Seven Years in Tibet

by Heinrich Harrer

  With the help of the Indian Legation, I succeeded from time to time in getting drama films for our moving pictures. I wanted to build up a more comprehensive repertory in order to please the Dalai Lama. The first of the drama films I secured was Henry V, and I was very curious to see what the young ruler’s reaction to it would be. He allowed his abbots to be present at the performance, and when it grew dark, the gardeners and cooks who worked inside the yellow wall slipped into the theater. The public squatted on the carpets on the floor of the theater, while the Dalai Lama and I sat as usual on the steps leading from the auditorium to the projection room. I whispered to him a translation of the text as it was spoken and tried to answer his questions. Luckily, I had taken some trouble to prepare myself, because it is not so easy for a German to translate Shakespeare’s English into Tibetan. The public were somewhat embarrassed by the love scenes, which I cut the next time we turned the film. Kundün was enthusiastic about the picture. He was deeply interested in the lives of great men, and his interest was not limited to kings. He wished to know all about generals and men of science, and to study their exploits. He watched a documentary film about Mahatma Gandhi several times. The Mahatma was a highly honored figure in Tibet.

  I already had reason to approve of his taste. Once when we were selecting an assortment of films, he put all the comic and purely entertaining pictures on one side and asked me to change them. His interest was in educational, military, and cultural pictures. Once I thought to please him by showing him a particularly beautiful film about horses, but I had to admit that the subject did not attract him. “It is funny,” he said, “that the former body”—meaning thereby the thirteenth Dalai Lama—“was so fond of horses, and that they mean so little to me.”

  At this time he was growing very quickly and displayed the usual characteristics of the awkward age. Once he let his exposure meter fall and was as unhappy about it as a poor child who has broken his only toy. I had to remind him that he was the ruler of a great dominion and that he could buy as many exposure meters as he liked. His modesty was a source of perpetual wonder to me. The average child of a rich tradesman was certainly far more spoiled than he was. His manner of life was ascetic and lonely, and there were many days on which he fasted and kept silence.

  His brother Lobsang Samten, the only person who could freely keep him company, though older than he, was far less developed mentally. At the beginning of our lessons, the Dalai Lama had insisted on his brother joining us, but for Lobsang this obligation was a torment, and he constantly asked me to make excuses for his absence. He admitted to me that he could hardly understand anything of our conversation and that he always had to struggle to keep awake. On the other hand, he had a much more practical understanding of government business and was already able to help his brother in carrying out his official duties.

  Kundün received his brother’s frequent excuses with resignation, at which I was surprised as Lobsang had told me how quick-tempered he had been as a child. No trace of this quality remained; in fact, he was really too collected and serious for his age. But when he laughed, he laughed as heartily as any ordinary child, and he was very fond of harmless jokes. Sometimes he used to pretend to box with me and often used to enjoy teasing me.

  Open as he was to the influence of Western thought, he nevertheless had to conform to the centuries-old traditions of his office. All objects that had served for the personal use of the Dalai Lama were regarded as sovereign remedies against illness or charms against evil spirits. There was great competition for the cake and fruits that I used to bring home with me from His Holiness’s kitchen, and I could not give my friends greater pleasure than by sharing these things with them.

  I knew how much the young king desired to lead his people one day out of the fog of gloomy superstition. We dreamed and talked endlessly about enlightenment and future reforms. We had already drawn up a plan. We proposed to bring to Tibet experts from small, neutral countries who had no interests in Asia. With their help we would build up systems of education and public health, and train Tibetans to carry on the work. A great task was reserved for my friend Aufschnaiter. As an agricultural engineer in Tibet, he would have more than enough to do for the rest of his life. He himself was enthusiastic about these ideas and asked for nothing better than to go on working here. For my part, I wished to devote myself to organizing education and dreamed of undertaking the great work of creating a university with its different faculties. But the future held out no prospect of realizing our visions, and Aufschnaiter and I were clear-sighted enough not to feed on false hopes. It was inevitable that Red China would invade Tibet, and then there would be no place for us two friends of Tibetan independence.

  WHEN WE WERE already on intimate terms with each other, I asked Kundün if he would not tell me something about his recognition as an Incarnation. I already knew that he had been born on July 6, 1935, in the neighborhood of Lake Kuku-Nor, but when I congratulated him on his birthday, I was the only person who did so. Birthdays are unimportant dates in Tibet. They are generally not known and never celebrated. For the people, the date of their king’s birth is quite without interest. He represents in his person the return to earth of Chenrezi, the God of Grace, one of the thousand Living Buddhas, who have renounced Nirvana in order to help mankind. Chenrezi was the patron god of Tibet, and his reincarnations were always the kings of Bö—as the natives call Tibet. The Mongolian ruler Altan Khan, who had embraced Buddhism, gave the title of Dalai Lama to the Incarnations. The present Dalai Lama was the fourteenth Incarnation. The people regarded him as the Living Buddha rather than as a king, and their prayers were directed to him not as ruler so much as patron god of the land.

  It was not easy for the young king to satisfy the demands made on him. He knew that he was expected to give divine judgments, and that what he ordered and what he did were regarded as infallible and would become a part of historical tradition. He was already striving by means of week-long meditation and profound religious study to prepare himself for the heavy duties of his office. He was much less self-assured than the thirteenth Incarnation. Tsarong once gave me a typical example showing the dominating character of the late ruler. He wished to enact new laws but met with bitter opposition from his conservative entourage, who quoted the utterances of the fifth Dalai Lama on the same context. To which the thirteenth Dalai Lama replied, “And who was the fifth former body?” The monks thereupon prostrated themselves before him, for his answer had left them speechless. As an Incarnation, he was, of course, not only the thirteenth but also the fifth and all the other Dalai Lamas as well. It entered my mind when I heard this story how lucky Tibet had been never to have had a ruler like Nero or Ivan the Terrible. But to a Tibetan such a thought could never have occurred, for how could an Incarnation of the God of Grace be other than good?

  The Dalai Lama could give no satisfactory answer to my question about how he was discovered. He was only a small child when it happened, and he had only a hazy remembrance of the event. When he saw how deeply I was interested in the matter, he advised me to ask one of the nobles who was present at his recognition.

  One of the few living eyewitnesses of the event was the Commander in Chief of the Army, Dzasa Künsangtse. One evening he told me the story of this mysterious event. Some time before his death, in 1933, the thirteenth Dalai Lama had given intimations regarding the manner of his rebirth. After his death, the body sat in state in the Potala in traditional Buddha posture, looking toward the south. One morning it was noticed that his head was turned to the east. The State Oracle was straightaway consulted, and while in his trance the monk oracle threw a white scarf in the direction of the rising sun. But for two years, nothing more definite was indicated. Then the regent went on a pilgrimage to a famous lake to ask for counsel. It is said that every person who looks into the water of Chö Khor Gye can see a part of the future. When the regent, after long prayers, came to the water and looked in its mirror, he had a vision of a three-storied monastery with golden
roofs, near which stood a little Chinese peasant house with carved gables. Full of gratitude for the divine direction, he returned to Lhasa and began to make preparations for a search. The whole nation took a lively interest in the business, feeling itself an orphan with no divine patron to protect it. With us it is generally, but mistakenly, believed that each rebirth takes place at the moment of the predecessor’s death. This does not accord with Buddhist doctrine, which declares that years may pass before the god once more leaves the fields of Heaven and resumes the form of a man. Search groups set out to explore in the year 1937. Following the signs that had been vouchsafed, they journeyed eastward in quest of the Holy Child. The members of these groups were monks, and in each group there was one secular official. They all carried with them objects that had belonged to the thirteenth Dalai Lama.

  The group to which my informant belonged journeyed under the leadership of Kyetsang Rimpoche till they reached the district of Amdo in the Chinese province of Chinghai. In this region there are many monasteries, as the great reformer of Lamaism, Tsong Kapa, was born here. The population is partly Tibetan and lives peacefully side by side with Muslims. The group found a number of boys, but none of them corresponded to the specifications. They began to fear that they would fail in their mission. At last after long wanderings, they encountered a three-storied monastery with golden roofs. With a flash of enlightenment, they remembered the regent’s vision, and then their eyes fell on the cottage with carved gables. Full of excitement they dressed themselves in the clothes of their servants. This maneuver is customary during these searches, for persons dressed as high officials attract too much attention and find it hard to get in touch with the people. The servants, dressed in the garments of their masters, were taken to the best room, while the disguised monks went into the kitchen, where it was likely they would find the children of the house.

  As soon as they entered the house, they felt sure that they would soon find the Holy Child in it, and they waited tensely to see what would happen. And, sure enough, a two-year-old boy came running to meet them and seized the skirts of the lama, who wore around his neck the rosary of the thirteenth Dalai Lama. Unabashed the child cried “Sera Lama, Sera Lama! ” It was already a matter for wonder that the infant recognized a lama in the garb of a servant and that he said that he came from the Cloister of Sera—which was the case. Then the boy grasped the rosary and tugged at it till the lama gave it to him; thereupon he hung it around his own neck. The noble searchers found it hard not to throw themselves on the ground before the child, as they had no longer any doubt. They had found the Incarnation. But they had to proceed in the prescribed manner.

  They bade farewell to the peasant family and returned a few days later—this time not disguised. They first negotiated with the parents, who had already given one of their sons as an Incarnation to the Church, and then the little boy was awakened from his sleep and the four delegates withdrew with him to the altar room. Here the child was subjected to the prescribed examination. He was first shown four different rosaries, one of which—the most worn—had belonged to the thirteenth Dalai Lama. The boy, who was quite unconstrained and not the least bit shy, chose the right one without hesitation and danced around the room with it. He also selected out of several drums one that the last Incarnation had used to call his servants. Then he took an old walking stick, which had also belonged to him, not deigning to bestow a glance on one that had a handle of ivory and silver. When they examined his body, they found all the marks that an Incarnation of Chenrezi ought to bear: large, outstanding ears, and moles on the trunk, which are supposed to be traces of the four-armed god’s second pair of arms.

  The delegates were now sure that they had found what they sought. They telegraphed in a secret code via China and India a message to be conveyed to Lhasa, and immediately received instructions to observe the utmost secrecy, to avoid intrigues that might inperil the success of their mission. The four envoys took a solemn oath of silence before a tanka on which a likeness of Chenrezi was embroidered, and then went off to inspect other boys as a blind. One must remember that the search was being conducted on Chinese territory, which made caution essential. It would have been fatal to betray the fact that the real Dalai Lama had been discovered, for the Chinese could then have insisted on sending an escort of troops with him to Lhasa. The delegates accordingly asked the governor of the province, a certain Ma Pufang, for permission to take the boy to Lhasa, where the Dalai Lama would be identified out of a number of candidates. Ma Pufang asked a hundred thousand Chinese dollars for the surrender of the child and this sum was at once paid over. This was a mistake, as the Chinese now perceived what importance the Tibetans attached to the child. They then asked for another three hundred thousand dollars. The delegates, conscious of their previous mistake, gave only a part of this sum, which they borrowed from local Mohammedan merchants, promising to pay the balance when they came to Lhasa to the merchants who accompanied the caravan. The governor agreed to this arrangement.

  In the late summer of 1939, the four delegates, together with their servants, the merchants, and the Holy Child and his family, started for Lhasa. They traveled for months before reaching the Tibetan frontier. There a cabinet minister was waiting for them with his staff. He gave the boy a letter from the regent containing official confirmation of his recognition. Then for the first time homage was paid to him as Dalai Lama. Even his parents, who had certainly guessed that their son must be a high Incarnation, only now learned that he was no less than the future ruler of Tibet.

  From this day the little Dalai Lama distributed blessings as naturally as if he had never done anything else. He has still a clear recollection of being borne into Lhasa in his golden palanquin. He had never seen so many people. The whole town was there to greet the new embodiment of Chenrezi, who at last after so many years returned to the Potala and his orphaned people. Six years had passed since the death of the “Previous Body,” and of these, nearly two had elapsed before the god reentered a human body. In February 1940, the enthronement of the Dalai Lama was celebrated during the Great New Year Festival, when he received new names such as “The Holy One,” “The Tender, Glorious One,” “The Mighty of Speech,” “The Excellent Understanding,” “The Absolute Wisdom,” “The Defender of the Faith,” and “The Ocean.”

  Everyone was astonished at the unbelievable dignity of the child and the gravity with which he followed ceremonies that lasted for hours. With his predecessor’s servants, who had charge of him, he was as trusting and affectionate as if he had always known them.

  I was very glad to have heard this account more or less at firsthand. During the lapse of time, many legends had collected around these extraordinary events, and I had already heard several garbled versions.

  WITH THE APPROACH of autumn, the hours of our companionship were more and more frequently interrupted. Even our quiet corner of the Jeweled Garden felt the breath of the coming storm. As the crisis intensified, the initiation of the young king into the business of government proceeded apace. The National Assembly transferred itself to the Norbulingka so as to be able to communicate important events to His Holiness without delay. The young king in spite of his inexperience surprised the whole official world by his farsightedness and his cleverness in opposing unsuitable policies. There was no doubt that the destinies of the state would soon be entrusted to him.

  The situation grew ever more serious. News came from East Tibet that Chinese cavalry and infantry were concentrating on our frontier. Troops were sent to the east, though it was clearly recognized that they were too weak to hold up the enemy. The government’s attempts to arrive at a settlement by diplomatic means were in vain. The delegations that had been sent out for propaganda purposes had got stuck in India. Tibet could count on no aid from outside. The example of Korea showed clearly enough that even the support of the United Nations was of uncertain avail against the Red armies. The people became resigned to the prospect of defeat.

  On October 7, 1950, the
enemy attacked the Tibetan frontier in six places simultaneously. The first engagement took place, but Lhasa received no news of the fighting for ten days. While the first Tibetans were dying for their country, festivals were being held in Lhasa, and the people waited for a miracle. After the news of the first defeats, the government sent for all the most famous oracles in Tibet. There were dramatic scenes in the Norbulingka. The gray-headed abbots and veteran ministers entreated the oracles to stand by them in their hour of need. In the presence of the Dalai Lama, the old men threw themselves at the feet of the prophetic monks, begging them for once to give them wise counsel. At the climax of his trance, the State Oracle reared up and then fell down before the Dalai Lama, crying, “Make him king!” The other oracles said much the same thing, and as it was felt that the voice of the gods ought to be listened to, preparations for the Dalai Lama’s accession to the throne were at once put in hand.

  In the meantime, the Chinese troops had penetrated hundreds of miles into Tibet. A few Tibetan commanders had already surrendered, and others had ceased to resist, seeing no future in a fight against overwhelming force. The governor of the principal town in East Tibet had sent a wireless message to Lhasa asking for permission to surrender as resistance was useless. The National Assembly refused his request, so after blowing up his guns and ammunition dumps, he fled in the direction of Lhasa with the English radio operator, Ford. Two days later he found his way barred by Chinese troops, and both men were captured. I have already referred to the fate of Robert Ford.

  The National Assembly now sent an urgent appeal to the UN for help against the aggressors, claiming that their country had been invaded in peacetime on the pretext that the Red People’s Army could not tolerate the influence of imperialistic powers in Tibet. The whole world knew, they pointed out, that Tibet was utterly free from any foreign influence. Here there were no imperialistic influences and nothing to liberate. If any nation deserved the help of the UN, it was Tibet. Their appeal was rejected, and the UN expressed the hope that China and Tibet would unite peacefully.