GERMAN MEDIA
(English version)
Baseler Zeitung - Aurel
Schmidt - December 1999
Berner Zeitung - Hans Peter
Roth - May 1999
Facts No. 9 - Patrick Mauron and Stephanie Riedi - March 1999
Publik Forum - "The Shadow of Tibetan Buddhism" - Norbert Copray
- April 1999
Ab 40 - Greta Tüllman - January 2000
Woman World Wide - June 1999
Evangelical Office of Information - Georg Schmid - August 1999
Gesundheit
(Natur-Mensch-Technik) - September 1999
Badische Zeitung - Johannes
Schradl - March 1999
Novalis - Günter Röschert - October 1999
Different Press Voices
Baseler
Zeitung - Aurel Schmidt -
December 1999
Religion in global era - Questions for
Buddhism
Every day, life goes on in Tibet and the country changes a
little more, not necessarily for the better. Daily the cityscape of old Lhasa moves another step closer to destruction; in Lhasa and Xigatze, the
two largest cities in the country, the Chinese population is now in the
majority. The Tibetans have becomes strangers in their own country.
Progress has undoubtedly been made, but the Chinese occupation cannot be
justified by this. When China
claims to respect and support Tibet’s
cultural independence, then one has to ask why, for example, the portrait
of the Dalai Lama has disappeared from all the monasteries in Tibet.
Not to mention the political indoctrination and the religious restrictions,
particularly in the monasteries. The Tibetans talk quite openly to tourists
about such matters.
But one can also nevertheless ask whether an Asian
power play between the Dalai Lama and the Chinese leadership is not
involved. The Dalai Lama is winning over ever more followers in the West;
the Chinese leadership is extending its influence in Tibet and the rest of the
world. It would not be surprising if the Dalai Lama were to return to Tibet
with Chinese approval one day. Both sides could only win – yin and yang
complementing each other. But this is something that the people in the
post-Enlightenment West could hardly understand. They stick to what they
believe, and thus fail to consider that people in Asia
have completely different conceptions of time, action, influence, power,
and so forth. The Dalai Lama is an excellent politician. Persistently, he
pursues a goal that he never lets slip from view. He thinks, with no little
success, in longer time spans. In this lies his superiority. The
rationalists must therefore draw the short straw.
Two points of view
Buddhism under a Tibetan flag is slowly spreading
in the West. Buddhism is modern, chic, and the Dalai Lama can rely on the Hollywood connection. The actress Goldie Hawn, from
the American film city, is reported to have said,
"I meditate and I feel sexy".
Those who profess to Buddhism by now belong to the well-off, even when
this is often a private Buddhism from which each and everyone has picked
out the best for themselves.
Robert Thurman, an American professor of religious
studies at Amherst and Harvard and an avowed Buddhist, as he says of
himself, talks of a transformation of civilization and travels
internationally, preaching a "cool" and "inner"
revolution, and enthusing about a Buddhocracy or a "Buddhaverse",
at any rate under US American control. Following the failure of
Judeo-Christian utopianism, everyone with good intentions may participate.
What is happening is a development which - in an allusion which can be
traced back to the theory of "morphic resonance" of Rupert
Sheldrake, also a confessed Buddhist - is "infectious". That is
more edifying than scientific. Nonetheless, Buddhism should and will
conquer the world.
Seen in total, Thurman’s book, Inner Revolution,
is a frankly Buddhist and further a Tibetan propaganda document, even when
it is everybody’s free choice what they make of it. There are things in the
book which are downright appealing, but the book is definitely not
multicultural or multi-religious (given it need be so).
That one can also see everything differently, and
thus come to completely distinct conclusions is shown by another book, The
Shadow of the Dalai Lama by Victor and Victoria Trimondi. What Thurman
expresses emphatically, but also in a generalized and vague manner,
Trimondi and Trimondi address frankly, without mincing words. Tantrism
(Tibetan Buddhism), they say, is a theocracy, a conservative if not
totalitarian, undemocratic, misogynist religion; the Dalai Lama, who
incontestably holds spiritual and worldly power in his hands, a skillful
"oriental despot", who presents himself outwardly as friendly and
understanding, quick witted and humorous, but at heart inexorably pursues
his goals. That critique from his own ranks is increasing in proportion to
the number of people in the West flocking to him is another matter. There
are two points which Trimondi and Trimondi make their central concern: on
the one hand the sexual-magic tantric Kalachakra initiation rites, which
for a small circle of initiates are taken beyond a spiritual visualization,
and are in a practical and unequivocal sense carried out, to the
disadvantage of women who are abused by terrible lamas (Sanskrit ‘guru’,
actually teacher); and on the other hand the concept, linked with the
Kalachakra Tantra (tantra means roughly doctrinal text, system of
teachings), of a realm called Shambhala, from where, in the public version,
the savior of the world will come, while for the initiated, Shambhala
really means the world conquered by Buddhism.
800 pages of argumentation
Over 800 pages the Trimondis expand upon their
arguments (behind the pseudonym are Herbert and Mariana Röttgen, who once
ran the Trikont publishing house and also maintained close contacts with
the Dalai Lama). Originally the two authors had wanted to write a
completely different book, but as they began to better familiarize
themselves with the material they became more and more alert. It was no
different with the preparation of this review.
The scope of the book makes it impossible to go
into all the details. An overall reference to the book must suffice here.
Those who will, can gain fresh insights from it. Nobody must take it on as
it is, but the objections, which are all well substantiated, are weighty
enough to warrant being taken seriously. That the doubts advanced by the
Trimondis might be manipulated by China would be too simple. All
religions strive to increase their influence, as the Pope with his trip to India recently demonstrated to apply for
Christianity in Asia. With regard to the
psychological influence of the tantric rituals on the initiated as well as
their sexual partners, the consequences can be serious. Far-reaching
psychic changes can occur, as is known from (experience with) former
members of sects for example. Connected to this is an extended power
structure of lamas culminating in the Dalai Lama. The book by these two
authors has understandably set off vehement controversies, which are
published at length on the Internet. Perhaps the most important of these
are the reactions of women, who in their commitment to Buddhism suffered as
"sex slaves", as the American June Campbell has described in the ... book, Traveller in space about
the role of women in Tantrism. What the Trimondis intend to achieve with
their book is an engaged critique of religion. Christianity and Islam are
also in their sights.
Religions are not just for obvious reasons authoritarian
– in the age of globality the character of religions is also always
changing. They are globalizing themselves, becoming increasingly
aggressive, and more and more unyielding in their claims to possess the
ultimate truth. But this is all happening in a time when people are ever
more urgently searching for meaning and hope to find it in a religion, a
disappointing realization. When meaning can only exist in some form of
dependence, then it’s a false meaning. For many people, Buddhism is probably
so attractive because it gets by without a personal God. It attempts to
point out a way which the individual can pursue to free him- or herself
from the cycle of entanglements of worldly existence. "Pop" or
"instant" Buddhism, however, cannot achieve this. What the
discussion triggered by the book by Trimondi and Trimondi has revealed,
over and above its explicit content, is the need to critically examine
Buddhism. Until now a great deal has been considered by many people
probably either much too superficially or much too idealistically. In
contrast to this, critical vigilance can very well accompany participation.
A.S.
Berner
Zeitung - Hans Peter Roth
- May 1999
"Scratches in the mythical
‘God-King’s’ veneer"
In the latest books Hans Peter Roth discovers
shadows over the blissful image of Tibet
The time for going easy on the Dalai Lama and
Tibetan Buddhism is over. Forty years after the Chinese invasion, several
authors at once have begun to violently shake up blissful Western clichés
about the ostensibly peaceful Tibetan culture.
"False!" says the Dalai Lama with
emphasis whilst the cameras roll, "Their claims are not true! There is
no violence among Tibetans". In an episode of the "10 to 10"
program the religious and worldly leader of the Tibetans reacted with
irritation to critical questions from reporter Beat Regli. The Swiss TV
personality had documented attacks among Tibetans in exile in India
and wanted to discuss these with the Dalai Lama. And thereby obviously hit
a raw nerve. Then the "God-King" is consistently protected by his
entourage from everything which could tarnish the image of His Holiness or
Tibetan Buddhism. "I was nevertheless perplexed at how aggressively
and strained the Dalai Lama reacted to several questions", says Regli.
The incensed reactions to Regli’s program show that we are not (yet)
accustomed to critical talk about Tibetan culture and its sole leader, the
Dalai Lama. Especially in Switzerland,
the sympathy awakened by the brutal Chinese invasion of Tibet exactly 40 years ago
remains particularly strong. Then a renowned community of exiled Tibetans
lives here with monasteries of their own.
The "cuddly Buddha"
The ethnologist Elisabeth Oberfeld from Bern sees reasons for
the one-sidedly positive view of Tibetan culture in the West: "The
blissful image is based upon hopes and fantasies that ‘Shangri La’, a
perfect world exists there, a sort of paradise on earth so to speak. The
majority of the representations in the media, especially the big Hollywood
productions like 'Kundun', 'Little Buddha' or 'Seven Years in Tibet'
contribute to this blissful image." Idealizations and fantasies are
systematically cultivated, the Tibetans one-sidedly presented as a peaceful
and compassionate people. Other aspects of Tibetan reality on the other
hand remain blanked out, claims Elisabeth Oberfeld, who has traveled in
Tibet a total of six times.
But now the pendulum is swinging the other way, as
the magazine Facts recently wrote: "Tibetan Buddhism is falling
into discredit." This is in large measure attributable to the Dalai
Lama himself. He has disqualified himself with his "publicity
madness" and downgraded himself to the status of an "eternally
smiling cuddly Buddha".
Helmut Gassner has also distanced himself from the
Tibetan leader in the meantime. From 1979 to 1995 he was the Dalai Lama’s
personal German translator and recalls a "very warn relationship"
to him. Today he is shocked by the "contradictory statements, indeed
lies of His Holiness".
Misogynist Tradition
Most recently, numerous freshly published books
convey an unaccustomedly gloomy image of Tibetan culture. June Campbell, a
religious studies scholar from Scotland, stresses misogynist
aspects in the Tibetan system in her book Traveller
in Space. There is no place for a self-determined subjectivity
of the woman. She has personally experienced the consequences of masculine
power, feminine dependency, and secrecy. Over many years she was the
"secret sexual companion" of her teacher, Kalu Rinpoche, a highly
revered "monk-lama". Yet, tantric-sexual relationships between
teacher and pupil maintained in strict secrecy are not one-off cases,
according to June Campbell: "They are just the tip of an iceberg of
spiritual tradition, in which power structures, secrecy and exclusion play
an important role."
Ritual sexual magic
The most intensive criticism comes from the newly
published book The Shadow of the Dalai Lama by the German couple
Victoria and Victor Trimondi alias Mariana and Herbert Röttgen. "A
deeply misogynist culture appears on the Tibetan-Buddhist stage when the
pacifist curtain of compassion is drawn aside", the publisher and the
historian say in confirmation of the views of June Campbell, and they go
further: iIn tantric sexual rites the feminine life force, the "gynergy"
is bled out of women as "fuel". Then in sacred sexuality, in
erotic love and particularly in the woman’s "gynergy" lies the
chief energy source with which the mysto-political motor of the lamaistic
system is driven, directly through ritual sexual magic. "In general,
the profane and materialistically oriented West completely underestimates
such connections", Victoria Trimondi is convinced: "We completely
ignore the power of practices like the sexual ritual magic and the dangers
they imply. In its one-sided spiritual orientation Western culture
unfortunately refuses to open up a broad-ranging discussion on this topic.
It blindly leaves the religions to their domain, under the condition that
they abide by the laws of the state."
In total, in their more than 800-page book, the
Trimondi couple summarize the Tibetan system as an "an at heart
atavistic, fundamentalist, sexist, and warlike cultural design", which
is striving towards a "global Buddhocracy". A cultural design
which also fundamentally questions the Western values of democracy, freedom
of opinion, human rights, sexual equality and humanism, although it
constantly appeals to them.
Call for boycott
Opinions differ about The Shadow of the Dalai
Lama: according to co-author Victoria Trimondi, their book is in roughly
equal proportions well received and torn to pieces by the media. Peter
Michel’s opinion for instance is scathing: "It would be desirable if
readers seriously interested in Buddhism were to abstain from this
book", says the chief and head of sales of the publisher Aquamarin in
a two-page circular to bookshops in an indirect call for a boycott. The
"concoction" is an "historical Tibet porno". That
Michel’s esoteric publishing house has no interest in the criticism of the
Dalai Lama is revealing, however: just last September Michel published The
Path of Compassion, a book which lends the "God-King" an all
too well-known radiant aura. But The Shadow of the Dalai Lama is
selling well. "Precisely thanks to the controversy about the
book", Victoria Trimondi believes. The authors are already at work
preparing the third, revised edition.
And further trouble already threatens: Anytime now
a polemic work by Jutta Ditfurth and Colin Goldner with the title Dalai
Lama: A Biography is to appear. In it the sect investigator Goldner
accuses the Tibetan leader of, among other things, "religious
brainwashing".
Facts No. 9 - Patrick Mauron
and Stephanie Riedi - March 1999
THE DISMANTLING OF HIS HOLINESS
In the West he is revered and
idolized as an angel of peace. Stars adorn themselves with His Holiness.
And 1999 is the fortieth anniversary of his escape from Tibet. Now of all times critics
are telling the DALAI LAMA where to get off.
GOD OR DEMON?
Sexual abuse, contact with fascists,
brainwashing - the accusations against the Dalai Lama are really something.
They criticize the Dalai Lama:
- Victor and Victoria Trimondi:The author
couple want to expose the peaceableness of the Dalai Lama as "a
mask".
- Colin Goldner The psychologist accuses the Dalai
Lama of religious brainwashing.
The Buddha is the party sensation. Alongside
techno parade, carnival and fireworks, the spiritual and worldly head of Tibet is the main attraction at the Fêtes de
Genève in Geneva
at the beginning of August: his Holiness, the Dalai Lama.
There is barely a party without the 64-year-old
jet-set monk. Whether film premiere or gala dinner, this year the Dalai
Lama will hardly be absent from any celebrity occasion. The popularity of
the Fourteenth Dalai Lama is greater than ever before, 40 years after his
escape and the suppression by the Chinese occupation of the Tibetan popular
rebellion on the 10th of March 1959. Commemorative celebrations on the 40th
anniversary are taking place all around the world. 1999 will be the year of
the Dalai Lama.
Now of all times, at the zenith of this reverence
for His Holiness, two books with explosive contents have appeared. The
Buddha of compassion ought to be knocked from his pedestal.
"Overnight, the god has become a demon", says the just published,
800- page strong, indictment The Shadow of the Dalai Lama by Victor
and Victoria Trimondi. The author couple want to expose the peaceableness
of the Dalai Lama as "a mask" and Tibetan Buddhism as "an at
heart atavistic, fundamentalist, sexist, and warlike cultural design".
The second polemic, Dalai Lama: The Fall of the
Godking by Colin Goldner, appears in April. The sect investigator
accuses the Tibetan leader of religious brainwashing, maintaining contacts
with right-wing radicals, and protecting a belief system in which women and
girls are sexually abused. Goldner, a psychologist, who runs a counseling
center in Munich
for those who have suffered under therapy, supports his case with documents
from Dharamsala, the seat of the Tibetan government in exile, eye-witness
reports, religious texts, and historical indicators.
The deconstruction is targeted at a god king who,
since receiving the Nobel peace prize ten years ago has been riding a wave
of sympathy which has carried him as far as Hollywood. Stars, starlets and statesmen
sun themselves in the aura of the charismatic Buddhist. From top model
Cindy Crawford to fashion designer Christa de Carouge, from Clinton to Cotti they
fraternize with the Prince of Peace. Dalai Lama is there for everybody,
Dalai Lama loves you. A meeting with His Holiness from the "roof of
the world" is considered the highest level of social enlightenment. In
the last two years Hollywood has also seized
upon the topic of Tibet.
Spectacular epic films like Kundun and Seven Years in Tibet
finally won over a broad public.
But now the pendulum is swinging the other way.
Tibetan Buddhism is falling into discredit. Tibetan circles show their
shock: "The books are an exploitation of the ignorance of the
West", says the Dalai Lama’s private secretary, Kelsang Gyaltsen.
Tibetan Buddhism is being maliciously defamed by them.
The contents of both books display amazing
parallels. Victor Trimondi explains the simultaneous appearance of the two
titles with reference to the zeitgeist: "A critical discussion
with the Tibetan religion and the shady side of the Dalai Lama was
overdue."
In comparison to Islam and Christianity, to date
Buddhism has in fact been only hesitatingly examined: "Buddhism was
not just nonviolent", says Tibet
expert Martin Brauen from the Ethnological
Museum of the University of Zurich.
In the West Buddhism was idealized around the myth of nonviolence and the
desire for a land of happiness was projected onto Tibet. This resulted in the
myth of Shangri La, the place where gentleness rules the heart.
One of those who actively participated in the
creation of this myth is the same person who now bugles to attack: Herbert
Röttgen under the pseudonym of Victor Trimondi, co-author of The Shadow
of the Dalai Lama. In the seventies a member of a Maoist group, he
sought refuge in the eighties in the bodily incarnation of compassion. As
publisher of books in praise of Buddhism and His Holiness’s tour manager he
organized appearances at the Frankfurt Book Fair in 1982 and conferences
with Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker, Fritjof Capra and David Bohm for the
Dalai Lama. But Röttgen did not find enlightenment. Instead a warning lamp
lit up when he and his wife Victoria thoroughly examined the inner workings
of Tibetan Buddhism and the Dalai Lama. Now he takes to the field as
investigator of his earlier mentor. "The Dalai Lama is not just the
simple man he presents himself as," he says, "but rather a sacred
ruler, who controls both worldly and spiritual power in one person."
His claim to world domination is an element of Buddhist doctrine. Röttgen
refers to the Tibetologist Robert Thurman, father of the actress Uma
Thurman. In 1997 at a Tibet
conference in Bonn
"the spokesperson for the Dalai Lama" announced the impending
fall of the decadent West and its replacement by a worldwide Buddhocratic
leadership along Tibetan lines.
Radical disillusionment for the believers and
"boom Buddhists". Alone in Switzerland there are 100
Buddhist centers, over 30 000 sense-seekers follow the path of the goodly
people.
Of all the Buddhist lines, Tibetan Tantrism is the
most widely distributed in Europe and the USA. As the youngest Buddhist
teaching it has, according to the Dalai Lama, "a marked sexual
symbolism", which leads to the false impression that it is about real
sex. The tantric rituals consisted solely of visualization exercises used
to unite feminine and masculine energies.
This stands in blatant contrast to one of the
chief accusations of the book authors Trimondi and Goldner. "Tantrism
is about nothing other than sexual violence, the sexual exploitation of
girls or as young women as possible, ostensibly for the individual’s
enlightenment", says Goldner, a psychologist. The sexual attacks and
the highly secretive sexual relationships of high-ranking Tibetan lamas are
not isolated cases, but rather part of the systems. However, the accusers
only cite Western women as witnesses.
On the whole, criticizes the ethnologist Brauen,
the authors lack convincing evidence for their most important theses.
"Trimondi’s indictment is based upon literal translations of tantras
which are over 1000 years old and have been superseded." This is as if
an African sought to explain current day Christianity on the basis of St John’s Gospel.
Röttgen replies to this: "The Dalai Lama also refers to these text and
rituals, which he performs."
Alongside the academic dispute there are also more
robust criticisms of His Holiness. In his keen hawking of the Tibet
issue he has obviously lost his sense of good and evil. His contact to the
Japanese guru and poison gas murderer Shoko Asahara won him a name as a
friend of fundamentalists among other things. "In 1989 the Dalai Lama
issued a letter of recommending the fascist sect leader for the dissemination
of Buddhism in Japan",
says Colin Goldner. Only thanks to this "letter of protection"
was it possible for Asahara to establish, in Aum, the financially most
potent occult sect of all time which was responsible for the poison gas
attack on the Tokyo
underground in 1995. "In return, gigantic sums flowed into the coffers
of the Tibetan government in exile."
Goldner has still more strings to his bow. Thus he
accuses the Tibetan government in exile of a "targeted propaganda by
misinformation". Tibet
support communities are reputedly furnished with arguments so that
donations flow in. Ultimately there is no proof for the alleged 1.2 million
Tibetan victims of the systematic torture of political prisoners and the
oft-cited cultural genocide.
Cynicism, says Kelsang Gyaltsen, His Holiness’s
private secretary, of Goldner’s accusations. Regarding those who have died,
he admits that there are no exact numbers, since they are based on the
questioning of refugees. "But the current 300 to 400 refugees per month
are sufficient witness." In January the Chinese launched a new atheism
campaign.
The Dalai Lama has only himself to blame for many
mistakes. Kitsch and commerce overshadow the Tibet myth and distract from
social and politico-religious grievances. Even Martin Brauen says, "It
is difficult to reconcile having a state oracle as political decision maker
in the parliament in exile with a democratic state system". And the
institution of reincarnated lamas (tulku) also leads to an
undesirable concentration of power.
It is undisputed that the Dalai Lama has
disqualified himself with his publicity madness. for a double-figure
million dollar fee he posed as an advertising model for Apple Computers,
designed a special issue of the glossy Vogue and writes prefaces for
other authors in piece work. The marketing chief of Buddhism has thus
degraded himself to an eternally smiling cuddly Buddha.
Even the Dalai Lama’s own PR strategy
"nonviolence, tolerance, and compassion" has reached the end of
its half-life. "All the attestations of sympathy from the world public
have after 40 years finally achieved nothing", says the Swiss-Tibetan
Jigme Risur, president of the European Association of Young Tibetans.
"We are fed up with the role of the nice little Tibetans." The
organization opposes the political direction of their chief. The explicitly
advocate independence for Tibet,
and not just autonomy like the Dalai Lama .
Apart from political differences the Dalai Lama
has also stirred up religious turbulence in the ranks since the mid-nineties.
With the declaration that the worship of the protective spirit Dorje
Shugden is dangerous, he split the largest school of Tantrism,
the so-called Yellow Hats, into two camps. Ironically, the Dalai Lama is
leader of the Yellow Hats.
"All the attestations of sympathy from the
world public have finally achieved nothing." (JIGME RISUR; European
Association of Young Tibetans)
Switzerland is a mirror of
the religious brotherly quarrel. Since the beginning of the sixties the
largest community of Tibetans in exile outside of Asia,
with 2400 people, lives here. The Shugden conflict led to a split between
the two Tibetan monasteries in Switzerland. The monks of the
monastery in Mont-Pelerin VD in contrast to those in Rikon ZH have not
bowed to the recommendation of the Dalai Lama. "We revere His
Holiness; but we cannot abjure a belief that is hundreds of years
old", says the Abbot, Gonsar Tulku Rinpoche. Since then they are
outlaws for a majority of the Tibetans in exile, who stand behind the Dalai
Lama. The seven monks from the monastery in Rikon unconditionally follow
the course of their leader. The formerly good relations have been
overshadowed by the God-King’s decision. In the one Western monastery
founded by the Dalai Lama one would prefer not to comment on the conflict.
"We are in the first instance Tibetans", says the acting Abbot,
Lodro Tulku.
When the God-King visits Switzerland this year, he will
not just smilingly bring his goods to market at the Fêtes de Genève. With a
smile he will also, following Gina Lollobrigida, Roger Moore, Fredy Knie,
and priest of the poor Abbe Pierre, take
over the patronage of the smallest vineyard in the world: the 1.67 square
meter "Farinet" in the Lower Valias
town of Saillon.
This will make the Dalai Lama – despite a vow of abstinence from alcohol –
the first Buddhist winemaker.
Publik Forum - "The Shadow of
Tibetan Buddhism" - Norbert Copray - April 1999
The Dalai Lama comes in for criticism -
The Shadow of Tibetan Buddhism
Does the religion of the Dalai Lama
have its "skeletons in the closet" too? A book gets feelings
running high.
Uproar in the Buddhist scene in Germany, Austria
and Switzerland.
The new book by Mariana and Herbert Röttgen, published under the pseudonyms
of Victoria and Victor Trimondi and with the title The Shadow of the
Dalai Lama has struck like a thunderbolt. The Buddhist scene generally
presents itself as peaceful and worldly. But the fundamental criticisms of
the author couple is strong stuff for the Buddhists, who see their religion
and the Dalai Lama as badly defamed by the book. For weeks, threatening and
abusive letters have been descending upon the publisher and the authors. At
a recent public occasion in Frankfurt a
representative from the inner circle of the Dalai Lama’s friends gave vent
to wild threats against Mariana and Herbert Röttgen.
By German-speaking standards the authors have
broken a taboo. In Anglo-Saxon countries the amount of critical literature
about Buddhism, even by Buddhists, has been swelling for some time. (But)
particularly in Germany
the media have stuck to mostly favorable, uncritical portrayals. Thus it
was possible to read some time ago, perhaps in the Spiegel,
that Buddhism is the only religion with no skeletons in its closet.
Something which especially angers Herbert Röttgen, since such a statement
displays not only ignorance but also the marketing success which the Dalai
Lama knows how to orchestrate for his own cause in the West. The Dalai Lama
as an individual also fascinates the Röttgen couple, and they would happily
agree point by point to what the Dalai Lama says and does in public. But
the point is to look behind this surface and to understand what the Tibetan
Buddhism of old was, how it continues to function and be organized today,
what goals are associated with it and how it plans to realize these.
Buddhism is not simply Buddhism. Basically,
Tibetan Buddhism unites Mahayana Buddhism, which makes Buddhism
comprehensible for the broad masses, with pre-Buddhist, sexual tantric,
magical, and typically Tibetan cultural traditions into a major creed of
its own, alongside other Buddhist denominations. But even within Tibetan
Buddhism there are various schools which cannot stand one another. The
Dalai Lama’s circle even suspects followers of one of these schools of cooperation
with the Chinese invaders and repressors of Tibet. They are also supposed
to have accepted funding from them.
Similar charges have been leveled at the author
couple Röttgen. They are alleged to have received a billion deutschemarks
from either the Catholic Church, the Evangelical Church,
the Chinese, or the Scientology organization for their "campaign of
agitation". None of this is true. It is certainly true that the Patmos publishing group has been known for over forty
years for its soundly-based, investigative, and humanistic nonfiction and
specialist program, which assembles such select intellectual figures as
Leonardo Boff and Eugen Drewermann. They stand for keen criticism of the State Catholic Church and the manner in which it
interprets and makes use of Christianity. Here, the Röttgens’ book is not
just in good company, but also comparatively moderate.
Look at a religion with very earthly
conflicts
An attempt to mow down the content of the book
using the biographies of the authors ought to misfire, and the intentions
guiding it are easily seen through. It is true that in the sixties Herbert
Röttgen belonged to the left-wing revolutionary scene in Munich, and that his Trikont publishing
house published among others Mao’s Little Red Book. But what does
that tell us? In the eighties he nonetheless published such valuable and
important books as "The Re-enchantment of the World" by Morris
Bermann, "Abundance and Nothing" by the Dominican mystic David
Steindl-Rast, and the Dalai Lama’s "The Logic of Love".
The Röttgens’ way involves, since 1982, a decided
nearing of Tibetan Buddhism and a direct encounter with the Dalai Lama, in
order to then treat his demands seriously, to not simply make a change in
religion out of fascination, but rather to precisely examine this religion
and its ways, to gain experience and to investigate critically. The
findings are nonetheless negative in character.
Mariana and Herbert Röttgen see in Tibetan
Buddhism a backwards-facing religion with a pronounced belief in spirits and
demons and many multilevel esoteric teachings and initiations, which
finally aims for a "Buddhocracy" which would make absolute
demands upon individuals and society, that is existentially, religiously,
ethically, socially and politically. To consider this at all possible, a
thorough study of the historical, religious, theological, spiritual and
sociopolitical backgrounds of Tibetan Buddhism and of the role and function
of the Dalai Lama is necessary. What Röttgen and Röttgen enlarge upon in
the over eight hundred pages of the book, is thus also an intensive (in a
few rare cases inexact) investigation of the available and
accessible literature.
Nonetheless significant is the question, to what
extent the traditions and practices examined can be laid at the doorstep of
the current Dalai Lama and his role, to what extent he himself has not also
undergone a major development since he has turned to the West, and whether
he even still sees himself as a "God-King". The authors attempt
to prove how much the old traditions have maintained their validity to the
present day, but cannot - for fear of asking too much of them - be admitted
to enthusiastic fans in the West, in order to not lose the esteem believed
to be needed to advance the matter of religious and political freedom for
Tibet.
Non-Buddhist experts on Buddhism, however, see in
the rituals, in the belief in spirits and images the attempt of Tibetan
Buddhism to provide spiritual transport, huge rafts as it were, with which
to cross over the flow of human rationality to an holistic consciousness,
which lets Buddhahood be achieved already in this life.
"Maha-yana", as this Buddhist creed is known, literally means
‘great vehicle’. The theory says (that ) if one has reached the shores of holism, one can be relied upon to provide a raft
for him- or herself. The visualizations and rituals thus ought to make
possible the breakthrough to a higher state of existence, since a person
who imagines himself as a divinity gains powers of consciousness for
enlightenment.
Röttgen and Röttgen nonetheless believe that this
is a favorable interpretation. In reality Tibetan Buddhism is dominated by
a literal belief in gods, rituals and images, which are lacking
transformative power and thus should be worked through afresh. Especially
the tantric sexual practices, which according to theory ought to bring both
man and woman enlightenment in the bodily union, lead in the Röttgens’ view
to a straightforward sexual exploitation of the woman. For the Röttgens
this Tantrism is, finally, a "ritualized female sacrifice".
The Dalai Lama: highly revered by
religious seekers in the western world, but not undisputed in the Asian
world of Tibetan Buddhism
Everything flaring up as part of this criticism of
Tibetan Buddhism has long been everyday for Christianity, especially in its
Catholic variety: historical, psychological, and political critical
examination, confrontation with internal contradictions, the making aware
of the risks for a religion when it favors literal over symbolic belief.
Further discussion will have to show whether the Röttgens’ criticism is
right, at least in its starting point. In all religions fundamentalist and
progressive interpretations coexist. Perhaps, just like the pope, the Dalai
Lama shimmers as he tries to simultaneously internally and outwardly
demonstrate affection for some basic orientation in matters which are
existential for him. But if anyone thought that there really could
be a pure, innocent, naive religion, and believed they had found it in
Tibetan Buddhism, they are possibly now either bitterly disappointed about
this religion or more than just angry at the authors. But what is happening
here is something which (even within a denomination) both pope and church
have had to put up with for centuries, and which everyone therefore should
perhaps have already known about: religions are shaped by people. They must
therefore face criticism and take it on board, in order to not be misused
as instruments of power or for the exploitation of human hopes and needs.
Ab
40 - Greta Tüllman - January 2000
Mariana and Herbert Röttgen (Victor & Victoria Trimondi) in
search of new visions in coming millenium.
In [the women’s magazine] Ab 40, much space
has been devoted to criticisms by women of the monotheistic religions. These
have concentrated on Christianity and Islam and women’s roles in both of
these religions. In contrast, Buddhism had become for many women a place of
refuge for their religious needs, and has stood for inner peace,
meditation, compassion, wisdom, calmness, spiritualization, etc., etc.
Now, in time for the turn of the millenium, comes
a rousing critique and analysis of woman’s role in Tibetan Buddhism, about
the devaluation and abuse of the feminine in this religion, (a critique)
developed in dialog by a woman and a man, Mariana and Herbert Röttgen
(Victor and Victoria Trimondi), which fits into the Ab 40
discussion. I have known Herbert Röttgen for almost 30 years.
What fascinated me alongside his pioneering,
visionary view of the world was his untiring, intensive dialog with women
[...], and now his dialog with his wife Mariana about the significance of
traditional religions for the establishment of values and creativity in a
future culture. Their joint book, The Shadow of the Dalai Lama is a
start in this direction and the vehement, often inappropriately aggressive,
criticism which this book has aroused in the media demonstrates that
Mariana and Herbert Röttgen (Victor and Victoria Trimondi) have hit a raw
nerve with their thesis.
As we want to devote space in the coming years in Ab
40 to an intensive woman–man dialog, the postscript which we have
reproduced here seems with its philosophical discourse to be a symbolically
successful way to launch our Ab 40 dialog off in this direction. Let
yourselves be inspired.
Mariana and Herbert Röttgen (Victor and Victoria
Trimondi) are a symbolic start for a successful "woman–man, man–woman
dialog". Greta Tüllman
Woman World Wide - June 1999
The two authors have ventured almost to the limits
of the "expressible" with their book, The Shadow of the Dalai
Lama. Particularly when one considers how many people have turned to
Buddhism nowadays. Average citizens, followers of the esoteric, celebrities
in Europe and America
have in good faith – but uninformed – committed themselves to the cause of Tibet
and its spiritual head of state. They are not familiar with Lamaism and the
religious practices of Tibetan Buddhism. And the peaceable mask of the
Fourteenth God-King remains untouched. It covers his power-political and
fundamentalist visions well.
What is actually hiding behind Buddhism and
Buddhist Tantrism has been subjected by the authors to a powerful analysis
and uncompromising critique. The fine detail of the differences within the
hierarchical ranking of the edifice of Buddhist teachings is incredibly
exactly sketched out here. With this view behind the curtains, the shocked
reader perceives the cultural design (to be) in its innermost core
atavistic, sexist and fundamentalist, and extremely warlike. Also revealed
is just how clearly a global Buddhism is being striven for, one which
questions values such as democracy, human rights, equality of the sexes,
and humanism. With a shock the reader glimpses the contempt for humans and
deeply misogynist culture which conceals itself behind Tibetan Buddhist
thought so glorified by everyone.
The Tibetan variant of Buddhism is regarded in the
West as a hoard of unadulterated Far Eastern religiousness. The Dalai Lama
counts as a living symbol of Good. The Nobel Peace Prize winner has managed
to anchor the "Tibet
myth" in the West thanks to Hollywood
films. The public are led astray with false information and cover-up
tactics by the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, the Tibetan government in exile, and
the Tibetan clergy. The two authors reveal the atavistic, fundamentalist
cultural design which cannot deny the ideological and cultic connection to
esoteric fascism and neo-fascism. But despite this almost uncompromising
critique, at the end of their work the authors canvas a discussion about a Buddhism
beyond such outdated and questionable traditions.
Evangelical
Office of Information - Georg Schmid - august 1999
"People who need no illusions will value the extensive work as
a contribution to a long due correction."
Herbert and Mariana Röttgen, the author couple
publishing under the pseudonym of Trimondi, tear a public blinded by the
modern myth of Tibet not just from out of its nostalgic dream of an in
every respect peaceful, never violent, thoroughly pro-woman Tibetan
Buddhism which transforms all the dark forces in people into bright energy.
In the volume of over 800 pages, the dark, occult,
sexual magical, misogynist, fascist-near, warlike, and politically
totalitarian aspects of Tibetan Buddhism, actually already known about in
the west, are also linked to one of its most essential ritual texts, the
Kalachakra Tantra.
Viewed in this context, the shady sides of Tibetan
Buddhism are no accident in the history of a spirituality which is actually
totally peaceful, but rather a logical expression of a religion and a
culture which never did nor does want to just dissolve its shadows into
light, and instead grants them a fateful inherent dynamism. The outbreaks
of violence in the milieu of Tibetan Buddhism and the Dalai Lama, so
incomprehensible to a western Tibet romantic – think of the still-echoing
ramifications of the struggle between Red Hats and Yellow Hats in the time
of the Fifth Dalai Lama with its many victims, of the so-called Shugden
debate of recent years, of the continuing conflict around the true
reincarnation of the new Karmapa, of the support which the Dalai Lama lent
the Japanese sect guru Shoko Asahara, or of the military ambitions of the
Dalai Lama’s brother - all these "absurd" incidents are no longer
bolts from the blue, without precedent or resonance. The Dalai Lama’s
claims to power, smilingly denied on the one hand, accepted without
question on the other, are, like many other apparent contradictions, based
in Tibet’s spiritual and political tradition and can only be understood when
the modern enthusiasm for Tibet gives way to a more realistic engagement
with this particular culture and religion, which like any other has
nurtured and continues to nurture both its bright and shady sides.
The reader’s verdict upon this detailed engagement
with the shady side of Tibetan Buddhism is entirely dependent upon his or
her willingness to renounce nostalgia and to concede that there never was
nor ever will be a completely peaceful culture or religion in the world of
humankind. Those who cannot or will not abandon the illusion of a
thoroughly peaceful Buddhism will only be able to see the work of the two
authors as a grim settling of accounts by disappointed former friends of
Tibetan Buddhism. People who need no illusions will value the extensive
work as a contribution to a long due correction.
Gesundheit (Natur-Mensch-Technik) -
September 1999
"Precisely because I know the danger of exercising magical
miraculous forces, I avoid and abhor them." Sayings of Buddha 1. 212.
This very up-to-date book presents the reviewer,
and certainly the main body of his readers, with no small difficulties. It
is simply apt to divide our society – at least it ought not leave any
reasonably responsible contemporaries unmoved; at the end of the day it is
about nothing less than the claim that the spiritual and political leader
of Tibet, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, is in his worldwide campaign up to
more than the thoroughly legitimate freeing of his home country, occupied
by Red China. People who here want to ask what Buddhism has to do with us
in central Europe are ignoring the fact
that Tibetan Buddhism in particular has become a sounding board for the
religious desires of tens of thousands of Europeans.
The large crowds that the Dalai Lama is able to
draw must make the pope pale with envy. The authors, both formerly active
in the "Free Tibet" movement, took literally the Dalai Lama’s
instruction to thoroughly investigate his teachings and traditions before
making a possible conversion to Buddhism. However, their study, from an
initially thoroughly sympathetic approach, in the end produced a completely
unexpected and contrary result: they recognized a danger in Tibetan
Buddhism, in its teachings and magical praxis in day-to-day politics, not
just for the psyche of the individual adept, but also for world peace. With
their book, based upon personal experience and meticulous research, they
hope to expose this so ostensibly pacifist, nonviolent religion, pious as
it is tolerant, as being an imperialistic, misogynist atavism, riddled with
a medieval-like belief in spirits and demons.
Allegedly, there is no taboo (child abuse,
necrophilia, cannibalism!) which is not broken in the sexual magic rites of
the tantric ways of this religion. As an enlightened citizen of central Europe one does not want to believe all this and
seeks refuge in depth psychology, which is able to explain the horrors as
projections or symbolic events – but even here the authors have collected
damning counter-evidence. Buddhism too has a wildly turbulent history and
past, where misogyny and witch burnings can also be found, and there are
still battles between warring sects. One only needs to think of the
poison-gas guru Shoko Asahara, who sees himself as a champion of a
worldwide Buddhocracy. But, if one is to take the implications of the book
at hand seriously, the Dalai Lama also wants nothing less than control of
the world in a Buddhist-theocratic tyranny. A careful reading reveals that
the authors declare themselves prepared to publicly discuss their hypothesis
with him or a representative; that this certainly furore-provoking work is
thus not a one-off surprise attack which only serves to generate confusion.
What remains is a shaken image of the most holy Dalai Lama, of the pure,
philanthropic politics and teachings of Buddhism, and the certainty that
every traditional religion, regardless of its shade of opinion, has its
skeletons in the closet. Only the idealism of those numerous volunteer
helpers of the Committee for the Freeing of Tibet is to be regretted. (b.h.)
Badische
Zeitung - Johannes Schradl
- March 1999
The Dalai Lama – End of a beautiful
legend?
BOOK UNDER DISCUSSION: A new study
poses critical questions for the religious basis of the smiling God-King
Is the Dalai Lama a murderer of women? Is a
dangerous despot lurking behind this figure, who appears as both a God-King
and a mendicant monk at the same time? To ask such questions is to take on
a large congregation. In Germany
alone half a million people are devoted to Tibetan Buddhism. For them the
Dalai Lama stands for peaceableness, inner harmony, compassion and social
justice – for, in a word, the good in this world.
When - in the enlightened Western sphere - living
figures from other cultural circles become objects of fervent adoration, it
cannot be ruled out that critical rationalism will stir itself and rear up
against excess and mystification. For the Fourteenth Dalai Lama it has now
come to this. Just in time for the 40th anniversary of the occupation of Tibet
by the Chinese, the authors Victor and Victoria Trimondi have set out to do
some deciphering of the bad in the good, in the cellar (gokhang) of
Tibetan Buddhism and behind the "tantric mask" of His Holiness
the Dalai Lama. Victoria and Victor Trimondi (real names: Mariana and Herbert
Röttgen – well-known and controversial as the publisher Trikont) do not
question that the countless public appearances of the Nobel Peace Prize
winner are of an impressive gentleness and modesty. However, the Dalai Lama
regularly avoids raising the veil which covers the "shadows", the
dark side of his religion, where there are: sexual magic mysteries
and power-political obsessions (Shambhala myth), spirits and demons
(Nechung oracle) and powerful destructive forces.
Tibetan teachings vs. Western civilization
For all that, of course the image of the Dalai
Lama as a murderer of women, for example, is not meant literally. But the
higher tantras do concern the sacrifice of the feminine principle in favor
of the masculine and the theft of feminine energy in the interests of the
tantric master. This is not something which a civilized Western person can
approve of, nor is the alleged urge recorded in the religious myths to
establish a "Buddhocratic" world rule. In this country, it is the
custom to separate state and religion – especially when we are dealing with
a pretty aggressive potential.
Western ‘fashion’ Buddhists with a rather
superficial desire for enlightenment are hardly open for this sort of thing
– at least not consciously, but beneath the skin they might already be
pre-formed, the authors suspect. Not least the flood of Buddhist films
which Hollywood
produces plays a role here. This may be exaggerated. Then it remains rather
doubtful whether those 10,000 worshippers, who made the pilgrimage to Schneverdingen
in Lower Saxony last November to hear the
words of the Dalai Lama and to meditate for hours, would also follow him in
a Buddhist religious state. And for them he meant: just stick to the
religion you have; everything else rapidly becomes strenuous.
The book had barely gone on sale when critics –
invited Tibetologists perhaps – reproached the authors that they had
fundamentally misunderstood something. It is not acceptable to
unconditionally interpret the religious "images" of Buddhism as
(dangerous) recipes for action in the here and now – rather than simply as
treasures of wisdom. The shockingly aggressive fighting out of
intra-Buddhist conflicts in Tibet
with the Shugden group – up to possible ritual murders – meanwhile, teach
us something different. There remains the criticism of the ostensible
scientific shortcomings of the 800-page calling to account of Lamaism – a
charge which one can readily present to outsiders.
Debate
in the interests of investigation
That a discussion which needs to be had is being
instigated here is not doubted by most critics, however. Even if the
authors here and there bring out the heavy artillery, as where they produce
the proximity of Tibetan Buddhism to German fascism and of the 14. Dalai
Lama to the leader of the murderous Japanese Aum sect, Asahara - their
concern is justified: to devote themselves to the myths behind the
permanent smile of the Far Eastern God-King. In the interests of
investigation. Although the Dalai Lama may preach values like human rights,
democracy, equality and pacifism, they are not anchored in Tibet’s
religion and traditions, as the religious studies scholar from Tübingen,
Cristoffer Grundmann, also says.
Novalis - Günter Röschert -
October 1999
The Buddhism of the Dalai Lama – A
Trojan Horse for the West?
In an interview in the weekly Das Goetheanum (No.
20/1998, pp. 294f.) the General Secretary of the Anthroposophical Society
in America, Arthur Zajonc, recently described Tenzin Gyatso, the Fourteenth
Dalai Lama, as a ‘modern representative of the consciousness soul’. This
anthroposophical statement of Professor Zajoncs now appears doubtful on the
basis of an extensive study, produced by Victor and Victoria Trimondi under
the title of The Shadow of the Dalai Lama. The married couple
Trimondi (real names Herbert and Mariana Röttgen) were for several years to
be counted among the Dalai Lama’s sympathizers, but then began to regard
him and Tibetan Buddhism increasingly critically and to evaluate
their experiences through a detailed study of the accessible specialist
literature. This biographical background, which the authors unreservedly
concede, has led isolated critics of the book to disqualify it as a
personal settlement of accounts.(The reviewer for the Süddeutschen
Zeitung headlined his review with the title ‘Renegade literature’ and
spoke of a ‘settling of accounts by two disappointed (believers)’. The
review was so mercilessly damning that, according to information from
booksellers, many SZ readers inquired about the book for precisely
this reason.) The book indeed has an explosive potential, since at least
the German-language literature about the Dalai Lama and Tibetan Buddhism is
almost exclusively affirmative or even originates from the Dalai Lama himself.
1. To help understand the book, first up the
following remarks in advance (introductory literature consulted: Helmuth
von Glasenapp, Buddhistische Mysterien [Buddhist Mysteries]. Stuttgart 1940; Julius Evola, Metaphysik des
Sexus [Metaphysic of the Sexus]. Stuttgart 1962; Heinrich Zimmer, Indische
Mythen und Symbole [Indian Myths and Symbols]. Düsseldorf 1972; Philip
Rawson, Tantra. Munich 1974; Heinrich Zimmer, Philosophie und
Religion Indiens [The Philosophy and Religion of India]. Frankfurt
1976; Mircea Eliade, Yoga. Unsterblichkeit und Freiheit [Yoga.
Immortality and Freedom]. Frankfurt 1985; Michael von Brück, Buddhismus
[Buddhism]. Gütersloh 1998): The development of Buddhism has proceeded in four
stages; a fifth stage has been heralded. At the beginning are the teachings
and life of the historical Buddha Gautama. After his death (480 B.C.E.) the
‘Teachings of the Elders’ (known as Hinayana or ‘Low Vehicle’)
developed, with the Four Noble Truths: of Suffering, the Cause of
Suffering, the Relief from Suffering, and the Eightfold Path. From the
second century B.C.E. the ‘Great Vehicle’ (Mahayana) emerged, with
the development of the teaching of the Bodhisattvas. From 500 C.E. an
India-wide movement, Tantrism, began, which gradually took a hold on Hinduism
and Buddhism as well. Even the word tantra (or Tantrism) is
difficult to define (Eliade, p. 209). It concerns a system of esoteric
instruction of non-ascetic character on the basis of a thoroughly
magical-symbolic world view (von Glasenapp, p. 17). Characteristic of
Tantrism is the marked inclusion of sexuality (Rawson, p. 14). Tantric
Buddhism is referred to as the ‘Diamond Vehicle’ (Vajrayana). All
stages of Buddhism still exist today alongside one another in more or less
large areas. Buddhism entered Tibet in its tantric form from
the eighth century C.E. on and displaced the up until then predominant
shamanism (von Brück, p. 277). In the following centuries in constant
exchange with Indian Buddhism several new tantric systems with a number of
extensive collections of texts emerged. The last major tantric system, the Kalachakra
Tantra, appeared in the 10th or 11th century (von Brück, p. 284). It is
thought that the tantric texts – despite a complete absence of proof –
originated from Buddha Gautama and existed for centuries as hidden
‘treasure’ (terma), waiting to be found at the correct time (cf. von
Glasenapp, p. 49). The book under discussion here concerns the Kalachakra
Tantra (Time Tantra) and its most important representative, the Dalai Lama.
2. The main thesis of Part 1 of the book states
that: ‘the mystery of Tantric Buddhism consists in the sacrifice of the
feminine principle and in the manipulation of erotic love in order to
obtain universal androcentric power (pp. 30, 317). From the up to now
accessible texts (see p. 24) the authors gather that there is a hidden
monistic orientation to Tantrism, whilst everything which exists in the
universe is dualist, emanating from a primeval divine couple, indeed from
their sexual union. In the sexual magic union of the tantric yogi with a
female partner the former seizes the feminine energy and elevates himself
to an androgynous state, through which the body of the yogi approximates
the spiritual unity of the universe. The ritual sacrifice of the woman (the
tantric partner) as originator of the great Maya is the precondition for a
transfer of her life energy to the tantric master. This procedure is in the
authors’ interpretation an application of an overarching tantric law of
‘inversion’, according to which immersion in the lowly and the base turns
into spiritual elevation to the supreme. Since the relevant passages in the
texts are presented by the authors as containing an abundance of practical
instructions, real, not just internal (to the soul) sexual magic should be
assumed (this is confirmed by Evola, p. 386). The repeated sexual magic act
lets the yogi, approaching androgynous unity, experience the spiritual
union of his physical and subtle body with the energies of the universe. The apex of
the Kalachakra Tantra is the overarching figure of the primal Buddha (von
Glasenapp, p. 85), of the so-called Adi-Buddha as cosmic androgyne. Through
the forces of the tantric initiation path the body of the yogi achieves an
occult correspondence to the diamond body of the Adi-Buddha, down, indeed,
to a detailed correspondence in the physiological energy structure. The
Adi-Buddha is the Lord of the Universe and thus the bearer of unbridled
power, including political power over the entire globe. This claim to power
is concretized in the utopia of the Shambhala realm, which is hovering on
the threshold of revelation and is destined to arise in the foreseeable
future in a final battle for control of the world.
3. In every era only one tantric master reaches the
highest level of the initiation path. The authors believe that the
encounters with the vile and demonic, which thanks to the law of inversion
should be transformed into the elevated and divine, can lead to the demonic
becoming taken for granted, at any rate among those adepts of the
Kalachakra Tantra who do not reach the highest level. But the tantric
master identifies himself with not just the ‘good’ Bodhisattvas (e.g..
Avalokiteshvara), but also with the Tibetan gods of wrath. In this
connection the authors attempt to explain the Tibetan pantheon of gods and
demons with its shockingly aggressive and murderous astral figures, even
the morbidity and aggressiveness of Tibetan culture in general. For the
tantric real and ritual/symbolic deeds are of the same moral value, since
he assumes a pervasive magical unity of the universe, through which each
layer of the phenomenal world can be a symbol of another. The Kalachakra
Tantra includes fifteen levels of initiation. The first seven levels count
as lower orders and are performed in public by the Dalai Lama in
front of thousands of people at huge open-air events. The higher levels are
of a sexual magical nature (pp.171, 183). The authors describe the four
highest levels as Ganachakra (a magical circle under participation
of several female sexual partners in an orgiastic form). The Master of the
Kalachakra Tantra of our time is the Dalai Lama; when one considers his
previous incarnations he has always been so, from the beginning. The
authors are convinced that he must thus understand himself to be a figure
who corresponds to the Adi-Buddha and prospective world ruler (Chakravartin).
4. In Part 2 of the book the authors attempt to
show that all of the Dalai Lama’s teachings and actions without exception
can only be understood against the background of the Kalachakra Tantra. The
sexual magic world of gods and demons of Tantrism with its by Western
standards repulsive rituals is carefully kept hidden from the Western
public. The Dalai Lama only provides European and American media with the
attractive teachings of Mahayana Buddhism. But the true politics of the
exile Tibetan community orients itself to the eschatological plan of the
Kalachakra Tantra with the Shambhala myth. Individual elements of the
politics of Dharamsala (the residence in exile of the Dalai Lama in India)
are still today mediumistically determined by the pronouncements of an
oracle. The famous Kalachakra sand mandala is a means of occult possession
of the territory in which it is created and then dispersed.
The book by the two Trimondis offers an
exceptional abundance of material in this part and describes, for example,
the Dalai Lama’s connections to representatives of fascism, to Mongolia, to Chinese Communism, to the
Japanese terrorist Asahara and to many Hollywood
actors. The West has such boundless good faith that it doesn’t notice
Tantric Buddhism setting out on a magical world mission straight out of its
situation of exile. With no clue of the sexual magical and demonic ‘shadow’
of the Dalai Lama, statesmen, artists, and academics everywhere seek out
and host visits from him. The spread of Tantric Buddhism in the West (the
fifth stage in the development of Buddhism) is already in top gear. The
authors believe an intensive explicatory study of the Kalachakra Tantra is
absolutely necessary, in its political aspects as well, and its core
transformation of sexuality into power. They view their book as a warning
study, which should be followed by further, unprejudiced investigations.
5. In this connection it is interesting that the
anthroposophical journal Info3 (11/1998) published several articles
on Buddhism on the occasion of a camp organized by the Dalai Lama on the
Lüneburg Heath at the end of October 1998. An editorial assistant reported,
with reference to Professor Zajonc, that the Dalai Lama, because of the
imminent apocalyptic Shambhala war, had begun to deposit the Kalachakra
initiation as an image in the subtle bodies (!)
of more and more participants at his large meetings. There were
strong similarities between the Kalachakra Tantra and Rudolf Steiner’s book
An Outline of Secret Knowledge. It then goes on to say: "Rudolf Steiner
repeatedly referred to the connection between Buddhism and Christianity. He
went as far as to say that both religions must come together in the future.
In the spiritual world this consolidation has already occurred."
Whoever studies the cited speech from 13.3.1911 (GA 124) attentively, will
note that Steiner is speaking of the continued effects of the spiritual individual
Buddha Gautama. Steiner was not, in this passage, discussing Tibet’s
Tantric Buddhism which first emerged a thousand years after Buddha Gautama
had died. This raises the question whether this amazing reinterpretation
through recontextualization of an extract from a speech by Steiner can be
linked to the outward appearance of the Tibetan mission as a Trojan horse
(Trimondi, p. 326).
In an era of spiritual and religious pluralism the
study of religion is an especially significant anthroposophical desideratum.
The book by the two Trimondis, which could only be discussed in fragments
here, is a polemical document and as such a clear warning not to approach
the world of religions naively or with guileless identifications. It is an
exciting book and in its wealth of material a stimulating invitation to
one’s own power of judgment, and to the appropriately qualified pupil of
Rudolf Steiner, to engage more closely with the subject of the book.
Different Press Voices:
Opinions differ about The Shadow of the Dalai Lama:
according to co-author Victoria Trimondi, their book is in roughly equal
proportions well received and torn to pieces by the media. ... But The
Shadow of the Dalai Lama is selling well. "Precisely thanks to the
controversy about the book" [...]. The authors are already at work
preparing the third, revised edition. Berner
Zeitung, 2 May 1999, Switzerland
Former Dalai Lama sympathizers settle accounts
with Buddhism. The new trend religion is said to be deeply caught up in
superstitious practices. The study in hand interprets Dalai Lama Buddhism
as a medieval-style secret doctrine. Focus Magazine, 15 March, Germany
Sexual abuse, links to fascism, brainwashing – the
accusations against the Dalai Lama have got what it takes. [...] The two
authors aim to expose the peaceableness of the Dalai Lama as "a
mask" and to present Tibetan Buddhism as "an at heart atavistic,
fundamentalist, sexist, and warlike cultural design". [...] Radical
disillusionment for the faithful and the "boom Buddhists". Facts, 4 March 1999,
Switzerland
An attempt is made to prove this bitter farewell
to a myth with a great flood of sources [...] The criticisms, by the way,
also come from Tibetans in exile and cannot be brushed aside, even by the
Dalai Lama himself: more and more he concedes to some shady sides. [...]
Thus it is a cheap trick when - as has happened - the book by the
Trimondis/Röttgens is dismissed as typical renegade revenge. The authorial
duo’s grasp of religious and cultural history is undoubtedly firm. Abendzeitung, 20 June
1999, Germany
Finally a long-overdue discussion of the
antifeminist, anti-liberal, and antidemocratic core of Tibetan Buddhism. Bayrische Rundfunk [Bavarian
Brooadcasting], April 1999, Germany
The first cracks have appeared in the image of the
perfect Buddhist ‘roof of the world’ which were, however, long overdue ...
Explanations of the background of Tibetan Buddhism are always necessary. Sender Freies Berlin, April 1999
Victoria and Victor Trimondi (have)delivered an
informative and gripping work of cultural history and fundamental research.
The book throws up many questions, several are answered satisfactorily.
Thus, a western reader’s curiosity about the tantra system is stilled. The
authors present Tibetan Buddhism as a religion of mysteries. [...] Its
mysteries are the driving force behind its political decisions and goal
setting. [...]The Shadow of the Dalai Lama is a thorough - sometimes
too detailed – and uncompromising analysis of Lamaism. The study is not
without emotion, however. Die Presse, 27 March 1999, Austria
A critical debate is emerging at the zenith of the
euphoria around Buddhism in the west: Is TIBETAN BUDDHISM really as
peaceful and democratic as the Dalai Lama claims? ... The authors ...
address the foundations of Tibetan Buddhism. ... Critical discussion of
Tibetan Buddhism is only just beginning in the west. Die Woche, 19 March
1999, Germany
As the title anticipates, we are dealing with an
sensation. ... The elevated level at which this attack is pitched is a
surprise. None of the work at hand (is) "dull" or superficial.
Everything is soundly researched and demonstrable. ... To sum the book up:
extremely well worth reading with comprehensive (coverage) of all aspects
of Tibetan Buddhism. Tattva Viveka, May 1999, Germany
Anybody who believes that the authors’ (the
Röttgen couple’s) critique can be consumed as journalistic fast food may
well be disappointed. As a matter of fact it’s a weighty tome of 800 pages,
which is nonetheless written in a very accessible style and offers
unaccustomed perspectives which harbor real dynamite. ORF, 4 March 1999, Austria
Tibet is going to
enter Western popular culture as something can only when Hollywood does the entertainment
injection into the world system" wrote the Herald Tribune in 1997.
This statement is also taken up by the two authors Victor and Victoria
Trimondi in their book, The Shadow of the Dalai Lama. The Trimondi’s
theses are as aggressive as they are provocative: desire for the end of the
world, an aggressive cult, the goal of world domination, and the sexual
exploitation of women – strong stuff with which to reproach Tibetan
Buddhism. In fact, in this book Buddhism and the Dalai Lama himself are
subjected to a comprehensive critique for the first time in the
German-speaking world. This (the criticism) comes from experts in the
scene. [...] Attacks from their own ranks, from Tibetans in exile, are also
accumulating. Like the sellout of their own country to the Chinese,
political lies, the rewriting of history among others. The authors inform
the reader in detail about the development of Buddhism and its cultic
ramifications such as Tantrism. Thus The Shadow of the Dalai Lama is
also an introduction to Buddhism. But the writers have something definite
at heart. [...] The book’s theses are well founded, described in detail,
and annotated with numerous sources. The background to the cultic and
ritual practices, the sexual and military obsessions of Buddhism are
accurately described. They carefully introduce the distinctions between the
individual tantras and compare this reality with idealized European
conceptions. The couple lay much value on the difference between the public
image of the "Prince of Peace" and his alleged
power-political ambitions. [...] The fullness, density, and challenge of
this book will demand a strong public discussion. This will be awaited with
bated breath. München Aktuell, 22 March 1999, Germany
It appears that the keenness of intellect and
linguistic skill of a 1968-trained dialectician are needed to tear the mask
from the face of the Dalai Lama in a manner which gets through these days. Etika, 2 May 1999, Italy
For those familiar with the material, as the
researchers Victor and Victoria Trimondi have shown themselves to be in
their book The Shadow of the Dalai Lama recently published by
Patmos-Verlag, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama proves to be a Trojan Horse, with
whose help the archaic-patriarchal monastic culture hopes to conquer the
West and thus take a great step towards its final goal of Buddhist world
domination. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 20 July 1999, Professor Dr. Dr. Udo Köhler, Germany
The Trimondis do not descend upon a harmless,
peaceful paradise, Shangri-La, so attractive to mental tourists, but they
are indeed stirring up a hornet’s nest at present. Neue Zürcher Zeitung,
15 July 1999, Switzerland
Ignorance has always been a precondition for and
foundation of all religions and ideologies, since "he who knows
nothing must believe everything" (Maria von Ebner-Eschenbach). On this
well-tested foundation, above all, dealings with Indian and Asian religions
and schools of wisdom, especially Tibetan Buddhism, are currently
flourishing in West. The latter’s highest representative, His Holiness the
Dalai Lama , exerts an almost magical attraction over that great mass of
people who neither know nor can judge critically either the roots or the
decisive content of their own religion, let alone that of others. To this
group belong in no sense just those without academic training, whose healthy
human intelligence protects them, but rather those many, often highly
specialized, but inadequately philosophically trained intellectual
eclectics, in particular physicists, but also politicians and, especially
of course, artists (Hollywood!), religious enthusiasts and mystics of all
sorts, for whom exact science and rational thought are foreign or even
hated anyway. The supreme Yellow Mage has an easy job with them. But what
conception of the world is hiding behind the smiling, so apparently philanthropic
and peaceable mask of the Tibetan God-King? The ignorance which this key
question exposes, particularly in the Western world, can only be described
as catastrophic. Here, the book at hand can and wants to help, for which
one cannot be grateful enough to the courageous researcher couple Trimondi.
Within it, they have divided the vast amount of material into two parts.
[...] In order that they do not sink afresh into the sweet sleep of their
affluence, but rather become immune to that no less sweet, but in the end
deadly poison of archaic-totalitarian, patriarchal-fundamentalist Tibetan
Buddhism, the book at hand is more suitable than any other currently
available. Reading it is thus a sine qua non for all scientists,
educators, politicians, and all who are responsible for others, not least
doctors, psychotherapists, and psychiatrists. Alongside a subject and
biographical index, a detailed glossary is urgently required. Wiss.Literatur-Anzeige der Univ. Gießen
und Marburg,
Autumn 1999, Prof. Dr. Dr. Köhler
As people say, where there is much light there are
also many shadows. No wonder then, that critics and warning voices also
address Eastern teachings of wisdom. The Shadow of the Dalai Lama
(Victor and Victoria Trimondi, Patmos, 800
pp., with photos and illustrations, DM 58.00) is a sharp-sighted analysis,
a religious-philosophical work of fundamental research into the
interpretation and decipherment of Tibetan Buddhism. The book is riveting–
I was "hooked" from the start: belief in ghosts, sexual magic,
political and ritual murder, ideologies of war, torture, and a deeply
misogynist culture appear on the stage when the authors pull aside the
pacifist curtain of "compassion". The book is actually more of a
political and explanatory book, which wishes to warn us of the
power-political consequences of Tibetan Buddhism. Buchhändler Heute,
Düsseldorf, June 1999
The Trimondi’s theses are provocative: desire for
the end of the world, an aggressive cult, the goal of world domination, and
the sexual exploitation of women – "strong stuff" with which to
reproach Tibetan Buddhism. In fact, in this book Buddhism and the Dalai
Lama himself are subjected to a comprehensive critique for the first time
in the German-speaking world. [...] The authors inform the reader in detail
about the development of Buddhism and its cultic ramifications such as
Tantrism. They oppose the hyping up of Buddhism by media and culture
trendies without a knowledge of its historical and cultural background.
This ignorance of the topic and of the background is what the authors wish
to put an end to with their book. The book’s theses are described in detail
and annotated with numerous sources. The background to the cultic and
ritual practices, the sexual and military obsessions of Buddhism are
accurately described. Rheinische Post, Nr. 214 Christoph Weiss - September 1999
Critical Links to Buddhism and Lamaism
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