Dalai Lama Biography

His Holiness is a saint. Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, is the Tibetan people's spiritual and temporal leader. He was born in Taktser, a tiny town in northeastern Tibet. His Holiness was born into a peasant family and was recognised as the rebirth of the 13th Dalai Lama at the age of two, according to Tibetan tradition. The Dalai Lamas (Tenzin Gyatso) are reincarnations of the Bodhisattva of Compassion, who decided to reincarnate to assist humanity. The name Dalai Lama translates to "Ocean of Wisdom." His Holiness is known to Tibetans as Yeshin Norbu, the Wish-fulfilling Gem, or simply Kundun, which means The Presence. The People's Republic of China invaded in the same year. 

Fearing assassination, he and tens of thousands of followers fled to Dharamshala, India, where they founded an alternative government. Then the Dalai Lama has made several steps to establish an autonomous Tibetan state within the People's Republic of China country. The Chinese government, on the other hand, has shown no signs of making progress toward peace and reconciliation with Tibet. The Dalai Lama has given hundreds of seminars, workshops, and lectures, around the world as part of his humanitarian efforts. In the year of 1989, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. After gallstone surgery, the Dalai Lama announced his semi-retirement in December 2008.

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An image of the 14th Dalai Lama

Early Life

In Mongolian, the word "Dalai" means "ocean" (the name "Gyatso" comes from the Tibetan word for ocean). "Lama" is the Tibet equivalent of the Sanskrit word "guru," which means “spiritual teacher”. The title Dalai Lama translates to “Ocean Teacher,” indicating a “spiritual teacher as deep as the ocean”. He is the Tibetan government in exile of state and spiritual leader, situated in Dharamshala, India. Tibetans believe he is his grandparents' and mothers' reincarnation. He had worked for nearly 50 years to establish Tibet as a self-governing, democratic state. Lhamo Thondup was the fifth of sixteen children, seven of whom died at a young age. 

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Images of a monastery young Dalai Lama 

After searching for a successor to the 13th Dalai Lama for several months and following several key spiritual signs, religious officials discovered Lhamo Thondup at the age of two and Thubten Gyatso, the 13th Dalai Lama, was identified as his reincarnation.

Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, was renamed Young Lhamo and proclaimed the 14th Dalai Lama. The 14th Dalai Lamas are considered to be a rebirth of Avalokitesvara, a Buddhist deity who is the personification of compassion and represents compassion. Dalai Lamas are enlightened beings who have chosen to postpone their afterlife to save humanity.

Education in Tibet

He started his studies at the age of 6 years and finished his Geshe Lharampa Degree (Doctorate of Buddhist Philosophy) at the age of twenty-five years. When he was 24, he took the preliminary examinations at each of the three monastic universities which are named Sera, Ganden and Drepung. During the annual Monlam Festival of Prayer, which takes place in the first month of each year, the final exam was held at Lhasa's Jokhang. He was tested on logic by 30 scholars in the morning. In the day, he debated the Middle Path with 15 scholars, and in the evening, 35 scholars put his knowledge of the canon of monastic discipline and metaphysics to the test. His Holiness the fourteenth Dalai Lama has performed himself excellently in the examinations, which were held in front of a wide audience of monk scholars.

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Dalai Lama Buddhist Teaching

Buddhism was founded in the sixth century BCE, when Buddha Siddhartha Gautama was born, making it one of the world's oldest religions. The religion originated in India and extended throughout most of eastern and southern Asia. In the eighth century CE, Buddhism arrived in Tibet. Unlike other religions, Buddhism focuses on four fundamental truths: life is imperfect, people are left unsatisfied by attempting to make life perfect, people can recognise there is a better way to achieve fulfilment, and people can achieve enlightenment by living their lives with wisdom, ethical conduct, and mental discipline. There are innumerable layers of teachings on the nature of existence, life, death, and the self within these truths.

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An image of a monastery

Buddhism encourages its followers to study, analyse, and test the facts against their own experiences rather than believing in them, as other religions encourage their followers to believe in their religion's primary leaders and dogma. The emphasis here is on exploration. Rebirth in Buddhism is more of a concept of "renewal" than a reincarnation of a spirit or body. As a flame goes from one candle to another in Buddhism, a person's consciousness can become a part of the consciousness of another person. The second flame would be neither the same nor different to the first.

As a result, Buddhists believe that life is a continuous path of discovery and experience, rather than a divide between life and the afterlife.

Leadership Responsibilities

When Tibet was threatened by China's might in 1950, His Holiness was called upon to assume full political responsibility as Head of State and Government at the age of 16.

He travelled to Peking in 1954 to meet with Mao Tse-Tung and other Chinese leaders such as Chou En-Lai and Deng Xiaoping. He met with Prime Minister Nehru and Premier Chou in 1956 while in India for the 2500th Buddha Jayanti to discuss the deteriorating situation in Tibet. After the Chinese military annexation of Tibet in 1959, he was driven into exile in India. He has lived in Dharamsala, sometimes known as "Little Lhasa," since 1960, where the Tibetan Government-in-Exile is based. His Holiness made three appeals to the United Nations on the Tibet issue during his early years in exile, resulting in three resolutions voted by the General Assembly in 1959, 1961, and 1965.

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An image of the Dalai Lama addressing a crowd

His Holiness issued a draught constitution for Tibet in 1963, guaranteeing a democratic form of government. His Holiness has established educational, cultural, and religious institutions that have made significant contributions to the preservation of Tibetan identity and legacy throughout the previous two decades. He has provided several initiations and teachings, including the rare Kalachakra Initiation, which he has performed more than any of his predecessors. His Holiness continues to present new measures aimed at resolving Tibet's problems. In 1987, he offered a Five-Point Peace Plan to the Congressional Human Rights Caucus as a first step toward settling Tibet's future status. Tibet must be classified as a peaceful zone, according to this plan. The tremendous influx of ethnic Chinese into Tibet is coming to an end, and fundamental human rights and democratic freedoms are being reinstated. The cessation of China's use of Tibet for nuclear weapons production and waste dumping, as well as “honest negotiations” on Tibet's future and relations with the Tibetan people. On June 15, 1988, in Strasbourg, France, he expanded on the Five-Point Peace Plan and urged the establishment of a self-governing democratic Tibet "in cooperation with the People's Republic of China."

The Dalai Lama, in his speech, said that this was the "most practical way to re-establish Tibet's unique identity and restore the Tibetan people's fundamental rights while satisfying China's interests."

Becoming the Dalai Lama

Tenzin began his religious instruction when he was six years old. His education included logic, Tibetan art and culture, Sanskrit, medicine, and Buddhist philosophy, which is split into five categories: wisdom perfection, monastic discipline, metaphysics, logic, and epistemology (knowledge study). Tenzin met Heinrich Harrer, an Austrian climber when he was 11 years old. Heinrich Harrer became one of Tenzin's tutors, teaching him about the outside world. Harrer died in 2006, and the two remained friends. Tenzin took full political power as the Dalai Lama in 1950, when he was just 15 years old. His governorship, however, was brief. The People's Republic of China conquered Tibet in October of that year, with minimal resistance. The Dalai Lama travelled to Beijing in 1954 to meet with Mao Zedong and other Chinese leaders for peace negotiations. However, the Tibetan people rose in 1959 as a result of Chinese troops' ongoing persecution. The Dalai Lama and his closest advisers felt he was being assassinated by the Chinese government. As a result, he and thousands of his supporters fled to Dharamshala in northern India, where they founded an alternate government.

14th Dalai Lama Biography

The 14th Dalai Lama, also called Jamphel Ngawang Lobsang Yeshe Tenzin Gyatso, Bstan-'dzin-rgya-mtsho, or Tenzin Gyatso, original name Lhamo Thondup, Thondup also spelt Dhondup. He downplayed the pomp and circumstance surrounding his position, portraying himself as an "ordinary Buddhist monk." Highly advanced religious teachers return to the world after death, motivated by their compassion for the world, according to Tibetan Buddhism religion (which has traditionally flourished not only in Tibet but also in Nepal, Mongolia, Bhutan, Sikkim, and other parts of India and China).

(For more on the Dalai Lama's call to compassion, see Dalai Lama: A Call to Compassion.) There were thousands of these teachers at the time of the Chinese invasion of Tibet in 1950, referred to in English as "incarnate lamas" (the Tibetan name is sprul SKU, which means "emanation body"). The Dalai Lama, whose lineage dates back to the 14th century, was the most influential and well-known of these teachers.

In 1580, the Mongol chieftain Altan bestowed the title of Dalai Lama (“Ocean Teacher”) on the third incarnation, known as Bsod-nams-rgya-mtsho (1543–88). His two prior incarnations were named the first and second Dalai Lamas after his death. The Dalai Lamas were important religious instructors of the Dge-lugs-pa sect (also known as Yellow Hats), one of Tibetan Buddhism's four major sects, until the 17th century. The fifth Dalai Lama was granted temporal rule of Tibet in 1642, and the Dalai Lamas remained in power until the 14th Dalai Lama's exile in 1959.

The prior incarnations of the 14th Dalai Lama are supposed to include the first Buddhist kings (chos rgyal) of the 7th, 8th, and 9th centuries, as well as the previous 13 Dalai Lama incarnations. All Dalai Lamas and these early rulers are revered as human representations of Avalokiteshvara, the compassionate bodhisattva and guardian of Tibet.