[guard-of-terra]

Well, I can imagine things like what you describe (regarding Cherokee Nation) and I won't find that especially odd.

But Tibetians are much more numerous and they've lost their independence much more recently, making their case incomparable to that of Cherokee. Your parable is shaky.

You seem to think that Dalai Lama issue is either solely about annoying China, or solely about self-presentation. It is not. People are genuinely interested in Buddhism because it looks elegant and less stained than other major religions.

[awl130]

Would it help you if it were "Free Hawai'i"? That timeline is comparable.

Your last statement confuses me. What does Dalai Lama have to do with Buddhism? The Dalai Lama is not the head of Buddhism but the head of Tibet, which is a tribe seeking a political state. Tibetan Buddhism is a sect of Buddhism practiced beyond Tibetan borders. Much like a great many Shia Muslims live in Iran, but we would not confound Iranian political independence with Shia Islam. Let's not forget Buddha was "born" in present-day Nepal. Certainly, the Dalai Lama is no fool and uses his religion for his political agenda, seeking to perhaps to conflate the two. By your post it seems he is succeeding.

[jmagoon]

The Dalai Lama is the head of Tibetan Buddhism, because Tibet is (was) a theocracy, much like the Pope is the head of the Papal State and the Catholic Church. (Though this is not an exact parallel due to to the distributed nature of the Tibetan Schools)

And, if you read the article, you would see that one of the major points is that the Dalai Lama has dissolved that connection (head of religion - head of state) only relatively recently.

Calling Tibet a 'tribe' is also a little bit strange, and smacks of the way Chinese propaganda reduces the legitimacy of Tibet's claim to nationhood (and even legitimate personhood), despite Tibet's governmental and territorial sovereignty from at least 1200 AD onward. Your claim that the "[Dalai Lama] is succeeding...at conflating religion and politics" is the direct Communist Party line, even though that is being directly contradicted by the source article.

My personal reading of the article is that the Dalai Lama gave up on statehood in the 80s, and is primarily focused on preserving Tibetan culture, despite the persistent claim that he is a "wolf in sheep's clothing", and that "every word he speaks is a lie".

[barry-cotter]

> Calling Tibet a 'tribe' is also a little bit strange, and smacks of the way Chinese propaganda reduces the legitimacy of Tibet's claim to nationhood (and even legitimate personhood), despite Tibet's governmental and territorial sovereignty from at least 1200 AD onward.

It is hilarious how the maps in museums fail to show the Tibetan Empire during any of many, many periods when it was both theoretically and actually independent but to claim that Tibet has been sovereign since 1200 is insane. The Qing dynasty ruled for almost three centuries and they the Tibetans were their vassals.

[atlantic]

>What does Dalai Lama have to do with Buddhism? The Dalai Lama is not the head of Buddhism but the head of Tibet

The Dalai Lama is considered by religious Tibetans to be the incarnation of Avalokiteshvara, the Tibetan Buddhist deity that personifies compassion. So your question makes about as much sense as asking what Jesus has to do with Christianity.

[Mikeb85]

Yes, but the point is that Tibetan Buddhism is a small subset of Buddhism. It's also the furthest from 'orthodox' Buddhism. And within that division, the Dalai Lama's specific sect is yet again another division.

The Dalai Lama is to Buddhism what, say, the Archbishop of Canterbury is (possibly of even lesser historical importance) to Christianity. His only real importance came about as a result of clever marketing of the Tibetan 'cause'.

[lawpoop]

> It's also the furthest from 'orthodox' Buddhism

Further than Zen? Which branch are you considering orthodox? And how are you measuring distance from it?

> Archbishop of Canterbury

So, a world-recognized religious leader?

Who in Buddhism would you count as a peer, or someone more important than the Dalai Lama, in the present day?

Whatever the reason he became famous for, he's probably done probably the single most influential figure to influence the West's familiarity and understanding of Buddhism.

[Mikeb85]

> Further than Zen? Which branch are you considering orthodox? And how are you measuring distance from it?

Distance in terms of belief and time. The most 'orthodox' and also the oldest extant sect is Theravada Buddhism (mainly centred around Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Thailand, but also with historic temples in India and elsewhere), although there is also the argument that some of the older Mahayana sects may have some succession to the Mahasamghika, but strictly speaking the oldest references to the 'Mahayana' are from the 1st century BCE, and the Theravada can be traced to the 3rd century BCE.

Anyhow, Tibetan Buddhism came as a result of various influences, including Indian Tantric Buddhist missionaries (Tantric beliefs, which originate in Saivism, a cult within Hinduism, appeared in Buddhist texts from the 3rd century CE onward, and of course don't appear in early Buddhist texts), the native Bon religion (animistic and shamanistic), and then-current Mahayana Buddhism. The origins of Tibetan Buddhism are fairly well documented, with Buddhism reaching Tibet in the 7th century CE, and it being adopted as the state religion in the 8th century CE.

> Who in Buddhism would you count as a peer, or someone more important than the Dalai Lama, in the present day?

Buddhism isn't supposed to have a central leader. It's supposed to be centred on the teachings of the Buddha, although there are prominent monks with fairly wide influence in all the major schools.

It's kind of like in Christianity. Prior to the great schism, you had the unified Orthodox/Catholic church which had 5 Patriarchs (Rome, Constantinople, Antioch, Jerusalem, Alexandria). Rome split and became huge and monolithic, the Orthodox were less centralised so when they spread, they established more 'Patriarchates' with more or less equal importance to the historic ones; in addition to the Patriarchs of Constantinople (New Rome), Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem, you also have Patriarchs of Moscow (3rd Rome), Georgia, Serbia, Romania and Bulgaria, in addition to Archbishops and so on. So even though Orthodox Christianity is nearly as widespread as Catholicism (arguably more widespread in the 'old world'), they don't have a visible 'leader' because of the flat power structure.

Tibetan Buddhism adopted a more vertical power structure because the Dalai Lama's sect eventually achieved political power over Tibet, whereas other schools of Buddhism maintained the flat power structure that existed in early Buddhism.

> Whatever the reason he became famous for, he's probably done probably the single most influential figure to influence the West's familiarity and understanding of Buddhism.

Familiarity yes, but not understanding. There have been many other Buddhist teachers who have actually brought the religion to the west (not only from Theravada, Mahayana, Ch'an, Zen and Vajrayana schools, but also from different sects of Tibetan Buddhism). Tibetan Buddhism contains some tantric beliefs which most westerners wouldn't even recognize as Buddhist, for example, consort practice https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karmamudr%C4%81.

Edit - should also add, Tibetan Buddhism/Vajranaya has the fewest adherents of the major schools, making it the least important Buddhist school as far as demographics go. Mahayana Buddhism (Zen/Ch'an, Pure Land, and other smaller Mahayana sects/regional variations) has the highest number of adherents, although is fragmented and many adherents may also follow other religions like Taoism and Shintoism. Theravada is probably the largest school with the most consistent teachings across its regional variations (150 million adherents). By contrast, there's 3 million people in Tibet, perhaps 10 million people worldwide who nominally belong to a Vajrayana Buddhist sect (including Tibetan exiles)...

[anoni]

> Whatever the reason he became famous for, he's probably done probably the single most influential figure to influence the West's familiarity and understanding of Buddhism.

That doesn't make him the head of Buddhism, unless you also believe Pizza Hut is the head of Italian cuisine, or ManchuWok is the leader of Chinese food.

Buddhism is not a hierarchical religion like Catholicism. If a monk seeks power/fame or participate in political struggle, he's not practicing true Buddhism.

[nemo]

"The Dalai Lama is not the head of Buddhism but the head of Tibet, which is a tribe seeking a political state."

The Dalai Lama has abdicated political leadership to the Tibetan Parliament in Exile and only retains a leadership role as head of the Gelugpa sect. He still speaks to the human rights abuses and political oppression of Tibetans but his proposal is a "Middle Way" which would preserve Chinese rule but give Tibetans some autonomy and representation in governing Tibet.

[GalacticDomin8r]

> Dalai Lama is not the head of Buddhism but the head of Tibet

Which seeks to be combined theological and political state in the vein of Russian czars, Japanese emperors, North Korea, and countless other ruling parties. You can even argue Great Britain still abides by this.

> we would not confound Iranian political independence with Shia Islam

Why would we not? They are 2 sides of the same coin. Religion is quite often the basis of political power such as in Iran.

[Alex3917]

> People are genuinely interested in Buddhism because it looks elegant and less stained than other major religions.

Because it was basically invented by white folks in the last 150 years and designed to appeal to those with scientific mindset. I'm not saying that's bad, but it's a little propagandistic not to acknowledge it.

[Silfen]

I think this is fairly revisionist. This narrative undersells the influence that Buddhist thought had on enlightenment philosophers[0].

IANAHistorian, and am likely well out of my depth here, but I'd venture a guess that the influence worked in both directions, due to overlap in philosophical positions. For example, from the Dalai Lama:

Both Buddhism and science prefer to account for the evolution and emergence of the cosmos and life in terms of the complex interrelations of the natural laws of cause and effect. From the methodological perspective, both traditions emphasize the role of empiricism. For example, in the Buddhist investigative tradition, between the three recognized sources of knowledge - experience, reason and testimony - it is the evidence of the experience that takes precedence, with reason coming second and testimony last.[1]

[0]http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/10/how-davi... [1]http://www.dalailama.com/messages/buddhism/science-at-the-cr...

[nostromo]

I don't think "invented by white folks" is fair. It's more of a collaboration. When East met West, both cultures were changed, and Buddhism is no exception.

Here's a good book on the subject:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0195183274/

> This sweeping and sophisticated analysis of the ways in which westerners and Asians alike have constructed new forms of Buddhism under the pressures of modernity is thoroughly disillusioning, in the best sense of the word. McMahan shows that much of what has been written and said about Buddhism in the modern era only can be understood against the background of dominant western discourses.

[npalli]

> Because it was basically invented by white folks in the last 150 years

This is astonishing. Can you let us know which buddhist principles were invented by white folks (and by whom) in the past 150 years.

[Alex3917]

> Can you let us know which buddhist principles were invented by white folks (and by whom) in the past 150 years.

I don't know to what extent individual principles or beliefs were created. Rather, the argument is that the religion as a whole was created by removing the parts that didn't fit the narrative. Think of it like the Jefferson Bible, but if pretty much the entire living tradition of Christianity was also removed from the religion instead of just redacting and rearranging the text.

[notahacker]

That's a rather difficult argument to square with Buddhism still including two entirely separate traditions, and arguably its "purest", least syncretic and most devout forms being in those parts of the world least affected by the West...

[omarchowdhury]

The only thing the white folk invented in the past 150 years regarding Buddhism is their books about what they think Buddhism is.

[blinkingled]

>Because it was basically invented by white folks in the last 150 years

Invented by white folks? What? Did you perhaps mean they made it mainstream for white people by giving it a western flavor?

[Alex3917]

No, iirc the religion was constructed pretty much wholesale during the opium wars to convince people that the Chinese were an intelligent people with a rich cultural history who we shouldn't be genociding. There are a bunch of books about it, this blog post gives an overview of the situation and links to a bunch of the books: https://meaningness.wordpress.com/2011/06/28/a-new-world-rel...

I haven't really spent any time reading up on it, but they talk about it all the time on the Buddhist Geeks podcast, and presumably they'd be in the know since they are/were students at Naropa.

[boxy310]

From your link: >I’m afraid I may be accused of political incorrectness here. I hasten to say that I myself practice (at minimum) demon worship and abominable rituals.

I'm afraid I can't believe this commentator at all, because it's committing No True Scotsman fallacies left and right about non-Abrahamic religions being "not a real religion" and conflating decentralized, non-textual religions with "demon-worship."

The underlying book that inspired the post [1] does look like a much more interesting connection between the Enlightenment and deist interpretations, but Buddhism with all its warts have existed in various forms for thousands of years. At best you can say that Buddhism has been dramatically impacted by interactions with Enlightenment philosophy, but its roots definitely stretch back further than the 1800's.

[1] http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0058C6FGS/?tag=meaningness...

[jmagoon]

I can't tell if you are talking about actual Buddhism or "Western Buddhism". As in, are you dramatically misinterpreting your source document, or are you trying to say that the "Western Buddhism" we experience is not "Real Buddhism"?

from the article: "There was a problem. Buddhism, as actually found in Asia, was much more like the European idea of “paganism” than a “great world religion.”"

The site relates to current academic discussion of "Real Buddhism", but the field has been investigating primary sources (Sanskrit, Pali, Tibetan, Chinese) for such a long time at this point as to make this article primarily a rant about "Western Buddhism" versus the more legitimate "Buddhisms".

[Alex3917]

> I can't tell if you are talking about actual Buddhism or "Western Buddhism".

This article doesn't have anything to do with Western Buddhism. It's about how what people currently believe/practice as Buddhism in Asia comes from the west.

The point is that before 150 years ago there was no core set of ideas that could really be distilled into what we think of as Buddhism today. Rather there were just different peoples worshipping different local gods. Westerners then went to Asia and translated a smattering of ancient texts and then went around and told the local people that they were practicing their religion wrong, and what they should actually do/believe instead is X, Y, Z. That's what modern buddhism is, and then Western Buddhism is an offshoot of that which was designed to appeal to Americans as a practice. (As opposed to being designed to appeal to westerners as a reason not to genocide various Asian populations.)

[jmagoon]

That's just really not true based on modern research. That's a fringe theory at best, that might be applicable to something like "Mainstream Buddhism". (e.g. what you see in a yoga magazine in the grocery store)

There's quite an established corpus of Tibetan texts and monastic curriculum that has existed for the past 1000 or so years (depending on the tradition) that involve primary sources (Sanskrit Indian texts dating from 100 AD or so onwards) and developed commentary in Tibetan. It's of primary importance for every Monastery / center to have a full set of Kangyur (sutra) and Tengyur (tantra), with many of the most revered and most studied texts coming from 1300 AD or so in Ancient Tibetan, and as far back as 100 AD (Sanskrit and Tibetan translations of Sanskrit).

There is meticulous textual preservation practiced at all major Tibetan monasteries, and many have preserved texts throughout the Cultural revolution that have been confirmed by other discoveries of identical copies and translations in China, India, Ceylon, and Southeast Asia.

That's an extremely odd theory, as well, because Tibetan literally has two different forms: Modern and Ancient, and texts can be dated by their use of language, similar to Modern and Ancient Chinese, and anyone who denies that is basically equivalent of thinking fossils were buried by the Jews or the earth is 5000 years old or something equally non-factual.

It's certainly reasonable to say that there are "Buddhisms"--there were many different interpretations of primary sources in different Asian regions that continued to develop independently of each other (and merged with local custom or ritual), but it's somewhat ludicrous to say that there was "no core set of ideas" that was being actively practiced in Asia 150 years ago within specific traditions, or that what is currently practiced in Asia is "Western" at its core. You can even make a strong argument that there are a few core principles that are consistent across all branches of "Buddhism" that have little to do with Western ideas or Western religion, namely lack of self, and the composed nature of all phenomena, which have their roots in the very earliest texts, with constant development and reinforcement from ~100AD forward.

source: Master's in Religious Studies, specifically Tibetan Buddhism

[GFK_of_xmaspast]

Do you have any idea of the size of the conspiracy that would be necessary to pull this off.

Here are three things you need to explain just for starters: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borobudur https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wat_Arun https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Journey_to_the_West

[Alex3917]

Well considering the argument is that what is practiced today as Buddhism is a small subset of what was believed/practiced previously, you would in fact expect all that stuff to exist...

And the fact Borobudur was only excavated in the mid 1800s and wasn't reconstructed until recently isn't exactly evidence that it was still considered an important part of the religion before then.

[notahacker]

Borobudur ceased to have religious significance because the Javanese switched to Islam

[guard-of-terra]

Contrary to many people I agree with you. The influence is hard to ignore.

[DominikR]

> But Tibetians are much more numerous and they've lost their independence much more recently

Correct me if I'm wrong, but as far as I know the majority of Tibetans were before the Chinese slaves in an absolutist monarchy/theocracy that used extremely cruel torture and punishments. (amputation of limbs, skinning, cutting off ears/noses)

Let's be honest here, this whole Free Tibet business is just about pressuring the Chinese government and nothing else.

If it advances the US governments strategic goals then they will even support barbarians like ISIS.

Unfortunately for the US the Chinese government is quite resilient.

They are not even trying to stir something in Tibet anymore, that one has failed. Currently they are trying hard in the Muslim Uighur regions, but apparently it doesn't work any better.

The Chinese will just crush any externally supported resistance, they don't give a crap. Nor do the Russians.

[notahacker]

The Free Tibet movement in the West has always had more to do with counterculture than the US government.

I suspect most Tibetans were rather worse off during the Cultural Revolution than in the quasi-feudal system that existed before. I'm not entirely convinced they're necessarily worse off today, but the Tibetan refugees risking their lives walking across the Himalayas into an exile where they get to "meet the Lama" couldn't really be any less focused on geopolitics...

I'm not aware of any parallel Cherokee diaspora.

I don't think the Uighurs' preferences for their own cultural practices is anything to do with them paying any attention to the US either.

[DominikR]

Sure, I don't doubt that these people really want to secede, but undoubtably some rather large component of this is created by external support.

Throughout history nationalism, religion and ethnicity has always been used to destabilise countries, this is nothing new.

I don't put any extraordinary blame on the US for this, it's what most powerful nations are doing in their quest for even more power.

About the Cherokees: Don't know if it is due to their low numbers, or simply because the US is powerful enough to prevent this from happening. Maybe the Cherokees are happy as it is or the right people are payed off by the government.

In general this can be exploited best when a country is in severe economic trouble. For example Chechnya after the collapse of the Soviet Union. The US is not even remotely in a comparable state.

[notahacker]

I think it's palpable nonsense to suggest that the US or other outside forces are behind all or indeed many of the world's regional minority groups desires to speak their own language, practice their own religion and run their own region in their own way.

What evidence do you have to back up your insinuation the US is backing the various Uighur factions? Frankly, it's pretty insulting to their culture to imagine they'd be freely and happily assimilating Han Chinese culture if it wasn't for the nefarious plotting of Uncle Sam.

[ZanyProgrammer]

>"China has pretty strong minority rights and the Uyghurs even have their own autonomous region." No, China is demographically trying to wipe out both the Tibetans and the Uighurs. The latter being one of the last conquests of Imperial China.

[DominikR]

Listen, we may disagree but for a fruitful discussion I'd expect more than just a reply stating "NO".

About the other statement you made: I cannot tell if the Chinese intend to demographically wipe them out, there's no official statement or document stating this, at least I'm not aware of that.

But as far as I see the current argument boils down to: They allow the Han to settle in this area and the Han do. Please explain why it should be forbidden for the Han to settle in some area that is part of their country?

And why would this automatically be equal to an attempt to wipe some population out?

[DominikR]

World Uyghur Congress which allegedly represents the "collective interests of the Uyghur peoples" is funded by the National Endowment for Democracy and it's president is living in the US.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Uyghur_Congress

So please don't tell me there is no interest. If the US government was impartial then they would at least refrain from funding this group as it is not their business to interfere in internal conflicts of foreign countries without UN resolution.

> it's pretty insulting to their culture to imagine they'd be freely and happily assimilating Han Chinese culture

China has pretty strong minority rights and the Uyghurs even have their own autonomous region.

But aside from that: No one will happily assimilate. The strong will always crush the weak. Did the native Americans happily assimilate? I heard there were 100 million of them before the settlers came. Where have they gone?

Edit: Nowhere did I insinuate that they would happily assimilate. Aside from that, this is not only a thing that authoritarian regimes do.

In the EU it currently seems as if every politician is thinking about how to assimilate the Muslims. Trust me, no one is going to ask them if they want to assimilate.

They will be forced. And this in a full fledged democracy.

[notahacker]

> No-one will happily assimilate

I think you made my point for me. The fact that one of the many exiled lobby groups chooses to take money from a US funded vehicle is essentially irrelevant to why some Uighurs want independence.

[guard-of-terra]

"nationalism, religion and ethnicity has always been used to destabilise countries" They were also used to create countries in the first place.

Remove nationalism, religious and ethnical union from a country and it starts to fall apart, just like Jugoslavia did.

[DominikR]

I like your thought but Yugoslavia is (I think) a bad example for this. (I came from there)

There was no religious or ethnical union, of that I am 100% sure, and I'm also not convinced of nationalism there.

The unifying ideology was socialism/communism.

It is understandable why this did work so well in a country with no clear religious or ethnic majority because it tends to flat out deny any ethnic/cultural differences and restrict religions and places instead the socialist ideal in the center. (all are equal)

Once nationalism was on the rise it was the end of Yugoslavia. Now in place of being a socialist comrade everyone was either Serb, Croat, Bosnian and so on and demanded their own state.

[guard-of-terra]

Yugoslavia turned to be an unnatural union and was swept by tidal forces. It lacked glue and unifying ideology expired in the end.

This is a lesson why you need religious or ethnic union, or nationalism. Why else you are country X and not country Y or Z?

[maus42]

Justifying a tyrannical government by virtue of the previous government having been a tyranny too doesn't persuade anyone.

For the US government, whatever it does is always about its interests, because that's what governments are about.

However, that's just the reason why being a small nation sucks, like any resident of a small country can tell you. Sometimes their plight even manages to gather some popular sympathy[, but as Dalai Lama can tell you, it doesn't help much anything]. The lucky ones are who happen to succeed at gaming at least two great powers against each other, instead of being surrounded by one large or its sphere of power, who will merrily invade you if it strikes their fancy.

[vinceguidry]

> Justifying a tyrannical government by virtue of the previous government having been a tyranny too doesn't persuade anyone.

It doesn't persuade you. Those of us who've been watching various forms of autocracy spring up and get overthrown throughout history appreciate progress where we can get it.

The situation in Tibet has a historical precedent. Hebrews living under Roman rule in the kingdom of Judea. Both were theocratic countries whose populations were really, really invested in traditional rule. Both had constant foreign interference from bigger and more powerful states. One had their entire population massacred and their places of worship burned to the ground.

The Romans were pragmatic and tolerated the eccentricities of the Judeans for hundreds of years, happy to take tribute and let them live the way they want to live. But the Judeans wanted more, and declared independence from Rome.

It's tough as an imperial administrator to know where to draw the line. By historical standards, the CCP is remarkably patient with its wayward sons.

[legulere]

It persuades people that are told that Tibet should get the old Dalai Lama as dictator system back.

China is criticized as an oppressive regime in tibet by people that at the same time cater to a wannabe dictator.

[justin66]

>It persuades people that are told that Tibet should get the old Dalai Lama as dictator system back.

It'd be interesting to know who is telling people that, since it sounds like a straw man. Not even the Tibetan government in exile advocates that.

[DominikR]

I agree with you except for this line:

> Justifying a tyrannical government by virtue of the previous government having been a tyranny too doesn't persuade anyone.

I do not care in the slightest about the Chinese government, so I'm not trying to convince anyone about their goodness.

No government will justify itself before anyone, not even their own citizens.

Sure, certain persons and parties might change democratically but the power structure and elite behind them will fight tooth and nails against anyone threatening them.