It looks like Beijing has already formulated plans for controlling whoever becomes the ‘Next Dalai Lama’ after the present one passes away. However, for over seventy years, China has attempted to solve what it terms the “Tibet question.” It has done this through military means, population migration, and the promotion of an Assimilation Culture. But there has remained one man who defies attempts at erasure. His name is the Dalai Lama.
Currently aged 90, the spiritual leader for in excess of seven million Tibetan Buddhists Internationally finds himself at the epicenter of a far from usual struggle to succeed in his passing that will not only absorb the loss of an honored Buddhist monk, but will also present an epoch-making clash between an heirloom religion and the modern Chinese government in its wake.
Since 1391, in Tibetan Buddhism, it is believed that each Dalai Lama deliberately reincarnates himself after death. High Lamas begin to hunt down a new person in whom lurks the religious legacy of the deceased leader. For more than six centuries, this approach has engendered just 14 Dalai Lamas, which is one of the most unusual and stable transfers of power in the whole history of humankind.
The current Dalai Lama was already two years old when he was chosen in 1939. After completing the rigorous selection test, he was brought to Lhasa to be groomed in the teachings of Buddhism and to be equipped to be a political leader. He became the political leader of the people of Tibet when the independence of his land was not easily in his grasp—at only 15 years old in 1950.
Invasion of Tibet and a leader in exile
A year after the communists seized power in China, the People’s Liberation Army invaded Tibet. China had promised to respect the country’s religion and to maintain independence. This was to change soon.
By 1959, Tibetan anger boiled over into rebellion. China suppressed this uprising, and the Dalai Lama fled over the Himalan Mountains to India, where he formed a Tibetan exile government. The Dalai Lama never went back to Tibet.
Within the region, monasteries were demolished, languages prohibited, and culture systematically erased. However, even in his exile, the Dalai Lama became the symbol of Tibetan identity. Internationally, over the years, the Dalai Lama has garnered support from the world community and made the Tibetan cause his mission of non-violence, compassion, and preservation of culture.
What is critical is that he chose to pursue compromise over confrontational stands. Instead of pressing for independence, he urged that Tibet can achieve the “Middle Way” as a part of China but with a level of autonomy. His move rejected outright and termed as that of a separatist. To a degree, China recognized that the Dalai Lama kept the extremists under control.
He called for an end to violence in supporting a peaceful solution to the Tibetan uprisings in 1987 and in 2008. His opponent politically was the Chinese government. Morally, the Chinese benefited.
This balance is now under threat.
China’s rehearsal: managing reincarnation
Beijing has already experimented with how to handle religious succession. In 1989, the Panchen Lama, known as the second highest person in Tibetan Buddhism, passed away. In 1995, his highest officials announced his reincarnation in a five-year-old boy. But a few days after, he and his family vanished.
China has also produced a new incarnation of the Panchen Lama, selected by means of the “golden urn.” This practice, in fact, has its roots in Qing imperial ritual. Today, the person thus legitimized supports communist ideology and the “Sinification” of Tibetan Buddhism.
Few Tibetans support him. But the Chinese government has learned a very valuable lesson: without religious sanction, control of the institutions of power can reduce the power of the Tibetan leadership.
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Two Dalai Lamas and an uncertain future
China also has plans for the succession of the Dalai Lama, where it proposes that “the reincarnation of the Dalai Lama shall be determined through the ‘golden urn’ and approved by the Chinese government, while any other incarnation is illegal.”
This has been strongly denied by the Dalai Lama himself. He has said that he alone has the right to choose his next reincarnation, which can be in Tibet or even in China. He has also said it could be a woman.
The possible outcome is one that has never been seen before: two people claiming to be the 15th Dalai Lama – one recognized by Beijing and the other by Tibetan religious authorities and the Tibetan diaspora.
Beijing expects this to eventually weaken Tibetan opposition. But the tactic poses a great risk. Without the leadership of the Dalai Lama in the present form, there might not be a leader to keep the lid on the anger in Tibet. Younger generations of Tibetans are already frustrated. They might lose faith in the use of peaceful measures. China’s global reputation is meanwhile being examined under the microscope – think Xinjiang, think Hong Kong, think Taiwan.
A China-controlled Dalai Lama might embroil the religion in even greater international suspicion rather than greater silence. Perhaps paradoxically, by passing over a leader who has always preached the need for moderation and compromise, Beijing may be removing the one individual who has prevented the situation from spiraling out of control. What passes for a solution in Beijing may in fact herald the beginning of an extremely turbulent period in the history of the Tibetan conflict.
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