo Rimpoche was a member of a Gallifreyan religious order which had fallen into decline by the time the Doctor was young . ( The High Council had disestablished the monasteries at some point during or shortly after the reign of Rassilon . ) ( PROSE : " Interference " ) As a youth , the First Doctor knew K ' anpo Rimpoche as the Hermit , a wise Time Lord who lived on the side of a mountain behind the house where the Doctor lived as a young boy , ( TV : " The Time Monster " ) near the Prydonian Academy where he studied at the time . ( PROSE : " " ) The Hermit told stories to the young Gallifreyan s , like the Doctor , about vampire swarms ( TV : " State of Decay " ) and the legions of the Sphinx . ( PROSE : " Lucifer Rising " ) He taught the Doctor transmigration . ( PROSE : " The Three Paths " ) The Hermit was , as the Third Doctor later said , his . In the time of the Doctor ' s greatest despair , he showed him hope in a simple yellow flower ( TV : " The Time Monster " ) called a sarlain . ( PROSE : " " ) Once the Hermit told the Doctor to fast for three days and three nights to make supplications to the Menti Celesti . ( PROSE : " " ) Towards the end of the Doctor ' s first life , K ' anpo helped him prepare for his upcoming regeneration by telling him the story of Penultimate Evil and returning to him his Five Hundred Year Diary . ( PROSE : " The Three Paths " ) Life on Earth . The Third Doctor next met him as the abbot of a Buddhist meditation centre in England with his assistant Cho Je . Unbeknownst to the Doctor and his companion at the time , Sarah Jane Smith , Cho Je and K ' anpo Rimpoche were one and the same . Cho Je only existed either as a future projection of K ' anpo Rimpoche or a creation of his mind , which Rimpoche used as a proxy while he hid from the Eight Legs . This did not deter the Eight Legs for long . When K ' anpo was struck down by the Eight Legs possessing his own meditation students as human hosts , Cho Je faded into nothingness and then re - appeared , taking the place of K ' anpo Rimpoche . He had regenerated . After the Doctor ' s confrontation with the Great One in her cave , he began to die from the radiation there . Once the Doctor had returned in the TARDIS to UNIT HQ , K ' anpo Rimpoche teleport ed to him to give the Doctor " a little push " enabling him regenerate into his next incarnation . ( TV : " Planet of the Spiders " ) Death . At the time of his death , K ' anpo Rimpoche was visited by the Sixth Doctor , who bid him thanks and farewell . ( PROSE : " Gone Too Soon " ) Abilities . K ' anpo Rimpoche had several abilities that other Time Lords did not . He was able to create a " mental projection " of his mind that was able to move and talk independently of K ' anpo himself . When K ' anpo was injured , he regenerated into the mental projection , " Cho Je " . He was also capable of teleporting himself and others from one place to another . K ' anpo displayed another unexplained skill in being able to " assist " in the Doctor ' s regeneration from the third incarnation to the fourth . By simply pointing both hands towards the pre - regeneration Doctor , he was able to speed the Doctor ' s regeneration considerably . It is possible that this was achieved though an unseen transfer of regenerative energy from K ' anpo to the Doctor . ( TV : " Planet of the Spiders " )