LAMAISM. - It is the Buddhism of the "great vehicle" (mahāyāna), in the particular ritual form that it assumed in Tibet. The name derives from the word bla-ma (pron. lama), master, which properly belongs only to monks of the highest rank.
Like other religions of Asia, L. has a doctrinal aspect and a popular one; the former is less known, the latter often described by European travelers.
I. THE DOCTRINE
The theoretical basis of L. is māhāyānic Buddhism, as it had developed in India in the first centuries of the common era; more precisely, L. is based on a particular form of it, the vajrayāna or Tantrism. The vajrayāna (adamantine vehicle) is Buddhist gnosis. Of the māhāyana it admits all the philosophical foundations and especially the postulate of the insubstantiality of all things (ēunyatā); but it is hostile to philosophical knowledge, and is centered around mystical intuition (prajñā). This is reserved to the initiated alone, regenerated through the mystical baptism. The prajñā as a symbol is then changed into an almost divine concept, practically into a śakti, or active principle of the divinity. The mystical process and the prajñā itself are represented symbolically by the mystical formula (mantra or dhāraṇī), whose sounds are exalted to the point of becoming themselves a divinity. Another symbolic representation is the mudrā, or mystical position of the fingers and hands. Finally, whether as a theoretical representation or as a practical aid to intuition, the vajrayāna makes wide use of the maṇḍala, a mystical diagram of the divinity and at the same time of the psychic processes that lead to it, symbolizing the eternal becoming in the macrocosm and in the microcosm. All these expressions and symbols are systematized in an endless series of liturgies (sādhana), practical methods for realizing, according to the various schools, the divinity in the soul of the mystic. The vajrayāna and its tantra also have a pronounced sexual aspect, inasmuch as copulation, as a mystical ceremony according to determined rites and as an iconographic representation (Tibetan yab-yum, "father-mother"), symbolizes the conjunction between the divinity and its contingent externalization (śakti), between knowledge (prajñā) and the means suited to obtaining it (upāya), between the mystic and the psychic forces he brings into play. Moreover, the boundary between mysticism and magic is rather vague, and one passes imperceptibly from the one to the other; some Tantric liturgies have an elevated mystical meaning, others are pure and simple magic, and sometimes black magic. Hence the great success of the vajrayāna among the lower classes. The texts of the vajrayāna in fact tend to explain to the adept the ways to obtain science (vidyā), a word that has the technical meaning of knowledge of the power of the formulas and of the way to use them. The ideal of the vajrayāna is not so much the mahāyānic one of the bodhisattva, that is, of the enlightened one who renounces entering nirvāya in order to lead men to salvation through preaching; it is rather the siddha, that is, the sage who through mystical practice has attained the siddhi, the supreme realization in its transcendent and earthly aspects. To reach this goal through contemplation (sa-mādhi), use is made of the yoga technique, even in its most violent form (haṭhayoga). On the one hand it serves to attain concentration and the mystical unity between macrocosm and microcosm; on the other it tends to obtain physical faculties superior to the ordinary, such as the gtum-mo (pron. tummō), that is, hyperpyrexia; the groh-jug (pron. dronggiuk), which is the transfer of one's own vital principle and one's own personality into a corpse, bringing it to life; the p'oba (pron. phovā), that is, the predetermination of one's own rebirth; and still others. So that the siddhi often lowers itself to a simple concept of magical power.
At the center of the vajrayānic (and mahāyānic) pantheon stand the five Buddhas (pañcatathāgata): Vairocana, Akṣobhya, Ratnasambhava, Amitābha, Amoghasiddhi, who are hypostases of the one primordial Buddha (Ādibuddha); this is an abstract conception, which no longer has anything to do with the historical Buddha. Of lesser doctrinal importance than the five Buddhas, but of much greater prominence in the cult, are some of the bodhisattva, especially Mañjuśrī and Avalokiteśvara. Higher in rank is Mañjuśrī, personification and protector of the transcendental consciousness. But much more popular than he is Avalokiteśvara (Tibetan: sPyan - ras - gzigs, pron. Cenresi), the bodhisattva who symbolizes one of the most human acts of the Buddha, that of looking with compassion (vilo-kayati) upon the creature; he is the personification of mercy, and is the tutelary god who protects Tibet, where he is incarnated in the Dalai-Lama.
II. THE CULT
The popular aspect of Lamaism is in part conditioned by its religious substratum. Before being converted to Buddhism, the religion of Tibet was Bon (v.), a primitive animism in origin very akin to Siberian shamanism; today, as a religion still living especially in eastern Tibet and among the Mo-so, it is profoundly influenced and transformed by Lamaism itself. Buddhism encountered strong resistance in Bon, solidly anchored in the Tibetan aristocracy, which constituted its priestly class; and it succeeded in overcoming it only by bargaining with it, admitting into its own pantheon a certain number of Bon-po divinities and accepting some of its cosmogonic ideas. Besides Bon, certain Iranian and Central Asian influences also penetrated into vajrayāna, by its own nature very suited to this form of syncretism. Thus, for example, there entered the Lamaist pantheon dPe-har (pron. Pehār), a tribal god of the northeast, who preserved his semi-demonic qualities and who is now incarnated in the c'os-skyōn (pron. ciōkiōng), "protector of the law," the official oracle of the Tibetan State, residing at gNas-c'ūn (pron. Neciūng) near Lhasa. Thus there also entered Beg-tse, a warlike deity armed with a sword and clad in armor, imported from Mongolia and become for the dGe-lug-pa one of the principal defenders of the doctrine. It should be noted, however, that while the pantheon continued to be enriched with ever new divinities, the fundamental bases of the doctrine remained intact and free of any external influence.
The Lamaist cult is complex and sumptuous. In the great temples, populated by innumerable statues arranged according to rigidly fixed iconographic schemes, the cult takes place in great collective ceremonies, with choral and individual prayers, offerings (never bloody), blessings. In the villages the local divinities of Bon-po origin continue to be worshiped, the sablag (pron. sadāk) and the btsan (pron. tzen), deities almost always malignant, tinged with only a light veneer of Lamaism.
III. THE HISTORY
The historical vicissitudes of Lamaism begin with the very introduction of Buddhism into Tibet. A first contact occurred with King Sroñbtsan-sgam-po (pron. Songtzèn-gampō; ca. 620-49). The introduction of Buddhism as the state religion, however, occurred only with King K'ri-sroñ-ldbtsan (pron. Thi-song-de-tzen; 755-97), under whom there began the assiduous work of translating the sacred texts from Sanskrit into Tibetan, in collaboration between Indian masters (paṇḍita) and Tibetan translators (lot-sava). This is the period that the Tibetans call the earlier propagation (sña-dar, pron. ngadār). The resistance of Bon was very vigorous, so much so as to produce, after the reign of the bigoted Buddhist king Ral-pa-can (pron. Ralpacèn), a furious reaction under King gLañ-dar-ma (pron. Langdārma; 836-41).
Buddhism was systematically persecuted and practically became extinct in Tibet, with the dispersion and exile of the monastic communities that were its mainstay. After the assassination of the King and the disintegration of the monarchy, the surviving centers of Buddhism lingered on with difficulty for about a century. Then there began anew, through the work first of Klu-mes (pron. Lumē, early 10th century), then of Rin-c'en-bzan-po (pron. Rincen-sangpō; 958-1055) and of the great Indian master Atīsa (d. 1054), the almost entirely new foundation, and on rather different bases, of the monastic community in Tibet. This is the "later propagation" (p'yi-dar, pron. cidār), which had as its consequence the definitive victory of Buddhism and the defeat of Bon, today reduced to small communities in the marginal regions of Tibet.
This entire epoch (11th-14th centuries) is characterized by a great flourishing of spiritual life, by the foundation of most of the Lamaist sects and by the translation of the greater portion of the canon. In the second half of the 13th century the abbots of Sa-skya (pron. Sākia) acquired great influence at the court of Kublai Khan and his successors, obtaining from him the concession of temporal dominion over central Tibet. This first theocracy was ephemeral, but from that time dates the intervention of the Lamaist sects in Tibetan politics and their growing temporal influence. Meanwhile the body of doctrine was being fixed in its definitive form, when Bu-ston (pron. Putön; 1290-1364) revised and reorganized the earlier collections, constituting those which are today the two great canonical collections of Lamaism: the bKa'-gyur (pron. Kanghiür), "translations of the revealed texts," in 108 volumes; and the bsTan-gyur (pron. Tanghiür), "translations of the commentaries," in 220 volumes. The theoretical bases were therefore beyond dispute; but the tantric foundation common to all the various older sects had as a consequence a strong relaxation of monastic discipline, emptied of all content by the sometimes monstrous symbolism of tantric practices. Hence the need for a reform, which was carried out by Tson-k'a-pa (pron. Tsong-khapà; 1357-1419). His sect, the dGe-lug-pa (pron. Ghelu kpà), had a very slow and contested rise. For a long time it was nothing but one among the various Tibetan schools, at times opposed even successfully by its older sister schools. Its superiority derived from its strong disciplinary organization and from the theory of incarnation, which established an absolute hierarchical continuity; the great leaders, especially the abbot of 'Bras-spuñs (pron. Drepüng) and that of bKra-šis-lhun-po (pron. Tascilhunpo) are incarnations, that is, phenomenal bodies (nirmāṇakāya, Tibetan sprul-sku, pron. tulku) of one of the Buddhas or of the bodhisattva, who nonetheless remain in their celestial seats with their transcendent body (dharma-kāya, Tibetan c'os-sku, pron. ciöku). The incarnate therefore do not die, but only change their body when it becomes too worn out by old age and illness, assuming that of a newborn child. This mode of succession was adopted already in the course of the 15th century for the abbot of 'Bras-spuñs, who was later known to the Mongols and then to Europeans by the title of Dalai-Lama (lama-ocean; dalai is the Mongol equivalent of rgya-mts'o, pron. ghiamtzö, which is the ending of all the names of the Dalai-Lamas; the Tibetan title is instead rGyal-ba Rin-po-c'e, pron. Ghielvà Rimpocè). The rise and definitive victory of the dGe-lug-pa with the help of the secular arm of the Khans of the Khoshot (1642) belongs to the history of Tibet. Shortly after the victory, the fifth Dalai-Lama Nag-dbañ-blo-bzañ-rgya-mts'o (pron. Ngawäng-lopsäng-ghiamtzö; 1617-82), recognized as an incarnation of the Buddha Amitābha and as second dignitary of the sect the abbot of bKra-šis-lhun-po, who is known to Europeans with the title of Tashi-Lama, from the name of his monastery, while the Tibetan title is Pan-c'en Rin-po-c'e (pron. Pancèn Rimpocè); in 1728 the Tashi-Lama also received a small temporal domain of his own from the Chinese Emperor. The year 1642 thus saw the transformation of Tibet into a theocratic state dominated by the dGe-lug-pa sect. The subsequent history of Lamaism is almost exclusively political history, also because after Tson-k'a-pa and his commentators there was no further doctrinal development, but only a process of clarification and systematization.
Limited for a long time to Tibet, Lamaism subsequently gained a foothold also beyond its frontiers. The protection granted by the Chinese emperors of the Yüan dynasty to the abbot of Sa-skya led to a certain diffusion of Lamaism among the Mongols, especially among those settled in China. With the expulsion of the Yüan (1368) Lamaism disappeared from China and languished until it nearly died out in Mongolia as well. Its revival is due in good part to political motives; in order to secure the support of the Mongol princes in the hard struggle he was conducting within Tibet, the third Dalai-Lama bSod-nams-rgya-mts'o (pron. Sönam-ghiamtzö; 1543-88) went to Mongolia, where he succeeded in obtaining the conversion of the principal Mongol chiefs, and where he died. His successor was the son of a Mongol chief. With this Mongolia was definitively won over to the dGe-lug-pa. Mongolian Lamaism differs in nothing from that of Tibet. The most learned Mongol lamas receive their theoretical formation in Tibetan monasteries, nor has there ever been the slightest doctrinal deviation. The bKa'-gyur and the bsTan-gyur have been translated into Mongolian, giving rise to a considerable exegetical literature in that language. At the head of Mongolian Lamaism was the incarnate of Urga, the rJe-btsun Dam-pa (pron. Getsün-dampà), in Mongolian Maidari Qutuqtu, along with other minor incarnates. A little later Lamaism spread also to the Buryats of eastern Siberia and to the Kalmyks of the Volga.
The first Chinese emperors of the Manchu dynasty protected Lamaism, above all for political reasons. The emperor Yung-cheng (1722-35) turned into a convent (Yung-ho kung) the palace in which he had lived before ascending the throne. The Yung-ho kung became the principal of the numerous Lamaist monasteries of Peking and Jehol. The capital became a center of Lamaist life; numerous incarnates resided there, for example the lCañ-skya (pron. Ciängkia) Qutuqtu and the T'u-kuan Qutuqtu, and there the bKa'-gyur and the bsTan-gyur were printed in a fine edition. However, Lamaism in China always remained the religion of foreign circles connected with the court, and never penetrated the mass of the Chinese people. From Peking there were attempts to introduce Lamaism into Manchuria. The bKa'-gyur was translated into Manchu; but the attempt was not carried through and had no practical outcome.
IV. THE CURRENT SITUATION
The l. as it exists today is divided into various sects, which are usually grouped into two large sections: a) the red sects, that is, those prior to the reform of Tson-k'a-pa; b) the yellow sect, that is, the dGe-lug-pa. This distinction is due to the fact that, along with the liturgical vestment used in religious ceremonies, which is uniformly dark yellow for all, the former wear a red cap and the latter a yellow cap. The red sects are found almost exclusively in Tibet; the principal ones are:
1) The rĪn̄-ma-pa (pron. Gningmapā), that is, the "ancients," descendants of Padmasambhava. They are the last remnant of the "earlier propagation," and they practice a Tantric Buddhism more contaminated than any other by Bon-po beliefs. Magical practices are of the greatest importance among them. The monks may marry.
2) The bKa'-gdams-pa (pron. Kadampā), the first great school of the "later propagation," descendants of Atīsa. Today they have almost disappeared, absorbed by the dGelug-pa reform that emerged from their midst.
3) The bKa'-rgyud-pa (pron. Kaghutpā), descendants of Mar-pa (1012-53); they are characterized by the particular importance they attribute to hathayoga and to the most severe ascetic practices.
4) The 'Brug-pa (pron. Drukpā), descended from Glīn-ras-pa (pron. Lingrepā; 1122-88); they are merely a branch of the bKa'-rgyud-pa, of little religious interest, but politically important, constituting the dominant sect in Bhutan; until a century ago they were also dominant in Ladakh.
5) The Sa-skya-pa (pron. Sakiapā), descended from 'K'on dKon-cog (pron. Khön Konciō, 1034-1103), had, as has been said, great political importance. Their abbot, still the temporal lord of a small territory, is hereditary and therefore must marry. The sect has its own system of meditation, called lam-'bras (pron. landrē), "the path and the fruit."
The yellow sect, or dGe-lug-pa, is dominant in Tibet and is the only one recognized in the extra-Tibetan lamaist territories. Tson-k'a-pa's reform constituted a return to tradition. In the doctrinal field, he restored to honor the mahāyānic ideal of the bodhisattva, in preference to the Tantric ideal of the siddha. He was, however, above all a restorer of monastic discipline, so relaxed in the red sects. The dGe-lug-pa must observe chastity and abstain from intoxicating liquors and from meat; the life of the monasteries is conducted strictly according to the ancient rules. The "curriculum" of studies is organized with a wise gradation of texts and with rigid discipline; students may obtain various academic degrees. One of the most conspicuous characteristics of the sect are precisely the enormous monastery-universities of 'Brasspuñs, Se-ra, dGa'-ldan (pron. Gadēn) and bKra-šislhun-po, inhabited by thousands upon thousands of learned lama and of simple monks (grva-pa, pron. trapā); before that time, by contrast, the monasteries (dgon-pa, pron. gōmpā, "solitude") were what their very name indicated: hermitages of a type that today one would call Camaldolese. Magical practices are forbidden, and generally the Tantric and yogic aspect of Lamaism is relegated very much to the background. Great prominence is given instead to dialectics, and formal logic is assiduously studied and practiced in public disputations. The principal text of the sect is the Lam-rim-c'en-ma of Tson-k'a-pa, a true Summa of lamaist doctrine, of an intelligently eclectic character.
As a practiced religion, Lamaism is today in a clearly declining phase. It still dominates in Tibet, in Bhutan and in some Indian territories (Sikkim, Ladakh, Spiti, Kunawar, Lahoul). In Outer Mongolia, which was for a moment a theocratic state under the last rJe-btsun Dam-pa from 1912 to 1924, the lamaist Church was gradually weakened and stripped of authority through the action of the communism prevailing there.
During the last war hundreds of monasteries were abolished and thousands of monks reduced to the lay state; and today Mongolian Lamaism seems headed toward dissolution. In Inner Mongolia, which remained subject to China, this process is still in its beginnings, but the tendency is the same; and this holds also for the border strip between Tibet and western China. In Peking, Lamaism was already in marked decline after the fall of the Empire; this decline is accentuated today more and more. The Lamaism of the Kalmyks of the Volga and of the Siberian Buryats suffered much from the anti-religious policy of the USSR from the Revolution until 1942; it is not then possible to know whether the partial change in that policy during and after the last war may have favored the revival of religious life in the monasteries of Transbaikalia, once so flourishing under the tsarist regime. - See pl. LI.
Bibliography10 works
Luciano Petech