It is a tension that harks back to the 14th Dalai Lama's own path to become spiritual leader.īy the time Tenzin Gyatso reached his early 20s, he had already led six million Tibetans through years of threats of all-out war with China. It's an ironic move for a strictly atheist government that does not allow its officials to practise religion, but experts say that having control over the next Dalai Lama would give China major power. "Therefore, the reincarnation must comply with Chinese laws and regulations, follow rituals and historic conventions." "The 14th Dalai Lama himself was found and recognised following rituals and conventions, and his succession was approved by the then central government," China's Foreign Ministry spokesman said in 2018. The Chinese government has made it clear that it wants final approval of all reincarnations of Tibetan Buddhism, including the Dalai Lama, and insisted they will be found within China's borders. An ever-present Chinaįinding the reincarnation of the Dalai Lama is steeped in ancient tradition, but that looks likely to change this time around. "There will be disputes, always, over whether you've found the right child or whether somebody has interfered with the process and so on."Īnd, just as his own journey across the Himalayas did, the process to find the Dalai Lama's replacement is already attracting attention from China. "When one dies, you've got to find the next one, then you've got to educate him and train him and wait for that child to grow up," Professor Barnett says. ( Wikimedia Commons: Coolmanjackey via Creative Commons 3.0) Potala Palace in Lhasa, Tibet, was the winter palace of the Dalai Lamas from 1649 to 1959. Under the tutelage of senior lamas, he learned logic, fine art, Sanskrit, medicine and philosophy, and led long ceremonies for his disciples. The four-year-old boy's hair was cut, his clothes swapped out for maroon monks' robes, and he was ordained with a new name: Tenzin Gyatso. That boy was a two-year-old named Lhamo Dhondup, who could pass every test offered to him and identify items belonging to his predecessor, reportedly shouting: "It's mine!"īefore he could travel to the Potala Palace in Lhasa, where Dalai Lamas have lived for centuries, the monastery had to pay a local Chinese Muslim warlord a ransom of 300,000 silver dollars.Īfter an arduous mountain trek, he finally arrived in Lhasa.
In the small hillside village of Taktser, they found a child who took an instant shine to one of the previous Dalai Lama's close advisers and seemed to recognise his old walking stick. "They sent out search teams, until they found a building that looked like what they had seen in the lake," explains Robbie Barnett, a Tibet researcher at the University of London.
( Flickr: HYLA 2009 via Creative Commons 2.0) Monks have been visiting the site for visions to assist in discovering reincarnations of the Dalai Lama for centuries. Lhamo La-tso is considered the most sacred lake in Tibet. The disciples also checked a lake traditionally used to see visions of the location of the next Dalai Lama. When the previous Dalai Lama died, in 1933, a search party of Tibetan disciples used signs from his body to find his successor.Ī head tilt and an unusual fungus on the shrine containing his corpse pointed them to the north-eastern Tibetan district of Dokham, an area spanning several provinces in present-day central China. "He's in human form, so there has to be degeneration of his body, which is a natural thing, which every one of us accepts," Tibet's political leader Penpa Tsering says.
Many of his predecessors didn't even live to see their 30th birthday. The current Dalai Lama, the 14th, is among the oldest in the lineage. It's believed the Dalai Lama is the human manifestation of a being who has attained nirvana - released from the cycle of life, death, and suffering - but is continuing to live on earth for the compassion of other beings.Īs one Dalai Lama's human form leaves this world, the soul is reborn in another body, according to Tibetan Buddhist belief. The chosen oneįor 600 years, Tibetans have been using ancient rituals and mysticism to find the human form of the Dalai Lama. Those closest to the situation are now calling for the international community to publicly support their choice for a successor over China's.Īmid global concerns about the Communist Party's growing influence, they say the future of their community - and the world - depends on it. Tibetans say the lack of clarity on what will happen next is a tactic to confuse China, as it seeks to gain political power by taking ownership of the spiritual lineage. The Dalai Lama has floated many options for who will take over his soul when he leaves his human form - someone he chooses while he's still alive, someone born in a 'free country', perhaps even a woman. The Dalai Lama marked his 87th birthday on July 6 in Dharamshala, India.
0 kommentar(er)
