In Exile From the Land of Snows

by John Avedon

  17. High status indicates a high rebirth either as a human or god among the six realms of samsara. Definite goodness refers both to a state free of samsara and to Buddhahood.

  18. Specifically cause and effect. Though cause and effect is the foundation of the Buddhist teachings, it is often impossible (with a normal consciousness) to recognize a specific cause or causes for a specific effect.

  19. The Pramanavarttika, written by Dharmakirti around A.D. 500, is a compendium of teachings on correct or unmistaken knowledge. The two types of correct knowledge set forth in the text are correct inference or logic and direct perception. They apply to both conventional and ultimate truths.

  20. Guru yoga entails a set of practices in which one’s own teacher is viewed as the embodiment of the qualities of all the Buddhas. It is done for the purpose of enhancing awareness through mixing one’s consciousness with an exalted object.

  21. Tsong-kha-pa (1357-1419), founder of the Ge-luk-pa Sect, was born in Amdo on what later became the site of Kum Bum Monastery. He wrote over two hundred books of which the Lam Rim Chen-mo or Stages on the Path to Enlightenment (extensive version) is one of the most widely studied.

  22. See notes 42 and 40.

  23. There were numerous oracles in Tibet; they were individuals—often self-proclaimed—who served as mediums for specific gods or spirits. Chief among them were the two State Oracles, Nechung and Ga-dong.

  24. The stage of generation (Tib. kye-rim) particular to Annutara or Highest Yoga Tantra (the final and most sophisticated of the four tantric cycles) involves practices through which the meditator, after having realized emptiness, projects or generates this wisdom consciousness into the form of a tutelary deity. During the practice, the full course of cyclic existence is duplicated within the mind of the meditator, i.e., death, intermediate state, and rebirth. (The final one encompasses the actual generation into the deities’ form.) These states both correspond to and devolve from specific types of consciousness. It is the meditator’s goal to gain control over the latter, thereby effecting release from their concomitant conditions. At first, such an endeavor is merely imaginary; a mimicking of the consciousnesses, the states they create and one’s own ascendency over them. The actual achievement of control comes at the conclusion of the following or completion stage (Tib. dzok-rim) and is synonymous with Buddhahood. (See note 32 for detailed explanation.)

  25. The three bodies of a Buddha are the Dharmakaya (Tib. chö-ku) or Truth Body, the Samboghakaya (Tib. long-ku) or Complete Enjoyment Body and the Nirmanakaya (Tib. trul-ku) or Emanation Body. The Dharmakaya is formless and represents an enlightened being’s undifferentiable union with the all-pervasive sphere of emptiness (not a single dimension or place as such but, as the ultimate reality of all phenomena, that which abides throughout). On the other hand, the two remaining bodies are known as form bodies. The Samboghakaya is a spontaneous projection from the Dharmakaya, produced by a Buddha’s wishes to help sentient beings. It appears to train advanced Bodhisattvas in the higher pure lands and is known as the Complete Enjoyment Body because of its pure nature. Nirmanakaya are lower-level physical forms of a Buddha (sometimes distinguished by thirty-two major and eighty minor marks), which can manifest in the human realm when times are suitable to teach the Dharma. While the Dharmakaya is the direct product of a Buddha’s insight into the ultimate nature of reality—his wisdom—the two form bodies are a result of the altruistic motivation to help others. As a result, they are infinite in number, manifesting throughout time and space whenever and wherever there are beings capable of being led toward liberation. Therefore, though the form bodies are produced by a Buddha’s compassion, their appearance is contingent upon the merit of others.

  26. Trainee means all those who are training in the practices that lead to enlightenment.

  27. Manjushri (Tib. Jam-pel) is the Bodhisattva of Infinite Wisdom. Maitreya (Tib. Jam-pa) is the next (no. five) of the Thousand Universal or Teaching Buddhas, who will appear during this world’s twenty intermediate aeons of abiding. He is currently dwelling in the Tushita Heaven, where the last historical Buddha—Shakyamuni—left him in charge of teaching the Bodhisattva-host, there assembled.

  28. Tulku in Tibetan literally means Emanation Body. In general usage it refers to any great saint or sage who, having obtained the ability not to reincarnate, does so voluntarily for the benefit of others. Such a being need not have obtained Buddhahood but must at the least have gained sufficient realization of emptiness to determine the place and circumstances under which he will be reborn. This ability is achieved at the level of the path of seeing, the third of the five paths of spiritual attainment leading to enlightenment.

  29. Shariputra and Maudgalyayana were the Buddha’s two principal disciples.

  30. Clear light (Tib. o-sel) is the term used to describe the basic entity of the mind from the viewpoint of the experiencing consciousness. Objectively speaking, clear light is emptiness itself. Subjectively, it is the subtlest consciousness realizing emptiness.

  31. The vajra-like samadhi of a learner is the final degree of insight prior to obtaining Buddhahood, reached at the end of the tenth Bodhisattva stage. Vajra (Tib. dorjé) means adamantine or diamondlike and in this context describes that state of a learner (one who has not yet become a Buddha) which cannot be damaged or obstructed.

  32. There are eight principal layers of consciousness that form the subtler levels of a human being’s mind. Ordinarily, we experience all eight on numerous occasions during the day. They pass in such rapid succession, however, that only an advanced practitioner can recognize their existence. The main times of their occurrence—in which they unfold and reemerge from the most coarse to the most subtle degree and back—are on going to sleep, on waking, at the start and finish of individual dreams, while fainting and sneezing, during sexual orgasm, and at death. The most subtle of the eight—the basic nature of the mind itself—is clear light. The most coarse, just underlying our normal waking consciousness, is called miragelike. Taking this as (1) and progressing inwardly to clear light at (8), the others are: (2) smokelike appearance; (3) like fireflies; (4) like the steady flame of a butter lamp; (5) the mind of radiant white appearance; (6) the mind of radiant red or orange increase; (7) the mind of radiant black near-attainment; and finally (8) clear light. The last four are known as the four empties and are those states referred to by the Dalai Lama.

  It is the particular purpose of Annutara or Highest Yoga Tantra to facilitate the meditator’s awareness of and eventual control over all eight states. One endeavors to obtain such control during the stage of completion. (See note 24.) Technically, a fully enlightened being or Buddha is someone who can remain in the most fundamental level of consciousness—clear light—without being compelled backward by past karma and mental obscurations (Sans. klesha; Tib, nyon-mong) into the coarser states. From such a position the Buddha can then emanate forms directly, without having to adopt the less developed states of awareness, which normally give rise to physical manifestations. The techniques used for becoming aware of and subsequently controlling the eight consciousnesses involve manipulation through various means of the ten inner winds coursing through the seventy-two thousand channels (Sans. nadis; Tib. rtsa) that regulate the human nervous system. These winds form the physical supports upon which the various states of consciousness are mounted. As they are brought into the central channel (Tib. u-ma) the different consciousnesses occur, final liberation being obtained at the conclusion of the completion stage when the four minds of appearance are passed through and the first three do not reoccur. For those who have achieved a good degree of proficiency in such practices, the time of death is looked forward to as a rare opportunity. At that time, there is no need to meditatively induce the eight states, as they occur within the dying person’s awareness one by one on being severed from their physical supports. An advanced yogi can utilize this by remaining forcibly within the clear light when it dawns; he can prevent himself from being cast back into anothe
r rebirth and can arise instead in an illusory body.

  33. Tibetan medicine recognizes three groups of five humors, which each make up the metabolism of a human body: wind, bile, and phlegm. The five major winds or currents of energy are said to be light, rough, cold, and energetic; the five types of bile are oily, acrid, and hot; the five phlegms: cool, heavy, gentle, and sticky.

  34. Samantabhadra (Tib. Kun-tu-sang-po) literally means “In All Ways Good.” Here it refers not to a particular being but to the basic entity of our minds: clear light.

  35. Chandrakirti was one of the foremost proponents of the Prasangika-Madhyamika School of Mahayana Buddhism.

  36. Conventional truth (Sans. samvrtisatya; Tib. kun-dzop-den-pa) refers to the relative nature of phenomena. According to the Prasangika-Madhyamika School (herein described), things exist conventionally as dependent-arisings. This is to say that nothing exists in and of itself, under its own power or by its own nature. Rather, entities arise in dependence upon causes and conditions as well as their parts. Relatively then, things do exist, but as they lack independence and are not self-originated they are ultimately nonexistent. Hence, the middle path taught by the Buddha (from which the Madhyamika School derives its name) falls to neither the extreme of existence nor nonexistence, and in so doing goes beyond both to recognize the two truths as one entity.

  37. Dharmata (Tib. chö-nyia) is another term for the ultimate nature of phenomena.

  38. The red and white constituents (Tib. tig-le-mar-po and tig-le-kar-po) are subtle material essences held (in tantric practice) to be the principal controlling and generative elements of the human form. Tig-le in Tibetan means drop (Sans. bindu); the name most often given these. The red drop embodies the female components of a person; the white, the male. They originate respectively from one’s mother and father at the time of conception, from which point they form the first stage in the growth of the body in the womb. As the embryo develops, they gradually disengage. In the fully matured form, the red drop occupies a place above the groin; the white at the top of the head. At death the former ascends up the central channel while the latter descends. They reunite in the region of the heart (where the primary mind dwells), their meeting marking the collapse of the final support between consciousness and the body and the culmination of the death process. At this time secretions will emerge from both nostrils, indicating that the person has died. (In some cases, it can be as long as three days before this occurs.)

  39. Misconceiving that things inherently exist produces both karmic seeds for future misconception (Sans. kleshavarana; Tib. nyon-drib) as well as an underlying predisposition, or latent tendency (Sans. jneyavarana; Tib. she-drib) to do so. The actual seeds or causes of misconception are eliminated—along with the afflictive emotions—by the view of emptiness at the level of the eighth Bodhisattva stage. The predispositions or latencies, however, are not. It is these predispositions that give rise to the continued appearance of inherently existent objects, even though the actual conception of them as such has been destroyed. Thus, the view of emptiness needs to be augmented or strengthened to a point where the predispositions are eradicated, permitting one to view both a conventional object and its ultimate state of emptiness at once. Such a view is identical with omniscience. It is the appearance of concrete existence (produced by the predispositions) that obstructs the mind from knowing all things throughout time and space—just as a wall blocks the view behind it.

  There is only one method for overcoming the predisposition to view things as truly existent: compassionate means (Sans. upaya; Tib. thab). The altruistic motivation, conjoined with its resulting deeds, has the power to boost the view of emptiness so that the obstructions to omniscience are overcome and the two truths cognized simultaneously. Due to this, a Hinayana Arhat may have obtained freedom from cyclic existence (based on a correct view of emptiness), but because he or she lacks the motivation to help others—such as that possessed by a Bodhisattva—they cannot reach the state of Buddhahood. Nevertheless, Mahayanists maintain that such beings will eventually recognize their limitations and commence to train in developing great compassion.

  40. The three types of Arhats (Tib. Dra-jom-pa) or Foe Destroyers—so called because they have destroyed the afflictive obscurations—are: (1) a Shravaka (Tib. Nyen-tö) or Listener, who obtains liberation for his or her sake only; (2) a Pratyekabuddha (Tib. Rang-gyel) or Solitary Realizer, who obtains liberation for his own sake and in his last life does not rely on a teacher; (3) a Buddha (Tib. Sang-gye), who achieves full enlightenment for the sake of all sentient beings. While the first two ranks may be obtained by following the Hinayana paths, the rank of Buddhahood is reached only by engaging in the Mahayana.

  41. Compassionate means (Sans. upaya; Tib. thab) and wisdom (Sans. prajna; Tib. she-rab) are the two mainstays of Mahayana practice. By the accumulation of merit through altruistic deeds, one purifies negative karma, thereby directly removing obstacles to the attainment of wisdom. On the other hand, wisdom or realization of the two truths enhances one’s compassion by destroying the cherishing of a nonexistent self.

  42. The three vehicles or avenues to enlightenment are those of the Shravaka, Pratyekabuddha, and Bodhisattva (often referred to as the Perfection Vehicle). The first two are Hinayana, the last, Mahayana.

  43. The six perfections (Sans. paramita; Tib. pa-rol-tu-chin-pa) are the features of the general Mahayana. They are: (1) giving (Sans. dāna; Tib. jin-ba); (2) morality (Sans. shila; Tib. tsul-trim); (3) patience (Sans. kshanti; Tib. zö-pa); (4) perseverance (Sans. virya; Tib. tson-dru); (5) meditation (Sans. dhyana; Tib. sam-ten); (6) wisdom (Sans. prajna; Tib. she-rab). By perfecting these six qualities and attainments, a Bodhisattva passes through the five paths and ten stages leading to Buddhahood.

  Acknowledgments

  I would like to thank Jann Wenner, publisher of Rolling Stone Magazine, for making this interview possible. I would also like to thank Elizabeth Paul, whose design and production of the original text—called An Interview with the Dalai Lama—helped introduce His Holiness’s views to the West. The Dalai Lama’s translators—Tenzin Geyché Tethong and Professor Jeffrey Hopkins of the University of Virginia—were central to the project. In particular, both Professor Hopkins and Khyongla Rato Rinpoché, president of the Tibet Center in New York City, were tremendously helpful in checking the text and contributing to the notes. Without their efforts, the degree of accuracy herein would be considerably less. Lastly, for his friendship, patience, and generosity, my thanks to His Holiness are unending.

  Chronology of Tibetan–Chinese Relations, 1979 to 2014

  1979 Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping invites Gyalo Thondup, elder brother of the Dalai Lama, to China and tells him that apart from the issue of total independence all other issues can be discussed and resolved.

  AUG. 5, 1979 First fact-finding delegation of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, led by Kalon Juchen Thubten Namgyal, begins tour of Tibet.

  MAY 1, 1980 Second fact-finding delegation from the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, led by Tenzin N. Tethong, begins tour of Tibet.

  JULY 1, 1980 Third fact-finding delegation from the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, led by Jetsun Pema, begins tour of Tibet.

  MAR. 13, 1981 In a letter to Deng Xiaoping the Dalai Lama states that the three fact-finding missions found “sad conditions” in Tibet and therefore “genuine efforts must be made to solve the problem in accordance with the existing realities in a reasonable way.”

  APRIL 24, 1982 A high-level Tibetan delegation arrives in Beijing to hold exploratory talks with Chinese officials. The delegation, composed of P.T. Taklha, Juchen Thubten Namgyal, and Lodi Gyari, makes no substantive headway.

  OCT. 19, 1984 The three-member exploratory delegation holds a second round of talks with Chinese leaders. Again, no progress toward substantive negotiations are made.

  1985 Fourth fact-finding delegation from the exile Tibetan government leaves for Tibet, led by W. D. Kundeling.

  JULY 24, 1985 Ninety-one members
of the U.S. Congress sign a letter urging Chinese President Li Nianian to initiate talks between China and the Tibetan Government-in-Exile.

  SEPT. 21, 1987 The Dalai Lama presents a Five-Point Peace Plan on solving the Tibetan problem to the U.S. Congress The plan includes a call for commencement of earnest negotiations on the future status of Tibet.

  DEC. 22, 1987 The United States Foreign Relations Authorization Act declares that the U.S. “should urge the Government of the People’s Republic of China to actively reciprocate the Dalai Lama’s efforts to establish a constructive dialogue on the future of Tibet.”

  JUNE 15, 1988 The Dalai Lama presents his Strasbourg Proposal as a framework for a negotiated solution to the Tibetan problem at the European Parliament. He also mentions that a negotiating team is ready to meet with the Chinese side on the basis of Deng Xiaoping’s statements.

  SEPT. 21, 1988 China responds indirectly to the Strasbourg Proposal with an offer to talk. In a press statement, the Chinese side says: “We welcome the Dalai Lama to have talks with the central government at any time, and talks may be held in Beijing, Hong Kong, or any of our embassies or consulates abroad. If the Dalai Lama finds it inconvenient to conduct talks at these places, he may choose any place he wishes.” The offer makes the talks conditional on the Dalai Lama “drop[ping] the idea of an independent Tibet.”

  SEPT. 23, 1988 Tibetan representatives convey the following response to the Chinese message of September 21: “We welcome China’s positive response to His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s call for talks on the Tibetan issue. We similarly welcome their leaving the choice of the venue for the talks to us. We would like the talks to be held in Geneva, Switzerland, which is the most convenient and neutral venue. We would also like the first round of talks to be held in January.”