Bishop caught in battle over living Buddha

By Jonathan Petre - Daily Telegraph

(Filed: 09/08/2005)

The Bishop of London, the Rt Rev Richard Chartres, was at the centre of an unholy row last night after he participated in an exotic spiritual ceremony with a disputed living Buddha.

Bishop Chartres welcomed six other faith leaders to the celebration "of friendship and trust" at St Ethelburga's, a London church transformed into a peace centre since it was bombed by the IRA in 1993.

Thaye Dorge

But the bishop, who was supposed to have taken a full part in the event, was forced to minimise his role amid the controversy.

He was represented by a stand-in as showers of rose petals were thrown, prayers were read in Latin and Sanskrit and a colourful Japanese tapestry was unveiled.

The spirit of enlightenment had been seriously disturbed after senior Buddhists denounced the presence at the event of His Holiness Thaye Dorje. The 22-year-old's claim to be the 17th Karmapa, one of the most revered figures in Buddhism, is fiercely disputed.

Bishop Chartres was inundated with angry letters and e-mails from Buddhists who insist that Thaye Dorje is the "failed candidate" and is not the real incarnation of the Karmapa, the head of the Kagyu Buddhist school.

Confusingly, to western minds at least, there is another reincarnation, His Holiness Urgyen Trinley, who is living in exile in India. He is recognised by most of the mainstream Tibetan Buddhist community as the genuine Karmapa.

Urgyen Trinley

Lama Yeshe Losal Rinpoche, a senior Buddhist abbot whose monastery is in Scotland, told Bishop Chartres that the person he would be meeting was not recognised by the Dalai Lama or any of the heads of the main Tibetan Schools.

The abbot also criticised Thaye Dorje's supporters, adding: "I humbly ask you not to provide a platform for these people and also to let other faith leaders know." The battle of succession, which has been raging for two decades, began after the death of the 16th Karmapa in 1981 when the traditional written instructions about where the next incarnation would appear could not be found. In 1992, one of the four regents appointed to find a successor claimed to have discovered a letter of prophesy, and Urgyen Trinley was identified in Tibet the same year.

With the approval of the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism, and most of the Karmapa's followers, he was installed near Lhasa in Tibet until he escaped over the mountains and arrived in India in 2001.

[...remainder snipped...]

Thaye Dorge is the reincarnation supported by the controversial "Lama Ole" from Denmark.

They've got the wrong one haven't they, the Karmapa usually accepted as authentic is quite a remarkable individual.

This is the problem with Tibetan Buddhism, where identifying the reincarnated party is so important for continuation purposes. There are two competing Panchen Lamas as well.

Seems a bit much for me, all this Tibetan power gaming. Seems outside of Buddhism, outside of Mahayana even, very unique. I think Nagarjuna would disapprove. I think many in the West are drawn towards the majic of the Vajrayana- but I always saw it as political, mostly. They WERE the ruling class, after all. Not just forest monks or something.

It is very attractive to think of Tibetan Buddhism with its reincarnations - tempting to consider that Dharamsala knows the 'truth' through mysicism. Actually the process is far from clear. I recently finished reading 'The Search for the Panchen Lama" which documents not only the controversy with the current panchen lama (the Tibetan candidate was born before the old one died) but also the historic problem and arguements around most 'identified' reincarnates. Before reading the book I assumed that the tibetan clergy actually 'knew' and all esle was political, but in fact is is not so clear cut, and there are many sides to each debate.

The Dance of Seventeen Lives by Mick Brown is a really good read about the whole Karmapa story. Admittedly it views Ogyen Drodul Trinley Dorje as the authentic Karmapa but it's hard not to agree with him after reading the story. The political scheming, in-fighting and even outright violence are typical of politicians anywhere.