Who Murdered the Sixth Dalai Lama? Part 6
- Jack Adrian
- Oct 3, 2024
- 28 min read
Part 6 of 6.
VI. Sanguine Aftermath
Lelung Tulku was a young rebirth when he first met Tsangyang Gyatso.1 He was named by the Dalai Lama, though in a ceremony that began late because the young Tsangyang, wanted to go play archery behind the Potala with friends. Tsangyang apparently found Lelung to be a bit stiff and shy, and joked that he would christen him with the name “The Nun Tingting Drolma.”2
Right: The Fifth Lelung Tulku Lobzang Trinley (1697-1740), whom Tsangyang Gyatso called "Tinting Drolma" and who may have later heard Lhazang Khan's dubious confession.
Years later, sometime after 1706, Lelung Tulku met Lhazang Khan at the Olkha hot springs. They stayed there for several days when finally, the Khan had this to say:
That Gongsa Tsangyang [Gyatso] had a wonderful charm, quite unlike ordinary people. He was tremendously bold, very different from the present Dalai Lama. He knew he was destined not to live beyond the age of twenty-five.3
Two points of diction here. The Khan’s use of the term “bold” (brtul zhugs) doesn’t carry pejorative connotations. One can imagine the world being used in a more modern political context to refer to an upstart rival against an established political power. Rather, the same term is used by other, more reverent commentators about Tsangyang Gyatso, more in reference to his “unconventional behavior.”4
Secondly, Gongsa (gong sa) is a title referring to the Dalai Lama. Though, literally, it refers to an upper position, as in “superior” or “higher” or even “sovereign.”
This is particularly notable, especially given that between Lhazang Khan’s return to Lhasa and to his death, the Khan’s absolutely needed to present Tsangyang Gyatso as nothing more than a mistakenly identified Dalai Lama. The “present” Dalai Lama he refers to in the latter half of the quote is not Kelzang Gyatso, who is currently considered the Seventh Dalai Lama, but rather one Pekar Dzingpa Ngawang Yeshe Gyatso (1686-1725).
Yeshe Gyatso was made Dalai Lama in 1707 after the declaration that the bodhi had left Tsangyang Gyatso. The Panchen Lama was persuaded to recognize him.5 Though, in an ironic parallel to the situation regarding today’s controversy over the Panchen Lama’s politically-appointed rebirth, Yeshe Gyatso was recognized by Tibetans not as Omniscient One (thams cad mkhyen pa), but rather as Mister (sku zhabs).6 On theme, of course, there were rumors that Yeshe Gyatso was the Khan’s biological son. Though the title Pekar Dzinpa, “Holder of the White Lotus,” indicates that while Tibetans did not regard him as a true Dalai Lama, that he is still considered a true incarnation of Chenrezi.
A bodhisattva is an enlightened being who chooses to return to the world of suffering (i.e. our world) again and again to help other sentient beings out of this cycle. Chenrezi, the Bodhisattva of Compassion, has been known to incarnate as a cuckoo, a bee, and in countless different human forms. Notably for our purposes here, as the Dalai Lama. It is said that at any one point in time, Chenrezi has a thousand incarnations. A common Buddhist expression is that a reflection of the moon is not the moon. And all it takes to produce more reflections of the moon is to fill more buckets with water. Yet, no matter how many reflections of the moon they are, they are only projections and not the moon itself.
“In other words,” Mullin writes,
Tibetans believe that the lamas commanded by Lhazang Khan to enthrone a new Sixth Dalai Lama did not choose just any ordinary person for the job, but rather identified a monk who was also an emanation of Avalokiteshvara.
Again, to Tibetans this is not a difficult leap in thinking. When I once asked the present Dalai Lama about the situation he laughed and replied, “There are always thousands of incarnations of Avalokiteshvara in the world. In this case the Tibetans just had to identify one of them and give him the name of the Dalai Lama.7
Lhazang Khan’s uncontested rule over Tibet was not particularly egregious. Though at this point, the Tibetans had had enough of him, and a series of events were set in motion.
Right: Ippolito Desideri as depicted in a Vatican postmark from 1984. The P stands for Pistoia, the village in Tuscany he was born in. While S. I. stands for Societas Iesu, the Latin name for the Jesuits' full name "The Society of Jesus."
Ippolito Desideri (1684-1733), an Italian Jesuit missionary from Pistoia, arrived in Tibet was dispatched to Tibet in 1712. He arrived in India the following year, left Ladakh in 1715, and arrived in Lhasa in 1716. He would stay until 1722.
Though Tsangyang Gyatso had been dead or disappeared for almost a decade before Desideri’s arrival in the Tibetan capital, his shadow loomed large. The concept of the Dalai Lama features prominently in Desideri’s report on Tibet, particularly as an enemy to the spreading of the Gospel, versus Lhazang Khan, who he saw as much more amenable to the spread of the Gospel in Tibet,
As I have said, the Grand Lamá [Dalai Lama] of Thibet [Tsangyang Gyatso], at the time when Cinghes-Khang8 [Lhazang Khan] ruled the Kingdom, was a dissolute youth, addicted to every vice, thoroughly depraved, and quite incorrigible, because of the blind veneration and stupid faith of the Thibettans. Ignoring the sacred customs of Lamás and monks in Thibet he began by bestowing care on his hair, then he took to drinking intoxicating liquors, to gambling, and at length no girl or married woman or good-looking person of either sex was safe from his unbridled licentiousness.9
Desideri goes on to write in detail about Tibetan customs, language, and religion. Adjusting for what was considered normal in the eighteenth century, he comes across as wildly tolerant. Desideri is well aware that Tibetans are really, not so unlike Europeans. If anything, he takes great pity on them, particularly because in Tibetan religion – particularly under the guise of reincarnate Lamas for the Gelukpa and under the guise of Padmasambhava for the Nyingma – they have been deceived by the devil himself into believing in metempsychosis: the transmigration of the soul. i.e. reincarnation.10
The Italian is notable for a lot of reasons, but in particular, for being the first Westerner to truly master the Tibetan language. Desideri wrote in Tibetan well enough to compose a treatise in which he spoke eloquently about philosophy and metaphysics, attempting to debunk the Tibetan notion of rebirth, and use Tibetan (Geluk, specifically) logic to refute their very concept of the soul (or more accurately to the Tibetans, the self).11
Desideri claims that he was given a platform by Lhazang Khan to read out his treatise to an approving audience on 6 January 1717.12 It’s clear that he saw his mission going very well, that he would soon be on the cusp of converting the Khan, and then naturally, Tibet would follow.
If Desideri did indeed deliver his sermon, no Tibetan account has been recovered that recalls the event. That said, while the appearance of the “white headed Lama”13 was a notable curiosity to the Tibetans, they had bigger things on their mind.
The departed Desi, Sangye Gyatso, had cultivated close relations with the Dzungars. Many Dzungar children were studying in Tibetan monasteries.14 The relationship between the Geluk hierarchs in central Tibet and the Dzungars was well known, as the Manchu considered Tibet “key” to subduing their Dzungar rivals entirely.15 The heads of the three governing Geluk monasteries had begun reaching out to Tsewang Rabten, the new Dzungar Khan around 1714.
The timing was not a coincidence. In 1708, a boy was born in Lithang, the very place where Tsangyang had asked to lend the white crane’s wings so that he would take rebirth.16 Later named Kelzang Gyatso, monks traveled east to Lithang where they examined the boy and soon were convinced that he was indeed the reincarnate of Tsangyang Gyatso. The Tibetan general in charge of this mission apparently reported back that it didn’t matter either way, after all, Tsangyang Gyatso was declared to be a false Lama, so the boy was irrelevant. However, the general spoke to the boys parents that night and advised them to leave Lithang and take their son somewhere safe. They fled north first to the independent kingdom of Dege. From there, rumors seemed to spread to other Mongol tribes who arrived at Dege and offered the boy and his family protection. Shortly after that, they escorted him to the Blue Lake, a Mongol stronghold where Lhazang Khan and his predecessors had once held complete dominion.17
That Lhazang Khan’s former base of power had now turned against him, surrounding the rebirth of the deposed “false” Lama, should have been an indication of what was about to happen. Though it is not made clear how aware of the situation Lhazang Khan was. Indeed, he may have heard rumors, but it’s possible that the general who tipped off Kelzang Gyatso’s family may have reported back to Lhazang Khan that he examined the boy himself and that there was nothing to fear.
Now the Geluk had a new Dalai Lama. A true Dalai Lama as they saw it. But to bring him to Lhasa, and replace Mister Yeshe Gyatso with the true successor to Tsangyang Gyatso meant they needed to get Lhazang Khan out of the picture. The Tibetans didn’t have a strong enough force to oust Lhazang Khan. Indeed, what Tibetan forces there were were under his control. So they reached out to Tsewang Rabten (1643-1727) and the Dzungars.
Tsewang Rabten sent a message to Lhazang Khan in 1714, proposing a marriage alliance between his daughter and Ganden Tenzin, the son of Lhazang Khan.18 The two already had an epistolary relationship, and all Ganden Tenzin needed to do was ride out to Dzungaria and claim his bride. Lhazang Khan was suspicious, but intrigued. If the Qoshot and Dzungars could form an alliance, they’d present a formidable opponent to whomever might oppose them.19 He consulted the Lhamo Oracle (ironically, the same that once delivered to Tsangyang the would-be assassins) but the Oracle’s pronouncement was interpreted differently by both father and son. To the Khan, there was only danger ahead. To his son, there would only be danger if the wedding was postponed. He promptly mounted his horse, rode out to Dzungaria, and was immediately imprisoned.
In 1717, an army of seven thousand Dzungar cavalry entered Tibet, crossing the Yarkand Desert and approaching Lhasa from the northwest. The army was merely an escort, they claimed, bringing the bride and groom to Lhasa. Lhazang Khan did not know that his son had already been executed, and the Dzungars had come to put an end to his reign.
Above: The Qing-Dzungar Wars of the 17th and 18th Centuries. Of which, we are focused on the southern portion on the map, where the Dzungar Khanate rides across the cold deserts of south-western Tibet (Ngari) before swinging east to Lhasa. This campaign was not the culmination of events, but merely the midpoint in the rivalry between the Qing and the Dzungars.
The war was short. The Dzungars defeated a Tibetan force under Pholhanas (1689-1747)20, surrounded Lhasa and put it to siege until November 1717. After their lengthy preparations, the Dzungars took the city “almost overnight,” Shakabpa writes, leaving only the mighty Potala in Lhazang Khan’s hands. The Khan sent his son Surya out of the Potala in an attempt to break out of the Dzungar blockade of the city and summon reinforcements from the Blue Lake. It was probably futile either way, given that the Lake was in control of Kelzang Gyatso’s supporters. Regardless, Surya was captured and killed by the Dzungars almost immediately.
Lhazang Khan’s reign was over. But he decided to go out fighting. On 3 December 1717, he rode out of the Potala. Desideri, who was witness to the Dzungar siege of Lhasa, and was later impressed into their army,21 writes,
When the principal door was destroyed [the Dzungars] rushed in, but [Lhazang Khan], his second son, the Viceroy and the general had already escaped by a secret door on the northern side, where good horses awaited them, leaving the Queen with her small son [...] Their flight was soon known and the enemy dashed furiously after them. The fugitives reached a deep ditch with a double palisade at which the King’s horse took fright, and in lieu of jumping the ditch fell with the unfortunate King. The inhuman [Dzungars] came up and attacked [Lhazang Khan], who defended himself valiantly, wounding and killing several of his assailants; with a last stroke he cut off the right arm of the man nearest to him and fell dead. When the general [Tsering Dondrup] heard the news he left the royal palace with sorrowful mien, and as soon as he saw the dead King threw himself on the body and bathed the wounds with his tears, loudly praising the many virtues and admirable qualities of the King he had so basely and treacherously betrayed.22
Lhazang Khan took eleven men with him before he fell from multiple shots.
But for the people of Lhasa, they were merely out of the frying pan.
Tibetan Buddhism has a history of inter-Buddhist tolerance. Certain empowerments are only deliverable by Nyingma masters, but Kagyu, Geluk, and Sakya teachers will send their students to receive it if they think it is beneficial, to take a minor example. The Mongols in particular once had a very long tradition of religious tolerance, as described by Jack Weatherford,
Genghis Khan specifically granted religious freedom. It was his first law proclaimed outside of Mongolia (i.e, the first of his international laws, or the Ih Yasa). Every individual had the right to chose any religion (or none), and every religious institution was granted freedom from taxation. But that did not mean that they had a license to do whatever they wanted. They had to obey the law.23
Phagpa shared Khubilai Khan’s court with Taoists, Confucians, Bo shamans, Nestorian Christians, and Muslim Imams.
But that was long ago, and this is not the full story. In the pre-modern era, monasteries and temples were known to not only have political affiliations, but military ones as well. The Dalai Lamas’ administration was only allowed to rise in the first place with a succession of Mongol Khans because it replaced a succession of indigenous Tibetan Kings who ruled with the blessing of the Kagyu monasteries. They, in turn, were only allowed to rise in the first place because the original Mongol Khanate was crumbling, and so was the control of their Sakya Lamas. Sir Charles Bell even went so far as to say, “There was no tolerance at that time [the seventeenth century]; battles were fought and monasteries were pillaged.”24
It is possible at this point that while the Dzungars regarded Tsangyang Gyatso as the “true” Sixth Dalai Lama, and Kelzang Gyatso as his true rebirth, they may have interpreted the chaos of events – beginning with the Great Fifth’s rumored interest in sexual yoga, Tsangyang’s ancestry, in particular being born from a long line of Nyingma Lamas, his many girlfriends, the possibility of converting the Dalai Lama position into a hereditary one – as a Nyingma element that had infiltrated the Tibetan government.
The Dzungars apparently allowed Yeshe Gyatso to retire from the Potala. He did so quietly, and went to Chakpori Medical College, where he earned the epithet Chakpori Lama.25 Had Yeshe Gyatso been a Nyingma, it is likely he would have met a different fate. The Dzungars now went about ripping out the last vestiges of Lhazang Khan’s supporters from the Tibetan government. Four Nyingma Lamas, Dodrag Rizin Chenmo, Meling Lochen, Dongsey Pema Gyumey, and Namling Konchog Chosdrag, were executed. Following them were two relatives of the Panchen Lama, and three higher Tibetan officials.
The commander of Lhazang Khan’s Tibetan forces, Pholhanas, was spared because he was an old friend of the new Regent appointed by Tsering Dondup, Lhagyal Rabten. However, he was tortured and demoted, before sent packing westwards.26 He would return to Lhasa in 1720, at the head of his own army.
In the meantime, the Dzungars destroyed two Nyingma monasteries in the vicinity of Lhasa. They also proceeded to terrorize individual Nyingma’s in the streets, threatening them with robbery, death, or worse, according to Desideri, who writes that,
the persecution was so great as to cause the ruin and almost the destruction not only of the monks [of the Nyingma], but of the unhappy Kingdom of Thibet. […] Indeed from the first of December, 1717, until the end of October, 1720, they ill-treated and murdered the monks [of the Nyingma] and all who had dealings with them.27
It’s worth remembering that Desideri regarded Padmasambhava as a literal demon who had deceived the Tibetans. Despite his dislike of their religious understanding of the world, something Desideri regarded as not just false, but as demonic, Desideri seems never to have forgotten that these were people he was talking about.
In one passage, Desideri refers to the “Lama of Lungar,” a man he refers to as a “married Lama,” i.e. one of the Nyingma. He describes him as “a fat man, very courteous and kindly by nature, lord of an extensive fief, very rich and powerful because of his relationship with many great families, and universally loved and respected.” He describes his relationship to the man as one of great friends. Their friendship was almost broken when Desideri continued to refuse gifts from him, until the Lama of Lungar learned that Desideri refused gifts from everyone, and that it was not a personal slight.
After the Dzungars took control of Lhasa, he writes,
Overcome by compassion and moved to tears I helped the poor fugitive Lama of Lungar to escape from his persecutors. […]
He was in bed one night when a messenger arrived with the sad tidings that his wife, little daughter, and many of their followers had been made prisoners by these barbarians, and immediately afterwards he heard screams and cries that the gate of his palace was assailed by the enemy. The palace and monastery of Lungar is on a high rock surrounded by a river on three sides, but joined to the mainland on the other by a good road leading up from the public highway to the entrance of the palace and monastery. On one side a secret postern, known to but few of the inmates, opens on a steep rocky pathway leading down to the river bank. The good Lama, overwhelmed with grief and fearing to fall into the hands of these barbarians, seized his little son and in the dark night hurried down the steep path to the river where he found one of his boatmen. The man hearing the tumult had taken his boat to the path and immediately ferried the Lama across the river and hid him in a safe place. When the barbarians found their prey had escaped they seized the unfortunate boatman and tortured him in every possible way, but not a word could they extract as to the fate of his master. It chanced that in his flight the Lama passed near to where I was then living and he sent to tell me of his sad plight, and asked me to lend him some money. With every precaution and secrecy I sent it to him with many messages of condolence.28
Referring to Urghien (i.e. Padmasambhava) as a demon, Desideri cannot contain himself upon the sight of seeing the icons, idols, and objects of the Nyingma being destroyed. He writes that the Dzungars not only burned texts containing references to Padmasambhava, but they forbid anyone from uttering prayers or mantras to him, and that they turned Nyingma places of worship into stables.29
Desideri, for his part, believes that the devotion the Dzungars claimed to hold for the Geluk sect, and support for Kelzang Gyatso as the true rebirth of the Dalai Lama was just an act. That, actually, they simply sought to vent their hate for the Nyingma, and satiate their greed by taking everything they could. His evidence is quite simple: once Manchu soldiers had united with the Mongols by the Blue Lake to bring Kelzang Gyatso to Lhasa under their protection, the Dzungars attacked the Manchu escort.
But the deluded Thibettans soon discovered that the statement that they had delivered the [Dalai] Lama from his prison in China and were bringing him to his palace of Potala was only a pretext to be able to vent their hatred on the monks of the [Nyingma]. So little did the former care about the [Dalai] Lama, that when the Chinese army entered Thibet escorting him, those deceitful wolves attacked them.30
The Manchu-Mongol force was reinforced by a native Tibetan army led by Pholhanas. They defeated the Dzungars, driving them out of central Tibet, and enthroned Kelzang Gyatso in the Potala Palace. The Manchu, for their part, seemed to tacitly regard him as Dalai Lama, delivering him a golden seal with the word “Sixth” on it, implying it was either the seal to be given to the Sixth Dalai Lama, or to the successor of the Sixth. The ambiguity was probably intentional: the Manchu seemed to regard Tsangyang as anything but a true Dalai Lama, while they didn’t want to alienate Tibetans allies they who very much regarded him as so.
Pholhanas, Kelzang Gyatso, and his father Sonam Dargye would go on to have their own political saga in Tibet. But in the meantime, peace had finally been restored.
The Chinese, according to Desideri, returned properties to their Nyingma owners and reversed the persecution of Nyingma people. He reported that he was saddened to see the return of Urghien to a place of prominence in Tibetan society, but was happy that the bloodshed had stopped. He even attributed to his mission a mild success that he was able to see the belief in metempsychosis “shaken” by all that had transpired.31
The Jesuit was soon recalled from Tibet. In 1721, Capuchin monks arrived to relieve him of his mission. The rival sect would be taking over, while Desideri was to take the long road back to Rome. Desideri was getting ready to depart when
about a year later the Chinese conquered Thibet and the Lama was reinstated in his monastery of Lungar, I was still in the province of Thakpo preparing to leave Thibet according to the orders of our very Reverend Father General, and went to see my old friend. I cannot describe the tears he shed when telling me of his misfortunes, and his assurances of unchangeable friendship. He wanted to give me back the money I had sent him and many valuable presents besides, but I refused to take anything, which made him regret still more the departure of so true and intimate a friend.32
VII. Conclusion
So the answer to the question of who killed Tsangyang Gyatso is, we don’t know. We don’t even know that he was, indeed, murdered on 14 November 1706. But if he was, then it was by the order of Lhazang Khan, who was at that time, Khan of the Qoshot Mongol tribe, and King of Tibet.
Of course, the Khan’s comment about Tsangyang to Lelung Tulku is hardly a confession. Nor is it even really circumstantial evidence. It’s just a tad suspicious.
What it was, certainly, was the beginning of the long tradition of evaluating, or reevaluating, the life of Tsangyang Gyatso according to the perspective of the analyzer. To the Khan, he was charming and bold. But he was also living dangerously for the kind of person he was and the times he lived in. For Desideri, who never met the young man, he was a voracious libertine, prone to all manner of vice and “unbridled licentiousness.”
Today it is fashionable to reevaluate Tsangyang Gyatso’s behavior as having been influenced by tantric thought or philosophy, and that his poems can be reevaluated as tantric teachings. This perspective, Paul Williams, author and translator of Songs of Love, Poems of Sadness, would like the reader to know that while some verses may be read tantrically, “we do not find advanced sexual yoga used in pre-modern sources as an explanation for the Sixth Dalai Lama’s involvement with women.” Rather,
To the extent that Tibetans consider the Dalai Lama as Avalokiteshvara incarnate, and thus possessed of wonderful powers and abilities, they consider him already a Buddha and beyond the need for yoga (or conventional morality) of any kind, including sexual yoga. The highest tantric practices aim at enlightenment in one lifetime, but the Dalai Lama is considered by ordinary Tibetans already enlightened.33
The most recent Dalai Lamas do not speak very highly of him. The Thirteenth disdains that he,
did not observe even the rules of a fully ordained priest. He drank wine habitually. And he used to have his body in several places at the same time, e.g. in Lhasa, in Kong-po… and elsewhere. Even the place where he retired to the Honourable Field (i.e. died) is uncertain; one tomb of his is in Alashar in Mongolia, while there is another in the Rice Heap [Drepung] monastery. Showing many bodies at the same time is disallowed in all the sects of our religion, because it causes confusion in the work.34
The Fourteenth’s view appears to have changed. In Tibet, China and the World, he writes, “[H]e was spiritually pre-eminent, but politically, he was weak and disinterested. He could not follow the Vth Dalai Lama’s path. This was a great failure.”35 As we see in Part 3: Danzang Wangpo, however, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama’s perspective seems to have changed with the times, evolving to more of a perspective that behind the failure was purpose and intention. In other words, the current Dalai Lama ascribes to more of the tantric sexual yoga theory than his predecessors seem to.
It’s worth noting that Williams seems to only quote Geluk sources, as most people writing about central Tibetan history from a modern lens do. Indeed, most of the sources used for this article tend to be writing from an explicitly Geluk lens. Gelukpa (dge lugs pa) literally means “the virtuous ones,” or as Williams calls them “the Goodies.”36 This sect, sometimes referred to as the “Reformed” sect of Tibetan Buddhism came into being with Tsongkhapa (recall Part 1: Seventeenth Century Tibet: Historical Context) who saw the disorder and lax discipline of the previous Kadam sect, and sought to whip everyone into shape. Tsongkhapa was even considered so preeminently spiritually powerful that it’s even said he was capable of using these advanced sexual yoga techniques, but denied doing so because it would set a bad precedent.
For the Nyingma, there is no such prohibition. And the Sixth Dalai Lama, while his title was and remains a Geluk institution, was held very much by Tsangyang Gyatso, who was born into a Nyingma family. We can’t deny that pre-exile Geluk perspectives have absolutely no evidence that this type of religion was on Tsangyang Gyatso’s mind. However, it seems that there is also an element of not only rejection of the social norms (the society in question here being the monastic society) but potentially of the Geluk, specifically. And after the trauma of what the Nyingma as a culture experienced following Tsangyang Gyatso’s death, it is reasonable to conclude that there remains a possibility that his life, times, and songs may have taken on a different interpretation among the Nyingmapa that was radically different from the Gelukpa as early as the eighteenth century.
This remains speculative, however, and would require much more research into Nyingma historical literature from the (potential) death of Tsangyang Gyatso in 1706 to the exile period of 1959.
Be all that as it may, it is important to recognize two things at the end of this series. First being the humanity of the individual, Tsangyang Gyatso. At a personal level, I find it difficult to read his life story, his behavior, and his poetry, and not empathize so completely with him.
Williams includes an Appendix to his work, “The Mind of a Dalai Lama,” in which he theorizes, far away from the more definitive aspects of the book (i.e. the history and poetry) that it is possible that Tsangyang Gyatso suffered from what would have been known in Tibetan medicine as “a disorder of ‘pervasive wind,’” or to Western, scientific medicine as a serotonin deficiency.37 In other words, Williams puts the possibility that Tsangyang Gyatso might have suffered from depression, anxiety, or some other form of mental health on the table. Diagnosing any historical figure with a modern illness, especially a psychiatric one, is risky business. Similar efforts have been made to reexamine the mental health of figures such as Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson, theorizing that they may have had severe depression or even a form of autism, respectively.38
But how much of Tsangyang’s behavior was simply that of a young man? Especially one who had been held in captivity for the better part of a decade, was told after years of hunger, cold, and a dose of fear that he might be put to death with his mother and father, that he was exceedingly special… and then was informed that he actually didn’t need to obey all of those rules and strictures placed upon him?
It’s helpful to remember that when Tsangyang Gyatso died, he was merely twenty-three years old. That he wanted to drink, be merry, and multiply should not strike anyone as odd, at least in my opinion.
In a very Joseph Campbellian sense, it is also hard not to see the drama, and the narrative of Tsangyang’s life, and his handing back his novice vows and his refusal to take full ordination as his Rejection of the Call. This period of his life, the one that draws the most attention, the archery, the drinking, the sex, the poetry, was in fact rather short: a mere three years, maybe four or five, liberally. A blink of an eye in the life of most individuals, and barely noticeable in the grand scheme of history. Had Tsangyang lived past this point in his life (or at least, had he lived past this point and without the drama and violence that followed) it is possible that he may have “gotten it out of his system” so to speak, and may have started down a more formal religious path of his own accord. This would not have been particularly odd, or even without precedent: this was how the Sakya Lamas and the Gyalwang Drukpa had done things for generations, and indeed, how the Zhabdrung and his son Jampal Dorji were conducting business to the south in Bhutan.
These were not without their own issues, but they were certainly possible.
It may simply be that as time went on, that Tsangyang Gyatso may have finally realized that it was his destiny to answer the call.
Actually, there’s no real “may” about it. When push finally did quite literally come to shove (the pusher being Sangye Gyatso, the shover being Lhazang Khan), Tsangyang Gyatso stepped up. The title of Dalai Lama, and all the power and authority that came with it, had been ripped away from him. Finally.
But what he meant to the Tibetan people could not be dismissed by a few Lamas and a politically motivated Khan. What Tsangyang Gyatso gave to the Tibetan people, in my opinion, was what the Dalai Lama meant to them.
The Dalai Lama is often referred to as a sort of “Pope.” Desideri even refers to the position as a “pontiff.” But this is inaccurate on several levels. The first and most important being that the Dalai Lama is only head of his own monastery (if he even has one). The true head of the Geluk sect is the abbot of Ganden Monastery, the Ganden Tripa (Ganden Throne-holder). It is he that determines Geluk orthodoxy and, theoretically, manages the Geluk organization. The Dalai Lama is really, if we are to extend the Catholic metaphor, a very powerful bishop. That power, i.e. power that could be exerted politically and physically, developed during the reigns of Sonam, Yonten, and Lobsang Gyatso (the Third, Fourth, and Fifth Dalai Lamas). But until then, they were really just some other Lamas. The possibility that a rival Mongol tribe could swoop in and replace the Geluk establishment with a Kagyu one, and seat the Karmapa on the throne of the Potala was remote, but remained.
Tsangyang Gyatso, after his apparent death, was not just an avatar of Avalokiteshvara, but an avatar of the Tibetan people as a whole. Lobsang Gyatso was beloved by the Tibetans, that’s for certain. But he was quite literally put on a pedestal. He was overly deified. Part of this is necessary in the building of a state, which was Lobsang Gyatso’s great project. But the top of the pedestal is hard to see, and its ornament is easily replaced.
Tsangyang Gyatso literally came down off of it. He was, rather than the “sexy” Dalai Lama, the “down to earth” Dalai Lama. He drank with the common people. He sang their songs and wrote them new ones. He quite literally became parts of their families. And when it mattered, when Lhazang Khan threatened to kill those who protected him, he stepped out of the monastery and gave himself into the Khan’s custody.
We’re still in the realm of theory here.
What’s not theory, however, is that rumors that Lhazang Khan killed Tsangyang Gyatso persisted for over a decade. By the time the Dzungars arrived in Lhasa and deposed Lhazang Khan with bullets, it was widely believed that Tsangyang Gyatso had been murdered by the sovereign, who was by hook or by crook, a treasonous foreigner. And it is undeniable that Tsangyang Gyatso’s martyrdom was instrumental in the development of the Dalai Lama as a foundation for modern Tibetan culture.
Though Kelsang Gyatso was brought to the throne in Potala bearing the “seal of the Sixth Dalai Lama,” Tibetans have always referred to him as the Seventh and Yeshe Gyatso as a good monk, but false Dalai Lama. There was only one, true, Sixth Dalai Lama.
When the Great Fifth died, Desi Sangye Gyatso replaced him with a doppelganger so easily that for fifteen years, few could just barely tell the difference. Tsangyang Gyatso, by contrast, gave the Dalai Lama a face Tibetans could see, and a voice they could hear.
A voice they missed when it was so quickly gone.
Footnotes
1. Aris 1988. p. 159. His full name is given as Lelung Jedrung Lobsang Thrinley, while Mullin refers to his modern incarnation as Lelung Tulku, which I’ve used here for simplicity. Mullin refers to the story following as relayed to him orally by the Tulku, whereas Aris is quoting directly from Shakabpa’s Bod kyi srid don rgyal rabs [An Advanced Political History of Tibet], the detailed Tibetan-language sibling to his English-language text Tibet: A Political History.
2. In Tibetan ting ting means clean or well-swept, Drolma being the Tibetan translation of the female bodhisattva Tara.
3. Aris 1988. p. 160.
4. Ibid.
5. Aris 1988. p. 172.
6. Shakabpa 1984. p. 134.
7. Mullin 2001. p. 274-2755.
8. Many are under the impression that Temujin of the Borjigin Clan went by the name “Genghis Khan” with a hard leading G. Khan (or Khaan or even more accurately Qayan) is just the Mongol word for “King.” Whereas genghis, or more accurately, but less commonly, chinggis, means something along the lines of “great,” though this is disputed. A young Mongol once told me that Chinggis Khaan meant “King of the World.” Desideri’s use of the term here is obviously not a reference to Temujin who died centuries earlier, but to Lhazang Khan, who he is regarding as “the great” Khan.
9. Desideri 1931. p. 150.
10. Ibid. p. 204-205.
11. See Lopez 2017. Dispelling the Darkness: A Jesuit’s Quest for the Soul of Tibet.
12. Desideri 1931. p. 223.
13. Gokar (mgo dkar), literally “white head” was a nickname the Tibetans gave to Desideri, contrasting with how they often referred to themselves as “black headed” or “red faced.” Cleverly, Desideri tried to turn this nickname to his advantage, referring to himself in his Tibetan treatise as the “star-headed Lama” (mgo skar). “White” (dkar) and “star” (skar) being homonyms.
14. Mullin 2001. p. 275.
15. See China Marches West by Peter C. Perdue.
16. Some allege that the prophetic poem was not discovered until long after Kelzang Gyatso was enthroned as the Seventh Dalai Lama. Either way, this presents multiple historiographical challenges.
17. Shakabpa 1984. p. 134.
18. Ibid. p. 135.
19. Though Lhazang Khan was an ally of the Manchu Emperor and the Dzungars were their enemy, it is possible that Lhazang Khan was looking more practically, knowing, of course, that the Manchu were always looking to expand. He might also have had Bhutan on his mind, as he had launched a failed southwards invasion earlier that year.
20. One of the worst Tibetan names for English speakers to attempt, the three parts of this epithet are an aspirated “Po,” an aspirated “la,” followed by a “nay.” Nas is the Tibetan suffix meaning “from.” Sonam Topgye was “from Pho’lha.” Just as Tsangyang Gyatso’s best friend was “from Thar’gyas.”
21. Desideri 1931. p. 169. “After sundown on the evening of the twenty-eighth of September, 1720, I received an order from the general in command of the troops in that province to go next day armed, and with a horse, a baggage mule, and two armed serving-men on foot to the camp, under pain of death if I disobeyed. My character as a Lama was of no avail as several Lamas of Thibet had been forced to obey.”
22. Desideri 1931. p. 158-159. The possibility that Tsering Dondrup wept at the sight of the dead Khan, and even touched his dead body strains credulity. The Dzungars were very much supporters of Kelzang Gyatso as the rightful successor and heir to Tsangyang Gyatso, and would have been more likely to see Lhazang Khan as the initial betrayer, who got exactly what he deserved.
23. Weatherford 2016.
24. Bell 1931. p. 126.
25. Mullin 2001. p. 275. Though it seems that they wanted to go Lhazang Khan’s route initially and end the possibility of Yeshe Gyatso returning to haunt them for good, as the Panchen Lama had to plead for Yeshe Gyatso’s life, receiving an ambiguous response. His retirement to Chakpori medical college is described in Shakabpa as an “exile,” who then goes on to say he was “sent” to China, where he died in 1725. (p. 137.) In other words, it’s a disturbingly exact parallel to what happened to Tsangyang himself.
26. Shakabpa 1984. p. 137.
27. Desideri 1931. p. 221.
28. Desideri 1931. p. 221-223.
29. Ibid. p. 223.
30. Desideri 1931. p. 221.
31. Desideri 1931. p. 223. This is likely grand-standing on Desideri’s part. It is incredibly unlikely that Tibetans would have had their faith shaken towards “the doctrine of rebirth.” Rebirth’s relationship to events in life (i.e. karma) is complex, and far too big of a topic here, but it is no incompatible with profound tragedy. If anything, the opposite is true. Desideri likely included this in his report because he lost his mission and wanted to provide some semblance of mild success if he was to get it back. I think it’s even reasonable to conceive that Desideri might be projecting a bit, here. That he might have absorbed more Tibetan language, philosophy, and worldview than he lets on, and that being so close to this level of brutality and violence might have shaken his faith.
32. Ibid.
33. Williams 2004. p. 46.
34. ibid. p. 45.
35. p. 31. As quoted in ibid.
36. ibid. p. 21.
37. Williams 2004. p. 156-157.
38. See Lincoln’s Melancholy by Joshua Wolf Shenk and Diagnosing Jefferson by Norm Ledgin. Again, these are tricky historical areas and should always be taken with a grain of salt. However, they are worth considering (in my opinion) about how they may have influenced historical actors without going as far as being understood as definitive.
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