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The Shadow of the Dalai Lama - Victor & Victoria Trimondi
 

The Shadow of the Dalai Lama – Part II – 16. Tactics, Strategies, Forgeries, Illusions

© Victor & Victoria Trimondi

 

 

 

16. TACTICS, STRATEGIES,

FORGERIES, ILLUSIONS

 

From a western point of view, religion and politics have been neatly and cleanly separated from one another since the modern era (18th century). In this sense a clear distinction is drawn here between the spread of Tantric Buddhism and the question of Tibet’s international legal status. However, for an ancient culture like the Tibetan one, such a division is just not possible. In it, all levels — the mystic, the mythic, the symbolic, and the ritual — are addressed by every political event. From a Tibetan viewpoint it is thus completely logical that the liberation of the Land of Snows from the claws of the Chinese dragon be blown up into an exemplary deed that should benefit the whole planet. “To save Tibet means to save the world!” is a widespread slogan, even among committed Westerners.

 

Just like the teachings of the Buddha, the political issue of Tibet at first evoked little resonance among the western public. Those who broached the topic of the fate of the Tibetan people in American and European governmental circles generally encountered rejection and disinterest. But this dismissive stance changed in the mid-eighties. With increasing frequency, His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama was officially received by western heads of state who had previously refused to be in public contact with him for fear of Chinese protests.

 

The “Tibet Lobby”

Since 1985 the so-called Tibet lobby has been at work in numerous countries. This is a cross-party collection of parliamentary representatives who in their respective parliaments advocate a Tibet resolution that morally condemns China for its constant human rights abuses and “cultural genocide”. A recognition of Tibet as an autonomous state is not linked to such resolutions. At the Tibet Support Groups Conference in Bonn (in 1996), Tim Nunn from England gave a paper on the methods (the upaya) of successful lobbying: well-groomed appearance, diplomatic language, proper dress, skilled presentation, and the like. Mr. Nunn was able to point to successes — 131 members of the British Lower House had engaged themselves for the cause of the Land of Snows in London (Friedrich-Naumann-Stiftung, 1996, pp. 77ff.).

 

In the USA the lawyer Michael van Walt van Praag has successfully argued the interests of the Tibetan government in exile to both Senators and Congressmen. He succeeded in getting a resolution on Tibet passed in the U.S. Senate. One of his greatest political successes was when in 1991 the Kundun was permitted to take his place in the rotunda and address the American House of Congress. Afterwards he met with President George Bush. Bush signed an official document in which Tibet was described as am “occupied country”. Since 1990 The Voice of America has begun broadcasting programs in Tibetan. A new broadcaster, Free Asia, which also has a Tibet department, has recently been approved by Congress. As of 1997, the State Department appointed a “special representative for Tibet” who is supposed to have the task of negotiating between the Kundun and China.

 

In early September 1995, the Dalai Lama smilingly embraced Senator Jesse Helms, renowned for his ultra-conservative stance. This was a high point in the thoroughgoing reverence the Republicans have shown him.

 

The Democrats barely acknowledged such conservative solidarity, since it was they who smoothed the way for the “liberal” god-king to reach a broad public. The American President, Bill Clinton, and his Vice-president, Al Gore, were initially reserved and ambivalent towards the Dalai Lama, whom they have met several times. The American government’s position is expressed unambiguously in a statement from 1994: „Because we do not recognize Tibet as an independent state, the United States does not conduct diplomatic relations with the self-styled the ‘Tibetan government-in-exile’“ it says there (Goldstein, 1997, p. 121).

 

But after several meetings with President Clinton and his wife Hillary the god-king was able to make a lasting impression on the presidential couple. Clinton committed himself as never before to resolving the question of Tibet. One of the major points of his trip to China (in 1998) was to encourage Jiang Zemin to take up contact with the Dalai Lama. Every western head of state who visits the Middle Kingdom now reiterates this, which has led to success: in the meantime the two parties (Beijing and Dharamsala) confer constantly behind closed doors.

 

In 1989 the Fourteenth Dalai Lama was awarded the Nobel peace prize. The fact that he received this high accolade has less to do with the political situation in Tibet than, above all, the bloody events in Tiananmen Square in Beijing, where numerous Chinese students protesting against the regime lost their lives. The West wanted to morally condemn China and the Tibet lobby was successful in proposing an honoring of His Holiness as the best means of doing so.

 

From now on the god-king possessed an international prominence like never before. The Oslo award could almost be said to have granted him a passport and access to the majority of world heads of state. There was hardly a president who still in the face of Chinese protests refused to officially receive the god-king, at least as a religious representative. In Ireland, France, Liechtenstein, Austria, Lithuania, Latvia, Bulgaria, Russia, the USA, Canada, England, Switzerland, Germany, Sweden, Israel, Japan, Taiwan, Gabun, Australia, New Zealand, several South American countries — everywhere the “modest monk” was honored like a pontiff.

 

In 1996 the lobbyists succeeded in maneuvering Germany into a spectacular confrontation with China through the passing of a resolution Tibet in the Bundestag (the German lower house). The resolution was supported by all parties in parliament, be they green, left, liberal, or conservative. The paradoxical side to this move was that both the Dalai Lama and the Chinese were able to profit from it whilst the naïve Germans had to pay up. This coup represents the Kundun’s party’s greatest political success in the West to date. On the other hand, the Chinese succeeded in inducing the intimidated German federal government into continuing to grant China the much desired Hermes securities formerly refused them. For Beijing, with this agreement in hand, the question of Tibet in its relations with Germany was resolved for now. Even if we cannot speak of a direct cooperation here, according to the cui bonum principle the two Asian parties profited greatly by drawing an essentially uninvolved nation into the conflict.

 

The media management of the Kundun’s followers is by now perfect. Numerous offices in all countries, above all the Tibet Information Network (TIN) in London, supply the press with material about the serious shortcomings in the Land of Snows, life in the community of Tibetan exiles, and the activities of the god-king. There is successful cooperation with Chinese dissidents. Reports from Beijing, which admittedly can only be treated with great caution but nonetheless include much important information, are uniformly dismissed by Dharamsala as communist propaganda. This one-sidedness in the assessment of Tibetan affairs has in the meantime also been adopted by the western press corps.

 

For example, when at the invitation of the Chinese the German Chancellor, Helmut Kohl, visited Lhasa as the first western head of government and afterwards announced that the situation in the Tibet capital was by no means so criminal as it was portrayed to be by the Dalai Lama’s office, he was lambasted in the media, who declared that he was prepared to sell his morals for financial considerations. But when he was there, the former American President Jimmy Carter, renowned for his great commitment to human rights, also gained the same impression (Grunfeld, 1996, p. 232).

 

The issue of Tibet has become an important means of anchoring Tantric Buddhism in the West. As a political issue it appears in the West to be completely divorced from any religious instrumentalization. The Kundun appears in public as a campaigner for peace, a democrat, a humanist, as an advocate of the oppressed. This skillfully adapted western/ethical “mixture” gains him unrestricted access to the highest levels of government. Although some politicians may see a confirmation of their ideals in the (ostensible) behavior of the Dalai Lama, fundamentally it is probably power-political motives which determine Western policy on Asia. The West’s relationship with China is namely extremely ambivalent. On the one hand there is a hope for good economic and political ties to the prospering country with its unbounded markets, on the other a deep-seated fear of a future Chinese superpower. The political situation in Tibet and the circumstances of the Tibetans in exile afford sufficient grounds to be employed as an argument against a potential Chinese imperialism.

 

The “Greens”

In Germany the issue of Tibet was first taken up by green politicians, primarily by the parliamentary representatives Petra Kelly and Gert Bastian. Their pro-Tibetan intervention is still marked by a continuing success. “Major entertainers and environmentalists”, wrote the Spiegel magazine, “have found a common denominator in their commitment to the kingdom on the roof of the world. Hollywood meets Robin Hood — Tibet’s Buddhism is the common denominator” (Spiegel, 16/1998, p. 109). Petra Kelly’s selfless engagement was later interpreted as a form of “engaged Buddhism” whose principle concerns were said to include the defense of human rights, ecological responsibility, and sexual equality. [1] The Kundun cleverly co-opted all these western demands and suddenly (at the end of the eighties) appeared on the political stage as a spearhead of the global ecological movement.

 

„Green politics” and environmental issues have in the meantime attained a central place within the political propaganda of the Tibetans in exile. There are hundreds of conferences such as the one introduced by His Holiness in 1993 under the title of „Ecological responsibility: A dialog with Buddhism”. The Kundun is a member of the ecologically oriented Goal Forum of Spiritual and Parliamentary Leaders on Human Survival. In 1992 he visited the Greenpeace flagship, the Rainbow Warrior. And at the „global forum” in Rio de Janeiro the Dalai Lama had far-reaching things to say about the earth’s problems: „This blue planet of ours is a delightful habitat. Its life is our life; its future our future. Indeed, the earth acts like a mother to all. Like children, we are dependent on them. ... Our Mother Earth is teaching us a lesson in universal responsibility”, the god-king announced emotionally. (www.tibet.com/Eco/dleco4.html)

 

Since the late eighties it has become normal at international environmental meetings all around the world to describe the Tibet of old as an ecological paradise, where wild gazelles and “snow lions” eat from the monks’ hands, as the Dalai Lama’s brother (Thubten Jigme Norbu) put it at a Tibet conference in Bonn (in 1996). For thousands of years, it says in edifying writings, the Tibetans have revered plants and animals as their equals. “Historical” idylls such as the following are taken literally by innocently trusting Westerners: „The Tibetan traditional heritage, which is known to be over three thousand years old[!], can be distinguished as one of [the] foremost traditions of the world in which … humankind and its natural environment have persistently remained in perfect harmony” (Huber, 2001, p. 360).

 

What glowed in the past should also shine in the future. Accordingly many western followers of the Kundun imagine how the once flourishing garden will bloom again after his return to the Land of Snows. His Holiness is also generously accommodating towards this image of desire and promises to found the first ecological state on earth in a “liberated” Tibet — for many “Greens” a glimmer of hope in a world that constantly neglects its environmental responsibilities.

 

Today, among many committed members of the international “ecological scene”, being green, environmentally friendly, nature-loving, vegetarian, and Tibetan Buddhist, are all but identical. But is there any truth in such an equivalence? Was the Tibet of old really an “earthly garden of paradise”? Is the essence of Tantric Buddhism pro-nature and animal-loving?

 

Tibetan Buddhism’s hostility towards nature

No complicated research is required to establish that the inhabitants of the Tibet of old, like all highlands peoples, had an ambivalent relationship with nature, in which fear and horror in the face of constant catastrophes (turns in the weather, cold, famines, accidents, illnesses) predominated. Nature, which was (and often still is) in fact experienced animistically as being inhabited by spirits, was only rarely a friend and partner; instead, most of the time it was a malevolent and destructive force, in many instances a terrifying demoness. We have presented some of these anti-human nature spirits in our chapter on Anarchy and Buddhism. Using violence, trickery, and magic they have to be compelled, tamed, and not unrarely killed.

 

In a comprehensive study (Civilized Shamans), the Tibet researcher Geoffrey Samuel has demonstrated that the violent subjugation of a wild nature is a drama constantly repeated within the Tibetan monastic civilization: beginning with the nailing down of the Tibetan primeval earth mother, Srinmo, by King Songtsen Gampo so as to erect the central shrines of the Land of Snows over her wounds, the construction of every Lamaist temple (no matter where in the world) was and is prefaced by a ritual that refreshes the dreadful stigmatization of the “earth mother”. Srinmo is undoubtedly the (Tibetan) emanation of “Mother Earth” or “Mother Nature” whom the Dalai Lama so emotionally pleads to rescue at international ecology congresses ("the earth acts like a mother to all”). It was the Kundun himself — if we take his doctrine of incarnation literally — who in the form of Songtsen Gampo many centuries ago nailed down “Mother Earth” (Srinmo). He himself laid the bloody foundations (the maltreated body of Srinmo) upon which his clerical and andocentric system rests. It is he himself who repeats this aggressive “taming act” at every public performance of the Kalachakra ritual: before a sand mandala is created, the local nature spirits (some interpreters say the earth mother Srinmo) are nailed to the ground with phurbas (ritual daggers).

 

The equation of nature with the feminine principle is an archetypical move that we find in most cultures. The Greek Gaia and Tibetan Srinmo are just two different names for the same divine substance of the earth mother. In European alchemy, nature is the starting point (the prima materia) for the magic experiments and likewise a principium feminile. We have examined the close interconnection of alchemy and Tantrism in detail and proved that in both systems the feminine principle is sacrificed for the benefit of a masculine experimenter. By adopting for ourselves the tantric way of seeing things in which everything is linked to everything else, we were able to recognize the nailing down of Srinmo (the symbol-laden primal event of Tibetan history) as the historical predecessor of the “tantric/alchemic female sacrifice”. Songtsen Gampo sacrificed the “earth mother” so as to acquire her energies for himself, just as every tantra master sacrifices his karma mudra so as to absorb her gynergy.

 

In recent decades numerous books have appeared that address the disrespect, enslavement, and dismemberment of nature by the modern scientific world view and technology. Many of the analyses, especially when they are the work of feminist authors, indicate that the destruction and control of nature are to be equated with the superiority of the masculine principle over the feminine, of the god over the goddess, in brief with the supremacy of patriarchy. This critical view of the history of oppression and exploitation of the scientific age has largely obscured the view of atavistic religions’ hostility towards nature, especially when these come from the east, like Tibetan Buddhism.

 

But Buddhist Tantrism, we would like to unreservedly claim, is hostile to nature and therefore ecologically hostile in principle, because it destroys the natural, sensual, and feminine sphere so as to render it useful for the masculine. Further, in the performance of his enlightenment rituals, every tantra master burns up all the natural components of his own human body and, parallel to this (on a macrocosmic level), the entire natural universe. From a traditional viewpoint nature consists of a checkered mixture of the different elements (fire, water, earth, air, ether). In Tantrism, however, fire destroys the other elementary constituents. In the final instance it is the “fiery” SPIRIT which subjugates everything else, but NATURE in particular. Let us recall that Avalokiteshvara, the incarnation father of the Dalai Lama, acts as the “Lord of Fire” and the Bodhisattva of our age.

 

Nor were the centers of civilization in former Tibet at all environmentally friendly. The Lhasa of tradition, for instance, capital of the Lamaist world, could hardly be described as an exemplary ecological site but rather, as a number of world travelers have reported, was until the mid-twentieth century one of the dirtiest cities on the planet. As a rule, refuse was tipped unto the street. The houses had no toilets. Everywhere, wherever they were, the inhabitants unburdened themselves. Dead animals were left to rot in public places. For such reasons the stench was so penetrating and nauseating that the XIII Dalai Lama felt sick every time he had to traverse the city. Nobles who stepped out usually held a handkerchief over their nose.

 

It is even more absurd to describe the Tibetan monastic society as a vegetarian culture. The production and consumption of meat have always been counted among the most important branches of the country’s economy (not least because of the climatic conditions). It is indeed true that a devout Tibetan may not kill an animal himself, but he is not forbidden from eating it. Hence the slaughter is performed by those of other faiths, primarily Moslems. The Kundun is also a keen meat eater, albeit, if one is to believe him, not out of enthusiasm but rather for health reasons. Anyone who is also aware of the great contempt Buddhism in general shows for being reborn as an animal can only wonder at such eco-paradisiacal-vegetarian retrospection now on offer in the “scholarly history” of the exiled Tibetans.

 

But by now the Tibetans in exile themselves gladly believe in such ecological fairytales. For them it is alone the brutal Chinese (whose behavior towards Mother Earth is no better nor worse than any other capitalist country, however) who are the villains and stand accused (in this instance rightly) of destroying the ancient forests of the country and because they pay high prices for aphrodisiacs won from the bones of the snow leopard. But there are also some factual objectors to the opinion that the Tibet of old was an eco-paradise. The Tibetans were never more ecologically aware than other peoples, writes Jamyan Norbu, co-director of the Tibetan Culture Institute in Dharamsala, and warns against dangerous myth making (Spiegel, 16/1998, p. 119).

 

Petra Kelly and Gert Bastian

In this section, which we introduced with the two German “Greens”, Petra Kelly and Gert Bastian, we would like to draw attention to some interesting speculations in the Buddhist scene concerning the reunification of Germany. The Dalai Lama rarely becomes directly and openly involved in world politics aside from the issue of Tibet unless calling for peace in general. There are nevertheless numerous occult rumors in circulation among his followers that suggest him to be the political director of the world who holds the strings from “another dimension” in his hands. For example, there has been talk that the fall of the Berlin Wall was to be attributed to him. Among other things, the fact that at the exact point where the first break in the wall was created (a scene broadcast all around the world) there stood a graffiti reading Long Live Dalai Lama is offered as proof of this.

 

In fact, six months before the German reunification the Kundun had stood praying before the “wall of shame” with a candle in his hand. The pacifist, opponent of atomic energy, environmentalist and committed campaigner for the freedom of Tibet, Petra Kelly, had been able to motivate him to cross the East German border together with his entire retinue in December 1989. After the candle ceremony mentioned, the group were ferried to a Round Table discussion with citizens’ rights groups by the GDR state security service (the infamous Stasi, or secret police). [2]

 

The first break in the “fall of the wall” of Berlin.

See the graffiti “Long live Dalai [Lama]”

 

Petra Kelly later described the situation as a political vacuum in which the democratic opposition presented the vision of transforming the former GDR into a non-aligned state without a military or nuclear weapons that would align itself with neither capitalist nor communist ideas. The Dalai Lama was assured that he would be the first guest of this new state and that Tibet’s autonomy would be recognized as the first act of foreign affairs. The German participants in this conversation regarded themselves as a kind of provisional government. All were said to have been deeply moved by the presence of His Holiness. “Only six months later, on 22 June 1990", writes Stephen Batchelor, “his prayer was answered when Checkpoint Charlie was 'solemnly dismounted'" (Batchelor, 1994, p. 378).

 

The Dalai Lama as a political magician who brought down the Berlin Wall with his prayers? Such conceptions lay the foundations for a “metapolitics” in which international events are influenced by symbolic actions. Petra Kelly probably thought along these lines; her extraordinary devotion to the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan cause is otherwise hard to comprehend.

 

The pacifist was certainly uninformed about the Kalachakra Tantra’s aggressive/warlike core, the androcentric sexual magic of Tibetan Buddhism, and the dark chapters in the Tibetan and Mongolian history. Like thousands of others, she followed His Holiness’s charm and messages of peace and was blind to the gods of the Vajrayana’s obsessions with power at work through him. As she and her de facto, Gert Bastian, visited Dharamsala in 1988, they were both, despite having an eagle eye for every minor infringement of democracy in the German Federal Republic, “enormously impressed by the extremely democratic discussions” that had taken place in the parliament of the Tibetans in exile. This was a total misassessment of the situation — as we have already shown at length and as anyone who has the smallest insight into the inner political affairs of Tibetans in exile knows, their popular representation is a farce (Tibetan Review, January 1989, p. 15). But not for Petra Kelly — following her visit to Dharamsala she was so completely entranced by the Kundun’s charm and humane political mask that the issue of Tibet became for her the quintessential “moral touchstone of international politics” (Tibetan Review, July 1993, p. 19). In concrete terms, that meant the politicians our world stood at a threshold: if they supported the Dalai Lama they would be following the path of morality and virtue; if they turned against the Kundun or simply remained passive, then they would be steering down the road to immorality!

 

The green politician Petra Kelly completely failed to perceive the religiously motivated power politics and the tantric occultism of Dharamsala. Like many other women she became a female chess piece (a queen) in the Kundun’s game of strategy, one who opened doors to the German parliament and the upper political ranks for him.

 

The illusory world of interreligious dialog and the ecumenical movement

Although dominated by culturally fixed images and rituals like every other religion, Tibetan Buddhism initially presents itself as a tradition that is tied to neither a culture, a society, nor a race. We hear from every lama that the teachings of the Shakyamuni Buddha consist exclusively in the experiences of each individual. Anybody can test their credibility in his or her own religious practices. Being of another non-Buddhist confession is no obstacle to such sacred exercises.

 

This, in the light of the tantric ritual system and the “baroque” Tibetan pantheon feigned, purist and liberal basic attitude allows His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama to present himself as being so tolerant and open minded that he has been celebrated for years as the “most open minded and liberal ecclesiastical dignitary” on the planet. His readiness to engage in dialog has all but become a catchphrase.

 

In now presenting the Kundun’s interreligious activities, we always have clearly in mind an awareness that at heart the entire Lamaist system is and wants to be incompatible with other faiths. Let us review the reasons for this once more, summarized in seven points. Tantric Buddhism, especially the Kalachakra Tantra and the associated Shambhala myth, includes:

 

  1. The extermination of those of other faiths
  2. A warlike philosophy of violence
  3. Foundations for a neofascist ideology
  4. Contempt for the person, the individual (in favor of the gods), and especially for women (in favor of the tantra masters)
  5. The linking of religious and state power
  6. World conquest and the establishment of a global Buddhocracy via manipulative and warlike means

 

In the face of these points the Kundun’s ecumenical activity remains a lie for as long as he continues to abide by the principles of the tantric ritual system and the ideological/political fundamentals of the Shambhala myth (and the associated grasp for the world throne). It is nonetheless of important tactical significance for him and has proved to be an excellent means of spreading the ideas of Lamaism all over the world without objection.

 

This indirect missionary method has a long tradition in Tibetan history. As Padmasambhava (Guru Rinpoche) won the Land of Snows over to Tantrism in the 8th century, he never went on a direct offensive by openly preaching the fundamentals of the dharma. As an ingenious manipulator, he succeeded in employing the language, images, symbols, and gods of the local religions as a means of transporting the Indian Buddhism he had brought with him. The tribes to whom he preached were convinced that the dharma was nothing more than a clear interpretation of their old religious conceptions. They did not even need to give up their deities (even if these were most cruel) if they were to “convert” to tantric Buddhism, since Padmasambhava integrated these into his own system.

 

Even the Kalachakra Tantra, based on a marked and pervasive concept of the enemy, recommends the manipulation of those of other faiths. Surprisingly, the “Time Tantra” permits the performance of non-Buddhist rites by the tantra master. But there is an important condition here, namely that the mystic physiology of the practicing yogi (his energy body) with which he controls the entire occult/religious event remain stable and keep strictly and without deviation to the tantric method (upaya). Then, it says in the time doctrine, “no form of religion from the way of one’s own or a foreign people is corrupting for the yogis” (Grünwedel, Kalacakra II, p. 177). With this permission, the way is free for one to externally appear tolerant and open minded towards any religious direction without conflicting with the power-political goals of the Kalachakra Tantra and the Shambhala myth that want to elevate Buddhism to be the sole world religion. In contrast, the feigned “religious tolerance” becomes a powerful means of surreptitiously promoting one’s own fundamentalism.

 

Where does this leave the ecumenical politics of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama? Interreligious discussions are one of the Kundun’s specialties; there is not a major world ecumenical event of significance where his negotiating presence is not evident. He is one of the presidents of the “World’s Parliament of Religions” in Chicago. The god-king tirelessly spreads the happy message that despite differing philosophies all religions have the same motive, the perfection of humans. „Whatever the differences between religions,” he explained in Madras in 1985, „all of them want man to be good. Love and compassion form the essence of any religion and these alone can bring people together and provide peace and happiness to humanity” (Tibetan Review, January 1985, p. 9).

 

Yet (he says) for the sake of quality one should not gloss over the differences between the religious approaches. It is not at all desirable that we end up with a uniform, overarching religion; that can not be the goal of the dialog. One should guard against a “religious cocktail”. The variety of religions is a outright necessity for the evolution of humankind. “To form a new world religion,” the Kundun says, “would be difficult and not particularly desirable. But since love is essential for all religions, one could speak of a universal religion of love. Yet with regard to the methods for developing love and for attaining salvation or permanent liberation the religions differ from one another ... The fact that there are so many different depictions of the way is enriching” (Brück and Lai, 1997, p. 520). In general, everyone should stick with the religion he or she was born into.

 

For him it is a matter of deliberate cooperation whilst maintaining autonomy, a dialog about the humanity common to all. In 1997 the god-king proposed that groups of various religious denominations undertake a pilgrimage to the holy places of the world together in order to learn from one another. The religious leaders of the world ought to come together more often, as “such a meeting is a powerful message in the eyes of millions of people” (Tibetan Review, May 1997, p. 14).

 

Christianity

In the meantime, exchange programs between Tibetan Buddhist and Christian orders of monks and nuns have become institutionalized through a resolution of the Dalai Lama, with all four major lines of tradition among the Tibetans (Nyingmapa, Sakyapa, Kagyupa, and Gelugpa) participating. In the sixties, the American Trappist monk and poet, Thomas Merton (1906-1968), visited the Kundun in Dharamsala and summarized his experience together as follows: “I dealt primarily with Buddhists ... It is of incalculable value to come into direct contact with people who have worked hard their whole lives at training their minds and liberating themselves from passions and illusions” (Brück and Lai, 1997, p. 49).

 

In 1989 the god-king and the Benedictine abbot Thomas Keating led a gathering of several thousand Christians and Buddhists in a joint meditation in the West. The Kundun has visited Lourdes and Jerusalem in order to pray there in silent devotion. There is also very close contact between the Lutheran Church and the Council for Religious and Cultural Affairs of H.H. the Dalai Lama. At the so-called Naropa Conferences in Boulder, Colorado, topics such as “God” (Christian) and “Emptiness” (Buddhist), “Prayer” (Christian) and “Meditation” (Buddhist), “Theism” and “non-Theism”, the “Trinity” and the “Three Body Theory” are treated in dialog between Christians and Buddhists.

 

The comparison between Christ and Buddha has a long tradition (see Brück and Lai, 1997, pp. 314ff.). There are in fact many parallels (the virgin birth for example, the messianism). But in particular Mahayana Buddhism’s requirement of compassion allows the two founding figures to appear as representatives of the same spirit. Avalokiteshvara, the supreme Bodhisattva of compassion is thus often presented as a quasi-Christian archetype in Buddhism and also prayed to as such. This is naturally of great advantage to the Kundun, who is himself an incarnation of Avalokiteshvara and can via the comparison (of the two deities) lay claim to the powerful qualities of Christ’s image.

 

But His Holiness is extremely cautious and diplomatic in such matters. For a Buddhist, the Dalai Lama says, Christ can of course be regarded as a Bodhisattva, yet one must avoid claiming Christ for Buddhism. (Incidentally, Christ is named in the Kalachakra Tantra as one the “heretics”.) The Kundun knows only too well that an open integration of the archetype of Christ into his tantric pantheon would only lead to strong protests from the Christian side.

 

He must thus proceed with more skill if he wants to nonetheless integrate the Nazarene into his system as Padmasambhava once incorporated the local gods of Tibet. For example, he describes so many parallels between Christ and Buddha (Avalokiteshvara) that his (Christian!) audience arrive at the conclusion that Christ is a Bodhisattva completely of their own accord.

 

Just how successful the Kundun is with such manipulation is demonstrated by a conference held between a small circle of Christians and himself (in 1994), the proceedings of which are documented in the book, The Good Heart: A Buddhist Perspective on the Teachings of Jesus. In that the god-king repeatedly and emphatically stressed at this meeting that he had not the slightest intention of letting Buddhism monopolize anybody or anything, he in fact had the opposite effect. The more tolerant and respectful towards other religions he showed himself to be, the more he convinced his listeners that Buddhism was indeed the one true faith. With this Catch 22, the Dalai Lama succeeded in emerging at the end of this meeting as a Buddhist super monk, who in himself combined all the qualities of the three most important Christian monastic orders: „He [the Dalai Lama] brings three qualities to a spiritual discourse,” the chief organizer of the small ecumenical event, a Benedictine, says, „traits so rare in some contemporary Christian circles as to have elicited grasps of relieved gratitude from the audience. These qualities are gentleness, clarity, and laughter. If there is something Benedictine about him, there is a Franciscan side as well and a touch of the Jesuit” (Dalai Lama XIV, 1997, pp. 16–17). The Kundun appeared to the predominantly Catholic participants at this interreligious meeting to be more Christian than the Christians in many points.


Richard Gere: “Jesus is very much accepted by the Tibetans, even though they don’t believe in an ultimate creator God. I was at a very moving event that His Holiness did in England where he lectured on Jesus at a Jesuit seminary. When he spoke the words of Jesus, all of us there who had grown up Christians and had often heard them before could not believe their power. It was  ...” Gere suddenly chokes with emotion. For a few moments he just stares into the makeup mirror, waiting to regain his compusere. “When someone can fill such words with the depth meaning that they are intended to have, it’s like hearing them for the first time.” (Schell, 2000, p. 57)


Although the Dalai Lama indignantly rejects any monopolization of other religions by Buddhism, this is not at all true of his followers. In recent times an ever-expanding esoteric literature has emerged in which the authors “prove” that Buddhism is the original source of all religions. In particular there are attempts to portray Christianity as a variant of the “great vehicle” (Mahayana). Christ is proclaimed as a Bodhisattva, an emanation of Avalokiteshvara who sacrificed himself out of compassion for all living creatures (e.g., Gruber and Kersten, 1994).

 

From the Tibetan point of view, the point of ecumenical meetings is not encounters between several religious orientations. [3] That would contradict the entire tantric ritual system. Rather, they are for the infiltration of foreign religions with the goal (like Padmasambhava) of ultimately incorporating them within its own system. On rare occasions the methods to be employed in such a policy of appropriation are discussed, albeit most subtly. Two conferences held in the USA in 1987 and 1992 addressed the central topic of whether the Buddhist concept of upaya ("adroit means”) could provide the instrument “for more relaxed dealings with the issue of truth in dialog (between Christians and Buddhists)” (Brück and Lai, 1997, p. 281) “More relaxed dealings with the issue of truth” — that can only mean that the cultic mystery of the sexual magic rites, the warlike Shambhala ideology, and the “criminal history” of Lamaism is either not mentioned at all at such ecumenical meetings or is presented falsely.

 

An 800-page work by the two theologists Michael von Brück and Whalen Lai (Buddhismus und Christentum [Buddhism and Christianity]) is devoted to the topic of the encounter between Buddhism and Christianity. In it there is no mention at all of the utmost significance of Vajrayana in the Buddhist scene, as if this school did not even exist. We can read page after page of pious and unhurried Mahayana statements by Tibetan lamas, but there is all but nothing said of their secret tantric philosophy. The terms Shambhala and Kalachakra Tantra are not to be found in the index, although they form the basis for the policy on religions of the Dalai Lama whom the authors praise at great length as the real star of the ecumenical dialog. We can present this “theologically” highbrow book as evidence of the subtle and covert manipulation through which the “totalistic paradigm” of Tibetan Buddhism is to be anchored in the west.

 

Only at one single incriminating point, which we have already quoted earlier, do the two authors let the cat out of the bag. In it they recommend that American intellectuals who feel attracted to Chinese Hua-yen Buddhism should instead turn to the Kundun as the only figure in a position to be able to establish a Buddhocracy: “Yet Hua-yen is no longer a living tradition. ... That does not mean that a totalistic paradigm could not be repeated, but it seems more sensible to seek this in the Tibetan-Buddhist tradition, since the Tibetan Buddhists have a living memory of a real 'Buddhocracy' and a living Dalai Lama who leads the people as a religious and political head” (Brück and Lai, 1997, p. 631). The authors thus believe, despite pages of feigned ecumenical Christianity, that a “totalistic paradigm” could be repeated in the future and recommend the god-king from Dharamsala as an example. They thus clearly and openly confirm the Buddhocratic vision of the Kalachakra Tantra and the Shambhala myth, of which they themselves have not breathed a word.

 

The Kundun even seems to have succeeded in gaining access to the “immune” Judaism. After the Dalai Lama’s visit to Jerusalem (in 1996), groups were formed in Israel and the USA in which Jewish and Buddhist ideas were supposed to be brought together. A film has been made about the fate of the Israeli writer Rodger Kamenetz, who converted to Buddhism after he had visited the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala and then set about reinterpreting his own religious roots in Buddhist terms. The so-called Bu-Jews (Buddhist Jews) are the most recent product of the Kundun’s politics of tantric conquest. They are hardly likely to be aware of the interlinkage between Tantric Buddhism and occult fascism that we have described in detail.

 

Islam (The Mlecchas)

In contrast Islam is proving more difficult for His Holiness than the Jews and Christians: “I can barely recall having a serious theological discussion with Mohammedans”, he said at the start of the eighties (Levenson, 1992, p. 288). This is only all to readily understandable in light of the apocalyptic battle between the Mlecchas (followers of Mohammed) and the Buddhist armies of the mythical general, Rudra Chakrin, prophesied in the Shambhala myth. A foretaste of this radical confrontation, which according to the Kalachakra prophecy awaits us in the year 2327, was to be detected as the Moslem Taliban in Afghanistan declared in 1997 that they would destroy the 2000-year-old statues of Buddha in Bamyan because Islam prohibited human icons. This could, however, be prevented under pressure from the world public who reacted strongly to the announcement. (We would like to mention in passing that the likenesses of Buddha carved into the cliffs of Bamyan, of which one figure is 60 yards high, are to be found in a region from which, in the opinion of reliable investigators like Helmut Hoffmann and John Ronald Newman, the Kalachakra Tantra originally comes.)

 

However, after being awarded the Nobel peace prize, the Kundun in his function as a world religious leader has revised his traditional reservation towards Islam. He knows that it is far more publicity-friendly if he also displays the greatest tolerance in this case. In 1998, he thus encouraged Indian Muslims to play a leading role in the discourse between the world religions. In the same, conciliatory frame of mind, in an interview he earlier expressed the wish to visit Mecca one day (Dalai Lama XIV, 1996b, p. 152). [4]

 

On the other hand however, His Holiness maintains very close contact with the Indian BJP (Bhatiya Janata Party) and the RSS (Rashtriya Svayam Sevak Sangh), two old-school conservative Hindu organizations (currently — in 1998 — members of the governing coalition) who proceed with all vigor against Islam. [5]

 

An honest renunciation of Tantric Buddhism’s hostility toward Islam could only consist in the Kundun’s clear distantiation from all the passages from the Kalachakra tradition that concern this. To date, this has — as far as we know — never happened.

 

In contrast, already today there are radical developments in the Buddhist camp that are headed for a direct confrontation with Islam. For example, the Western Buddhist “lama”, Ole Nydhal (a Kagyupa), is strongly and radically active in opposition to the immigration of Moslems to Europe.

 

As problematic as we perceive fundamentalist Islam to be, we are nonetheless not convinced that the Kalachakra ideology and the final battle with the Mlecchas (Mohammedans) prognosticated by the tantra can solve the conflict at the heart of the struggle between the cultures. A contribution to an internet-based discussion rightly described the idea of a Shambhala warrior as the Buddhist equivalent to the jihad, the Moslem “holy war”. Religious wars, which have the goal of eliminating the respective non-believers, have in fact, and for the West unexpectedly, become a threat to world peace in recent years. We return to this point in our conclusion, especially the question of whether the division of humanity into two camps — Buddhist and Islam — as predicted in the Kalachakra Tantra is just a fiction or whether it is a real danger.

 

Shamanism

Up until well into the eighties, the encounter with nature religions played a significant role for the Dalai Lama. There was at that stage a lot of literature that enthusiastically drew attention to the parallels between the North American culture of the Hopi Indians and Tibetan Buddhism. The same terminology was even discovered, just with the meanings reversed: for example, the Tibetan word for “sun” was said to mean “moon” in the language of the Hopi and vice versa, the Hopi sun corresponded to the Tibetan moon (Keegan, 1981, unnumbered). There are also said to be amazing correspondences among the rituals, especially the “fire ceremonies”.

 

For a time the idea arose that the Dalai Lama was the messiah announced in the Hopi religion. In the legend this figure had been a member of the “sun clan” in the mythical past and had left his Indian brothers so as to return in the future as a redeemer. “They wanted to tell me about an old prophecy of their people passed on from generation to generation,” His Holiness recounted, “in which one day someone would come from the east. ... They thought it could be me and had come to tell me this” (Levenson, 1992, p. 277).

 

In France in 1997 an unusual meeting took place. The spiritual representatives of various native peoples gathered there with the intention of founding a kind of international body of the “United Traditions” and presenting a common “charta” to the public. By this the attendees understood a global cooperation between shamanistic religions, still practiced all over the world, with the aim of articulating common rights and gaining an influence over the world’s conscience as the “circle of elders”. The Dalai Lama was also invited to this congress, organized by a Lamaist monastery in France (Karma Ling). Just how adroitly the organizers made him the focal figure of the entire event, which was actually supposed to be a union of equals, is shown by the subtitle of the book subsequently published about the event, The United Traditions: Shamans, Mecidine Men and Wise Women around the Dalai Lama. The whole scenario did in fact revolve around the Dalai Lama. Siberian shamans, North, South, and Central American medicine men (Apaches, Cheyenne, Mohawks, Shuars from the Amazon, and Aztecs), African voodoo priests (from Benin),Bon lamas, Australian Aborigines, and Japanese martial artists came together for an opening ceremony at a Vajrayana temple, surrounded “by the amazing beauty of the Tibetan décor” (Eersel and Grosrey, 1998, p. 31). The meeting was suddenly interrupted by the cry, “His Holiness, His Holiness!” — intended for the Dalai Lama who was approaching the meeting place. The shamans stood up and went towards him. From this point on he was the absolute center of events. There were admittedly mild distantiations before this, but only the Bon priests dared to be openly critical. Their representative, Lopön Trinley Nyima Rinpoche, strongly attacked Lamaism as a repressive religion that has persecuted the Bon followers for centuries. In answer to a question about his attitude to Tibetan Buddhism he replied, “Seen historically, a merciless war has in fact long been conducted between us two. … Between the 7th and the 20th century a good four fifths of Tibet was Buddhist. Sometimes this also meant violence: hence, in the 18th century, with the help of the Chinese, the Gelugpa carried out mass conversions in the border regions of Tibet which had long been inhabited by the Bon” (quoted by Eersel and Grosrey, 1998, p. 141). Still today, the Bonpos are disadvantaged in many ways: “You should be aware, for instance, that non-Buddhist children do not see a penny of the money donated by international aid organizations for Tibetan children!” Nyima Rinpoche protested (quoted by Eersel and Grosrey, 1998, p. 132).

 

But the Kundun knows how to deal with such matters. The next day he lets the Bon critic sit beside him, and declares the Bonpos to be “Tibet’s fifth school”. In his pride, Nyima Rinpoche forgot about any criticism or the history of the repression of his religion. The Dalai Lama takes the African voodoo representative, Daagpo Hounon Houna, in his arms and has a photo taken. The two book authors comment that, “Back home in Africa this picture will certainly receive great symbolic status” (Eersel and Grosley, 1998, p. 132). Then the Kundun says some moving words about “Mother Earth” he has learned from the New Age milieu and which as such do not exist in the Tibetan tradition: “These days we have too little contact to Mother Earth and in this we forget that we ourselves are a part of nature. We are cildren of nature, Mother Earth, and this planet is our only home” (quoted by Eersel and Grosrey, 1998, p. 180). Let us recall that before the start of every Kalachakra ritual the earth spirits are nailed down with a ritual dagger. The Dalai Lama goes on to preach about the variety of races and the equality of the religions of the world. And he has already won the hearts of all. It is naturally his congress, he is the axis around which the “circle of elders” revolves.

 

Roughly in the middle of the book we suddenly learn that the delegates were invited in his name  and that “without the support and the exceptional aura of His Holiness” nothing would have been possible (Eersel and Grosrey, 1998, p. 253). Even the high priest from Benin, who smuggled the remains of an animal sacrifice into the ritual temple that was, however, discovered and removed, accepts the Tibetan hierarch as the central figure of the meeting, saying “I therefore greet His Holiness the Dalai Lama around whom we have gathered here” (Eersel and Grosrey, 1998, p. 199). One of the organizers(Jean-Claude Carrière) sums things up: “That was actually the motor of this meeting. Here for the first time peoples, some of whom have almost vanished from the face of the earth, were asked to speak (and act) and they have recognized the likewise degraded, disowned, and exiled Dalai Lama as one of their own. It is barely imaginable how important it was for them to be able to bow before him and present him with a gift” (Eersel and Grosrey, 1998, p. 254). Tibetan