The great Nonsense of Buddhist Religion: Choosing the Rebirth of a Lama

Not too long ago I wrote a blog post about the question whether Buddhism is a religion or, as their followers use to say, a philosophy, a way of life. I am of the opinion that it is a religion, even if they don’t believe in God and I would like to write today about another element of Buddhism that shows how structured and organized this religion really is. At the same time it also shows, how it is crazy like every other religion: their system of Lamas, high religious priests, and their rebirth.

Similar to the Pope in Christianity, you can see the Dalai Lama as the head of the religion Buddhism. He and other, high-ranked Lamas are called ‘Tulku’ which indicates that they should have a very special ability: They are supposedly able to choose where they will be reborn! While your next incarnation is a miracle to everyone, Buddhists believe that their highest monks can choose.

This is why those monks normally reveal some information before they die about where they will be reborn. Strangely enough however that information seems rather vague – so that the high Lamas who are searching for the reincarnation have to consult an oracle, have to wait for dreams and meditate for getting visions. When a dead Lama is cremated, they look in which direction the smoke blows – is it going to the west, his incarnation has to be searched for in that direction. If one of the Lamas has a vision of a house with a green roof, they will go west and search a house with a green roof. You can imagine the wide range of possibilities such prophecies and visions bring – hundreds of young boys, born after the death of the previous Lama, could be the ones!

So the monks make lists and then wait for signs, more visions and advice from above to help them find the right one. Once they have selected a few boys, they show them several items some of which belonged to the previous Lama. If a boy recognizes those items, they believe it must be the reincarnation.

Should there still be any confusion about which boy it is, they kind of take the easy way out: they write their names on papers, put them in an urn and draw one out who will be the chosen one. Nice, isn’t it?

How can anybody, after reading about this selection process, still say that Buddhism is not a religion? Honestly, you believe that some people of special lineages are holy manifestations who can predict where they will be reborn but then they are not able to tell the names of their future parents? Or their exact birth date and place? If they are that much aware of their reincarnation, why can’t they make sure that their fellow Lamas don’t make a mistake later and choose the wrong one?

To me it looks like a fully random decision how they choose a boy. I actually feel bad about the way how they then take this boy away from his family and put him in a monastery, making him study and meditate, preparing him for his later tasks as a high-ranking priest and monk. In my eyes you destroy a young boy’s childhood.

I would like to end this article with the words that a historian noted as an excerpt of the fifth Dalai Lama’s autobiography where he confirms that his own selection as a Dalai Lama was a decision by a man and not any holy sign:

The official Tsawa Kachu of the Ganden Palace showed me statues and rosaries (that belonged to the Fourth Dalai Lama and other lamas), but I was unable to distinguish between them! When he left the room I heard him tell the people outside that I had successfully passed the tests. Later, when he became my tutor, he would often admonish me and say: "You must work hard, since you were unable to recognize the objects!"