The Dalai Lama

by Alexander Norman

  In the case of the Three Seats, besides the heads of each college, there were also various senior monastic appointments. Yet while these senior lamas, all of whom had come up through the ranks, were acclaimed teachers, the system of recognizing reincarnate lamas (or tulkus) meant that immense prestige also attached to this other class of monks—whether or not they were themselves notable scholars. And it was these tulkus, a sort of monastic aristocracy, who played a key role not only in the religious life of Tibet but also in its political life.

  The development of the tulku system, which finds its apotheosis in the institution of the Dalai Lamas, was in fact unknown until the thirteenth century. Its first instantiation came when a widely admired teacher and thaumaturge gave directions that enabled his reincarnation to be identified.* Here, though, it is important to be clear about what is being claimed when a child is identified as a reincarnation of a high lama.† It is not that the soul, or even the essence, of the deceased passes into the body of his successor. As we shall see, it is a fundamental claim of Buddhist thinkers that there is no substantial self. It is rather the accumulated karma attaching to the stream of consciousness that manifests through one individual which is passed on to, or made manifest in, another sentient being. That said, to the uneducated peasantry of Tibet, reincarnation is understood very much along the lines of a soul entering a new body, even if it is doctrinally incorrect.

  It is also important to realize that a clear distinction is drawn between rebirth and reincarnation. In essence, while rebirth is what befalls all sentient beings, reincarnation is open only to those far advanced along the path to Enlightenment. The difference lies in the ability of those who reincarnate to be able to choose the timing and manner of their rebirth. This reflects the notion that all reincarnates are understood to manifest the boundless compassion of one or more bodhisattvas—beings who stand on the verge of Enlightenment and thus have most of the attributes of one who is fully enlightened, including, for example, omniscience, yet who choose to remain among sentient beings in order to help them on their way to Enlightenment.

  No reliable figures exist as to the number of reincarnate lamas scattered throughout the Tibetan Buddhist world at the time of the Dalai Lama’s boyhood, but certainly many hundred and very likely more than a thousand seems plausible. It was, in any case, the most important of them who ruled Tibet at this time, alongside the senior-most monastic officials and the aristocracy. How this played out in the years immediately prior to Tibet’s “liberation” by Communist China will be seen in the catastrophic clash that broke out between two of the most important tulkus after the Dalai Lama himself.

  7

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  Boyhood: Two Cane-Handled Horsewhips

  The Dalai Lama is, from the perspective of the Tibetan tradition, both an object of worship and a source of merit. By worshipping him, and even more by giving materially to him, one acquires merit—merit that, one hopes, will contribute to a favorable birth in the next life. From his very first days in Lhasa, therefore, the young Dalai Lama attended ceremonies and functions at which he received not just the occasional foreign delegation but the much more numerous pilgrims, whether lay or monastic, for whom merely to be touched on the head with the red cotton tassel at the end of a short wooden stick, which was the Dalai Lama’s means of blessing them, was the crowning moment of their lives. Thereafter, “death held no fears.” One young visitor who joined the waiting line at this time noted, however, that, “surrounded by several elderly monks who now and then bent down and whispered to him,” the boy himself looked “no different from our urchin friends.”

  But if his public duties were vital to maintaining a connection with his people, from a personal perspective it was the Dalai Lama’s formation as a monk that took precedence over all. We might ask why this was so, why he needed educating at all, given that one of the chief characteristics of bodhisattvas is omniscience. It is true that, from the perspective of Buddhist tradition, learning for the Dalai Lama and other high incarnations is to a large extent a question of relearning. But though Chenresig himself is all-knowing, it does not follow that his earthly manifestations are not subject to the usual constraints of embodied existence. Together with Lobsang Samten, the Precious Protector therefore began his day in just the same way as any other novice monk.

  Having risen at dawn, they would set about their first task, which was to prepare the room in which their teacher would join them. Then, while awaiting his arrival, the boys would begin performing the preliminary invocation to Manjushri, Bodhisattva of Wisdom. This prayer ends with the syllable dhih, pronunciation of which is thought to sharpen one’s faculties. The boys would repeat it as many times as possible in a single breath: dhih, dhih, dhih, dhih, dhih, dhih, dhih, dhih . . . This done, they would start reciting the lines they had memorized the previous day, chanting at the top of their voices for maximum impact, and rocking their small bodies rhythmically back and forth. No doubt there was often more laughter than industry, but on hearing the footsteps of the Dalai Lama’s tutor, they would fall silent.

  Describing these early days, the Dalai Lama recounts how, as the tutor took his seat, one of two cane-handled horsewhips that hung on a pillar in the room would be taken down by an attendant and placed beside his teacher, who sat opposite the little boy’s throne on a “raised seat with no supporting cushions or backboard.” The teacher in question was Ling Rinpoché. Appointed as assistant tutor alongside the regent, who acted as senior tutor, Ling Rinpoché came to be the single most important person in the Dalai Lama’s life. A man with incredible powers of recall and an acknowledged clairvoyant, he also had a reputation for being a stern disciplinarian. In the biography he later wrote in homage to his tutor, the Dalai Lama tells, approvingly, the story of how, as deputy abbot of Gyuto Monastery, Ling Rinpoché punished some monks for not knowing the words to a particular series of chants. Ordering them to collect sand in sacks, he paraded them for inspection in the monastery courtyard. For reasons that are unclear, he further ordered that one of them be flogged. This caused a number of monks to grumble about Ling Rinpoché. Yet the Dalai Lama commends the punishment as a good deed, noting that when a smallpox epidemic struck soon after, “it is said that those monks who had to ferry bags of sand, apart from one or two, recovered from the disease,” this at a time when the fatality rate following infection was somewhere between a third and half of all cases.

  According to the Dalai Lama, Ling Rinpoché was one of those rare beings who could manifest the siddhi—the magical powers—of the most advanced yogins. On one occasion during a divination ritual he threw a stick that landed upright, an event that “everyone present regarded . . . with astonishment.” The Dalai Lama also notes uncritically the story that a particular statue in his tutor’s monastery would change its appearance according to whether Ling Rinpoché was in good health or not. When he was, it would turn its face to the sky. When not, it would be downcast.

  If the fact of corporal punishment was very much present, even for one so exalted as the Dalai Lama, so too was that other staple of a traditional education: learning by rote. Even today, the novice studying in a Tibetan Buddhist monastery dedicates much of his first ten years as a monk to memorizing the most important texts and rituals of his craft. This he does by chanting out loud—itself held to be a meritorious act because it benefits the many supernatural beings that surround humans at all times, who may not have had the opportunity to study the dharma for themselves. Although rote learning has become unfashionable in modern schools, one reason for the high value placed on memorization of texts in the Buddhist tradition is that, in order to understand a text, it is considered essential to have the words available for instant recall. What is known darkly becomes illumined when the meaning is expounded by the teacher.

  Helpfully, the majority of texts that the novice is required to commit to memory are written in verse form. Pass by a monastery when the youngsters are studying and you might think the whole place is in an upro
ar as they fight to make their voices heard. This is encouraged as, in so doing, they learn to concentrate to the point where nothing can distract them—for which reason a teacher will sometimes deliberately try to throw them off. A relatively recent story is told of how one of the novices at Namgyal Monastery was reciting a text when the Dalai Lama himself entered the room and proceeded to scratch him on the back. It was bad enough that anyone should do this, but that it was the Dalai Lama himself must have produced extraordinary emotion on the part of the young monk. It is to his great credit that history relates a successful outcome: he got to the end of the piece without fault or stumble.

  The first text the Dalai Lama learned was one known as the Ganden Lha Gya Ma: the Hundred Deities of Ganden. Composed in honor of the fourteenth-century Gelug master Je (Lord) Tsongkhapa, this is a short devotional practice that calls on the master and his two chief disciples:

  From your place at the heart of the One Who Is to Come—

  Guardian of those hundreds of the blessed in the Joyful Land—

  Come! Reposing on a cloud white as the freshest curd,

  Come! All-knowing Lobsang Drakpa,

  Come! And bring your two heart disciples:

  Take your places before me,

  And seat yourselves on lion throne, lotus, and moon

  Although the Dalai Lama often says he was a poor student, he is widely acknowledged as having the ability not just to quote verbatim from all the root texts but also, in his teachings, to be able to quote lengthy passages from the prose commentaries. It is evident he did not waste all his time.

  The Dalai Lama also has a fine hand. Within the tradition, penmanship is regarded as an art in itself, and he was taught calligraphy from the beginning. This was in marked contrast to the education of most other novices, among whom the ability to write was rare. Remarkably, it was not uncommon for even the most proficient scholars to be unable to write even their own names. There were several reasons for this. Writing was regarded as the province of monastery administrators and, as such, a less important occupation than the study and mastery of the sacred texts. Partly, too, the denigration of writing reflected the innate conservatism of the monasteries. Writing was the source of innovation and therefore should be taught only to those who could be trusted. It was also regarded as unnecessary: there was little if anything that had been left unsaid. Above all, however, at least within the major monastic institutions of Ganden, Drepung, and Sera, skill in debate was regarded as a greater accomplishment.

  For those who did learn to write, the task was complicated by the fact that there were three major scripts to master: one (u chen) is used for the printed word; a second (u me), a more cursive script, is used for everyday correspondence, note taking, essay writing, and so forth; and a third (chu yig) is a highly stylized cursive script used in formal correspondence and legal documents. Possibly in a dissenting move on the part of his writing tutor, for practice in the third, and most demanding, script, the boy Dalai Lama was given the text of the Great Thirteenth’s final testament, with its dire warnings of ruin if the Tibetan government did not set aside its habitual infighting. As a result, not only did the Dalai Lama develop an elegant hand, but also, from an early age, he was aware of the disastrous extent to which his predecessor’s recommendations were being neglected.

  By the time of the Precious Protector’s homecoming, many influential Lhasans had grown to dislike the regent, Reting Rinpoché, intensely. Personally, he was known to be fond of soccer and marksmanship; he was in fact something of a crack shot. It is said he once persuaded a young associate to allow him to shoot an egg from his outstretched hand. When, afterwards, Reting asked what had given him the confidence to do so, the monk replied that he had taken the view that if the shot had killed him, he would have died at the hand of a high lama and would therefore be assured of a favorable rebirth. But if these eccentricities could perhaps be overlooked, the venality of the Reting labrang (or household) could not.*

  As was customary, following the new Dalai Lama’s arrival in Lhasa, the National Assembly met to discuss an appropriate reward to be bestowed on the regent for successfully identifying and repatriating the rightful occupant of the Lion Throne. While there was general agreement that a reward of several landed estates would be suitable, one of the regent’s placemen announced that fifty or even sixty estates would be inadequate to express the gratitude the government should properly feel toward him. This prompted an argument in the course of which one of the more outspoken ministers repeated a proverb:

  After eating the mountain, hunger is not satisfied,

  After drinking the ocean, thirst is not slaked.

  This was interpreted by the regent’s party as an open insult, and the minister in question was forced to resign. Shortly afterwards, Reting moved to reward the monk who had spoken in his favor by making him abbot of an important college. This incensed the college members, all of whom remained loyal to the present incumbent. A standoff ensued and resulted in the regent’s finally having to back down. But before he did so, his support within government circles had largely evaporated. Not long afterwards, rumors began to circulate about the regent’s sexual indiscretions.

  It seems inescapable that these rumors were grounded in fact and that not only did Reting have a male lover but also he had also fathered a child by a relative’s wife. And whereas a blind eye could be turned to the one (indeed, homosexual relationships were nothing unusual within the monasteries and were condemned only if the parties engaged in penetrative sex), to the other no leniency could be shown. A monk who had broken one of his root precepts* was no longer a monk. It was for this reason that posters began to appear in Lhasa asserting Reting’s unfitness to administer vows to the young Dalai Lama. Within the Tibetan tradition, vows are not sworn by the one who will keep them but are “administered,” or “conferred,” by someone who already maintains the precepts the novice vows to keep. In this case, the regent was due to confer the thirty-six preliminary monastic precepts on the Dalai Lama as part of the getsul ceremony, at which the boy would formally embark on the path to full ordination as a bikshu (the title given to one who is so ordained) in the Mahayana* tradition—the Mahayana being the more recent of the two great schools within Buddhism taken as a whole.

  This was a scandal of the most serious import. Of course, the Regent could simply deny the rumors—as many advised that he should. But for all his faults, it is clear that Reting Rinpoché took his vocation seriously. He had offended against the precepts of his calling, and he could not and would not try to pretend otherwise. He therefore announced that various spiritual and oracular sources had given strong presentiments of danger to his life if he did not at once resign his position and undertake a lengthy retreat.

  Who, then, should take his place as regent? It is clear that Reting saw resignation as only a temporary measure. He would indeed undertake a lengthy retreat, but once the getsul ceremony was out of the way, and when the scandal had died down, he would reassume his position until the Dalai Lama came of age. With this in mind, he would ask his own teacher, the elderly Taktra (pronounced, roughly, “Ta-tag”) Rinpoché, to stand in for him.

  Many of those closest to Reting urged him to reconsider. He could avoid the getsul ceremony by claiming illness. But Reting refused. In that case, at least one of his advisers urged, he should make sure not actually to relinquish power. Taktra should act only in matters of minor importance. Reting must not make the mistake of letting go of “the orphan’s box of brick tea.”

  The story of the orphan’s box of brick tea (the tea that Tibetans generally drink is made from leaves compressed into bricks for ease of transport) perfectly illustrates the thought processes of a traditionally educated Tibetan. Once there was a child who became orphaned. Being in need, he went at once in search of his uncles and aunts. On asking succor of them, he was serially rebuffed. “I’m not your uncle.” “I’m not your aunt.” Alone and distraught, the orphan went on his way, when, as great good luck w
ould have it, he came across an abandoned box of brick tea. These were riches indeed! It was a time when tea was in great scarcity. All of a sudden, he found himself besieged by people claiming to be his relatives. At this he bowed down before the box: “Because of you, I have found uncles. Because of you, I have found aunts.” It is, of course, a version of the story of the goose that laid the golden egg.

  Reting is said to have laughed on being reminded of the story, knowing full well that in his case the box of brick tea symbolized his power as regent. But still he would not budge.

  The first the now seven-year-old Dalai Lama knew of the matter was when asked who he thought should replace Reting as his senior tutor. It is likely that the question was posed in such a way that the only answer was Taktra. In any case, the appointment suited the boy, who considered the elderly Taktra “a very gentle man.” But though Taktra may have been gentle in person, and apt to fall asleep on those occasions when he came to conduct a lesson with the Precious Protector, it turned out that in his dealings with others, he was as stern and unyielding as his politics were dictatorial and his religion was reactionary.