 The XVIIth Gyalwang Karmapa Returns to Tolung Tsurphu Monastery
In 1981, the XVIth Karmapa entered parinirvana. In 1992, His Holiness the XVIIth Karmapa fulfilled the promise of the Karmapas, and returned to Tsurphu, a boy of seven. The Karmapa was self-identified, so to speak, through a letter that the 16th Karmapa had left behind in the care of His Eminence Tai Situ Rinpoche. The seventeenth incarnation of the Karmapa matched the predictions of the letter, as interpreted by senior Kagyu scholars. Due notice was given to the Office of the Dalai Lama, who
examined the evidence and issued a "Buktham Rinpoche," official letter acknowledging the incarnation. His Holiness Sakya Trizen, the head of the Sakya, and His Holiness Mindrol Ling, one of the heads of the Nyingma, also offered their own acknowledgments. Even Beijing acknowledged that the Karmapa had been found in Tibet. For many years the young Karmapa performed the activities of a bodhisattva, continuously meeting with people, studying and meditating as much as he
could, sometimes performing ceremonies, sometimes dispensing "miracles," sometimes simply playing with toys, always presiding over the rebuilding of Tolung Tsurphu, seat of the Karmapas for nine hundred years. His Holiness tried to keep to completely spiritual pursuits, but as the years went by, obstacles to his activity increased. His Holiness was not free to engage in the education and training required of a Karmapa. His Holiness' main teachers, His Eminence Tai Situ Rinpoche
and His Eminence Gyaltsab Rinpoche, were unable to obtain visas to visit Tsurphu, and His Holiness was not permitted to leave Tibet. The Karmapa was not able to engage in the triad of activities, which passed on the lineage: key instructions, reading transmissions, and empowerments of the Kagyu tradition. So, although the Karmapa appeared to be able to do what he wished within the confines of Tsurphu, he merely had some apparent freedom
to stay at the monastery and rebuild it; he did not have real freedom to learn, to teach, to enlighten. In China, moreover, many officials believe it is the duty of every person and every institution to engage in some "patriotic" activities. Officials thus repeatedly requested of the Karmapa that he support the Chinese-selected Panchen Lama, denounce the Dalai Lama, give speeches prepared by politicians, appear at certain ceremonies, acquiesce to the repackaging of
the Karmapa's positions. From a religious point of view, such requests are not appropriately made to a Karmapa and are not the appropriate activities of a Karmapa. The Karmapa often refused inappropriate requests. Those free thinkers in the Lhasa area who observed the Karmapa remarked upon his independence and spirit. But they also knew that the pressures on him to conform would continue to build. <<Previous | 1 | 2 |
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