When Holy Men Turn To Battle: The Fight of Tibetan Buddhists

In March 2009, there were two reports that passed through on the Internet, catching my attention: “Dalai Lama: Tibetans ‘suffering’ under China,” was the headline of the Associated Press (AP) piece filed on March 10, 2009. Then, “Tibetans attack police station, 93 monks arrested,” was the March 22, 2009 headline of the next AP piece.

Why these reports and why now?

According to the Dalai Lama, the Nobel Peace Laureate, “life for Tibetans under Chinese rule has been ‘hell on earth.’ He added that “These 50 years have brought untold suffering to the land and people of Tibet.”

On March 22, when the second piece was filed, hundreds of Tibetans had attacked a police station and government officials in northwestern China. This was despite heightened security.

Clearly, with nearly 100 monks being arrested, there was a message in this: The Tibetan Buddhists were fed up with suffering in silence, and they weren’t going to take the mistreatment anymore.


For a religion that practices love and peace towards all of mankind, this was a clear departure in responding to challenges. As a matter of fact, the primary goals for followers of Tibetan Buddhism is to find enlightenment themselves, so that they can show others the way to attain that state of being while still on Earth.

Once this “enlightenment,” defined as finding all there is to know, is found, then the person should be in a state of perpetual bliss. Finding enlightenment is also considered to be the same as finding “Buddhahood." So what happened to being in this state of perpetual bliss?


Conflict With the Chinese
The primary conflict with the Chinese comes from Tibetan Buddhism’s two seemingly conflicting practices of skepticism and guru devotion.


The issues stem from the committed practices at the CORE of Tibetan Buddhism: a healthy skepticism is encouraged to foster growth in the followers’ abilities in analytic meditation, and reverence for teachers, who in Tibetan Buddhism, are called lamas. These lamas are revered...the reverence becomes total devotion and unquestioning faith in the guru. This type of reverence for a teacher (leader) is in direct conflict with the Chinese Socialist orientations.




A student typically takes teachings from many authorities and revere them all as lamas in a general sense. Often, though, only one lama is held in special esteem as his own root guru. This most likely is the teacher who first introduced the person into Buddhism. Here's where the problem with the Socialist regime began.

The first military attacks by the People's Republic of China on Tibetan troops began at the end of May 1950 and escalated in late 1951, that's more than 50 years ago. This eventually led to armed conflicts later in the decade, with a failed uprising resulting in the exile of about 80,000 Tibetans, many of them Buddhist clergy members, to India. Some of them went further to the west, which in turn eventually led to the spread of Tibetan Buddhism to many Western countries, where the tradition has gained popularity.

Tibetan Definitions of "Buddhist"

Worldwide today there are about five million followers of Tibetan Bhuddism.

Tibetan Buddhism is the body of Buddhist religious doctrine and institutions characteristic of Tibet and certain regions of the Himalayas, including northern Nepal, Bhutan, and India (Arunachal Pradesh, Ladakh and Sikkim). It is also practiced in Mongolia and parts of Russia (Kalmykia, Buryatia, and Tuva) and Northeast China.

Tibetan Buddhism comprises many distinct schools but is primarily divided into four main traditions: Nyingma, Kagyu, Gelug, and Sakya. All schools are said to include the teachings of the three vehicles of Buddhism: the Foundational Vehicle, Mahayana, and Vajrayana, which some, like the Gelug tradition, consider to be a derivative of part of Mahayana.

Introspection as the mark of a Buddhist, is embodied in the Tibetan term for Buddhist, meaning, literally, internalist.


Tibetans specify the criteria for being Buddhist, as either, formal, where one practices; or in belief, where three or four marks of existence are accepted.

Tibetan Practices

Monasticism was the foundation of Buddhism in Tibet. There were over 6,000 monasteries in Tibet and nearly all were ransacked and destroyed by the Chinese communists (many of them young ethnic Tibetan Red Guards), mainly during the Cultural Revolution. Most of the major ones have been at least partially re-established but many still remain in ruins.



Tibetans are fond of quoting sutra (scripture) that one should test the Buddha's words as one would the quality of gold.

On the other hand, at the beginning of a public teaching, a lama will do prostrations to the throne on which he will teach due to its symbolism, or to an image of the Buddha behind that throne, then students will do prostrations to the lama after he is seated.

Merit accrues when one's interactions with the teacher are imbued with such reverence in the form of guru devotion, a code of practices governing them that derives from Indian sources.

Preliminary Practices (ngöndo, sngon-'gro)and the Tibetan Approach to Vajrayana
Vajrayana : said to be the fastest method for attaining Buddhahood but it carries the caution that for unqualified practitioners it can be dangerous. Even for a qualified advanced practitioner, to engage in Vajrayana, without having received the appropriate initiation (also known as an "empowerment") from a lama who is fully qualified to give it, is to court controversy.

From the time a person resolves to accept a Vajrayana initiation, skepticism towards the person giving that initiation as guru is suspended and the utmost sustained effort in guru devotion towards them is essential.

Just as Sutrayana preceded Vajrayana historically in India, so sutra practices constitute those that are preliminary to tantric ones.

Preliminary practices include all Sutrayana activities that yield merit like: hearing teachings, prostrations, offerings, prayers and acts of kindness and compassion. Chief among the preliminary practices are realizations through meditation on the three principle stages of the path: renunciation, the altruistic bodhicitta will for enlightenment and the wisdom realizing emptiness. Without the basis of these three in particular to practice Vajrayana, it can be a very challenging practice.




Dalai Lama, Tulku and Hollywood


The Dalai Lama is a lineage of religious leaders of the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism. The Dalai Lamas were also the political leaders of Lhasa-based Tibetan government between the 17th century and 1959. With "Lama" being the general term referring to Tibetan Buddhist. teachers, the current "Dalai Lama" is often called "His Holiness" (HH) by Westerners, although this does not translate to a Tibetan title. Tibetans may refer to him by epithets such as Gyalwa Rinpoche, meaning "Precious Victor,"or Yishin Norbu, meaning "Wish-fulfilling Jewel."



The Dalai Lama is believed to be the rebirth of a long line of tulkus, who have chosen to be reborn in order to enlighten others. He is also the official leader of the Tibetan government-in-exile, or Central Tibetan Administration (CTA).

A tulku is a person who is recognized to be the reincarnation of someone who is deceased. The practice of recognizing tulkus is unique to Tibetan Buddhism. Through the centuries the many lineages of tulkus have become important to maintaining the integrity of monastic institutions and teachings.

Steven Seagal is one Hollywood celebrity closely associated with Tibetan Buddhists. Seagal has been recognized by Tibetan lama Penor Rinpoche as a reincarnated Tulku.

Let's hope that tantra prayers and the peacefulness of the Dalai Lama and other lamas work on behalf of Tibetan Buddhists scattered throughout the world. It would be a welcome sight to see the Holy Men once again just doing their analytical meditation or prostrations, or whatever they choose to do, before the Buddha in their search for "Buddhahood."

Namaste',

Che'

Beautiful People Profile: James (Jim) E. Smith of Wolcott, Connecticut

He always will stand out in a crowd. Always and in ALL WAYS!

[Jim with his wife, Debbie, his son, Jayson, and daughter, Megan, his and Debbie's daughter.]
[Jim & Debbie with Jim's Aunt Marge & Uncle Raymond Holman of Catawba, South Carolina]

From his baritone voice to his demeanor, when people meet James E. Smith for the first time, he makes a lasting impression.

The reason is this: you know very simply you’re in the Presence of one who is “Good” and one who walks in the light of God.

In his walk and in his talk, Jim Smith exudes Goodness. If you’re soured on people and places and things, he makes you want to believe again in all things that are good.


What is so interesting about this man is that he does not walk with any air of pomposity or arrogance. As a matter of face, he walks with a humility...and grace...and his own style. But Jim Smith simply is...goodness, so he cannot help but let his light shine through to all those who are in his presence.


Every person who has walked alongside Jim Smith and those who have worked beside him year after year after year at IBM know this about him.


The management at IBM has long known this.


That’s why layoff round after layoff round at the company, Jim Smith has never been touched, even though he himself says, “I believe more talented, more deserving people than I were let go.”


You don’t have to wonder or ponder why the management at IBM chose to bypass Jim. He simply is the type of person you want to always have around. His personal philosophy towards life, of “Loving the Lord with all (his) heart and mind and soul and loving (his) neighbor as himself” shows up in his work and in his ways at IBM for almost 30 years.


Jim treats everyone he meets with love and respect, knowing he says, that “we all deserve to be treated this way, as God’s children, created in his image. That love is “agape” love, unconditional, the same kind of love God shows us in spite of the fact that we often forget him. This kind of love of one another includes our enemies, as we are called to love our enemies, as they too are God created, and all God creates is good. It’s our human nature that makes us unclean.”


I TRULY cannot see Jim Smith ever having an enemy in this world. I don’t see how anyone would ever call him anything but a friend.


He has seen so many people come from behind him, achieving much higher levels at IBM than he did. “One is now a vice president, another is a director, yet another became executive assistant to the worldwide VP of Corporate Communications,” he says. Yet, Jim simply watched them move on up, without complaint, jealousy, anger or frustration.


“Working in a corporate environment is tough with people angling for position and attention, competing all the time, shoving you aside if they can help it. I have worked for IBM for nearly 30 years and have worked very hard to avoid that kind of attitude. I have tried to have the attitude that the work I do is for God, as we are instructed to serve God always, to glorify him in all we do and say. I have achieved much in my IBM career, but not nearly what I perhaps could have if I’d bowed to unsavory practices to get ahead. Instead, I let God’s will be done, and I’m happier for it.”


So what does make this man, James E. Smith, tick?


First, there is God.

“God is the center of my life, creator of all things—Yahweh, all powerful, all-seeing, ever present....My number one purpose is to serve God.“

Next , there is his wife, Debbie, to whom he would have been married for 28 years in September. She is an Iowa-born farm girl, who grew up in Kasson-Manorville, Minnesota, a small town just outside Rochester. So, Jim sees that loving this woman until death is to “love as Christ loved the Church.”

[Debbie with her best friend, Peggy Anson.]
Then, there are his kids. First, there is Jayson, a physical therapist in Southhaven, Mississippi, who aspires to have his own clinic someday in Atlanta, Georgia. Jayson is married and has a three-year old son.

[Jim's grandson, Jayson Jr.]

Then there is Amy, his 35-year-old stepdaughter, to whom he’s been a father since she was seven years old. Amy is married to a “great man” who is a financial manager and whose family is from Lebanon. They have three daughters, 13, 5, and 2.
[Stepdaughter Amy's wedding, with Debbie's mom, Madonna, and Amy's first-born, Victoria. Jim & Debbie, too].
[Amy and her three daughters.]
Then there is his youngest, Megan, age 23, who is living outside Denver, Colorado and is an assistant account executive for a major advertising firm, but she has dreams of becoming a clinical psychologist to help those afflicted with Mauchausen By Proxy Syndrome.
[Megan with two of her cousins].
[Aunt Marge & Uncle Raymond Holman visit Megan at Roger Williams Business School, Bristol, Rhode Island.]

Jim Smith says about his life, “I’ve been blessed. I see how God has been showing up in my life!”


From the age of five, Jim says he was curious about everything about God. Even then, he kept asking his parents about God and where did he come from and who created him. One day, he was searching so hard and getting NO ANSWERS, so he searched his own little mind and... actually...passed out in trying to find the answer!


That day was the beginning of an unending search for God.

Jim grew up curious about everything God. When he was old enough, he says, he read the Bible cover to cover, like a history book, “learning a lot but not understanding the Bible themes. I tried numerous religions...Baptist, Pentecostal, even went to a Catholic Mass or two.”

Nothing resonated with Jim.

Today, Jim says that he “has no religion.” But he has a “Christian life....a life devoted to Christ and his teachings...but not a religion.”


For six years, Jim has served as an elder in the Waterbury Church of Christ, a role, he says, the Bible refers to as a Shepherd, Bishop, Presbyter, Pastor.

Jim is one of five men who serve in this way by leading the local congregation of about 160 people. He teaches Adult Bible class each Sunday morning, occasionally preaches and leads the outreach and evangelism ministry.


This is his real passion. ”Teaching, especially sharing my faith and teaching the significance and relevance of the Gospel of Christ. Other than my family, above all else is my desire to share the peace and joy I get from a relationship with Christ. It helps me navigate the storms of this life.”


Yes, even Jim has had challenges that come from having a high-powered corporate life and working in the church. “At times,” he says. “It has put a strain on my family life and marriage, but we have persevered through those obstacles, financial and others. Prayer has been the key.


“I use the Bible wisdom as the primary compass for my life, and I accept and depend on God’s Grace. I call it my life GPS, God’s Positioning System. The Bible—Basic Instructions Before Life Ends. And Grace, God’s Riches at Christ’s Expense.”

All powerful stuff coming from a powerful man!


Jim’s career at IBM has included all aspects of Corporate Communications: executive speechwriting, multi-media slide show management, conference show producer/director, and also managing numerous global IBM public relations programs.Jim currently manages all communications aspects of IBM’s corporate Integrated Supply Chain business and its global retail operations. He works out of IBM’s Somers, NY, office. [Jim watching a chess match in the office, using the the board involved in the chess match between Gary Kasparov and the Deep Blue IBM supercomputer].

His life has prepared him for these achievements.

He grew up in Charlotte, North Carolina and was a straight “A” student, finishing 4th out of a class of 700. He received a full Northwestern Academic Scholarship to Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Journalism and Mass Communications.

He worked as a reporter for the United Press International and as a general assignment reporter, covering stories that ranged from state government to sports. He covered stories on Hank Aaron , members of Congress, including now U.S. Congressman, Senator David Scott, D-GA. At one time, he also served as Press Secretary to Congressman Lloyd Meeds, D-Wash, as part of an internship program.


Jim Smith plans to retire in three to five years from IBM. At that time, he looks forward to doing work in a charitable organization, using his public relations skills. Of course, he will welcome the extra time to spend with his wife and family and devoting a greater amount of time to ministering to the spiritual lives of all who have open and honest hearts.
[Jim and his three granddaughters, who call him Bompa.]

What can we say to those who will meet Jim Smith, as he reaches out and touches them?


“You don’t have a prayer to escape such goodness and light.”


Tomorrow, May 18th, is Jim Smith's Birthday. Happy Birthday, Jim! May your light and your star continue to shine so very, very brightly in the world!

Namaste’,

Che’

NOTE: I worked side-by-side with Jim Smith during my time at IBM. We worked together, first in IBM offices in Stamford, Connecticut, then in White Plains, New York. From those days, Jim and I have maintained a steady and enduring friendship that now spans decades. I consider him to be truly one of my best friends. Thanks, Jim, for your many years of friendship, loyalty and support!