Newsgroups: alt.religion.buddhism.tibetan Path: shell.portal.com!svc.portal.com!sdd.hp.com!gatech!newsfeed.internetmci.com!tank.news.pipex.net!pipex!btnet!news.compulink.co.uk!cix.compulink.co.uk!usenet From: johnc@cix.compulink.co.uk ("John Cleaver") Subject: Re: Tibetean Buddhist reincarnation. Message-ID: Organization: Compulink Information eXchange References: <4h5q25$i3h@sundog.tiac.net> Date: Fri, 1 Mar 1996 10:16:01 GMT X-News-Software: Ameol32 Lines: 48 Sphere observes: >The >closest I have found to some sort of mechanism >for the continued existence of an individual >self after the death of the body has been in >the physical objects transformed during the existence >of the body and the memories of people effected >during the individual life. I think a lot of confusion is caused by the Tibetan notion of a reincarnating lama (tulku, nirmanakaya). Tulku means Nirmanakaya, physical manifestation of a buddha. The nirmanakaya is a projection. But Tibetan tulkus are *not* buddhas (despite the popular presses use of the expression 'living buddha'). They are bodhisattvas at some level or other. Ask a tulku, and he will confirm this. Therefore it is incorrect to call them nirmanakayas. The idea that they can project their personality into a future life substantially intact seems to me to be rather folklore-ish. It is worth noting that when Buddhism first came to Tibet, lineages were passed down through families, not through reincarnating lamas. The tulku system appears to have been set up in response to some corrupt practices appearing in the family lineage system (people inheriting a lineage who were obviously not up to teaching and maintaining the lineage). Incidentally the family system is preserved in some significant lineages - I believe the Sakya Trizin (sp?) lineage is passed down through the family. The confusion arises (in questioning western minds) because the tulku system seems to imply that something other than karma can be preserved through death, and this seems to contradict the fundamental teaching of no abiding self. People have deep confidence in their tulku lama, not neccessarily arising from the claim that the lama is a tulku; they then have difficulty reconciling the tulku claim with the philosophical position that on death, the personality is necessarily destroyed completely. It is worth noting that no other tradition than the Tibetan one has any similar system, and that there are definitely some aspects of the Tibetan traditions that were put in place for political reasons - it's no coincidence that the Tibetan establishment has been theocratic for a thousand years. Jack.