December 14, 2024

European Press Critically Exams the Dalai Lama and Kalachakra Rituals While the American Press Naps in Washington, D.C.

Comments on a Press Release

Monday, July 11, 2011

I just ran across a press release that gives some vital information on the Kalachakra Initiation that is occurring in Washington, DC. Here it is. It  provides very critical insights on what appears to be happening in Washington, DC. Hope you find it of assistance.

‘The Kalachakra Initiation in Washington DC is the one of the largest and most spectacular events Tibetan Buddhism ever has performed in the West. Nearly all high ranked Lamas are present from around the globe including the young Karmapa, who seemingly is being billed by the D. L. as his spiritual successor. So estimate that 100.000 participants will be attending the Kalachakra ceremonies over the ten day period (July 6-16,2011) including some high ranking political figures.’ Although the Dalai Lama recently resigned from his position as King of the Tibetan-Government-in-Exile and boasts of “separation of Church and State, he has already had political meetings with US top politicians including Speaker of the House John Boehner, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (CA), and several other representatives.

Because of the complexity and potential consequences of the initiation, it is imperative that this  issue be discussed into an open and critical debate.  Unfortunately, it’s difficult to find journalists that are not Tibet-o-philes blogging at the ceremony.  While they provide interesting observations, the difficult analytical work of the investigative journalist is missing. Take a look below at the list of hard hitting European articles. What a difference. Where are the Aikman’s and Woodwards?  JCS

Trimondi Online European Magazine (English)

Press release of the Critical Forum Kalachakra.

The Kalachakra-Tantra

A Ritual of Peace or a Totalitarian Temptation?

From July 6 through 16, 2011 the XIV Dalai Lama will offer a Kalachakra-Tantra-Ritual in the heart of the U.S. capital, Washington, DC. In Sanskrit, Kalachakra means “The Wheel of Time.” The Kalachakra Tantra, as well the sacred text used in its ritualistic performance, is considered to be “the pinnacle of all Buddhist systems.”

Included in the Kalchakra Tantra are: the construction of a so-called Sand Mandala, which symbolizes the cosmos, an apocalyptic prophecy known as the Shambhala Myth, and several top-secret initiations.

This complicated mystical ritual is presented by the Dalai Lama and the organizers of the event as a dignified and uplifting contribution to world peace, which fosters compassion with all living beings, inter-religious dialog, interracial tolerance, ecological awareness, sexual equality, inner peace, spiritual development, and bliss for the third millennium (Kalachakra for World Peace). One of the Dalai Lama’s mottos for the whole performance is: “Because we all share this small planet earth, we have to learn to live in harmony and peace with each other and with nature.”

But are the Kalachakra Tantra and the Shambhala Myth truly pacifist? Do they really encourage harmony and cooperation among people? Do they make any real contribution to freedom and justice, equality of gender, religious tolerance or ethnic reconciliation? Are they a comprehensive, politically humanist, democratic and non-violent contribution to world peace?

Andrei Znamenski, Associate Professor of History at Alabama State University and author of an exciting book about the Shambhala Myth in Bolshevist Russia (Red_Shambhala – Magic, Prophecy, and Geopolitics in the Heart of Asia) came to another conclusion:

“It might be shocking for many readers, but let me start by saying that the Kalachakra Tantra has nothing to do with peace, compassion­, and freedom. In Tantric Buddhism it was a misogynist­ic quest performed by male initiates to accumulate sacred power of particular Buddhist deities (the lower seven initiation­s are open for all) and, through blending male and female fluids (top secret initiation­s that involved sexuality)­, to eventually turn themselves into superhuman androgynou­s beings. Moreover, part of the Kalachakra teaching was a militant Shambhala prophecy, a call for a Buddhist holy war against enemies of Buddhism.”
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Andrei Znamenski is not alone in this assessment. The Kalachakra Tantra and Tibetan Buddhism are coming more and more into focus by critics. (See: Critical Links to Lamaism) In their groundbreaking work The Shadow of the Dalai Lama – Sexuality, Magic and Politics in Tibetan Buddhism, German cultural philosophers, Victor and Victoria Trimondi, not only provide surprising, previously ignored research but also undertake a well-founded interpretation of Lamaism, rendering the Tibetan-Buddhist worldview understandable for Western readers through a comparison with European religious traditions.

The text pays particular attention to an extensive analysis of the Kalachakra Tantra and its political, ideological, and spiritual implications. (The book appeared in 1999 through the reputable German publishing house Patmos Verlag. The English version is online. It became the standard work on the critical examination of Lamaism and the metapolitics of the Dalai Lama.

In the eighties Victor Trimondi did support the Tibetan religious leader, organized several international congresses and other events with him and featured books about him in his own publishing house, the Dianus-Trikont-Verlag.) In their book the two authors describe in detail the secret rituals of sexual magic in the higher initiations of the Kalachakra Tantra (The Public and the Secret Initiations); they have shown the religious-political intention of the Tantra to establish a world-wide Buddhocracy with a sacred world-ruler (The ADI Buddha); they discuss the intolerance of the Tantra vis-à-vis the monotheist religions, its militant and aggressive warrior-ideology, and its vision of a religious end-time battle against Islam (The Aggressive Myth of Shambhala); and they show how the Tantra is interpreted by the Dalai Lama spokesman Robert Thurman as a symbolic and meta-political instrument to conquer western culture by Lamaism (The Buddhocratic Conquest of the West ).

The Trimondis came to very similar conclusions as their American colleague Andrei Znamenski and other critical authors on the topic: “The teachings of the Buddha have so many treasures and wonderful insights, but the philosophy, the vision and the practices of the Kalachakra Tantra are neither compatible with fundamentals of Buddha’s teachings nor with basic principles of Western Enlightenment. Therein are included an apocalyptic war of religion, the aggressive application of super-weapons, radical transgressions of a humanistic moral code, the dissolution of the ego and the soul of the participants of the ritual, the totalitarian subjugation under the will of the guru, the idea of an imperial and global lama-state (Buddhocracy), and the concept of an absolutist world ruler, the Chakravartin.

The sexual rites in the higher initiations of this occult ritual have to be designated as a manipulation of erotic love and a misuse of female energy to produce spiritual and worldly power of men and monks. So the equality of the sexes, democratic decision making, and ecumenical movements are in themselves foreign to the nature of the Kalachakra Tantra.”

The two German cultural philosophers created the Critical Forum Kalachakra to open a wide-ranging debate over the hidden “dark sides” of the Tantra, and  published many other articles, including a pamphlet, Eight Questions to the 14th Dalai Lama on the Topic of the Kalachakra.

During the public Kalachakra Initiation in Graz/Austria directed by the Dalai Lama (2002), the German-speaking media picked up these critiques from the Trimondis and other authors  to discuss the controversial ritual.

  • The Austrian state TV & Radio ORF broadcasted a feature called, “Critique of the ‘Peace Ritual’ of the Dalai Lama in Graz.” ‘Peace Ritual’ has been written in quotations marks to emphasize the ambivalence of the term in this context.
  • Der Standard (The “New York Times” of Vienna) published a cover article with the title, “A Warrior Ritual of the Dalai Lama: The Kalachakra,”
  • The conservative German Weekly Der Rheinische Merkur wrote: “Extremely wild warriors: what is hidden behind the Kalachakra – Thousands have attended the peace ritual of the Dalai Lama. But the ‘Religion of Happiness’ has also its dark sides.”
  • Georg Schmid, Prof. for Religious Studies at the University Zürich (Switzerland) called attention to the fact that the Kalachakra Tantra was the product of the religious war between Buddhists and militant Moslems in India around the turn of the first millennium.  It was under this influence that the Tantra changed fundamental Buddhist principles. “In this time,” said Professor Schmid, “Buddhism had adopted the law of its enemies and had developed a Buddhist concept of a holy war, a forthcoming apocalyptic conflict between friend and foe of the Buddha-way and a future Buddhist world dominium.”
  • Alexander Berzin, a designated Kalachakra expert of the Dalai Lama [JCS comments Berzin is the Dalai Lama’s apologist. So what’s needed are several different perspectives], also confirms that the Tantra proclaims a holy war: “A careful examination of the Buddhist texts, particularly The Kalachakra Tantra literature, reveals both external and internal levels of battle that could easily be called ‘holy wars.’ An unbiased study of Islam reveals the same. In both religions, leaders may exploit the external dimensions of holy war for political, economic, or personal gain by using it to rouse their troops to battle. Historical examples regarding Islam are well known; but one must not be rosy-eyed about Buddhism.”
  • In the meantime, dozens of books, articles, and discussion groups in German and French have carried forward these criticisms and have expanded them–without sparing the person of the Dalai Lama.
  • A lot of the critical voices came also from the Buddhist camp. See, for example, comments to an article about the Kalachakra Initiation 2011 in the Huffington Post.

 

  • The latest high point of this critical wave in Germany was a cover story in Germany’s biggest magazine “Stern” (2009): The two faces of the Dalai Lama – The soft Tibetan and his undemocratic Regime (trans. in English). This article was written by Tilman Müller, the same journalist who uncovered ten years before–with his Austrian colleague Gerald Lehner–the Nazi past of the Dalai Lama’s teacher, Heinrich Harrer: Dalai Lama’s friend: Hitlers Champion (trans. in English). Their sensational discovery caused a protest movement in the Jewish community against the film adaptation of Harrer’s autobiographical book Seven Years in Tibet, with Brad Pitt as Harrer.
  • Very accurately the historian Andrei Znamenskis calls the Kalachakra Tantra “a totalitarian temptation.” In his book Red Shambhala he recounts the story of political and spiritual seekers from West and East who used the Tibetan Buddhist prophecies of the Kalachakra Tantra (the Shambhala Myth) to promote their spiritual, social, and geopolitical agendas and schemes. Red Shambhala proves that people in the Left were no strangers to the occult, and they were equally mesmerized by the Tantra. But even more mesmerized have been people of the far Right.
  • In their second book, Hitler-Buddha-Krishna – An unholy alliance from the Third Reich to the present day (2002) which received international attention, Victor and Victoria Trimondi show how influential Fascists and Nazis used the philosophies, mythologies, visions, and dogmas as well as the religious practices and texts of the spiritual traditions of Asia for glorifying war, and for the deification of the “Führer” and the white race. Some of them have been electrified by the Kalachakra Tantra and the Shambhala-Myth.
  • The Trimondis uncover how the Nazi-Orientalists who prepared the SS Tibet Expedition of Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler have been interested in the ritual, and how members of the SS Ahnenerbe (the brain trust of the SS) wanted to spare the Kalachakra Temple in Leningrad (St. Petersburg) during the siege and barrage of the city by the Deutsche Wehrmacht (1941 – 1944). The Shambhala Myth of the Kalachakra Tantra and its militant ideologies are a topic in the occult literature of the international Neo-Fascist and Neo-Nazi scene. One example is Miguel Serrano, the recently deceased leader of the Chilean National Socialists.
  • Another is Ernesto Mila, former chief of the Spanish National-Socialists, who writes about the Kalachakra-Ritual in his article, The envoys of Hitler in Tibet: “The Kalachakra Tantra and its initiation is not a normal ritual. . . . It is the ‘supreme initiation,’ that ‘assured the renaissance in Shambhala’ at the moment of the last battle against the powers of evil. . . . It is the initiation which is appropriate for the warrior caste.”
  • Another example is the accredited expert on the Orient (and Hitler admirer) Jean Marquès-Rivière who after WW II was convicted in absentia and given the death sentence for turning Jews and Free Masons over to the Gestapo and SS in France. He was the author of a Kalachakra interpretation once popular with some fascist elements. He wrote in his book that the Dalai Lama personally gave a ring to him with the Kalachakra Emblem to demonstrate that he is part of the inner circle of Shambhala adepts. (Kalachakra: Initiation Tantrique du Dalai Lama)  Last but not least, the Japanese Doomsday Guru, Shoko Asahara must be mentioned. He intended a Shambalization of our planet by means of nuclear terror. Asahara was responsible for poisonous gas attacks on Tokyo’s metro in 1995, killing 12 and leaving hundreds injured. The terrorist sect’s leader met the Dalai Lama on several occasions. Even weeks after the first assault, the Dalai Lama called him a “friend, yet not a perfect one.” Only later did the Dalai Lama distance himself from the sect leader. (The Doomsday Guru Shoko Asahara and XIV Dalai Lama).
  • So the “totalitarian temptation” which streams out from the Kalachakra Tantra for all sorts of political and religious fanatics makes it absolutely necessary that the text, commentaries, and the ritual itself are discussed and disputed openly and honestly, especially at this time when the ritual is performed in a place where the power of the world is concentrated: Washington DC. The organizers are very conscious of this political acupuncture point when they write, “The Kalachakra for World Peace 2011 will unfold in a world capital where local actions deeply and globally affect the lives of so many.”

A statement from the Capital Area Tibetan Association, which is putting on the event, also stressed the significance of having it in Washington: “If there is a seed of spirituality in this very city, that seed when it grows is bound to have an effect.” The ritual is to be carried out in the Verizon Center approximately mid-way between the White House and the US Capitol Buildings, just a short stroll from the National Mall.

A Washington Post article states, “Many still see huge significance in his [the Dalai Lama’s] picking the capital of the world’s superpower as the place for a ritual about how to reconcile disunity. Some believe the Kalachakra’s hopeful explanation about how to deal with differences literally will spread through meditators to area bigwigs coping with national debt, wars, environmental disasters and terrorism.”

The article cites Clark Strand, former editor of Tricycle, a Buddhist magazine: “The most significant thing about this is the time and place, 10 years after 9/11, and in a place where big decisions are being made about the planet.”

Yes,10 years after 9/11! But what did happen exactly ten years before 9/11? In 1991 in New York City a so-called Kalachakra Sand Mandala was constructed, then destroyed by the Dalai Lama, and the sand was poured into the water near the World Trade Center. Two years later in 1993 another Wheel of Time (Kalachakra) Sand Mandala was built by Tibetan Monks in the lobby of Tower One. For over thirty days, many of the World Trade Center workers and visitors were invited to participate during the construction of this Mandala. Although these coincidences may be accidental, they prove that these two Kalachakra events were not a remedy for “national debt, wars, environmental disasters and terrorism.” If they did have any magical effect at all, it was to produce exactly the opposite.

You will find a résumé of the most problematic contents of the Kalachakra Tantra with original citations under: Critical Forum Kalachakra. The English site of the “Trimondi Online Magazine” under: www.trimondi.de/EN/front.html and the book “The Shadow of the Dalai Lama – Sexuality, Magic and Politics in Tibetan Buddhism” under: www.trimondi.de/SDLE/Index.htm Critical Forum Kalachakra.

The Buddhist Next Door

The Buddhist Next Door

By James C. Stephens

Little Lisa on The Simpsons Christmas special, tired of the hypocrisy and commercialism of the Springfield church, decides to become a Tibetan Buddhist and is mentored by Richard Gere on prime-time television.

About the same time, John Altschuler, the producer and writer for King of the Hill, is given a book on the Buddha by his wife. He ends up writing a satire for an episode he nicknames, “He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Buddha.” In this episode, the Hills’ only child, Bobby, is recognized as an American reincarnation of the Lama Sanglug by immigrant monks, putting his father, Hank, through great angst as he unsuccessfully attempts to explain his Methodist worldview to his son. Ever so subtly, and, sometimes blatantly, Buddhism slips in uninvited to comfortable living rooms across America via mainstream media.

This influx of popular Buddhism began in 1960, when Masayasu Sadanaga (George M. Williams), a young student from Japan, stepped onto the UCLA campus with the resolve to introduce “true Buddhism” to America.

In 1970, I was swept up into the excitement of their movement to establish world peace through human revolution while studying political science on the campus of Cal State University Northridge. Thus began my 14-year journey into Buddhism, complete with many practices similar to evangelical Christianity-street witnessing, late-night discussion meetings and the singing of Buddhist sutras set to tunes such as “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad.”

My Buddhist worldview was challenged, however, while visiting Japan on an architecture tour. As I leaned over to put some postcards in my travel bag, someone yelled a warning at me in Japanese. Unfortunately, I didn’t speak Japanese, nor did I have time to move as a 200-pound sign blew over on my back. In shock, I was whisked away in a taxi to the hospital, suffering from a sharp blow to my spinal chord and a partially paralyzed arm. Ironically, the accident report read, “Act of God.”

While lying on several hospital beds in Japan, I struggled with troubling questions about the power of the Buddhist gods to save. After returning to the states, I joined Amway and became consistently exposed to the testimonies of Christians, and observed the importance faith played in their business and marriages. Initially, my wife and I just became more committed to becoming the first successful Buddhist distributors. Evidently, God had other plans.

The following three years were spent aggressively pursuing my business goals, while rubbing shoulders with godly friends who prayed for me, asked me convicting questions and gave me books that answered many of mine. After a month of frightening dreams, weighing the numerous prophecies of Christ with those of the Buddha and wrestling with 2 Peter 3:10 that spoke of the day of the Lord coming like a thief, I sought out a pastor who led me to Christ one hot July afternoon in 1984.

I began to thirst for more than fellowship. Weekly, I searched the church library looking for answers on issues that were of importance to me as a former Buddhist. I searched for books on Christian meditation, but found only those suggesting that Zen meditation made them better Christians. (I knew Zen from my studies and practice, and even as a new Christian saw it as incompatible with the Christian faith.)

This ideology is not confined to books alone. One friend claims that he was healed by his Zen priest’s treatments. Now at his doctor’s advice, he’s practicing Buddhist meditation at home-albeit with a twist: He uses the Lord’s prayer instead of praying to the Buddha. Although claiming to have a love of Christ, he has a very limited understanding of the theological underpinnings of his faith.

This confusion may be traced to the fact that a high percentage of evangelicals no longer believe in the exclusivity of the Christian faith. Instead, according to an August 2005 Beliefnet.com poll, “Eight in 10 Americans-including 68 percent of evangelicals-believe that more than one faith can be a path to salvation, which is most likely not what they were taught in Sunday school.”

Buddhist theology and practice is antithetical to biblical Christianity. For instance, the Buddhist objective in meditation is to empty one’s mind while seeking union with the cosmos, ultimately buying into the Serpent’s ancient lie, “You shall become as gods.”

Since we have already been saved through His grace, we don’t meditate to accumulate merit as would a Buddhist. Through contemplation, we focus our minds on His Word and His works, waiting upon Him and actively listening. Christian meditation takes discipline, but is only fruitful by the grace of God (see 2 Cor. 3:5; 9:8).

So, why do so many Christians neglect to share their faith with Buddhists? Many have willfully chosen to follow the latest popular religious fashions and put their theological mind on hold. According to research by Robert Wuthnow and Wendy Cadge published in Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion (September 2004), “Fifty-six percent of the American public thinks of Buddhists as tolerant, while 63 percent believe them to be peace-loving.”

In its August 2005 survey, Beliefnet.com posed the question, “Can a good person who isn’t of your religious faith go to heaven or attain salvation, or not?” Brace yourself for a shock. While 91 percent of Catholics said yes and 83 percent of non-evangelical Christians said yes, 68 percent of evangelicals said yes as well. Consider how elements of Buddhist ideology have become entwined in our thinking:

A youth pastor at a prominent evangelical church recently rose to the pulpit and gave a report on the success of their recent summer camp. He exclaimed, “It was so great, I thought I died and gone to nirvana.”

Another day, our children-keenly tuned to sniff out Buddhism’s subtle invasion into our culture-shared that their favorite history teacher who was teaching on world religions passed around a little fat Buddha statue and jokingly taught them to rub it for good luck. All this in a preppy private Christian high school in Southern California.

Another friend of mine occasionally travels to India and relayed a story about the many Pentecostals and charismatics he met there who were practicing Tibetan Buddhism. When I asked why, he said, “Most were seeking spiritual experiences, and while they loved Jesus as a teacher, they were not firmly grounded in the Scriptures and went astray as they sought the supernatural.”

We’ve also seen Baptists, Catholics, Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians and Congregationalists slide into Buddhism. One pastor of a local church joined his wife in taking vows at the local Buddhist temple-while retaining his position as senior pastor of the church.

The primary struggle for every generation that is dedicated to missions and evangelism is coming to terms with how does the true gospel get translated into mainstream culture without compromise? How do we keep our faith and maintain our moral and theological standards while still living in the midst of an increasingly pluralistic society?

When an invasive pop culture and its terminology has become the norm, and millions are spent on conveying that message through the media, one cannot passively sit back and live in a 1950s religious cocoon. Daniel and his followers in Babylon faced similar tests of their faith. We are told that the godly will be persecuted. The question is, “Will we remain faithful?”