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

negative uses and results. Tibetan Buddhism, known for its mastery of the mind, has an area of
concentration called ‘tantra’ that specializes in bringing spiritual motivation to the realm of mental
projections …” (Namgyal, HPI 012). From this, the authors continue, follows the need to have a
Buddhist influence upon the net, to bless it and purify it.
The document continues as follows: the monks of the Namgyal Institute, “the personal monastery of
the Dalai Lama, [were asked] to discuss whether the blessing of cyberspace would be possible. They
enthusiastically responded, noting that one tantric system in particular, the Kalachakra Tantra, …
would be highly appropriate as a blessing vehicle because it especially emphasizes space …
Coincidentally, the Kalachakra is also the most widely disseminated of the Tibetan Buddhist tantric
systems…” (Namgyal, HPI 012). Cyberspace, we also learn, could be used as the vehicle for a tantric
projection (i.e., of the Kalachakra Tantra).
Thus the Namgyal Institute conducted the first Kalachakra cyberspace blessing with a ritual on
February 8, 1996: “The actual ceremony took about 30 minutes and consisted of the monks chanting
blessing prayers from the Kalachakra Tantra while envisioning space as cyberspace, the networked
realm of computers, in their imagination. An image of the Kalachakra mandala, actually a scanned
photo of a sand painting made earlier by the monks, was present on a computer as a visual aid …
Future cyberspace blessings will likely be offered at other auspicious times …” (Namgyal, HPI 012).
It should be obvious that the monks’ prayers contained the constantly recited Mahayana wish to help
all living beings. The vision of a global Buddhocracy discussed in the Kalachakra Tantra, however, is
not openly mentioned. [7]
There is something both fascinating and frightening about Buddhist theoreticians and even the Dalai
Lama depicting Tantrism as the potential awareness of a world-spanning megacomputer. In this an
identity of the ADI BUDDHA as a global superbrain is implicit. Does it perhaps have something to do
with this Buddhist vision that His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama made himself available for an
advertisement by the computer manufacturer, Apple? (Spiegel, 16/1998). [8]
In reading the literature about the structures of consciousness and their relation to computer
technology, it is notable that “tantra” and “net” are frequently compared with one another, not just
because the Sanskrit word “tantra” can be translated as “something woven” or “network”, but because
the two systems are somehow presumed to be fundamentally related. Surprisingly even such a
complex thinker as the astrophysicist and systems theorist Erich Jantsch –probably out of ignorance of
the matter — has (in the late seventies) equated the principle of “cybernetic leaning processes” with
Tantrism (Jantsch, 1982, p. 324).
In October 1987, a small group of well-known Western scientists headed by Francisco Varela traveled
to Dharamsala to take part in a several-day seminar on neurobiology, cognitive psychology, artificial
intelligence, and evolutionary theory with the Dalai Lama. There were daily meetings with an expert
paper and subsequent discussion. The intention behind the whole event was however ultimately
directed at just one question — how could the latest discoveries in the most advanced branches of
scientific research be derived from Buddhism? After every expert paper one heard, yes, Buddhism
already says that too! Admittedly, His Holiness spoke emotionally about a “combination of Western
science and Eastern spiritual development”, but at heart it was not about cooperation, but rather the
consolidation of the Buddhist paradigm described about. In the meantime such meetings between His
Holiness and Western scientists have become institutionalized by Dharamsala and take place annually