October 5, 2008
"I pray for all of us, oppressor and friend, that together we succeed in building a better world through human understanding and love, and that in doing so we may reduce the pain and suffering of all sentient beings." - His Holiness the Dalai Lama
On this day in 1989 His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso, received the Nobel Peace Prize for his nonviolent efforts to free Tibet from China. Some phrases from his acceptance speech:
I accept the prize with profound gratitude on behalf of the oppressed everywhere and for all those who struggle for freedom and work for world peace. I accept it as a tribute to the man who founded the modern tradition of nonviolent action for change - Mahatma Gandhi - whose life taught and inspired me. And, of course, I accept it on behalf of the six million Tibetan people, my brave countrymen and women inside Tibet, who have suffered and continue to suffer so much. They confront a calculated and systematic strategy aimed at the destruction of their national and cultural identities. The prize reaffirms our conviction that with truth, courage and determination as our weapons, Tibet will be liberated...
I pray for all of us, oppressor and friend, that together we succeed in building a better world through human understanding and love, and that in doing so we may reduce the pain and suffering of all sentient beings.
Last month the Dalai Lama cancelled trips to Europe because of exhaustion. In September President Bush called the exiled spiritual leader to express concerns about his health. The Chinese government denounced the president's phone call to the Dalai Lama as "interfering in their internal affairs." China claims that Tibet is a a part of mainland China although Tibetans consider Tibet an independent country that was invaded by Communist troops in 1950. The Dalai Lama wants greater autoomy for Tibet to protect the country's Buddhist culture. President Bush awarded the Dalai Lama the Congressional Gold Medal a year ago, saying he was "a universal symbol of peace and tolerance, a shepherd of the faithful and a keeper of the flame for his people."
One of my favorite books is Seven Years in Tibet, by Heinrich Harrar. The Austrian mountain climber details his escape from a prison camp in India, and how he crossed the Himalayas into Tibet where he became a tutor to the Dalai Lama. (The book was made into a movie starring Brad Pitt, and it actually captures the essence of the book fairly well.)
There's a new book out about the Dalai Lama, Why the Dalai Lama Matters, by Buddhist scholar, Robert Thurman (father of actress Uma Thurman). Robert Thurman is a professor at Columbia University and the first westerner to be ordained a Buddhist monk.
But the best books I have read that reveal the beliefs and teachings of the Dalai Lama were written by his own hand. Ethics for a New Millennium, is a purely written book that is filled with beautifully worded wisdom. How to See Yourself as You Really Are provides a road map to happiness by developing self-knowledge through meditative reflections. This prayer ends the book, Ethics for a New Millenium:
May I become at all times, both now and forever
A protector for those without protection
A guide for those who have lost their way
A ship for those with oceans to cross
A bridge for those with rivers to cross
A sanctuary for those in danger
A lamp for those without light
A place of refuge for those who lack shelter
And a servant to all in need.
7 comments:
I can't help but be struck by the contrast between this post and the last one, particularly the difference in attitude you display toward those who stick up for the autonomy of Tibet and those who stick up for the autonomy of the CNMI.
The CNMI negotiated a Covenant with the US that clearly defines political parameters. China violently overtook the country of Tibet.
The Chinese would tell you that their rule over Tibet was negotiated between the seventh Dalai Lama and the Emperor of Qing in 1720; that they only took care of defense and foreign affairs at first; but that their intervention in 1959 was necessary to save the Tibetan people from slavery and oppression.
What they may say and the reality may not be the same. From the report about the oppression of women in occupied Tibet: The Chinese takeover constituted an aggression on a sovereign state and violation of international law. The continued occupation of Tibet by China, with the help of several hundred thousand troops, represents an ongoing violation of international law and of the fundamental rights of the Tibetan people to independence.
On March 17, 1959 His Holiness the Dalai Lama left Lhasa to seek political asylum in India. He was followed by an unprecedented exodus of Tibetans into exile. Never before, in the long history of Tibet, had so many Tibetans been forced to leave their homeland and under such difficult circumstances. There are now more than 130,000 Tibetan refugees scattered over India and the world.
China tries to justify its occupation and repressive rule of Tibet by pretending that it "liberated" Tibetan society from "medieval feudal serfdom" and "slavery". Beijing trots out this myth to counter every international pressure to review its repressive policies in Tibet.
Traditional Tibetan society was by no means perfect. It was in need of changes, which His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama initiated as soon as he assumed temporal authority in Tibet. However, it was not as bad as China would have us believe. And it certainly was not a "serfdom". As far back as 1960, the International Commission of Jurists' Legal Inquiry Committee reported, "Chinese allegations that the Tibetans enjoyed no human rights before the entry of the Chinese were found to be based on distorted and exaggerated accounts of life in Tibet."
I agree that the Chinese have used distorted and exaggerated accounts of life in Tibet in an attempt to create a bogus moral justification for what was really an act of naked political aggression.
I also believe that the US has adopted the same cynical strategy toward the CNMI.
Wow -it's amazing to me that someone could compare the occupation of Tibet and its relationship with China to the relationship of the US with the CNMI. Tibet did not have a plebiscite or role in determining it's political future, as the CNMI did. The CNMI wanted, and wants, to be part of the US community. The CNMI willingly accepts federal funds and continually requests more. The CNMI asked to have a representative in the US Congress. (which they will have.) There are no US troops forcing CNMI residents to comply with any political strategies. No one in the CNMI is burning US passports or requesting to be separated from the US as far as I know. Having US law on US soil is rational, not cynical.
The Tibetans (at least the Dalai Lama's followers) are not demanding separation from China, just the autonomy within the Chinese nation that they are supposed to have even under the Communist constitution, which officially establishes the "Tibet Autonomous Region," just as the Covenant officially establishes the CNMI as a self-governing (i.e., autonomous) Commonwealth.
But neither of us is getting the automony we are supposed to, because in both cases a reflexive and arrogant nationalism prevails at the top. This is the attitude that demands "US law on US soil," and "Chinese law on Chinese soil."
And this law will be enforced. You think there are "no US troops forcing CNMI residents to comply with any political strategies"? Who do you think is going to be enforcing the new immigration laws? Federal agents backed up by federal marshals -- i.e., men with guns, answerable only to national, not local, control.
I don't claim that US policy toward the CNMI involves the kind of physical brutality that you see in Chinese policy toward Tibet. That, however, is the only difference I can see.
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