Kritik am Buch „The Shadow Of The Dalai Lama ... - Neues von Shi De

mentioned above are combined by the Tibetan “god-king” as the highest vajra master with the
Kalachakra Tantra. According to what is known as the Rwa tradition, the Bodhisattva
Avalokiteshvara even stands at the beginning of the Buddhist doctrine of time as the “root
guru” (Newman, 1985, p. 71). Now, what do we know about the performance of the Kalachakra
system by the current incarnation of the Chenrezi, His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama?
Almost nothing is known in public about the eight “highest initiations” of the Time Tantra described
in the first part of our study, but all the more is known about the seven lower initiations. They have
been and continue to be conducted by His Holiness — frequently, publicly, on a grand scale and
throughout the whole world. The ostentatious performance of a Kalachakra spectacle set in scene by
the monks of the Namgyal Institute [3] in colorful robes is meanwhile an exotic sensation, which on
each occasion attracts the attention of the world’s press. Thousands, in recent years hundreds of
thousands, come flocking to experience and marvel at the religious spectacle.
The Kalachakra Tantra, whose aggressive and imperialist character we have been able to demonstrate
in detail, is referred to by the Dalai Lama without the slightest scruple as a “vehicle for world peace”:
“We believe unconditionally in its ability to reduce tensions”, the god-king has said of the Time
Tantra, “The initiation is thus public, because in our opinion it is suited to bringing peace, to
encouraging the peace of the spirit and hence the peace of the world as well” (Levenson, 1990, p.
304).
Interested westerners, who still block out the magic-religious thought patterns of Lamaism, are
presented with the Kalachakra ritual and the associated sand mandala as a “total work of art, in which
sound and color, gesture and word are linked with one another in a many-layered, significance-laden
manner” (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 1 February 1986). For the Dalai Lama, however, an
assembly of the invoked gods actually takes place during the rite.
In the year 1953 His Holiness was initiated into the Kalachakra rites by Ling Rinpoche for the first
time. To what level is unknown to us. Profoundly impressed by the beauty of the sand mandala, the
young Kundun fell into a state of dizziness. Shortly afterwards he spent a month in seclusion and was
internally very moved during this period. In saying the prayers the words often stuck in his throat
through emotion: “In hindsight I understand this situation to have been auspicious, an omen that I
would conduct the Kalachakra initiation much more often than any of my predecessors” (Dalai Lama
XIV, 1993a, p. 118).