Particularly, it is these instances of intimidation, and the structural implementation of the manipulation of people, that bring such systems of thought into the proximity of cults (Hassan 2018). But, since these challenges cannot be solved individually, analyses of the underlying structures and of the complex interrelations promoting such incidents are required, without disregarding the need for immediate prevention of such practices, and urgent relief for those already affected. The following passage may clarify how far Vajrayāna has deviated from its core by now:
Please understand the harm that you have inflicted on us has also tainted our appreciation for and practice of the Dharma. In our decades of study and practice of Tibetan Buddhism with you, we trained our minds to view you as the ‘all embodied jewel’ and the ‘source of all the teachings and blessings’ of the Buddha-Dharma. We trusted you completely. Yet, we struggled for years because your actions did not square with the teachings. Today, for many of us who have left you, the Lerab Ling community, and Rigpa the organization, our ground of confidence in the Buddha-Dharma has been compromised. Some of us, who chose to depart abruptly Lerab Ling, left all of our possessions, because we were desperate to break away from your abuse and the community that supported it. […] Whether we departed abruptly or have faded away from you and Rigpa, we struggle to rekindle an appreciation for the transformative teachings and teachers we encountered.
-- (Standlee et al. 2017, p. 7)
In reviewing teachers, ensuring that their actions correspond with what they teach is a core factor, and it is said the actions of sages are refined, or differentiated, like barley flour. Corrupt Dharma, however, presents as cruel behaviour, covert objectives, lack of transparency and a double bind of authorities and their entourages.
This tradition of allowing gurus, i.e., tulkus, to behave in an unorthodox manner, was embedded in tantric Buddhism in India, and Tibetan Buddhists faced with the problem of rogue behavior by lamas often cite the conduct of Tilopa, the Indian guru who led Naropa to enlightenment by putting him through a series of extremely painful ordeals. To speak of only two, once Naropa followed Tilopa’s orders to leap into a blazing fire, and another time, he jumped into a ditch full of ravenous leeches. Both experiences were nearly-fatal, but Naropa did not complain, and after resuscitating him with his magical powers, Tilopa initiated him into ever higher levels of Mahamudra, the path of the Transcendent Gesture. Because Naropa subsequently taught Marpa, a Tibetan, whose disciple Milarepa became the quintessential Tibetan ascetic yogi, the story of Naropa is given special significance, and is often cited by Tibetan Buddhists to prove that true guru devotion knows no rational limits.
-- Against Hell: A Refutation of the Buddhist Hell Realms, Based on Their Historic Origins, Political Purpose, Psychological Destructiveness, Irrationality, and Demonstrable Inconsistency With the Original Buddhist Teachings, Framed as A Searching Review of Sam Bercholz’s After-Death Memoir, "A Guided Tour of Hell", by Charles Carreon
"Now is the time of the Kali Yug, the age of darkness," the tenth Karmapa said. "In Tibet, the only dharma left is superficial teachings, so it is not worth your trouble to save it."
-- Buddha's Not Smiling: Uncovering Corruption at the Heart of Tibetan Buddhism Today, by Erik D. Curren
Whatever may have been the practical effect of incarnation in former times, it is, as matters stand at present, an incarnation of all vices and corruptions, instead of the souls of departed Lamas......
The present Tibetan Buddhism is corrupt and on the road to decay.
-- Three Years in Tibet, by Shramana Ekai Kawaguchi
Clinging to self-interest is said to be far from the attitude of a bodhisattva (Gyalchok and Gyaltsen 2006, p. 558) and, in that way, one is even losing the necessary conditions of Vajrayāna attitude and practice, as such behavior is the opposite of the basic practices condensed as “parting from the four clingings” (Gyalchok and Gyaltsen 2006, p. 525). Together with the silencing of trauma and its victims, the commercialization of Vajrayāna has now led to the concealment of personal interests. This shows in its highly confusing structural, terminological and psychological issues.
Idealists are understood to represent the world as it might or should be.... In the arts, similarly, idealism affirms imagination and attempts to realize a mental conception of beauty, a standard of perfection.
-- Idealism, by Wikipedia
2.3. The Narrative of Physical Closeness to One’s Guru Being Interpreted a Sign of Having ‘Good Karma’
The commercialization of any meditation techniques attributed to Buddhism, and attempts to make use of them without ever having studied them in their original language contexts, lead to the development of international substructures. Many of the large numbers of people attracted to these strive towards reaching positions within these organizations, which are often described as a particular physical closeness to the teacher, or towards income—all of which is covered and concealed by a spiritual cloak.
It was well known among Tibetan lamas that the best fund-raising was to be had in the overseas Chinese communities of East and Southeast Asia and North America.
"In 1984, Thrangu Rinpoche came up with an idea to get money in Taiwan," said Jigme Rinpoche, Shamar's brother, a lama in his own right and the director of two large monasteries in France since the mid-seventies. Like Shamar, Jigme lived at Rumtek in the sixties and seventies. Now in his late fifties, the soft-spoken, baby-faced Jigme exudes an air of motherly care that seems ill-suited to controversy; Yet, he has been the most outspoken of Shamar's supporters in criticizing Thrangu's role.
"Thrangu Rinpoche chose a monk, he was called Tendar," Jigme said. "He left Rumtek with Thrangu Rinpoche in 1975 and followed him to his retreat place Namo Buddha in Kathmandu. Thrangu Rinpoche had the idea to present this Tendar as a high lama."
With specific instructions from Thrangu, the new "Tendar Tulku Rinpoche" went to Taipei with the credentials of a spiritual master, in order to teach and raise funds for Thrangu's work in Nepal and elsewhere. Jigme told me that "Thrangu Rinpoche asked his own monks in Taiwan, who knew that Tendar was merely an ordinary monk, to keep his secret and pretend that Tendar was a high lama." The monks in Taiwan went along with Tendar's masquerade until the following year when Tendar himself, apparently fearful of discovery, backed out of the scheme, but not before raising enough money to demonstrate the potential of this approach to his boss Thrangu Rinpoche.
Thrangu later elaborated on this strategy and reportedly went on to promote dozens of undistinguished lamas to rinpoches. "These lamas owed their new status and loyalty to Thrangu Rinpoche personally," Jigme explained. "Later, Situ Rinpoche followed his lead, recognizing more than two hundred tulkus in just four months during 1991, as we learned from our contacts in Tibet."
In 1988, while traveling in Taiwan, Thrangu met with Chen Lu An. "Mr. Chen approached Thrangu Rinpoche with a plan to raise millions of dollars for the Karma Kagyu in Taiwan," explained Jigme Rinpoche. In exchange for a percentage of donations, a kind of sales commission that would go to his own Guomindang party, Chen offered to conduct a large-scale fund-raising campaign. Chen asked Thrangu to convey his proposal to the four high lamas of the Karma Kagyu: Shamar, Situ, Jamgon, and Gyaltsab Rinpoches.
Together, according to Jigme -- who said the Rumtek administration received reports from a dozen loyal monks in Taiwan who heard about this plan from their devotees and other Tibetans on the island -- Thrangu and Chen worked out the details of a plan to raise as much as one hundred million dollars by finding a Karmapa and then touring him around Taiwan.
Beforehand, they would create interest with a publicity campaign announcing the imminent arrival of a "Living Buddha" and promising that whoever had the chance to see the Karmapa and offer him donations would be enlightened in one lifetime. On his arrival, the tulku would perform the Black Crown ceremony at dozens of Tibetan Buddhist centers and other venues on the island.
"With such a plan," Jigme said, "according to our monks on Taiwan, Mr. Chen assured Thrangu Rinpoche that he would be able to get between fifty and a hundred people to donate one million dollars each, along with hundreds of others who would give smaller amounts."
According to Jigme's sources, Thrangu asked Chen to keep the plan to himself. He promised Chen he would personally inform the Karma Kagyu rinpoches of their plan and Chen's offer to carry it out. However, when Thrangu returned to India, he did not share the plan with Shamar, Jamgon, or Gyaltsab, but only with Tai Situ. Situ was reportedly excited by the plan. "Soon after," Jigme explained, "Thrangu Rinpoche took Situ Rinpoche on a secret trip to Taiwan to meet with Mr. Chen."
"Together, the three worked out the details of a fund-raising tour for their future Karmapa. The plan was worked out at least four years before they announced Ogyen Trinley. Situ Rinpoche and Thrangu Rinpoche wanted to bring Gyaltsab Rinpoche into their plans, but they didn't think they could trust Jamgon Kongtrul Rinpoche." In any event, they were apparently certain that Shamar would not agree to participate and would spoil the plan, probably exposing it as he had exposed an earlier idea of Thrangu's, to take over the Karmapa's Kaolung Temple in Bhutan.
-- Buddha's Not Smiling: Uncovering Corruption at the Heart of Tibetan Buddhism Today, by Erik D. Curren
Although the narrative of striving toward positions within spiritual groups is explained as a special closeness with the teacher and his agendas, the intermingling of interests already diverges from traditional texts, where the foundation and necessary condition of Buddhist practise is explained by the basic attitude of going beyond worldly concerns. As this attitude is the benchmark dividing between spiritual and other paths, there is no spiritual path which includes working for one’s own positions and profits, regardless of whether one is in an international Buddhist center, which is described as a good way to identify with the projects and goals of one’s guru, or anywhere else.
Just when [Thubten] Norbu's departure seemed secure, however, complications arose. Neither he nor his accompanying servant had passports, and they had fled Tibet with insufficient funds to pay for extended overseas travel. Thus, both of them needed to quickly secure some form of sponsorship.
At that point, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) stepped forward with a ready solution. By coincidence only weeks earlier the agency had inaugurated the perfect vehicle for discreetly channeling financial support to persons like the Dalai Lama's brother. On 18 May, the San Francisco-based Committee for a Free Asia (CFA) had been formally unveiled to the public as a means to "render effective assistance to Asians in advancing personal and national liberty throughout their homelands." The committee's charter further declared its intention to assist noncommunist travelers, refugees, and exiles in order to "strengthen Asian resistance to communism." Left unsaid was the fact that the committee was made possible by financial assistance from the CIA. [15]
***
Fosmire also received help from yet another of the Dalai Lama's older brothers, Lobsang Samten. A gentle sort, the twenty-five-year-old Lobsang had already suffered one nervous breakdown. Briefly serving as lord chamberlain in Lhasa, he had escorted the Dalai Lama to India during the Buddha Jayanti and decided not to return. Instead, he had made his way to the United States, and the CIA had arranged for him to study English at Washington's Georgetown University. When this did not prove to his liking, the agency periodically drove him down to Peary to help with translations. "He was never really in the resistance mood," said Greaney. "He preferred to come over to my house and play with the kids."
***
For the better part of a week, the location of the Dalai Lama and his escape party was a mystery to the outside world. The first to get a hint of his fate was the CIA; this came after the lord chamberlain's message to Yarlung was forwarded by courier on horseback to Tom and Lou at the NVDA rear base in Lhuntse Dzong. [22] Upon reading this, Tom took his radio set and, together with a small band of guerrillas, sprinted to intercept the Dalai Lama near the Chongye valley, thirty kilometers north of the Drigu Tso. Lou followed in his wake with another group hauling the bulk of the weapons received during the second weapons drop.
On 25 March, eight days after he departed Lhasa, the Dalai Lama and his followers arrived at Chongye and linked up with Tom's advance NVDA party. While there, the Tibetan leader was enlightened about the CIA supply drops and the RS-1 radio, which was kept hidden. Discreetly taking his leave, Tom returned to the radio and keyed a message to Okinawa. Tibet's god-king, he informed the agency, was alive and well....
The Dalai Lama's move was not unexpected, and the agency already had an inkling that India would give its nod. Two days earlier, CIA Director Dulles had informed the rest of the NSC that Prime Minister Nehru had privately hinted his support of asylum for the Dalai Lama, but not for the fleeing armed rebels, for fear of provoking incursions by the PLA. [25]
At the same time, policy makers in Washington had come to the conclusion that the Dalai Lama's exile was in the United States' interest. [26] Given its radio link at the scene, the CIA was the logical intermediary to facilitate Indian approval. No time was wasted; at 1:00 in the morning on Sunday, 29 March, a message was sent from Washington to the CIA's New Delhi station asking that it relay the plea directly to Nehru.
Back in Tibet, the Dalai Lama and his entourage had not waited for an answer. Leaving Lhuntse Dzong and riding for a day, they reached a village just four hours from the Indian frontier. Huddling that night inside their tent during a torrential downpour, the CIA agents turned on their radio and learned of New Delhi's official consent via Washington. [27]
Tom and Lou waited until early the next morning for the rains to lighten and then made a dash to Phala's tent and passed on the news. For the first time, they saw the lord chamberlain break into a wide smile.
The Dalai Lama, though haggard after almost two weeks on the road and weakened by a bout of dysentery, was visibly elated....
By the end of the second week of April, the Dalai Lama had reached Bomdila and made immediate contact with [P. N.] Menon and Dave. Just as quickly, their talks grew heated. Counseling moderation, Menon urged the monarch to refrain from any mention of an independent government in exile during his initial public statement, which he would presumably make upon confronting the mob of newsmen at Tezpur. At this, the Dalai Lama bristled. His press announcement had already been penned, he said, and he was determined to push for independence. The monarch told Menon defiantly that if New Delhi insisted that he accept the limited role of prominent religious leader, perhaps he should not accept Nehru's offer of asylum.
Clearly unsatisfied, the Dalai Lama departed Bomdila by jeep on 18 April and was finally able to meet Gyalo and relay his early frustration with New Delhi. The Dalai Lama also used the opportunity to pass his brother a verbal message to the U.S. government, reaffirming his determination to support the resistance of his people and asking Washington to recognize his exiled government and supply those who were continuing the resistance.
***
Throughout the month of April, the U.S. government took pains to ensure that it did not appear to be instigating or exploiting the revolt for cold war profit. If such a perception arose, there was fear that Nehru might lash out against both the United States and the Tibetans. This even applied to U.S. aid for Tibetan refugees; to avoid the impression that it was being offered for political rather than humanitarian reasons, no supplies were to be sent unless requested by India, and preferably for indirect distribution through the Indians themselves. [7]
***
Howard Bane was senior to Hoskins and in theory would act as the primary point of contact with Gyalo. In addition, the CIA had started contributing a stipend for the Dalai Lama and his entourage -- "providing them with rice and robes," said Hoskins -- and Bane was in charge of the purse.
***
the Dalai Lama and his entourage had taken up residence in the town of Dharamsala. Situated 725 kilometers northwest of New Delhi in the Himalayan foothills, Dharamsala -- literally, "rest house" -- was once a traditional stop for Hindu pilgrims. By 1855, it had become a flourishing hill station for the British, only to see its popularity plummet after a devastating 1905 earthquake. Its last bloc of residents, a handful of Muslims, left for newly created Pakistan in 1947.
For the Indian government, Dharamsala's remote location and lack of population were now its major selling points. Since the Dalai Lama had crossed onto Indian soil, he had made his temporary quarters near another former hill station, Mussoorie. But because Mussoorie was just a short drive from New Delhi, the monarch enjoyed easy access to the media limelight. Influential leaders such as Krishna Menon cringed at the young Tibetan's frequent and sympathetic contact with the press, leading them to propose more permanent -- and distant -- quarters at Dharamsala. With little choice, the Tibetan leader made the move in April 1960.
If the Indians thought that Dharamsala was the answer to stifling the Dalai Lama, they were sadly mistaken. Using its isolation to his advantage, he converted the town into his de facto capital, then made good on his threats over the past year and began creating a government in exile. Part of this involved reforming the cabinet offices that previously existed in Lhasa. It also involved preparation of a draft constitution.
***
Gyalo arrived in the United States during late spring and called on Michael Forrestal, then special assistant to the President. Through Forrestal, the Dalai Lama's brother was told that Kennedy offered his deepest sympathy on behalf of the American people for the plight of the Tibetans. In time-honored doublespeak, Kennedy also said that the U.S. government desired to do what it could within the limits of practical and political circumstances to improve the Tibetans' fortunes.
***
On the afternoon of 16 October 1964, the arid desert soil around Lop Nur in central Xinjiang Province rippled from the effect of a twenty-kiloton blast. "This is a major achievement of the Chinese people," read the immediate press communique out of Beijing, "in their struggle to oppose the U.S. imperialist policy of nuclear blackmail." [1]
The detonation had not been unexpected. For the past few months, the United States had been closely tracking China's nuclear program using everything from satellite photographs to a worldwide analysis of media statements made by Chinese diplomats. India, still smarting from the 1962 war, had supported this collection effort by allowing the CIA to use Charbatia in April to secretly stage U-2 flights over Xinjiang. By late September, there were enough indications for senior officials in Washington to publicly predict the blast three weeks prior to the event. [2]
Such forewarning did nothing to dampen anxiety in New Delhi. This resulted in a windfall of sorts for the Tibet project, with the CIA using the Indians' more permissive attitude to push for a series of covert initiatives aimed at raising Tibet's worldwide profile. The first such scheme was an effort to recruit and train a cadre of Tibetan officers for use as administrators and foreign representatives. An advisory committee of U.S. academics and retired diplomats was established to oversee this project, with Cornell University agreeing to play host and the CIA footing the bill.
In the fall of 1964, an initial group of four Tibetans arrived at the Cornell campus for nine months of course work in linguistics, comparative government, economics, and anthropology. Among the four were former Hale translators Bill and Mark; both had been at Georgetown University over the previous two years honing their English skills. A second group, totaling eight Tibetans, arrived in the fall of the following year. Included was former Hale translator Thinlay "Rocky" Paljor and Lobsang Tsultrim, the nephew of one of the Dalai Lama's bodyguards. As a teenager, Lobsang had joined the entourage that fled Tibet with the monarch in 1959. Midway through the semester, half of the class was quietly taken down to Silver Spring, Maryland, where they were kept in a CIA safe house for a month of spy-craft instruction; all eight later reassembled, completed their studies at Cornell, and went back to India together. [3]
These first dozen Cornell-trained Tibetans were put to immediate use. Three were assigned to the Special Center. Others were posted to one of the CIA-supported Tibet representative offices in New Delhi, Geneva, and New York. The New Delhi mission -- officially known as the Bureau of His Holiness the Dalai Lama -- was headed by a former Tibetan finance minister and charged with maintaining contact with the various embassies in the Indian capital. The Office of Tibet in Geneva, led by the Dalai Lama 's older brother Lobsang Sam ten, focused on staging cultural programs in neutral Switzerland. [4]
The New York Office of Tibet, which included three Cornell graduates, formally opened in April 1964 following a U.S. visit by Gyalo Thondup. This office concentrated on winning support for the Tibetan cause at the United Nations, which was becoming an increasingly difficult prospect. In December 1965, Gyalo was successful in pushing a resolution on Tibet through the General Assembly for the third time, but some twenty-six nations -- including Nepal and Pakistan -- joined the ranks of those supporting China on the issue. [5]
During a break from lobbying at the United Nations, Gyalo had ventured down to Washington for meetings with U.S. officials. Among them was Des FitzGerald; one of the strongest advocates of the Tibet program within the CIA, he had since left his Cuba assignment and in the spring of 1965 was promoted to deputy director of plans, putting him in charge of all agency covert operations. FitzGerald used the opportunity to invite Gyalo to dinner at the elite Federalist Club. Joining them was Frank Holober, who had returned from an unpaid sabbatical in September 1965 to take over the vacant Tibet Task Force desk within the China Branch. Remembers Holober, "Des loved Gyalo, fawned over him. He would say, 'In an independent country, you would be the perfect foreign minister.'"
Gyalo proved his abilities in another CIA-supported venture. Because the Dalai Lama had long desired the creation of a central Tibetan cultural institution, the agency supplied Gyalo with secret funds to assemble a collection of wall hangings -- called thankas -- and other art treasures from all the major Tibetan Buddhist sects. A plot of land was secured in the heart of New Delhi, and the Tibet House -- consisting of a museum, library, and emporium -- was officially opened in October 1965 by the Indian minister of education and the Dalai Lama. It remains a major attraction to this day....
***
Ever since arriving on Indian soil, the CIA had secretly channeled a stipend to the Dalai Lama and his entourage. Totaling $180,000 per fiscal year, the money was appreciated but not critical. Most of it was collected in the Charitable Trust of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, which in turn was used for investments, donations, and relief work.
***
In 1970, Lhamo Tsering returned to New Delhi after his prolonged deployment to Nepal. Waiting for him at the Special Center was John Bellingham, who was anxious to finalize a formal demobilization plan for Mustang. Until that point, the CIA was still funding 2,100 guerrillas at a cost of $500,000 a year. Pressed for time, Lhamo Tsering outlined a schedule whereby the force would be cut by a third over each of the next three calendar years. Without delay, Bellingham approved the scheme. [15]
Part of the demobilization plan involved a rehabilitation program for the guerrillas, to ensure that they would be able to support themselves. Members of the Special Center were immediately deployed to Kathmandu and Pokhara to oversee this program. Their purpose was to ensure that rehabilitation funds would be wisely invested in self-generating enterprises. Although the demobilized guerrillas had few marketable skills, existing Kathmandu-based projects funded by the Dalai Lama and foreign aid groups demonstrated that Tibetan handicraft and carpet factories were profitable ventures.
Drawing on this precedent, the first third of the rehabilitation funds was channeled into two carpet factories in Pokhara. Part of the money was also used to break ground for a thirty-room budget hotel in the same town. With a third of the guerrillas dutifully filing out of the mountains to take up employment at these sites, demobilization appeared to be progressing according to plan.
***
The Dalai Lama has gone from strength to strength, winning the 1989 Nobel Prize for Peace and earning an enormous international audience that includes Hollywood celebrities, rock musicians, New Agers, and scores of other Westerners looking for answers in the East.
-- The CIA's Secret War in Tibet, by Kenneth Conboy and James Morrison
Therefore, this mainstream habit of rationalizing closeness to authorities in the sense of a demonstration of ‘good karma’, often intermingled with one’s own position in any spiritual group, is a trap in the path itself and a dead end—the effects of which have become obvious by now. Furthermore, people being played against each other, in the light of the new narrative about the physical closeness to any master and the frequency of meetings, has paved the path for abuse at all levels. Contrary to that, in the traditional texts, one was taught to rely on the teachings and not an individual (Kongtrul 2012, p. 68). Thus, the spiritual path itself was regarded as a highly individual process towards autonomy.
Lies: Intentional Errors of Fact. In some contexts this is called bluffing. If the speaker thinks that lying serves a moral end, this would be a Pious Fraud.
-- A List Of Fallacious Arguments, by Don Lindsay
And, far from the meaning of the term karma (Kongtrul 2012, pp. 184–91), within traditional Tibetan texts of Buddhist philosophy, such ‘good karma’ demonstrations, by means of striving for positions and physical closeness to a supposedly spiritual teacher, have increased the building of hierarchies and covert rivalries among group members. Furthermore, simplistic conceptual implications that others, who are not running after such issues, have any ‘bad karma’ and even ought to be ‘purified’, were employed. As conceptualizing one’s own sublimity goes along with identification and giving up one’s self-responsibility along with that, this not only furthers arrogance and increases narcissism, but serves to cover up dysfunctional group aspects and is critical when it comes to one’s own progress on the path. This issue impacts not only on the individual, but also on the Buddhist group, other groups of (Tibetan) Buddhism and society. Therefore, in addition to relying on traditional procedures to examine the qualifications of a teacher (Kongtrul 2003, p. 42), these need to be updated to meet the current societal challenges, especially regarding attitudes of exploitation towards women.
2.4. Structural and Terminological Issues in Developing Power Imbalances
Downgrading introspection in the value scale of Western cultures (Attersee Anders 2016, p. 11) for long has resulted in an uncritical incorporation of ideas seemingly satisfying this need. Therefore, the longing for introspection (Attersee Anders 2016, p. 11; Attersee Anders 2017, p. 14) has been approached through the uncritical and unreflective adoption of social hierarchies and power imbalances accompanying so-called Buddhist meditation. This has led to the commercialization of any meditation techniques attributed to Buddhism and attempts to make use of these concepts without ever having studied them in original language contexts. The statement of one of the probands, saying “below the surface it looks different than at first glance” (respondent #1), reflects the structural and terminological challenges one faces when looking below the surface.
2.4.1. Structural Challenges
In recent decades, feudal structures (Anders 2019a, p. 35; Finnigan and Hogendoorn 2019, p. 139) and hierarchies of power imbalances have been copied unreflectively from Asia to Europe in the name of Buddhist spirituality, teaching and training. The strict hierarchical organization in international Tibetan Buddhist organizations teaching Vajrayāna supports maintaining the power of a particular lineage, in terms of combining secular with spiritual power, just as in ancient Tibet. The silencing of abuse victims is enforced more swiftly in such structures, thus serving to silence trauma. Besides strictly hierarchical command structures, a covert attitude of exploitation can be observed, especially towards the feminine. And although their financial gains long seemed to justify the strategy to disregard both the traditional and the contextual procedures of teaching certain techniques only to prepared people, the high price we all pay for it now shows. The opinion of some masters and their entourages to be beyond the law of the countries they are in, together with their disregard for the Convention on Human Rights, especially Women’s and Children’s Rights, currently present society with particular challenges. Society must compensate for the costs of those who have become chronically ill as a result of exploitation, stigmatization and trauma, and the respective burden of isolation and silencing that they carry. Particularly, since the feminine was not only devalued, but considered an exploitable mass to be controlled, this type of knowledge transfer and business, in recent decades, was performed at the expense of many women. After the disclosure of the first cases testifying abuse, we reached a point where these once seemingly flourishing centers of international Buddhist organizations in many countries have turned into religious as well as societal challenges, instead of an individual issue. In order to illustrate these circumstances, quotes from testimonials, as well as statements from probands, which are taken from the current research project (Anders 2019b, 2019c), will be presented in the following text. People from different countries, who learned about my research project through word of mouth or social media over time have requested the questionnaires via email. The links to the English or German version of the questionnaires were sent to the participants, together with an individual TAN via email. In this way, they could be pseudonymously filled and submitted in protected places. Thus, even when participating in the study on health in Buddhist groups, there is a distribution that reflects the tabooing in groups on the one hand and tremendous distress of those affected, who have to fear for their safety and sometimes their lives. It is currently evident that filling out the questionnaire in safe places using a pseudonym was used by some people as a medium of, and a cry for, help. At the same time, however, there is also information indicating that severely traumatized people require therapeutic care urgently and, due to triggers when writing, cannot complete the questionnaire at all. The probands wrote from their experiences in international so-called Buddhist organizations—many of which have a huge number of centers in many countries, which increases and complicates the issues addressed, and renders legal procedures and necessary victim compensation almost impossible. The number of centers may indicate a large number of directly and indirectly affected individuals, seminar attendees, workers and their children—not all of whom are members. Someone who stated that he was part of the Zen-Suzuki groups in Germany and different Tibetan Buddhist groups such as the Rangjung Yeshe Gomdes, Drikung and Rigpa Centers described his experiences as follows:
I found this mixture increasingly unacceptable. Glorifying attitudes, struggling for recognition, power over others and striving for top positions, under the carpet of niceties and hugs, denying and suspending unpleasant truths, neurotic devotion to a strictly hierarchical and non-transparent system that confuses spiritual devotion with self-abandonment. It was quite striking how easy it was to manipulate the vast majority of the participants, most of them were actually waiting for what I found to be a consequence of a lack of genuine personal responsibility. Even teachers unwilling to create such manipulations were wrapped up in a web of what I call ‘sangha-show’. Unfortunately, they do not seem to understand this. Often enough with a feeling of being at the pinnacle of evolution to be able to teach others. In the vast majority of groups, I found little room for what I consider to be genuine practice, which I believe to imply an ability of being honest with oneself, but instead any other substitute activities, concealed by incredible effort of pretending to be advanced already.
-- (respondent #1)
The manipulation described above is masked by a conglomerate of seemingly Buddhist terminology and the formation of stereotypes (Anders 2019a, p. 34), within which hidden agendas are communicated. Besides the resulting self-deception rendering one’s own path a dead end, this is the context for double bind, causing severe diseases after years of exposure. In the international Buddhist groups, hierarchies, similar to the ones in Buddhist monasteries where women are ranked below the youngest of monks, as well as the level of physical closeness to the master, are considered important ordering principles. Whereas the former corresponds to the working and command hierarchies, the latter is spiritually connotated, constituting an inherently risky conceptual connection between sexuality and spirituality. These two structures may overlap, and what was called the ‘inner circle’ in the organization Rigpa might well have other names in other organisations, e.g., Kusung in the organization Shambala. Baxter outlined the implications of these structures as follows:
Individual experiences are very different. There are varying degrees of closeness to Sogyal Lakar, with the closest relationships regularly referred to as the ‘inner circle’. The experiences of some of the members of the inner circle are very different from the experiences of many of those who are less close. […] a. some students of Sogyal Lakar (who were part of the ‘inner circle’, as described later in this report) have been subjected to serious physical, sexual and emotional abuse by him; and b. there were senior individuals within Rigpa who were aware of at least some of these issues and failed to address them, leaving others at risk.
-- (Baxter 2018, p. 4)
Thus, at this point, the aspect of silent testimony has been touched upon. In the following subchapter, some core aspects of terminological challenges will be addressed.
2.4.2. Decontextualisation of Terms and Concepts
Whereas the word-by-word commentaries on Buddhist philosophical texts in Tibetan monastic education focus on explaining the meaning of terms and context for the purpose of one’s own autonomy on the path of training, translations disregarded these differentiations, as well as existing semantic connotations in the corresponding languages, whilst commercializing Buddhist spiritualty. Thus, the decontextualization unfolded, ascribing new, simplified meanings to terms. Particularly, beyond clear definitions, differentiated use of language and logical conclusions, the understanding of meaning became more difficult. Thus, an understanding of meaning that goes beyond a mere repetition of terms was lost. In particular, an inability to understand introspective patterns and establish true self-reflection based on them, and the fact that teachers no longer teach from experience, means a loss of conveyed meaning—that is, the prevailing concepts ascribed to Tibetan Buddhist philosophy and Vajrayāna practice have little to do with what was taught in original language contexts.
In compliance with the request of the priests in my dormitory, I delivered a sermon on the ten Buddhist virtues, which seemed to please them greatly. They confessed to me that, priests as they were, they found no interest in the theoretical and dry expositions of Buddha’s teachings to which they had been used to listen, but that my delivery was so easy and pleasing that it aroused in them a real zest for Buddhism. This fact is a sad commentary on the ignorance of the average Tibetan priests.
-- Three Years in Tibet, by Shramana Ekai Kawaguchi
Furthermore, the current wording has been used to disguise the facts of abuse for decades. Therefore, allowing the painful naming of those issues, and listening to those concerned by indoctrination and abuse, will be a step towards urgently needed change. Depending on the victim’s personality and the damage suffered, these expressions may vary. We have seen this naming of facts in the open letter by eight people from the organisation Rigpa, saying “we now see clearly the many ways that you betrayed our trust, manipulated and abused us and our Dharma brothers and sisters” (Standlee et al. 2017, p. 7) and in many other groups, as well. Concurrently, we can observe the stigmatization and silencing accompanying this, not only by the groups themselves but also by Tibetan authorities, particularly the instillation of fear of losing a ‘pure view’. In early stages of counselling and treatment of the people affected, issues of isolation, stigmatization, silencing and fear are crucial. It is due to these issues, that people have committed themselves to secrecy to this day. Furthermore, if this secrecy is violated, some of them are threatened with methods of slander and social isolation. In particular, the perception (Anders 2019a, p. 39) of critically minded individuals and abuse victims has been systematically questioned, while they, at the same time, have been socially isolated (Anders 2019a, p. 39). One person from the organisation Rigpa described this as follows:
With Rigpa: Refusal of any discussion on the part of Rigpa, I felt the situation to be hopelessly stuck. My person as a critic was accordingly ridiculed, portrayed as psychologically ‘strange’. Usually this happened with most ‘dissidents’, that was one reason to go, some form of ethics was completely missing. Right was what was in the mind of the master or what was thought to be so. One could call it a general refusal to engage in dialogue. Other organizations: Even if the lama is okay and doesn’t abuse students, unfortunately there are always various phenomena: worship of the lama in a western, blind and seemingly naive way, completely intransparent structures regarding money, power, ways of decision. Fixation on career in the ranking in the ‘Sangha’. Willing adaptation of authoritarian structures. Those who don’t want to or can’t fit in will fall out sooner or later, the social pressure is often subtle but very high. Mixing of the whole sub-cultural mishmash of hippie, New Age small ideologies, green alternative behaviors with the traditional ballast from Asia: feudalistic structures, special hierarchies, outdated interpretations, etc. [sic.] Efforts to mix psychological methods with Buddhism.
-- (respondent #2 in Anders 2019b)
Due to the use of stigmatisation and slander as a threat (Anders 2019c) against group members, and, in this way, destroying their wider social and professional resources, it is not easy for members to distance themselves from such organizations, as was shown, for example, with the statement “you have encouraged us to defame others, in particular in France, who have spoken out against you in recent years” (Standlee et al. 2017, p. 8). At this point, counselling, particularly concerning legal and social protection and sorting out the double bind members are caught in, can help people to leave cruel groups in a timely manner and, in this way, also prevent the development or chronification of mental diseases. It is the combination of a personality cult (Anders 2019a, p. 34), together with the phrase ‘crazy wisdom’ and the neologism ‘karma purification’, that allows for violence and irresponsible deeds on the part of the leaders and their followers. That is, people are taught to believe they have to suffer abuse to have their so-called ‘bad karma’ purified (Anders 2019a, p. 39). Thus, actual reality widely diverges from the idealized picture or projected ideas of healers (Anders 2019a, p. 37). Whereas the master of the narrative would be allowed arbitrariness without any consequences, due to having been attributed with uninterrupted access to ‘absolute truth’, other people’s perceptions are systematically questioned. They get used to being told that they have the ‘wrong perception and view’, because it is inconsistent with the authority’s. Thus, this narrative traps people by setting ‘purification’ as an impossible standard (Hassan 2013, p. 16), with shame and guilt at its core, while assuming any ‘master’ would be in a position to ‘purify’ their ‘bad karma’ and conceptualize his group as being allowed, or ordered by himself, to do so. This new kind of group manipulation, called ‘karma purification,’ serves to justify violence and abuse against individuals. This is supplemented by a denial of self-responsibility, and the constant merging of one’s mind with so-called spiritual leaders, which is referred to as ‘guru yoga’. Apart from this kind of mind control, group pressure imposes various stereotypes regarding how a good Buddhist is supposed to speak and act. The very compassion that was once defined as a clear sign of the effects of authentic, correct practice, is absent in so-called teachers manipulating and abusing their followers. It is the ambiguous two-faced reality they create, with ideal images to which people are required to adapt to, which in turn binds them into such systems of exploitation and abuse. That is, due to their longing for the quickest path to enlightenment and chasing of promises such as enlightenment in one lifetime, people are made to pay for a growing number of seminars which supposedly lead to this. Instead of gaining access to their own spirituality, however, they are drawn into a net of dependencies and devaluations. Thus, although Vajrayāna has both compassion and bodhicitta as its central premise, it is these very qualities which have increasingly disappeared. Within these new narratives of Vajrayāna Buddhism, the victims themselves are even being blamed for the harm they have suffered, stigmatized and excluded. These actions of wounding and secondary wounding speak for themselves. Now that their reputation and structures are at stake, it has become evident that the secrecy and silencing these organizations have enforced has not done them any good.
2.4.3. Confusing Concepts
The new terms and meanings ascribed to Buddhist practise served to conceptualize risky relational structures and double bind, covering the entire system, which is confusing, because any action one chooses may be interpreted as the wrong choice. Double bind may show in many ways, for example in the discrepancies between the public and private face of leaders or position-holders, which were addressed in the following statement:
This letter is our request to you to stop your unethical and immoral behavior. Your public face is one of wisdom, kindness, humor, warmth and compassion, but your private behavior, the way you conduct yourself behind the scenes, is deeply disturbing and unsettling. A number of us have raised with you privately, our concerns about your behavior in recent years, but you have not changed.
-- (Standlee et al. 2017, p. 2)
Asked why he took the decision to separate from the organization Rigpa after approximately ten years of study and work there, one person shared the following:
I saw directly that while they present a very acceptable public image behind that is a lineage of pure violence. They believe they are accountable to no one and are quite capable of taking someone’s head off believing they are above any law. They also use remote viewing to injure people. One of their major teachers publicly said Tibetan Buddhism was a system that could be used by a good person or a terrorist. I have seen both sides.
-- (respondent #3)
The manipulation, indoctrination and abuse (Anders 2019a, p. 34) that are currently coming to light do not only impact on single individuals, but the on the group structures themselves, their group dynamics and the social and health systems of respective countries. Due to their questionable concepts and double bind, it stands to reason that years spent in such a system are not conducive to one’s health, but are likely to impair it. Apart from the damage to health and the economic conditions of individuals, however, any groups that consider themselves and their masters to be above the law of the country are inflicting further damage. Thus, an overall rationalizing system, based on new meanings ascribed to seemingly Buddhist terminology and concepts, has evolved around these inconsistencies, attributing obvious misconceptions to the participants themselves. Concerning the ethical guidelines which are currently written for groups, one person said: “anyone or any group can make guidelines. It is actually getting them implemented that is the problem. Most large organisations, e.g., [sic e.g.,] company, religious group or government all try to hide wrongdoing as they don’t want to be sued or lose reputation” (respondent #3).