Chinese Leaders Dispute ‘Reincarnation’ Of Lama Dalai Lama Says 6-Year Old Has Spirit Of Panchen Lama

They’re officially atheist, but China’s Communist rulers are accusing the Dalai Lama of breaking the rules of his own faith in the search for the reincarnation of the second-highest leader of Tibetan Buddhism.

The harsh condemnation of the exiled Tibetan leader this week is just one sign of China’s determination to maintain its grip on the remote Himalayan region, whose people are intensely religious.

The Dalai Lama announced last Sunday that a 6-year-old Tibetan boy had been identified as the reincarnation of the Panchen Lama.

The Panchen Lama, according to Buddhist belief, is the reincarnation of Amitabha, the Buddha of Light. Shortly after the last Panchen Lama’s death in 1989, his spirit is believed to have passed into the body of an infant.

The Dalai Lama has been in exile since a failed revolt in 1959, so the Panchen Lama also is the highestranking Tibetan Buddhist leader inside Tibet.

The last Panchen Lama’s general support of Communist policy was key to China’s leadership of Tibet. He served as vice chairman of China’s legislature and was honorary president of the Chinese Buddhists’ Association.

Although some criticized him for cooperating with China, the Panchen Lama was still respected. He spoke out against what he considered harsh treatment of Tibetans, and once was punished with nine years of house arrest.

As part of its effort to oversee Tibet’s religious activities, the government had supervised a search for his reincarnation by Tibetan Buddhists, and reports suggested it was nearly finished.

Before the government could announce the results, the Dalai Lama declared the boy had been found.

There is no indication of whether the Chinese government has rejected the young candidate, Gedhun Choekyi Nyima.

But it clearly did not approve of the way the decision was handled.

According to the government, the proper way to find the reincarnated child follows these steps: monks find certain boys who might fit the profile, they ask the boys to identify utensils used by the late Panchen Lama, and they seek help through prayer and divination.

Finally, lots are drawn from a golden urn under the statue of Sakyamuni, the founder of Buddhism, and the central government gives final approval.

“If there is something wrong, Sakyamuni will intervene,” said Zhao Puchu, the head of the Buddhist Association of China and the head of the government’s reincarnation search.

Zhao said lots were not drawn, violating the wishes of the late Panchen Lama. He also accused the Dalai Lama of violating the principles of his own sect of Buddhism.

On Friday, The People’s Daily, the newspaper of the Communist Party, ran a long article - with footnotes - by a member of China’s Tibet Research Center elaborating on the rituals and China’s claims to the right to approve the reincarnation of the Panchen Lama and the Dalai Lama.

The official Xinhua News Agency reported today that leading Tibetans met in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, to denounce the Dalai Lama’s announcement.

“Dalai himself doesn’t have the right to determine a reincarnated child of the Panchen Lama,” Bilung Baima Dandzim, a living buddha in the Tashi Lumpo Temple, traditional home of the Panchen Lama, was quoted as saying. He insisted China had to approve the reincarnation announcement.

Xinhua quoted another living buddha, Dezhub Jambai Losang, as saying, “What (the Dalai Lama) did violated historical conventions and religious rituals. He was just attempting to ruin the stability and unity of Tibet.”

But Robert Barnett, a Tibetan expert, said the specific procedures China claims are needed to find the new Panchen Lama are a Chinese invention.

“The steps the Chinese are talking about didn’t exist historically,” said Barnett of the Tibet Information Network in London. “They took a range of traditional methods and forced them into a fixed procedure. Everything was actually very fluid in the traditional system.”

The Dalai Lama said in a statement Sunday that Buddhist tradition had been strictly observed in the search for the child.

The search was conducted by the Tashi Lumpo monastery in Shigatse, Tibet. Barnett said the lamas would not accept any reincarnation without the Dalai Lama’s endorsement.

The reincarnation dispute is the latest round in a government campaign to destroy the Dalai Lama’s religious status in Tibet, Barnett said. Most Tibetans do not take the Chinese accusations seriously because they aren’t made by high Tibetan religious figures, he said. The Dalai Lama is widely revered by Tibetans.