The 14th Dalai Lama

Peacekeeping and Universal Responsibility

Mario I. Aguilar

• Publisher: Routledge India
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781000223293
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Política y relaciones internacionales
• Subtopic: Paz y desarrollo global

This book outlines the life of spiritual diplomacy of the 14th Dalai Lama and his emergence as a global peace icon. It traces his evolution as a Tibetan Buddhist monk rooted in the Geluk tradition, as a Nobel laureate, and as an internationally recognized peacemaker.

The volume brings to the fore the Dalai Lama's monastic life grounded in the compassion and ethical responsibility of a bodhisattva, somebody who is willing to renounce samsara for the benefit of others, as well as that of a political leader of Tibet. It examines the deep impact of his ideas of peacekeeping and universal responsibility on world politics, which draw on acceptance, inclusion, and respect as their central pillars. Further, this book highlights his departure from the practices of the earlier Dalai Lamas, and how the Chinese invasion and his exile in India transformed him into a universal figure of peace, rather than solely being the leader of Tibet.

An introspective read, this book will be of much interest to readers interested in spiritual diplomacy and political philosophy. It will also be of interest to scholars and researchers of peace and conflict studies, international relations, politics, and religion, especially Buddhism.

1
BECOMING THE 14TH DALAI LAMA

The 14th Dalai Lama was born on 6 July 1935 in a small farming family in Taktser, in the province of Amdo, northeast Tibet.¹ The search for the incarnation of the 14th Dalai Lama had begun in the summer of 1936, two and a half years after Thubten Gyatso, known as the 13th Dalai Lama had died.² Following custom, Retting Rinpoché, the Regent of Tibet, had convened the Tibetan National Assembly in order to send out teams that searched for the new Dalai Lama. Previously, the Regent and a group of senior monks had visited the waters of Lake Lhamo Latso and had a vision seeing three Tibetan alphabets (Ah, Ka, Ma), a monastery with a three-tiered turquoise roof and a gilded pagoda-like top, and a twisting tail leading east of the monastery to a bare hill and a small one-storey house with a blue roof. For the Regent, the letter ‘Ah’ referred to Amdo and the search party left for Amdo. After a couple of visits to his home by senior lamas, Tenzin Gyatso, was recognised as the incarnation of the 13th Dalai Lama and he was enthroned in Potala on 22 February 1940.

The importance of the Dalai Lamas for Tibet cannot be downplayed and the formation and persona of the 14th Dalai Lama was shaped by the Tibetan expectations of a religious Buddhist leader who at the same time was expected to lead the politics of Tibet as head of the Tibetan Government. It is clear from the conversations by Thomas Laird with the Dalai Lama that the Dalai Lama assumed his full connection through the incarnational principle with the thirteen previous Dalai Lamas.³ Historically, the head of the Geluk, a Tibetan monastic order (wearing yellow hats), became central to the history of Tibet because of the understanding and cooperation between the Third Dalai Lama and Altan Khan, a powerful prince of the Turmet Mongols who recaptured the ancient imperial Mongol capital of Karakorum ca. 1550. Khan invited the Third Dalai Lama to visit Mongolia in 1577.⁴ The Third Dalai Lama travelled to Mongolia and in June 1578 they met exchanging titles and gifts. Altan Khan translated the common name of all Dalai Lamas ‘Gyatso’ as ‘ocean’ and keeping the name Lama, which has been traditionally applied to somebody recognised as a Tulku or to one’s teacher gave the name ‘Dalai Lama’ to the head of the Buddhist masters of the Mongols.⁵ Thus, the first and Second Dalai Lamas had not used such title and were given the title later, following the understanding that the title conferred by Khan to the Third Dalai Lama could and should be applied to the previous Dalai Lamas following laws of incarnation. The 14th Dalai Lama has played down any higher ‘wisdom’ attached to the name Gyatso as ‘ocean’, arguing that Gyatso is just a name.⁶

Regardless of titles it is clear that the visit of the Third Dalai Lama to the Mongols made an impact on Altan Khan and that all of them under his patronage converted to Buddhism, burned their traditional shamanic objects, and conferred noble titles to all Geluk monks who taught all the Mongols under Altan Khan.⁷ The military protection of Altan Khan extended to Tibet and the following khans gave the same loyalty to their Buddhist teachers. While it is clear that with the aid of the khans the following Dalai Lamas made Tibet into a powerful nation vis-à-vis China, for the purposes of religious historiography and the Dalai Lama’s heritage it is crucial to understand the historical and monastic life of the First, Second, and Third Dalai Lamas. Tibet through the nobility and the monasteries was already an organised feudal nation.

Dalai Lama I: Gendün Drup 1391–1474

The monk Gendün Drup [his birth name was Pema Dorje] was born in 1391 in a nomad family that lived near Sakya Monastery in Tsang.⁸ On the evening after his birth bandits attacked the family and Gendün’s mother hid him inside a cave where hagiographical writings tell us that he was protected from vultures by a single vulture. According to Shen Weirong ‘this vulture was an embodiment of the Four-Faced Mahakala, which became the personal Yidan deity of Gendün Drup’.⁹ After the death of his father at the age of seven he sought refuge with the community at Kadam Monastery in Tsang. He received the genyen (ordination) from Druppa Sherap the 14th abbot of Narthang and learned how to write and recite sacred texts. At the age of fifteen he was given his monastic name and ordained as a getsul. After five years he received the full ordination as a gelong at Narthang. Over the years he received instruction from more than sixty lamas throughout Tibet, most of them either Kadam or Geluk lamas. Thus, his unusual sense of monastic belonging and his wide education made him an example of religious diversity.

Together with another disciple of Tsong Khapa, a monk with the name of Sherap Sengee, Gendün Drup travelled extensively all over Tibet between the years 1426 and 1438, a reason for the consolidation of Tibetan Buddhism and the monasteries within Tibetan national life. It is possible to argue that he was a great monk given that he fulfilled the three areas required from those monks or lamas who were remembered through the ages in monasteries and through Tibetan life: (a) they were widely knowledgeable and scholarly oriented, (b) they were morally strict in following the three vows taken within Tibetan monastic life, and (c) they were generous in their availability to others. In the case of Gendün Drup, he fulfilled the first two conditions through his monastic life and his dedication to teaching. An example of his availability to others can be found, for example, in his rejection of his nomination as abbot of Ganden Monastery in Lhasa in 1450, a position that would have made him leader of the Geluk School. Instead, he decided to continue his journey from monastery to monastery, a practice that was going to be the exception to the rule with the increase of monastic communities and the absolute centrality of the Dalai Lama as a symbol of a unified Tibet.¹⁰

A prolific writer, his works were collected in six volumes among which there was an expertise in logic and extensive commentaries on Buddhist writings. Gendün Drup continued the practice of his master of celebrating the annual Mönlam Chemno festival and in 1474 he invited 1,600 monks to Tashilhünpo Monastery to celebrate a twelve-day festival that was attended by 10,000 monks. It was a clear sign that the Geluk school of Tibetan thought was clearly established within a variety of monastic traditions. He died in the same year and a year later a commemoration (Gong Dzok) was celebrated in his honour with more than two thousand monks taking part. His remains were kept until 1478 and then placed in a large stüpa made of silver and decorated with gold and copper.

Dalai Lama II: Gendün Gyatso 1475–1542

Gendün Gyatso wrote his autobiography in 1528 as well as his father’s biography in 1509.¹¹ In his autobiography he described his birth as very auspicious of an important reincarnation and with the emphasis on his father’s and mother’s lineages already recognised as a lineage of important reincarnations within Tibetan Buddhism. I cite here from Amy Heller’s translation:

As soon as I was born, I looked about timidly and found beauty in front of me, and I smiled. My mouth was turned towards the direction of Tashilhünpo and my hands were in a gesture of devotion. My body was white like crystal, emanating a very pure light. My father immediately performed a special ritual for Cakrasamvara.¹²

By the time he was three years and annoyed with his mother, he threatened to leave for Tashilhünpo. Later, other signs such as the ease with which he composed sacred verses and his familiarity with monastic practices led the surrounding community realise that he was a reincarnation of Gendün Drup, who had had a spiritual home at Tashilhünpo Monastery. Nevertheless, his public recognition and enthronement took longer than usual because of the politics of that time. Some of the lamas, particularly the Abbott of Narthang, had animosities towards Gendün Gyatso’s father and therefore they distrusted that the recognition of the reincarnation of an enlightened one could have come from such a father.¹³ By the time that Gendün Gyatso was twenty years of age and a monk he suffered from the same controversies with other monks and one of the reasons why he didn’t settle in one single monastery could have been because of the monastic politics of that time.

His main contribution to the development of the Geluk institutions was to expand their influence beyond Lhasa and Tashilhünpo. He served as abbot of three important monasteries in Central Tibet: Tashilhünpo (1512), Drepung (1517), and Sera (1528). He founded monasteries in the area East of Lhasa, particularly the important monastery of Chökhorgyal Metoktang in 1509. Located on the north banks of the Tsangpo this monastery became the home of the Dalai Lama’s lineage and each Dalai Lama had to visit it once in their lifetime. In 1541 he founded the monastery of Ngari Dratsang to honour the relation of patronage with the kings of Guge in Central Tibet.

One of the central preoccupations of Gendüm Gyatso was politics of that time. In his writings he separated politics and the political into three different spheres: his engagement as a member of the lineage of the main teachers of Tibetan Buddhism, his engagement with the politics of his own monastic order, and the relationship with the Tibetan nobility through teaching that ultimately secured income for the monasteries and lands for further expansion.¹⁴ During the period of Dalai Lama II there had been armed conflicts between the Karma and the Geluk Schools. The Karma members had already taken over Shigatse during the period of Gendün Drup and in 1480 they sent troops towards Ű in Central Tibet. By 1492 they occupied territories under control from Lhasa and in 1498 they occupied Lhasa itself. In 1517 and as Gendün Gyatso took over as abbot of Drepung the Geluk monks managed to drive the Karma Army away from Lhasa.

It was Gendün Gyatso who formalised the method to find a Geluk reincarnation. Monks went to a sacred lake called Lhamo Latso where the goddess Palden Lhamo lives in order to have visions about the location of the new incarnation of Chenziri, being the Tibetan name for the Bodhisattva (bodhi = enlightenment and sattva = being) Avalokiteshvara in Sanskrit. Thus, according to Thomas Laird,

Bodhisattvas are Buddhist saviours who work during the course of thousands of lifetimes for the benefit of others trapped in the prison of cyclic existence. They will not pass over into final enlightenment, and escape from the wheel of birth, death, and rebirth, until all other beings do so.¹⁵

Thus, the Bodhisattvas are altruistic beings who can visualise and feel the situation of others as their own and who identify themselves with the poor and the marginalised.¹⁶ Gendün Gyatso expanded his influence through Central and Southern Tibet and prepared Tibetan Buddhism for its expansion into Mongol territory and the adoption of Tibetan Buddhism by the Mongols.

Dalai Lama III: Sönam Gyatso 1543–1588

The Third Dalai Lama was born at the beginning of the Tibetan year of 1543 in the state of Khangsargong in the region of Kyishö in Central Tibet.¹⁷ His family had close ties with the Sakya School and with the political ruling group of Phakmo Drupa as his father was a district official and his mother’s father, Wangchuk Rinpoché, was a well-known Tantric master serving the Tibetan royal household. His birth, as portrayed in most Tibetan biographies of somebody who has achi...