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

Buddhist tantra texts.
The karma mudra and the West
Since the general public demands that a Tibetan lama lead the life of a celibate monk, he must keep
his sexual practices secret. For this reason, documents about and verbal accounts of clerical erotic
love are extremely rare. It is true that the sexual magic rites are freely and openly discussed in the
tantra texts, but who does what with whom and where are all “top secret”. Only the immediate
followers are informed, the English author June Campbell reports.
And she has the authority to make such a claim. Campbell had been working for many years as
translator and personal assistant for the highest ranking Kagyüpa guru, His Holiness Kalu Rinpoche
(1905–1989), when the old man (he was then approaching his eighties) one day asked her to become
his mudra. She was completely surprised by this request and could not begin to imagine such a thing,
but then, she reluctantly submitted to the wishes of her master. As she eventually managed to escape
the tantric magic circle, the previously uninformed public is indebted to her for a number of
competent commentaries upon the sexual cabinet politics of modern Lamaism and the psychology of
the karma mudra.
What then, according to Campbell, are the reasons which motivate Western women to enter into a
tantric relationship, and then afterwards keep their experiences with the masters to themselves? First
of all, their great respect and deep reverence for the lama, who as a “living Buddha” begins and
ritually conducts the liaison. Then, the karma mudra, even when she is not publicly acknowledged,
enjoys a high status within the small circle of the informed and, temporarily, the rank of a dakini, i.e.,
a tantric goddess. Her intimate relationship with a “holy man” further gives her the feeling that she is
herself holy, or at least the opportunity to collect good karma for herself.
Of course, the mudra must swear a strict vow of absolute silence regarding her relations with the
tantric master. Should she break it, then according to the tantric penal code she may expect major
difficulties, insanity, death and on top of this millennia of hellish torments. In order to intimidate her,
Kalu Rinpoche is alleged to have told his mudra, June Campbell, that in an earlier life he killed a
woman with a mantra because she disobeyed him and gossiped about intimacies. “The imposition of
secrecy ... in the Tibetan system”, Campbell writes, “when it occurred solely as a means to protect
status , and where it was reinforced by threats, was a powerful weapon in keeping women from
achieving any kind of integrity in themselves. ... So whilst the lineage system [the gurus’ chain of
initiation] viewed these [sexual] activities as promoting the enlightenment state of the lineage holders,
the fate of one of the two main protagonists, the female consort, remained unrecognized, unspoken
and unnamed” (June Campbell, 1996, p. 103). June Campbell also first risked speaking openly about
her experiences, which she found repressive and degrading, after Kalu Rinpoche had died.
In her book, this author laments not just the subsequent namelessness of and disregard for the karma
mudra despite the guru praising her as a “goddess” for as long as the ritual lasted, but also discusses
the traumatic state of “used up” women, who, once their master has “drunk” their gynergy, are traded
in for a “fresh” mudra. She also makes reference to the naiveté of Western husbands, who send their
spouses to a guru in good faith, so that they can complete their spiritual development. (June
Campbell, 1996, p. 107). During her relationship with Kalu Rinpoche he was also practicing with
another woman who was not yet twenty years old. The girl died suddenly, of a heart attack it was said.
We will return to this death, which fits the logic of the tantric pattern, at a later stage. The fears which