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Tashi dele from Tibet [April-May 1999]

Tibet trip

Agelasto
2004-05-20 20:00:06

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rehabilitation.
At various times the 10th Panchen Lama, who died in 1989, was considered an ally of (or
co-opted by, depending on point of view) the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
Apparently with the CCP?s oversight, an 11th Panchen Lama was chosen a few years ago.
Lamas are traditionally chosen by a process that involves identifying an infant who is the
reincarnation of the previous lama; the selection process for the 11th included criteria of
parental political correctness. In any case, the 11th, still a child, lives in Beijing under the
watchful eye of the government. Just a few days after I visited Tibet, the 11th himself was
permitted to visit and officiate at various ceremonies.
The other strain of Tibetan Buddhism is the larger and more religiously significant one,
that of the Dalai Lamas. The current Dalai Lama, who is the fourteenth in succession,
worked with the new government of the PRC from about 1950, when he was just 15 years
old, when the CCP secured the new nation?s frontiers, until he fled China in 1959. The
record suggests that the 15-year-old lacked the political experience to deal with such a
consummate politician as Mao Zedong. From the accounts I have read, the Dalai Lama
seemed unable to control the political situation in Tibet, the 1959 street riots which the
CCP felt very threatened by. The Dalai Lama took the advice of his associates and moved
to northern India.
The respect for, and indeed the mythology surrounding, the Dalai Lama runs deeply in
Tibet. Locals will often ask tourists for photos of the 14th Dalai Lama, effigies which are
prohibited by government degree issued several years ago (a bit silly, don?t you think, for
a world power to restrict photographs of a religious leader?). The Dalai Lama is an
internationally recognized humanitarian, whose speaking engagements around the world
generate sufficient funds to maintain ...