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

the tantric system as the fearful aspect of a Buddha (a heruka) or as a bloodthirsty dharmapala
(tutelary god).Thus more and more stories were invented which portrayed him as a representative of
the Holy Doctrine (the dharma).
Among other things, Mongolian lamas constructed an ancestry which traced back to a Buddhist
Indian law-king and put this in place of the zoomorphic legend common among the shamans that
Genghis Khan was the son of a wolf and a deer. Another story tells of how he was descended from a
royal Tibetan family. It is firmly believed that he was in correspondence with a great abbot of the
Sakyapa sect and had asked him for spiritual protection. The following sentence stands in a forged
letter in which the Mongol addresses the Tibetan hierarch: “Holy one! Well did I want to summon
you; but because my worldly business is still incomplete, I have not summoned you. I trust you from
here, protect me from there” (Schulemann, 1958, p. 89). A further document “from his hand” is
supposed to have freed the order from paying taxes. In the struggle against the Chinese, Genghis
Khan — it is reported — prayed to ADI BUDDHA.
The Buddhization of Mongolia
But it was only after the death of the Great Khan that the missionary lamas succeeded in converting
the Mongolian tribes to Buddhism, even if this was a process which stretched out over four centuries.
(Incidentally, this was definitely not true for all, then a number took up the Islamic faith.) Various
smaller contacts aside, the voyage of the Sakya, Pandita Kunga Gyaltsen, to the court of the nomad
ruler Godän Khan (in 1244), stands at the outset of the conversion project, which ultimately brought
all of northern Mongolia under Buddhist influence. The great abbot, already very advanced in years,
convinced the Mongolians of the power of his religion by healing Ugedai’s son of a serious illness.
The records celebrate their subsequent conversion as a triumph of civilization over barbarism.
Some 40 years later (1279), there followed a meeting between Chögyel Phagpa, likewise a Tibetan
great abbot of the Sakyapa lineage, and Kublai Khan, the Mongolian conqueror of China and the
founder of the Yuan dynasty. At these talks topics which concerned the political situation of Tibet
were also discussed. The adroit hierarch from the Land of Snows succeeded in persuading the
Emperor to grant him the title of “King of the Great and Valuable Law” and thus a measure of
worldly authority over the not yet united Tibet. In return, the Phagpa lama initiated the Emperor into
the Hevajra Tantra.
Three hundred years later (in 1578), the Gelugpa abbot, Gyalwa Sonam Gyatso, met with Althan
Khan and received from him the fateful name of “Dalai Lama”. At the time he was only the spiritual
ruler and in turn gave the Mongolian prince the title of the “Thousand-Golden-Wheel turning World
Ruler”. From 1637 on the cooperation between the “Great Fifth” and Gushri Khan began. By the
beginning of the 18th century at the latest, the Buddhization of Mongolia was complete and the
country lay firmly in the hand of the Yellow Church.
But it would be wrong to believe that the conversion of the Mongolian rulers had led to a fundamental
rejection of the warlike politics of the tribes. It is true that it was at times a moderating influence. For
instance, the Third Dalai Lama had demanded that women and slaves no longer be slaughtered as
sacrificial offerings during the ancient memorial services for the deceased princes of the steppe. But it
would fill pages if we were to report on the cruelty and mercilessness of the “Buddhist” Khans. As
long as it concerned the combating of “enemies of the faith”, the lamas were prepared to make any
compromise regarding violence. Here the aggressive potential of the protective deities (the