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Tibetan Buddhism
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Tibetan Buddhism is the body of Buddhist religious doctrine and institutions characteristic of Tibet and certain regions of the Himalayas, including northern Nepal, Bhutan, and India (Arunachal Pradesh, Ladakh and Sikkim). It is also practiced in Mongolia and parts of Russia(Kalmykia, Buryatia, and Tuva) and Northeast China.
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Tibetan Buddhism is the body of Buddhist religious doctrine and institutions characteristic of Tibet and certain regions of the Himalayas, including northern Nepal, Bhutan, and India (Arunachal Pradesh, Ladakh and Sikkim). It is also practiced in Mongolia and parts of Russia(Kalmykia, Buryatia, and Tuva) and Northeast China. Tibetan Buddhism comprises many distinct schools, but is primarily divided into four main traditions: Nyingma, Kagyu, Gelug, and Sakya. All schools are said to include the teachings of the three vehicles of Buddhism: the Foundational Vehicle, Mahayana, and Vajrayana, although some schools, the Gelug for example, consider Vajrayana a part of Mahayana.
The first military attacks by the People's Republic of China on Tibetan troops began at the end of May, 1950, and Generals Zhang Guohua and Tan Guansan reached Lhasa on the 26th October, 1951. Soon after thousands of PLA troops marched through Lhasa. This all led to armed conflicts later in the decade. The failed uprising resulted in the exile of about eighty thousand Tibetans, many of them Buddhist clergy members, to India. Some of them went further to the west, which in turn eventually led to the spread of Tibetan Buddhism to many Western countries, where the tradition has gained popularity.
The Tibetan Buddha Ideal
The ideal goal of spiritual development in Tibetan Buddhism, a Mahayana tradition, is to achieve the enlightenment (Buddhahood) in order to most efficiently help all other sentient beings attain this state.
Buddhahood is sometimes partially defined as a state of omniscience. "Omniscience" relates to the Buddhist principle that all things are created by mind.
When, in Buddhahood, one is freed from all mental obscurations, one is said to attain a state of continuous bliss mixed with a simultaneous cognition of emptiness, the true nature of reality. In this state, all limitations on one's ability to help other living beings are removed.
It is said that there are countless beings who have attained Buddhahood. Buddhas spontaneously, naturally and continuously perform activities to benefit all sentient beings. However it is believed that sentient beings' karmas limit the ability of the Buddhas to help them. Thus, although Buddhas possess no limitation from their side on their ability to help others, sentient beings continue to experience suffering as a result of the limitations of their own former negative actions.
Tibetan definitions of "Buddhist"
Introspection as the mark of a Buddhist is embodied in the Tibetan term for Buddhist: literally, "internalist".
More precisely, Tibetans specify two alternative criteria for being Buddhist: a) formal: having taken refuge and b) in belief: acceptance of the three (sometimes four) marks of existence.
General Methods of Practice
Transmission and Realisation (lungtok, lung-rtogs)
An emphasis on oral transmission as more important than the printed word derives from the earliest period of Indian Buddhism, when it allowed teachings to be kept from those who should not hear them. Hearing a teaching (transmission) readies the hearer for realisation based on it. The person from whom one hears the teaching should have heard it as one link in a succession of listeners going back to the original speaker: the Buddha in the case of a sutra or the author in the case of a book. Then the hearing constitutes an authentic lineage of transmission. Authenticity of the oral lineage is a prerequisite for realisation, hence the importance of lineages.
Merely reading about a teaching is helpful but no substitute for receiving a transmission on it. Having a text recited aloud by someone who holds the lineage for transmission of that text makes oneself also a holder of that lineage and the more ready for realization of the teaching in it. Oral transmissions by lineage holders traditionally can take place in small groups or mass gatherings of listeners and may last for seconds (in the case of a mantra, for example) or months (as in the case of a section of the canon). A transmission can even occur without actually hearing, as in Asanga's visions of Maitreya.
Analytic Meditation and Focussed/ Fixation Meditation
Spontaneous realisation on the basis of transmission is possible but rare. Normally an intermediate step is needed in the form of analytic meditation, i.e., thinking about what one has heard. As part of this process, entertaining doubts and engaging in internal debate over them is encouraged in some traditions particularly.
Analytic meditation is just one of two general methods of meditation. When analytic meditation achieves the quality of realisation, one is encouraged to switch to "focussed" or "fixation" meditation. In this the mind is stabilised on that realisation for periods long enough to gradually habituate it to it.
A person's capacity for analytic meditation can be trained with logic and that for successful focussed meditation through calm abiding. A meditation routine may involve alternating sessions of analytic meditation to achieve deeper levels of realisation and focussed meditation to consolidate them. The deepest level of realisation is Buddhahood.
Skepticism and Guru Devotion
Of all aspects of Tibetan Buddhism, none more than skepticism and guru devotion have led it into conflict with Chinese socialism and so invited the genocide of the Tibetan intelligentsia under Mao. An attitude of critical skepticism is encouraged to promote abilities in analytic meditation. However, as in other Buddhist traditions, an attitude of reverence for the teacher is also highly prized.
In favour of skepticism towards Buddhist doctrines in general, Tibetans are fond of quoting sutra to the effect that one should test the Buddha's words as one would the quality of gold. On the other hand, at the beginning of a public teaching, a lama will do prostrations to the throne on which he will teach due to its symbolism, or to an image of the Buddha behind that throne, then students will do prostrations to the lama after he is seated. Merit accrues when one's interactions with the teacher are imbued with such reverence in the form of guru devotion, a code of practices governing them that derives from Indian sources. By such things as avoiding disturbance to the peace of mind of one's teacher and wholeheartedly following his prescriptions, much merit accrues and promotes one's practice.
There is a general sense in which any Tibetan Buddhist teacher is called a lama. A student may have taken teachings from many authorities and revere them all as lamas in this general sense. However, he will typically have one held in special esteem as his own root guru and is encouraged to view the other teachers who are less dear to him, however more exhalted their status, as embodied in and subsumed by the root guru. Often the teacher the student sees as root guru is simply the one who first introduced him to Buddhism, but a student may also change his personal view of which particular teacher is his root guru any number of times.
The opposing principles of skepticism and guru devotion are reconciled with the Tibetan injunction to scrutinise a prospective guru thoroughly before finally adopting him as such without reservation. A Buddhist may study with a lama for decades before finally accepting him as his own guru.
Preliminary Practices (ngöndo, sngon-'gro) and the Tibetan Approach to Vajrayana
Vajrayana is said to be the fastest method for attaining Buddhahood but it carries the caution that for unqualified practitioners it can be dangerous. Even for a qualified advanced practitioner, to engage in Vajrayana without having received the appropriate initiation (also known as an "empowerment") from a lama who is fully qualified to give it is to court controversy. From the time one has resolved to accept a Vajrayana initiation, skepticism towards the person giving that initiation as guru is suspended and the utmost sustained effort in guru devotion towards them is essential.
Just as Sutrayana preceded Vajrayana historically in India, so sutra practices constitute those that are preliminary to tantric ones. Preliminary practices include all Sutrayana activities that yield merit like hearing teachings, prostrations, offerings, prayers and acts of kindness and compassion, but chief among the preliminary practices are realizations through meditation on the three principle stages of the path: renunciation, the altruistic bodhicitta will for enlightenment and the wisdom realizing emptiness. For a person without the basis of these three in particular to practice Vajrayana can be like a small child trying to ride an unbroken horse.
While the practices of Vajrayana are not known in Sutrayana, all Sutrayana practices are common to Vajrayana. Without training in the preliminary practices, the ubiquity of allusions to them in Vajrayana is meaningless and even successful Vajrayana initiation becomes impossible.
The merit acquired in the preliminary practices facilitates progress in Vajrayana. While many Buddhists may spend a lifetime exclusively on sutra practices, however, an amalgam of the two to some degree is common. For, example, in order to train in calm abiding, one might use a tantric visualisation as the meditation object.
Esotericism
In Vajrayana particularly, Tibetan Buddhists subscribe to a voluntary code of self-censorship, whereby the uninitiated do not seek and are not provided with information about it. This self-censorship may be applied more or less strictly depending on circumstances such as the material involved. A depiction of a mandala may be less public than that of a deity. That of a higher tantric deity may be less public than that of a lower. The degree to which information on Vajrayana is now public in western languages is controversial among Tibetan Buddhists.
Buddhism has always had a taste for esotericism since its earliest period in India. Tibetans today maintain greater or lesser degrees of confidentiality also with information on the Vinaya and emptiness specifically. In Buddhist teachings generally, too, there is caution about revealing information to people who may be unready for it. Esoteric values in Buddhism have made it at odds with the values of Christian missionary activity, for example in contemporary Mongolia.
Native Tibetan developments
Some commentators have emphasised Tibetan innovations such as the system of incarnate lamas, but such genuine innovations have been few. True to its roots in the Pala system of North India, however, Tibetan Buddhism carried on a tradition of eclectic accumulation and systematisation of diverse Buddhist elements, and pursued their synthesis. Prominent among these achievements are the Stages of the Path (lamrim, lam-rim) and motivational training (lojong, blo-sbyong).
Schools
Tibetan Buddhism has four main traditions:
- Kagyu(pa), Lineage of the (Buddha's) Word. This contains one major subsect and one minor subsect. The first, the Dagpo Kagyu, encompasses those Kagyu schools that trace back to Gampopa. In turn, the Dagpo Kagyu consists of four major sub-sects: the Karma Kagyu, headed by a Karmapa, the Tsalpa Kagyu, the Barom Kagyu, and Pagtru Kagyu. There are further eight minor sub-sects, all of which trace their root to Pagtru Kagyu. Among the eight sub-sects the most notable of are the Drikung Kagyu and the Drukpa Kagyu. The once-obscure Shangpa Kagyu, which was famously represented by the 20th century teacher Kalu Rinpoche, traces its history back to the Indian master Niguma, sister of Kagyu lineage holder Naropa. This is an oral tradition which is very much concerned with the experiential dimension of meditation. Its most famous exponent was Milarepa, an eleventh century mystic.
- Sakya(pa), Grey Earth, headed by the Sakya Trizin, founded by Khon Konchog Gyalpo, a disciple of the great translator Drokmi Lotsawa. Sakya Pandita 1182–1251CE was the great grandson of Khon Konchog Gyalpo. This school very much represents the scholarly tradition.
- Gelug(pa), Way of Virtue, whose spiritual head is the Ganden Tripa and whose temporal head is the Dalai Lama. Successive Dalai Lamas ruled Tibet from the mid-17th to mid-20th centuries. This order was founded in the 14th to 15th century by Je Tsongkhapa, based on the foundations of the Kadampa tradition. Tsongkhapa was renowned for both his scholasticism and his virtue. The Dalai Lama belongs to the Gelugpa school, and is regarded as the embodiment of the Bodhisattva of Compassion.
Texts recognized as scripture and commentary are fixed by the Tibetan Buddhist canon.
These major schools are sometimes classified into Nyingma ("Old Translation") and Sarma ("New Translation") traditions according to translations and lineages of various Tantric texts. Another common way of classification is the differentiation into "Red Hat" and "Yellow Hat" schools:
| Nyingma | Kagyu | Sakya | Gelug |
|---|
| Old Translation | New Translation | New Translation | New Translation | | Red Hat | Red Hat | Red Hat | Yellow Hat | |
Besides these major schools, there are a number of minor ones like Jonang. The Jonangpa were suppressed by the rival Gelugpa in the 1600s and were once thought extinct, but are now known to survive in Eastern Tibet.
There is also an ecumenical movement known as Rimé.
Study of tenet systems in Tibetan Buddhism
Tibetan Buddhists practise one or more understandings of the true nature of reality, the emptiness of inherent existence of all things. Emptiness is propounded according to four classical Indian schools of philosophical tenets.
Two belong to the older Hinayana path (Skt. for Lesser Vehicle, Tib. theg dman). (Hinayana is sometimes referred to as Sravakayana (Skt. Vehicle of Hearers) because "lesser" may be considered derogatory):
- Vaibhashika (Tib. bye-brag smra-ba)
- Sautrantika (Tib. mdo-sde-pa)
The primary source for the former is the Abhidharmakosha by Vasubandhu and commentaries. The Abhidharmakosha is also an important source for the Sautrantikas. Dignaga and Dharmakirti are the most prominent exponents.
The other two are Mahayana (Skt. Greater Vehicle) (Tib. theg-chen):
- Yogacara, also called Cittamatra (Tib. sems-tsam-pa), Mind-Only
- Madhyamaka (Tib. dbu-ma-pa)
Yogacarin base their views on texts from Maitreya, Asanga and Vasubandhu, Madhyamikas on Nagarjuna and Aryadeva. There is a further classification of Madhyamaka into Svatantrika-Madhyamaka and Prasangika-Madhyamaka. The former stems from Bhavaviveka, Santaraksita and Kamalashila, and the latter from Buddhapalita and Chandrakirti.
The tenet system is used in the monasteries and colleges to teach Buddhist philosophy in a systematic and progressive fashion, each philosophical view being more subtle than its predecessor. Therefore the four schools can be seen as a gradual path from a rather easy-to-grasp, "realistic" philosophical point of view, to more and more complex and subtle views on the ultimate nature of reality, that is on emptiness and dependent arising, culminating in the philosophy of the Madhyamikas, which is widely believed to present the most sophisticated point of view.
Monasticism
Although there were many householder-yogis in Tibet, monasticism was the foundation of Buddhism in Tibet. There were over 6,000 monasteries in Tibet, and nearly all were ransacked and destroyed by the Chinese communists (many of them young ethnic Tibetan Red Guards), mainly during the Cultural Revolution. Most of the major ones have been at least partially re-established but many still remain in ruins.
In Mongolia during the 1920s, approximately one third of the male population were monks, though many lived outside monasteries. By the beginning of the 20th century about 750 monasteries were functioning in Mongolia. These monasteries were largely dismantled during Communist rule, but many have been reestablished during the Buddhist revival in Mongolia which followed the fall of Communism.
Monasteries generally adhere to one particular school. Some of the major centers in each tradition are as follows:
Nyingma
The Nyingma lineage is said to have "six mother monasteries," although the composition of the six has changed over time:
Also of note is
Kagyu
Many Kagyu monasteries are in Kham, eastern Tibet. Tsurphu, one of the most important, is in central Tibet, as is Ralung.
Sakya
Gelug
The three most important centers of the Gelugpa lineage are Ganden, Sera and Drepung Monasteries, near Lhasa:
Three other monasteries have particularly important regional influence:
Great spiritual and historical importance is also placed on:
- Jokhang Temple in Lhasa — said to have been built by King Songtsen Gampo in 647 AD, a major pilgrimage site
History
According to a Tibetan legendary tradition, Buddhist scriptures (among them the Karandavyuha Sutra) and relics (among them the Cintamani) arrived in southern Tibet during the reign of Lha Thothori Nyantsen, the 28th king of Tibet (fifth century). The tale is miraculous (the objects fell from the sky on the roof of the king's palace), but it may have a historical background (the arrival of Buddhist missionaries).
The earliest well-documented influence of Buddhism in Tibet dates from the reign of king Songtsän Gampo, who died in 650. He married a Chinese Tang Dynasty Buddhist princess, Wencheng, who came to Tibet with a statue of Shakyamuni Buddha. According to a Tibetan legendary tradition, Songtsän Gampo also married a Nepalese Buddhist princess, Bhrikuti; but Bhrikuti, who bears the name of a goddess, is not mentioned in reliable sources. Songtsän Gampo founded the first Buddhist temples. By the second half of the 8th century he was already regarded as an embodiment of the bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara.
The successors of Songtsän Gampo seem to have been less enthusiastic about the propagation of Buddhism. But in the 8th century, King Trisong Detsen (755-797) established Buddhism as the official religion of the state. He invited Indian Buddhist scholars to his court. In his age the famous tantric mystic Padmasambhava arrived in Tibet according to the Tibetan tradition. In addition to writing a number of important scriptures (some of which he hid for future tertons to find), Padmasambhava established the Nyingma school ("the old school").
Tibetan Buddhism exerted a strong influence from the 11th century CE among the peoples of Central Asia, especially in Mongolia and Manchuria. It was adopted as an official state religion by the Mongol Yuan dynasty and the Manchu Qing dynasty that ruled China.
Transmission of Chan to the Nyingmapa
According to A. W. Barber of the University of Calgary, Chan Buddhism was introduced to the Nyingmapa in three principal streams: the teachings of Master Kim, Kim Ho-shang, (Chin ho shang) ??? transmitted by Sang Shi in ca. 750 CE; the lineage of Master Wu Chu of the Pao T'ang School was transmitted within Tibet by Ye shes dbang po; and the teaching from Mo Ho Yen, ????? (Tibetan: Hwa shang Mahayana) that were a synthesis of the Northern School of Chan and the Pao T'ang School.
Tibetan king Khri srong lde btsan (742–797) invited the Ch’an master Mo-ho-yen (whose name consists of the same Chinese characters used to transliterate “Mahayana”) to transmit the Dharma at Samye Monastery. Mo-ho-yen had been disseminating Dharma in the Tun-huang locale, but, according to Tibetan sources, lost an important philosophical debate on the nature of emptiness with the Indian master Kamalashila, and the king declared Kamalashila's philosophy should form the basis for Tibetan Buddhism. However, a Chinese source says their side won, and some scholars conclude that the entire episode is fictitious. According to some scholars, Hwashang's ideas of the Chan school are preserved by the Nyingmapas in the form of dzogchen teachings.
Whichever may be the case, Tibetan Buddhists today trace their spiritual roots from Indian masters such as Padmasambhava, Atisha, Tilopa, Naropa and their later Tibetan students.
Tibetan Buddhism in the contemporary world
Today, Tibetan Buddhism is adhered to widely in the Tibetan Plateau, Nepal, Bhutan, Mongolia, Kalmykia (on the north-west shore of the Caspian), Siberia (central Russia, specifically Buryatia and Chita Oblast), and the Russian Far East (concentrated in Tyva). The Indian regions of Sikkim and Ladakh, both formerly independent kingdoms, are also home to significant Tibetan Buddhist populations. In the wake of the Tibetan diaspora, Tibetan Buddhism has gained adherents in the West and throughout the world; there are estimated to be tens of thousands of practitioners in Europe and the Americas. Celebrity Tibetan Buddhism practitioners include Richard Gere, Adam Yauch, Jet Li, Sharon Stone, Allen Ginsberg, Philip Glass, and Steven Seagal (who has been proclaimed the reincarnation of the tulku Chungdrag Dorje).
See also
Further reading
Introductory books
- Wallace, B. Alan (October 25, 1993). Tibetan Buddhism From the Ground Up: A Practical Approach for Modern Life. Wisdom Publications. ISBN-10: 0861710754, ISBN-13: 978-0861710751
- Yeshe, Lama Thubten (2001). "The Essence of Tibetan Buddhism". Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive. ISBN 1-891868-08-X
Other books
- Coleman, Graham, ed. (1993). A Handbook of Tibetan Culture. Boston: Shambhala Publications, Inc.. ISBN 1-57062-002-4.
- Smith, E. Gene (2001). Among Tibetan Texts: History and Literature of the Himalayan Plateau. Boston: Wisdom Publications. ISBN 0-86171-179-3
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