Chapter 1 The world of gods,demons,and men
In short ,without the cooperation of the local spirits,the community cannot hope to achieve prosperity;without the prosperity of the community,the material basis for religious achievement is lost;and without achievement in religious practice and learning,the cooperation of the local spirits cannot be won.This cycle of interdependence undergirds the religious life of Tibet in all its aspects,whether in settings denoted as Buddhist or Bon,whether on the level of the modest village or,in past times,of the Tibetan State under the leadership of the Dalai Lamas.
Tibetan understanding of sang cohere closely with beliefs regarding the character of the local divinities,particularly the mountain gods.These are beings of great power but also olfactory sensitivity;it is for this reason,for instance,that there is a widespread cultural ban on grilling or roasting meat,which may bring about spiritual pollution,or drip.
Chapter 2 Souces of Tibetan religious traditions
Tibet was then(4th century CE) surrounded by lands in which Buddhism was a long-established religious and cultural system:Nepal and India to the south,China to the east,the Silk Road states to the north,and the pre-Islamic Iranian world to the west.Tibetan history begins with the Tsenpo,or emperor ,Songtsen Gampo(ca.617-49),who militarily and politically unified the Tibetan plateau and began the conquest of writing,based on Indian models,was developed at this time.The emperor's marriage to the Chinese princess Wencheng(d.680)is believed to have been accompanied by the installation in his capital city,Lhasa,of a precious image of Sakyamuni Buddha brought from China as part of her dowry and said to have been manufactured in India as a portrait of the Buddha himself.
It is sometimes thought that the adoption of Buddhism by the Tibetan court pacified the warlike Tibetan people and thus,having emasculated the nation,brought about the decline and fall of its empire.It is clear however,that Tibet continued aggressive policies long after adopting Buddhism as an aspect of Tibetan imperial ideology.Buddhism provided the empire with the symbolic means to represent itself as the worldly embodiment of a universal spiritual and political order,in which the Tsenpo was the Buddha's earthly representative.This was made tangible though the Tsenpo's identification with the cosmic Buddha of Radiant Light,Vairocana,whose icon was widely reproduced in imperial domains.
Though this pattern was maintained in Tibet,many of the detailed rules of the Vinaya-for instance ,the prohibition of an evening meal following the major meal at midday-came to be quietly neglected.
Three vehicles in the classical Buddhist idea,but nine in Bon?
Chapter 3 The growth of the orders and schools
The Tibetan political system,in the form in which it was developed by the fifth Dalai Lama and his successors, vaporized the ideal of an equilibrium between the religious and secular branches of governmennt,though in fact the ecclesiastical offices came to dominate Tibetan administration.
The fifth Dalai Lama visited the court in Beijing soon after the inception of the Qing dynasty(1644-1911)under China's Manchu conquerors.During the decades that followed,Tibet increasingly emerged as a focal point of ompetition between Manchus and Mongols in their rivalry for hegemony in Central Asia.
It's so funny:
The controversial sixth Dalai Lama,Tsangyang Gyatso(1683-1706),a libertine who preferred wine and women to the life of a monk,was forcibly removed from office by Tibet's Mongol overlord Lhazang Khan and died under mysterious circumstances while on route to the Chinese capital.
The intermittent struggles in Central Tibet throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries helped to transform Tibet's religious geography more generally.For centuries Central Tibet had been the clear center of gravity in Tibetan spiritual life,but masters of eastern Tibetan origin,and sometimes others as well,now began to focus their efforts increasingly in far eastern Kham and Amdo.This had many causes and consequences. A case in point may be seen in the career of the Tenth Karmapa Choying Dorje(1605-74),an artist of considerable genius.Crowned during his youth as "king of Tibet"by the rulers of Tsang,he was forced into exile with the ascent of the fifth Dalai Lama and passed much of his life in the far southeast of Tibet,in what is today Yunnan,where he was honored by the rulers of the Naxi Kindom based in LIjiang.
Chapter 4 Spiritual exercise and the path of the bodhisattva
In Tibetan societies,a comportment of modesty and humility must be adopted when one enters a temple,greets a monk or,especially,a lama,and when one attends to the arrangement of the household shrine.
Interesting:
In the Buddhism,Holy persons,places and structures are kept to one's right,so that,instead of seeking the shortest route between two points,one must adhere to a pattern of clockwise circumambulation.(in the case of the Bon religion,though circumambulation is practiced in the opposite,counterclockwise direction)
Three refuge-granting Jewels:Buddha,Dharma and Sangha.(teacher,protector and guide)
Chapter 5 Philosophical developments and disputes
Chapter 6 Enlightenmentin this very body
Tibetan Buddhism is often characterized as "tantric",in aspects of popular and monastic ritual,and yoga and meditation were most often tantric as well."Yoga" is not the gymnastic yoga widely taught in heath clubs,it refers to practices of meditation through which the adept may achieve union with the highest reality.??
Why is called secret?
Their teachings and practices are to be concealed from the uninitiated,but often also allusively,indicating that only those who are suitably receptive can gain insight into the tantras,whether or not they are deliberately concealed.
Chapter 7 When this life ends
Sky burial is an event of great solemnity,the last and ultimate offering one can make,a sacrifice of one's own flesh to feed hungry creatures who bear the matter of which one was made to pure celestial realms.
Water burial,cremation,Inhumation.
Chapter 8 Tibetan Buddhism today
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The end.