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Asia Times Online :: South Asia news, business and economy from India and Pakistan
Some very interesting paras...
...
The Dalai Lama claims political and doctrinal ascendancy over the other Tibetan Buddhist sects by virtue of the Gelugpa sect's political dominance of Lhasa and the Tibetan heartland since the 17th century. The stated hierarchy is Dalai Lama first, followed by the Panchen Lama, and the Karmapa in third place.
The Kagyu sect - also known as the Black Hat sect by virtue of the magical headgear woven of goddess hair worn by the Karmapa on ceremonial occasions - disputes the presumption of the Dalai Lama to speak on its behalf. Kagyu adherents point out that the Karmapa holds precedence as a reincarnation over the Dalai Lama since the Karmapa reincarnation was initiated over 100 years before the first Dalai Lama was enthroned. The seat of the Karmapa was the Tsurpha monastery inside the present-day PRC; the 16th Karmapa fled to Sikkim with the Kagyu sect's most important regalia and treasures, and established an imposing new seat called Rumtek a few miles outside the Sikkimese capital of Gangtok.
This institutional friction was exacerbated in the 1960s when the Dalai Lama's decidedly un-Buddhist brother, Gyalo Thondup - who was the US Central Intelligence Agency liaison for the secret war against the Chinese occupation of Tibet - spearheaded the creation of a "united front" that would centralize the control of the fractious emigre community and sects under the control of the government in exile in Dharmsala. The other sects were apparently loathe to bow to Gelugpa control and formed their own political organization, the "Fourteen Settlements" group under the leadership of Gungthang Tsultrim.
In 1977, Gungthang was assassinated. His assassin allegedly told police that he had been paid $35,000 to commit the crime by the government-in-exile, and further alleged that he had been promised a bounty of double that amount to kill the current Karmapa. [1]
Efforts to centralize control of the emigre community collapsed, leaving a residue of bad feeling between Gelugpa and Kagyu leaders.
The situation was complicated by a split within the Kagyu sect itself upon the death of the 16th Karmapa in 1981.The conflict boils down to the rivalry between two Rinpoche in the Kagyu order, Tai Situ Rinpoche and Shamar Rinpoche ("Rinpoche" is an honorific typically applied to reincarnated lamas).
They have battled for decades over control of Rumtek and its ecclesiastical and worldly treasures (which are now in legal limbo; Indian courts have awarded control to a trust established by Shamar Rinpoche, but the local government has not taking the politically traumatic step of evicting the partisans of Tai Situ Rinpoche, who actually occupy the facility).
They also continue to battle over the very identity of the 17th Karmapa.
Tai Situ Rinpoche claimed to have found a secret note from the 16th Karmapa that directed him to the boy subsequently acknowledged by the Dalai Lama and enthroned in 1992 as Ogyen Trinley Dorje, the 17th Karmapa.
Shamar Rinpoche had none of that, asserting that a dream led him to a different Karmapa, one Trinley Thaye Dorje, whom he quietly brought to India from the PRC and enthroned in 1994.
Adherents of Shamar Rinpoche consider Ogyen Trinley Dorje's acknowledgement by the Dalai Lama as a piece of low, Gelugpa skullduggery. An America student of Shamar Rinpoche, Erik Curren, wrote a book on the Karmapa controversy titled "Buddha's Not Smiling". Talking to Asia Times, Mr Curren characterized the elevation of Ogyen Trinley Dorje as a virtual coup d'etat against the Kagyu sect by the Dalai Lama, with the intention of elevating an easily-manipulated son of nomads to the position of Karmapa.
Shamar Rinpoche's followers have also hinted that a neutral Rinpoche was murdered during the trip to Tibet to find Ogyen Trinley Dorje so he wouldn't complicate the selection process. They have also alleged that the young man now in Dharmsala isn't even Ogyen Trinley Dorje at all.
They claim that the real Ogyen Trinley Dorje was afflicted by a learning disability that rendered him incapable of performing the duties of the Karmapa; therefore, according to the accusation, Tai Situ Rinpoche introduced an impostor, an older relation of the boy, to take his place.
Allegedly, this boy was too old to be the reincarnation of the 16th Karmapa (he would have been born before the previous Karmapa passed on); the records of the medical examination performed upon his arrival in India - that would have demonstrated that his "organs" were too developed to be consistent with his stated age - have, in the best conspiratorial tradition, disappeared.
...
What the cash/Karmapa controversy has revealed, more than the fraught nature of succession to the Dalai Lama's role as spokesperson for Tibetan aspirations, or the ugly state of affairs within the Kagyu sect, is the clumsy attempts of the Indian government to manage the affairs of the Tibetan Buddhist communities inside India.
Some very interesting paras...
...
The Dalai Lama claims political and doctrinal ascendancy over the other Tibetan Buddhist sects by virtue of the Gelugpa sect's political dominance of Lhasa and the Tibetan heartland since the 17th century. The stated hierarchy is Dalai Lama first, followed by the Panchen Lama, and the Karmapa in third place.
The Kagyu sect - also known as the Black Hat sect by virtue of the magical headgear woven of goddess hair worn by the Karmapa on ceremonial occasions - disputes the presumption of the Dalai Lama to speak on its behalf. Kagyu adherents point out that the Karmapa holds precedence as a reincarnation over the Dalai Lama since the Karmapa reincarnation was initiated over 100 years before the first Dalai Lama was enthroned. The seat of the Karmapa was the Tsurpha monastery inside the present-day PRC; the 16th Karmapa fled to Sikkim with the Kagyu sect's most important regalia and treasures, and established an imposing new seat called Rumtek a few miles outside the Sikkimese capital of Gangtok.
This institutional friction was exacerbated in the 1960s when the Dalai Lama's decidedly un-Buddhist brother, Gyalo Thondup - who was the US Central Intelligence Agency liaison for the secret war against the Chinese occupation of Tibet - spearheaded the creation of a "united front" that would centralize the control of the fractious emigre community and sects under the control of the government in exile in Dharmsala. The other sects were apparently loathe to bow to Gelugpa control and formed their own political organization, the "Fourteen Settlements" group under the leadership of Gungthang Tsultrim.
In 1977, Gungthang was assassinated. His assassin allegedly told police that he had been paid $35,000 to commit the crime by the government-in-exile, and further alleged that he had been promised a bounty of double that amount to kill the current Karmapa. [1]
Efforts to centralize control of the emigre community collapsed, leaving a residue of bad feeling between Gelugpa and Kagyu leaders.
The situation was complicated by a split within the Kagyu sect itself upon the death of the 16th Karmapa in 1981.The conflict boils down to the rivalry between two Rinpoche in the Kagyu order, Tai Situ Rinpoche and Shamar Rinpoche ("Rinpoche" is an honorific typically applied to reincarnated lamas).
They have battled for decades over control of Rumtek and its ecclesiastical and worldly treasures (which are now in legal limbo; Indian courts have awarded control to a trust established by Shamar Rinpoche, but the local government has not taking the politically traumatic step of evicting the partisans of Tai Situ Rinpoche, who actually occupy the facility).
They also continue to battle over the very identity of the 17th Karmapa.
Tai Situ Rinpoche claimed to have found a secret note from the 16th Karmapa that directed him to the boy subsequently acknowledged by the Dalai Lama and enthroned in 1992 as Ogyen Trinley Dorje, the 17th Karmapa.
Shamar Rinpoche had none of that, asserting that a dream led him to a different Karmapa, one Trinley Thaye Dorje, whom he quietly brought to India from the PRC and enthroned in 1994.
Adherents of Shamar Rinpoche consider Ogyen Trinley Dorje's acknowledgement by the Dalai Lama as a piece of low, Gelugpa skullduggery. An America student of Shamar Rinpoche, Erik Curren, wrote a book on the Karmapa controversy titled "Buddha's Not Smiling". Talking to Asia Times, Mr Curren characterized the elevation of Ogyen Trinley Dorje as a virtual coup d'etat against the Kagyu sect by the Dalai Lama, with the intention of elevating an easily-manipulated son of nomads to the position of Karmapa.
Shamar Rinpoche's followers have also hinted that a neutral Rinpoche was murdered during the trip to Tibet to find Ogyen Trinley Dorje so he wouldn't complicate the selection process. They have also alleged that the young man now in Dharmsala isn't even Ogyen Trinley Dorje at all.
They claim that the real Ogyen Trinley Dorje was afflicted by a learning disability that rendered him incapable of performing the duties of the Karmapa; therefore, according to the accusation, Tai Situ Rinpoche introduced an impostor, an older relation of the boy, to take his place.
Allegedly, this boy was too old to be the reincarnation of the 16th Karmapa (he would have been born before the previous Karmapa passed on); the records of the medical examination performed upon his arrival in India - that would have demonstrated that his "organs" were too developed to be consistent with his stated age - have, in the best conspiratorial tradition, disappeared.
...
What the cash/Karmapa controversy has revealed, more than the fraught nature of succession to the Dalai Lama's role as spokesperson for Tibetan aspirations, or the ugly state of affairs within the Kagyu sect, is the clumsy attempts of the Indian government to manage the affairs of the Tibetan Buddhist communities inside India.
