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# Dalai Lama

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The Dalai Lama is the highest religious leader of Tibetan? Buddhism and, until the annexation of Tibet by the China in 1959?, was also the highest political leader of that country. Each Dalai Lama is believed by Tibetans to be the reincarnation of the Bodhisattva (Buddha) of Compassion. Thus, all of the Dalai Lamas are considered to be manifestations of the very same being. When a child is suspected of being the next Dalai Lama, he is examined by representatives of the Tibetan Buddhist faith, the crucial question being whether he intuitively recognises objects that belonged to the previous Dalai Lama.

The Dalai Lama is the leader of one sect of Tibetan Buddhism. Other sects have there own lamas as leaders; and while they grant him first place of honour, his religious authority is limited to his own sect.

At this writing, the current Dalai Lama is His Holiness the 14th the Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso. He was born Lhamo Dhondrub on 6 July 1935, in the village of Taktser in the northeastern region of Tibet. Born a peasant, His Holiness was discovered at the age of two by monks acting on a vision. He is supposed to have spontaneously recognized a crucifix worn by one of the monks as having belonged to "him" in his previous life as his predecessor, the 13th Dalai Lama, been able to name another prominent monk, and then passed the test of being able to identify articles belonging to the Dalai Lama from among items the monks had brought with them. Lhamo Dhondrub was, contemporaneously with being elevated to the status of Dalai Lama, renamed Jetsun Jamphel Ngawang Lobsang Yeshe Tenzin Gyatso - "Holy Lord, Gentle Glory, Compassionate, Defender of the Faith, Ocean of Wisdom." Tibetans normally refer to His Holiness as Yeshe Norbu, the "Wishfulfilling Gem" or just Kundun - "The Presence."

After a failed uprising of the Tibetans against China in 1959?, the 14th Dalai Lama fled to India, and has lived there in exile ever since, still fighting for Tibet and its independence. In 1989?, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

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Last edited August 6, 2001 3:42 am (diff)
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