Love, Compassion and a Warm Heart
Kemp, H. “Love, Compassion and a Warm Heart: the Dalai Lama in Wellington, May, 2002” Zadok Perspectives. Issue 76, Spring 2002, 17 – 19.
I first met the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala, North India when I was 16 years old. I was on a school field trip, and at the time, I had no idea who he was, except for some vague notion that the Tibetan people had been pushed out of Tibet by the Chinese and that the Dalai Lama was their leader.
Since my embarrassment at that first encounter, I have made it a priority to learn something of Tibet’s unique culture and religion and to explore an appropriate Christian response to it. To that end, I spent three years in Mongolia, one of the several central Asian countries which have come under Tibetan Buddhism’s influence. I was there to help in developing Christian resource material for training Mongolian Church leaders.
Now being resident in New Zealand, I am naturally curious to hear what the Dalai Lama says to the West. On May 27th, 2002, I therefore took a World Religions class of mine to Wellington’s Queen’s Wharf Exhibition Centre to hear him.
The hall was filled to its capacity of 4500, mainly professional people who had merely stepped out of their offices at 5 pm and into the event. By some ironic coincidence, ex-USA-president Bill Clinton was speaking at an $800 per ticket event in Auckland at the same time. “I know where I’d rather be”, said Sir Paul Reeves, Anglican Bishop and ex-Governor-General in his welcome, alluding perhaps to the perceived spiritual and moral depth (or lack of it) in both.
Sir Paul suggested in his introduction that we were assembled together to consider “what this experience called life is, and why are we taking part in it?” What were the values and moral framework needed in society and “what is the essence of the creature engaged with the Creator and the cosmos?” It crossed my mind that the Dalai Lama may have trouble answering this question since according to classic Buddhist philosophy, a Creator, if it exists, certainly has no personality, and even then our perceptions of the cosmos are an illusion at best. I had recently read the Dalai Lama’s book on ethics[1]; Sir Paul’s proposition was more of an invitation for the Dalai Lama to explore the field of secular ethics expounded in the book, rather than to give us a long dissertation on the disciplines of Tibetan Buddhist tantrism or the finer points of the kalachakra ceremonies.
His Holiness obliged, and gave us a lecture on secular ethics. His Holiness spoke with no notes, and seated himself cross legged on the sofa provided, with a translator to his left and slightly behind to help him out when he got stuck. His English had improved considerably since I’d heard him previously in Christchurch Anglican cathedral in 1996.
His Holiness explained that he had come to New Zealand (and Australia) to promote human values: to show care and responsibility within community is the foundation of a happy life. Financial security was only secondary to this, as the pursuit of wealth often caused “negative emotions” and hence the loss of happiness. “Mental unhappiness” cannot be overcome by wealth but only through “peace of mind”. We should make every effort to work on “mental balance” and people should “show more interest in the inner life”. As “humans have evolved” it has been natural to make the effort to resolve the immediate problem of material need. But as a society develops wealth, “then we start to understand life has a higher level of spiritual understanding and also problems”. He went on to explain that because of this we therefore need to increase basic human good qualities of “compassion, sharing and respect, which is the opposite of hate, self-centredness, greed and power”. The result will be that the negative forces in our mind will decrease and “positive qualities will increase… not through meditation, but through education”.
His reference to education marks a change from the last time I’d heard him speak. Was this a concession to the West? In Mongolia or India he would have said “through meditation” and left it there. What seemed to be emerging was a treatise on secular spirituality; two modes of promoting the “increase of secular moral ethics”, were recommended, namely education and the family.
His agenda for education was to promote “love, compassion and a warm heart”; if society has these, then it will improve. With regard to the family, he affirmed that children should not be isolated without affection, and chided the West for neglecting its children due to the pursuit of second jobs and wealth: “it is better to build good values in your children”. If the one-ness of humanity is promoted in the family, then violence will decrease: “conflict must stop in the family!” A point I heartily agree with.
Introducing the topic of violence, His Holiness shifted to the issue of world peace. He believed that there is a growing desire for peace in the world: “this is a good change”. Ironically, and despite this shift, people still like watching violent movies. “Me too” he admitted. “I like the shiny polished guns”. A wave of nervous chuckle rippled through the hall. “All conflict must be resolved with dialogue, but it is unrealistic to expect to have no problems at all… if all reached nirvana, then it will be good”.
His ultimate solution for world peace is the process of dialogue. Both parties in a conflict “have the right to live, and to live happily. Our humanity means we are inter-related, therefore we must dialogue. Destruction of your neighbour is destruction of yourself. If you can compromise, then dialogue is easily achieved”. We must make every effort to decrease hatred, and we do this by “inner disarmament, which must go side by side with external disarmament”. He illustrated the success of this by referring to the recent Bush-Putin summit in which 2/3 or the combined US-Russian nuclear arsenal would be cut back: “complete elimination [of nuclear weapons] should be the goal”.
At this point he braved an excursion into the new physics, attempting to theorise about the creation of a “unified force” to reduce the risk of war, drawing on the work of a German professor, one D.Baum. “I’m not a good student”, His Holiness reflected, “but Germany and France are friends now [after many years of warfare]”. At the international level, we must “discuss openly, frankly with a compassionate heart… to harbour more compassionate attitudes has many benefits in many areas of life”, including international politics.
With this, he abruptly finished his monologue on secular ethics. I had recognised some of the language from his recent publications, but found that his presentation lacked philosophical depth. He’d been able to hold the attention of a vast audience for nearly an hour so far; he certainly had charisma and charm.
Then he suddenly switched to religion. “Religious belief and basic human values are two separate things”, he abruptly announced as precursor to his second part of the presentation. As is the custom at his meetings, a question box had been circulated around the audience before hand in which visitors were invited to place written questions. Knowing this would happen, I had told my class to stack the box with strategic questions; I had placed a total of nine in, to increase the odds that one of mine would be selected. Now that he was onto religion, I was looking for categories of definitions: I wanted my students to hear him define terms like “forgiveness, love, compassion, soul” and most importantly who he thought Jesus was. This would give us fuel for further discussion back in the classroom.
I was disappointed with his reflections on religion, although I admired his audacity in commenting on Christianity: “religious traditions have the important role to serve and help humanity… Some problems are created in the name of religious traditions, but all religious traditions carry the same message; love, compassion, forgiveness, tolerance, self-discipline, contentment… like Christianity and Buddhism do. In Christianity, the monastic system of discipline is simplistic, like Buddhism’s monasteries and nunneries. [They share] a common method, a common practice, a common ground. We have common respect, therefore we should work together".
I had read earlier in the year the book by Thich Nhat Hanh, Going Home: Jesus and Buddha as Brothers.[2] Hanh is a Vietnamese monk now resident in Village des Pruniers (Plum Village) in east Bordeaux, France. He has established a study centre where both Buddhist and Christian disciplines are embraced and even mixed. I had become very suspicious of this experiment, finding Hanh’s agenda to be naïve, neglecting basic Christian hermeneutics of both Scripture and culture. For example, Hanh says “if you do not succeed in getting in touch with the horizontal dimension, you will not be able to get in touch with the vertical dimension (or ‘vertical theology’)… If you cannot love man, animals, and plants, I doubt that you can love God”.[3] In other words, the vertical relationship with God is secondary to the horizontal relationships around us. Surely this is opposite to basic Christian teaching, that first we must get right with God (the ‘vertical theology’) before we can get right with people and creation around us?
In a similar vein to Hanh, His Holiness believed that all religions have a common message and experience: “We should all promote harmony amongst the religious traditions. Even the Buddha incorporated Hindu ideas”. Hanh is experimenting with Christianity and Buddhism in France, but both religious leaders reveal a basic misunderstanding of a Christian hermeneutic: buddhist “mindfulness” is not the same as the Holy Spirit[4], nor is the Holy Spirit merely the “energy of God”[5], nor does “one thing contain the whole cosmos”.[6]
The Dalai Lama believes however, that sincerity is the key commonality: once a person has decided on which religion they will follow then “we should not label ourselves Christian or Buddhist if in daily life there is no practice of it”. Only if we are sincere in our own religion will we then “gain deeper spiritual experiences which will lead us to see the value of other traditions”. Sincerity, apparently leads to happiness: “all people have the same desire, namely happiness… If you have a happy life then at the end, you will have satisfaction”.
In summary? Sincerely believe in what you will, as long as you end up happy. Or maybe this is too simplistic? But I’m forced to end up with this conclusion, if I am to believe in what he says (or to practice buddhist “mindfulness”, which apparently, according to Pritam Singh, “has been embraced and become a part of Christendom”[7]).
Two major factors are missing, in my mind. The first being Truth, and the second, moral outrage. Granted, Tibetan Buddhism isn’t particularly looking for truth: classic Buddhism in Tibet is more interested in tools for getting through today, rather than attempting to plumb metaphysical abstractions. And the western form of Tibetan Buddhism certainly is sympathetic to this non-quest for truth. But sincerity in whatever? Surely it matters crucially what you believe: you can sincerely believe you are superman, but it is highly improbable that you will be able to catch a bullet in your teeth.
And moral outrage? His Holiness finished with these reflections: “we should now use our inner potential through training of our mind. We can gain new understanding which will lead to a more open mind… mental attitude is the key factor in our inner life. Analyse yourself, then eventually you will gain some benefit.” So I should train my mind to have compassion for the Chinese who just raped my land, and for Hitler who exterminated six million Jews? Certainly I need to find some forgiveness, if possible, but I can only do that because I know that ultimately there is a righteous God who is morally offended and outraged himself at the injustice! If His Holiness had come merely to “promote human values”, then he had certainly achieved nothing more than this. Where was the passion and conviction of the Christian evangelist?
So we came to question time.
Question 1: “What do we need most as human?”
Good humoured answer: “I’ve already explained that. Next question” (chuckles from the audience).
Question 2: “Do you feel the consciousness of the people of this planet is moving towards a spiritual awakening?”
Answer: “It’s difficult to say. There is a natural force leading this. I think we need to make the effort and then we as a people will move to greater understanding”. (Implication: of course there is, but its momentum depends on each individual’s mental cooperation towards harmony)
Question 3: “Is it possible for you to forgive the Chinese for stealing your country”. Bingo! One of my questions. I had put it into the box, wanting him to commit himself to a definition of “forgiveness”.
In response, His Holiness first had a long and animated conversation in Tibetan with his translator, and then replied: “Forgiveness is the ability to refrain from harbouring enmity and losing compassion. It does not mean submission. The Chinese have neglected proper education and training. Their intent is the control of Tibet. They want the minerals, forests etc. The Chinese government must respect our culture and environment. We must stand on our principle, but we must not hate and have anger. We must make a distinction between the government and the [Chinese] people. The Chinese people themselves suffer like us. We must have concern and compassion towards the government officials, and intentionally not allow ill-feeling. They are human brothers and sisters”.
This I found to be a noble answer, although shallow, lacking any sense of justice, recompense or metaphysical concepts. I still prefer the answer in the “scandal of the cross”, that God in Christ actually achieved a real, forensic, once for all death to animosity, and that the resurrected Christ empowers people now to live in an ongoing forgiven and forgiving state, should they wish to appropriate this forgiveness offered. His Holiness finished his answer with the caveat “forgiveness does not entail forgetting”.