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

clung to it in this current life. From a Tibetan point of view phowa practices can also include the
murder of an individual. Asahara committed his followers to murder through an oath in the form of a
prayer known as the “Vajrayana Vow” that required complete subjugation to the guru and the practice
of phowa. It was recommended that the following prayer be recited “a thousand, a million, a billion
times” (Brackett, 1996, p. 96).
I take refuge in the Tantra Vajrayana!
(repeated four times)
What is the first law?
To be mindful of the Buddha.
And in Tantra Vajrayana,
the Buddha and the Guru are identical.
I take refuge in the Guru!
(repeated four times)
What is the Guru?
The Guru is a life form born to phowa all souls.
Any method that leads to salvation is acceptable.
My life will come to an end sometime.
It makes no difference if the end comes in twenty years,
thirty years, or eighty years,
It will come regardless.
What’s important is how I give my life.
If I give it for salvation,
eliminating all the evil karma I have accumulated,
freeing myself from all karma, the Guru and Shiva
and all winners of truth
will without fail lead me to a higher realm.
So I practice the Vajrayana without fear.
The Armageddon taught in the Bible approaches,
The final battle is upon us.
I will be among the holy troops of this last great battle
And phowa the evil ones.
I will phowa one or two evil ones.
Phowa is the highest virtue
And phowa is the path to the highest level of being.
(Brackett, 1996, pp. 96-97)
In the end, the Tibetan phowa ritual became the guiding principle behind the acts of terrorism and also
played a significant role in the prosecution’s case against Asahara. There, the following incriminating
quotations from the guru were also tabled: “If your guru commands you to take somebody’s life it is
an indication that this person’s time is already up. With other words you are killing this person at
precisely the right time and making possible the phowa of this person. […] The end justifies the
means. Take the example of a person who is burdened by so many sins that he is certain to go to hell.
If an enlightened person decides that it would be best to put an end to his life and to really kill him,
this act would generally be seen by society as a straightforward murder. But in the light of our
teachings the killing comes to the same thing as making his phowa possible for this person. Every
enlightened person would see at once that both the murderer and the murdered benefit from the