Newspaper Page Text
GUEST EDITORIAL
THE DIVINE ONE
Things you should know about the Dalai Lama...
The Dalai Lama has come out in support of the ther
monuclear tests recently conducted by the Indian state,
and has done so in the very language of the chauvinist
parties that now control that state’s affairs. The “devel
oped” countries, he says, must realize that India is a
major contender and should not concern themselves
with its internal affairs. This is a perfectly Realpolitik
statement, so crass and banal and opportunist that it
would not deserve any comment if it came from another
source.
“Think different,” says the ungrammatical Apple
Computer advertisement that features the serene visage
of His Holiness. Among the
untested assumptions of this
billboard campaign is the
widely and lazily held belief
that “Oriental” religion is
different from other faiths:
less dogmatic, more con
templative, more transcen
dental. This blissful,
thoughtless exceptionalism
has been conveyed to the
West through a succession
of mediums and narratives,
ranging from the middle
brow bestseller Lost
Horizon by James Hilton
(creator of Mr. Chips as
well as Shangri-La), to the
memoir Seven Years in
Tibet by the SS veteran
Heinrich Harrer, prettified
for the screen by Brad Pitt.
China’s foul conduct in an
occupied land, combined
with a Hollywood cult that
almost exceeds the power of
Scientology itself, has fused with weightless Maharishi-
and Bagwan-type babble to create an image of an ideal
ized Tibet and of a saintly god-king. So perhaps the Apple
injunction to think differently is worth heeding.
The greatest triumph modern PR can offer is the
transcendent success of having your words and
actions judged by your reputation, rather than the
other way about. The “spir
itual leader” of Tibet has
enjoyed this unassailable
status for some time now,
becoming a byword and
synonym for saintly and
ethereal values. Why this
doesn’t put-people on their guard I’ll never know. But here
are some other facts about the serene leader that, dwarfed
as they are by his endorsement of nuclear weapons, are
still worth knowing and still generally unknown.
• Shoko Asahara, leader of the “Supreme Truth" cult in
Japan and spreader of sarin nerve gas on the Tokyo sub
way, donated 45 million rupees, or about 170 million yen,
to the Dalai Lama, and was rewarded for his efforts by
several high-level meetings with the divine one.
• Steven Seagal, the robotic and moronic “actor” who
gave us Hard to Kill and Under Siege, has been pro
claimed a reincarnated lama and a sacred vessel, or
“tulku,” of Tibetan Buddhism. This decision, ratified by
Penor Rinpoche, supreme head of the Nyingma School
of Tibetan Buddhism, was initially received with
incredulity by Richard Gere, who had hitherto believed
himself to be the superstar most favored. “If someone’s
a tulku, that’s great,” he was quoted as saying. “But no
one knows if that's true.” How insightful, if only acciden
tally. At a subsequent Los Angeles appearance by the
Dalai Lama, Seagal was seated in the front row and Gere
two rows back, thus giving the latter’s humility and sub
missiveness a day at the races. Suggestions that Seagal’s
fortune helped elevate him to the Himalayan status of
tulku are not completely discounted even by some
adepts and initiates.
• Supporters of the Dorge Shugden deity — a
“Dharma protector” and an ancient object of worship
and propitiation in Tibet — have been threatened with
violence and ostracism and even death following the
Dalai Lama’s abrupt prohibition of this once-venerated
godhead. A Swiss television documentary graphically
intercuts footage of his Holiness, denying all knowledge
of menace and intimidation, with scenes of his followers
enthusiastically flaunting “Wanted” posters and other
paraphernalia of excommunication and persecution.
• While he denies being
a Buddhist “pope," the
Dalai Lama is never happi
er than when brooding in a
celibate manner on the sex
lives of people he has never
met. “Sexual misconduct for
men and women consists of
oral and anal sex," he has
repeatedly said in promot
ing his book on these mat
ters. “Using one’s hand, that
is sexual misconduct.” But,
as ever with religious stipu
lations, there is a nutty
escape clause. “To have
sexual relations with a
prostitute paid by you and
not a third person does not
constitute improper behav
ior.” Not all of this can have
been said just to placate
Richard Gere, or to attract the
royalties from Pretty Woman.
I have talked to a few Dorge Shugden adherents, who
seem sincere enough and certainly seem frightened
enough, but I can’t go along with their insistence on the
“irony” of all this. Buddhism can be as hysterical and san
guinary as any other system that relies on faith and tribe.
Lon Nol’s Cambodian Army was Buddhist at least in name.
Solomon Banda-ranaike,
first elected leader of inde
pendent Sri Lanka, was
assassinated by a Buddhist
militant. It was Buddhist-
led pogroms against the
Tamils that opened the long
and disastrous communal war that ruins Sri Lanka to this
day. The gorgeously named SLORC, the military fascism
that runs Burma, does so nominally as a Buddhist junta. I
have even heard it whispered th^t in old Tibet, that pris
tine and contemplative land, the lamas were the allies of
feudalism ar, u unsmilingly inflicted medieval punishments
such as blinding, and flogging unto death.
Yet the entire Western mass media is uncritically at
the service of a mere mortal who, at the very least, pro
claims the utter nonsense of reincarnation and who
affirms the sinister if not indeed crazy belief that death is
but a stage in a grand cycle of what appears to be futility
and subjection. What need, then, to worry about nuclear
weaponry, or sectarian frenzy, or the sale of indulgences
to men of the stamp of Steven Seagal? “Harmony" will
doubtless kick in. During his visit to Beijing, our senti
mental Baptist hypocrite of a President turned to his dic
tator host, recommended that he meet with the Dalai
Lama and assured him that the two of them would get on
well. That might easily turn out to be the case. Both are
very much creatures of the material world.
Christopher Hitchens
This article, from the current issue of The Nation, was
reprinted with that publication s kind permission.
Buddhism can be as hysterical
and sanguinary as any other system
that relies on faith and tribe.
H
PRiNce avenue SR3-&SRR
The Next Level
in Home Furnishings
Overstuffed Pieces • Bean Bag
Chairs • Lighting • Shelves
Updated Styles of Frames and Covers
Lifetime Warranties
287 West BroadTStW^gfe) 353-1218
a « . •
Smoothies, Pastas & Sauces,
Sandwiches, Wraps and Bowls.
Try a New Menu
Item and Receive
10% OFF
with this ad.
Offer Good Thru 8/7/98
Downtown on Bropd 208 0962
JULY 22, 1998 FLAGPOLE H