Centerfield

Problems for Tibetan Buddhist Hierarchalists Ahead?

The Dalai Lama says he wants to follow the example of the Jewish faith in exile, and continue its existence in exile.

But, you know, Tibetan Buddhism is hierarchical. There are figures equivalent to the Pope, going in a pyramid down to the lowly worshipers. Now, the Jewish faith started terribly hierachical, and has ended up pretty nearly unheirarchical. There no longer is any equivalent of a Bishop or Pope, nor will there ever be, because you can't put long-fled birds back into bags.

From my point of view, Jews and Judaism has had much more influence after the Diaspora than it ever did when the Temple was still up. Part of that is simply that Jews inevitably meet far more people now than when mostly in one or two countries. Another part is that many Jews had to face horror and death constantly, and thus had to be on their toes.

But, to me, at least as big is that, because hierarchs couldn't simply impose their will at pain of torture or death anymore, Jewish rabbis and religious scholars had to start thinking to gain mindshare, and, what's more, they could without said penalties, and they did. Even many Jewish peasants gained an interest and respect for reading and thoughtful argument, and did as much of both as their host authorities and circumstances permitted. They still do.

For similar reasons, Zen Buddhism, the ultimate in individualistic faiths, has, I think, been more successful in the West than hierarchical Buddhisms. Will we see big populations of Tibetans in free countries turn to Zen and/or a nonhierachical mutation of Tibetan Buddhism?

I was reminded that I wanted to do this post by this post on China requiring permission for reincarnation, which I thought was some of the funniest news I'd heard in awhile. Yeah, yeah, probably China will try to produce its own Dalai Lama who's filled out all the paperwork nicely and is a nice Chinese Communist. But who will believe, since he's already said he's going to reincarnate outside China? Too slow, way too slow, China.