The Dalai Lama

by Alexander Norman

  As well as being a stickler for the rules of personal conduct, Tsongkapa brought to the monastic movement itself a renewed emphasis on the life and works of the historical Buddha. The annual celebration of the Great Prayer Festival in Lhasa was one of his key innovations. He also established Ganden Monastery, which—together with its sister foundations at Drepung and Sera—came to be the single most important religious foundation in Tibet. From his own time up to the present, Tsongkhapa continues to inspire not only young Tibetans but also, increasingly, people from all over to renounce the world and dedicate themselves to the monastic life. Yet Tsongkhapa is not without his critics. There are those who question the authenticity of his self-proclaimed relationship with the bodhisattva Manjushri. Others are suspicious of the way in which he totally ignored the earlier Tibetan tradition of which the Lotus-Born is the key figure. Yet for the present Dalai Lama himself, Tsongkhapa is the scholar-saint of the Tibetan tradition to whom he feels closest, and he regularly gives teachings on the master’s Great Treatise on the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment.

  With respect to Shugden, as the Dalai Lama explained in his 1997 talk, the origins of the deity’s cult lie in the seventeenth century, during the lifetime of the Great Fifth Dalai Lama. It was this incarnation—the one to whom the present Dalai Lama has often said he identifies with most closely—who acquired for the Dalai Lama institution its temporal power. Until his alliance with Gushri Khan, the Mongolian warlord who became chief patron of the Gelugpas, the Dalai Lamas were merely one among several reincarnation lineages renowned for their spiritual attainments. His predecessor the Fourth Dalai Lama, Yonten Gyatso, can, by virtue of his Mongolian princely ancestry, be regarded as an earlier attempt at gaining political power for the (still relatively young) Gelugpa sect. But the Fourth Dalai Lama died a failure, unimpressive in either the temporal or the spiritual realm. As a result, during the interregnum that followed his death, the Gelugpas, having no reliable backing, struggled for survival “like a butter lamp flickering in a raging storm.” It was only when, through the diplomacy of his chamberlain, the (not yet deemed Great) Fifth Dalai Lama forged an alliance with Gushri Khan, head of the Qoshot Mongols, that Gelug fortunes were transformed. Sweeping all before them, the Mongolians destroyed first the resurgent Bonpos of the kingdom of Beri in eastern Tibet. It is the Bonpos who claim to be the guardians of the original religion of Tibet (though they have adopted many Buddhist practices). Then, despite the Dalai Lama’s deep misgivings, and after a lengthy siege, the Mongolians toppled the Kargyu-supporting king of Tsang in central Tibet.

  When, subsequently, the Dalai Lama established his headquarters in Lhasa, he oversaw a major expansion of the Gelug establishment. Yet for all his dedication to the legacy of Tsongkhapa, and despite being the incarnation of its most important lineage, he was himself a master of the Nyingma tradition and an initiate of many of its most secret and occult practices, notably the art of war magic.

  Even in the seventeenth century, there was considerable opposition within Gelug circles to the Dalai Lama’s enthusiasm for the Nyingma tradition. This opposition coalesced around a gifted lama by the name of Drakpa Gyaltsen, who had in fact been a candidate when the Fifth Dalai Lama was being searched for. Both sides agree that matters eventually came to a head when Drakpa Gyaltsen died, though how he did so is a matter of dispute. According to devotees of Shugden, the two met in a debate, which, humiliatingly, the Dalai Lama lost. The following day, the victor was found dead with the silk offering scarf the Dalai Lama had been compelled to present to him in recognition of his triumph rammed down his throat. Exactly what happened next is also a matter of controversy, although there is broad agreement at least as to the outcome.

  As we saw earlier, it is well understood that victims of violent crime are likely to be reborn as shi dre, a kind of ghost that often causes harm to those with whom it comes into contact. Something similar seems to have happened with Drakpa Gyaltsen. When his remains came to be cremated, it is said that a thick pall of black smoke rose from the pyre, assuming the shape of an open hand, which hung suspended in the air. Soon after, strange events began to be reported in central Tibet: the silver casket into which his ashes had been deposited started to emit a buzzing sound; animals became unaccountably sick and many died; crops failed. More troubling still, the dishes on which the Dalai Lama’s food was set overturned themselves spontaneously, and there came the sound of stones crashing onto the roof of the Potala. The noise could be drowned out only by monks blowing on the huge dung chen horns normally used to summon the faithful to prayer. Exasperated, the Dalai Lama summoned the abbot of the recently founded Mindroling Monastery (a Nyingma foundation), who presided over construction of a demon trap. On this occasion, however, the abbot was distracted at a critical moment during the ritual, enabling the spirit to escape. In the end, the best that could be done was to lure it to a lonely spot where a small shrine was built in its honor.*

  Shugden devotees claim that, at this point, the Dalai Lama was forced to accept that this was no ordinary spirit but that Drakpa Gyaltsen, having been reborn in a heavenly realm, was revealed to be a dharma protector, whose real name was Dorje Shugden.† It is even alleged that the Great Fifth wrote prayers in his honor, though, as the present Dalai Lama pointed out in his 1997 speech, there is no evidence for this in any of the eighteen volumes of the collected works. On the contrary, these make clear that, far from settling at the shrine, Shugden’s “harmful activities only intensified.” In response, the Great Fifth ordered a huge ritual onslaught, culminating in a fire ceremony during which effigies of the “perfidious interfering spirit” and his entourage were burnt. A sign of success was “the smell of burning flesh that everybody witnessed.”

  Unfortunately for the Dalai Lama, despite this promising sign, ultimately his campaign failed and the spirit survived. By the time of the Great Thirteenth Dalai Lama, Shugden’s cult had spread to Kham, where, thanks to the enthusiastic advocacy of one of the greatest and most famous lamas of this time, Phabongka Rinpoché, guru to both Ling Rinpoché and Trijang Rinpoché and a teacher of legendary charisma, he acquired an enormous following. This was further bolstered by Shugden’s spectacular manifestation through the Panglung oracle. Joseph Rock, the Austro-American botanist and explorer who reported on the massacre of Tibetan children by Hui bandits, recounted in National Geographic how, during a séance he witnessed in 1928, the oracle “took a sword handed to him, a strong Mongolian steel blade . . . [and] [i]n the twinkling of an eye . . . twisted it with his naked hands into several loops and knots!”

  The Great Thirteenth likewise had severe reservations about the deity. Formally reprimanding Phabongka, he required him to desist from spreading the practice. But by now it was too late. So when the Great Thirteenth Dalai Lama died in 1933, some said that Shugden had a hand in his demise. In spite of this, the cult of the deity continued to spread, especially among the laity in Kham. So powerful did he become that it is said the western gate of Nechung Monastery was kept permanently locked, as it was there that Shugden waited, poised to move in the moment Pehar attained final liberation.

  Part of the discomfort Shugden’s devotees feel about the present Dalai Lama’s attempted proscription of his cult is the thought that he is calling the commitment of many great masters of the Gelug tradition into question. Also, by implication, that he is willing to abrogate the samaya—the sacred bond established when a pupil takes a teaching from a lama—that exists between himself and those Shugden devotees, notably Trijang Rinpoché and the regent Taktra Rinpoché, whose student he was. The bond further requires that the student sees the teacher as the actual embodiment of the Buddha. This means that to criticize the teacher in any way is to criticize the Buddha himself. Yet the Dalai Lama is quick to point out that while he had just such a relationship with Reting Rinpoché, no one argues that Reting did not make mistakes. For him to deny these would be to contradict the evidence—the letters the ex-regent wrote asking for Chinese support—that he
saw with his own eyes. Furthermore, just because he has come to the conclusion that Trijang Rinpoché’s Shugden practice was mistaken, he emphasizes that this should in no way be seen as disrespecting either the high spiritual attainments or the great contribution of his junior tutor. He even confided that his regard for Trijang Rinpoché remains so deep that, on one occasion, he even dreamt of “lapping up” his teacher’s urine as the junior tutor relieved himself. To the outsider this seems a surprising—even shocking—anecdote to share, but to a monastic audience, it will have put them in mind of a relatively common practice whereby small quantities of the bodily waste of high lamas are ritually imbibed as a means to furthering one’s own spiritual progress.*

  Over the years since his 1997 address, the Dalai Lama has maintained his position on Shugden (whom he refers to as dolgyal—the king demon) with consistency, explaining that, when it comes to matters of such importance, “being a fairly forthright person, I just don’t know how to be courteous and discreet.” Fortunately, there have been no more killings, though there is anecdotal evidence of continuing friction between the two factions. More destructive has been the internationalization of the issue. This has been seen in protests, such as those that occurred during high-profile visits by the Dalai Lama to the University of Oxford in 2008 and, in 2015, to the University of Cambridge. Organized by an alliance of Shugden groups in the West, these incidents bear eloquent testimony to the power of metaphysics to move human beings; this is, after all, a deity that, until at most a century ago, had not been heard of beyond the reaches of a relatively small number of Himalayan communities. Yet it is in Tibet that the greatest damage has been done. The controversy has not gone unnoticed by the Chinese authorities, and it is unsurprising to learn that a number of Shugden-supporting monasteries have been, in recent years, recipients of generous funding from Chinese government sources.

  Without question, the Shugden controversy highlights the single most challenging aspect of the encounter between Tibetan tradition and contemporary secular society. The Dalai Lama is fully committed to introducing the natural sciences not only into the ordinary school curriculum but into the monastic curriculum as well. He is similarly committed to the advancement of women, to full democracy, and to institutional transparency.* At the same time, it is clear that the Dalai Lama remains fully immersed in the traditional Buddhist worldview—even if he regards the cosmological texts as needing interpretation—and to the dharma protectors and their supernatural enemies central to that worldview.

  At the time of writing, there appears to be an uneasy truce between declared Shugden supporters and those who follow the Dalai Lama on the issue. Among the exile population, anecdotal evidence suggests that the proportion of Shugdenpa is unlikely to be more than 10 to 15 percent at the most. A similar figure is probably true of Tibetans in Tibet itself. Nevertheless, both Ganden and Sera Monasteries in exile have seen breakaway groups opening separate Shugden monasteries, and there are several other, smaller monasteries in exile that have opened separate Shugden houses too. It is thus not impossible that Shugden numbers could grow during a future regency period. From the Precious Protector’s point of view, it is fortunate that the one person who might have emerged to take on leadership of the pro-Shugden faction, the new Trijang Rinpoché, has shown no inclination to do so. Indeed, the young man discovered himself to be at the center of a plot to discredit the Precious Protector. It emerged that a group of Shugden devotees planned to murder his chief assistant with the intention of laying the blame on Dalai Lama loyalists. Even so, there are signs that such leadership could yet emerge.

  When the 101st Ganden Throne Holder, the highest authority within the Gelug establishment, retired in 2009, observers were stunned when news emerged that he had joined the breakaway Shugden-supporting Shar Ganden Monastery in southern India. If true, this meant that, throughout his six-year incumbency, he had been in undeclared opposition to the Dalai Lama all along—a revelation made all the more remarkable for his impeccable scholarly and spiritual conduct. This defiance of the Dalai Lama at the very highest level suggests that there might be other, similarly highly placed opponents of the Precious Protector waiting for a safe moment to declare themselves. At the very least, it suggests that there is likely to be further turmoil in the community when the Dalai Lama chooses to manifest the act of passing away.

  21

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  Tibet in Flames: The Beijing Olympics and Their Aftermath

  If the violence of the Shugden controversy has to some extent overshadowed the latter years of the Dalai Lama’s biography, it has had little impact on his reputation internationally. Following the award of the Nobel Peace Prize, public recognition of the Precious Protector has continued to grow—as has appreciation of his message of universal compassion.

  One moment when this surging popularity might have suffered came in 1997, when the Dalai Lama’s private office received an open letter from a prominent gay activist seeking clarification over some remarks the Precious Protector had recently made. The Dalai Lama had given an interview during which he had expounded the classical Buddhist view of active same-sex relationships—that they are impermissible—apparently contradicting a more liberal stance he had taken earlier. In response, the Dalai Lama agreed to meet a small group of gay and lesbian Buddhists in San Francisco during the summer of that year. Later, one of the participants wrote of how, “stepping into the June sunlight [afterward, he] felt tired, calm, enormously grateful—and disappointed.” The Dalai Lama had explained that, while for non-Buddhists the strictures did not apply, for followers of the Buddhadharma, certain sexual practices were indeed forbidden. He explained further that the prohibition against these activities applied equally to non-same-sex couples. It followed, therefore, that it was not same-sex relationships themselves that were proscribed but only the physical expression of them. He added, however, that the matter was one of tradition and that this tradition reflected the moral codes of the time, allowing the possibility that change could come about “in response to science, modern social history and discussion within the various Buddhist sanghas.” As for himself, while he was open to the possibility of such change, he had no authority to bring it about single-handedly even if he wanted to. The activists should therefore advocate for their interests according to the Buddhist principles of “rigorous investigation and non-violence”—presumably remaining chaste while doing so.

  The notion that the Dalai Lama could be persuaded to change his mind if the tradition itself changed its mind, while not quite what the group was looking for, was enough to satisfy most people that the highest Tibetan spiritual authority was not closed to the possibility of a development of doctrine—even if this was an example, noted by one commentator, of how the Dalai Lama “delights listeners everywhere by being the rare spiritual figure who says there is no need for temples or scripture” but then “disappoints them, often, by suggesting that there is a need for old-fashioned ethics and all the things your grandmother told you were good for you.” Yet it is clear that this tendency to disappoint does not diminish the Dalai Lama’s appeal to those attracted to his identification with nonviolence and compassion, and to his insistence that warmheartedness is of greater value than which religious tradition people do or do not adhere to. This, surely, is what is behind his emergence, during the closing years of the twentieth century, as a universal “doctor of the soul”—Pico Iyer’s evocative soubriquet—even though it is also true that Buddhism explicitly denies the existence of the soul.

  At the close of the twentieth century, this growing appreciation of the Dalai Lama was augmented by high-profile appearances at events such as a rock concert celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Here, alongside the likes of Bruce Springsteen and the surviving members of Led Zeppelin, the Dalai Lama took to the stage in Paris to declare his own commitment to human rights—infuriating the Shugden devotees who were, at that moment, making a case to Amnesty International that h
e had infringed theirs by proscribing worship of the deity.

  Arguably the most important element in securing the Dalai Lama’s reputation as a “doctor of the soul” was the publication in 1998 of The Art of Happiness. Marketed as being jointly authored by the Dalai Lama, the book was based on a series of interviews granted to the American psychiatrist Dr. Howard Cutler. In presenting and interpreting the Dalai Lama’s outlook to Westerners educated in the norms of contemporary society, the work succeeded brilliantly in presenting not so much the profundity of its subject’s thinking as the notion that happiness (admittedly never precisely defined) could be attained by “assembling” the causes and conditions of happiness—which, the book further suggested, did not necessarily include the strict discipline of the religious life. The book was an immediate—and enduring—success, selling more than a million copies in its first year of publication in America alone.

  With the Dalai Lama’s increasing popularity came increasing requests for talks and teachings. Most continued to be at the invitation of different Buddhist groups around the world. In fulfilling these, the Dalai Lama would often drive himself so hard that he would return to Dharamsala utterly exhausted. Although his public talks are generally given extemporaneously, he prepares meticulously for every teaching he gives. His principal translator, the brilliant Cambridge-educated (now former) monk Thupten Jinpa, recalls once catching sight of the Dalai Lama’s heavily annotated copy of a notoriously abstruse text. Jinpa later noticed that, during an enforced wait at the airport, he “delved into his small shoulder bag and . . . launched into deep study,” approaching the text almost like a young student.