“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results”. So who’s really the insane ones in this situation?” –Albert Einstein
While I was in Lijiang, Yunnan recently I noted there were many photos of the Chinese recognized 11th Panchen Lama, Chokyi Gyalpo in all the monasteries, including the Karma Kagyu ones. Whereas there are none with the 14th Dalai Lama photo, a tragic turning of the tables after three centuries of Gelug absolute rule on the back of violent Mongolian military invasion and oppression, where every monastery had to have a photo of the Dalai Lama prominent on their shrines.
The Panchen Lama lineage continues to be considered second in power/seniority (in the Gelugpa lineage at least) to the Dalai Lama. Yet, the Panchen Lama lineage history and origin, is not as ‘black and white’ as the mainstream narrative perpetuated by the Gelug-Ganden authorities in Tibet and exile would have us all believe.
Many will also no doubt have heard about the so-called ‘disappearance’ of their 11th Panchen Lama, who according to the 14th Dalai Lama/ Gelugpa sectarian Tibetan exile institution narrative (which most ‘orientalist’ westerners have blindly accepted), was ‘kidnapped’ by the Chinese communist government forces and is being used as a puppet by them for their political purposes.
However, most people (including myself until recently) do not seem to be aware that prior to that, the 14th Dalai Lama had recognised the 10th Panchen Lama, who is still alive and living in Ireland still. Indian Kālacakra scholar-translator, Niraj Kumar who quotes a Western scholar in his book, Kālacakra Tantra about this issue, says:
“There were two official 10th Panchen Lamas and now there are two 11th Panchen Lamas. Panchen Ontrul Rinpoche was recognised to be the emanation of the 9th Panchen Lama by the 14th Dalai Lama. So, when the 10th Panchen Otrul Rinpoche dies will his reincarnation be the third 11th Panchen Lama. So what are we to make of this, when the Tibetan exile government are also saying that the 11th Panchen Lama is missing?”
So what is happening here, and why has the position of Panchen Lama become so important in Tibetan Buddhist history? Again, like the rise to political and spiritual power of the Dalai Lama/Gelugpas in Tibet as a result of the Mongolian military violence and theft, if we look at the history of the Panchen Lamas in Tibet and how they came to power and recognition, we can see there is a similarly profoundly dark and political past to it. This article is a small start to challenge and change that mainstream, and inaccurate narrative to one that acknowledges the political forces that created the Panchen Lama name and lineage.
Guru Padmasambhava stated in several termas that the yellow hat Gelugpas would almost destroy Tibet and the Buddha Dharma there. The Panchen Lama lineage is another clear example of how they did that, in fact, in terms of Chinese claims to Tibet, they started when the 5th Dalai Lama allowed Tibet to be ruled by the Qing empire with himself as the spiritual and political Tibetan leader. I dedicate this article to the memory of the 10th Karmapa, and the King of Tsang brutally murdered by the Mongolian-Gelug alliance, and to Tibetans in Tibet and in exile, to the Tibetan Buddhist heritage and culture, to all beings and to the Buddha Dharma.
Music? Guru Padmasambhava mantra and Gimme Some Truth, by John Lennon.
The history of the recognition of the Panchen Lama in Tibet: a political appointment of the teacher of the 5th Dalai Lama
Unknown to perhaps many, like the institution of the Dalai Lama, the establishment of Panchen Lama title and role by the Gelugpa lineage is not really a ‘tulku’ lineage in the purest sense of the word as described by the 17th Karmapa recently, based on inner realisations alone, but was also imposed on Tibetans by the Gelug-Mongolian military forces. Thus, the lineage is not renowned at all for great spiritual realisations, legacy, scholarship etc., but for simply being the 5th Dalai Lama’s tutor, who received the title “Panchen Bogd” from Altan Khan and the Dalai Lama in 1645, who declared he was an emanation of Buddha Amitabha. Bogd is Mongolian, meaning “holy”. The first to third Panchen Lamas were then recognised posthumously. Officially, he became the first Panchen Lama in the lineage, while he had also been the sixteenth abbot of Tashilhunpo Monastery.
However, eventually, the absolute violent and sectarian religious dictatorship of the Gelugpa/Ganden government (the Dob-Dob culture) became too much even for the 9th Panchen Lama, Thubten Chokyi Nyima, who was forced to flee into China from the aggression of the Ganden government, who were demanding excessive taxes and suppressing all the major lineages there. The 9th Panchen Lama then began to give mass Kalacakra empowerments, outside Tibet, at the suggestion and with the support of the Chinese. Up until then, the Dalai Lamas had had little to zero interest in Kalacakra. However, incensed or moved by the Panchen Lama’s Kalacakra activity, the 14th Dalai Lama then started to give such mass empowerments himself in Tibet and in exile India and foreign countries. For more on that, see my article here.
In addition, the Panchen Lama institution is known for its practice of the now-banned worldly ‘protector’ whom the 14th Dalai Lama says has turned into a malevolent force of Gelug sectarianism, and is endangering Tibetan lives and that of the Dalai Lama himself (and that is according to the Gelugpas, so must be bad!) However, as can be seen in the tragic arrests, deaths, imprisonments and so on surrounding those involved with the recognition of 11th Panchen Lama in Tibet, as with the political appointment of the 5th Dalai Lama by the Mongolians, the politically created Panchen Lama lineage has led to nothing but murder, heartache and trouble for Tibetans.
The Tenth Panchen Lama’s support of Chinese ‘liberation’, Kālacakra empowerment and 17-point agreement
The official 10th Panchen Lama (recognised by China) was born as Gonpo Tseten on 19 February 1938, in Bido, today’s Xunhua Salar Autonomous County of Qinghai, known as Amdo. His father was also called Gonpo Tseten and his mother was Sonam Drolma. After the 9th Panchen Lama died in 1937, two simultaneous searches for the tenth Panchen Lama produced different boys, with the government in Lhasa preferring a boy from Xikang, and the 9th Panchen Lama’s khenpos and associates choosing Gonpo Tseten. On 3 June 1949, the Republic of China (ROC) government declared its support for Gonpo Tseten.
On 11 June 1949, at twelve years of age in the Tibetan counting system, Gonpo Tseten was enthroned at the major Gelugpa monastery in Amdo, Kumbum Jampa Ling monastery and given the name Lobsang Trinley Lhündrub Chökyi Gyaltsen. Attending were also Guan Jiyu, the head of the Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission, and ROC Kuomintang Governor of Qinghai, Ma Bufang. Still in Lhasa, the 14th Dalai Lama had previously recognised a 10th Panchen Lama, Ontrul Rinpoche, but then later recognized the Panchen Lama Choekyi Gyaltsen a few years later, after they met.
The 10th Panchen Lama reportedly supported China’s claim of sovereignty over Tibet, and supported China’s reform policies for Tibet. Radio Beijing broadcast the religious leader’s call for Tibet to be “liberated” into China, which created pressure on the Lhasa government to negotiate with the People’s Republic. At Kumbum Monastery, the Panchen Lama gave a Kalacakra initiation in 1951. That year, the Panchen Lama was invited to Beijing as the Tibetan delegation was signing the 17-Point Agreement and telegramming the Dalai Lama to implement the Agreement. He was recognized by the 14th Dalai Lama when they met in 1952. The terms of the agreement claimed that Tibet sought Chinese protection from imperialist powers. Clause One of the agreement stated that “The Tibetan people shall unite and drive out imperialist aggressive forces from Tibet; the Tibetan people shall return to the family of the Motherland – the PRC.”
Almost all the narratives about that 17 point agreement say that Tibetans were ‘forced to sign it’. Although that may be true, what is often omitted from that narrative is how the actions of the Dalai Lamas (from the 17th Century onwards) and the Gelugpa ruling forces set the whole ball in motion enabling and allowing Qing Chinese dynasty to prop up their new-found absolute power, that led to later Chinese claims of ownership of Tibet.
The curious case of the living 10th Panchen Lama chosen by the 14th Dalai Lama
However, unbeknown to many, there seem to be actually two 10th Panchen Lamas, the one above who was chosen by the 9th Panchen Lama’s Khenpos and Lamas and the Chinese, and another who was chosen earlier by the 14th Dalai Lama, Panchen Ontrul Rinpoche, who is still alive and living in Ireland.
Panchen Otrul Rinpoche was born in Kham around 1939. In 1951, he was taken to Lhasa as a possible re-incarnation of the Panchen Lama who had died in 1937. According to the Kālacakra Tantra scholar, Niraj Kumar, and probably unknown to most, this tulku choice was picked by the 14th Dala Lama, but later dropped him, when it became clear that the Chinese and Panchen Lama sangha backed one was becoming more powerful and well-known, and so he recognised him instead. The boy was then given the title “Panchen Ontrul,” which means “Panchen Candidate.” and taken to Drepung Gomang Monastery where he continued his Dharma studies. The rest they say is historical oblivion, until here in this article perhaps.
Four days before his death, the official 10th Panchen Lama, Chokyi Gyeltsen made his own will publicly to follow the tradition. On 24 January, following the opening ceremony of the Ling Pagoda, with religious figures in Tibet, Qinghai, Gansu, Sichuan and Yunnan provinces and autonomous regions, the 10th Panchen Lama held a special talk on the reincarnation of the Living Buddha, proposing that ” candidate boys should be identified first and then investigated one by one”.
If the 10th Panchen Lama is still alive, why do the Tibetan exile authorities say their 11th Panchen Lama has been kidnapped?
Three days after the death of the 10th Panchen Lama, the Premier of the State Council published its decision on how the 11th Panchen Lama was to be selected, claiming to have taken advice from the committee of Tashi Lhunpo Monastery and monks.
Armed with Beijing’s approval, the head of the Panchen Lama search committee, Chadrel Rinpoche, maintained private communication with the Dalai Lama in order to arrive at a mutually acceptable candidate for both the Dalai Lama and Beijing authorities concerning the Panchen Lama’s reincarnation.
However, the Dalai Lama named Gedhun Choekyi Nyima as the 11th incarnation of the Panchen Lama on 14 May 1995. Despite the fact that the 10th Panchen Lama originally chosen by the 14th Dalai Lama was alive and well in Ireland, on 14 May 1995, the Dalai Lama then recognized a new 11th incarnation of the Panchen Lama. How was that possible? That is question that perhaps only the 14th Dalai Lama could answer. However, to an objective observer such ‘dropping’ of the 10th Panchen Lama seems to be more a political move, rather than one based on realisations and authenticity.
It also provoked and incensed the Chinese authorities, who had Chadrel Rinpoche arrested and charged with treason and leaking state secrets. He is reported to have been disappeared from the Chengdu Airport on either 14 May, during his return from Beijing to Chengdu, or a few days later.
The Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy reports that Champa Chungla, his assistant and deputy director of the monastery, was also disappeared from the airport. Gyara Tsering Samdrup, a business associate of the 10th Panchen Lama, was also detained.
In 1996, Chadrel Rinpoche was formally expelled from the CPPCC. Three days later on 17 May, the Tibetan exile government, led by the 14th Dalai Lama stated that the six-year-old Panchen Lama was kidnapped and forcibly disappeared by the Chinese government. The Chinese then recognised and enthroned the 11th Panchen Lama, who is pictured with his photo in many Tibetan Buddhist monasteries in China and Tibet. A karmic turnaround of the Dalai Lama in every Tibetan monastery of brute Mongolian-Gelug dictatorship.
Prolonging the karmic suffering and results of Gelugpa sectarianism in Tibet and India?
The United Nations, with the support of numerous states, NGOs, and private individuals continue to call for the 11th Panchen Lama’s release. Yet another ‘thorn in the side’ of Chinese-India-Tibet relations, and one that the Gelugpa sectarian powers in exile, show no signs of dropping for greater harmony and friendship.
Especially, as the more one investigates the history and creation of the Panchen Lama institution, the more one discovers that it was based more about maintaining and preserving political power, rather than on genuine Buddhist realisations, purpose and legacy. Yet is anyone actually asking the question that perhaps it is that very institution and the forces of unseen beings they used for political reasons, that is completely blocking now any really movement or liberation of Tibet and with better and harmonious relations with India and China? Also, there should be no surprise at all that the Panchen Lama institution is now being used by the Chinese government for political reasons, right?
Still the dangerous and destructive Gelugpa sectarianism and propaganda continues in Tibet itself with Tibetans regularly losing their lives in prisons and by their own hands, over their continued support of the previous Dalai Lama/Gelugpa rulers. For example, recently, it was reported that Tenzin Dorjee, a learned monk at the Shelkar monastery committed suicide due to teaching texts by the Dalai Lama. Ironically, Shelkar used to be a Sakya monastery founded in 1385 by the renowned Lotsawa Drakpa Gyeltsen of the Sakya school, which was forcibly and violently converted to Gelug in the 17th century. The karmic past lingers on and on, with no change of approach or end in sight.
US-Gelug policy bullying and silencing Indian and foreign critics, and endangering Indian lives and harmony in the India-China region
Certainly, geo-political experts, such as Dr. Andrea Galli (2018) have noted that the Indian government have also recently had to change its approach to Tibetan-Indian politics after the ‘highly provocative’ visit of the 14th Dalai Lama to Arunachal Pradesh in 2017, and the danger that caused Indians in that region from the inflamed Chinese reaction. This was then followed by the ‘highly inappropriate’ incident with of the 14th Dalai Lama with an Indian boy in 2023, and then this year the inflammatory and divisive, and non-Buddhist, comments of the US politician, Nancy Pelosi in Dharamsala while a guest of the Dalai Lama there.
It is clear that the generous and compassionate Indian hosts of the Tibetan exile powers, are starting to regard their Gelugpa-sectarian guests (now sometimes religious bullies) with some suspicion, and mistrust. For example, the organised mass letter-writing/email campaign of (apparently) hundreds of exile Tibetans to silence, ‘cancel’ and remove the then Director, Niraj Kumar from his job at the Indian Ministry of Culture, (for being critical of the mass Kālacakra empowerments and the Dalai Lama’s actions with the boy) was the final straw for some Indian officials privately too.
This growing resentment towards Tibetans in exile is not due to Indian racism towards the Tibetans (as many Tibetans shouted at the tops of their voice when the Indian media castigated the 14th Dalai Lama for his trying to get inappropriate and forced oral contact with a boy). Practically speaking, the Indians have been the most generous and kindest nation in the world to the Tibetans who escaped from Tibet to live in India. Nor is it due to Chinese malevolence or spies etc. as the Gelugpas love to slander and point the blame at anyone who dares to question their biased, one-sided narrative. It is mainly due to the ongoing Gelugpa sectarianism and discrimination they have continued in India for the last six decades, and which they still show no signs of changing.
After all, as I wrote about here, why do all the Tibetan Buddhist monasteries in exile still have a photo of the 14th Dalai Lama on their shrines, but not of any of the other lineage heads? Centuries of intimidation, propaganda, violence and brainwashing can be hard to break free from, but there are some Tibetans who have tried (and still do), such as Gedun Chophel, Tashi Tsering, and even the 9th Panchen Lama.
The Gelugpa sectarian Tibetan exile media outlets, funded and supported by the US government are still going strong, but one thing is for sure, karmically it is clear, the Gelugpas basically shot themselves (and Tibetans) in the foot when it comes to genuine peace, harmony and freedom in Tibet both pre- and -post 1959. In fact, this future ‘bad result’ was predicted by the 5th Dalai Lama himself, when he learned of his regent, Sonam Chophel’s violent and aggressive actions towards the other Buddhist leaders and lineages with the Mongolian army.
However, the Gelugpa-US approach is also now potentially endangering Indians too, and always has damaged India-Chinese relations. Do they care about that though? Seemingly no, but they cling to power and the same old political rhetoric (see Nancy Pelosi’s recent speech in Dharamsala) as if nothing has ever changed.
Even the powerful and infallible teacher of karma seems to be having little to no impact on the sectarian Gelugpa general strategy and attitude. As the Shakyamuni Buddha taught, but also as Albert Einstein (the scientist so many Gelugpas in exile seem to admire) is reported to have said: “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results”.
