China Regulates Buddhist Reincarnation

[ajna]

Dalai Lama: "catch me if you can!"

By Matthew Philips

Newsweek

Aug. 20-27, 2007 issue - In one of history's more absurd acts of totalitarianism, China has banned Buddhist monks in Tibet from reincarnating without government permission. According to a statement issued by the State Administration for Religious Affairs, the law, which goes into effect next month and strictly stipulates the procedures by which one is to reincarnate, is "an important move to institutionalize management of reincarnation." But beyond the irony lies China's true motive: to cut off the influence of the Dalai Lama, Tibet's exiled spiritual and political leader, and to quell the region's Buddhist religious establishment more than 50 years after China invaded the small Himalayan country. By barring any Buddhist monk living outside China from seeking reincarnation, the law effectively gives Chinese authorities the power to choose the next Dalai Lama, whose soul, by tradition, is reborn as a new human to continue the work of relieving suffering.

At 72, the Dalai Lama, who has lived in India since 1959, is beginning to plan his succession, saying that he refuses to be reborn in Tibet so long as it's under Chinese control. Assuming he's able to master the feat of controlling his rebirth, as Dalai Lamas supposedly have for the last 600 years, the situation is shaping up in which there could be two Dalai Lamas: one picked by the Chinese government, the other by Buddhist monks. "It will be a very hot issue," says Paul Harrison, a Buddhism scholar at Stanford. "The Dalai Lama has been the prime symbol of unity and national identity in Tibet, and so it's quite likely the battle for his incarnation will be a lot more important than the others."

So where in the world will the next Dalai Lama be born? Harrison and other Buddhism scholars agree that it will likely be from within the 130,000 Tibetan exiles spread throughout India, Europe and North America. With an estimated 8,000 Tibetans living in the United States, could the next Dalai Lama be American-born? "You'll have to ask him," says Harrison. If so, he'll likely be welcomed into a culture that has increasingly embraced reincarnation over the years. According to a 2005 Gallup poll, 20 percent of all U.S. adults believe in reincarnation. Recent surveys by the Barna Group, a Christian research nonprofit, have found that a quarter of U.S. Christians, including 10 percent of all born-again Christians, embrace it as their favored end-of-life view. A non-Tibetan Dalai Lama, experts say, is probably out of the question.

© 2007 Newsweek, Inc

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20227400/site/newsweek/

Edited August 21, 2007 by ajna

[Amulte]

China has banned Buddhist monks in Tibet from reincarnating without government permission.

how do they plan to enforce this?...

[Auxin]

If the dalai lama were to reincarnate by most of the worlds legal standards the infant would have a blank legal background- if they persecuted him it would be for his creed and religion only. With this law if he reincarnates without filling out the proper form and being authorized to reincarnate by the chinese government its actually the infant that would have broken the law and they can call it a criminal and start persecuting it anew.

[dqd]

China has banned Buddhist monks in Tibet from reincarnating without government permission.

how do they plan to enforce this?...

By eating their souls of course! The communist party has been doing this successfully for years... turn the nuns to whores and the young monks to active militants therefore an enemy worth destroying...

[Jesus On Peyote]

The Dalai Lama is not any better then the communists,he justs wants to free tibet so he can be king,and the us only helped him so they can set up a base or somthing there eventually.

[devance]

Maybe just shoot them in head and sell organs as usual for the Chinese

Perhaps another type of reincarnation that would astound the Chinese atheist communist party.

Hearts, livers and kidneys maybe stem cells.

[mu!]

The Dalai Lama is not any better then the communists

I think you're on to something there Jesus On Peyote

[Monk]

I think you're on to something there Jesus On Peyote

Yeah, seriously. Especially with all the pain, strife, poverty and baby murdering that Dalai Lama bastard has inflicted on the world.

Do I hear a touch of sarcasm, mu?

[nabraxas]

he justs wants to free tibet so he can be king

Here's what the man himself has said:

Therefore, in my speech of the March 10 Anniversary in 1969, I declared that when the Tibetans regained their right to rule themselves, the people must decide for themselves as to what kind of system of government they wanted. I also stated that it was not certain whether the system of government with the Dalai Lama as the supreme head would continue or not.

I believe that in future, Tibet should have a multi-party system of parliament, and that it should have three organs of government - legislature, executive and judiciary - with a clear separation of powers between them, each independent of the other and vested with equal powers and authority.

Personally, I have made up my mind that I will not play any role in the future government of Tibet, let alone seek the Dalai Lama's traditional political position in the government.

Ov course he could be lying.

[Auxin]

In the end it will be best if the monastic body never regains control of tibet. People mistakingly think its 'pro-commie' or at least not 'politically correct' to point out that the rules for monks and nuns in the buddhist religion expressly forbid such things as monks ruling countries or kingdoms. It may have started as the monks just being community guides but it grew into a government. The whole time they were in power they were committing a serious offense and degrading themselves as monastics and they were Never Supposed To Rule Tibet. They got so deep into politics the Dalai Lama himself once blatantly perverted the principals of the buddhist religion institutionalizing bigotry to please powerful men that held power in the government and society. (He later subtly and underwhelmingly retracted the profoundly un-buddhist homophobic proclamations)

[nothinghead]

He does seem like a power-monger... Could be the next Stalin with all that economic blab.... Maybe he's actually the reincarnation of Lenin!!!! Saffron is the new Red!